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I recommend watching "Who Killed the Electric Car?" - it explains most of the history of EV cars in California. I disagree with its conclusion that battery tech

I recommend watching "Who Killed the Electric Car?" - it explains most of the history of EV cars in California. I disagree with its conclusion that battery technology was not to blame - I feel that range-anxiety is a real concern and the GM EV1's range of under 100 miles using bulk lead-acid or 140 miles using NiMH batteries was, and remains, inadequate. Compare to today's Telsa's S and X 250-300+ mile range. That - and the program was open to easy sabotage.

0xcde4c3db 9y ago
> I feel that range-anxiety is a real concern The term "range anxiety" seems crafted to make people not take it seriously. The implication is pretty clearly that range is actually fine and it's your feelings about it that are the problem.
- DaiPlusPlus 9y ago
  It's both. My commute is 30 miles a day (15 miles each way) and about once or twice a week I'll drive further - perhaps 60 miles in a day - by that logic I would be happy with the Ford Focus Electric as in practice that car gets 70 miles per charge. But this assessment completely disregards the times, often at unpredictable occurrences, when I need to drive 100-200 miles (or more) at short notice and when there is not a time allotment to spend 4-8 hours to have the car recharge sufficiently. I would need to rent a car at very short notice in that case - which can be impossible. Things like a family emergency, a server crash at a data-center, a friend urgently needs a ride from Seattle to Portland and back, etc... Remember, even if an ICE car and an EV have the same range, if both have zero fuel/energy left, the ICE car can be refilled from a hand-portable gas-tank or AAA truck enough to get to the next fuelling station - and you're free to carry additional fuel in your storage space, an EV car does not have that option: there's the prospective of expensive towing and hours waiting for it to recharge. I'd be less concerned if Tesla made some kind of "towable" extended battery or drop-in for the frunk or trunk, or even a portable Honda generator - but it doesn't. I think it's naive to expect that while the majority of American car owners have no need to travel more than 100 miles per day - that they also have no expectation of travelling that distance - and you only need to travel that distance a few days in a whole year to make the purchase of an ICE vehicle worthwhile so long as EVs take longer to recharge without any kind of fast battery-swap feature. I'm in the market for an EV myself - I wish I had gotten on to the Model 3 waiting list sooner - but it would have to be a Model 3 because the range of the Chevy Bolt, Volt, Leaf and the Focus Electric is not sufficient for those occasional long-distance journeys, and I imagine that a plurality (if not the majority) of the car-owning public feel the same way I do.
WalterBright 9y ago
Lead acid batteries have short lives, too, when deep-cycled.
- dsfyu404ed 9y ago
  Unless they're built to be deep cycled.
owenversteeg 9y ago
I haven't seen it, so I can't comment on the movie, but it's worth noting that in the early 90s there was no such thing as high-capacity lithium ion batteries. The capacity of 100 miles with bulk lead-acid was pretty incredible for the time.
cptskippy 9y ago
100-140 miles is inadequate for a lot of people however it is more than enough for others. Even if a multi-car family adopts 1 EV it makes a difference.
- Teknoman117 9y ago
  100-140 miles is more than adequate for nearly all of the United States. While there are people who drive farther, the vast majority of the citizens of this country travel less than 40 miles for work, and I don't know anyone who would drive that far for groceries. People tend to want to buy a car for the largest trip they can imagine they'd take, even if that event may only happen a few times in the vehicle's lifetime.
  - ams6110 9y ago
    Well I drive beyond the range of any electric car several times a month. Granted that's probably somewhere beyond "normal" use but it means an electric car remains infeasible for me. I'm not going to deal with the hassle of renting a car that often.
  - mrcsparker 9y ago
    I have a hybrid (well, I did before the flood) and it got 17 miles on a charge. It handled most of my trips to the store, errands, etc.
  - Zanni 9y ago
    You're assuming that you always start from a full charge (an assumption I used to make before I got an EV). That's not always the case. I live in a townhouse, so I'm in the process of getting a charging station installed (it's been six months so far and we're still in the paperwork stage ...) In the meantime, I charge where I can. That means I almost never start my day with a full charge. Worse, there are only a few places I can charge, and my best options add 20 miles of range in an hour. Say I start my day with 70 miles of range, which should be more than adequate for my ~45 miles of round trip commute. But an emergency comes up and I have to run an errand. It's just a short 10-mile trip, but now I'm coasting in to home with just 5 miles of range left ... if my meter is accurate (it's not), if traffic's not bad (it might be), etc. Charging stations are few and far between, which means the nearest one might be outside of my remaining range. Or, if I can get to one, it might be occupied. At a gas station I can just wait five minutes. At a charging station, I might have to wait hours for someone who's trying to get a full charge.

