Poll: Do you have, or plan to get, an electric car?

[madscientist451]

When I get too old to take care of simple things on my car, like changing the oil and tracking down issues that turn on the idiot lights, I'll get an electric car. I'm actually looking forward to the zero-60 in 3 seconds.....

 

[sibelman]

Or go Italian with one of these.

 

[fatjay]

Or go Italian with one of these.
View attachment 874420

Italian electrics! What could go wrong?

 

[madscientist451]

So I was just on the Slate truck website, looking at the options, and the power went out in the whole town. Its back on now, about 2.5 hrs later, but its a wake up call about depending on the grid. I'm thinking about throwing my $50 in and reserving a Slate truck. Looks like an interesting concept that would work for me although not as my current commuter car (not enough range) and not a vehicle I would take on trips either. I don't really need any more cars, and I'd like to drive one before I actually commit to it. Its more likely I would wait a few more years so they could eliminate any issues. I'm also wondering how the current trade negotiations are going to influence the $27K price point. The Slate truck website didn't give me any prices for the different options they say are going to be available. The factory will be in Warsaw, Indiana.

 

[brewskitom]

Can I change my vote from "I plan to" to "Yes?"

Last week I drove home a BMW i4. It's a very nice car - basically a 4 series with the ICE powertrain replaced with electric. That leads to some trade-offs on interior space relative to a car designed from the ground up as an EV but it suits my needs just fine. It's has plenty of pep and handles surprisingly well given the extra 1000+ lbs vs the 430i. In 'D' mode it drives just like a normal car. In 'B' mode with maximum regenerative braking you can one pedal drive.

When we put solar on the house I intentionally installed more capacity than the house can use. For most of the year, by early afternoon the solar has recharged the whole house battery and is outputting power to the grid. My hope is that I can mostly keep the car charged from the surplus solar power and only charge from the grid (off peak, of course) when there is insufficient sunlight. It's too early to tell for sure. If need be I can add additional panels to the solar system. I have room on the roof and additional inverter capacity.

 

[mac_1103]

the power went out in the whole town. Its back on now, about 2.5 hrs later, but its a wake up call about depending on the grid

I was driving north on I-95 during the blackout in August 2003. Nobody could pump gas.

 

[madscientist451]

I was driving north on I-95 during the blackout in August 2003. Nobody could pump gas.

Good reason to fill up when you get to 1/2 tank.

 

[Kent88]

With home charging I rarely go below half charge on my EV battery.

 

[mac_1103]

Good reason to fill up when you get to 1/2 tank.

I actually had more than enough fuel to get to my destination. I only noticed the outage because we stopped for a bathroom break.

 

[Airborneguy]

The worst disaster I have ever experienced was Hurricane Sandy. The region had spotty power starting the day after which progressively improved every day. My home was fully back to normal on the second day.

We couldn’t reliably obtain gas for over 2 weeks. And for me, that was still the case even though my stepfather owned a gas station for 40 years.

 

[madscientist451]

My mom's house had 4' of water during SS Sandy. She's 93 and still in the same house. Her town had no power for months. If you had an EV, it would have been very challenging....

 

[sibelman]

EV road trip! Gotta learn to embrace the bottom half of the fuel charge gauge, cuz charging is faster away from the top.

 

[Airborneguy]

My mom's house had 4' of water during SS Sandy. She's 93 and still in the same house. Her town had no power for months. If you had an EV, it would have been very challenging....

If I had my EV then, it would have been far more convenient than my gas car doing 12 tours for 2 weeks straight praying I could find gas every 2-3 days. Then waiting on ridiculous lines when the calls went around confirming stations that actually had some.

So yeah, I wish I’d had a Tesla then. Same as when I drove mine to Orlando DURING Hurricane Ian a few years ago and had zero hiccups the whole way other than trying to physically get around the long gas lines to get to the working chargers.

