
How Cheap Can Electric Vehicles Get? - Osiris30
http://rameznaam.com/2016/04/12/how-cheap-can-electric-vehicles-get/
======
dsfyu404ed
A cheap used economy car will still have the lowest cost per mile for a very
long time....

When you factor purchase price into the equation gas vehicles win by a long
ways since you need X years of EV economy cars on the market before you can
get an X year old used EV. EV's will need to fill the same market segment as
today's Chevy Aveos and Toyota Yarii (plural of Yaris?) for a decade or more
before they're competitive in price at the bottom chunk of the used car
market. E.g. if a 2030 Civic EV is price competitive with a 2030 Civic
gasoline then it'll be 2045 or later before they're both competing for the
"cheapest cost per mile." Theoretically, the EV wins that hands down because
when purchase price is so small the operating cost dominates the cost per mile
(less maintenance, cheaper gas). The problem with that is that with current
tech you won't be able to find a 15yo EV without trashed batteries, so the
hypothetical $2k 2030 gas civic vs $2k 2030 EV civic comparison goes out the
window because the EV needs batteries replaced or will need them replaced soon
and you can't exactly buy used batteries at the junkyard (they wear out) so
you'll need to shell out big bucks for that new replacement battery, and I'd
bet that whatever a new battery costs in 2045 will still buy a heck of a lot
of gas and maintenince...

"But storage tech will improve and batteries will be able to withstand a
bajillion cycles without replacement" Sure, but why would the OEMs put a big
battery that's good to 1,000,000mi in a car when they can get away with one
that's good to half that, reduce cost, weight, etc

TD;DR, EVs will be cheaper soon the same way cars will all be driving
themselves next year.

~~~
madaxe_again
You assume a constant price for gasoline, which is a bold assumption, given
that the oil markets are currently gyrating wildly, and have been for some
time - we're likely to see prices at the pump go up by orders of magnitude
over a relatively short timescale, which will provide a big push towards EV
adoption, and will drive people away from older vehicles which guzzle gas.

No, it isn't going to be overnight, but like most transitions, it's going to
happen far more quickly than you think. In 1905 people thought that most
people would still be using horses in a century, that cars were just too
expensive and niche, that horses were good enough. Horses were obsolete within
15 years of private automobiles being a thing - by 1920 more freight was
hauled and more passenger-miles were travelled by internal combustion than
horse, in the US.

EVs have been around for seven years, in a "real" form, give or take, their
adoption rate is similar to that of the original gasoline automobiles when
compared to horses.

I give it seven more years before they're dominant.

I'm also putting my money where my mouth is, and I've been buying up nice dirt
cheap houses on busy, noisy, polluted roads. They'll be nice, not so cheap
houses on less busy, quiet, clean roads in fifteen years.

~~~
greedo
Gotta call BS. Gas in my area is currently $2/gal. I think it's highly
unlikely to go up "orders of magnitude" in a short timescale, unless you're
intentionally using weasel words. There's plenty of oil around, wells are
being capped due to oversupply/drop in demand.

~~~
philovivero
I think the "orders of magnitude" phrase was a misunderstanding of exactly how
large an order of magnitude is. Probably meant "an order of magnitude."

I could see gas jumping to $20/gal pretty quickly if things go wrong in the
right way.

~~~
greedo
Short of a revolution in Saudi Arabia, or something along those lines, oil/gas
costs aren't going to go up 10x. Although gas isn't perfectly linked to oil
prices, a barrel of oil isn't going to hit $450 anytime soon. There's far too
much accessible oil at under $100/barrel for this to occur.

~~~
kirrent
Exactly, people seem to forget how many oil sources are out there which become
profitable at about $100 a barrel.

~~~
aidenn0
In addition, the fuel cost-per-mile (so I'm ignoring maintenance), is capped
at about 30-40x that of an electric as we already know how to directly convert
air and water into gasoline or ethanol substitutes at approximately that
energy ratio (~10x the chemical energy, plus ~3-4x the thermodynamic
efficiency of car versus battery cycle)

------
pmontra
A car sharing service in Milan, Italy, is using small two seater electric cars
from China.

