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Personally (in the UK) I don't have an EV because I only drive about 2000 miles a year. Even with our high petrol prices, it's still not worth paying the EV pre

Personally (in the UK) I don't have an EV because I only drive about 2000 miles a year. Even with our high petrol prices, it's still not worth paying the EV premium versus a "cheap run-around" ICE car. While I do drive below the UK norm, the the mode miles per car is only get about 3500 miles per year and the median about 7000. Last time I looked into it (which admittedly was during COVID crazy car price era), when comparing cars lb for lb, it only really made sense to get an EV if you plan to drive it more than 10k miles per year. High electric prices don't help. That being said, I'd imagine for most people the decision as to which sort of car to buy is more about emotion and presentation than it is about cold hard logic.

thebruce87m 2y ago
> High electric prices don't help. Octopus gives me 7.5p per kWh at night, working out about 3p/mile for me vs about 12p/mile for my old diesel. Not sure how you got 10k miles, but every mile is cheaper if you just look at fuel and can charge at home.
- cameronh90 2y ago
  I did say the electricity prices don't help, not that they were the sole determining factor. If electricity was 3p/kWh, the crossover point would be a lot sooner. The main difference is the depreciation of the car itself and, surprisingly, the insurance which for me was quite a bit higher on every EV I looked at. For an EV that's equivalent in spec to an older efficient and ULEZ-compliant petrol car, the EV is more expensive and has higher depreciation costs. Since I only drive a few thousand miles, I only spend a few hundred pounds per year in petrol, but even at 10k miles I'd only be spending roughly 1200 GBP with my decently efficient engine, compared to 400 GBP with an EV, which isn't a huge saving. That also assumes I always charge at home, which would not be the case as my driving pattern is usually 1 or 2 miles a week locally with the occasional 300+ mile trip. I assume you're probably using Octopus Go for that price, so you'd have to account for the fact that it makes your electricity more expensive through the rest of the day too for it to be a fair comparison. That being said, I personally use Octopus Agile, which makes it really hard to figure out precisely how much it'd end up costing me.

thebruce87m 2y ago

> High electric prices don't help. Octopus gives me 7.5p per kWh at night, working out about 3p/mile for me vs about 12p/mile for my old diesel. Not sure how you got 10k miles, but every mile is cheaper if you just look at fuel and can charge at home.

cameronh90 2y ago
I did say the electricity prices don't help, not that they were the sole determining factor. If electricity was 3p/kWh, the crossover point would be a lot sooner. The main difference is the depreciation of the car itself and, surprisingly, the insurance which for me was quite a bit higher on every EV I looked at. For an EV that's equivalent in spec to an older efficient and ULEZ-compliant petrol car, the EV is more expensive and has higher depreciation costs. Since I only drive a few thousand miles, I only spend a few hundred pounds per year in petrol, but even at 10k miles I'd only be spending roughly 1200 GBP with my decently efficient engine, compared to 400 GBP with an EV, which isn't a huge saving. That also assumes I always charge at home, which would not be the case as my driving pattern is usually 1 or 2 miles a week locally with the occasional 300+ mile trip. I assume you're probably using Octopus Go for that price, so you'd have to account for the fact that it makes your electricity more expensive through the rest of the day too for it to be a fair comparison. That being said, I personally use Octopus Agile, which makes it really hard to figure out precisely how much it'd end up costing me.