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Comment by Someone1234 | Hacker News Reader

I like it conceptually, but isn't there missing technology still? Batteries have improved mildly, but energy to weight ratio (and energy to cost) remain problematic.

If we witnessed a jump in battery technology, we may not even need to wait for 2035 for the market to do this for us. But in the meantime we're still seeing electric cars that cost at minimum 10K more than their gas counterparts (with the low cost of oil/gas right now only making that look worse).

I'd love to own a Tesla Model 3 for example, but realistically it is a $37K car that competes with $25K gas vehicles or $27K Hybrids. When is THAT going to change? When is electric going to be affordable for the average person?

The $7.5K federal tax incentives also disappeared (and we never had state incentives here).

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> When is electric going to be affordable for the average person?

The average price of a car bought in May of 2019 was $36,718. A Model 3 is $37,990. Given the offsets in maintenance and gas, I'd say the answer to that question is "now".

https://www.edmunds.com/industry/press/new-vehicle-prices-cl...

From what I know, this is due to trucks and SUVs - which there are not comparable alternatives in the electric world. (A Model X is way too expensive and there is no electric truck available now or anytime soon in mass quantity)

and this is only looking at new cars

How soon is "soon"? GMC's pickup is supposed to be a 2022 model year, which means it will likely arrive in about a year.

Just because you can spend the average amount, it doesn't you have to spend the average amount. A car can cost well under even the base model Model 3 and have 90% of the same functionality (the price disparity gets even larger if you opt into Autopilot); albeit it won't be the status symbol that is a Tesla.

There are cheaper EVs on the market than Teslas.

Nissan Leafs and Toyota Priuses are closer to $30k flat, and the Honda Fit is $16k new.

A Honda Fit isn't 0 emissions and runs on a gasoline engine. So it would be banned.

Wow, I guess I always assumed it was an electric car because it looks so wonky. Thanks for the correction.

The average person is not buying a new vehicle.

So that turns the question into "When is used electric going to be affordable for the average person?" My gut says the answer to that is going to be ~5 years after new electric vehicles are more prevalent. But if electrics continue to retain their value the way the have been it might be a little longer, which is obviously a good thing; a car that last longer has even lower impacts.

You can't expect new cars to trickle down to the used market that quickly.

Used sales are about 2x new car sales [1] and the average used car is probably north of $20,000 [extrapolated from 2]. The best estimate I see of Teslas retaining value is 90% over 3 years [3]. If that holds then it would take 15 years (probably much closer to 10 given inflation, other cars coming up, and the average of other cars going up) for these to hit the used market at an average price point.

Also, the average person doesn't live in California, where the median family income was almost $10,000 higher than the country as a whole [4 and 5].

1: https://www.statista.com/statistics/183713/value-of-us-passe...

2: https://static.ed.edmunds-media.com/unversioned/img/car-news...

3: https://electrek.co/2020/07/16/tesla-model-3-retains-90-perc...

4: https://www.statista.com/statistics/205778/median-household-...

5: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/income-p....

Part of the reasoning for this move is to create an incentive for battery researchers and manufacturers to serve the massive California auto market by or before 2035.

You have to compare TCO. According to https://ev.pge.com/vehicles/Tesla_Model_3_Standard_Range_Plu..., a model 3 is $1700 cheaper than a Toyota Camry Hybrid over 5 years.

Meh, the maintenance costs on the PGE website are highly overrated. It also assumes your insurance costs for a Tesla are going to be the same, and they aren't. You also don't get a Tesla for 27000 net of incentives, unless you make so little money that it doesn't make sense.

That $27K is saying that you can buy it for $37K and sell it for $10K 5 years later. That's super conservative, you should be able to get at least 40%.

You can click on the "include vehicle resale" box to remove the resale factor.

The fact that PG&E is clearly advocating for electric cars should give everyone pause.

Gasoline cars can be filled by gas from any company, so there's actual competition. But an electric car mandate will expand PG&E's monopoly by billions of dollars per year. Imagine how poorly they will behave when they have a lock on both electricity and transportation.

You can put solar panels on most of the roofs.

PG&E and the CPUC need significant attention to come to serve the people. CA pays some of the highest rates in the nation but gets some of the shoddiest infrastructure in return. Check out slide 28 in [1] and read the entirety of [0].

[0] https://www.buttecounty.net/Portals/30/CFReport/PGE-THE-CAMP...

[1] https://www.cpuc.ca.gov/uploadedFiles/CPUCWebsite/Content/Ne...

2035 is still a long way away - by this time the German manufacturers will have gone to battle stations on EVs. VW group's R&D budget is roughly comparable with Tesla's revenue, they may need a kick up the arse to get going but when they do EVs will definitely go up a gear.

