For occasional commutes, 115km one way is ok (not for me, but it's not unthinkable).<p>But 115km each way (230km round trip) 5 days per week is a problem. We should not be doing this, at least not in individual cars. That electric car is still creating a lot of particulate pollution from the tires on the road, not to mention its contribution to general traffic.<p>The focus should be on how to reduce the commute distance (or eliminate it as often as possible), and to build/use efficient mass transit systems.<p>So much of our intellectual and financial energy seems to be directed toward overclocking the horse and buggy - with diminishing returns. At some point it's time to step back and rethink the greater system. (I believe that point was 20+ years ago, when it became clear that cities would continue to become the population growth centers.)
My experience with EVs (Teslas):<p>EVERYDAY CITY DRIVING - I drive whenever I need or want, without ever worrying about range. If I notice the expected range has dipped below ~60 miles, give or take, I plug it in at home at the end of my day. I'm <i>delighted</i> that I never have to go to a gas station, which reeks of all that smelly/poisonous/explosive stuff.<p>LONG TRIPS - I charge to 100% the night before, get on the road, and stop to charge only if/when the software tells me I should. The longest trip I've taken is ~325 miles, and it requires only one 15-20 minute stop to get 150+ miles of range at a supercharger (I grab a snack and go to the bathroom). Whenever possible, I try to stay in/go to places with destination charging, so I can plug the EV and find it fully charged by next morning.
Author first assumes that only 60% of the available battery capacity is used (80% > 20%) and then arrives at the conclusion that the range is lower than expected. Well, no shit.<p>I personally do charge my Ioniq BEV to 100%, and I often drive it to, say, 6%.
In summer, I get a range of 220km, and in winter 160-180km, depending on temperature and number of cold starts (cold starts seem to trigger a battery warm-up). SOH is still at 100% after almost 3 years.
So you deliberately don't charge the battery to 100% then conclude the realistic range is shorter than advertised? I get you don't charge to 100% every day, but if you know you're going to drive further then....you do. Or just do what I do and charge to max each time, the battery is warrantied for 8 years, it's going to be fine.<p>>>Imagine your daily commute is 115 km (e.g. Roeselare-Brussel<p>That would be an <i>extremely</i> unusual commute to be doing by car in Europe, people do it but it's very rare. If you're going to be covering over 1000km a week(!!!!) Then get a good diesel, not a brand new EX90.
Model Y in cold climate here.<p>While the sticker estimates of range are probably advertising, and the % battery to range meter you get in the app / dashboard is junk, <i>the drive estimates are spot on</i>.<p>When you enter a destination, it will tell you very precisely how much energy it will take, accounting for every current condition, including temp. This must surely be data driven because it is alarmingly good. So your day to day use will not involve these guessing games, imho
Just did a 1000km (and back) drive this week, using a Kia Niro, which does about 400km on 64kWh. Was amazed I actually managed to drive this distance with 4 charges one way, and just 3 on the way back, reaching almost 400km actually on the first leg of the return trip (though this was downhill from the Alps). With longer roadtrips you want to go way below 20% remaining charge. With the quality of the charging-network in western-europe, and using ABetterRoadPlanner I managed to get a charge at 2% and a second one at 8% remaining, thus giving you 25% more capacity than re-charging at ~20% (~4-80 compared to 20-80). And this was with winter-tires and a full car. Sure, the actual range is still lower than the EPA / WLTP / NEDC range, but very usable and predictable.
“In my case, I typically charge the car to 80%”<p>My understanding is that the preservation of the battery is built into the charge controller and you shouldn’t have to worry about it. In other words when your car says it’s fully charged it’s only “really” charged to 80% or some other cutoff as determined by the charge controller. I don’t drive a Tesla so my only point of reference is my Fiat 500e which doesn’t have as far as I know a setting to limit battery charging to a certain percentage and I would think most consumers just plug in overnight without thought to this.
"Cold weather has an influence on the battery capacity too."<p>I take this to mean that the author acknowledges GAS cars are also affected by cold weather. There's just no escaping thermodynamics. It's also like pointing out GAS cars' MPG is reduced by 20%+ in cold weather. While it's true, it's like pointing out a gotcha edge case for all cars. So the conclusion can also apply the same way to GAS cars. 'Next time you estimate the mileage, take a 20% discount!'<p>According to energy.gov[1]:<p>Cold weather and winter driving conditions can significantly reduce fuel economy. Fuel economy tests show that, in city driving, a conventional gasoline car's gas mileage is roughly 15% lower at 20°F than it would be at 77°F. It can drop as much as 24% for short (3- to 4-mile) trips.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/fuel-economy-cold-weather#:~:text=Cold%20weather%20and%20winter%20driving,to%204%2Dmile)%20trips" rel="nofollow">https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/fuel-economy-cold-weather...</a>.
I charge my Bolt EV to 100% every day. Most manufacturers provide some headroom so rated capacity is less than actual and you aren't hitting 100% SOC, just what the car reports.<p>What the OP also omits is that you gain range during fair weather. My Bolt EPA rating is 255 miles, but I've gotten 303 miles in the summer and as low as 191 in the winter.
