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I just don’t buy this argument as a reason people don’t want EVs. The primary benefit of an EV is that you ~never need to stop and “refuel” it unless you’re mak

by rafram 2y ago

I just don’t buy this argument as a reason people don’t want EVs. The primary benefit of an EV is that you ~never need to stop and “refuel” it unless you’re making a long road trip. You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit, and always have a full battery in the morning. When you do need to stop on a road trip, you can use fast charging, which is ~250 kW, so somewhere around a quarter of the gas pump’s “wattage.” You’ll probably want to use the bathroom/buy a drink anyway, so charging taking four-ish times as long as pumping isn’t really a big deal.

alephnerd 2y ago
> You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit Lots of people rent, and might not have a parking space with charging available. That said, battery and charging technology is evolving, so it might be a solved problem 10 years from now - especially as Toyota and Idemetsu Kosan are on track for mass producing Solid State EV batteries by 2028 [0] [0] - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/japans-idemitsu-build-lithium-sulphide-plant-help-support-toyotas-ev-plans-2025-02-27/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/japans-idemitsu-buil...
- rafram 2y ago
  Yeah, of course. I’m a renter, I understand. Some states [1] have laws allowing tenants to install chargers, although obviously not all renters have designated parking spaces. Where I live (NYC), most people rent and the idea of a “tenant parking space” is fairly foreign, but there are a decent number of EV chargers on the street in my neighborhood, so people make it work. [1]: https://americanlandlord.com/california-landlord-tenant-laws/california-landlord-must-allow-electric-vehicle-charging-station/ https://americanlandlord.com/california-landlord-tenant-laws...
dylanmulvaney 2y ago
[flagged]
hartator 2y ago
> unless you’re making a long road trip Yes, but that’s enough to really make road tripping on an EV a chore.
loloquwowndueo 2y ago
I don’t want an EV because it’s too freaking expensive. That’s basically the only reason at this point.
- tzs 2y ago
  In the US if you buy before the tax credits go away you can get a Chevy Equinox EV for around $27500.
- johnea 2y ago
  I bought a used 2023 Nissan Leaf for $15K. It had 18K miles on it, 150 miles of range on a full charge, and still 5 years on the battery warranty, and 2 years on the bumper to bumper warranty. I did admittedly find a good deal, but this is not unobtainium A friend wanted one of those licensed electric golf carts to drive around town, it cost more than my car. With off-peak charging, (and the cost of gasoline in San Diego) I expect the car to pay for itself in fuel savings in ~5 years. How many years will it take an inexpensive gasoline car to pay for itself?
  - loloquwowndueo 2y ago
    lol at that level of “good deal” one could find a recent low-mileage gas car for half what you paid. $7500k will pay for a lot of gas.
    - johnea 2y ago
      Yes, about 2 years worth at my 300 mile/week usage and San Diego $5/gal gas price. After which, the gas car continues to use gas, and I continue to save $3000/year by not buying gas... But your comparison is valid. You could also compare the saving of the small, gas efficient, car to the choice of buying giant, low milage truck or SUV. BTW, this good deal was not a once in a lifetime thing. I see EVs in this price range on craigslist routinely...
Uvix 2y ago
> You’ll probably want to use the bathroom/buy a drink anyway, so charging taking four-ish times as long as pumping isn’t really a big deal. That doesn't take nearly as long as charging, nor do I need to do it as frequently as I would need to charge. And even if it did, the places where you can do that, and the places with chargers, aren't the same. Maybe the US will get there in a decade (or two at current rates), but for now a PHEV seems like the best of both worlds.
- Electrcition234 2y ago
  [dead]
- vel0city 2y ago
