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I was referring to losing $55,000 in investing.
Certainly it's not going to happen overnight. It took 16 years for the Prius to get where it is today. I don't know the sales numbers for the early years of the Prius in Japan, but from 2001 to 2003 model years the Prius sold about 53,000 in North America. Tesla is aiming to better that with the Model S and without an established network of dealers (not that the dealer were any help to selling the Prius, but at least they existed).
Actually, steady speed on the highway isn't the best way to improve efficiency (at least not in the Prius anyway). When the temperature is warm I can do almost as good as in the city.
DATE__________ODO____INC_____AVG
--- Trip to NE starts here (this is two back-to-back trips)
08/13/10____111690____625____59.8 (3.9)
08/14/10____112308____618____60.0 (3.9)
08/20/10____112972____663____64.2 (3.7)
08/22/10____113411____438____58.9 (4.0)
08/31/10____113922____510____61.8 (3.8)
--- Trip to NE ends here
When it's cold, it's still reasonable:
DATE__________ODO____INC_____AVG1760
--- Trip to NE starts here
01/07/12____128603____481____56.6 (4.2)
-- 13 F here
01/12/12____129042____438____52.7 (4.5)
01/15/12____129420____378____50.3 (4.7)
01/20/12____129094____481____56.2 (4.2)
--- Trip to NE ends here
Of course. The Model S is not a mass market car. The math works for me, it won't work for everyone. However, if Tesla can educate people about the total cost of ownership it will be affordable to more than the initial sticker shock would indicate.
Simple maths would give four recharging points for every motorway/interstate service station. Two for each direction.
Or you could expand this with a number of local businesses which surround major junctions so that EV drivers aren't restricted to "Mc Chargin"
Or you could expand this with a number of local businesses which surround major junctions so that EV drivers aren't restricted to "Mc Chargin"
So you're assuming that if you invested $55,000 you'd lose it all? :crying: Maybe true if you speculated day-trading, but I have bond mutual finds and closed-end ETFs and indexed funds, and well-rated bonds from solid companies and my portfolio is worth more now than it was before the crash of '08, and I've been spending a good chunk of the income.
You cannot compare the Prius with an EV. The Prius, even though it is the most efficient gasoline car, has inherent inefficiencies which can be minimized by careful, calculated driving. The characteristics of an EV are so completely different, that efficient driving strategies are different. An example is that P&G accomplishes nothing in an EV. Tesla is clear that the most efficient driving in their cars is steady speed, with peak efficiency at a very slow speed (between 15 and 20 mph for the Roadster) and declining with increasing speed. "Ideal" is at 55 mph because that's fast enough that a relaxed, patient driver will accept it, and many secondary highways have a 55 mph limit. But on the freeway, very few people drive that slow, and from 55 to 65 the Roadster loses 18% of its range, falling from 245 to 200.
There's a real problem with this. If there's a line-up at the gas pumps, each car takes maybe 5 minutes to fill. If there's a line-up at the charge point, each car takes half an hour to several hours to fill, depending on the kW rating of the charger and the capacity of the car. And most gas stations have more than two pumps.
To allow for reliable trip planning, there would have to be a reservation system. And then I'd have to precisely time my departure and hope I don't encounter traffic delays. And if I get lucky and traffic is light, it does me no good because I still have to wait for my slot to open up.
OTOH, if we had those flux batteries, where you drain and refill the electrolyte, then it's a whole new ball game.
Where I drive, and with the time remaining to me before I'm too old to drive, I don't think I'll be giving up my Prius as my road-trip car. At a minimum I'd have to know that at every spot where I need to charge, there would be a charge point open and available when I get there, which can vary considerably depending on traffic conditions and construction delays. And since I go different places different summers, there'd have to be charging stations along each of those routes. And since this is a once-a-year extended trip for me, I'd be stopping at each place once a year. Not much of an incentive for anyone to install chargers.
Some areas, like the coasts, where more people are buying EVs will be covered sooner. But full country EV infrastructure will be very slow, making EVs more practical as daily and commuter cars than as road-trip cars for most of the nation. But there is so much potential for this, that EVs can gain widespread acceptance in their most practical niche even without public charging. I've been driving electric for 5 years and I've never charged anywhere except at home.