 

[madscientist451]

If I had my EV then, it would have been far more convenient than my gas car

I don’t get it, I guess I’m missing something, you can’t charge at home, no power. You find a charging station and sit there however long it takes to get a full charge, and then you get 150-250 miles? Or get gas once and get 400+ miles?

 

[Airborneguy]

I guess you have to experience it to understand. I don’t know what else to say. I drive way more than the average American and I haven’t experienced a single instance of inconvenience since purchasing my first EV 4 years ago. I’m on my second and my wife drives one also.

Hers has never been charged at a public charger. In that time, she’d have had to stop for gas at least 20-30 times. I would never have realized how inconvenient those fueling stops are either, until of course we never had to do it anymore.

Not to mention they’re way less expensive to drive. My monthly electric bill rarely cracks $200. I was spending around $300 on gas alone, figure another $100 for her. That $200 electric bill is for both cars and my house.

As for roadtrips… well, I’m not 25 anymore. I have no interest in driving 400+ miles without stopping. I’ve driven mine to south Florida from NJ twice and innumerable other roadtrips including a single day trip from NYC to Rochester and back. Zero complaints. If stopping to charge more on roadtrips outweighs NEVER having to stop to fuel in your daily routine, then I guess it’s not for you. I’m only refuting the all-too-common inexperienced yet definitive statements you’re making. I couldn’t care less what kind of car others drive and have zero political agenda on this topic.

 

[beren]

I have observed another potential problem. I don't know how widespread this is, but it's been fairly consistent for me. It's people's insistance in charging to 100%. This is a real issue that affects the longevity of the battery. The people that I see doing it are on public chargers, and likely will just trade the car in after 3-5 years. The vast majroity of the EV's that I've seen have no way to easily check the battery health. Which is going to be a real issue with second hand sales. How many people will pay a decent dollar for a used EV when they have no idea how the previous owners treated the battery.

With modern day beurcracy, and this isn't a political thing, building a new powerplant isn't an easy thing. The last new plant was nuclear in 2016, and before that was a coal plant in 2013. If EV adaptation went from 1% to 5% in the next 5 years, there is absolutely no way power plants will be built to absorb that additional strain on the grid in that time.

So depending on the usage, charging to 100% is fine. I do it for longer trips. As long as it’s not sitting at 100% for long periods of time it’s not that bad, and the car can report the battery condition/degradation so there’s no mystery. Mine knows exactly how many times and kWh it’s fast charged, slow charged, and charged with regen.

California has so much excess solar during peak times they can’t use it all so mid-late day charging would be a great thing for them, and as there is more solar and more places to charge while parked, like at work, this is less of an issue.

Data centers use more power and water than entire states and are expected to grow massively https://www.energy.gov/articles/doe...ting-increase-electricity-demand-data-centers.

 

[Airborneguy]

Microsoft just contracted with Three Mile Island to reopen a shuttered reactor to power an AI data center. “Blah blah, evs will crash the grid!” meanwhile we need a whole nuclear reactor so people can have AI complete simple tasks for them.

 

[beren]

Microsoft just contracted with Three Mile Island to reopen a shuttered reactor to power an AI data center. “Blah blah, evs will crash the grid!” meanwhile we need a whole nuclear reactor so people can have AI complete simple tasks for them.

Way more than one…

 

[Kharnynb]

Microsoft just contracted with Three Mile Island to reopen a shuttered reactor to power an AI data center. “Blah blah, evs will crash the grid!” meanwhile we need a whole nuclear reactor so people can have AI complete simple tasks for them.

bitcoin likely uses more power than all ev's put together...and it's literally just a gambling device.

 

[mac_1103]

...you can’t charge at home, no power...

I guess you have to experience it to understand. I don’t know what else to say.

I think he was asking specifically about the widespread power outage scenario.

 

[Airborneguy]

I think he was asking specifically about the widespread power outage scenario.

I don’t know if this was directed at me, but that’s exactly what I was addressing.

I don’t deal with complete hypotheticals. I stick to what I have seen in real life. Considering my past experience as a 4 time combat veteran, a cop who responded to Katrina and Sandy, and my recent experience as a private security supervisor for hurricane relief sites in Florida, I can confidently say I have seen REAL worst case scenarios.