  For the routes I take on road trips, this is already the way. Lots of nice rest stops with lots of EV charging. Some restaurants, clean bathrooms, convenience stores to buy whatever snacks, etc. I stop, go to the bathroom, grab a beverage, and by the time I'm back to the car I've got more than enough charge to hit the next stop. Coupled with Blue Cruise and road trips have never been so smooth and easy. And I'm in Texas, a place you wouldn't expect to be some EV mecca.
marcusb 2y ago
> The primary benefit of an EV is that you ~never need to stop and “refuel” it unless you’re making a long road trip. Maybe for some people. I bought an electric car in 2018 because I think over the long haul that, first, they'll be better for the environment and second, disentangle my country from foreign energy producers. Note: I'm not saying EVs or current battery tech are perfect in these ways now, just that I think they have better long-term potential, which will only be realized if people buy imperfect EVs today to justify investment in making them better tomorrow. All that said, while my family has never had a problem with charging on long-ish road trips (we like to take a break and get out and walk around,) I don't expect everyone to have the same attitude. Some people really don't like the idea of a 20-minute "fill up". What I'd really like to see - what I hope gets developed long term - is a fast-battery-pack swapping system. Bonus points for a standardized form factor from SAE or some similar standards body. This could solve a few problems: * Faster recharges on trips - potentially faster than filling up a gasoline or diesel vehicle. * Optimized energy use, at least to a certain extent. Battery packs could be charged off-hours to reduce load on the grid. * As part of the cost of swapping the pack, the charging station could take on responsibility for repairing the battery packs. Battery packs are the most expensive single component in most EVs, and I think some people do have anxiety on getting stuck with a five-figure repair bill if their battery pack goes bad. Obviously there's a lot to work out, both technologically, and vis-a-vis the business model of a battery swapping network.
- Epa095 2y ago
  The current bet is more towards even faster chargers, possibly with batteries supporting them in the back.
- dingnuts 2y ago
  The problem with battery packs is that batteries age. It's not like returning a propane tank and getting a full one. If you just bought your car and you go to refuel and they swap your once used battery pack with one that's seen ten thousand charge cycles you aren't getting a fair deal.
  - vel0city 2y ago
mattmaroon 2y ago
No, I’ve road tripped around the country with both types of vehicles. It’s delusional. And I’m not anti-EV by any means, I like them, but when you do need to use public charging, it sucks. The charger may be right on the on your route, which is nice, but it often isn’t. If it’s five minutes out of the way, that’s an extra 10 minutes on my trip +20 minutes of charging. That’s a half hour where a gas station would’ve been three minutes. There are a good amount of times when it is more than five minutes away. That’s extremely common and even supposes the chargers are available, I remembered to pre-condition the battery, etc. all of those are not given. And for preservation of battery life you’re really operating with 60% of the stated capacity because you’re keeping it between 20 and 80 all the time. So a 250 mile range is really 150. I have had it happen where I drive two hours, spend a half hour charging, rinse, repeat on a road trip.
- Electrcition234 2y ago
  [dead]
Ntrails 2y ago
> You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit, and always have a full battery in the morning I am fortunate enough to own 2 homes, and neither can do what you suggest since they don't have off street parking. I won't bother arguing the rest.
pseudocomposer 2y ago
I just got a RAV4 Prime (a “plugin hybrid” or PHEV). In EV mode, it has 40 or so miles of range. That’s high enough that I never need to use gas during the week, unless I go to the next city over. It’s also low enough that it can always fully charge overnight without a special circuit. If I need to go further, it just becomes a RAV4 Hybrid (with better performance - aka HV mode). No long waits or searching for chargers needed. Generally I put in maybe a half tank of gas ($15) once a month. Especially in the US, I really think PHEVs make much more sense than EVs. BYD seems to make some really nice ones, but we’re sadly hostile to them.
