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Comment on xkcd #3214: Electric Vehicles

surewhynotlem@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

Must be a Europe thing. I ran the numbers in America and avoiding gas cost (vs electric cost per mile) means the car paid for itself after 30k miles. And that’s ignoring that it needs no maintenance.

I thought European gas was expensive. Is the electricity over there also really pricey?

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SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

car paid for itself after 30k miles.

I bought a used hybrid in 2020 when gas was cheap. It’s already 100% paid for itself.

People are morons and don’t do the 5 year math on what a vehicle costs to run.

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AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
It depends where you live. We have cheap gas and I live in an area with one of the more expensive prices for electricity (and there are worse), but “filling up” at home is much cheaper than “filling up” my ice car.

However

yes, we only have expensive EVs here. You can make up an extra $5k of purchase price with money saved on operations, but $10k or more is much harder

trip chargers are already in a race for exploitation, profit seeking. Except for Tesla, prices are high, maintenance is low, and they compete for trapping customers more than attracting them

since EVs became political we are currently off balance between supply and demand, so used cars are over supplied and lost much value. The quickly changing technology just makes it worse
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- surewhynotlem@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  
  so used cars are over supplied and lost much value
  
  Perfect time to buy one then
  
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  - AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    Yes, I’ve argued that too. While there is the factor of fast changing technology, I think used EVs are a great buy right now.
    
    I’m not in the market for an additional car although I’ve actually been tempted anyway …. I have two college kids sharing my old Subaru and it would prevent a lot of fights if I had another old vehicle for them
    
    Then again my older kid just applied for a summer job with like 90 miles each way commute so may not be appropriate for limited or unknown range
    
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  - SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    This is Lemmy, no onecan buy a used car. not possible.
    
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turboSnail@piefed.europe.pub ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
Depreciation is a massive slice of the pie in all cars, but EVs are hit even harder. Buying a used EV is probably my best bet in about 5-10 years from now.

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- surewhynotlem@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  TCO is even better for electric. Near zero maintenance. The depreciation is real, but only if you plan to sell it at it’s half life. If you plan to hold it a long time, depreciation evens out.
  
  My EV is ten years old and cost $30k. It’s paid for itself twice over in just gas. More if I factor in the zero maintenance (not totally zero. I changed the tires a few times and had to replace a trunk component). The resale on it is about $8k lower than an equivalent ICE. But for me, the EV was a good deal.
  
  I’d definitely recommend getting a used one though. I bought mine new, and that makes the numbers worse.
  
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  - AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    
    The depreciation is real
    
    It’s not though, or it is currently. It wasn’t too many years ago that teslas kept their value more than any other car. I’d argue this is a temporary market condition that is only valid for decisions now but is not predictably valid
    
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    surewhynotlem@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    I lean the other way. I think Tesla valuation was artificially hyped and manipulated. The car’s valuation was luxury priced and tied to Elons personality. And that tanked. So I personally don’t think that was normal or ever coming back.
    
    I think the current conditions are also abnormal, with EV becoming political and a horse running amok in the white house.
    
    The normal depreciation is probably in the middle. But when are things ever normal anymore?
    
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  - turboSnail@piefed.europe.pub ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    The way I see it, rich people can buy new cars. Everyone else who needs one should consider buying a used one instead. After a few years, depreciation isn’t quite so rapid any more, which makes TCO less of a burden.
    
    Maintenance expenses do increase as the car ages, but as long as it isn’t like 25 years old, it’s not completely absurd. Currently, I’m looking to buy something that is about 5 years old, and then sell it when it begins to require frequent maintenance. That way, I should be able to avoid the two expensive extremes.
    
    However, there’s another nasty twist. Cold environment will murder the NMC cells in no time. Not too long ago, I had to leave my car in a cold parking lot for a long time, and when I got back it was about -30 °C. Fortunately, I don’t need to abuse the engine this way any more than maybe twice every year. Oh, boy did it sound unhappy with that cold start, but it managed it anyway. If I had an EV, I would probably need to leave it at home, and take a bus for horribly timed trips like that.
    