Prompted by this article I finally investigated and found them at
[http://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/China-
eec-l7e-80-elect...](http://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/China-
eec-l7e-80-electric-car_60432063640.html) They're quoted with a maximum price
of $8000.

They're definitely made for driving inside a city. Not very good suspensions
(don't drive too fast on cobble stones) but good torque (easily beats a gas
car out of a green light). 120 km of autonomy, which is good enough in the
typical European city center, apparently 80 km/h max speed, which again is
more than enough there. Very easy to park.

More important matters:

Would I survive a crash? They're very tiny...

How long to recharge?

Operating costs? I'm paying 19 Eurocents per minute, all included.

Do they compete with gas cars? The other two car sharing companies in Milan
have gas cars and cost 25 and 29 cents per minute. I prefer the electric one:
it's a shakier ride but cheaper and more fun because of the torque.

~~~
S_A_P
I feel like the size = safety is fallacious. Size _can_ equal safety, but its
not a guarantee. Sure I would not want to get hit by a 3 ton lifted SUV with
ranch style bumpers on it. I would feel that way even if what I were driving
was a 3 ton suv with the same bumpers. There was an NHTSA video a few years
back of a modern chevy impala hitting a 1959 impala and the much larger 59
getting demolished, while the new one had much more survivable damage. Safety
cages, and metallurgy have made cars much safer, even small ones. I drive a
mid sized sedan, and feel that I have a pretty reasonable chance of surviving
a crash so long as I am not hit by a vehicle that is so tall the bumper goes
through my windows and doesn't hit any significant metal surface of my car.

~~~
Someone1234
This issue was covered in great depth when the Smart Car (e.g. Fortwo) got
popular in Europe. Smart Cars have a lot of safety features, seat belts,
airbags (4x), ABS, stability control, but the question was really about impact
distribution.

They put in a tridion protection cell[0] and moved the engine to the back to
offer SOME crumple at the front. The Euro NCAP rated it 4/5, IIHS rated it
"good" but it later failed the partial frontal collision test ("poor").

A Smart Car likely would do alright in most collisions. Although it somewhat
benefits from the large crumple zones of every other vehicle has on the road.
If two Smart Cars collided head on, the results might be worse than if a Smart
Car collided with any other vehicle type.

That all being said, just because Smart managed it, doesn't mean every small
car is equally safe. Without the tridion cell and SOME crumple zone, it would
be a much less safe vehicle.

[0] [http://auto.howstuffworks.com/smart-
car1.htm](http://auto.howstuffworks.com/smart-car1.htm)

~~~
Retric
If your driving in a city and never break 45mph then overall risks change
significantly.

I drive a relatively small car for the US, and it's about the minimum I would
consider safe at 70MPH. But, if you are spending 98% of your time in the city
then simply renting a larger car becomes very viable. You can rent a mid size
SUV at ~600$ per week and for a longer vacation you can upsize for minimal
cost. Further, if your flying somewhere your car becomes meaningless anyway.

PS: Remember a tiny electric could end up saving you 250+$ / month.

~~~
tomtang0514
FYI, the IIHS small overlap frontal test, which I personally consider as the
"hardest" test today, is done at 40mph. By that saying, a crash in the city
can be worse than the test result.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance_Institute_for_Highwa...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance_Institute_for_Highway_Safety#Small_overlap_frontal_test)

~~~
Retric
You can have a partial overlap at 40MPH or 70MPH, the second is much more
difficult to survive.

------
PinguTS
This article has lots of false assumptions. To phrase it positively, the
article ignores a lot of facts.

 _EVs are simpler devices than gasoline-powered vehicles. They have a smaller
number of parts, making them easier to assemble. At similar scale to gas
vehicles, electric vehicles should indeed be lower cost to built.

In addition, EVs have many fewer moving parts (in the engine and drivetrain in
particular) than internal combustion vehicles. That further means lower
construction cost for the most complex and costly part of a vehicle, and far
lower maintenance cost._

While it is true, the engine and drive train has fewer parts, when I reduce it
to motor and battery. But in fact every EV has a gear, including the Tesla.
Yes, this gear is much simpler, but it is there and even runs with oil that
has to be replaced every 100.000 miles like in every other car. The battery is
as complex as an engine itself. Because you need to measure lots of sensors
values and to control that it will not explode and not wear down to fast.
Every battery, including the one in the Tesla, has a dedicated heating and
cooling system just for the battery within the battery.

Then also lots of parts in car are the very same like brakes, steering, air
condition, windows, and so. Remember that a current car is about 30% software
and will be more in future. But there is only 1 engine control unit. The most
of the parts are other things to control safety or personal comfort.

 _Electric vehicles, today, have lower total costs per mile than equivalent
gasoline-powered vehicles, due to lower energy costs of electricity and the
lower maintenance costs._

That neglects the fact, that most of the maintenance costs are not engine
related. Like the brakes have to be regularly checked. It neglects the fact,
that a battery will wear out sometimes between 3 to 6 years and has to be
replaced, which is a huge cost related issue. The guarantee Tesla has, does
not help, because you will pay for that guarantee otherwise.