SByer
'08 #383
Just as somewhat of a counterpoint, I think what you say about charging at home with occasional road trips will help accelerate EV charging station installation beyond what a normal chicken-and-egg problem would normally cause. Because you can charge so much at home, 'people'(*) will charge at home, take the road trip expecting to charge along the way with insufficient planning, and bitch at the local spot that they don't have enough charging stations when they get there and things are occupied, which provides pressure to more quickly install additional capacity... or, at least with EVs I think that's a much more likely scenario than other fuels - especially hydrogen, where you wouldn't even consider getting a hydrogen vehicle without infrastructure in place because you can't fill at home, or with carefully planning the trip to the last detail.
(*) clearly, I'm thinking outside my mental map of contributors here ;-).
You have a good point there. Of course 'people'(*) are going to complain no matter what you do.
Fortunately, we'll never have to worry about hydrogen until fusion reactors are online because hydrogen is so energy intensive to produce (It takes something like five times the energy created to produce the hydrogen. And then there's the 6000 psi that you need to compress the hydrogen at to get a usable amount). Hydrogen is not a fuel, it's a storage medium, just like a battery.
Steering back to the original topic -- the main point of the thought experiment is figuring out what happens when people can "fill-up" their cars at home.
- When would somebody use one of these charging points that aren't at home?
- What if that also included work? Workplaces could have a schedule for electricity swapping or similar, but if most people drove electric and wanted to fill at work then there is a lot of infrastructure that needs to be put in place.
- Why/when would somebody use a charger that isn't at home or work? Home much would somebody be willing to pay for that? Is there a business for such things and what are the breakpoints for that business paying off? How fast does charging need to be?
Taking a stab at the issue off the top of my head: people would rarely use charging that isn't at home, they'll want chargers at rest stops along major highways and they'll pay 5-10x the electricity cost for that convenience. They'll want 10 miles of charge in 1 minute minimum. If it could get to 100 miles in 1 minute, then there is no difference from gasoline.
Existing highway oasis stops (picturing things like truck stops here; western US is my experience) could get the electricity pretty easily and now you are just talking about build outs in the rest stops. However there isn't enough electric on the road right now to justify the expense. Within 20 years, sure. And I'll prolly be driving my Model S still. :biggrin:
- When would somebody use one of these charging points that aren't at home?
- What if that also included work? Workplaces could have a schedule for electricity swapping or similar, but if most people drove electric and wanted to fill at work then there is a lot of infrastructure that needs to be put in place.
- Why/when would somebody use a charger that isn't at home or work? Home much would somebody be willing to pay for that? Is there a business for such things and what are the breakpoints for that business paying off? How fast does charging need to be?
Taking a stab at the issue off the top of my head: people would rarely use charging that isn't at home, they'll want chargers at rest stops along major highways and they'll pay 5-10x the electricity cost for that convenience. They'll want 10 miles of charge in 1 minute minimum. If it could get to 100 miles in 1 minute, then there is no difference from gasoline.
Existing highway oasis stops (picturing things like truck stops here; western US is my experience) could get the electricity pretty easily and now you are just talking about build outs in the rest stops. However there isn't enough electric on the road right now to justify the expense. Within 20 years, sure. And I'll prolly be driving my Model S still. :biggrin:
smorgasbord
Active Member
You're only going to get that with a battery swap, or some future liquid battery where you can swap fluid. Even Tesla's SuperCharger does at best 4.5 miles/minute for 30 minutes.
Anytime you compare specific criteria without looking at the overall picture, you're going to come up short. For road trips, my body needs a 30 minute bio-break after 300 miles or so. So, it's OK if my car needs a 30 minute charge, too.
In 20 years your Model S will be so outdated you'll want something better.
But at 4.5 miles/minute, your car will need more than an hour's charging every 300 miles. I could accept that. My problem is what happens when there are two cars ahead of me. Now I have to wait well over 3 hours. And I'm not prepared to accept that. So there needs to be a large redundancy in charging slots. But since nearly everyone is charging at home nearly all the time, there's far less revenue to be had from chargers.
