Some people have lots of money.

I’m not convinced that it would make sense to build EVs that held more than 200 – 300 miles of charge unless batteries get very cheap and very light. If one could drive for 3-4 hours, stop for a 20 charge break and then get back on the road, that’s all almost anyone would need.

Most people drive long distances so infrequently that carrying all those extra batteries around wouldn’t make sense.

http://studentenergy.visibli.com/share/1s4tmf

Prices have changed very quickly, you have to check to see when an article was written. Something written two years ago, or with two year old numbers is going to be out of date.

Prices, as I understand it, fell considerably in the last year. That drop in battery price is not reflected in the show room price of the Leaf (and Volt) because manufactures had already signed 2012 purchase contracts before prices dropped. We should see quite different prices when the 2013 models arrive.

GM is guaranteeing the Volt’s batteries for 8 years or 100,000 miles. But think about how many gasmobiles have a 30,000 mile guarantee yet we commonly get over 100k with no problems.

After 100k the Leaf batteries will still have a lot of life left in them. They should hold at least 80% as much power as they did when new. If your driving style allows you to go 100 miles between charges when new you should still get 80 miles.

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Utility companies are planning on buying these used “80%” batteries for grid storage. I suspect that someone buying a Leaf today might well replace the “100 mile” battery pack with a significantly longer range battery pack several years from now, for a lot less than $5k, and have a utility company pay a hunk of that $5k for the old battery.

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You can’t really compare a used car with a new car. Almost always you’re paying a premium in order to be the ‘first driver’. My father always bought cars when they were three years old and sold them when they turned six. He let the first driver eat the largest part of the depreciation and let the third driver deal with repairs that were going to start after 60k – 70k. (That was back when cars didn’t last much more than 100k.)

I set up a spreadsheet and compared a full priced ($32,500) Nissan Leaf with a 30MPG $20k gasmobile. For the first five years (while paying off the loan) you would pay between $100 and $200 more per month to drive the Leaf. Once the loan was paid you would save between $100 and $200 per month over the gasmobile. At about ten years of ownership they cost the same. After 12 years the Leaf owner would save about $6k over owning the gasmobile.

And that assumes that gas goes up only 3% per year over the next ten years. (12k miles per year, $0.08/kWh electricity, 4% interest.)

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Battery research and manufacturing is being supported. A lot of the stimulus money helped build battery factories in the US and that’s a large part of what has brought down battery prices.

Battery research is going on at many universities and often/generally funded by government grants.

Private industry is also spending vast amounts of money on batteries. It’s clear to many that we’re going to be moving to electric cars if/when we have a battery that can hold enough power and brings the price of an EV down to not much more than a gasmobile.

The company/companies that develop those batteries are going to make fortunes. I don’t think funding for battery tech is underfunded at all.

The last car I bought was 4 years ago, it was 10 years old when I bought it, and it had low miles. I paid $3500, and it runs great. I don’t put that many miles on a car, so it would not make sense for me to spend $25000 on an electric car.

Even if the batteries are under 10K it is going to be a tough sell to people like myself. Now if gas were to go to $10 a gal. then I might reconsider.

I’m not against public funding of Tesla or Fiskar, I am just wondering if it wouldn’t be better to fund batteries instead? That might be the quicker way to energy independence.

Everything that is learned at this rarefied level will transfer down to the “everyperson” EV. Starting with the “everyperson” would have produced a car that no average Joe or Jane would have been willing/able to purchase.

Tesla has laid out their route.

Start with the $100,000+ Roadster. Build a few hundred and show that EVs don’t have to be short range golf carts with windows. (Done)

Build a moderate-luxury EV with very usable range and sell if for considerably less than the Roadster. (Done)

Build an ‘affordable’ EV for the folks who might otherwise by a Civic or Camry. (That’s to happen in a year or so.)

BTW, battery prices are coming down pretty quickly The batteries for a Nissan Leaf are probably now under $10k. And battery life is a lot longer than 5 years. The Toshiba SCiB batteries that Honda is using in its Fit EV should last about 400,000 miles. (4,000 full DoD cycles in a 123 mile range EV.)

My guess is that a $25,000 car with a 175 mile range gets us off both foreign and domestic oil very quickly. If we can offer drivers an EV that costs them no more than $100/mo during the loan payoff period and then saves them $100 – 200/mo we’re going to see a lot of guzzlers heading to the crusher sooner than normal.

Was it the car that came with the solar panel roof, or was the solar panel roof in addition to the car, installed on his house?

Cars with $20,000 worth of batteries that last 5 years, are not going to get us off oil. A $15,000 car with a range of 150 miles, would have us off foreign oil rather quickly. The savings would likely be spent on installing solar PV cells on homes, and businesses, which could have us off domestic coal.