Electric vs Gas Cost

I have driven the route from Phoenix to SD yearly for the last several years. Typically took my Tacoma.
I would need to stop for gas once along the way but at least one other stop for a bathroom break...getting old is bitch (or having the GF along- woman can't hold it either). Since it is a 6 hour drive and starting in the AM the stop for gas usually coincides with eating lunch. So there is a least a 20-30 minute break.

This year I decided to take the Tesla. Fully charged the night before. The car had us stop in Yuma to recharge to 90% from about 24%. We arrived around 11 am at a Supercharger that was located around multiple fast food options. Set up to charge- charge time 20 minutes. I had to get up from eating to disconnect the car. That charge was supposed to get us to our hotel at around 10%. The hotel had level 2 chargers so destination charging would not take up any of my time other than having to disconnect as to avoid idle fees.
We hit a lot of wind on the way and as we got closer to SD it looked like we would arrive at about 3-4%. Since we both wanted a bathroom break we stopped at a charger about 25 miles from our destination and charged up to 60% from 10% which took another 20 minutes. We got coffee and a snack while we were charging. That additional charge allowed us to go to our planned afternoon trip to Coronado with out having to charge again until that night at the destination charger. Overall it added about 15 minutes to our trip because of a slightly longer second stop. It was nice to get out and stretch my legs a bit regardless.

Most people that buy electric vehicles do so with daily commutes and around town commutes in mind. I live on the far east side of Phoenix and my GF family in on the north west side over 60 miles away. We drive there and back without even coming close to using the entirety of an 80% daily charge. The next morning I am at 80% again without ever having to stop at a gas station. I would not have it any other way. It has been a game changer.
EVs are not for everyone, I get it. But, if your are a typical commuter that stays within 75 miles of your home on a daily basis, you just can't beat them if you have a home to charge at.
Over the last year I have seen the number of Tesla's increase substantially in the Phoenix area, especially where I live in the SE valley. A year ago, on a typical commute of 12 miles to work, I would pass about 10-12 other Tesla's (I get bored driving). Now I will see anywhere from 17-21 on the same commute.
Battery technology will improve exponentially and range will continue to improve in the short term. EV will eventually become the norm but I do not see ICE vehicles being replaced for decades as much as the government believes they can be.
This is coming from an owner of a Taco, Porsche 911 turbo and a 67 Mustang.

 

I just made a round trip 180 mile drive yesterday in a Tesla and today in my mostly stock 2018 Tacoma. Speed limit is 75 most of the way with lots of hills so both vehicles had less than ideal fuel economy.

Yesterday I used 56kwh which costs me $0.13/kwh for a total of $7.28

Today I averaged 18mpg at $4.20/gal. 10gal totals $42.00

 

Oh the EV haters are gonna hate this post.

 

I hate EV thread got nuked from orbit ?

 

In an absolutely shocking turn of events that literally nobody could have predicted, it started dripping P.

 

hard to imagine

 

I love how everyone knows exactly what thread you were talking about

 

Yup - that tracks with my experience too. That's 4 cents/mile for an EV vs 23 cents/mile for a Tacoma. I pay a little less for electricity and have solar so I figure my Tesla costs about 3 cents/mile to drive.

I tracked the costs on my last road trip and even paying inflated Supercharger rates my cost was 8 cents/mile.

I read a few posts and just

 

Which is fine. Charging at a commercial charger is similar to eating out at a restaurant vs. eating at home. It is often the exception, not the rule. Charging (and eating) at home is multitudes cheaper than at a commercial establishment, and if done sparingly while on vacation, etc., will not add much to your overall fuel/food bill.

 

That is not even close to true. I did a 9,100 mile road trip in my Tesla. Out of 62 Supercharging sessions the most expensive was $24.19, and the average was $12.84. The way I compare burning gas vs charging is the cents per mile. Supercharging my Tesla for all those miles cost about 9 cents/mile. Driving my Tacoma that same distance would have cost me 22 cents/mile at $4/gallon. So, it is 2.4 times more expensive to drive my Tacoma than my Tesla.

Supercharging is cheap compared to burning gas. Charging at home is crazy cheap vs gas. I figure it costs me 3 cents/mile to daily drive my Tesla vs 22 cents/mile in my Tacoma. Even people that have to use a Supercharger for daily driving are coming out ahead. When I'm road tripping I pay zero attention to charging rates, but a lot of chargers have time of use rates. It wouldn't be hard to time your charging to periods when the costs are lower.

 

Although I do agree that charging at home is SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper, as for the price of a SuperCharger you have to consider apples to apples and a Tesla does not compare to a Tacoma. The Tesla is roughly equivalent to a 35mpg gas car (straight gas, not hybrid) so the cost per mile would be much closer to around $.10 per mile.

The other thing to consider is that a Tesla is VERY efficient in the EV space, other EVs will require a fair bit more energy for the same mileage and thus incur a higher cost at public chargers.

 

I agree that comparing apple to apples is important and this comparison is a fair comparison for me. I don't own a 35 mpg car, however I do own a 20mpg truck, as do most people here. If I want to go on a road trip my choices are Tesla or Tacoma. But, in the vein of comparing apples to apples name me one SUV that does 0 to 60 in under 5 seconds and gets 35 mpg. I'm no SUV expert so we could quibble over choices, but the BMW X5 is the closest SUV in both price and power, with a zero to 60 of 5.3 seconds and gets 26 mpg on the highway.
Putting a 20 mpg Tacoma, 26 mpg BMW and 35 mpg unobtainium SUV into my spread sheet you get:

• Tesla 9 cents/mile Supercharging
• Tesla 4 cents/mile home charging
• Tacoma 22 cents/mile
• BMW 17 cents/mile
• Unobtainium SUV 13 cents/mile

Even if you compare apples to bananas and use a 35 mpg car the Tesla is still cheaper on road trips.