I also think SUVs should possibly be banned fairly soon (Bad for cities, bad for roads, bad for parking, emissions etc.)

I'll eat my hat if there is a national ban on SUVs and pickups in the US in the next few years. Instead, I expect their market share to increase

Not only do I think a national ban on SUVs and pickups will be politically impossible in the next 10 years, I think it’s a terrible idea. If you think it’s likely to happen you should spend more time out of whatever urban core you live in.

If you have a family of more than 4 an SUV is both practical and economical. The whole family can go places together, with enough cargo space for a beach weekend or a costco run.

If you ban pickup trucks you’ll essentially ban private boat ownership. You’ll also upset the many people that use their truck for both personal and business common for construction/agri/landscaping.

Why would we even ban SUVs or pickups? If you are concerned with global warming it seems to me that pollution should be taxed and if some people are still choosing to do so they can. And then keep raising these goals so we get rid of inefficient SUVs. This is what EU is doing pretty successfully with the German car manufacturers being dragged kicking and screaming into making low polluting cars.

SUVs can certainly be practical, though a crossover or minivan can do many of those things too. With better fuel efficiency and less weight on the road.

Would it actually have a large effect on boat ownership? Something like a Model X (or many regular crossovers as well) can tow 4-5000 lbs, which should cover the common ones right? I don't really know much about boats, but some quick research suggest that covers the common ones. I also didn't realize just how common boat ownership is in the US, but apparently its ~1 in 10 households.

But you are right, we are certainly not close to being able to replace trucks for business use at this time. The F150 is the top selling vehicle, and has been for many years. Mostly because of business uses. I don't think trucks are going anywhere for a long time in the US.

There are a lot of merits to an SUV over a crossover/minivan. The SUV will be able to hold more cargo — you can tow a boat or a small trailer. An SUV will be able to handle off road situations much better —- perfect for taking the family camping, skiing, or to the beach. An SUV is generally more comfortable and roomy than a crossover.

Yeah, many people can an do operate with a crossover or an EV instead. Smaller crossovers, like the RAV4, would be very crammed and feel underpowered with filled with 5 people, enough of their stuff for a week’s vacation, towing a 3000lb boat, and going up hill.

SUVs are basically required in many parts of the US. Or at very least, it's much worse to have a sedan in the snowier and hillier parts of the country. Not to mention towing capacity or the more rural areas where off-road capabilities are important.

Having lived in both cold and rural parts of the country, I can confirm that sedans work just as well as SUVs.

I have as well. In no world is dealing with chain control in your 2WD sedan working "just as well" as an AWD SUV.

This also doesn't account for towing capacity. Most sedans are not suitable for towing a boat, for example.

I assume the ban would exempt commercial operations, but something to bring up as well.

Focus on electric vehicles, not bans on trucks and SUVs.

There is no chain control in most cold+rural areas. But if you are in a place that would benefit from AWD, there are plenty of non-SUV AWD options, including sedans.

Only until you actually need to haul anything.

In Europe there are a good number of EVs you can buy today for around the €35k mark. Most countries are offering between €5k and €10k of incentives on top of that, so if you compare a similar sized ICE car the prices are not that much different.

VW ID.3 €35,574 300km

Pegeuot e208 €29,682 340km

Hyundai Kona €33,971 305km

(Prices are for base models in Germany, including taxes, excluding incentives)

The Model 3 is around €50k here, so even with the discounted price it's still going to expensive compared to other cars. Now of course it has a greater range, but I am wondering if Tesla are going to bring out a more budget model for Europe to compete.

IIRC, the federal tax incentives phase out per manufacturer, based on the number of qualifying vehicles sold. So buyers of VW's newly-announced ID.4 will be able to claim the full credit, but buyers of Tesla's Model Y won't.

The ID.4 starts $40K base without destination charges or local taxes. Even with the $7.5K federal tax credit that's an incredibly expensive compact SUV (you can get full SUVs for $5K less, let alone compact SUVs).

They're reportedly targeting $35k minus the tax credit. Don't have the link but I read this in a publication this AM.

Multiple publications are describing it as $40K base:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/23/21444141/volkswagen-vw-id...

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a34114103/2021-vw-id4-reve...

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2020/09/volkswagens-new-id-4-el...

Found it:

> Volkswagen also says it will offer a $35,000 version of the ID.4 when production moves to Tennessee.

from https://www.jdpower.com/cars/new-car-previews/2021-volkswage...

Also reported at https://www.digitaltrends.com/cars/2021-volkswagen-id4-previ...

Considering the average transaction price of a new car is $39k now, $35k is right in line with what the market can bear.

That's the average new car that people can buy. I assure you there would be demand below that number.

