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We've been reading headlines about Tesla, Nissan Leaf, and several other recent arrivals in the EV market the past few years, but the growth curves are starting to look very interesting:
We already wrote about the recent ZSW report that found that the world electric car market was up to 740,000 at the end of 2014. Other cool stats noted there included:
- China saw 54,000 electric cars registered in 2014, a growth of 120%.
- The US grew 69% to hit 290,000 total electric cars, about 39% of all electric cars on the road.
- Japan grew 45% to hit 110,000 total electric cars.
- The overall global electric car market saw a growth of 76%.
However, we missed sharing a big one, but thanks to reve putting it in a headline and a hat tip from Bob Wallace, we’re getting it now. Actually, you just saw it in the title: ~43% of the world’s electric cars were bought in 2014.
Coupled with the ongoing steep drop in the price of solar panels, we are quickly approaching an epochal tipping point in transportation, energy, and many other realms. My family is ready to switch to an EV as soon as a mass market car is available where we are. How about other Soylentils, do you plan to jump to an EV too, or hang on to your ICE?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by jmorris on Tuesday April 21 2015, @03:01AM
When I can buy an electric that can do the job of an ICE engine and not pay a price premium directly or indirectly by stealing from my neighbors to fund a subsidy, then and only then will I buy. That day is still a bit in the future for any hybrid I have looked at and still science fiction for all electric.
I only have one vehicle in the household, I can usually walk to work so the Mrs. can have the car most days and that has worked out so far. But we do drive beyond the range of every all electric (other than the insanely expensive toys from Tesla Motors aimed at the high end performance market) I have seen from time to time so until they can either go three hundred real miles on a charge or recharge over lunch, no sale. Also the infrastructure to recharge needs to be available out here in flyover country.
For a hybrid the additional cost of the hybrid drive needs to be less than the real world savings from the increase in fuel costs by remaining on ICE alone. These cost calculations must factor out the government subsidies, I refuse to base the decision on theft. I would even avoid buying (and being forced to benefit from the subsidy) if the difference were small in favor of the hybrid. A few hybrids are now selling well enough and for long enough the subsides are fading, hopefully this problem is starting to end.
When math meets most 'green' tech it turns out that you aren't saving money at all, or just getting other people's money redistributed to you by the government. What is usually being bought, at a hefty premium, is egoboo. The ability to preen to the neighbors about how greener than thou you are for owning one.
(Score: 2, Troll) by tftp on Tuesday April 21 2015, @06:18AM
I won't be waiting until the government cancels the tax credit. I own a Prius since 2005. Taxes are used to incentivize something that the society wants more of. Why should I reject the offer? Solar panels are also incentivized with a tax break - should I insist on burning coal instead? (I have solar panels as well, 6 kW of them.) I just do what I think is appropriate.
I bought a hybrid 10 years ago because I needed a new car, and this one was priced right, and offered significant savings. However after getting one I realized that it comes with yet another advantage - the electric CVT. It is extremely smooth and pleasant.
Today, were I looking for another vehicle, I can't buy an EV. It's hilly around here, and nobody has a calculator for effects of hills. I rarely drive more than 50-70 miles per day, but when I do it becomes 200 to 500 miles per day. No chargers anywhere - you are lucky to find gas on rural roads of CA and NV. Today a hybrid is the only type of a vehicle that fits the bill - it has unlimited range and it requires no charger at the parking. I do not want to worry every day about the battery in the car - I have enough other worries to deal with. There are too many scenarios that can leave you with no joules in the battery and no way to put them in. Rarely people choose something that costs more to run, but in return is less dependable than the alternative.
EVs are OK for some people, but those must fit a very specific niche. The owner of an EV must own a house with a garage. He has to work well within the range, considering inevitable side trips. He has to have a second vehicle for longer trips - to airport, to the beach, to a park, etc. He has to be always aware of the SOC of his car; he has to have a plan for the day when he returns home from work, plugs the EV to charge, and then his phone rings and his wife says that her car broke down 50 miles away and she needs to be picked up. The SOC of the EV is 30%, and it won't even get *there*, let alone the round trip. Those problems do not exist for owners of traditional and hybrid vehicles. An EV today is a special car for a special purpose. A few EVs that can do more cost so much that you would be better off calling a limo whenever you want to get anywhere, instead of buying them (these EVs will never justify their purchase price.)
