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I live in Maine. Most charging stations that I see are located in parking lots of restaurants. Go in and enjoy a meal while your vehicle charges.
The vehicle HUD will display the nearest charging station where you can go to charge.
There is a continuous string of charging stations up and down the East Coast from St. Johns all the way to the Florida keys, as well as coast-to-coast.
Not everyone wants to eat restaurant food or spend the money for it every time they need to charge. And not everyone wants a road trip along the interstate.
According to DOT, less than 1% of trips are over 100 miles so 99%+ of charging is at home with seconds to plug in vs trip to gas station and 5 minutes to fill so 99% of the time the EV is much quicker to fill. On the road on longer trips, charging an EV at a fast charger is more like 15-20 minutes than "hours. More like quick bite than a sit down meal but ok if that is what you want - you don't have to get a meal just because the charger is near a restaurant.
Filling with gas may take 5 min but how long are you doing other stuff like eating and using the facilities. I find that charging the EV adds maybe just a few minutes on my normal 6 hour trip. The cost difference is huge though - $10 vs $60+.
But if you are eating either way, why is a meal only a cost borne by EV owners and why is eating on a trip being a "Rich retiree".
"According to DOT", right a gov't pushing an agenda would NEVER lie to you.
What was the quote, "I'm from the gov't and here to help you"!
That could take hours. Is the meal cost included in all these projections about EVs being cheaper?
It takes 30-minutes to fully recharge most EVs.
The restaurants are not charging anyone for charging their vehicles it is free.
My plugin hybrid retails at $24k, I do not view this as a particularly expensive vehicle.
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... How will this affect a poor family of say 5? Add $100 to every fillup?
There exists a string of charging stations from St.John all the way down to the Florida Key, all up and down the East Coast. As well as multiple routes East-West Coast-to-coast, and I think there is one established up and down the West Coast as well.
For long road trips, it is a great convenience.
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... How is this even comparable with filling a car with gas which takes 5 minutes?
Yes, driving an EV is a lot cheaper than driving a petroleum-fueled vehicle, thank you for pointing that out.
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... Rich retiree much?
Rather a contradiction in terms there.
Yes, I am on pension, I have been retired on pension for 21 years so far. Though I am not sure how 'rich' I am. Our combined pensions put my wife and me right on the line, the cut-off, to the Federal 'poverty' levels.
I live in rural Maine. Our house has a solar array that powers our house and/or that charges our plugin hybrid.
The Tesla has software to find the next chargers, and they have fast chargers, so imagine what it's like for the other brands. The EV is great for local driving, a short commute, around town, but when it comes to road trips, the gas engine is still the way to go. EV technology has a long way to go before it has more than half the range of the gas vehicles and a 5-10 minute full charge time.
Could you imagine the trouble a EV semi tractor trailer would have when we average 400 to 600 miles a day. Then on an over the road driver need that powere to stay cool or warm during their 10 hours down time.
Could you imagine the trouble a EV semi tractor trailer would have when we average 400 to 600 miles a day.
It is coming. Every year we see multiple manufacturers showcasing their EV semi tractor trailer rigs. I just read about another one in yesterday's news.
They are coming.
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... Then on an over the road driver need that powere to stay cool or warm during their 10 hours down time.
Heating and cooling are both done with a heat-pump, extremely efficient. In my plugin hybrid, fully charged it can heat or cool for 24 hours without draining the battery enough to register as a drain.
Tesla and EV's definitely have their niche, and I was a supporter of them until the Government got involved. Free market should decide, the government forced the hand of automakers to invest into EV's and it looks like the auto industry will be in a mess for the next decade or two.
The one sad fact about EV's are that they are throw-away cars. Batteries have a limited lifespan, and die regardless of usage.
The whole battery thing.
There should be a requirement that all electric car companies use the same battery cell. (Think of it like giant AA batteries)
Proprietary systems are already a way to fleece consumers.
How so? Someone is paying for the cost to install, maintain, and operate the charging stations.
Nationwide chains are signing contracts with Tesla to install the charging stations. To the chains, it is a minor cost to draw in customers.
Now everyone driving an EV has continuous display of the nearest charging stations. ie, your restaurant.
Our nearest one is a Ruby Tuesday. they get free advertisement from this deal.