Priority #1 is always to preserve life. Priority #2? Restore power. The civilian supply of gas - which btw requires a source of power - is not priority #3. I’ve seen this sequence unfold many times, without fail.

My real world, worst case scenario experience, which is most likely more extensive than anyone who regularly poses this question to refute my statements, has secured my confidence that an EV is as capable, if not more so, of being fueled during a catastrophic event.

 

[mac_1103]

I don’t know if this was directed at me, but that’s exactly what I was addressing.

It didn't seem to me that the post I quoted actually did address the power outage situation. Your previous one sort of did, but only hypothetically since you didn't have an EV at that time. I think it is reasonable to wonder how you would charge an EV in the case of a lengthy and widespread power outage, just as it is reasonable to consider how you would get gas in the same situation (as I already mentioned in a previous post of my own).

 

[Airborneguy]

But that’s the rub: inexperienced people never question how they will get gas. They just assume it will be present and easily available but electricity won’t be.

This past October I was in Tampa/Clearwater after the hurricanes. As with my past experiences, gas lines persisted long after electricity had been mostly restored. I drove down in a rental gas vehicle because the company I was working for does not reimburse personally owned expenses. Ideally, they’d have let me bring my Tesla and I’d have charged from day 1 at the airbnb. Instead, I waited on gas lines almost every day for a week because the sites I was supervising were spread out all around Tampa Bay, forcing me to drive hundreds of miles daily.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

But that’s the rub: inexperienced people never question how they will get gas. They just assume it will be present and easily available but electricity won’t be.

BTW I appreciate the context. I probably wouldn't have intuited that it might be EASIER to charge an EV after a disaster than to find gasoline.

But I didn't get that from the first post that mac quoted, so your second response was needed for me to pick up what you were saying.

 

[Airborneguy]

To put this to bed: my prior posts, 3210 and 3213 specifically (just above the mad scientist post quoted by Mac), both directly addressed my hurricane Sandy experience which resulted in a widely reported regional power outage and extensive longterm destruction.

In 3215, the post Mac quoted, I had moved on from this line of discussion since the other two were (and remain) part of the conversation.

If I’m wrong…

 

[Airborneguy]

The worst disaster I have ever experienced was Hurricane Sandy. The region had spotty power starting the day after which progressively improved every day. My home was fully back to normal on the second day.

We couldn’t reliably obtain gas for over 2 weeks. And for me, that was still the case even though my stepfather owned a gas station for 40 years.

If I had my EV then, it would have been far more convenient than my gas car doing 12 tours for 2 weeks straight praying I could find gas every 2-3 days. Then waiting on ridiculous lines when the calls went around confirming stations that actually had some.

So yeah, I wish I’d had a Tesla then. Same as when I drove mine to Orlando DURING Hurricane Ian a few years ago and had zero hiccups the whole way other than trying to physically get around the long gas lines to get to the working chargers.

 

[fatjay]

I don't understand why people need to drive hundreds of miles in a power outage? Where are you going?

Fortunately in my area i'm mostly immune from natural disasters, although when sandy hit we had no power for 3 weeks. I ran my generator, but if I had my solar, I'd have been just fine on that.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

To put this to bed: my prior posts, 3210 and 3213 specifically (just above the mad scientist post quoted by Mac), both directly addressed my hurricane Sandy experience which resulted in a widely reported regional power outage and extensive longterm destruction.

In 3215, the post Mac quoted, I had moved on from this line of discussion since the other two were (and remain) part of the conversation.

If I’m wrong…

I wasn't disagreeing or criticizing. I was just saying that I didn't see the point you were making until post #3221 when you said this:

a cop who responded to Katrina and Sandy, and my recent experience as a private security supervisor for hurricane relief sites in Florida, I can confidently say I have seen REAL worst case scenarios.

