5 ms·

> Well, you don't see poor people buying EVs that much. You don't see poor people buying new cars that much. Which for now is pretty much the same thing as not

by audunw 6y ago

> Well, you don't see poor people buying EVs that much. You don't see poor people buying new cars that much. Which for now is pretty much the same thing as not buying EVs, since almost all EVs on the road are relatively new. That's starting to change here in Norway. There's a decent amount of used EVs entering the second-hand market. And if you can deal with the short range it's definitely preferable to buy one, since they're way more reliable than on older used ICE. The other things helping people buy cheaper EVs here is that it's easier to deal with the shorter range since you have fast charging stations everywhere now. So what needs to improve is: - More used EVs (just have to get middle class people to buy more EVs and wait 5-10 years) - Better charging infrastructure (again, get the middle class to buy EVs to help fund the build-out) - Cheaper EV batteries (again, just get whoever can to buy more EVs, to fund R&D and drive economies of scale) That's why it's so damaging when countries make EV incentives with caps. Just make it a percentage of the price (or cut all taxes) and don't worry about the benefits going to rich people buying luxury EVs. Increase income taxes on the rich instead if that's a problem. This is like the one case where trickle-down economics kind of work, since buying expensive EVs now makes future EVs and charging stations cheaper. And I think cheap BEVs will be a HUGE benefit to poor people in the future, since it saves on gas and maintenance costs in the long term.

baybal2 6y ago
> And I think cheap BEVs will be a HUGE benefit to poor people in the future, since it saves on gas and maintenance costs in the long term. I believe the same, if you race for the lowest cost possible, eventually an EV will be cheaper than the cheapest IC powered car for those exact reasons. ... But as I said above. Wuling MiniEV costs like $5500, which is cheaper than low-end Chinese petrol, or diesel engined sedans priced at $7000-$8000, but is still massively, massively outsold by IC cars in its price bracket despite China's massive subsidies for EVs, and quite draconian curbs on IC powered cars.
- Robotbeat 6y ago
  In part because the MiniEV has really low range (think first generation Leaf) whereas any IC car is gonna be like a Model 3 at least. 200 miles (on the EPA cycle) really is the minimum for a pure electric car IMHO. 250 miles, really. Otherwise it looks like less of a value than an IC car.
  - baybal2 6y ago
    Depends who you ask. For most people in the world, even 60km-80km will be more than enough.
  - yellowapple 6y ago
    It seems like there should be a removable gasoline or diesel generator purely for range extension. For day-to-day commutes and errands near home, leave the generator at home and save on weight. For long-distance trips, bring the generator with you.
tonyedgecombe 6y ago
> And I think cheap BEVs will be a HUGE benefit to poor people in the future, since it saves on gas and maintenance costs in the long term. I’ve been wondering whether the opposite is true. We might find the cost of replacing the battery puts a floor on the price of old EV’s. I wouldn’t be surprised if we are coming to the end of bangernomics.
- Qwertious 6y ago
  We already have million-KM batteries, and we're headed toward million-mile batteries. Even if the battery does die, I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of secondhand batteries with half a million Ks of mileage put up relatively cheap. You don't need to go straight to brand-new.
elihu 6y ago
The other way that EVs enter the market is that someone takes a gas-powered car and converts it to electric. It's not a particularly common thing to do, for multiple reasons. It's time consuming, expensive, and requires tools and space, and a certain amount of expertise or willingness to learn. The may be a lot of people who have the time, inclination, space, and access to tools to do a conversion but are blocked by the cost barrier. That probably includes at least some poor people. Mostly I'm thinking of young college-age people who might not necessarily be experiencing poverty but also don't have any significant wealth either. Maybe they live with their parents and are having trouble finding work. I'd like to see EV conversions have the same level of subsidy as OEM cars; that could make it a worthwhile and cost-effective endeavor for a lot of people. It could also provide jobs for local mechanics, for customers who don't want to do the work of converting the vehicle themselves. There are a lot of gas-powered cars on the road. They aren't all worth converting, but some of them are. It seems a waste to replace them all rather than convert the ones worth converting.
- yellowapple 6y ago
  There's also a bit of an annoyance w/ EV conversions, at least here in the US: automatic transmissions being pretty much ubiquitous. They're basically dead weight for an EV (which doesn't need to switch gears), and they further tend to have a lot of mechanical and electrical complexity. I suspect that if I ever convert my Highlander to an EV (which is something I'd like to investigate should its current drivetrain eventually give up the ghost), it'll likely entail needing to remove the transmission entirely (and maybe replace it with a fixed gearbox of some sort?). And given that it's AWD, that complicates things further, since there are very few AWD/4WD EV conversions. That said, if there are solutions to this problem, and said solutions prove viable, then this makes EV conversion a lucrative business, and opens it up to most cars on American roads.
  - elihu 6y ago
    Transmissions aren't entirely dead weight; being able to switch gears means you can get away with using a smaller motor than you otherwise would. You also don't need to worry quite so much about getting a motor rated for super high RPM. Converting something with a manual is probably easier than an automatic (especially if there's some software controlling when to shift the automatic based on some engine sensors which aren't there anymore), but there's no fundamental reason why you couldn't just keep the transmission even in an automatic. Especially if bolting a motor on where the engine was is far simpler than re-engineering half the drive train. (You might be able to get rid of or disable the torque converter, though.) At this point I think the biggest roadblocks to EV conversion are cost and availability of parts so you don't have to design and build everything from scratch. And I think subsidizing conversions would help with both of these. If there's a big enough market, you might even get reasonably priced kits (possibly from the original vehicle manufacturer) that has everything you need including battery boxes and can be installed by someone who's done it before in less than a week. (Battery boxes are usually the most difficult and time consuming part of a conversion, since they're usually constructed in an ad-hoc way to fit whatever battery you're using into wherever they would fit. Having something that's actually engineered and possibly even crash tested would be great.)

