# Electric Vehicle critics **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 24, 2019, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254 "2019-10-24T20:43:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 62
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1221 "2019-12-15T12:04:47Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > Well yes but that is why i made reference to the “Manhattan Project”. If global warming is real then act like it and put everything you’ve got into it. The issue is that 40% of Americans don’t believe that we are currently battling (the metaphorical) World War II. ---
**Author:** ![YamatoTwinkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/cc9497/32.png) [@YamatoTwinkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YamatoTwinkie)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1222 "2019-12-15T22:20:34Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > I posted a link up-thread about the long wait times at charging stations during a holiday. In order for EV’s to work seamlessly there needs to be MORE charging stations (compared to ICE cars)during peak-use because of the extended charging time. In other words, if it takes X number of gas station pumps per 1000 cars it would take 4X number charging units because it takes 4 times longer to fast charge a car than it does to fill one up with gas. This isn’t necessarily true: Most EV drivers are going to start the holiday trip with close to a full charge. As long as the round trip is within the cars range (or there’s an outlet available at aunt Betty’s house \<250 miles away), all these cars should have Zero need for fast charging. To really figure out the peak demand, you’d have to find out the distribution for how many miles people drive beyond ~ 250 over the holiday weekend, and what % of cars would have charging available at their destination. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1223 "2019-12-15T22:58:45Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > You have substantively misrepresented what he said. Tesla Superchargers are virtually always within a block or two of **a** freeway exit. You have reinterpreted his words to mean Superchargers are “so abundant that there is always one conveniently located.” In other words, the plain reading of **Dr. S** ’s correct statement is that where there is a Supercharger, it is close to a freeway exit; into the wrong statement of if there is a freeway exit, there is a Supercharger. Do you seriously think that no one will notice that you’re acting like the following was not included in the quote: “They don’t take 30 minutes to get to if you’re sticking to major routes, and it would be pointless to go to one if they were”? I knew you were going to just dismiss the examples (like I said, I posted it for people who think I’m mischaracterizing, not for you) but completely ignoring a bold statement like that is pretty impressive even for you. > [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > You can either report these perceived insults, or stop the accusations. Any further accusation on your part will be considered harassment. Take it to the pit if you want - but not here. This is the end of it. I will continue to respond as I feel appropriate in this thread unless and until a moderator instructs me to do something differently. You aren’t an individual who is empowered to direct what people are allowed to post here, but giving directions like this fits very well with the general tenor of your posts. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1224 "2019-12-15T23:14:36Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > Oh, I thought you were talking about _real_ trips, the ones that the average person only takes a couple of times a year. With the goalpost momentarily placed at two hour (each way) trips to places where you can’t possibly find a charge anywhere, It gets really tiring to be accused of ‘moving goalposts’ when I’m accepting the terms that EV proponents are using. If people are going to call a set of distances ‘long’ in this thread (to the point that they’ll talk about a ‘half billion mile commute’), it’s not reasonable to accuse me of moving the goalposts if I accept their definition and refer to them as ‘long’. Also (and this is another example of the sort of strawman you claim doesn’t exist), I never put a stipulation of ‘can’t possibly find a charge anywhere’. That is just a ludicrous standard to use. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1225 "2019-12-15T23:24:20Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > I think you realize that most consumers live in those densely populated urban through suburban areas and fewer in those sparsely located farm communities. But consumers living in ‘densely populated’ urban through suburban areas have friends and relatives that live and activities that take place outside of their said densely populated areas. Your contention seems to be that the vast majority of people (over 75%, as you considered ‘25% not’ to be high) follow a model of sticking to things that are within the distance of their work commute the vast majority of the time, but I haven’t seen anything that supports that contention. As I and a few others have said, that is radically different from what we have observed, and no one has been able to find statistics supporting the claim. