What Running Out of Power in a Tesla on the Side of a Highway Taught Me

[realjd]

Right, these are temporary problems not too different from when the car was first invented (use a ridiculously expensive gas powered car on a cross country trip? Are you nuts? A horse is much more reliable).

Electric cars were here from the beginning as were gasoline cars.  The problem with the electric car always has been, how do you easily add extra fuel?  Liquid-fueled internal combustion engines, and even steam engines can have a power source brought to them or carried along with them.  People used to carry gasoline cans with them prior to having a gas station every 500 feet.  Steam engines can have wood or coal brought with them.  This is, and always has been a major handicap for the electric car.

Tesla already has a somewhat convoluted battery swap scheme. As battery prices drop, replaceable/swappable batteries is one potential solution to the "bring the energy to the car" problem.

And you will wait and wait for the new battery along the side of I-40 when you could have hitched a ride, bought a 1 gallon fuel can, got back quickly, and added enough liquid fuel to the vehicle to make it back to said filling station to refuel the vehicle.

It's just not there yet, and I seriously doubt, after over 100 years of development, that it ever will be.

I was picturing more along the lines of you hitching a ride, grabbing a single battery cell, getting quickly back, then adding enough electrical juice to get to the next gas station.

Battery technology will be there soon if it isn't already. We just don't have the infrastructure in place.

Personally, I think electric cars charging off of the grid are a temporary thing. Once fuel cell technology has matured, the electricity will be generated on-board from a fuel cell of some sort.

[cpzilliacus]

Don't forget that electric power (unlike petroleum-based products) is cheaper when when it pass the customer's meter during times of day when demand is lower (in most of the U.S., that means late at night).

[Duke87]

Don't forget that electric power (unlike petroleum-based products) is cheaper when when it pass the customer's meter during times of day when demand is lower (in most of the U.S., that means late at night).

Only if your utility has installed interval meters and set up its pricing scheme accordingly. Plenty of utilities still do it the old fashioned way where you pay a flat rate per kWh used, and they can't tell from your meter when it was used.

What is far more common, though, is peak demand charges for commercial and industrial customers - where it isn't fluidly time of day based, but half of your bill is based on what your kW peaks at during the day.

As for whether electricity is cheaper than gasoline, well... There are roughly 35 kWh worth of chemical energy in a gallon of gasoline. If gasoline costs $4 per gallon, this equates to about 11 cents per kWh. Your electric rates may be lower or higher than that, depending on where you live. But this does not take into account differences in efficiency between electric motors and gasoline engines, which is really more why the electric car comes out ahead on fuel cost. Hence electric cars being marketed as "100 MPG equivalent" - which is true from the customer's perspective but not from a carbon footprint perspective since it doesn't account for inefficiencies in generation and transmission of electricity (which are substantial). But that's a separate can of worms.

[cpzilliacus]

Don't forget that electric power (unlike petroleum-based products) is cheaper when when it pass the customer's meter during times of day when demand is lower (in most of the U.S., that means late at night).

Only if your utility has installed interval meters and set up its pricing scheme accordingly. Plenty of utilities still do it the old fashioned way where you pay a flat rate per kWh used, and they can't tell from your meter when it was used.

What is far more common, though, is peak demand charges for commercial and industrial customers - where it isn't fluidly time of day based, but half of your bill is based on what your kW peaks at during the day.

As for whether electricity is cheaper than gasoline, well... There are roughly 35 kWh worth of chemical energy in a gallon of gasoline. If gasoline costs $4 per gallon, this equates to about 11 cents per kWh. Your electric rates may be lower or higher than that, depending on where you live. But this does not take into account differences in efficiency between electric motors and gasoline engines, which is really more why the electric car comes out ahead on fuel cost. Hence electric cars being marketed as "100 MPG equivalent" - which is true from the customer's perspective but not from a carbon footprint perspective since it doesn't account for inefficiencies in generation and transmission of electricity (which are substantial). But that's a separate can of worms.

And, at least for now, I do not believe that electric cars are paying motor fuel taxes on the electric power they consume ... are they?