A year ago, I was negotiating a contract with a local non-profit to install a community solar farm on my land. A 30-year lease contract. I asked them to include a public charging station [For ten years I have been looking at the EV farm tractors, and I would really like to operate an EV farm tractor. So a 'BIG' charging station on my land would be nice.] As it turned out though, we need to have nearby 3-phase power lines, which we do not have here in my rural location.
Having a Community Solar Farm on my land would pay me nicely and it would draw in many big logging trucks [as they continue to shift over to EV rigs].
I recently took a 2500 mile road trip with three other adults and we could stop at a gas station, pump 18-20 gallons, have everybody cycle through the restrooms and buy snacks and be back on the road in 15-20 minutes. Not at all possible with an electric car.
The entire electric car business infuriates me to no end. They're certainly cool, and as a 2nd car to run around town they're awesome, but the entire "save the environment" raison d'etre is just a fallacy. Then you have California and all the states with trigger regulations based on California essentially forcing the death of the gasoline car in a relatively short time frame. If you really cared about carbon emissions and saving the environment, you would be pushing plug-in gas/electric hybrids. The tech is mature, the battery packs are 1/6th the size, and you really do get the best of both worlds...around town electric running and long range.
I agree.
EV's are the cool hip "IT" vehicles right now but why has the Gov. abandoned the hybrids with this insane push for all Electric?
A hybrid is the best of both worlds and if the technology can be pushed a bit further maybe they could be getting 100 MPG?
How are the EV semi's going to work when the current electric pickup trucks are having their range cut in half or worse when towing something? How many batteries is it going to take to haul a loaded trailer that can weigh up to 80,000 pounds in total?
It is odd how everyone seems to be on the EV bandwagon but where will all those batteries come from and what do we do with the millions that stop holding a charge after several years? How much can really be recycled? Will the EV's be throw away vehicles when the batteries die out?
Imagine getting a "deal" on a 5 year old Tesla but instead of a 500 mile range you only get 250 due to the age of the batteries? How many fast charges did those batteries experience? A slow trickle charge is better for a battery than a big shock of a energy dump into it.
How many of these Pro EV people have ever had an cordless drill? I use drills a lot and they are great and powerful but eventually the batteries reach a point where they do not hold much of a charge and they are junk and the option is to buy new batteries or buy a whole new drill.
EV cars are much like a cordless drill.
What is really terrible is how the older EV's can catch fire due to a short in its system. I saw a video the other day of one that was engulfed. it took the Fire department 2 hours and 12,000 gallons of water to put it out and the whole time there was great plumes of thick black toxic smoke bellowing into the sky. Everything that EV and 1000 more sought to remove from the environment was belched right back into it with one fire.
Oh well, what can we do but complain and point out the obvious problems with the mad push to EV's our Gov. is forcing on us?
Nationwide chains are signing contracts with Tesla to install the charging stations. To the chains, it is a minor cost to draw in customers.
Now everyone driving an EV has continuous display of the nearest charging stations. ie, your restaurant.
Our nearest one is a Ruby Tuesday. they get free advertisement from this deal.
A year ago, I was negotiating a contract with a local non-profit to install a community solar farm on my land. A 30-year lease contract. I asked them to include a public charging station [For ten years I have been looking at the EV farm tractors, and I would really like to operate an EV farm tractor. So a 'BIG' charging station on my land would be nice.] As it turned out though, we need to have nearby 3-phase power lines, which we do not have here in my rural location.
Having a Community Solar Farm on my land would pay me nicely and it would draw in many big logging trucks [as they continue to shift over to EV rigs].
Whether it's a "minor" cost may well depend on where the charging station is located and how that cost might be offset. For example, someone mentioned that it might cost $10 worth of electricity to completely charge a vehicle. I don't know if that number is correct, but for now let's use that number.
So, this means that every time someone charges their vehicle at this "free" station, then there has to be some way for the owner/provider of that power to offset their cost. If the station is out in the boondocks and is located beside a restaurant, then the restaurant might benefit enough to help pay the cost of providing "free" electricity.
However, what if the charging station is located near a populated area? What's to keep the car owner from driving up and using the FREE electricity and then not spending a dime at the adjoining business? You can bet that if there is some way for people to "game" the system and get free electricity, then they will do so.
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