# Are electric cars here to stay? I don't think so. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 8, 2012, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382 "2012-11-08T18:03:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2012, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/101 "2012-11-19T21:42:01Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > And how do they trend outside the US? IME to minimizing commute, but I’ll admit I haven’t bothered look for citeable papers. His cite does not say what he think it does. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2012, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/102 "2012-11-19T21:46:40Z")
So what happens to you if you own a Fisker EV? When the mfg. goes bankrupt, who services your car/turkey? Since the US Government paid over $200 million into Fisker, do you have some kind of subordinated claim?:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2012, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/103 "2012-11-19T23:23:39Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > Do they have a charger at the hospital? Who would you call to find out? Can they guarantee that the one token charger they installed will be free when you arrived? It won’t always be just one and “token”. The idea is to have them everywhere, more ubiquitous than service stations are today. You can conceivably have chargers at every single parking space, where parking meters used to stand, as well as in public multilevel carparks like at hospitals, supermarkets, airports, etc. > [@Diceman](#): > > This is a basic problem with electric cars, which I don’t see going away in the forseeable future. “Refueling” the car becomes something you need to plan for, and allot time for. With a gasoline car, you can stop at any local gas station you happen to be wandering past, and leave \<5 minutes later with a full tank. Electric cars are simply less convenient. You don’t see [this](http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2012/04/nissan-adopts-15-electric-car-chargers-in-california/1#.UKq99K7_k5s) in the foreseeable future? Like, within 10 years? Or does your “foreseeable future” only stretch to next March? There was a time when there weren’t any local gas stations, and then popularity of cars created demand. The same needs to happen for EVs, and all of you who reject them based on how things are now are being ridiculously short-sighted. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/104 "2012-11-20T00:50:23Z")
The who you call to find out is “[there is an app for that](http://www.plugincars.com/maps-apps-how-find-charging-stations-wild-107378.html).” Nevertheless the point is valid - buying a pure EV right now, especially from a new company that may or may not survive long term, involves a certain amount of uncertainty, that is unquantifiable risk. Will public chargers become more commonplace? Will the battery last the life of the car? If not how much will it cost to replace? We can create best and worst case scenarios but the spread between the two is wide and best guesses vary depending on who is doing the guessing. Again a pure BEV will be a good choice only for a few, those who have no real need for that car to travel farther than the range can comfortably handle. Meanwhile PHEVs will fit more peoples needs and public chargers will be used by them at first. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/105 "2012-11-20T02:17:44Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > And how do they trend outside the US? IME to minimizing commute, but I’ll admit I haven’t bothered look for citeable papers. Even in the US the regions are so different. There is nothing in the midwest that remotely resembles the city of New York. And the same can be said for places out west. You’re an hour’s drive from the middle of frickin nowhere. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/106 "2012-11-20T02:24:54Z")
> [@phreesh](#): > > Sorry, I agree with almost your entire post, but I don’t think 35% constitutes the vast majority of anything. > > But, to counter my counter, even if _only_ 35% of American households get an electric car, that’s more than enough vehicles to incent the creation of electric refueling infrastructure and technology that would make the refueling issue a moot point. That’s only true if you can recharge the battery quicker. Nobody is going to want a car that takes hours to recharge when taking a long trip. Faster charging batteries cheaper batteries That’s what it’s going to take for pure electrics to become mainstream. In the meantime a cheaper battery for extended range hybrids is needed to span the gap. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/107 "2012-11-20T09:42:51Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > It won’t always be just one and “token”. The idea is to have them everywhere, more ubiquitous than service stations are today. You can conceivably have chargers at every single parking space, where parking meters used to stand, as well as in public multilevel carparks like at hospitals, supermarkets, airports, etc. how many gas stations would there be if every house in America came equipped with a gas pump? who is going to spend the money to upgrade our electric infrastructure and install millions of chargers when 95% of charging happens at home? ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/108 "2012-11-20T11:42:32Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > who is going to spend the money to upgrade our electric infrastructure and install millions of chargers when 95% of charging happens at home? I’m not sure. As an ordinary guy who lives in a country that seems to be largely ignoring the EV issue almost entirely (Australia), those are details I am not privy to. Ask [these guys](http://www.afdc.energy.gov/fuels/electricity_infrastructure.html), because they’re hoping for the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Saraya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@Saraya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saraya)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/109 "2012-11-20T12:27:54Z")
