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Historically, there have been a variety of reasons why electric cars did not take substantial market share. You likely know what they are: Range anxiety, lack o

Historically, there have been a variety of reasons why electric cars did not take substantial market share. You likely know what they are: Range anxiety, lack of charging infrastructure, poor performance, funky styling, 'general dorkiness', .... The current independents have focused on these issues and in many cases, clearly eliminated them. Moreover, the market itself has evolved with the US in particular finally starting to wake up to environmental issues (T notwithstanding), and China making strident environmental policy out of pure desperation. Add to the situation that a popular figurehead with a superhero alter-ego is leading the way with awe-inspiring (crash inducing) feats of science and technology, and I think we'll all be surprised at how fast electric vehicles become mainstream.

codeulike 9y ago
Agreed. I drive a Leaf and I think the switchover is going to come faster than people think. Nonetheless its an interesting article despite its slightly sniffy attitude to electrics because it highlights the scary predicament that the big automakers find themselves in.
- jseliger 9y ago
  I drive a Leaf and I think the switchover is going to come faster than people think Yes. That's the other thing: the best argument for an electric car is driving one—particularly a Tesla. The minute most of the population has access to one (from a friend, family, whatever), they're going to want one.
- rconti 9y ago
  Yeah. I've got a couple of good old fashioned regular performance cars here in the SF bay area. I'd love to have the excuse (read: carpool lane access, long commute, whatever) to buy an electric but there's just no "need" in my life for a new vehicle. That said, the penetration rate of electric vehicles as a proportion of new vehicles here is staggering. The Model S easily outsells any competitor's luxury car in the same class, you'd have to combine all A6 / 5 series / E Class sales to even hope to show the same numbers. And I can see why -- if you want to plunk down all this cash for a new car, why not get something truly new, not something outdated? My uncle is very frugal and has spent years looking at buying a new car and then up and ordered a (very base) Model S with the reasoning, if I'm spending all this money, I want to spend the money on future tech, not old tech. Even sitting in my 2016 car this morning, in the cold, I was thinking how silly it is that I have to wait for the coolant in the car to warm up before the heater starts blowing hot, and how funny all of the ICE cars look with steam coming out of the exhaust on a cold morning. It already feels out of date.
  - codeulike 9y ago
    You might enjoy this tongue-in-cheek 'Test Drive of a Petrol Car' written by a Swedish Tesla owner back in 2015 http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-car/ http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-car/
    - BatFastard 9y ago
      That is fabulous!
  - mikestew 9y ago
    It already feels out of date More than that, after six years of Leaf ownership it feels downright primitive. In our ‘81 VW it’s acceptable because, hey, it’s an old vehicle. You know, back when you could really feel what a car’s doing, blah, blah, blah. But in a modern $50K car? Turning mechanical gears to get that rattling contraption of an ICE going, gawd, I’m surprised you didn’t make me crank it by hand. To refuel it, I have to go out of my way to a specialist vendor? Not just plug it in when I get home? Sounds silly unless you’ve owned an EV, but it truly represents my feelings even when driving our smooth, reliable Scion. But as the old canard goes, if I have to explain then you wouldn’t understand.
    - funnelsgun 9y ago
      > You know, back when you could really feel what a car’s doing, blah, blah, blah. There is an argument to be made for this. In most new cars, whether ICE or electric, electric power steering racks have almost removed all feedback through the wheel. Feedback is good, it communicates what the wheels are doing, what the road surface is like, what traction is like, etc... and I'd argue that good steering feedback is important for safe driving.
      - mikestew 9y ago
        There is an argument to be made for this. There most certainly is, for a tiny, tiny minority of people who buy cars. That’s why I used it as example. Picture the older middle-aged guy going on about how “cars back then..” until your eyes glaze (and if you’ve met me, you’ll have a working example). Yeah, nobody cares, old man, my ‘08 Corolla was cheap. I already typed this before you deleted, so I’m putting it here. :-) In summary, I think “feel” matters to a small number of people. To those that notice (I count myself amongst them), it’s pretty important. To the vast majority of drivers I think that as long as the car gets them to work it’s good enough. The reason I used it as an example is because the ones I find that will argue the importance of “feel” are old, rambling guys like me. IOW, I was originally making of myself to some degree.