OTOH, once we have a 500-mile car, then I don't need to charge until I get to my night's stop, and assuming ten hours to eat and sleep, a 16.7 kW charger is adequate. And if it's not a multi-day drive, then much less power is needed to top the car off before my return. For me, since I have a long day's drive and then spend a week or two there, if I had a 500-mile car, all I'd need is a safe and reliable place to plug into a 120-v outlet.
Getting back to the original question again.
Imagine a world of 250 mile range EVs. These EVs can fast charge, gaining 250 miles of range per hour plugged in.
( pretty close to the specs of the Model S )
Suppose all of them drive 12000 miles per year. 10000 of those miles are on days less than 250 miles, so that they fully charge at home.
4 days per year, they drive a long distance, 500 miles - on those days they require 250 miles worth of charging, a total of 1000 miles worth.
That 1000 miles of charging requires 4 hours plugged in time.
Now suppose that 75% of those long days happen on one of 24 weekends between april and september - either friday, saturday or sunday, and the charging happens sometime between 8AM and 6PM. Those 24 weekends of 3 days each with 10 core hours are a total of 720 hours.
And each EV needs 3 hours of plug time out of that 720.
Now imagine that all those EVs are in two cities connected by a single 500 mile road with a single charge point in the middle.
One charger at that point can serve 240 EVs, if they schedule perfectly with no contention.
Every weekday, and every weekend not in the core 24 weekends, the chargers are mostly unused, but on the core 24 weekends between 8AM and 6PM they are completely utilized.
With 1 charger and 240 EVs, you are very likely to have to wait. But with 2 chargers ( only 50% ultilization ) you are very unlikely to have to wait.
With 24000 cars, you need 100 chargers with perfect scheduling. Each additional charger reduces the average wait time.
What's the moral of my story?
First, the average usage case is not important. The worst case is. Summer/holiday weekends. Chargers will be idle *most* of the time, but in high demand on peak days. If you have to wait a long time on the peak days, you will be unhappy.
Because a car ties up a fast charger plug for a long time, we are going to need 1 fast charger per N cars, where N is a small number.
Higher values of N will yield longer wait times.
If N turns out to be 200, and the cost of a fast charger is $20,000, thats $100 per car. Not so bad.
A sample scenario with 1 million EVs, and 500 charge locations around the country will need between 2 and 50 fast chargers at each location depending on the volume of cars that visit that point, with a total of 5000 actual fast chargers - 200 per car and an average of 10 per location.
Imagine a world of 250 mile range EVs. These EVs can fast charge, gaining 250 miles of range per hour plugged in.
( pretty close to the specs of the Model S )
Suppose all of them drive 12000 miles per year. 10000 of those miles are on days less than 250 miles, so that they fully charge at home.
4 days per year, they drive a long distance, 500 miles - on those days they require 250 miles worth of charging, a total of 1000 miles worth.
That 1000 miles of charging requires 4 hours plugged in time.
Now suppose that 75% of those long days happen on one of 24 weekends between april and september - either friday, saturday or sunday, and the charging happens sometime between 8AM and 6PM. Those 24 weekends of 3 days each with 10 core hours are a total of 720 hours.
And each EV needs 3 hours of plug time out of that 720.
Now imagine that all those EVs are in two cities connected by a single 500 mile road with a single charge point in the middle.
One charger at that point can serve 240 EVs, if they schedule perfectly with no contention.
Every weekday, and every weekend not in the core 24 weekends, the chargers are mostly unused, but on the core 24 weekends between 8AM and 6PM they are completely utilized.
With 1 charger and 240 EVs, you are very likely to have to wait. But with 2 chargers ( only 50% ultilization ) you are very unlikely to have to wait.
With 24000 cars, you need 100 chargers with perfect scheduling. Each additional charger reduces the average wait time.
What's the moral of my story?
First, the average usage case is not important. The worst case is. Summer/holiday weekends. Chargers will be idle *most* of the time, but in high demand on peak days. If you have to wait a long time on the peak days, you will be unhappy.
