From The Mirror we get a story of a fairly standard trip by EV. I drove 350 miles in a day in an electric car - the numbers didn't work
The journalist/author was given a loaner of Volvo C40 Recharge Twin Pro by Volvo to test out. This story is from the UK, so "footballing" refers to soccer.
Every few weeks, I embark on a 350-mile round trip from my home in Cornwall to Bristol for family and footballing reasons. The question wasn't whether the journey was possible, but rather how convenient it would be, the cost involved, and how it would compare in terms of time.
I'm not sure why this was published now, since the incident he recounts is from a few years ago. Maybe it is because a few years ago no one would publish anything bad about electric vehicles. See the conclusion below.
It is a long article that details issues of charging. Costs. Speed of charging. Range anxiety. Here is one example.
I finally arrived in Bristol just past 11am, about half an hour later than usual. Upon arrival, my charge was down to 35% with a range of 60 miles.
I hastily plugged in at a relative's house for a slow recharge using a standard three-pin plug. By 6.30pm, I had managed to add another 30 miles to the car's range, costing around £5.
That was the slowest way to charge of course, but the time and the cost were telling. Even at the cheapest way to charge, 30 miles cost £5, which is $6.74 at today's exchange rate.
For those frequently embarking on long journeys, the current high costs of service station chargers remain a significant hurdle, even more than two years since I did this drive. If I had relied solely on the 79p charger, for instance, my total cost would have skyrocketed to £130 - something like four times the cost of diesel.
This doesn't even factor in two other vital considerations - the car's price tag and its environmental impact.
He then goes on to ignore most of the environmental impact. Cobalt mining. Lithium mining. Neodymium mining. Nickle mining. ...
Hat tip goes to MGUY Australia and his video This REAL-WORLD EV road trip was AWFUL!
There's nothing like a good old real world road trip in an EV story to bring a smile to your face. You ride the roller coaster of emotions with the poor driver as they anxiously plan their trip around charging stations. The highs as they realize they might just make their destination before the battery runs out. And the lows when they realize the only charging station that can save them is broken.
About two years ago, two men (associated with something like Car & Driver) conducted a test.
ReplyDeleteUsing two identical brand new Ford pickup trucks, except one being electric, the other gasoline engine.
The first part of the test was simply to find maximum range on one fill up/electric charge.
The second half of the test was pulling a small camp trailer over the same route. All were highway miles. IIRC, it was on I-70.
The electric vehicle lagged in speed. Worse, driving up a grade severely reduced the range. Worse, the driver had to calculate on the fly if he could make it to the next charging station. The numbers kept changing and not in his favor. The state of charge as shown on his truck display bounced around so much that it was deemed unreliable. He did not complete the test. He had to turn around to go back to a charging station he had passed.
Worse, at no time in this second part of the test was the actual range more than 50% of the mfg's estimates.
In the western U.S. there are long and lonely stretches of highway. Factor in the cold of winter or the heat of summer and perhaps an EV should in no way be a consideration.
ReplyDeleteImagine arriving to a highway rest stop which your information says has a charging station. Imagine your sense of relief turning to horror when you see that lonely outpost has been vandalized for its copper.
It is also so sad that when you arrive at the broken charging station you can't call someone to bring you a jug of electric to get you to the next station. EV for anything beyond non-critical running around in town just does not work.
ReplyDeleteI'm waiting for the instance of, "We can't come to your house fire right now, we need to recharge our firetruck; we'll be there as soon as we can."
DeleteThere have been examples when the cops had to break off from pursuit of a bad guy because their EV didn't have the charge to maintain speed.
DeleteI wouldn't be surprised if that became a reason why the fuzz couldn't respond to a call.