- BackPropagate 9y ago
  Your LEAF is a golf cart. Leaf people are gay.
- smsm42 9y ago
  I'm not sure how that would work. So far I see these obstacles/concerns: 1. Range. Right now I can drive ~400 miles on a fill. Can I get even close to that in EV? 2. Refills. I am pretty sure wherever I go, there would be a gas station within tens of miles. And I'm pretty sure most maps or GPS devices I would have would be able to point me to it. With electric car, not only I have to worry about finding charging station (or even plan the trip around its presence) but I'm not even sure how to find one. Would my GPS device show it? Would it work with my car (Tesla ones e.g. work only with Teslas)? Would I need some kind of subscription/registration to access it? I imagine being anxious about these things would be pretty annoying (unless it's already solved somehow - I have no idea). 3. Do I need to have charging station at home? What if I move - would I need to get a new one or pay to move it? What if I need to go somewhere at night and the car isn't charged yet? Would I need to buy special "fast charge" station? What if one day I'm too tired at the evening and forget to plug in the car for the night? 4. With ICE car, I am sure any competent mechanic would be able to take care of the most problems with my car. Electric cars are new, most mechanics had no training for them and no experience with them, and manufacturing solutions and practices would be very non-uniform - how I find the good service and how I make sure he doesn't use relative scarcity on the market to fleece me? 5. If I want to sell this car, what would the resale value be? Would I be able to resell it at all, or would it be the analogue of 5 year old smartphone, worth tiny fraction of the premium price it fetched only recently? 6. Wouldn't buying now, when the technology is still developing, lock me in with inferior first-try technology while superior one will show up in 5 years and make my car not only look like Flintstone's carriage but also drive its resale value down and maybe make it unusable due to chargers switching to newer superior standard of something? I'd like to hear how these concerns are resolved.
  - jblow 9y ago
    1. My EV (Tesla Roadster, updated battery) goes 340 miles on one charge. Admittedly it is a small car. The new Tesla Roadster slated for 2020 goes 620 miles on one charge. Admittedly that is an expensive car. But you should be able to get good range in a less-expensive car at that point. 2. Newer Teslas (Model S, Model X, Model 3) have charger planning built into their standard map program. About other EVs, if I were an EV manufacturer I would do a license deal with Tesla to allow my cars to use their charging network. But maybe they'll build their own. The one Tesla built is pretty good ... if a small company can do that, GM can do way more, and do it faster. So even though "there's no infrastructure" has been raised as this huge problem for years, it does not in actuality look like much of a problem. 3. Good electric cars have their own charging circuitry built in, so you just plug it into the wall. You can even charge off 110 volts, though it takes a long time. A dryer socket is much more reasonable. Just being able to plug in your car, in your garage, is much more convenient than going to a gas station. (This presumes you have a garage to park in. If you park on the street, different story.) 4. Electric motors and drivetrains are much simpler and much more robust than mechanical engines and drivetrains. Electric cars just do not tend to need repair in the same way. (I have had my car for over 7 years and it has never yet needed a repair of this kind). 5. Tesla Roadsters still hold their value very well, considering. But this may be in part due to the fact that it's a rare car. I am not sure about the Leaf, etc. 6. Maybe, yeah.
nicoburns 9y ago
I thought it was interesting that the article focussed on trends in the US market, which seems the least EV-friendly (from what I hear, fuel prices are half what they are in the EU).
keldaris 9y ago
