So who thinks they will be driving electric in 10 years?

Please not to be considered flamboyant - I thought the thread needed a little more colour, and see if folk like a little of what is here now, before they settle for some ugly little over-controlled OCD eco-centric automatic pram with a motor that would not disgrace a sewing machine in 10 or 20 years into the future.

The all electric Jaguar E-Type Zero! Yum! Old style body. Brand new car with modern brakes, suspension, and packed with tech. I did not even try to discover the $$$$$. The much more "economy" offering, the I-Pace is still something of a supercar. The latest Jaguar I-Pace looks mean enough - but cannot ever be as beautiful as the E-Type, if only because it is a 2019 hatchback. Jaguar I-Pace is Tesla class, but with much better stitched leather interior and refinements that fit the "nearly supercar" price tag. Skip over the E-Type picture, and consider the family hatchback I-Pace is near $70K!

Electric Jaguar E-Type Zero.png
Jaguar E-Type Zero

Jaguar I-Pace.png
Jaguar I-Pace - $69,500

So how about the Tesla Model 3? Tesla have a big grip on all the tech. Some users do not like all the fixable bits in the car being treated as if it was software update. There is no 3rd party parts distribution outlet. About 10 bucks short of $39K. Price-wise, it is a whole lot lower cost than the Jaguar. I would still have to hang out for a depreciated "pre-loved"! Teslas are serious EVs. They have competition now, but Elon got there first.

tesla-model-3.jpg
Tesla Model 3 - $38,990

Then there is the Chevrolet Bolt EV.
I must admit, I have not looked at Chevrolet since the long ago days I loved Chevys in Africa. There was Impala, Biscayne, Bel Air, Camaro, and Corvette Sting Ray. What happened to the "Volt"? Oh yes - that is a hybrid. Why call a car a name like "Bolt"? Billed as affordable and long range, by which they mean $36,320 and "up to" 238 miles.

chevrolet-bolt-ev.jpg
Chevrolet Bolt EV - 36,320

As I make this list, generally heading to lower prices, I am not sure the value-for-money quotient goes up. Less car is what you get, but the 238 miles before ending up stranded is actually very usable, and enough for many. DO NOT run out of juice in an EV! There is a reason for the existence of hybrids!

Just because they get smaller, they do not necessarily get cheaper! OK - there is a reputation for build quality from the BMW stable. The BMW i3. What is it with the "i"? The Jags have got it too - except they go for the capital "I". It used to mean "fuel injection" before came "i-Tunes". Your EV model begins to sound like the next generation not-so-smartphone! OK then, I accept that it is a matter of taste, and some other than the committee that approved the design might love it, but I think it looks ugly! Is there something in the breeze that makes EV designers go for a race to the bottom, and end up with the same look? Not exactly so "affordable" either!

BMW i3.jpg
BMW i3 - $44,450

The Nissan "Leaf". It used to have a range of about 80 miles, which is a no-no! Now it can do 150 miles. So OK. Why call a car a "leaf"? What vibe are they trying to convey? A car is not "leafy" unless one counts it gets a rusty look when it is about to fall apart and rot! They play the "options" game to an insane art form. Right down to whether the steering wheel has a leather cover. The image is a 2018 model, but if I blink, they all start to look the same, and the white reminds me the Jag. Three "trim levels", but I could only find two prices.

Nissan Leaf Tekna.jpg
Nissan Leaf Tekna 2018 - $29,990 & $34,300 (mid-range).

There are loads more. I don't know how long the list is, but I think every car manufacturer is going for it! Mercedes has been seriously researching new battery tech, and is in volume production building cars in 6 factories. My favourite brand (I drive a diesel Merc), but expect electric Mercs to be pricey for a new one. They seem to have something Tesla-ish about them, but I could not quite place it. No picture of a Merc yet, but I am sure you can find one.

I suppose I had better say that none of the above was "sponsored" in any way, and given the stuff I was saying about them, you can tell that is true. I can guess there might be some vendors a bit miffed that I "left them out". This is just a sampling of what we can have now. Maybe jump in and enjoy, because in 10 years, or maybe 20, the whole scene of personal mobility might be quite constrained, and we might look back on these, the times we checked out pictures of new EVs as "them good old days"!
 
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Flyinfool said:
The problem is in the other end of the power distribution. In an average neighborhood the grid can only handle around 3 or 4 electric cars per city block, a newer neighborhood might handle 5 or 6. Most neighborhoods are not wired to supply that many amps to every house at the same time. It takes a lot of amps to charge one of these cars overnight. And for those that think a car can be charged in 30 minutes........ It is simple math, if the battery in a Telsa S is 375 volts and 90KWh, and you need to charge it to 80% in 30 minutes, that means that you will be pumping in the power at nearly 400 volts and at 640 amps. This is very lethal power levels for home owners to be messing with. Like plugging it in while it is raining or snowing out and everything is wet. Now factor in winter and everything is covered with road salt and wet, road salt in water is very electrically conductive. Now that charger if connected to a 220 volt system, will be pulling over 1,000 amps out of the wall. Most small factories do not have that much power available. People do not consider these type of numbers when they are wanting a faster charge.

