Want an Electric Car with a 300Mile Range? When Was the Last Time You Drove 300?
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
For us, we noticed that the 250km was a minimum. The drop to 200km was manageable during winter, but we noticed it. The Leaf's 100km during winter is barely enough for daily use, and the 150km really isn't fun when we want to go to our cabin.
We knew the Leaf would have less range, but it really drove home that the next car must have at least 250km, but we don't really need significantly more than that. When going to the cabin or visiting family it was usually enough to just charge midways, which fit well with a short break for visiting the bathroom and grabbing some food or refreshments.
That said, after about a couple of days with the i3 it was clear our next car would not have an ICE. Just the lack of engine sounds when driving slowly (like in traffic or residential areas) and lack of exhaust fumes was enough for that.
This is something I don't think people take into account when they say or assume that having two power sources is wasteful and that anyway, batteries are getting cheaper.
You could also infer the relative cost by the unsubsidized price, but there are many rationalizations that blind people to that.
The paradigm where an EV must have enough battery range for the maximum daily trip is like the paradigm where an ICE must have enough HP for the maximum daily acceleration. The virtue of hybrids is that they don't have to have either.
Regarding exhaust fumes, you perceive any difference with a catalytic converter operating?
> Regarding exhaust fumes, you perceive any difference with a catalytic converter operating?
It's better when it's operating, but it's still noticeable in my experience. After a couple of years of being used to not smell fumes when sitting in the car, it becomes very noticeable when there's even just a tiny bit.
If I lived up north where 250km is a short trip, I'd probably have a different view on things. But given that there's plenty of BEVs that fit our need, we definitely won't go back.
The reality is that the vast majority of people don't drive more than 150 miles a day except on rare occasions. And, for families with more than one car (which is a lot of people), it's not unreasonable that their second car be of a more limited range. Further complicating things is the recharging story - something that will only get better over time.
I'm not saying electric cars "have arrived", but they're going to; however, acting like they have for everyone just makes you look foolish. Writing this title as a question was a mistake, imo, and frames the argument poorly.
e: By the way: 300 miles is at least 4 hours in a car, not including breaks. It's not unreasonable to take a 20 minute break to recharge during a 4+ hour car ride - and while you're at, plug your car in as well. A better headline might have been: "When was the last time you drove 8 hours?"
I haven't driven more than 60km a week in 5 years, with occasional 150-300 forays and most of my fellow apt dwellers are the same. We know we exist, we know you exist.
if your answer is "we all do" then you are definedly in a very specific cohort, which I think you need to identify and clarify what % of the population you are. Hint: you probably aren't working in LA or NY where millions and millions of people live and work.
Considering that EVs are way more expensive than ICEVs and the design team has even more constraints compared to gasoline cars (because they need to have an even lower aerodynamic Cx)...buying an EV as it stands is essentially an altruistic choice.
As a young person I feel like I maxed by dose of altruism when I was asked to essentially stop living 2020-2022 for what essentially amounts to a virus comparable with the 1969 Influenza when people where having the time of their lives consming all sorts of drugs at Woodstock and engaging in decadent expenses such as the one incurred in sending people to the Moon.
Also it's not even clear who's gonna be the beneficiary of this altruism, it's a story as old as time that if you leave a vacuum someone else is gonna fill that vacuum. For every ugly Tesla 3 that people in the West inflict upon themselves (and those who have to look at it) there are Indians and Malay farmers who see it as an opportunity to light up even more palm oil for their convenience. Not to mention Chinese industries which post bogus GDP numbers and will soon post bogus CO2 emission numbers.
The West is cucking itself on basically every possible front so we have to thank Nature for installing backup systems in other cultures which will come in handy as they refuse to follow us in this nonsense.
tl;dr Austerity and limiting one's quality of life has never been the answer, all the way back to very beginning of life itself. It won't start being the answer now.
Now don't get me wrong, on BUILD QUALITY alone I could go to inferior, but that aside, its accelleration at the lights from the standing start is just unbelievable. If you live for burning off the guy in the next lane, its not inferior.
Its subjective.
And as I pointed out, EV take off at the lights as if somebody tied a burning rag to a cats tail. Hard to be reductionist about "inferior" if its actually better at something.
or.. dare I say it, being less polluting?
"less optionality for a higher price" is not actually inferior. "it depends"
here's a theory. I am arguing with a low karma account which seeks to increase its karma by being provocative. I wonder.. is there a model where somehow other than not responding, we can stop that? probably not: I need to police my responses better.
The common story on all these things is that they improved as technology matured.
And in regards to cuckolding ourselves (poor phrasing on your part), we've taken out a big metaphorical loan to live like we do, from the planet. To get here, we've filled the ocean with plastic, poisoned the rainwater with PFAS and ruined a whole lot besides. We have not found a nominal equilibrium yet. Our operations at large scale still come with tremendous unanticipated negative externalities, whether it's the cultivation of supercharged diseases and pests through heavy use of chemicals on crops and the creation of large monocultures, polluting water bodies with huge fertilizer runoffs and the contraceptives we excrete because of our addiction to consequence free sex or rapidly draining aquifers for water to drink or just waste in hour-long showers. We pollute our own bodies in this way, with plastic particles in our water, our meat. So, we can't keep doing this. We do need to curtail how we live amd find a better way that isn't necessary going to be sexier or less work. Even if we do, there remains the open question about how other countries can even advance, as the world can hardly afford more first world countries that live at the standard that you or I do now.