0xcde4c3db 9y ago

> I feel that range-anxiety is a real concern The term "range anxiety" seems crafted to make people not take it seriously. The implication is pretty clearly that range is actually fine and it's your feelings about it that are the problem.

DaiPlusPlus 9y ago
It's both. My commute is 30 miles a day (15 miles each way) and about once or twice a week I'll drive further - perhaps 60 miles in a day - by that logic I would be happy with the Ford Focus Electric as in practice that car gets 70 miles per charge. But this assessment completely disregards the times, often at unpredictable occurrences, when I need to drive 100-200 miles (or more) at short notice and when there is not a time allotment to spend 4-8 hours to have the car recharge sufficiently. I would need to rent a car at very short notice in that case - which can be impossible. Things like a family emergency, a server crash at a data-center, a friend urgently needs a ride from Seattle to Portland and back, etc... Remember, even if an ICE car and an EV have the same range, if both have zero fuel/energy left, the ICE car can be refilled from a hand-portable gas-tank or AAA truck enough to get to the next fuelling station - and you're free to carry additional fuel in your storage space, an EV car does not have that option: there's the prospective of expensive towing and hours waiting for it to recharge. I'd be less concerned if Tesla made some kind of "towable" extended battery or drop-in for the frunk or trunk, or even a portable Honda generator - but it doesn't. I think it's naive to expect that while the majority of American car owners have no need to travel more than 100 miles per day - that they also have no expectation of travelling that distance - and you only need to travel that distance a few days in a whole year to make the purchase of an ICE vehicle worthwhile so long as EVs take longer to recharge without any kind of fast battery-swap feature. I'm in the market for an EV myself - I wish I had gotten on to the Model 3 waiting list sooner - but it would have to be a Model 3 because the range of the Chevy Bolt, Volt, Leaf and the Focus Electric is not sufficient for those occasional long-distance journeys, and I imagine that a plurality (if not the majority) of the car-owning public feel the same way I do.

WalterBright 9y ago

Lead acid batteries have short lives, too, when deep-cycled.

dsfyu404ed 9y ago
Unless they're built to be deep cycled.

owenversteeg 9y ago

I haven't seen it, so I can't comment on the movie, but it's worth noting that in the early 90s there was no such thing as high-capacity lithium ion batteries. The capacity of 100 miles with bulk lead-acid was pretty incredible for the time.

cptskippy 9y ago

100-140 miles is inadequate for a lot of people however it is more than enough for others. Even if a multi-car family adopts 1 EV it makes a difference.

Teknoman117 9y ago
100-140 miles is more than adequate for nearly all of the United States. While there are people who drive farther, the vast majority of the citizens of this country travel less than 40 miles for work, and I don't know anyone who would drive that far for groceries. People tend to want to buy a car for the largest trip they can imagine they'd take, even if that event may only happen a few times in the vehicle's lifetime.
- ams6110 9y ago
  Well I drive beyond the range of any electric car several times a month. Granted that's probably somewhere beyond "normal" use but it means an electric car remains infeasible for me. I'm not going to deal with the hassle of renting a car that often.
- mrcsparker 9y ago
  I have a hybrid (well, I did before the flood) and it got 17 miles on a charge. It handled most of my trips to the store, errands, etc.
- Zanni 9y ago
  You're assuming that you always start from a full charge (an assumption I used to make before I got an EV). That's not always the case. I live in a townhouse, so I'm in the process of getting a charging station installed (it's been six months so far and we're still in the paperwork stage ...) In the meantime, I charge where I can. That means I almost never start my day with a full charge. Worse, there are only a few places I can charge, and my best options add 20 miles of range in an hour. Say I start my day with 70 miles of range, which should be more than adequate for my ~45 miles of round trip commute. But an emergency comes up and I have to run an errand. It's just a short 10-mile trip, but now I'm coasting in to home with just 5 miles of range left ... if my meter is accurate (it's not), if traffic's not bad (it might be), etc. Charging stations are few and far between, which means the nearest one might be outside of my remaining range. Or, if I can get to one, it might be occupied. At a gas station I can just wait five minutes. At a charging station, I might have to wait hours for someone who's trying to get a full charge.