Unless there is some major breakthrough in battery or power generation like finding a good source of dilithium crystals. Electric will not replace IC in my lifetime. It will remain in the category of a second car, or a toy. Cross country travel is totally impractical with any current or proposed form of EV.
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Infrastructure will be very expensive to install and implement, and will replace "range anxiety" as the next limiting factor in acceptance of the EV.
And to continue to beat the dead horse, lithium-ion technology cannot remain as the foundation of the EV revolution. Its limitations are too varied, too serious and too politically charged. (Please pardon the pun);)
 
Flyinfool said:
We already have adequate power generation in most (not all) parts of the country. Most people will charge at night when most of the factories and big offices are shut down, This will actually smooth out the load on the power plants and allow them to run more efficiently. The problem is in the other end of the power distribution. In an average neighborhood the grid can only handle around 3 or 4 electric cars per city block, a newer neighborhood might handle 5 or 6. Most neighborhoods are not wired to supply that many amps to every house at the same time. It takes a lot of amps to charge one of these cars overnight. And for those that think a car can be charged in 30 minutes........ It is simple math, if the battery in a Telsa S is 375 volts and 90KWh, and you need to charge it to 80% in 30 minutes, that means that you will be pumping in the power at nearly 400 volts and at 640 amps. This is very lethal power levels for home owners to be messing with. Like plugging it in while it is raining or snowing out and everything is wet. Now factor in winter and everything is covered with road salt and wet, road salt in water is very electrically conductive. Now that charger if connected to a 220 volt system, will be pulling over 1,000 amps out of the wall. Most small factories do not have that much power available. People do not consider these type of numbers when they are wanting a faster charge.

Unless there is some major breakthrough in battery or power generation like finding a good source of dilithium crystals. Electric will not replace IC in my lifetime. It will remain in the category of a second car, or a toy. Cross country travel is totally impractical with any current or proposed form of EV.
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Your math is way off. Houses can't handle that kind of current. Most electric cars are probably charging at 32 or at a max 50 amps at 240V
 
I recently retired after working at a nuclear electric generating station for 30 years. I've seen many a trend in this industry over that time.
Here's my predictions.
The state of the electric grids and generating capacity in both the US and many European countries is getting very aged and falling short of current needs. Most of the nuclear facilities in many European nations have been decommissioned along with many of the coal fired stations both in the EU and US. Add to that, deregulation of electric utilities in the US has put the greedy, money grubbing corporations in control so only the minimum upgrades and replacements of old equipment are being done.
In the US, what is not widely known is almost 90% or more of the nuclear generating stations are within 10 to 12 years of reaching their license term for operation with most of them already into the extensions given by the NRC.
THERE WILL BE NO MORE EXTENSIONS !! If they do grant them under political pressure, I feel sorry for anyone living anywhere near one.

With electricity demand already on a continuous rise even before EV's, older fossil generating stations long shutdown and decommissioned, and no new nuclear plants even being planned for, I'm not sure how they plan on charging EV's if a majority of people are driving them.
Oh, and for the GREEN weenies that think renewables are the answer....PIPE DREAM... Wouldn't even exist without government subsidies.

What will their answer be ?? I'll tell you. TAXES !!
Yep, think of the day when you're paying a highway users tax to microwave a bag of popcorn to eat while watching a movie on your TV. The electric meter on your house will be taxed as if it was all used to charge your EV. Yep, it's coming.
I'll even wager that there are some young enough to see what will happen next. You'll drive to work in your shiny, new EV, plug it in and go to work. You'll get off work after a long day, tired and sweaty, jump in that shiny EV only to find the battery is DEAD.
Yep, while you were at work there was a big generating capacity loss and market prices skyrocketed so the company that owns the charging stations figured out they can take the power in all those vehicles, reverse the current flow and convert it to AC and ship it back out on the grid for a huge profit.
Meanwhile, there you'll sit with all your co-workers. Tired, hot, and dirty wondering how you're going to get home and wondering why you ever got rid of that old, reliable petrol guzzler.

I know some of you are laughing at this. I just hope it pops back in your head when it happens.
Remember, he that laughs last, laughs best.
 
Vehicle to grid doesn't exist at the moment. No current EVs are capable of reversing the flow of energy. There is talk about it, but there are a number of problems that need to be resolved before that can happen. The worst that can happen with present tech is that you don't get charged at work. Even if it does, people won't be stranded as they would need to enable that and they would likely have limits built in to prevent total draining. Nobody would use it if they didn't. And most of us don't need to charge at work. I can and most days do, but I can get home fine without it. If it's not connected, you can't drain it.

Right now, renewable with storage is being built without subsidies for less per kwh than fossil or nuclear. There are problems to solve for sure, but that's what distribution companies are buying. That doesn't mean that all other sources will go away. Every source has pros and cons.