> [@Michael63129](#): > > (there’s better ones than corn though, but this will become less viable as food demand increases, already is a shame how much of the U.S. corn crop goes to making automobile fuel when it could be exported to Africa or other areas that need it)… The only shame is that it’s sent off to a place in the world that’s not America’s responsibility. The amount of problems with resource projection and protection that the U.S. faces could be countered easily if they’d stop dumping their time and money into foreign nations (military or non). ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/110 "2012-11-20T12:47:42Z")
95% of charging or 95% of vehicles? Not even the more enthusiastic EV supporter expects a 95% penetration for many many decades. Many analyses have already concluded that the current generation infrastructure can easily handle something like 60 to 85% (I’d need to find the original cites for exact numbers) of a switch to EVs just by utilizing current overnight low demand periods. The potential infrastructure problem actually occurs at the substation level if significant “clustering” occurs - one neighborhood going almost all EV quickly. That would require substation upgrading and/or some distributed generation. My 110 charger (enough for my needs) comes with the car. A 220 one would run me a thousand or so and I could get one that could travel with me when I move (one that just plugs into a 220 outlet so long as it is a dedicated line), and of course would outlast the life of the vehicle. Of course if one thinks that cheap gas will last forever and that the consequence of using it is a cost not worth avoiding then such is a silly thing to do. If one does not believe those things then the these are modest investments and regular grid upkeep will include substation improvements along the way. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2012, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/111 "2012-11-20T13:30:37Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I’m not sure. As an ordinary guy who lives in a country that seems to be largely ignoring the EV issue almost entirely (Australia), those are details I am not privy to. Let’s turn the question around. You can recharge your car at $0.10 per KWh at home, while you sleep. 95% of your driving is within the base range of your new EV. Are you going to make a habit of visiting 3rd party charging stations who are going to charge you a premium, in order to cover their cost and profit? Why would you? There is no benefit to going to a 3rd party for daily driving, you’re going to plug in at home anyway, it costs less, and you don’t have to deal with payment and hooking up the car while you’re out. The only benefit is extending your range, and the vast majority of the time you don’t have to. It’s ultimately a small market, as ranges increase it gets even smaller as less daily driving goes past the range of a full charge. Roadside charging also, as DSeid mentioned, does not take advantage of overnight demand, you’re charging during a period of high use. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2012, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382/112 "2012-11-21T01:58:01Z")
Interestingly enough plug-in hybrid and EREV owners [are _more likely_](http://green.autoblog.com/2012/10/26/ev-project-finds-plug-in-hybrid-owners-more-likely-to-use/) to use public chargers than pure battery electric vehicle owners are. > [@](#): > > The public-private, multi-year EV Project is gives away Blink home-charging stations to plug-in vehicle drivers of cars in both of these plug-in electric categories, embodied in both the Chevrolet Volt and Nissan Leaf. According to the data – collected over 43 million plug-in miles – Leaf drivers are choosing to charge more at home – 89 percent of the time and are plugging in 1.1 times per day – while Volt drivers plug in away from home 21 percent of the time (compared to 11 percent for Leaf drivers) and tend to charge 1.5 times per day. > > Part of the reason is that the Nissan Leaf has about twice the battery-powered range, around 70-80 miles, than the Chevy Volt, which tends to go around 35-40 miles on battery power. It only makes sense that Leaf owners would be charging more at home, often plugging in when they come from work and unplugging before leaving the next time. Volt owners pay more for their extended range car, but then apparently want to drive more miles on electricity than gasoline to save money. This year, the US auto market has been seeing more plug-in hybrids purchased than pure electric vehicles and the ratio of plug-in hybrid to pure electric is expected to reach two to one. According to Ecotality, with that shift comes a desire for more public charging stations. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-electric-cars-here-to-stay-i-dont-think-so/640382.md?page=5)