~~~
perbu
I think you're overestimating the battery capacity loss. There is a Dutch
study which concludes the following:

 _Based on 84 data points from the 85-kWh version of the Model S and six from
60-kWh cars, the study concludes that the Model S will retain about 94 percent
of its capacity after 50,000 miles, with losses thereafter shrinking to about
1 percent per 30,000 miles.

That means that after 100,000 miles, the typical Model S is projected to
retain about 92 percent of its battery capacity and range._

So what "fact" you are relying on stating the battery will have to be replaced
between 3 and 6 years is probably not very factual. Other, simpler EVs,
lacking the rather sophisticated battery management system of the Model S
might degrade quicker - especially in warmer climates, but nowhere near as
fast as you state.

Other than that, you're right in that most EVs are almost as complex as a
modern ICE. They need to be checked regularly and will need repairs.

~~~
forgetsusername
> _There is a Dutch study which concludes the following_

You should probably link to the study.

> _3 and 6 years is probably not very factual._

3 years might be early, but I have a hard time believing that Tesla has hit on
some magic as far as batteries are concerned. The drain on anything I have at
home is far more than what you state; my phone battery certainly isn't much
good after 6 years.. But I have no idea. I guess we'll see as the current
Teslas age.

~~~
mikeash
It's a completely different scenario from your phone battery. Your phone
battery gets charged to 100% every day (if you're like most people), gets
discharged deeply on a regular basis, and has no thermal management. Tesla
batteries are typically charged to 90% or less, with the 100% charge level
being reserved for long trips, they're typically not using a particularly
large fraction of the battery (most people don't drive 200+ miles every day),
and there's a sophisticated thermal management system that keeps the batteries
at the optimal temperature.

What kills lithium batteries is time, cycle count, heat, and extreme states of
charge. A Tesla battery has a massive advantage on three out of those four
compared to consumer electronics, which is why comparing to your phone or
laptop isn't very informative.

------
JulianMorrison
I confidently predict, in my lifetime,

\- Nearly all cars will be electric.

\- Nearly all cars will be self driving.

\- Nearly all cars will be Uber, or something like it.

\- Exceptions to the above will be owned by the same sort of people who
currently own Ford model Ts. They will be lovingly maintained, proudly
exhibited, and illegal to drive on the public highway.

~~~
djrogers
>illegal to drive on the public highway.

Model T's are not illegal to drive today... And you've got a lot more public
sentiment to overcome and a LOT more cars to replace than you think if you
believe all of this will happen in the next 50 years.

~~~
JulianMorrison
As with film cameras, internal combustion cars have a long logistical tail
that is highly dependent on the continued existence of the current volume of
use. So when electric cars start squeezing them out, gas stations and repair
garages will start to disappear, prices will go up for fuel and parts. Poor
people with junker gasoline cars they really don't want to replace will be
driving longer to find fuel and sooner or later will be driven to either
convert their car or sell it for scrap. The only demographic that will be able
to afford to run them will be moneyed enthusiasts. Once they effectively
disappear from the roads (and the voting booth) the government will ban them.

I expect that taxis and trucks will be mandated self-driving before cars will,
because the safety upside will be obvious and huge, and the government is used
to meddling in those industries. Seeing the results of that, there will be a
sustained public pressure to mandate it for cars, with each accident splashed
on the news and reporters saying "if only". As above, they'll first become
rare and then banned.

