Post by Oldfella on Feb 23, 2012 8:41:29 GMT -6
It appears that someone has worked some math and logic in reference to the new Volt cars.
Why electric cars won't make it-- until we have no other fuel:
Volt at the invitation of General Motors.
For four days in a row, the fully charged battery lasted only 25 miles
before the Volt switched to the reserve gasoline engine.
Eric calculated the car got 30 mpg including the 25 miles it ran on the
battery. So, the range including the 9 gallon gas tank and the 16 kwh
battery is approximately 270 miles. It will take you 4 1/2 hours to drive
270 miles at 60 mph. Then add 10 hours to charge the battery and you have a
total trip time of 14.5 hours. In a typical road trip your average speed (including charging time) would be 20 mph. According to General Motors, the Volt battery hold 16 kwh of electricity. It takes a full 10 hours to charge a drained battery.
The cost for the electricity to charge the Volt is never mentioned so I
looked up what I pay for electricity. I pay approximately (it varies with amount used and the seasons) $1.16 per kwh. 16 kwh x $1.16 per kwh = $18.56 to charge the battery. $18.56 per charge divided by 25 miles = $0.74 per mile to operate the Volt using the battery.
Compare this to a similar size car with a gasoline engine only that gets 32 mpg. $3.19 per gallon divided by 32 mpg = $0.10 per mile.
The gasoline powered car cost about $15,000 while the Volt costs $46,000.
So, who is it that wants us to pay 3 times as much for a car that costs more that 7 times as much to run and takes 3 times as long to drive across country. REALLY?
Someone has made the comparison that a Volt uses a 400 pound battery costing $10000 to go 40 miles, about the same distance that car will go on a gallon of gasoline weighing 6.3 pounds costing $3.50. GM and the gov't planned on selling a million Volts; they are about 980,000 short. Now they are having to retrofit them with new batteries because of recent fires in the batteries.
Why electric cars won't make it-- until we have no other fuel:
Volt at the invitation of General Motors.
For four days in a row, the fully charged battery lasted only 25 miles
before the Volt switched to the reserve gasoline engine.
Eric calculated the car got 30 mpg including the 25 miles it ran on the
battery. So, the range including the 9 gallon gas tank and the 16 kwh
battery is approximately 270 miles. It will take you 4 1/2 hours to drive
270 miles at 60 mph. Then add 10 hours to charge the battery and you have a
total trip time of 14.5 hours. In a typical road trip your average speed (including charging time) would be 20 mph. According to General Motors, the Volt battery hold 16 kwh of electricity. It takes a full 10 hours to charge a drained battery.
The cost for the electricity to charge the Volt is never mentioned so I
looked up what I pay for electricity. I pay approximately (it varies with amount used and the seasons) $1.16 per kwh. 16 kwh x $1.16 per kwh = $18.56 to charge the battery. $18.56 per charge divided by 25 miles = $0.74 per mile to operate the Volt using the battery.
Compare this to a similar size car with a gasoline engine only that gets 32 mpg. $3.19 per gallon divided by 32 mpg = $0.10 per mile.
The gasoline powered car cost about $15,000 while the Volt costs $46,000.
So, who is it that wants us to pay 3 times as much for a car that costs more that 7 times as much to run and takes 3 times as long to drive across country. REALLY?
Someone has made the comparison that a Volt uses a 400 pound battery costing $10000 to go 40 miles, about the same distance that car will go on a gallon of gasoline weighing 6.3 pounds costing $3.50. GM and the gov't planned on selling a million Volts; they are about 980,000 short. Now they are having to retrofit them with new batteries because of recent fires in the batteries.