To offer a slightly anecdotal counterpoint, if you discard ideological reasons and generous subsidies available in a few markets, I have no idea why anyone would buy an electric car right now. The range and the charging times are still an issue, especially if you don't live in California. The performance of most electric cars is abysmal (straight line speed may be all right, but cornering with the extra weight is just inferior) compared to traditional performance cars and while styling is subjective, the only electric car I've seen that wasn't outright ugly was the BMW i8, and that's a hybrid. That's not to mention the fact that they still carry a severe price premium in most markets. I realize my opinion will be highly controversial in the HN bubble, but I find it to be very common in real life, particularly outside the U.S. Like any future prediction, I'm probably way off, but to me it looks like on the list of vastly overhyped car trends pure electric cars are second only to self-driving cars. I'm sure they'll find specific markets (taxis, urban deliveries, etc.), but I don't see myself switching to an electric car for at least a decade, probably more.
- reaperducer 9y ago
  In the cities I've lived in over the last 15 years, probably 90% of the taxis have been hybrid. I've seen FedEx, and even Coca-Cola running electric delivery trucks in urban areas. I think a wholesale shift from gas/diesel to electric is a long way off, but certainly it seems that electric/hybrid is the end of compressed natural gas vehicles.
  - Animats 9y ago
    Shenzhen just converted their entire bus fleet, 30,000 buses, to all electric.
    - reaperducer 9y ago
      Seattle, Vancouver, and other cities with abundant hydroelectric power have had electric bus fleets since at least the 1960's. Probably earlier. The only difference now is that instead of running wires overhead, you have to install charging stations.
- 9y ago
reaperducer 9y ago
Building on your "lack of charging infrastructure," I think it's worth noting that there has been a huge shift from owning to renting in the last decade or so. It's easy to add an electric charger to a house you own, but if you rent the house or apartment, it's not going to happen. If you live in a newer apartment building, you might get lucky and they'll have chargers in the parking garage. But when I lived in such a building in Chicago, the chargers were ALWAYS full. It was a large building, and there were probably 40 or 50 of them across a five-story garage.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  Both California and Illinois mandate by law rentals allowing you to install a charger (at your cost). Other states have similar legislation pending.
  - chc 9y ago
    That doesn't seem like a very good deal, though. You have to pay a sizable chunk of cash to improve somebody else's property and insure it for a million dollars. That is a much worse proposition than installing a charger in your house. I'm not sure how useful it is to your average renter who is just looking to buy a car.
    - toomuchtodo 9y ago
      It’s a happy medium until we can improve on the situation.
    - plorkyeran 9y ago
      Installing a home charging station costs around $2000 these days. If you're buying a $30-60k car and move infrequently it won't be that huge of a portion of the total cost of ownership of the car.
      - Dylan16807 9y ago
        And a dryer outlet, which is plenty for home charging, is just a fraction of that much.
jsz0 9y ago
I think gasoline engines will stick around much longer than most people expect. They are a known commodity and many people have invested time and money into learning how to operate and maintain them. For example it's been brutally cold where I live lately and I know my gasoline engine works just fine in these conditions. If it fails to crank I know how to jump start it. I know to let it warm up a bit before turning high RPMs. I don't know anything about how electric cars would fare in these cold conditions. They may work just fine too but I have no experience to back that up. I'll learn at some point but a lot of people never will.
- funnelsgun 9y ago
  I agree, I think we have at least another one, perhaps two decades with gasoline engines. The sad news is that displacement will continue to get smaller, even in sports cars. The transition from the Porsche 981 to 718 is a great example of how to ruin the perfect sports car.
- codeulike 9y ago
  FYI, in cold weather this is what you need to do with an electric car: 1. Turn it on 2. Drive off Optionally, step 0: Use the app on your phone to tell the car to warm up, defrost the windscreen etc while you are in the house having breakfast. Range does suffer in cold temperatures; similarly ICE engines are less efficient in cold temperatures.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
tschwimmer 9y ago
I think cost is a big one too. Nearly all electric cars in the US could be considered 'Luxury' by price tag. The Leaf is an exception, but it also scores high on the factors you've listed so its lukewarm reception is understandable.
- codeulike 9y ago
  See also: Chevvy Bolt, Tesla Model 3