------
martythemaniak
I was thinking about the same thing a few months ago, so I wrote a blog post,
which then turned into a little calculator.

[http://martin.drashkov.com/2015/09/how-cheap-can-
autonomous-...](http://martin.drashkov.com/2015/09/how-cheap-can-autonomous-
cars-get.html)

Paying 15-20 cents per kilometre to ride in an autonomous taxi seems
achievable. This means that public transit could become slightly cheaper and
self-sustaining. At this rate, it also means people will likely be travelling
a lot more, so maybe the price will go up again because of congestion charges.

------
LoSboccacc
today I got married. according to projection, in a month I'll have 30 wives

~~~
taneq
Unlikely. You weigh a kilogram more after the reception, in a month you'll be
30kg overweight so you have to take that into account (unless you set your
survey period to end mid-reception when you're at your funniest after a few
beers, so your d(sense-of-humour)/d(weight) remains above 1. ;)

------
Animats
Auto internal combustion engines aren't that expensive to make. A base Ford
engine cost about $100 to make in the 1980s. Today's cars have more cost in
the electronics than in the powertrain.

The Tata Nano, the world's cheapest car, originally cost about $1500. But Tata
discovered that the versions with more features sold better. It also flunked
even basic crash tests.

------
Shivetya
When they perfect the fuel cells stack technologies then electric cars will
get cheaper. The issue with batteries is their power to weight ratio is not
good. Who wants 400kg of batteries added to the mass of every car?

BMW did show the direction the market will go to overcome that weight,
composites for the rest of the car. Aluminum was good when it came about but
composites are the only future.

I do think the 100 mile range city car is a good opportunity to exploit
provided they get it to city car sizes (read: Smart) and make it cheap that
its such a viable alternative you cannot say no. In the US this would be 10k
to 12k new pricing but specifically they would always be leased which would
further increase affordability. The key to acceptance is getting people to
accept a smaller package single purpose vehicle

------
superuser2
Don't forget that EV ownership effectively requires land ownership. If you
rent your parking space, good luck getting a charger installed. If you park on
the street, good luck convincing the city to install more than a small handful
of token EV spots.

A house in the suburbs with a garage that I could do electrical work on would
account for the vast majority of the cost if I wanted an EV.

~~~
Grishnakh
That's a problem right now, but it's solvable. Cities that wanted to push EV
adoption could easily pass a law requiring landlords to install chargers, and
of course the city could install their own chargers for street parking.

Obviously this won't happen everywhere, so some cities will be much better
places to have an EV than others.

Don't forget that as EVs become more popular, landlords who are EV-friendly
will do better than those who aren't.

------
nosuchthing
An addon kit for a bicycle is currently around ~$400-$1500.

With more cities rolling out ebike stations things are looking good.

[http://www.monoprice.com/pages/ebikekit](http://www.monoprice.com/pages/ebikekit)

------
kozak
So, can an electric car (not counting the cost of the battery) be
realistically cheaper than a gasoline one within the next 5-10 years? I know
that the number of moving parts is smaller, but these parts that are there are
kind of higher tech.

~~~
bagels
The battery costs are all that prevent electric cars from being cheaper.

~~~
boredpudding
I found this:

> Bereisa based his analysis on the base Model 3 being offered with a 60 kWh
> battery, like the Bolt, and on Tesla achieving a cost of ~$190/kWh. He
> estimates that Tesla’s current battery pack cost (cells, casing, cooling and
> entire pack) is at $260/kWh, while GM’s is at $215/kWh. GM’s cells and
> battery pack are manufactured by its partner LG Chem.

On Elektrek.co

Let's say you need a 50 kWh battery to have a usable range, and it costs $
190/kWh, then the battery will cost $ 9,500 dollar.

And that is within the next 2 years. So.. it's going down extremely fast.

------
dovdov
So you get an electric model of the same car. It costs about double. Even if
fuel prices double/triple, you can easy fill up at least for 10 years off the
difference. Now, ask yourself how often do you replace your car. :)

~~~
epistasis
The question is what is the lifespan of the car, and the total cost of
ownership over that period, not how long a single person owns a car.

~~~
dovdov
Well, you have to replace the battery after about 10 years. And yes, maybe the
resale value is more important.

