about EV broad adoption strategies

[Yoused]

In France, they have an EV with a 160/93 mile (city/highway) range on a 30KWh+supercap storage system (the supercap greatly improves regenerative braking). The Bolloré Bluecar retails for c. $25K, which sounds like a very damn good price for a Leaf-range car with a range that would cover the needs of some 90% of Americans most of the time.

Of course there is a catch: when you buy the car, you sign a contract requiring you to pay a battery usage fee of $105/month. Basically, you buy the car and lease the battery. For many Americans, this would take care of the high cost of entry that makes EVs unreachable for such a wide swath of the country.

It sounds attractive, in its way, as getting all of us out of the ICEs and properly electrified is a highly desirable goal. But I have my misgivings. The notion of not owning your battery is troubling. The only way I could see a scheme like this working (in a way that I would be comfortable with) is if the batteries were owned by DOE and the monthly fee were largely directed toward upgrading the electrical grid to support the increased load, with a 5-year buyout option (after 5 years, the car owner could keep paying the fee or buy the battery pack at retail).

Thoughts?

 

[Cmaier]

In France, they have an EV with a 160/93 mile (city/highway) range on a 30KWh+supercap storage system (the supercap greatly improves regenerative braking). The Bolloré Bluecar retails for c. $25K, which sounds like a very damn good price for a Leaf-range car with a range that would cover the needs of some 90% of Americans most of the time.

Of course there is a catch: when you buy the car, you sign a contract requiring you to pay a battery usage fee of $105/month. Basically, you buy the car and lease the battery. For many Americans, this would take care of the high cost of entry that makes EVs unreachable for such a wide swath of the country.

It sounds attractive, in its way, as getting all of us out of the ICEs and properly electrified is a highly desirable goal. But I have my misgivings. The notion of not owning your battery is troubling. The only way I could see a scheme like this working (in a way that I would be comfortable with) is if the batteries were owned by DOE and the monthly fee were largely directed toward upgrading the electrical grid to support the increased load, with a 5-year buyout option (after 5 years, the car owner could keep paying the fee or buy the battery pack at retail).

Thoughts?

I’d happily not own my battery if it meant that tesla was responsible for it. Though the price isn’t much of a bargain. Figure a 10-year nominal lifespan, so you’re looking at 12*10*105=$12,600. Replacing Tesla’s much bigger battery is around $17k for a model S, last I checked. One can make different assumptions and run the math.

 

[Apple fanboy]

In France, they have an EV with a 160/93 mile (city/highway) range on a 30KWh+supercap storage system (the supercap greatly improves regenerative braking). The Bolloré Bluecar retails for c. $25K, which sounds like a very damn good price for a Leaf-range car with a range that would cover the needs of some 90% of Americans most of the time.

Of course there is a catch: when you buy the car, you sign a contract requiring you to pay a battery usage fee of $105/month. Basically, you buy the car and lease the battery. For many Americans, this would take care of the high cost of entry that makes EVs unreachable for such a wide swath of the country.

It sounds attractive, in its way, as getting all of us out of the ICEs and properly electrified is a highly desirable goal. But I have my misgivings. The notion of not owning your battery is troubling. The only way I could see a scheme like this working (in a way that I would be comfortable with) is if the batteries were owned by DOE and the monthly fee were largely directed toward upgrading the electrical grid to support the increased load, with a 5-year buyout option (after 5 years, the car owner could keep paying the fee or buy the battery pack at retail).

Thoughts?

Renault had the same idea with their first EV’s. But they have stopped leasing the batteries now. I’ll be honest when I was looking into EV’s I discounted the Renault Zoey because of the battery lease. If you pay £105 a month, there really isn’t any saving to be had over ICE.

 

[SuperMatt]

A report on EV adoption going up quite a bit in America. We are still well behind Europe and China though.

U.S. Electric Car Sales Climb Sharply Despite Shortages (Published 2022)

A scarcity of semiconductors and raw materials held back production, but buyers remain enthusiastic.

www.nytimes.com

(Paywall removed)

Vehicles that run on batteries accounted for 5.6 percent of new-car sales from April through June, still a small slice of the market but twice the share a year ago, according to Cox Automotive, an industry consulting firm. Overall, new-car sales declined 20 percent.

Companies like Tesla, Ford Motor and Volkswagen could have delivered more electric cars if they had been able to build them faster. The carmakers struggled with shortages of semiconductors, which are even more essential to electric cars than to gasoline vehicles, while prices soared for lithium and other raw materials needed for batteries.

While electric vehicle sales in the United States are growing fast, Europe and China remain far ahead. Battery-powered vehicles account for more than 10 percent of new cars sold in Europe and around 20 percent in China. Government quotas and subsidies play a large role, but there is also a greater selection of lower-priced models.

Government policy also plays a large role in the United States. California requires manufacturers to sell a certain number of zero-emission vehicles, and residents there drive nearly 40 percent of electric cars on the road in the United States. But efforts by the Biden administration to promote electric vehicles nationwide, by offering electric car buyers tax credits worth up to $12,500, for example, have run into strong opposition in Congress.

 

[SuperMatt]

Pete Buttigieg clears up some misconceptions about EV prices:

https://www.Twitter or X not allowed/i/web/status/1549416679590965249/

 

[quagmire]

Pete Buttigieg clears up some misconceptions about EV prices:

https://www.Twitter or X not allowed/i/web/status/1549416679590965249/

“ I got my numbers from KBB”.

No your staffer got those numbers and then you tried to imply KBB used post-credit price vs MSRP.

That’s some Tesla level misleading pricing BS there.