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Comment by mrfusion | Hacker News Reader

Although unlikely, don’t rule out a tipping point situation. Say in ten years enough people bought E.V.s that gas stations started closing down. So less people buy ice vechiles so more gas stations close down.

At some point if you start getting range anxiety in your ice vechile it might not complete its 20 year turnover.

Note I did say this is unlikely in such a short time frame.

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Is gas really how gas stations make money? I was always under the impression that gas didn't bring in much profit, but everything within the store did.

Maybe, but why would EV owners would ever shop at a gas station if they can charge their car at home, work or while shopping at other regular shopping venues.

Gas stations probably won't close en masse. They'll have charging stations (where economically possible) because it fits their business model better because. Gas stations make almost no profit on gas (except the ones by the highway or in the rich neighborhood that cost $0.30/gal more than the others). They make their profit on the convenience store they run. Gas is just what gets people to show up. In urban areas where everyone parks on street gas stations will just convert to charging stations. In rural areas gas stations get enough foot traffic from being convenience stores. Suburban areas where everyone owns a house and can put in a charging station and there's plenty of other buying options for what convenience stores sell are where gas stations may close.

Indeed, BP is the world’s largest seller of Coca Cola. As one of their board members said to me, “It’s all selling black sticky stuff”

One thing that has been interesting to me owning an EV for about a year now is how charging and refueling create different needs.

With an EV I rarely need to charge when out and about, because I leave every morning at 100% charge. Those few times I do need to visit a charger it's generally for a full charge, so it'll take 20 minutes to an hour, so I'll much prefer charging stations at restaurants or grocery stores.

I think there will be a big market to reimagine the gas station concept into something more destination oriented, e.g. much more like truck stops, fewer in number but with more services.

Starbucks should be investing all our into chargers! They’d be the perfect place to hang out for an hour. Or Barnes and noble.

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