The author says his average mileage is 184Wh/km. I've seen similar numbers in other sources: about 200Wh/km.<p>I am an avid cyclist. When I output 200W for an hour I can go 20-30km depending on the terrain. Maybe 15 if it's steep uphill all the way. Cyclists are not very aerodynamic. They sit high and have boxy shape. A small vehicle can be much more efficient (the reason recumbents beat standard bikes on a track).<p>It all seems so wasteful to me. It's true sometimes you need to carry load or more people, or go to very steep uphill, or maybe sometimes you really need to go fast. In vast majority of cases though, especially inside populated areas it's one person and a short trip. You carry your 2 ton metal box with you, use 20-30x more energy than a cyclist would and take so much space traffic jams are inevitable.<p>True innovation those electric cars. The very definition of missing the forest for a tree.
The author is claiming <i>way</i> more (and worse) than they can actually back up. Different EVs actually get different percentages of their nominal mileage, and then respond differently to cold weather. I like this one for range under semi-optimal conditions.<p><a href="https://insideevs.com/reviews/443791/ev-range-test-results/" rel="nofollow">https://insideevs.com/reviews/443791/ev-range-test-results/</a><p>Here's some "winter effect" info for different models.<p><a href="https://www.recurrentauto.com/research/winter-ev-range-loss" rel="nofollow">https://www.recurrentauto.com/research/winter-ev-range-loss</a><p>I'd take that second one with a <i>little</i> grain of salt, though. I know that my 2022 Nissan Leaf SV+ gets more than the 175 miles they claim for summer (as long as I keep my speed down which is another factor OP seems to ignore). Haven't really given it a real winter workout, but I'd expect that number to be a bit higher than that table's 125 too. That's a <i>very</i> far cry from OP's claim of only ~110 miles.<p>Some might try to dismiss that as anecdata, but <i>so is OP</i>. Claims based on their one empirical observation, failing to account for known confounders and clearly wrong for a second sample, are kind of worthless. I'm not trying to propose any grand theory like they are. Find out the right numbers for <i>your</i> vehicle, routes, temperatures, and driving style.
If you preheat the battery I've noticed far better winter driving range. In fact, I only recently noticed because I always preheat the cabin which preheats the battery. Recently I didn't do that and was pretty surprised at how much energy it used while it warmed up.<p>If you typically plug in at home you should always be preheating the car before going out.
>Imagine your daily commute is 115 km (e.g. Roeselare-Brussel) and you can’t charge at the office. <i>Then you need 230km realistic daily range, and probably more like 300km.</i> The only cars that come near that, are the Volvo EX90 or the BMW i7. Those are not cheap cars.<p>Realistic daily range is a bullshit phrase that assumes you will never have access to a fast charger. I understand realistic range, e.g. you can not go as far in cold, and daily range, e.g. you need to go 230km every day. I'm calling out how a combination of the two terms somehow excludes the ability to refuel when needed on that 230km commute. If you're going to be realistic, be realistic.
Despite the provocative headline, it's not a bad rule of thumb.<p>But at least in the US, pretty much any new EV you can buy has a rated range of 200 miles or more. More than 100 miles of commuting per day is a lot! Also, workplace charging is becoming more of a thing, and would effectively double your range without any additional inconvenience.<p>Ironically, the inefficiency of ICEV engines is what makes them less variable in their range. First, you get heating for free because the engine produces an abundance of excess heat. Second, since the engines are at best 30% efficient, the effect of things like drag and grade are far less noticeable in terms of fuel consumption.
Calling out an enormous assumed fact in this article that I very much doubt is the case. Author claims people don't charge to 100%: they absolutely do.
Totally agree, EPA ranges are bullshit. The real world has these things called hills that they've probably never heard of in Washington DC. It also doesn't snow much in in DC so they probably don't know about that either.<p>They really should be reporting 50% of their ranges as standard. When people get slightly better than that, they'll be pleasantly surprised and it will result in much more customer satisfaction across the board.<p>ALWAYS underpromise and overdeliver if you want happy customers.
This just shows another reason EVs are unrealistic at least in rural USA. 200 km or 125 miles in cold weather. And that's for a Tesla a top of the line EV. Even if you live in the city most people want ability to travel long distances. I just reviewed consumer reports reviews of EVs. Not at all impressed. Overall ratings were very low for most cars. Charging is proprietary for the most part or slow or just in general a hassle. To get decent reviews you need to spend $50k at minimum. The tax rebate may help to extend the fantasy for a while but even Tesla owners are getting disillusioned. For the most part Tesla has saturated the market for high end EVs and the rest are low quality or suffer technical problems. I mean the vision is enticing but most Americans won't put up with the expense and hassle. And attempts to legislate the hassle won't bode well for politicians or will result in the predictable deadline extensions. And this is not even taking into consideration the extreme burden it will put on the grid which is not at all prepared for hundreds of millions of electric vehicles.