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The withering dream of a cheap American electric car

(www.wsj.com)
152 points voisin | 4 comments | 17 Nov 24 23:52 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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bartvk ◴[18 Nov 24 00:05 UTC] No.42168473[source]▶
https://archive.ph/9oIT4

I wish it would have adjusted for inflation. One quote: "The average transaction price for a new vehicle sold in the U.S. last month was $48,623, according to Kelley Blue Book, roughly $10,000 higher than in 2019, before the pandemic." However, about 9200 euros of that is due to inflation according to this calculator: https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

That's a nitpick though. All in all, an interesting article, which can be summarized as: the EV car market is lacking demand, and car makers definitely don't want to make cheap EVs since it's already so hard.

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rootusrootus ◴[18 Nov 24 00:10 UTC] No.42168514[source]▶
> the EV car market is lacking demand

There is scant evidence for this. Every time prices improve, sales surge. Sounds like the demand is there, but price matters. As it always has.

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vundercind ◴[18 Nov 24 15:20 UTC] No.42173130[source]▶
I can't make great use of a full EV but would love more AWD PHEV options, of which there are currently few and they're mostly very expensive. A PHEV can be my everything-car that runs entirely on electricity for 90% of trips. I assume there's some reason they're not a more widely-supported option, but damn, I wish they were more common.
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f1refly ◴[18 Nov 24 15:33 UTC] No.42173295[source]▶
Maybe because PHEV are a really dumb idea? You're lugging around two complete powertrains the whole time, a massive waste of energy!
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short_sells_poo ◴[18 Nov 24 15:59 UTC] No.42173618{3}[source]▶
Nobody wants this, but in an imperfect world, one has to make suboptimal compromises.

You can get an EV, and then have to deal with half a dozen barely competent charging networks each with their own donkey, slow and insecure app, their own quirks and pricing schemes, etc. For some, the tradeoff is worth it, for others it isn't.

You can also get a PHEV, which could allow you to use one car for commuting purely on electric power - even if you are lugging around an entire ICE power train - and then also take the family out to the countryside over the weekend. Without the having to deal with a bunch of annoyed passangers when you are stuck midway through your journey and the charging station you are trying to use is giving you the massively helpeful error message of "Charging failed, please try again later".

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some_random ◴[18 Nov 24 16:12 UTC] No.42173771{4}[source]▶
I think you'll find most normal people find PHEVs extremely attractive propositions that are a perfect compromise between ICE and EVs.
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short_sells_poo ◴[18 Nov 24 16:27 UTC] No.42173965{5}[source]▶
I mean, that's exactly what I'm saying. It's a compromise. A pure EV would be much better if the charging infrastructure was great. If it isn't, then you need a compromise...
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some_random ◴[18 Nov 24 16:49 UTC] No.42174207{6}[source]▶
No, even if charging infrastructure was perfect EVs still require a significant amount of time to charge compared to refueling an ICE vehicle. There are other esoteric benefits of ICE but that's the one the vast majority of people are hung up on and that will likely not be fixed anytime soon.
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1. short_sells_poo ◴[18 Nov 24 17:32 UTC] No.42174712{7}[source]▶
> Even if charging infrastructure was perfect EVs still require a significant amount of time to charge compared to refueling an ICE vehicle.

That's just down to charging infrastructure no? Sure, there are physical limits to how much electricity one can move in a given time, but we are nowhere at those physical limits.

So it's just down to infrastructure in the end. If there was infrastructure to quickly and reliably charge EVs, ICE would only have niche advantages.

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2. travisb ◴[19 Nov 24 18:27 UTC] No.42186622[source]▶
Your average, rather small, gasoline pump 'charges' an ICE at an average speed around 4000 KW, effectively 1200 KW after accounting for moderate efficiency -- hybrids will get better. Good EV charging today is a peak around 300 KW with a much lower average.

Honestly, _averaging_ 300 KW is probably within a factor of 2 of the highest we'll do for light vehicles given economic (how much electric distribution infrastructure can an 8-32 stall charging station have?) and practical (how heavy and stiff can the charging cable be?) limits.

It's unlikely EV charging speed will ever match existing ICEs. Relatively long recharge times are an intrinsic trade-off of BEV technology which needs to be engineered around, mostly by having enormous and heavy batteries.

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3. short_sells_poo ◴[20 Nov 24 13:28 UTC] No.42193764[source]▶
Or you could have drop in batteries? You pull up to a charging station, they take your battery and replace it with one charged to 100%.

Does this require further work? Yes of course. We are definitely not there yet, and we may never get there. But let's not pretend that this is an insurmountable problem.

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4. travisb ◴[20 Nov 24 19:47 UTC] No.42197421{3}[source]▶
Battery swapping has so many serious pragmatic problems I don't think we'll ever see it offered at scale for public use. It could be a fit for large private fleets however.

On the engineering side:

- Swapping requires standardization of batteries across models and manufacturers. To accommodate different vehicles the batteries will need to be rather small so most vehicles will need multiple swapped every time

- Requires more space and weight because the battery cannot be structural. This will reduce the overall range of EVs

- Connectors for high voltage, signalling, cooling fluid, and high strength mechanical rated for thousands of cycles in the face of road grime and poorly maintained swap robots will not be small. Cooling system contamination will be a serious concern.

On the financial side:

- Batteries are expensive, how do you track and reclaim them across the entire continent? What about theft? Destruction insurance?

- With swappable batteries the incentive is to store them at 100% then run them 100% to 0%, which is especially bad for battery longevity

- How do you deal with batteries swapped at different 'swap' networks?

On the user side:

- What if the swap station is out of batteries when you need them? Are you always gambling on holiday weekends that you won't need to sit for hours charging (if that is even possible!)?

- Since some batteries will be more worn than others, how do you deal with constant variability of range because maybe last week you got a new set of batteries and next week you'll get an older set with only 80% capacity left.

- Are you allowed to charge at home? How is the wear from that charged?

- Did I buy a battery with my car, or are cars no longer batteries included? If my car came with a battery, how do I know I get it back? Do I get paid for the wear other users put on it? Do I need to retrieve my battery from the same station on the way home after a road trip?

That's just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are others. Most of these issues are solvable with unlikely levels of corporate cooperation or immense levels of excess capital expenditure. However, they all cost money and will reduce the economic viability of battery-swap EVs versus every other vehicle type.