ta20240528 2y ago
'The primary benefit of an EV is that you ~never need to stop and “refuel”' I beg to differ: The primary benefit of an EV is that I am not handing over my hard-earned post-tax income for oil to countries that loath my way of life and my values. Some decisions in life should transcend economics.
- rafram 2y ago
  If you’re in the US, most oil is domestic, but obviously that doesn’t make it much better. (If you’re not, sorry - “my way of life and my values” is very US-coded language.)
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - ta20240528 2y ago
    In not in the US. If you are, then the analysis just goes down one level: do the people in the USA that sell you domestic fuel share your values. I submit you would be a lot better off with EVs for this reason alone.
jcranmer 2y ago
> When you do need to stop on a road trip, you can use fast charging, which is ~250 kW, so somewhere around a quarter of the gas pump’s “wattage.” You’ll probably want to use the bathroom/buy a drink anyway, so charging taking four-ish times as long as pumping isn’t really a big deal. Yeah, no. My gasoline car gets ~400 miles to a tank. Well, more than that: 400 miles is effectively the "no matter the circumstances [that cause gas mileage to be sapped], I can always guarantee making it at least that," not like EVs where the range number tends to be more of an aspiration than a reality. Admittedly, I have a small sedan which gets ~40mpg on the highway, but it takes less than 2 minutes to fill it up at the gas pump (about 100s IIRC, I did actually time it). Even derating for less fuel-efficient cars, you're comfortably extending your range by > 100 miles/minute of charging. The EV charging, by contrast, is going to run something like 200 miles/20 minutes. That's a multiplier closer to 10×, not 4×; it makes the time you need to stop to charge it much more considerable. But the range issue means I now have to slot an extra major stop. Sure, I can fill up during lunch. But that isn't enough to get me to my destination--I still have 5-6 hours of driving after lunch (sometimes more, since I like to take early lunches to avoid crowds). That extra stop takes longer than all of my bathroom breaks on the trip, combined. That's a not-insignificant amount of extra time on my trip. The other consideration is that, if you're trying to tell people to overlap charging with lunch, well have you seen how crowded the travel plazas get on a busy travel day? They can get so packed that every parking space is taken up. The fill-up-while-you-eat rule suggests that pretty much every single one of those parking spaces needs a charger, most of which don't have the room for a charger as it stands.
fumeux_fume 2y ago
Took a trip to Canada with my brother in his new EV. Trying to get an EV spot at the hotel was a nightmare and when one finally opened up, the charger was incompatible. Most charging stations weren't in convenient locations and the ones that were, were slow and required you to pay through an app. I'm not anti EV at all, but the experience of dealing with charging issues outside of the day to day routine was pure shite.
jjav 2y ago
> I just don’t buy this argument as a reason people don’t want EVs. These descriptions are unrealistic to our experience. We're on our third EV, so plenty of experience with this. It's always a pain to go anywhere outside a small area. Just this week my partner needed to go to a nearby city 2hrs away. Round trip too long for the EV. Luckily my office is halway there and has chargers, so stopped by for 2.5hrs to top up the batteries. That's a longer refueling stop than the whole trip. Faster chargers exist but they are few and far between, usually broken or taken, so finding one is an exercise in frustration. > You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit, and always have a full battery in the morning. It takes us three days to fill up the car at home if it gets really low, not having a special circuit. So if the car was used yesterday it won't be full this morning. The only way this works at all is because my partner normally only needs to commute about 30 minutes and only twice a week.