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1226 "2019-12-15T23:32:34Z")
> [@Corry\_El](#): > > However where everyone doesn’t agree is how common it is that that’s really the division. Our two cars as of recently are a hauling-stuff capable SUV (15 yr old one we bought back from one or our kids in exchange for our older BMW sedan) and a sporty car (my M2). Some Tesla fans would claim their favorite vehicle is like or better than the M2 in that dept but I just don’t agree with them: they can do as they like with their money and me with mine. But it’s likely a lot of households don’t actually have a long/short trip division between their cars but some other division. I definitely agree with this, the idea that the typical 2 car household has one ‘commute to work’ vehicle and 1 ‘long distance trips’ vehicle seems to be firmly embedded in several people’s minds, but I don’t see many households that practice this. Usually if people have two cars, they’re both used for regular commuting. I’ve seen a lot of households where two parents with kids have one large car (van, minivan, pickup, crossover or the like) and one small car, where the large car gets used for the shorter commute and for any family activities, while the small car gets used for the longer commute and any trips where the kids aren’t going (one parent doing a trip, or leaving the kids with someone for a weekend). This doesn’t lend itself well to the ‘replace one car with an EV’ model at all. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1227 "2019-12-15T23:45:48Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > Yeah the scenario is of those who are looking to buy a second household car. (Or to replace one of the household’s current two cars.) You aren’t? Then yes getting one makes no sense. The post of yours that I responded to was asking a person who isn’t currently looking for a second car whether they would consider getting an EV if they were looking for a second car, so I answered it because I’m in the exact same situation. To make it clearer, if I was looking to buy a second car, getting an EV would make no sense as it wouldn’t provide me any benefit. If I was going to get a second car, it would be to add a capability I don’t have right now like a pickup truck for towing and hauling, 4-wheeler for offroad driving, minivan/van for driving a large number of people, or something along those lines. Adding an EV as a second car wouldn’t add anything for me (and I think it wouldn’t for the person you were asking either). Later on next year when I will probably become a 2-car, 2-driver household, converting one to an EV would still not make sense because both of us would prefer to retain the ability to do things like ‘each visit our own parents on a weekend’ or ‘one visits friends a distance away, one goes to a convention the other isn’t interested in’ over the small to nonexistent savings of converting one car to an EV. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1228 "2019-12-15T23:52:31Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > I definitely agree with this, the idea that the typical 2 car household has one ‘commute to work’ vehicle and 1 ‘long distance trips’ vehicle seems to be firmly embedded in several people’s minds, but I don’t see many households that practice this. Usually if people have two cars, they’re both used for regular commuting. I’ve seen a lot of households where two parents with kids have one large car (van, minivan, pickup, crossover or the like) and one small car, where the large car gets used for the shorter commute and for any family activities, while the small car gets used for the longer commute and any trips where the kids aren’t going (one parent doing a trip, or leaving the kids with someone for a weekend). This doesn’t lend itself well to the ‘replace one car with an EV’ model at all. One (well actually two) commuter + one “long trip” car is exactly our usage pattern. We have on small MPV and one larger MPV - if we’re going anywhere “far” we’d take the larger MPV. An electric car would be more than sufficient for either of our daily usages. Should one of us be going “far” alone, the larger MPV could be taken, with the other partner being quite ok with an EV for the short time the partner was away. I’m a BIG proponent of EVs - the only thing currently holding me back is: Price - my daily car was purchased for $5,000 3 years ago, we just replaced an accident damaged MPV for $3,500 There aren’t (yet) any EV available this price point. Now of course - my daily commute is less than 5km each way - so it’s pretty hard to justify the extra spend from a petrol saving viewpoint. However I can well imagine that an 80 km round trip daily commute would provide enough impetus to stump up the extra cash for a dedicated EV commuter ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1229 "2019-12-15T23:56:04Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > But consumers living in ‘densely populated’ urban through suburban areas have friends and relatives that live and activities