They all exist because of government help. Some from monopoly protection, nuclear by covering the insurance and cleanup costs. They all have various levels of money and regulation helping them.

I agree with the issues that the corporations have caused by failing to maintain the infrastructure properly. I wish I had a solution to that one.
 
Not sure where you're getting your numbers from. Except for hydro-electric all renewable sources of generation cost way more than fossil or nuclear. The ONLY reason distribution companies are buying them is because of governmental mandates.
To appease the voting GREEN public for their votes, the government mandated that all energy companies had to produce an increasing percentage of their output via renewable sources.
Take away the regulations, requirements, & subsidies and almost all of the wind farms and solar farms would be shutdown and abandoned tomorrow. There's no money in it without them.
The last few years I worked, they build a huge wind farm that surrounded the dual unit station I worked at. At the time, we could produce electricity at $5 per Megawatt-hour. The wind farm was at $25+ per Megawatt-hour if the wind was blowing hard enough, more if it wasn't.
The wind farms on the east coast in the New England area are only operated full tilt during the winter months.
Why ?
Because it reduces the demand on the fossil and nuclear stations so they can keep their cooling water discharge temperature below EPA limits to prevent temperature shock to fish and wildlife and prevent huge fines to the generating companies.
Not hardly operated during the summer months when electric demand is at its peak to run all the AC units.
 
I don't claim to be an expert, but there are a number of sources that seem to back it up.

www.forbes.com

Plunging Prices Mean Building New Renewable Energy Is Cheaper Than Running Existing Coal

New analysis shows renewable energy is beating coal on cost cross the U.S.: The price to build new wind and solar has fallen below the cost of running existing coal-fired power plants in Red and Blue states.
www.forbes.com www.forbes.com

blog.aee.net

The Numbers are In and Renewables are Winning On Price Alone

We knew this time was coming: Call it the crossover point, when technologies like large-scale wind and solar come so far down the cost curve that they become cheaper than legacy sources of electric power generation.
blog.aee.net blog.aee.net

Most of the data comes from these guys.


Reasonably well sourced, if perhaps biased discussion of the subsidy of nuclear insurance.

How much of a subsidy is the Price-Anderson Nuclear Industry Indemnity Act?

thinkprogress.org thinkprogress.org

We're getting into the weeds for a topic on EVs on a machinist forum, but I was asked for sources. These are just a few of top hits from Google search on cost of energy.

EDIT: updated the Lazard link above. Was a 404 dead link. Replaced with a Way Back Machine snapshot from their archive.
 
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ttabbal said:
We're getting into the weeds for a topic on EVs on a machinist forum ..
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Aww - that's OK. I kinda relied on the group title saying "OFF TOPIC Discussion". Seriously though, you are right to point to some real data searched.

The human need for energy will remain insatiable, and there is no limit to the ambition. We do manage to put our planet at risk. Jim Dawson's light-hearted reference to Marty McFly's dandy gadget aside, even if we got the fusion power going with pretty much unlimited capability, I am thinking humans would find projects dear to their aims which would gobble it up ! Where are we? ITER is scheduled to start up in 2025, and it will remain an incredibly expensive experiment. There are criticisms of it, but it is apparently intended to be a "proof of concept. The DEMO project first phase to provide a 2GW generator is to last from 2033 to 2038. Maybe something can be contrived for earlier.

The UK grid was once the nationalized CEGB (Central Electricity Generating Board). The grid it made is substantially still in use today. We now have about 5 large "energy suppliers" among a list I counted of 36. The consumer unit trip switch on my house is 100A, and our line voltage is 235VAC.

Without getting into a tangle about private supplier philosophies vs other nation-wide infrastructure arrangements, there are some simple truths. The electrons delivering the energy that is flowing into your new Chevy, or powering your AC unit, was mechanical energy torque hauling a turbine only microseconds earlier. The origin of the energy is still the facilities that generate it. That these in between "suppliers" can "own", the energy during the microseconds it took to arrive at your house, and somehow give it added value on the way to re-selling it in competition with each other.. is the fallacy.

There is nothing any "supplier" can do to make the electrons any more energetic, nor move any faster, nor somehow smell any sweeter than from any other. What we get is the supply bundled with "air miles", complexity tariff marketing to "better suit our lifestyles", and rates that will vary upward after a while, and "switch over to us" incentives, and complimentary stationery, and the list goes on..
They do nothing to help the electrons in any way. In this sense, a purely parasitic accounting arrangement! An extra layer of what amounts to the billing department of the prime generator facilities. For a grid to serve a community, like garbage collection, it has to have some "communal" feature that works way better than each user generating his own. With absolutely zero nod to Marx, and Engel, Aldous Huxley, starry-eyed capital investors, deluded "zero point energy" enthusiasts and various pseudo-science adherents, I say I can completely relate the "Mr Fusion" appeal.

Nobody will be powering their Tesla (or restored DeLorean) by stuffing a banana peel + crushed beer can, whatever, into a converted Krups coffee grinder anytime soon!
 
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