Because a car ties up a fast charger plug for a long time, we are going to need 1 fast charger per N cars, where N is a small number.
Higher values of N will yield longer wait times.
If N turns out to be 200, and the cost of a fast charger is $20,000, thats $100 per car. Not so bad.
A sample scenario with 1 million EVs, and 500 charge locations around the country will need between 2 and 50 fast chargers at each location depending on the volume of cars that visit that point, with a total of 5000 actual fast chargers - 200 per car and an average of 10 per location.
That's a pretty low percentage of vacation miles. Depending upon where I go and how many trips I take each year, my actual miles driven has varied from 10,000 (no trips) to 24,000 (several trips). Average is about 25% of the miles are vacation trip miles.
At least one of my trips each year happens between October and February.
That is certainly correct.
Also true. However, my suspicion is that for the next few years those who purchase EVs will also be those who tend not to drive on the long weekends so there will be time to build up the required infrastructure. Also a fair percentage of early adopters will get the HPC primarily for the purpose of allowing others to charge their Tesla in a reasonable amount of time. While it's not a supercharger, it's way better than an RV park--and you might actually meet some interesting people.
This could eventually be a gold mine for entertainment complexes with 20 or 30 chargers per location. For an average vacation trip a comfortable distance is 600 to 700 miles per day. One stop for a nice meal (meaning not Rotten Ronnie's or his friends) and another stop for a movie or something would be great. The problem is not so much that you stop for an hour every 250 miles. The problem is what to do during that time--especially if you have kids. No one will hang around a filling station environment for that long but for an entertainment complex it's no big deal. It will probably make the trip safer as well because there is some rest time.
You mentioned the solution. The car ties up the plug, not the charger. Any fast charger should have at least 2 plugs, with some intelligent sharing of time and/or power between them. As soon as one EV is "full" and gets moved, the next car can plug in and wait for his charge to begin.
Imagine one Supercharger with 4 parking slots around and 2 plugs that can reach all 4 slots. The Supercharger can instruct the Model S to unlock the plug as soon as a certain SOC threshold is reached. Any driver arriving at the station can transfer the plug to his vehicle. The Supercharger would display an estimate of time when charging would start and when completed. The driver then goes for any activity, knowing when to return soonest. Utilization of the Supercharger can be maximized while minimizing the tying up of drivers babying the charge process.
favo
P3D+ owner
I would rather see 1 plug per parking slot. I wouldn't trust other people not to accidentally scratch my car with the plug or break the port cover or whatever else clumsy, thoughtless people do to wreak havoc. I know most people will try to be careful, but it only takes one dummy, and there always is one. The charger can be smart enough to direct the right amount of juice to the right car(s) based on time of arrival, SoC, and other parameters like paying extra for expedited charging or being a "gold club" member or specifying that you don't need the car for the next 3 hours.
I just saw this on the Tesla web site, after being directed there from a post in another thread. The supercharger provides 300 miles of range per hour of charge. I'm sure this figure was out there, but this is the first time I've noticed it officially stated.
This would work for me for my road trips IF there were superchargers located where I needed them on my vacation route over secondary highways between Spokane and Golden, B.C., and between Spokane and Revelstoke, B.C. And IF I could count on being able to plug in when I got there and IF I could count on the charger being in service when I need it. Because if a gas station is closed there's always another, but if the supercharger is out of service and there's not another I could be delayed a full day while I charge on 120, and if there's a line-up, it could add hours to my trip.
There have to be enough of them, in the right places. But this is a great beginning.
This would work for me for my road trips IF there were superchargers located where I needed them on my vacation route over secondary highways between Spokane and Golden, B.C., and between Spokane and Revelstoke, B.C. And IF I could count on being able to plug in when I got there and IF I could count on the charger being in service when I need it. Because if a gas station is closed there's always another, but if the supercharger is out of service and there's not another I could be delayed a full day while I charge on 120, and if there's a line-up, it could add hours to my trip.
There have to be enough of them, in the right places. But this is a great beginning.
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