[leroys73]

map of Tesla's current and planned Supercharger locations

Not a direct route from LA to NY either.
But maybe by the year 2100 they will be like gasoline stations. I can't wait.  I'll only be 151 years old.

How about a road trip together? We can tell the youngsters about the gas guzzling days. 
[/quote]

I am already telling them about the gas guzzling days.  409s, 389s with three 2s, 440s with two 4 barrels, the Magnum package called the 6-pk, 426 Hemi, 396 SS, 427 with 3 dueces.  Throw in a 4.56 differential, along with bias tires with drum brakes on some of them. Some would do 140+ off the lot.  WOW... the "good 'ol days".  Oh yes, tune ups every few thousand miles including points, plugs, and condenser.  Some required valve adjustments every few thousand miles.  We got to work on our cars every few weeks if not every week and 10 mpg was not bad.   

[Duke87]

And, at least for now, I do not believe that electric cars are paying motor fuel taxes on the electric power they consume ... are they?

They are not. Washington state has taken an interesting action on this matter by tacking an extra $100 onto the annual registration fee for electric cars. This is equivalent to the state tax on 179 gallons of gasoline (55.9 cents/gal), which means it is still less than the average driver of a gasoline powered car will pay. 179 gallons at 30 MPG is only 5370 miles.

[Pete from Boston]

Don't forget that electric power (unlike petroleum-based products) is cheaper when when it pass the customer's meter during times of day when demand is lower (in most of the U.S., that means late at night).

Only if your utility has installed interval meters and set up its pricing scheme accordingly. Plenty of utilities still do it the old fashioned way where you pay a flat rate per kWh used, and they can't tell from your meter when it was used.

What is far more common, though, is peak demand charges for commercial and industrial customers - where it isn't fluidly time of day based, but half of your bill is based on what your kW peaks at during the day.

As for whether electricity is cheaper than gasoline, well... There are roughly 35 kWh worth of chemical energy in a gallon of gasoline. If gasoline costs $4 per gallon, this equates to about 11 cents per kWh. Your electric rates may be lower or higher than that, depending on where you live. But this does not take into account differences in efficiency between electric motors and gasoline engines, which is really more why the electric car comes out ahead on fuel cost. Hence electric cars being marketed as "100 MPG equivalent" - which is true from the customer's perspective but not from a carbon footprint perspective since it doesn't account for inefficiencies in generation and transmission of electricity (which are substantial). But that's a separate can of worms.

And, at least for now, I do not believe that electric cars are paying motor fuel taxes on the electric power they consume ... are they?

I gave up asking quite some time ago what the plan is when the share if vehicles using a) less gasoline or b) no gasoline reaches a point where the bottom falls out of the gas tax money pool and no politician can muster the courage to tell people we still need to pay for every road.

[vdeane]

Perhaps an electricity tax (with a deduction for those who heat their homes with electric)?

[vdeane]

If anyone was curious about Tesla: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s

Anyone else think of this when the phone app was mentioned?

[ZLoth]

Anyone else think of this when the phone app was mentioned?

Must be some sort of super-proprietary version of LordBlueTooth....

[Dr Frankenstein]

Electric motors beat internal combustion engines in just about every aspect I can think of: torque, power, reliability, maintenance, speed (the Tesla doesn't even have a gearbox!), efficiency/consumption, etc. Most railroads had completed the switch when my dad was still a kid.¹

The only goddamn issue that's left to address is how to store and extract that energy in a way that's easy to implement in a passenger car.



1. Even diesel locomotives are actually hybrids and have been since the 1940s. The diesel engine is only a generator that powers electric motors, much like in the Chevy Volt.

[kkt]

And, at least for now, I do not believe that electric cars are paying motor fuel taxes on the electric power they consume ... are they?

They are not. Washington state has taken an interesting action on this matter by tacking an extra $100 onto the annual registration fee for electric cars. This is equivalent to the state tax on 179 gallons of gasoline (55.9 cents/gal), which means it is still less than the average driver of a gasoline powered car will pay. 179 gallons at 30 MPG is only 5370 miles.

However, since electric vehicles are by nature short-range vehicles, they will probably run up fewer miles over the course of a year than a gasoline vehicle.  It's a crude measure, but more fair than not charging the electric users anything.