I doubt it with multiple large manufacturers discontinuing cheaper cars and continuing to push up market. If there was a market for cheaper cars, there wasn't enough demand to be sustainable.

Lightly used cars have become far better value than new cheap cars.

You know a car without any safety features could be even cheaper. Petrol with lead and sulphur is cheaper. Houses with asbestos are cheaper. Why do you feel entitled to a certain price on cars?

That's absurd hyperbole. $25K gas vehicles or $27K Hybrids represent Toyota, not "vehicles without safety features."

Also, you're putting the cart and horse in the wrong order, nobody felt entitled to anything, we were discussing EVs making sense without states needing to push/mandate them which means competitive pricing that's affordable relative to other offerings in the existing market.

Your whole argument feels like a way to shut down discussion.

I think you misunderstood the point there. That $25k gas vehicle would be much cheaper without its required safety features. We are fine with the government mandating an increase in price in order to guarantee safety features. It isn't that much of a stretch to have them mandating an increase in price in order to guarantee zero emissions.

> $25K gas vehicles or $27K Hybrids represent Toyota, not "vehicles without safety features."

I agree, but I think their point was something along the lines of: gas cars are cheaper, and there are ways to make cars even cheaper than those cars (ex. removing many safety features), so where do you draw the line for how cheap cars should be vs the minimum level of responsibility they should comply with -- safety, environmental, morality, etc.

I'm sure before the government regulated a lot of safety features, had they asked the public if they would want those responsible features forced on them if it was going to drive the base price of cars way up, they too would have said no. But today, it seems absurd in hindsight not to have seat belts, the same way it will probably seem absurd in 35 years that we have minimal environmental regulations in place right now.

That doesn't make it right, but it's an interesting dynamic to think that we've exhausted the low hanging personal safety fruit and now we need to address more environmental safety features.

There may be cost to doing this but car prices have never factored in their environmental cost and now they absolutely have to. If you consider both the TCO of an gas vs electric vehicle and the long term cost of climate change, it's a bargain.

Tesla announced yesterday they intend to have a $25k electric vehicle in 3 years.

Sounds like we'll have a $30k car in 6 years

That’s not bad all things considered

Yeah, I'm sure that'll work out just like the Model 3 for $35,000... There was one strippo version of the Model 3 available (as special-order-only to severely limit the number sold) for what, maybe three or four months?

Surely that's why this starts in 2035 and not in 2020.

If the technology was already there to replace cars with no price premium, we should be outlawing ICE cars today.

It's also competing with low-mileage $12-15K used cars that you can actually take on a cross-country trip. The Tesla store here in Austin recently confirmed for me that a trip to South Florida would take more than three times as long in a Tesla as a gas-powered car, after figuring in charging stops and the twisty routes required to get to the chargers. (And that was a $100K Model S!)

And remember folks, EVs aren't zero emissions, they're just remote emissions!

Did you see what Tesla announced at their battery conference yesterday?

No. Did they announce a cost reduction in their vehicles?

I think they threw out a guesstimate being able to sell a low end model for around $25k three years from now.

Musk said the same thing years ago. He’s a chronic liar and/or an over-promising, under-delivering salesman.

Really? The model 3 is an excellent vehicle that everyone dismissed and said would never come to fruition

The quality surveys and several owners I know would beg to differ. Tesla has had, and continues to have, horrendous quality issues. Don't get me wrong, Tesla does do some things well, and they're certainly not afraid to innovate, but they're anything but "excellent vehicles".

I don't know a single Model S owner that hasn't had the door handles fail. It's a $900 repair, unless you haggle with them for weeks ant threaten to sue them, at which point they'll agree to pay for it, because Tesla knows they don't work.

Oh, and a tire/wheel budget of $3000+ a year is pretty excessive, too. (On Teslas, both are notoriously unable to withstand potholes and dips that even other cars with low-profile tires can just drive over. All that battery weight is a really bad combo with low-profile tires and thin-cast wheels.)

I have a model 3 and am extremely happy with it and so is everyone else I know that owns a tesla

Would appear the people working for him have a history of delivering though.

Elon Musk said they expect to "halve" the costs of batteries. This is due to a new battery design, manufacturing changes, vertical integration.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/22/21450916/tesla-battery-pa...

Elon Musk has a reputation for overselling and underdelivering, so there doesn't mean much.

One decade ago, he said Tesla would be delivering 500,000 EV in 2020. This looks more and more probable as we get closer to EOY.

That's the most important criteria to evaluate the success of Tesla (in addition to profitability). I'd say he's been the most reliable executive in the industry. No wonder why he's the CEO in auto with the longest tenure.

> When is electric going to be affordable for the average person?

Maybe never... A lot of today's technology runs on fossil fuel. It may very well be the case that our standard of living will decrease as we won't find comparable source of energy.

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