John Steck wrote:
All electric vehicles will not reduce pollution, just shift it out of urban areas to more harmful types.
This is incorrect. All modern electric vehicles are far more fuel efficient than pure ICE, and somewhat better than hybrid ICE. There are two reasons: the initial generation of energy is far more efficient, and a modern electric vehicle regenerates electricity during braking. Every book and government study I have seen confirms this. See, for example the NREL document here:
http://lenr-canr.org/EnergyOverview.pdf
Not sure why everyone thinks that is better. The additional electric demand burden of replacing 20% of passenger vehicles would put a substantial demand on current electric generation plants.
No it would not. There is plenty of spare capacity at night. It would consume additional fuel from fossil fuel fired plants. However it would consume less fossil fuel per km of vehicle propulsion than conventional ICE automobiles do.
EV cars are not less expensive to buy or operate. The cars cost more up front, the parts cost more when they break or when in accidents, insurance cost more, and complex electromechanical systems require specialized technicians who cost more per hour.
I do not know about EV cars, but I know about the Prius hybrid, and this statement is inaccurate. It is true that the insurance companies charge a premium for hybrid vehicles, because repairs are somewhat more expensive. But the difference is not great. The cost of insuring a $27,000 hybrid is roughly the same as the cost of insuring a $35,000 luxury car. I have direct personal knowledge of this because not only do I own a new Prius, but last week some idiotic lady who was talking on a cell phone while driving an SUV whacked into it, causing $1,000 of damage. (She wrecked the car behind it and caused a three-car chain collision.) Fortunately, the body shop and insurance company assure me that the repairs will be no more expensive than they are for an ordinary car, and all traces of the damage will be erased. Obviously if she had damaged the engine it would cost more to repair than an ordinary car, but insurance companies now have enough actual field data to take this into account, so they do not lose money when they cover this car.
As a car class, their resale value is yet to be benchmarked, their true service life unknown.
Toyota spent $1 billion developing this car. They have been operating prototypes for more than 10 years. Thousands of these cars have been on the road for five years now. The true service life certainly is known. So far, the resale value for the first two years is higher than the new car list price, and in many cases higher than the first owner actually paid.
- Jed