codeulike 9y ago

Agreed. I drive a Leaf and I think the switchover is going to come faster than people think. Nonetheless its an interesting article despite its slightly sniffy attitude to electrics because it highlights the scary predicament that the big automakers find themselves in.

jseliger 9y ago
I drive a Leaf and I think the switchover is going to come faster than people think Yes. That's the other thing: the best argument for an electric car is driving one—particularly a Tesla. The minute most of the population has access to one (from a friend, family, whatever), they're going to want one.
rconti 9y ago
Yeah. I've got a couple of good old fashioned regular performance cars here in the SF bay area. I'd love to have the excuse (read: carpool lane access, long commute, whatever) to buy an electric but there's just no "need" in my life for a new vehicle. That said, the penetration rate of electric vehicles as a proportion of new vehicles here is staggering. The Model S easily outsells any competitor's luxury car in the same class, you'd have to combine all A6 / 5 series / E Class sales to even hope to show the same numbers. And I can see why -- if you want to plunk down all this cash for a new car, why not get something truly new, not something outdated? My uncle is very frugal and has spent years looking at buying a new car and then up and ordered a (very base) Model S with the reasoning, if I'm spending all this money, I want to spend the money on future tech, not old tech. Even sitting in my 2016 car this morning, in the cold, I was thinking how silly it is that I have to wait for the coolant in the car to warm up before the heater starts blowing hot, and how funny all of the ICE cars look with steam coming out of the exhaust on a cold morning. It already feels out of date.
- codeulike 9y ago
  You might enjoy this tongue-in-cheek 'Test Drive of a Petrol Car' written by a Swedish Tesla owner back in 2015 http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-car/ http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-car/
  - BatFastard 9y ago
    That is fabulous!
- mikestew 9y ago
  It already feels out of date More than that, after six years of Leaf ownership it feels downright primitive. In our ‘81 VW it’s acceptable because, hey, it’s an old vehicle. You know, back when you could really feel what a car’s doing, blah, blah, blah. But in a modern $50K car? Turning mechanical gears to get that rattling contraption of an ICE going, gawd, I’m surprised you didn’t make me crank it by hand. To refuel it, I have to go out of my way to a specialist vendor? Not just plug it in when I get home? Sounds silly unless you’ve owned an EV, but it truly represents my feelings even when driving our smooth, reliable Scion. But as the old canard goes, if I have to explain then you wouldn’t understand.
  - funnelsgun 9y ago
    > You know, back when you could really feel what a car’s doing, blah, blah, blah. There is an argument to be made for this. In most new cars, whether ICE or electric, electric power steering racks have almost removed all feedback through the wheel. Feedback is good, it communicates what the wheels are doing, what the road surface is like, what traction is like, etc... and I'd argue that good steering feedback is important for safe driving.
    - mikestew 9y ago
      There is an argument to be made for this. There most certainly is, for a tiny, tiny minority of people who buy cars. That’s why I used it as example. Picture the older middle-aged guy going on about how “cars back then..” until your eyes glaze (and if you’ve met me, you’ll have a working example). Yeah, nobody cares, old man, my ‘08 Corolla was cheap. I already typed this before you deleted, so I’m putting it here. :-) In summary, I think “feel” matters to a small number of people. To those that notice (I count myself amongst them), it’s pretty important. To the vast majority of drivers I think that as long as the car gets them to work it’s good enough. The reason I used it as an example is because the ones I find that will argue the importance of “feel” are old, rambling guys like me. IOW, I was originally making of myself to some degree.
BackPropagate 9y ago
Your LEAF is a golf cart. Leaf people are gay.
smsm42 9y ago
I'm not sure how that would work. So far I see these obstacles/concerns: 1. Range. Right now I can drive ~400 miles on a fill. Can I get even close to that in EV? 2. Refills. I am pretty sure wherever I go, there would be a gas station within tens of miles. And I'm pretty sure most maps or GPS devices I would have would be able to point me to it. With electric car, not only I have to worry about finding charging station (or even plan the trip around its presence) but I'm not even sure how to find one. Would my GPS device show it? Would it work with my car (Tesla ones e.g. work only with Teslas)? Would I need some kind of subscription/registration to access it? I imagine being anxious about these things would be pretty annoying (unless it's already solved somehow - I have no idea). 3. Do I need to have charging station at home? What if I move - would I need to get a new one or pay to move it? What if I need to go somewhere at night and the car isn't charged yet? Would I need to buy special "fast charge" station? What if one day I'm too tired at the evening and forget to plug in the car for the night? 4. With ICE car, I am sure any competent mechanic would be able to take care of the most problems with my car. Electric cars are new, most mechanics had no training for them and no experience with them, and manufacturing solutions and practices would be very non-uniform - how I find the good service and how I make sure he doesn't use relative scarcity on the market to fleece me? 5. If I want to sell this car, what would the resale value be? Would I be able to resell it at all, or would it be the analogue of 5 year old smartphone, worth tiny fraction of the premium price it fetched only recently? 6. Wouldn't buying now, when the technology is still developing, lock me in with inferior first-try technology while superior one will show up in 5 years and make my car not only look like Flintstone's carriage but also drive its resale value down and maybe make it unusable due to chargers switching to newer superior standard of something? I'd like to hear how these concerns are resolved.
- jblow 9y ago
  1. My EV (Tesla Roadster, updated battery) goes 340 miles on one charge. Admittedly it is a small car. The new Tesla Roadster slated for 2020 goes 620 miles on one charge. Admittedly that is an expensive car. But you should be able to get good range in a less-expensive car at that point. 2. Newer Teslas (Model S, Model X, Model 3) have charger planning built into their standard map program. About other EVs, if I were an EV manufacturer I would do a license deal with Tesla to allow my cars to use their charging network. But maybe they'll build their own. The one Tesla built is pretty good ... if a small company can do that, GM can do way more, and do it faster. So even though "there's no infrastructure" has been raised as this huge problem for years, it does not in actuality look like much of a problem. 3. Good electric cars have their own charging circuitry built in, so you just plug it into the wall. You can even charge off 110 volts, though it takes a long time. A dryer socket is much more reasonable. Just being able to plug in your car, in your garage, is much more convenient than going to a gas station. (This presumes you have a garage to park in. If you park on the street, different story.) 4. Electric motors and drivetrains are much simpler and much more robust than mechanical engines and drivetrains. Electric cars just do not tend to need repair in the same way. (I have had my car for over 7 years and it has never yet needed a repair of this kind). 5. Tesla Roadsters still hold their value very well, considering. But this may be in part due to the fact that it's a rare car. I am not sure about the Leaf, etc. 6. Maybe, yeah.

