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As a regular consumer, I am not sure what advantage electric cars provide that I should be champing at the bit to get one. If I had to get a new car today I’d g

As a regular consumer, I am not sure what advantage electric cars provide that I should be champing at the bit to get one. If I had to get a new car today I’d get a gasoline engine. I think the automakers see this and aren’t worried about “keeping pace”; while I guess electric is probably the future for political and resource exhaustion reasons, it’s not the immediate future.

hasdf 5y ago
if you have a garage there is the huge advantage of not having gas/oil fumes filling up your garage and seeping into your house. This was a big plus to me but I seem to be more sensitive to this then some people
Ekaros 5y ago
I would go with hybrid, probably not even plugin one. Was cheap when I got my current car, which with my current use should last decade. I really doubt we will actually hit the goals politicians are currently setting.
colinmhayes 5y ago
Have you driven an electric car? They're a much better driving experience. Silent, instant acceleration, never have to waste time at the gas station.
- Amezarak 5y ago
  My car is already very quiet, and I have never in around 20 years of driving put the accelerator anywhere near the floor anyway. I guess it’s “nice” to have better acceleration and I appreciate people drive differently than I do, but doesn’t accelerating hard waste charge in an electric car too? I visit a gas station about once a week for maybe five minutes, that’s another “I guess that would be nice”, but it doesn’t bother me and I would probably visit the convenience store part anyway, so it’s not worth any kind of electric car premium and I’m not sure about the downsides - what if I forget to charge at home overnight, getting a charger at home, what do I do when there’s a hurricane and no power for weeks, etc. Also, this is not limited to electric cars, but I have one car with a bunch of controls moved to the touchscreen and I’m never doing it again.
  - mcbits 5y ago
    > what do I do when there’s a hurricane and no power for weeks If I ever (can afford to) buy an electric car, this is actually the strongest selling point for me. It's enough of a reservoir to keep my most important electronics powered up for weeks.
    - Amezarak 5y ago
      My 'most important electronics' might be different than yours, they're my AC, well pump, and refrigerators/freezers. :) But yes, you can still run them for a while...as long as you're willing to make the tradeoff that you can't leave the house without losing power, and using the car as your home energy supply means trading transportation charge for power. That makes me uneasy. And of course, where I might be able to get in the car or my old beater truck, drive 50 miles, and come back with 50 gallons of gas, generator running for my family all the while, I guess recharging the battery would be...a much more troublesome venture. If gas stations have trouble with capacity during those times, then the length of the charging time is going to have a massive disparate impact on the lines on charging stations. It's going to be nightmarish. And I also have to think about husbanding my car charge so there's enough to leave and get recharged... I think the "car as backup generator" is a fantastic idea for those unpredictable short blackouts that happen once in a blue moon, just not for hurricanes. I probably would buy an electric car before I bought an automatic whole-home generator.
  - colinmhayes 5y ago
    The acceleration isn't about pedal to the metal, it's about the delay between pushing the gas and the car beginning to accelerate. Obviously none of these things are must haves, but imo and in the opinion of almost everyone I've asked, electric cars are more enjoyable to drive than ICE ones.
    - Amezarak 5y ago
      I think most people are pretty content to drive cars that are not "enjoyable" to drive. There are a lot of ICE cars out there much more fun to drive than the average commuter car. I don't think people other than car and maybe tech enthusiasts rate this factor very highly - which goes back to what I'm saying, I don't think the major car manufacturers are really losing out because they don't have a popular EV out right now. Even when I do hear about Teslas (I do not see very many here), people seem much more excited about the "it drives itself!" (invariably all have been majorly oversold on the capabilites of autopilot) and almost never mention the EV part. I do think automatic cruise control and lanekeeping are nice features particularly on very long drives, but those two in particular are widely available now.
- toast0 5y ago
  5 minutes at the gas station (10 minutes if Costco) every 400-600 miles is not too bad. How many charging sessions would that be, and how much time to plug and unplug? For my plugin hybrid, using gas is more time efficient (especially since I'd get a better electric rate if I charged at my outbuilding rather than my house, and that would add more walking time)
  - colinmhayes 5y ago
    It takes me 5 seconds to plus in when I park in my garage. Gas stations are also much worse in cold climates, definitely wouldn't be as big of a deal if lived somewhere where it wasn't freezing in the winter.
tootie 5y ago
I suppose if you aren't concerned with exhaust fumes, air quality or climate change.
- Amezarak 5y ago
  I observe that the vast majority of people are not worried about these things. Some of them do talk about it, but do not make even simple changes to their lives that would reduce their impact. (Single most important impact anyone can make: stop buying stuff you don't actually need.) In my area smog and air quality from exhaust is not a concern. I don't worry myself with climate change because it is not only inevitable, but an inevitable part of living on earth. We can try to shift and reduce our impacts, but we cannot eliminate them, and at any rate it's much too late for the CO2-caused climate change concerns. My buying one more ICE car does not matter. It doesn't affect my consumption behavior or that of most other people.