by rafram 2y ago

alephnerd 2y ago

> You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit Lots of people rent, and might not have a parking space with charging available. That said, battery and charging technology is evolving, so it might be a solved problem 10 years from now - especially as Toyota and Idemetsu Kosan are on track for mass producing Solid State EV batteries by 2028 [0] [0] - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/japans-idemitsu-build-lithium-sulphide-plant-help-support-toyotas-ev-plans-2025-02-27/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/japans-idemitsu-buil...

rafram 2y ago
Yeah, of course. I’m a renter, I understand. Some states [1] have laws allowing tenants to install chargers, although obviously not all renters have designated parking spaces. Where I live (NYC), most people rent and the idea of a “tenant parking space” is fairly foreign, but there are a decent number of EV chargers on the street in my neighborhood, so people make it work. [1]: https://americanlandlord.com/california-landlord-tenant-laws/california-landlord-must-allow-electric-vehicle-charging-station/ https://americanlandlord.com/california-landlord-tenant-laws...

dylanmulvaney 2y ago

[flagged]

hartator 2y ago

> unless you’re making a long road trip Yes, but that’s enough to really make road tripping on an EV a chore.

loloquwowndueo 2y ago

I don’t want an EV because it’s too freaking expensive. That’s basically the only reason at this point.

tzs 2y ago
In the US if you buy before the tax credits go away you can get a Chevy Equinox EV for around $27500.
johnea 2y ago
I bought a used 2023 Nissan Leaf for $15K. It had 18K miles on it, 150 miles of range on a full charge, and still 5 years on the battery warranty, and 2 years on the bumper to bumper warranty. I did admittedly find a good deal, but this is not unobtainium A friend wanted one of those licensed electric golf carts to drive around town, it cost more than my car. With off-peak charging, (and the cost of gasoline in San Diego) I expect the car to pay for itself in fuel savings in ~5 years. How many years will it take an inexpensive gasoline car to pay for itself?
- loloquwowndueo 2y ago
  lol at that level of “good deal” one could find a recent low-mileage gas car for half what you paid. $7500k will pay for a lot of gas.
  - johnea 2y ago
    Yes, about 2 years worth at my 300 mile/week usage and San Diego $5/gal gas price. After which, the gas car continues to use gas, and I continue to save $3000/year by not buying gas... But your comparison is valid. You could also compare the saving of the small, gas efficient, car to the choice of buying giant, low milage truck or SUV. BTW, this good deal was not a once in a lifetime thing. I see EVs in this price range on craigslist routinely...

Uvix 2y ago

> You’ll probably want to use the bathroom/buy a drink anyway, so charging taking four-ish times as long as pumping isn’t really a big deal. That doesn't take nearly as long as charging, nor do I need to do it as frequently as I would need to charge. And even if it did, the places where you can do that, and the places with chargers, aren't the same. Maybe the US will get there in a decade (or two at current rates), but for now a PHEV seems like the best of both worlds.

Electrcition234 2y ago
[dead]
vel0city 2y ago
For the routes I take on road trips, this is already the way. Lots of nice rest stops with lots of EV charging. Some restaurants, clean bathrooms, convenience stores to buy whatever snacks, etc. I stop, go to the bathroom, grab a beverage, and by the time I'm back to the car I've got more than enough charge to hit the next stop. Coupled with Blue Cruise and road trips have never been so smooth and easy. And I'm in Texas, a place you wouldn't expect to be some EV mecca.

marcusb 2y ago

> The primary benefit of an EV is that you ~never need to stop and “refuel” it unless you’re making a long road trip. Maybe for some people. I bought an electric car in 2018 because I think over the long haul that, first, they'll be better for the environment and second, disentangle my country from foreign energy producers. Note: I'm not saying EVs or current battery tech are perfect in these ways now, just that I think they have better long-term potential, which will only be realized if people buy imperfect EVs today to justify investment in making them better tomorrow. All that said, while my family has never had a problem with charging on long-ish road trips (we like to take a break and get out and walk around,) I don't expect everyone to have the same attitude. Some people really don't like the idea of a 20-minute "fill up". What I'd really like to see - what I hope gets developed long term - is a fast-battery-pack swapping system. Bonus points for a standardized form factor from SAE or some similar standards body. This could solve a few problems: * Faster recharges on trips - potentially faster than filling up a gasoline or diesel vehicle. * Optimized energy use, at least to a certain extent. Battery packs could be charged off-hours to reduce load on the grid. * As part of the cost of swapping the pack, the charging station could take on responsibility for repairing the battery packs. Battery packs are the most expensive single component in most EVs, and I think some people do have anxiety on getting stuck with a five-figure repair bill if their battery pack goes bad. Obviously there's a lot to work out, both technologically, and vis-a-vis the business model of a battery swapping network.

Epa095 2y ago
The current bet is more towards even faster chargers, possibly with batteries supporting them in the back.
dingnuts 2y ago
The problem with battery packs is that batteries age. It's not like returning a propane tank and getting a full one. If you just bought your car and you go to refuel and they swap your once used battery pack with one that's seen ten thousand charge cycles you aren't getting a fair deal.
- vel0city 2y ago

mattmaroon 2y ago

No, I’ve road tripped around the country with both types of vehicles. It’s delusional. And I’m not anti-EV by any means, I like them, but when you do need to use public charging, it sucks. The charger may be right on the on your route, which is nice, but it often isn’t. If it’s five minutes out of the way, that’s an extra 10 minutes on my trip +20 minutes of charging. That’s a half hour where a gas station would’ve been three minutes. There are a good amount of times when it is more than five minutes away. That’s extremely common and even supposes the chargers are available, I remembered to pre-condition the battery, etc. all of those are not given. And for preservation of battery life you’re really operating with 60% of the stated capacity because you’re keeping it between 20 and 80 all the time. So a 250 mile range is really 150. I have had it happen where I drive two hours, spend a half hour charging, rinse, repeat on a road trip.

