Captain_Kong
Member
Do people of Hong Kong like hybrids? 40-50% less emissions with very small battery packs seems quite effective to me. The gas prices in Hong Kong is pretty high. A hybrid should pay off quickly, no? With the high gas prices, it seems the ICE drivers are paying a big tax for the gasoline they use.
Unfortunately, EVs with big battery packs is not a scalable solution for the world. The world doesn't have enough batteries or resources/mines to convert the ~90M cars sold every year to pure EVs. That also requires massive charging infrastructure.
With one 60 KWh battery pack for a Model S60, 40 hybrids can be produced, each cutting emissions by 40-50%.
With the batteries for 500k M3, we could have 20M hybrids made each year around the world without worrying about charging infrastructure, range anxiety or time to recharge. The range on some of these hybrids is impressive (~700miles with a tank of gas.) .
Above all, no one needs to wonder where the electricity comes from. It's a straight 40-50% reduction in emissions.
There was also a recent study published, that claimed production of long range EVs itself causes lots of CO2 emissions. The emission analysis over entire life cycle of EVs can get very interesting.
New Study: Large CO2 Emissions From Batteries Of Electric Cars | The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
Hopefully, Hong Kong will promote hybrids and plug-in hybrids, which are better, scalable solutions in cutting emissions.
Just checked the Hong Kong grid. it looks like Hong Kong is using 53% coal. So, in effect, BEVs could be worse in Hong Kong for CO2 emissions ? Is this data obsolete?
Electricity sector in Hong Kong - Wikipedia
You've hit on a very good point on the battery / lithium supply.
There is not going to be enough lithium battery as of today, if Tesla is going to achieve 500k unit sales next year. This is also the reason why Tesla is building the Gigafactory, which is just barely enough to supply Tesla's own EV needs. Please bear in mind that this one factory at its full designed capacity is doubling the global battery supply already.
So in reality, the short answer is that EV or hybrid is unlikely to capture a material market share in the near future, save for Tesla with a readied supply of battery from its Gigafactory.
Another reason that the hybrid may not work for the consumers (in HK and elsewhere) is the battery and related component cost - apart from the premium over the comparable models, I understand that for the Prius sold in HK, a replacement battery pack would cost almost 1/3 of the car's price, and similarly for Porsche or Mercedes hybrid's replacement battery, it's pricey enough to buy half of a Prius should they broke down. So in short, the fuel saving is too marginal in HK to offset any pricing premium and maintenance / repair cost.