Hey folks, we are talking about cars here. Let’s keep this conversation on track. Remember the Forum Rules about not debating and keeping it friendly.
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Thanks! This is really cool.
I am disappointed to see how little hydro-based electricity is imported from my former home to the north. However, I am pleased to see that we are hardly using coal at all. I think that Monty Python might have said that coal is good for lying down and avoiding, if they had publicly spoken about the subject.
It is also interesting to see how they are forecasting short term future electrical usage, and how the actual usage matches the forecast usage.
You need to take in the whole picture of your car usage to see how an EV might work or might not work for you.
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How often do you make this 1000+ mile trip? Is it a once a month thing? Several times a year? Once a year? Once every 5 years?
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About how many miles a week on average do you drive in your daily life?
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Do you take many shorter road trips? Like 200-300 miles?
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How often do you buy gas? Once a week? Once a month?
If you are mainly driving under 150 miles a day then driving an EV is super easy if you have access to charging overnight (again Chevy is offering to install a Level 2 charger in your garage for free with a purchase of a new EV and the Bolt MSRP is around $26K). Depending on your electricity rates charging an EV overnight can be either much cheaper than gas or much, much, much cheaper.
For folks who take a big 1000+ mile trip like this once every few years, you can just rent a car if you are concerned with having too many charging stops. Or your might find that you love your EV so much you don’t mind stopping. And depending on the car some charge faster and have longer ranges. If you make this trip monthly and you don’t want to deal with charging stops then an EV might not be the best choice for you.
EVs are very popular with folks who do Uber and Lyft for a living. My husband and I had a nice chat with an Uber driver with a Bolt at a charger a few months ago. He also has a Nissan Leaf. He said that the gas savings and low maintenance were definitely worth it to drive an EV for Uber/Lyft.
I think if you need a new car and usually drive less than 150 miles a day then it makes sense to check out an EV. If you don’t need a new car and don’t usually drive much anyway then it probably doesn’t make sense, and just keep that ICE vehicle. But the closer to 150 miles a day you drive the more sense it makes if you can charge on a Level 2 at home. If you have a 50 mile commute/100 mile roundtrip, an EV is amazing.
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Actually, it isn’t. Peak electricity use hours are more likely to overload the grid, which is why there are time-of-use electricity rates that are higher in the late afternoon and evening (when AC use is highest and other uses like cooking happen more) than they are at other times.
In addition, time of day can affect what generation sources are used to produce the electricity. Additional use during peak hours means turning on more expensive generation plants that utilities would prefer to keep turned off as much as possible (because they are expensive to run).
That is why electric vehicles typically have time of day settings for charging, and home electric vehicle charging is typically done at off-peak hours to avoid higher peak hour electricity rates. Some public charging stations also have different prices for peak and off-peak hours.
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I’ve know people who drive older cars and rent when they want to make weekend trips. So that’s a model that would definitely work with EV’s.
I have lots I could say about electric power as my husband just retired from that industry, the last part of his career in renewables.
The problem with renewables is that the output is very low compared to some other forms of electric generation. I think you would find many of those who work in the power industry think that we should embrace nuclear. It’s the greenest option with the most output by far. It’s really too bad that it’s become such a problem with the American public that no plants have been built since the the 1970’s. And those that were built are being decommissioned.
Right now, personally we have 2 newer cars that we 
will last us for a while. But my kid is very happy with her little EV. She’s even put a proposal together to get a charging station installed at her work site.
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I’m not trying to convince you but I thought this might be instructive for people.
I don’t know where in central MA so I mapped Springfield to Pittsburgh (actually, I asked my car to do it and it took less than a minute).
I have an ID4 and chose to start fully charged.
In a 9.5 hour trip it has me charge 3 times taking a total of 64 minutes (19, 17, 28 minutes charging).
Driving roughly 2 hours between charges and stopping at a Walmart and twice at Sheetz.
These are all electrify America stations where charging is free for me for the first three years with my VW. Nice side benefit.
Personally I’d have stopped every few hours anyway even in my old ICE car.
So that’s just a FWIW for people.
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You replied directly to me.
Your points are off base regarding me and regarding extrapolating your experience in your neighborhood to the rest of the US and the rest of the world.
EVs are definitely part of the solution. And FWIW, I would argue that commercial composting is inferior to home composting because they have to drive to come pick it up.
Actually it is.
My point is what else are “you” (the general “you,” not you you) doing during those peak times, when it means turning on more expensive power generation, even though “your” EV isn’t charging then?