nicoburns 9y ago

I thought it was interesting that the article focussed on trends in the US market, which seems the least EV-friendly (from what I hear, fuel prices are half what they are in the EU).

keldaris 9y ago

To offer a slightly anecdotal counterpoint, if you discard ideological reasons and generous subsidies available in a few markets, I have no idea why anyone would buy an electric car right now. The range and the charging times are still an issue, especially if you don't live in California. The performance of most electric cars is abysmal (straight line speed may be all right, but cornering with the extra weight is just inferior) compared to traditional performance cars and while styling is subjective, the only electric car I've seen that wasn't outright ugly was the BMW i8, and that's a hybrid. That's not to mention the fact that they still carry a severe price premium in most markets. I realize my opinion will be highly controversial in the HN bubble, but I find it to be very common in real life, particularly outside the U.S. Like any future prediction, I'm probably way off, but to me it looks like on the list of vastly overhyped car trends pure electric cars are second only to self-driving cars. I'm sure they'll find specific markets (taxis, urban deliveries, etc.), but I don't see myself switching to an electric car for at least a decade, probably more.

reaperducer 9y ago
In the cities I've lived in over the last 15 years, probably 90% of the taxis have been hybrid. I've seen FedEx, and even Coca-Cola running electric delivery trucks in urban areas. I think a wholesale shift from gas/diesel to electric is a long way off, but certainly it seems that electric/hybrid is the end of compressed natural gas vehicles.
- Animats 9y ago
  Shenzhen just converted their entire bus fleet, 30,000 buses, to all electric.
  - reaperducer 9y ago
    Seattle, Vancouver, and other cities with abundant hydroelectric power have had electric bus fleets since at least the 1960's. Probably earlier. The only difference now is that instead of running wires overhead, you have to install charging stations.
9y ago

reaperducer 9y ago

Building on your "lack of charging infrastructure," I think it's worth noting that there has been a huge shift from owning to renting in the last decade or so. It's easy to add an electric charger to a house you own, but if you rent the house or apartment, it's not going to happen. If you live in a newer apartment building, you might get lucky and they'll have chargers in the parking garage. But when I lived in such a building in Chicago, the chargers were ALWAYS full. It was a large building, and there were probably 40 or 50 of them across a five-story garage.

toomuchtodo 9y ago
Both California and Illinois mandate by law rentals allowing you to install a charger (at your cost). Other states have similar legislation pending.
- chc 9y ago
  That doesn't seem like a very good deal, though. You have to pay a sizable chunk of cash to improve somebody else's property and insure it for a million dollars. That is a much worse proposition than installing a charger in your house. I'm not sure how useful it is to your average renter who is just looking to buy a car.
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    It’s a happy medium until we can improve on the situation.
  - plorkyeran 9y ago
    Installing a home charging station costs around $2000 these days. If you're buying a $30-60k car and move infrequently it won't be that huge of a portion of the total cost of ownership of the car.
    - Dylan16807 9y ago
      And a dryer outlet, which is plenty for home charging, is just a fraction of that much.

jsz0 9y ago

I think gasoline engines will stick around much longer than most people expect. They are a known commodity and many people have invested time and money into learning how to operate and maintain them. For example it's been brutally cold where I live lately and I know my gasoline engine works just fine in these conditions. If it fails to crank I know how to jump start it. I know to let it warm up a bit before turning high RPMs. I don't know anything about how electric cars would fare in these cold conditions. They may work just fine too but I have no experience to back that up. I'll learn at some point but a lot of people never will.

funnelsgun 9y ago
I agree, I think we have at least another one, perhaps two decades with gasoline engines. The sad news is that displacement will continue to get smaller, even in sports cars. The transition from the Porsche 981 to 718 is a great example of how to ruin the perfect sports car.
codeulike 9y ago
FYI, in cold weather this is what you need to do with an electric car: 1. Turn it on 2. Drive off Optionally, step 0: Use the app on your phone to tell the car to warm up, defrost the windscreen etc while you are in the house having breakfast. Range does suffer in cold temperatures; similarly ICE engines are less efficient in cold temperatures.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

tschwimmer 9y ago

I think cost is a big one too. Nearly all electric cars in the US could be considered 'Luxury' by price tag. The Leaf is an exception, but it also scores high on the factors you've listed so its lukewarm reception is understandable.

codeulike 9y ago
See also: Chevvy Bolt, Tesla Model 3