Priority #1 is always to preserve life. Priority #2? Restore power. The civilian supply of gas - which btw requires a source of power - is not priority #3. I’ve seen this sequence unfold many times, without fail.

That for me was the light bulb moment. And it makes sense. Getting the power back on is MUCH higher on the priority list than making sure gas stations have product--which is often difficult because it has to be transported in and [I assume] many people hoard in advance of the hurricane leading to low stock on hand.

What I thought you were saying was "it's bad either way; I'll take my chances with an EV". What post #3221 said to me is "it's bad, but the priority will be getting power on, which means the very electrons that my car needs are likely going to be delivered to my house a lot sooner than I can easily find gas at a pump."

I just quite frankly didn't get that from posts #3210 and #3213.

 

[Airborneguy]

Fair.

All too often the pro-gas crowd (not you, just saying) ignores the fact that the gasoline industry requires a heck of a lot of electricity from extraction to production through to delivery and individual consumption. These are all important factors when disaster strikes, necessitating a focus on power restoration long before commercial gas delivery resembles anything near normal. Then of course there are other reasons why electricity takes priority: life safety systems, homebound disabled persons, traffic control, water delivery, hospitals, etc.

It’s just maddening when people pretend as if gas delivery is not affected by natural disasters.

As I said up thread, my stepfather owned a gas station for 40 years. During Sandy, it helped me maybe once during the 2 weeks that gas was nearly impossible to find. Whenever he had a delivery, the lines were already down the block and allowing us to cut would have caused a riot. It wasn’t worth the trouble. He had to hire security guards to police the chaos.

 

[beren]

Not only that, if you have solar and either a battery or the right micro inverters, you can have power without the grid working at all. Try making your own gasoline without infra ;-)

 

[day_trippr]

EV market could be challenging for Tesla soon...

https://www.torquenews.com/17998/my...cking-doors-were-flimsy-mid-2000s-corolla-and

 

[mac_1103]

In 3215, the post Mac quoted, I had moved on from this line of discussion since the other two were (and remain) part of the conversation.

What threw me a little was that it didn't seem like the poster you quoted in 3215 had moved on. So that post seemed like a direct response that didn't really directly respond, and that was the only reason I posted 3220, quoting both you and madscientist.

If I’m wrong…

"Wrong" is such a strong word.

Confused is more like it. As in me. At the time.

 

[Airborneguy]

I guess we’ll have to wait until Mad Scientist chimes in as I’m still confused over what transpired since I had already directly addressed his widespread power outage concern. He had moved on to a different point and I addressed that one as well.

Or preferably, we just move on.

 

[mac_1103]

I’m still confused over what transpired since I had already directly addressed his widespread power outage concern

What transpired is that he either didn't think you had addressed the widespread power outage concern or didn't understand your explanation. Obviously you thought he had moved on to a different point, and you addressed that different point, and then you circled back and addressed the widespread power outage concern in a way that at least some of us found more thorough and helpful than your previous response.

But I'm still confused over how exactly you read "you can’t charge at home, no power..." as not talking about the power outage scenario? (BTW, I'm not asking you to address that again; you already covered it very well).

 

[Kent88]

If MadScientist has decided to step away from the conversation, I think we've discussed his recent comments enough that we can move on.

 

[Airborneguy]

If MadScientist has decided to step away from the conversation, I think we've discussed his recent comments enough that we can move on.

Agreed. Strange it’s coming from a third person and not him.

 

[Bilsch]

The important takeaway for me from that whole conversation is you can make electrons for an EV on your roof even in a disaster but you can't make gas in your garage ever.

 

[Kent88]

I know we're all a bunch of brewers, but I doubt any of us really want to spend money and dedicate the space to setting up a mini ethanol plant in our garages.

 

[Bilsch]

I know we're all a bunch of brewers, but I doubt any of us really want to spend money and dedicate the space to setting up a mini ethanol plant in our garages.

Unlikely if this lot made ethanol any of it would actually make it into their gas tanks.

 

[Pkrd]

Unlikely if this lot made ethanol any of it would actually make it into their gas tanks.