Recently we’ve been going on long trip like this about three times per year. We did it in March, then just now in July and expect to do another in November. In addition, I’ve had three work conferences this year which have all been over 200 miles away. Next year I will be retired, so the plan is March to Florida, then April to Pittsburgh, then May to Florida. Yeah, we drive a lot. When I’m not doing my long drives, my car basically sits. I’ve been working from home mostly so there is the occasional trip to a store but that’s about it. Not counting my long trips, I doubt I drive 50 miles per week. Almost all the miles on my car are distance driving.
I’m not sure how the economics would work. I would spend more to get an EV, then save a little on short trips around town, and then be inconvenienced for the majority of my driving, though of course I would save. If there really were charging stations everywhere I might change my mind but when I saw that there was none on the stretch leading to Scranton that really did it for me. That is my regular route. Both my kids live in Pittsburgh so we go there a lot.
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That is a bit of an unusual driving pattern so I could see it might not be the best choice for you.
Pre-pandemic I used to drive about 350 miles a week, but I don’t drive that much any more.
If your family has two cars when it is time to replace the older one you might look for a used Bolt. I think with Chevy dropping the MSRP on the new ones and the faster charging technology coming online with the Hyundais and Kias, etc, the price on the used Bolts will drop back down to reasonable levels. (The prices went sky-high when the gas prices rose and with the supply chain issues.)
Or you might try just test driving an EV when you are next in the market for a car and see what you think.
For me, in the Bolt, it does take longer to get there on longer trips. If it’s a one stopper it’s not too bad, but if it’s multiple stops it can add up. I have not done a 1000+ mile trip. The Florida trip was about 650 and Atlanta is about 350-400. In a car with newer technology like a Tesla or the Kia or Hyundai or any of the ones that aren’t 5 years old like my Bolt, the stops are a lot shorter.
As I said, it’s not about you, but I was intending the general you, and I apologized. You can either accept or reject it. I don’t really care at this point.
And my points are still valid, because HVAC usage, obesity, bag usage, not replacing your real lawn with drought resistant plants or fake lawn, which we’re doing BTW, removing pools, etc. (the list is enormous) aren’t problems that are only local to me.
And I know my neighbors aren’t home composting either, since I’ve seen their yards. BTW, composting trucks are more and more using alternative fuel, reducing green house emissions.
ETA: I’m moving on from the tangent.
There is no apology in this. There are a bunch of excuses, but no “I’m sorry” or “I apologize”. You saying that you made an “error” is not apologizing.
The other things you keep bringing up are off-topic so I am try not to address them because the topic is EVs and Hybrid cars.
EVs and Hybrids are part of the solution to the environmental problems we face. They (especially EVs) are also fun to drive.
I mistakenly edited out, but it was there before I screwed it up. I apologize. My post was MEANT to be to the general audience.
The points I’m making aren’t off topic to me, because some EV buyers get this “holier than thou” attitude, which I don’t appreciate, especially when the rest of their life is nothing about saving the environment. And that’s a universal problem, not only in my locale. We just have more EV’s than most, if not all, places.
EV’s are part of the power grid, so I think think they’re operating on the margins when we as a society can make even bigger differences elsewhere. And we aren’t.
I apologized, I’ve made my point, and now I’m moving on.
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We just waited three months to get a part for our Toyota. The supply chain shortages are pretty universal right now.
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We’ve all learned that electric vehicles is a topic that many are quite passionate about.
On a related note, a friend has one. He loves it and has done road trips before with it, but it does require a fair amount of planning ahead of time and he needs to factor in re-charging time. On one recent road trip, he almost got stuck in a national park in Utah w/no power left…only barely made it to a charging station in time before his battery ran out of juice.
It’s not something that I would care much for, but I understand why people like them. I just wish that in our metro area, Tesla drivers would stop driving like total jerks.
I understand all of the reasons why people buy EV’s. It’s just not for me. Your mileage may vary. 
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That sounds like the argument that “if you cannot do everything, you should not do anything”. But, whether you are looking at your own personal energy costs or the collective effect on society, doing something that is cost effective and convenient is better than doing nothing.
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This feels like a universal truth we can all rally around 
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Buying an EV is all one can do? Really? There aren’t easier and even cheaper things to do than buying an EV to lower one’s personal energy cost.
How about stop overeating (and drinking) and throwing away food? Unless you’re in 120 degree weather and/or have medical issues, can you turn off your thermostat? How about using your bicycle or public transportation, if available and reasonably convenient. How about removing water-sucking draining landscaping and replacing with drought resistant lanscaping? Again, the list is enormous.
But hey, buy the EV (vs. SULEV) and feel good about the saving the environment.
Not saying that is the only thing one can do, or that doing that precludes doing anything else.
Guess what I already do to the extent possible.
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This is purely coincidental, but on the freeway this morning, a Tesla Model S, I believe, was doing a “James Bond” around cars this AM and then crossed several lanes of traffic in order to get to another freeway. The most aggressive driving than I’ve seen in a while.