hasdf 5y ago

if you have a garage there is the huge advantage of not having gas/oil fumes filling up your garage and seeping into your house. This was a big plus to me but I seem to be more sensitive to this then some people

Ekaros 5y ago

I would go with hybrid, probably not even plugin one. Was cheap when I got my current car, which with my current use should last decade. I really doubt we will actually hit the goals politicians are currently setting.

colinmhayes 5y ago

Have you driven an electric car? They're a much better driving experience. Silent, instant acceleration, never have to waste time at the gas station.

Amezarak 5y ago
My car is already very quiet, and I have never in around 20 years of driving put the accelerator anywhere near the floor anyway. I guess it’s “nice” to have better acceleration and I appreciate people drive differently than I do, but doesn’t accelerating hard waste charge in an electric car too? I visit a gas station about once a week for maybe five minutes, that’s another “I guess that would be nice”, but it doesn’t bother me and I would probably visit the convenience store part anyway, so it’s not worth any kind of electric car premium and I’m not sure about the downsides - what if I forget to charge at home overnight, getting a charger at home, what do I do when there’s a hurricane and no power for weeks, etc. Also, this is not limited to electric cars, but I have one car with a bunch of controls moved to the touchscreen and I’m never doing it again.
- mcbits 5y ago
  > what do I do when there’s a hurricane and no power for weeks If I ever (can afford to) buy an electric car, this is actually the strongest selling point for me. It's enough of a reservoir to keep my most important electronics powered up for weeks.
  - Amezarak 5y ago
    My 'most important electronics' might be different than yours, they're my AC, well pump, and refrigerators/freezers. :) But yes, you can still run them for a while...as long as you're willing to make the tradeoff that you can't leave the house without losing power, and using the car as your home energy supply means trading transportation charge for power. That makes me uneasy. And of course, where I might be able to get in the car or my old beater truck, drive 50 miles, and come back with 50 gallons of gas, generator running for my family all the while, I guess recharging the battery would be...a much more troublesome venture. If gas stations have trouble with capacity during those times, then the length of the charging time is going to have a massive disparate impact on the lines on charging stations. It's going to be nightmarish. And I also have to think about husbanding my car charge so there's enough to leave and get recharged... I think the "car as backup generator" is a fantastic idea for those unpredictable short blackouts that happen once in a blue moon, just not for hurricanes. I probably would buy an electric car before I bought an automatic whole-home generator.
- colinmhayes 5y ago
  The acceleration isn't about pedal to the metal, it's about the delay between pushing the gas and the car beginning to accelerate. Obviously none of these things are must haves, but imo and in the opinion of almost everyone I've asked, electric cars are more enjoyable to drive than ICE ones.
  - Amezarak 5y ago
    I think most people are pretty content to drive cars that are not "enjoyable" to drive. There are a lot of ICE cars out there much more fun to drive than the average commuter car. I don't think people other than car and maybe tech enthusiasts rate this factor very highly - which goes back to what I'm saying, I don't think the major car manufacturers are really losing out because they don't have a popular EV out right now. Even when I do hear about Teslas (I do not see very many here), people seem much more excited about the "it drives itself!" (invariably all have been majorly oversold on the capabilites of autopilot) and almost never mention the EV part. I do think automatic cruise control and lanekeeping are nice features particularly on very long drives, but those two in particular are widely available now.
toast0 5y ago
5 minutes at the gas station (10 minutes if Costco) every 400-600 miles is not too bad. How many charging sessions would that be, and how much time to plug and unplug? For my plugin hybrid, using gas is more time efficient (especially since I'd get a better electric rate if I charged at my outbuilding rather than my house, and that would add more walking time)
- colinmhayes 5y ago
  It takes me 5 seconds to plus in when I park in my garage. Gas stations are also much worse in cold climates, definitely wouldn't be as big of a deal if lived somewhere where it wasn't freezing in the winter.

tootie 5y ago

I suppose if you aren't concerned with exhaust fumes, air quality or climate change.

Amezarak 5y ago
I observe that the vast majority of people are not worried about these things. Some of them do talk about it, but do not make even simple changes to their lives that would reduce their impact. (Single most important impact anyone can make: stop buying stuff you don't actually need.) In my area smog and air quality from exhaust is not a concern. I don't worry myself with climate change because it is not only inevitable, but an inevitable part of living on earth. We can try to shift and reduce our impacts, but we cannot eliminate them, and at any rate it's much too late for the CO2-caused climate change concerns. My buying one more ICE car does not matter. It doesn't affect my consumption behavior or that of most other people.