Here's a chart of EV efficiencies


Using these numbers Supercharging 43 cents KW/h vs 11 cents/KWh home charging vs $4/gallon gas (current prices in my area)
Tesla Model Y long range 270 Wh/mile/1000 W/KW * .43 KW/h Super charge = 11 cents/mile
Tesla Model Y long range 270 Wh/mile/1000 W/KW * .11 KW/h home charge = 3 cents/mile

I'm going with the standard range Ford Mach-E AWD as the poor economy EV because it is a direct competitor to the Model Y and the EVs below it are more sports oriented. Pick pretty much any other EV and it will do better than the Mustang
Ford Mach-E 362 Wh/mile / 1000W/KW * .43 KW/h super charge = 15 cents/mile
Ford Mach-E 362 Wh/mile / 1000W/KW * .11 KW/h home charge = 4 cents/mile

Not factoring in extra maintenance required by ICE like oil changes
Toyota Tacoma $4/gallon / 20 mpg = 20 cents/mile
BMW X5 $4/gallon / 26 mpg = 15 cents/mile
Unobtainium SUV $4/gallon / 35 mpg = 11 cents/mile

There is a grain of truth in the anti-EV argument that Supercharging costs the same as gas. And if a person has no alternative but to Supercharge and can only charge during peak hours the cost saving isn't as great. My example ignores the additional routine maintenance required of ICE cars. Now if a person can charge at home the whole conversation gets thrown out the window and EV's win the cost savings argument by a mile.

* my 9 cents/mile road trip costs are based on actual numbers. Sometimes supercharging is more and sometimes it is less. Also it is becoming more and more common for hotels to offer free charging. On road trips I will choose a hotel that offers free charging if I can.

 

You will never convince the non-believers with facts and mathematics.

 

I'm not sure where he sits on the scale of anti-EV. His posts don't seem trollish so I respond just incase someone else might be on the fence.

 

Keep in mind that BMW will also take Premium, so the gas will cost more per gallon than the Tacoma.

With a little planning, there are also plenty of free level 2 chargers. PlugShare is a great app to locate them. Taking the Tesla across the state I now nearly exclusively use free chargers, so I pay cheap home charging rates to go out there and my return trip the car is charged for free. (The car can make it to my destination on a single charge). I still take the Tacoma in the dead of winter when mountain passes are dicey, and the cost of 2 tanks of gas always stings compared to paying almost nothing with the Tesla.

 

You are cherry picking here a bit.

I own a 48 mpg car, do I get to use that in this argument instead?

My point is that if you are having a discussion you must be fair and comparing a truck that gets dismal fuel economy vs one of the most efficient evs out there is a false comparison. It's similar to the folks who say ev trucks will "never work" because they cannot do "real work", which apparently the only thing considered real work is hot shots or towing a glamper across county.

Back to the comment, I already stated that charging at home is SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper. The fact remains, if you are choosing vehicles on cost alone, and must use commercial chargers, then the cost per mile of a tesla is similar to the cost of a similarly sized and equipped vehicle. Yes, there are a lot of benefits to an ev, especially tesla, and performance is a BIG one but that isnt the end all be all for everyone. Plus, once you take tesla out things like the id.4 etc lack that performance metric that tesla has.

The anti ev crowd is full of zealots that twist arguments and use false comparisons, doing the same from the other side will not help ev adoption.

 

Did you actually read my post? I used real numbers and compared the cost to an equivalent ICE SUV. If you want to compare apples to bananas then do compare the Tesla to a 35 mpg passenger car. Oh wait I did that. I also compared that 35 mpg car with an inefficient EV, and included an EV rating chart so people could do their own comparisons. I gave real charging numbers rather than just saying SIGNIFICANTLY, 3 vs 11 cents/mile for the Tesla or 4 vs 15 cents/mile for the inefficient Mustang. I even showed my math so that others could do it for themselves or calculate based on their local electric rates.

Can you use your 48 mpg car? Absolutely, and I'll even do the math for you.

Firn's car $4/gallon / 48 mpg = 8 cents/mile. That beats even the Tesla for road tripping fuel expense. But even the inefficient Mustang EV is half the cost (4 vs 8 cents/mile) if allowed to charge at home. The bottom line is if someone is buying an EV to save money it is fair to compare it against equivalent ICE cars or whatever car they may currently own. It is also good to provide numbers for supercharging vs home charging. If they own a 48 mpg car and can only supercharge there isn't going to be much money saved. On the other hand if they can charge from home even inefficient EV's will save money vs any ICE. (see actual numbers above)

Your post reads like an anti ev post. I did not twist the arguments or cherry pick my numbers. I actually did the second part of that post not knowing how the numbers would work out. Maybe I should have done a tldr, so here it is

When charged at home EV's are cheaper than even the most efficient ICE car. When supercharging EV's and ICE cars can be similar to run on a cost/mile basis depending upon a number of factors including supercharging price, availability of free charging, the price of gas, the efficiency of the EV and mpg of the ICE.

 

I’m just waiting for an EV truck with a solid state battery like Toyota is saying they have in development. Loved everything about the electric experience minus the range when towing. Even with poor efficiency towing it was cheaper to operate per mile than my ICE trucks in the same conditions and it absolutely crushed them in terms of towing performance.

 

This was literally the point I made, which you have continued to craft lengthy arguments against. Aside from that all I said was it is disingenuous to compare cost per mile of a Tacoma against a tesla, which I still stand behind.