    Let’s say, about 6 times a year, I’ll have badly timed trips, with temperatures hovering around +5…-15 °C: That isn’t a complete disaster for EVs, but it’s still very bad for the cells. Some cars have a built-in heating system for the battery, so I guess that feature would see frequent use. When I’m eventually buying a use EV, having a battery heating system is going to be a completely non-negotiable feature.
    
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    AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    
    temperatures hovering around +5…-15 °C
    
    We’ve just come off a cold streak like this and I have to say it was no big deal.
    
    Obviously I don’t know of there are long term effects on the battery but
    
    most/all EVs have active thermal management now so will maintain a healthy temperate while in use
    
    my decision point on technology maturity was when they started using heat pumps rather than resistive heat. That’s still too rare but makes a huge impact on cold weather range
    
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- exasperation@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  
  Depreciation is a massive slice of the pie in all cars, but EVs are hit even harder.
  
  I think that’s a quirk of Tesla trying to preserve market share by aggressively cutting prices of their new models over the past 5 years, which naturally puts pressure on all used models on the road. I don’t think that can last.
  
  If EV manufacturers are racing to compete on price, then the new EVs will get cheaper faster to where EVs are cheaper than ICE vehicles new. And if the EV manufacturers stop cutting prices, then that will alleviate that depreciation pressure.
  
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  - turboSnail@piefed.europe.pub ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    I guess an update is in order. I was thinking of a calculation that is already several years old. I can’t even find it any more, but it had three options: small gasoline powered ICE car, hybrid and a fully electric one. Can’t remember if the latter one was Tesla, Toyota, BMW or something. Anyway, at that time, TCO of a small gasoline powered car was a bit lower that that of a hybrid or a fully electric one.
    
    The final tipping point will be when the demand for EVs exceeds the demand for other car types. When that happens, depreciation of gasoline cars will increase dramatically, giving EVs a lower TCO. At the moment, charging infrastructure seems to be the bottle neck for a many people, so that’s why we haven’t gone past the tipping point yet. The real bottle neck here is actually the electrical grid, and upgrading that will take many years, if not decades. We could install more charging stations, but that would break the whole grid, so that’s why we have to limit their number in specific parts of the grid.
    
    The price of a new EV is obviously going to decrease in the future, as every step along the chain ramps up production. Alternative battery chemistries play a role as well, now that LFP cars have finally entered the market. I’m also looking forward to seeing how Na-ion batteries affect the prices, but that’s still going to take a many years. I expect that in about 5-10 years the prices of cheap EVs will be a lot lower than they are today.
    
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    exasperation@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    The economics are basically always shifting. Real world depreciation and maintenance don’t always follow the model projections, and neither do actual fuel/energy price projections. Electricity service has skyrocketed in a lot of places in recent years, while gasoline prices have remained pretty low, which obviously affects the accuracy of the calculations and modeling that were done 5 years ago. Not to mention, both gasoline and electric energy pricing vary heavily between place.
    
    And, of course, the ever changing regulatory landscape might affect pricing and resale value, as well.
    
    Plus the thing with cars is that most people aren’t buying the absolute bare minimum they can afford. People are willing to spend more on things: passenger and cargo space, performance, aesthetics, features/comfort, exterior dimensions that fit their own needs (for example, people who live in a city and want a car that can fit in tiny spaces), etc. For someone who is looking at total cost of ownership of something like mid tier or even luxury model, they should be comparing specific models they’d consider.
    
    Ultimately, people need to do the calculation for their own specific situations. Someone in the market for a minivan in Detroit is gonna have different considerations than the person looking for a pickup truck in Dallas or a luxury sedan in Los Angeles or an economy car in Honolulu.
    
    And as things shift, we’ll likely see more people make the decisions that are right for themselves in that particular moment. Including people who want to pay more for something not directly financially beneficial to themselves, whether it’s the driver who wants a manual transmission and the sounds of a revving internal combustion engine, or the person who would rather spend a little bit of extra money to do something more for climate change. Or the person who wants to boycott Elon Musk and will spend a bit more getting another non-Tesla EV.
    
    At this point, my next car is almost certainly an EV, but I’m not going to prematurely sell my current car to make it happen.
    
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