------
jopython
The recharge time will be a major factor in EV adoption. Currently it takes a
couple or so minutes to fully fill a gas tank. I will wait until Battery
charging tech gets there.

------
ninju
The author should also show a decline line on the prices of the average (and
lowest cost) cars on his graph because I am sure the cost will come down for
all types of cars

------
donretag
Subsidies must have some effect on the price. As the government subsidies for
electric vehicles diminishes, the overall price diminishes as well.

------
gregwtmtno
The author believes that electric cars will be better for ride sharing
services than gasoline cars because the cost per ride is cheaper.

I'm not sure I agree. Unlike private cars, shared cars are in use many more
hours per day and charging time versus gasoline refill time should be
considered.

~~~
icebraining
Three years ago Tesla already had a robot that could replace a battery in 90s:
[https://www.teslamotors.com/videos/battery-swap-
event](https://www.teslamotors.com/videos/battery-swap-event)

~~~
dragontamer
Yeah. Except no one can figure out how the system would work.

The Roadster's battery pack costs $28,000. The Tesla Model S's battery pack is
expected to cost $10,000+ AFTER the efficiency of the Gigafactory in 2020.

Swapping out a $10,000+ part and sharing it between cars is going to be a
major, MAJOR business / economic question. How do you do it fairly? How do you
ensure that the quality of the battery remains the same? Can people cheat the
system?

~~~
misthop
In the sharing paradigm it is Tesla, or a large fleet service, who owns all
the vehicles. In that case they have their own battery swapping sites and they
own all of the batteries. Fairness only come into play if you are assuming
private ownership of the vehicles.

------
frankus
It may seem like a minor nitpick, but the title should be "How Cheap Can
Electric _Cars_ Get?".

It's a bit like equating "Digital Camera" with "DSLR", and ignoring camera
phones as a source of disruption.

------
jhoechtl
Down to the sum of the prices of its components.

------
sickbeard
How are EV's disruptive technology?

------
mark-r
Such an interesting premise, such a flawed assumption...

An electric car shares most of its parts with a gas one, so you can't expect
any savings from economies of scale there. Going back to the Model T for the
cost curve is just laughable.

~~~
mikeyouse
> An electric car shares most of its parts with a gas one

Definitely depends on how you qualify 'most'. An electric car has nearly none
of the mechanical complexity of an ICE car. Look at the engine bay and
undercarriage of a typical internal combustion car:

[http://i.imgur.com/uDxSsR2.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/uDxSsR2.jpg)

Gas tank, fuel lines, transmission, engine, drive shaft, spark plugs /
distributor cap, muffler, exhaust system, fuel pump, engine, air intake,
turbo/super chargers if necessary, oil pumps / reservoirs, etc. -- many
hundreds of parts can be shaved off of full electric cars.

I'm firmly in the camp that Tesla is going to have a much more difficult time
that people predict in shipping a mass-market car, but that doesn't change the
fact that it's much easier to build an electric car than an ICE one.

~~~
dragontamer
> Gas tank, fuel lines, transmission, engine, drive shaft, spark plugs /
> distributor cap, muffler, exhaust system, fuel pump, engine, air intake,
> turbo/super chargers if necessary, oil pumps / reservoirs, etc. -- many
> hundreds of parts can be shaved off of full electric cars.

Battery software, Battery management, Battery coolant. Electric Drivetrain.

The Drivetrain in particular seems to be rather complicated. Consider that
Edmunds was forced to replace their Drivetrain FOUR times in two years:
[http://www.edmunds.com/tesla/model-s/2013/long-term-road-
tes...](http://www.edmunds.com/tesla/model-s/2013/long-term-road-
test/2013-tesla-model-s-drive-unit-iv-the-milling.html)

Note that modern engines have a lot of parts because we KNOW which parts wear
out over time. Spark Plugs for example wear out, and its very simple to
replace spark plugs to recondition an ICE engine.

What wears out in an electric vehicle? Do the permanent magnets in the
induction motor require replacement in 10 years? Nobody knows! Probably not,
but there's probably something in there that needs replacement (due to rust or
whatnot).

Eventually, electric motors will grow to have more parts. Not because they
NEED more parts, but because we will learn what parts SHOULD have replacing.

Replacing a $4000 drivetrain whenever "something" is wrong? That's a problem.
Replacing the $1000 permanent magnet in the induction motor? Well, that will
be a better problem, but will require long-term testing before Tesla is able
to discover (let alone solve) those problems.

Consider this: Hard Drives have more moving parts than Solid State Drives, as
do Tape Drives. Yet we place more trust in them than SSDs because we really
don't know the failure modes of SSDs.