Some say that if the price is low enough than even an EV with a small or moderate range becomes viable. Perhaps that is true; however they need to remember that each vehicle is individually taxed and insured. It costs real money to own a worthless car. People may not be able to afford a cheap EV if they have to have a second vehicle as a backup. That might work in some families, in some usage patterns, but this is yet another example of special circumstances.
I may need to move soon. I will be living in an apartment building. I won't have a garage anymore. Imagine what would I have to go through if, for some unfortunate choice, I own an EV? My choice of viable housing would be reduced from a hundred possibilities to maybe five; those would be high end places, and they will charge dearly for the pleasure of living and parking there. The EV would be enormously expensive to me; it might be even cheaper to get rid of it and buy a regular car. Fortunately, I do not face this problem - and I have no desire to. My car has no special requirements and can be fueled up at any gas station in about three minutes. This is the boat that most people are in. The remaining few... they enjoy their EVs because they work well for their specific needs. Should we expect to see more EVs sold? It depends on what they can do to people, and on what people need from their cars. Plenty of people who can have an EV and want to have an EV got an EV already. The rest are not interested. Growth of the EV market will be only driven by slow expansion of charging networks, chargers in apartment buildings and in the street, faster charging batteries. The needs of people aren't going to change drastically (unless everyone becomes unemployed and has nowhere to go.)
(Score: 5, Insightful) by RedBear on Tuesday April 21 2015, @09:32AM
Meanwhile, back in the real world, the entire fossil fuel industry is being subsidized to the tune of tens of billions of dollars a year [priceofoil.org]. Including a big chunk of my, you and your neighbors' taxes which either go directly to the oil industry in the form of huge multi-billion-dollar tax breaks and many other "subsidies", or go to support the military-industrial complex which largely exists to protect our nation's ability to have a constant supply of fossil fuels. We also subsidize corn like crazy, for both ethanol and food.
The few tiny subsidies that are grudgingly being applied to some "green" technologies here and there can -- like the actual NASA and public broadcasting budgets -- rightly be classified as "chump change" by comparison. I realize that it isn't that easy to truly grasp just how much every gallon of gas really costs because those costs have been with us for decades and are well-distributed and hidden throughout the global economy, but anyone who is still favoring fossil fuel vehicles over hybrids or EVs because of some piddly little tax incentive (that many people won't even fully qualify for) has a very tenuous relationship with reality.
The best thing you could possibly do to reduce your neighbors' tax bills is to help us all stop needing fossil fuels. There are plug-in hybrids on the market already with plenty of range suitable for your "flyover country" where you have limited charging options available. A good PHEV like the Chevy Volt or the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV will probably let you do 50-80% of your driving on electric even if you can only charge at home. Either can be charged from a regular outlet in a few hours (less than overnight) and have around 50 miles of electric range. The Outlander PHEV is being sold for the same price as the regular ICE version. No premium.
It's time to stop childishly referring to green technologies as being all about "egoboo". Open your eyes and learn about the real, quantifiable economic, societal, political and public health costs of fossil fuels. It doesn't matter how cheap the gas gets. We're all paying a hefty premium for every drop of it. The very idea that hybrids and EVs have a real premium attached in big-picture terms is laughable.
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ
(Score: 3, Informative) by mojo chan on Tuesday April 21 2015, @10:35AM
I have a Leaf as my primary car, haven't driven an ICE for nearly six months now. I regularly drive beyond the range of the battery; I simply charge it back up again. It's actually very convenient, as it charges while I'm at my destination (e.g. shopping) or while I'm getting a cup of coffee (rapid charging), and at the moment it's mostly free. I even get dedicated parking spaces, treated like royalty.
I feel much better about "stealing" from my neighbours to buy an EV than stealing from them to put heavily subsidised petrol in my car and then burn it and release the fumes for them to breathe in. Pollution is pretty bad in most UK cities.
Cost wise it's similar to other high spec medium sized cars once you factor in the fuel savings. Electricity is about 1/5th ro 1/6th the cost of liquid fuel in the UK, and the savings multiply if you start farming your own with solar panels. Obviously if you were planning to buy a second hand beat up Fiesta or a Kia something it is more expensive, but I wanted a nice car anyway. There are taxi firms that use them here too, and the savings are huge when you do 60-70k+/year.
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