by audunw 6y ago

baybal2 6y ago

> And I think cheap BEVs will be a HUGE benefit to poor people in the future, since it saves on gas and maintenance costs in the long term. I believe the same, if you race for the lowest cost possible, eventually an EV will be cheaper than the cheapest IC powered car for those exact reasons. ... But as I said above. Wuling MiniEV costs like $5500, which is cheaper than low-end Chinese petrol, or diesel engined sedans priced at $7000-$8000, but is still massively, massively outsold by IC cars in its price bracket despite China's massive subsidies for EVs, and quite draconian curbs on IC powered cars.

Robotbeat 6y ago
In part because the MiniEV has really low range (think first generation Leaf) whereas any IC car is gonna be like a Model 3 at least. 200 miles (on the EPA cycle) really is the minimum for a pure electric car IMHO. 250 miles, really. Otherwise it looks like less of a value than an IC car.
- baybal2 6y ago
  Depends who you ask. For most people in the world, even 60km-80km will be more than enough.
- yellowapple 6y ago
  It seems like there should be a removable gasoline or diesel generator purely for range extension. For day-to-day commutes and errands near home, leave the generator at home and save on weight. For long-distance trips, bring the generator with you.

tonyedgecombe 6y ago

> And I think cheap BEVs will be a HUGE benefit to poor people in the future, since it saves on gas and maintenance costs in the long term. I’ve been wondering whether the opposite is true. We might find the cost of replacing the battery puts a floor on the price of old EV’s. I wouldn’t be surprised if we are coming to the end of bangernomics.

Qwertious 6y ago
We already have million-KM batteries, and we're headed toward million-mile batteries. Even if the battery does die, I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of secondhand batteries with half a million Ks of mileage put up relatively cheap. You don't need to go straight to brand-new.

elihu 6y ago

The other way that EVs enter the market is that someone takes a gas-powered car and converts it to electric. It's not a particularly common thing to do, for multiple reasons. It's time consuming, expensive, and requires tools and space, and a certain amount of expertise or willingness to learn. The may be a lot of people who have the time, inclination, space, and access to tools to do a conversion but are blocked by the cost barrier. That probably includes at least some poor people. Mostly I'm thinking of young college-age people who might not necessarily be experiencing poverty but also don't have any significant wealth either. Maybe they live with their parents and are having trouble finding work. I'd like to see EV conversions have the same level of subsidy as OEM cars; that could make it a worthwhile and cost-effective endeavor for a lot of people. It could also provide jobs for local mechanics, for customers who don't want to do the work of converting the vehicle themselves. There are a lot of gas-powered cars on the road. They aren't all worth converting, but some of them are. It seems a waste to replace them all rather than convert the ones worth converting.

yellowapple 6y ago
There's also a bit of an annoyance w/ EV conversions, at least here in the US: automatic transmissions being pretty much ubiquitous. They're basically dead weight for an EV (which doesn't need to switch gears), and they further tend to have a lot of mechanical and electrical complexity. I suspect that if I ever convert my Highlander to an EV (which is something I'd like to investigate should its current drivetrain eventually give up the ghost), it'll likely entail needing to remove the transmission entirely (and maybe replace it with a fixed gearbox of some sort?). And given that it's AWD, that complicates things further, since there are very few AWD/4WD EV conversions. That said, if there are solutions to this problem, and said solutions prove viable, then this makes EV conversion a lucrative business, and opens it up to most cars on American roads.
- elihu 6y ago
  Transmissions aren't entirely dead weight; being able to switch gears means you can get away with using a smaller motor than you otherwise would. You also don't need to worry quite so much about getting a motor rated for super high RPM. Converting something with a manual is probably easier than an automatic (especially if there's some software controlling when to shift the automatic based on some engine sensors which aren't there anymore), but there's no fundamental reason why you couldn't just keep the transmission even in an automatic. Especially if bolting a motor on where the engine was is far simpler than re-engineering half the drive train. (You might be able to get rid of or disable the torque converter, though.) At this point I think the biggest roadblocks to EV conversion are cost and availability of parts so you don't have to design and build everything from scratch. And I think subsidizing conversions would help with both of these. If there's a big enough market, you might even get reasonably priced kits (possibly from the original vehicle manufacturer) that has everything you need including battery boxes and can be installed by someone who's done it before in less than a week. (Battery boxes are usually the most difficult and time consuming part of a conversion, since they're usually constructed in an ad-hoc way to fit whatever battery you're using into wherever they would fit. Having something that's actually engineered and possibly even crash tested would be great.)