~~~
Vendan
You may place more faith in HDD, but I place my faith in SSD, cause it _lacks_
the failure cases that HDD's have. For instance, I can drop my laptop and not
worry about the HDD, I don't have to worry about strong magnetic fields, and
so on. And there has been extensive testing done on SSDs.

------
akgerber
'Disruptive' means something worse and cheaper than eventually overtakes its
more better, expensive competitors, like microcomputers versus mainframes.

Which makes the current market-winning electric cars, which are generally both
more expensive and better than gasoline cars, not disruptive:
[http://www.vox.com/2016/4/12/11394260/tesla-not-
disruptive](http://www.vox.com/2016/4/12/11394260/tesla-not-disruptive)

------
grandalf
When you buy a car in the US, most of what you pay for is fancy molded plastic
and attractive sheet metal work, cleverly organized by the manufacturer into
trim level "tiers" intended to create maximum perceived value.

The package is then financed or leased with incentive financing and the sights
are set on getting you to replace it after 2-4 years whether it needs to be
replaced or not.

I think a 6 passenger mini-van could be manufactured for the US market
(electric or gasoline) for under $8K if all the frills were removed.

This would entail simple, rubber bench seats, no radio (just a plastic bracket
to snap in a smart-phone, which would also be used as a speedometer, and the
smallest allowable engine.

I'd like to see an open hardware platform for car chassis, perhaps modeled
after a successful platform like some of the 1980s Toyota trucks, designed to
use abundantly available OEM and 3rd party parts.

Of course, self-driving electric cars might leap into reality before any of
this is relevant, but once we stop owning our own vehicle, firms can focus on
cost cutting for their fleets in ways that will usher in similar platform-
style improvements that are difficult when people pick cars for aesthetic and
emotional reasons.

~~~
mywittyname
This isn't really possible to produce a sub $8k, even with an "open" platform.

The reason I know this is because the VW Minibus, which was engineered in the
40s has been sold in Brazil from 1953-2013 with very little change. Want to
know how much a brand new van designed 60 years ago would cost you? $18,000
USD.

That's a vehicle whose engineering and equipment was paid for decades ago,
that received numerous exemptions to tightening safety and emission standards
and could be produced in a region with cheap labor. It was also the cheapest
vehicle of its kind on the Brazilian market.

Super cheap cars like the Versa are really only possible because Nissan
figured out how to build value without making money. The $11k stripper model
is a good for marketing (i.e., inflated fuel economy #; generates interest in
the low price, even if they aren't viable), money can be made on the back-end
(financing), lowers lease residuals, it can be used to keep factories at full
capacity, and helps negotiate lower prices with suppliers.

~~~
felixlechat
We have super cheap car in Europe which cost much less (see Dacia). And for
exemple, Renault is selling a 3500€ car in India
([https://www.renault.co.in/vehicles/personal-
cars/kwid.html](https://www.renault.co.in/vehicles/personal-cars/kwid.html)).
As a note, this same auto manufacturer is leader of electric car in Europe
with Renault Zoe
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Zoe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Zoe)),
even if sells are disapointing due to poor autonomy.

~~~
mywittyname
Yes, but that's a compact car, not a van.

The Renault Lodgy is more a more appropriate comparison and it starts around 9
lakh ($13500/12000€)in India. Which is still substantially more than our $8k
target price.

~~~
felixlechat
Right, but I can imagine Renault doing a van on the same basis. From
4000$(3500€) to 8000$ is a huge gap for changing only the auto body. It is
also funny to see that Dacia Lodgy is more expensive in India than here in
France with more regulation where it cost 9900€ ([http://www.dacia.fr/gamme-
dacia/lodgy/](http://www.dacia.fr/gamme-dacia/lodgy/)), closer to your target
price.

