EV Infrastructure

it's just going to be a slow build up over the next 25 years, of more and more charging infrastructure, and better and better technology. rome wasn't built in a day, and there's plenty of gasoline available.
those who feel the infrastructure for long trips is adequate, are early adopters and promoters, willing to put up with the necessary legwork and planning.

 

It is not as bad as you put it. Look neither is a truck or Jeep or a Bolt is for everyone. According to the study by the MIT - not exactly sure of the numbers, you can look it up - 80% of driving needs of an average household can be done on an EV with < or = of 100Mi range. The fact is that most folks go to work/school get home eat dinner, take the kid(s) to the park, play soccer whatever, go home to sleep, charge the car overnight and start the same over again. This is real life for a very large number of households. For these a 100mi EV would do. The problem is many of these folks use a pickup or a huge SUV to go to the store for groceries. The issue is mentality. Many of the families when go to see grandma simply fly - end rent car for the "last mile".

I think there is a long life for hybrids and PEVs like the Volt.

 

Most households have more than one vehicle. Current BEVs could easily be the daily drive for one member without the need for public charging. A network helps with adoption, and is needed if the goal is to switch from ICE to BEVs, but it isn't an either or option when we are getting PHEVs like the Volt and Prime.

The real hurdle is the mental one in the public.

 

is the article correct, that the bolt will only charge 30 miles overnight on 120v? that seems awfully slow. i don't know what they consider 'overnight' to be, but can't you put 25 miles in the prime in 5 hours on 120v?
plus, an empty battery charges faster in the beginning.

further, he doesn't even seem to know about the possibility of L2 charging at home.

 

No, it's off on at least that point. The Bolt charges ~4 miles/hr with L1.

Chevy EV Life: Bolt EV Charging Guide | Chevrolet

"Overnight" with that calculation means the poor sap would only get to plug in for 7.5 hours. Most people work much shorter days than that constraint, have a couple days off work a week for even longer charging, and use only a fraction of the battery's available capacity on any given commute day.

A more likely scenario would be to plug in at 6pm and plug out at 7 am on a work day. That would give ~52 miles. Start with a full battery and that's rarely a problem for a large percentage of commuters.

 

Pretty much everybody charges at that rate with minor variations. The Tesla is a little, slightly, less efficient.

Bob Wilson

 

i guess they aren't putting the car away until 11:30 pm.

 

Bottom line is wider EV adoption will require continuous and large gov't mandates and subsidies.
But that's also why we all have 10% ethanol in our gaso tanks, and E85 pumps nationwide. So that's certainly possible.

The $64000 question is will EV graduate to national mandate status like ethanol? Since California has been ceded the partial right to set national policy, it has already been partially mandated. My guess is we are headed to mandating eventual 10% of USA gaso market to EV, much the same as 10% ethanol. I do not see "natural" demand without mandates being a big market in USA, maybe EU better as they love pep and naturally dislike gaso as a whimpy weak car power source.

 

natural demand is cause and effect. if government stayed out of it altogether, ev might be growing faster, idk. but from what i've heard, oil company tax breaks a re much larger than ev's.

either way, i think the horse is out of the barn. it will be a long slow process, and there will be times when it stalls, but in 20 or 30 years, i think we'll see a significant number of ev's on the road.
unless cold fusion comes first.

 

hey, anything is possible.

 

well, the current sales of EV is 50% CA where it is mandated, subsidized, and you get free HOV which is a huge benefit in CA. So it is tempting for many supporters to suggest EV's are flying off the shelf due to natural demand, and not due to mandates and large subsidies. But look at Georgia, they took off a huge state EV subsidy and now barely a Leaf is sold, vs. a major market player a few years ago.

 

agree completely. i would venture to guess that cali would lead the nation if there were no subsidies, even on a per capita basis. but nearly by the amount it is now.

nothing will change much with 2 dollar gas, it's a free for all out there. not to be short sighted, because you never know what will happen, but it is a strange place we're in right now.

at 2 bucks, gas is cheaper for most people than it was at 30 cents in the sixties, and the same size vehicle probably gets better mpg's.

 

Source: Fact #915: March 7, 2016 Average Historical Annual Gasoline Pump Price, 1929-2015 | Department of Energy

• 1971 - VW MicroBus 28 MPG
• 2014 - BMW i3-REx ~75 MPG (single charge and single tank)
• 2017 - Prius Prime ~75 MPG (gas and electric)
• electric $/mi ~= 2/3 * gasoline $/mi
  • ~1/3 electric from 'free' chargers

So we're looking: reasonable inflation adjusted gasoline; doubling of mileage, and; diluted by cheap(*) electricity.

(*) - cheap is a localized ranging from $0.09/kWh (Ala.) to $0.18/kWh (Mass.)

So I took the fuel economy, EV savings, and free-EV metrics:


Bob Wilson

 

even at 24 cents/kwh, it really is a bargain. my first 'real' job after college, i was making 20k. now, i make 65k in retirement. there are a lot of necessities, which have gone way up, compared to energy.

 

Infrastructure here in the midwest is laughable, with the exception of KC (which is more like a California city in comparison). Travel between Lincoln and Omaha (60 miles apart) is doable in warm conditions. But I'm not sure I will want to try it if the weather is very cold. Traveling to KC or DesMoines is out of the question due to stretches of road longer than 80 miles without charging stations. Hoping this will change soon.

 

When someone makes an electric pickup, tractor or harvester that can plug-in to a wind farm, the problem will be solved.

Bob Wilson

 

Actually saw a small windmill at Tractor Supply Country for 12volt systems; electric fences mainly.