Electrcition234 2y ago
[dead]

Ntrails 2y ago

> You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit, and always have a full battery in the morning I am fortunate enough to own 2 homes, and neither can do what you suggest since they don't have off street parking. I won't bother arguing the rest.

pseudocomposer 2y ago

I just got a RAV4 Prime (a “plugin hybrid” or PHEV). In EV mode, it has 40 or so miles of range. That’s high enough that I never need to use gas during the week, unless I go to the next city over. It’s also low enough that it can always fully charge overnight without a special circuit. If I need to go further, it just becomes a RAV4 Hybrid (with better performance - aka HV mode). No long waits or searching for chargers needed. Generally I put in maybe a half tank of gas ($15) once a month. Especially in the US, I really think PHEVs make much more sense than EVs. BYD seems to make some really nice ones, but we’re sadly hostile to them.

ta20240528 2y ago

'The primary benefit of an EV is that you ~never need to stop and “refuel”' I beg to differ: The primary benefit of an EV is that I am not handing over my hard-earned post-tax income for oil to countries that loath my way of life and my values. Some decisions in life should transcend economics.

rafram 2y ago
If you’re in the US, most oil is domestic, but obviously that doesn’t make it much better. (If you’re not, sorry - “my way of life and my values” is very US-coded language.)
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- ta20240528 2y ago
  In not in the US. If you are, then the analysis just goes down one level: do the people in the USA that sell you domestic fuel share your values. I submit you would be a lot better off with EVs for this reason alone.

jcranmer 2y ago

> When you do need to stop on a road trip, you can use fast charging, which is ~250 kW, so somewhere around a quarter of the gas pump’s “wattage.” You’ll probably want to use the bathroom/buy a drink anyway, so charging taking four-ish times as long as pumping isn’t really a big deal. Yeah, no. My gasoline car gets ~400 miles to a tank. Well, more than that: 400 miles is effectively the "no matter the circumstances [that cause gas mileage to be sapped], I can always guarantee making it at least that," not like EVs where the range number tends to be more of an aspiration than a reality. Admittedly, I have a small sedan which gets ~40mpg on the highway, but it takes less than 2 minutes to fill it up at the gas pump (about 100s IIRC, I did actually time it). Even derating for less fuel-efficient cars, you're comfortably extending your range by > 100 miles/minute of charging. The EV charging, by contrast, is going to run something like 200 miles/20 minutes. That's a multiplier closer to 10×, not 4×; it makes the time you need to stop to charge it much more considerable. But the range issue means I now have to slot an extra major stop. Sure, I can fill up during lunch. But that isn't enough to get me to my destination--I still have 5-6 hours of driving after lunch (sometimes more, since I like to take early lunches to avoid crowds). That extra stop takes longer than all of my bathroom breaks on the trip, combined. That's a not-insignificant amount of extra time on my trip. The other consideration is that, if you're trying to tell people to overlap charging with lunch, well have you seen how crowded the travel plazas get on a busy travel day? They can get so packed that every parking space is taken up. The fill-up-while-you-eat rule suggests that pretty much every single one of those parking spaces needs a charger, most of which don't have the room for a charger as it stands.

fumeux_fume 2y ago

Took a trip to Canada with my brother in his new EV. Trying to get an EV spot at the hotel was a nightmare and when one finally opened up, the charger was incompatible. Most charging stations weren't in convenient locations and the ones that were, were slow and required you to pay through an app. I'm not anti EV at all, but the experience of dealing with charging issues outside of the day to day routine was pure shite.

jjav 2y ago

> I just don’t buy this argument as a reason people don’t want EVs. These descriptions are unrealistic to our experience. We're on our third EV, so plenty of experience with this. It's always a pain to go anywhere outside a small area. Just this week my partner needed to go to a nearby city 2hrs away. Round trip too long for the EV. Luckily my office is halway there and has chargers, so stopped by for 2.5hrs to top up the batteries. That's a longer refueling stop than the whole trip. Faster chargers exist but they are few and far between, usually broken or taken, so finding one is an exercise in frustration. > You can install a charger at home, even a very slow one that doesn’t need a special circuit, and always have a full battery in the morning. It takes us three days to fill up the car at home if it gets really low, not having a special circuit. So if the car was used yesterday it won't be full this morning. The only way this works at all is because my partner normally only needs to commute about 30 minutes and only twice a week.