For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

sollawen

But I think American drivers probably don’t care about these things.

beardyw

Hard to make an opinion when EVs are not being scrapped to any great extent.

linzhangrun

The US does not have the same power infrastructure as China.

yieldcrv

> “We even did a sensitivity study to see if the range is reduced in very cold climates, and we found that, even in the most unfavorable conditions, EVs still reduce emissions by a substantial amount,” Miotti says. the range is so bad that he couldn’t even finish the thought about range that’s hilarious and I’m an EV driver, in warm and sunny southwest though

wood_spirit

My experience - in the Nordics, but this is transferable - is they are also much nicer to own and drive. I don’t know anyone who went electric and then went back. The generation who went electric a few years ago is now on their second or third electric car. The makes and models in favour is changing (cue tangent on Tesla brand death in Europe) but the power source choice is not. So as more people get one, I expect their market share to just climb and climb.

deathanatos

Unless things have changed, when I looked a couple of years ago, I couldn't make the math math. The cost difference outweighed the savings, IIRC, even if we assumed electricity to be free. The bigger problem, though, was that the EV we were considering (a Prius) was scarce. So even though I couldn't make the alleged price make sense … well, if there's no supply, then the price may as well be $∞. So IDK, since that lack of supply also seems to suggest other people disagree (or put utility to the ecological aspects).

apparent

How do they account for the cost of having to rent ICE vehicles for road trips that do not suit EVs (some do, and some do not)? Do they factor in the cost of insurance, which some say is much higher for their EVs? I have owned PHEVs and like them quite a bit, but if I'd bought them new I still wouldn't have reached the payback period. It seems that a PHEV typically costs $12k more than the ICE version, so the payback period is quite long (I think I estimated it to be 50k miles, assuming you charge for free at work, and gas is $5/gallon). EVs and PHEVs can be great for some people, and some may even save money with them (maintenance is blessedly low). But I find it unlikely that for "most" US drivers, they would save money (and of course they would save on emissions, this is kind of a useless thing to add to the headline).

BLKNSLVR

The overall calculation is very personal to each household. Do you even need a car? Do you live in a house or an apartment? If you're in an apartment, is there car parking with charging infrastructure? If you're in a house, do you own it or are you renting? Do you have solar panels? How long is your daily drive? How often do you need to travel further than the car's range? How much can the car recharge overnight? Can you plug the car in anywhere to charge overnight? What public charging infrastructure is nearby? What rate are you charged for electricity? I'm in a house with solar and battery and have had a 2014 Nissan Leaf for nearly two years. It costs $11k, and in that time has saved us around $2,500 in petrol. We've since purchased another EV, replacing a petrol family car, both of which have about the same range with a 'full tank', except the EV costs about $5 to go from empty to full whilst the petrol car was about $70. We've only had the new one about 3 months, so I can't speak to reliability over an extended period. Both cars are charged overnight just at 10A, 240V, no fast charge and so far they cover our normal daily usage no worries. I'm aware that I'm lucky in that my situation seems to be a perfect use-case for EVs. (I'm also not in the US, and so the recent EV was cheaper or at least comparable to equivalent petrol cars; someone mentioned a 'payback period', in my case it doesn't apply).