that take place outside of their said densely populated areas. Your contention seems to be that the vast majority of people (over 75%, as you considered ‘25% not’ to be high) follow a model of sticking to things that are within the distance of their work commute the vast majority of the time, but I haven’t seen anything that supports that contention. As I and a few others have said, that is radically different from what we have observed, and no one has been able to find statistics supporting the claim. It doesn’t seem that you are listening - AGAIN - for our family, and we’re by no means unique in our area - We very seldom need to drive more than 50 km to an event / meeting / outing And IF we do - we would simply take the ICE car instead of the electric. Alternatively - often there will be a 3-8 hour time where we are parked up AT the event - as charging stations become more and more common, this time can be spent charging. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2019, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1230 "2019-12-15T23:58:06Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Do you seriously think that no one will notice that you’re acting like the following was not included in the quote: “They don’t take 30 minutes to get to if you’re sticking to major routes, and it would be pointless to go to one if they were”? I knew you were going to just dismiss the examples (like I said, I posted it for people who think I’m mischaracterizing, not for you) but completely ignoring a bold statement like that is pretty impressive even for you. I can’t understand what you’re objecting to at this point. **Ravenman** ’s interpretation of my statement here is correct. And anyone that even casually glanced at [Tesla’s Supercharger map](https://www.tesla.com/findus?bounds=64.74124808694707%2C-38.641152181906875%2C9.806315024575113%2C-140.41849593190682&zoom=4&filters=store%2Cservice%2Csupercharger%2Cdestination%20charger) can see exactly what I meant by my statement. If you are driving a long route, you’ll need to stop at a Supercharger at regular intervals. Depending on the car, your driving style, and the exact route, the interval might be every two or three stations. When you do need to stop, however, it will never be the case that you have to go 30 minutes out of your way. Just like gas stations, the Superchargers are generally right off the exit. The extra time spent in diverting from your route is negligible. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1231 "2019-12-16T00:14:23Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > For me, I would cross it off my list because it doesn’t make any sense. This completely flops on a cost perspective, as the entire cost of the EV is extra instead of just the cost of an EV over the ICE vehicle. If I buy a new vehicle and drop months worth of gas money on a charger for it, I don’t think that cutting my gas bill even to a negligible amount will be a net savings over the life of the car, especially since I’ll still have to pay insurance and taxes on it. Adding a second car to maintain and plan around will increase what I have to do, so it fails from a convenience perspective. I don’t really gain any capability other than being able to loan It just doesn’t make sense unless the car is so cheap that I will actually save money by buying it over the 5 years or so I’d expect to have it, and that’s wildly not the case for current EVs. A few things to think about 1. The charger installation is a one time cost that will last for the next 20 years or more, so can be amortised over many cars (and as an aside, it can also be used by your friends who drive EVs - removing one of the other hurdles to EV uptake) 2. If you take out the range “problems” - an EV is much nicer and more fun to drive than a comparably sized ICE - it’s quieter, smoother, faster and more comfortable 3. Maintenance in an EV is much less - particularly if it is a commuter car which is known to be hard on ICE engines (arranging an oil change / service is inconvenient for me) ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1232 "2019-12-16T00:27:17Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Yes, but in most such households, when they take a long-distance trip, they are both in the same car. > > I know that my husband and I are somewhat unusual in that we share two cars, and whoever is driving farther gets the one with better mileage. This is easier for us than for some couples because our hip-to-toe length is about the same. I don’t actually know how hard it would be for other households to share two cars, instead of having his&hers cars. We have “his and hers” but freely swap between them as needs (and, with long narrow driveway so the cars are parked nose to tail, parking order) dictate. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1233 "2019-12-16T01:12:11Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > I definitely agree with this, the idea that the typical 2 car household has one ‘commute to work’ vehicle and 1 ‘long distance trips’ vehicle seems to be firmly embedded in several people’s minds, but I don’t see many households that practice this. Usually if people have two cars, they’re both used for regular commuting. I’ve seen a lot of households where two parents with kids have one large car (van, minivan, pickup, crossover or the like) and one small car, where the large car gets used for the shorter commute and for any family activities, while the small car gets used for the longer commute and any trips where the kids aren’t going (one parent doing a trip, or leaving the kids with someone for a weekend). This doesn’t lend itself well to the ‘replace one car with an EV’ model at all. Actually, that lends itself very well to “replace one car with an EV”. That’s exactly the market the Chrysler Pacifica is aimed at. That’s not a true EV, it’s a PHEV, but with enough EV range that most drivers will rarely burn gas. It would work for your hypothetical family as an EV. In my household we never take long road trips for just one of us. That’s what airplanes are for. We could use a conventional minivan or SUV for family trips, for dump runs, and for the shorter regular commute, and a small EV for the longer daily commute and routine shopping and visiting folks. The only reason we haven’t gone that route is that we have a third driver who mostly monopolizes the second car, but that’s just enough slop that the two of us can basically share one car. Which is currently a PHEV (Ford c-max) but might be replaced with a ICE. But… Much as my lemon drives me nuts, the idea of needing to buy gas all the time just seems so annoying. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1234 "2019-12-16T01:18:42Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > I definitely agree with this, the idea that the typical 2 car household has one ‘commute to work’ vehicle and 1 ‘long distance trips’ vehicle seems to be firmly embedded in several people’s minds, but I don’t see many households that practice this. Usually if people have two cars, they’re both used for regular commuting. I’ve seen a lot of households where two parents with kids have one large car (van, minivan, pickup, crossover or the like) and one small car, where the large car gets used for the shorter commute and for any family activities, while the small car gets used for the longer commute and any trips where the kids aren’t going (one parent doing a trip, or leaving the kids with someone for a weekend). This doesn’t lend itself well to the ‘replace one car with an EV’ model at all. Your claim is the exact opposite of my experience. I know of no two EV households. I know of roughly 20 friends and acquaintances with EVs. It’s typically a larger car for commuting for one parent and very long road trips, and the EV for commuting for the other parent and everything other than very long road trips. That’s because everyone who drives an EV knows they are much better than an equivalent ICE car, so they want to use them as much as they can until it gets unreasonable to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1235 "2019-12-16T01:21:22Z")
25 pages in & no one has brought up [fire trucks](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/worlds-first-all-electric-fire-engine-unveiled-menlo-park-california-fire-district/) yet. ---
**Author:** ![Oredigger77](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oredigger77/32/3181_2.png) [@Oredigger77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oredigger77)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1236 "2019-12-16T01:41:06Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > But consumers living in ‘densely populated’ urban through suburban areas have friends and relatives that live and activities that take place outside of their said densely populated areas. Your contention seems to be that the vast majority of people (over 75%, as you considered ‘25% not’ to be high) follow a model of sticking to things that are within the distance of their work commute the vast majority of the time, but I haven’t seen anything that supports that contention. As I and a few others have said, that is radically different from what we have observed, and no one has been able to find statistics supporting the claim. Way back, on like page 3, the New York Times article I posted said that 60% of households don’t travel more then 50 miles from home in a given year. Its not the 75% you’re talking about but its true a lot of people don’t travel. I would bet the 9% of carless households fall into that 60% so its probably more like 50% of households with cars don’t travel more than 50 miles from home each year. The other 50% take 20 drives per year of at least 50 miles and prefer driving trips of 8 hours before they spend the night. I think that is where a lot of the talking past each other in this thread happens. Until, EVs can deal with long trip half of us don’t see EVs as viable, unless the charging infrastructure improves dramatically and or EVs get 500 miles to a “tank” they aren’t viable. On the other hand the other half see adding 300 miles in 5 minutes as crazy and needless. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1237 "2019-12-16T02:01:46Z")
> [@Oredigger77](#): > > Way back, on like page 3, the New York Times article I posted said that 60% of households don’t travel more then 50 miles from home in a given year. Its not the 75% you’re talking about but its true a lot of people don’t travel. I would bet the 9% of carless households fall into that 60% so its probably more like 50% of households with cars don’t travel more than 50 miles from home each year. > > The other 50% take 20 drives per year of at least 50 miles and prefer driving trips of 8 hours before they spend the night. I think that is where a lot of the talking past each other in this thread happens. Until, EVs can deal with long trip half of us don’t see EVs as viable, unless the charging infrastructure improves dramatically and or EVs get 500 miles to a “tank” they aren’t viable. On the other hand the other half see adding 300 miles in 5 minutes as crazy and needless. I’d agree with you with two caveats… a) that assumes single car households with no “gas” car (seems to specifically exclude the concept of two car households) b) Driving 8 hours before spending the night is different from 8 hours without a break for lunch, sightseeing, letting the dog pee, changing the baby’s pampers etc. I’ve done trips where it truly was 8 hours with only 5 minutes for petrol, but also trips where we stopped every two hours for 15 or 20 minutes (or more) and adding electrons (if a charger were available) would not have been even a slight inconvenience. The most recent “long” trip I’ve taken was with the family (the only one in the last 3 years where a 300km range wasn’t enough) we made enough stops along the way such that an EV would have been easily sufficient (assuming charging available at popular tourist spots) ---
**Author:** ![RioRico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f04885/32.png) [@RioRico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RioRico)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 8:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1238 "2019-12-16T08:38:30Z")
I’ve been off for a few days and TL;DR so I don’t know if this has been addressed yet. [This CityLab piece](https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2019/06/electric-bus-china-grid-ev-charging-infrastructure-battery/591655/) covers electric buses, 99% of which are in China. Cities and districts trying to build electric bus fleets run into infrastructure problems - like how and where to charge the buggers, and how much power capacity is needed. > [@](#): > > That’s why [Gorguinpour] says one of the most overlooked stories from Shenzhen’s experience is the city’s long process in setting up the charging infrastructure to support more than 16,000 electric buses. Each bus has a range of about 124 miles on a single charge of 252 kilowatt hours (KWh). In total, [fully charging] the fleet can eat more than 4,000 megawatt-hours (MWh). For comparison’s sake, 1 MWh is enough to power about 300 homes for an hour. “That’s an insane amount of power required, not to mention real estate,” he says. That’s just buses. This leads to my question: How much must the entire US power grid, source to outlet, be upgraded to charge many millions of EVs of all sizes? Mega-doses of personal cars and pickups will be joined by fleets of buses, semi-tractors, cargo vans, ambulances, fire trucks, all thirsty for juice. Hint: invest in copper and nukes. ---
**Author:** ![echoreply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/echoreply/32/3641_2.png) [@echoreply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/echoreply)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1239 "2019-12-16T15:45:20Z")
> [@RioRico](#): > > I’ve been off for a few days and TL;DR so I don’t know if this has been addressed yet. [This CityLab piece](https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2019/06/electric-bus-china-grid-ev-charging-infrastructure-battery/591655/) covers electric buses, 99% of which are in China. Cities and districts trying to build electric bus fleets run into infrastructure problems - like how and where to charge the buggers, and how much power capacity is needed. Put it in perspective. Don’t compare 4,000 MWh to nothing, compare 4,000 MWh to 600,000 gallons of burned fuel. 16,000 buses at 124 miles each is 600,000 gallons of diesel (based on a transit bus average MPG of 3.26). How much needs to be spent to clean up from fuel burning buses? How much is lost in illness and death due to pollution? Sure whataboutism, but here it is: Option B has costs. Yes, but what about the costs of Option A. Those have to be considered when deciding between the two options. How will the electricity demands be met? Building transmission infrastructure, and new generation sources. How was the demand for providing 600,000 gallons of fuel to the bus fleet met? Building holding tanks, pipelines, refineries, and tanker trucks. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254/1240 "2019-12-16T20:21:26Z")
Interesting news here. For this year through November, guess which is the 11th best-selling passenger car in the United States? I don’t know either, because the Tesla Model 3 is in the [top ten.](https://cleantechnica.com/2019/12/15/tesla-model-3-9th-best-selling-car-in-usa/) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254.md?page=61) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-vehicle-critics/842254.md?page=63)