Some electric cars have a road trip problem.

[Doug Garson]

I'm going on 10 years driving Teslas. While it was a little more interesting driving at the beginning of that, getting a charging plug at home made it a non-issue. Then a Tesla supercharger was built on my way to/from work, and life got easier, and free electricity. No question many of the non-Tesla charging stations were often out of service. I used to try them all the time for kicks. The Tesla one worked all the time. Range anxiety (which was pretty silly at the time having 200+ mile range), vanished as my Plaid gets well over 300 miles on a charge (and can charge to about 350 miles before a pending hurricane, for example.)

The idea of mandating electric cars until apartment/condos have charging outlets for all the residents is folly. Why would any of those people buy an EV? That being said, I love having an EV, and haven't worried about charging in years.

Why would apartment/condos need to have charging outlets for all residents? If your range is say 200 miles and your daily commute is 25 miles you would be charging once a week and who says it has to be at home? Forget the last time I saw an apartment/condo complex with a gas pump.

[Dan Friedrichs]

Why would apartment/condos need to have charging outlets for all residents? If your range is say 200 miles and your daily commute is 25 miles you would be charging once a week and who says it has to be at home? Forget the last time I saw an apartment/condo complex with a gas pump.

If not for habitability code, there would be apartments without showers/tubs. The cost of adding an outlet is minor and serves a larger societal purpose.

[Allan Dozier]

I also have about 14,000 miles under my belt on a Kia EV6 and couldn't be happier. I have a 3/4 ton diesel pickup which I now use mostly just for towing or really big loads. Range is up to 300 miles so if I am driving from Charlotte to Raleigh for instance for a one day roundtrip I stop at a charging station for around 10 minutes. Typical around town and commuting is so simple since I charge at night once or twice a week. But one of the main reasons I purchased it was that we were building a second home in the mountains about 150 miles away. I now have a charger there too but even while we were building it and couldn't stay overnight I could plug in for a couple hours while I worked and had plenty of juice to get back. Now I can drive back and forth between the homes for pennies each week.
On the forum for these vehicles there was a recent post about driving an EV6 from South Carolina to Oregon and how uneventful it was.

[Jim Koepke]

Why would any of those people buy an EV?

The cost of driving a mile on fossil fuel vs the cost of driving a mile electrically.

When people are able to charge their car from solar cells on their roofs as opposed to paying for gas or diesel, there will be more EVs on the road.

jtk

[Doug Garson]

If not for habitability code, there would be apartments without showers/tubs. The cost of adding an outlet is minor and serves a larger societal purpose.

I would agree including a charging station in a new build is minor and would be a good selling feature and maybe should be in the building code for new builds, but retrofitting a condo complex with a few hundred units would be substantial and as I suggested, not necessary, since even if every resident had an EV it is unlikely more than 15 to 20% of them would be in use at any one time. My pushback on the earlier post was suggesting having charging stations for all residents was required.

[Alan Lightstone]

Why would apartment/condos need to have charging outlets for all residents? If your range is say 200 miles and your daily commute is 25 miles you would be charging once a week and who says it has to be at home? Forget the last time I saw an apartment/condo complex with a gas pump.

In your neck of the woods, the government feels otherwise and has passed this law effective 2021:

For new buildings, the city of Vancouver mandates:100% of new residential parking stalls must be EV-ready with Level 2 charging. Visitor parking is exempt.

Unless you have a charging outlet at home or at work, it's an inconvenience compared to an ICE car. And many people avoid buying them, or aren't happy because of that.

[Jerome Stanek]

In your neck of the woods, the government feels otherwise and has passed this law effective 2021:

For new buildings, the city of Vancouver mandates:100% of new residential parking stalls must be EV-ready with Level 2 charging. Visitor parking is exempt.

Unless you have a charging outlet at home or at work, it's an inconvenience compared to an ICE car. And many people avoid buying them, or aren't happy because of that.

Who pays for the electric

[Doug Garson]

Who pays for the electric

According to the bylaw "All costs associated with the infrastructure in the recommendations in this report are the responsibility of the property developer. Any revenues from fees to access the charging infrastructure would accrue to the building operator." so the end user could be required to pay to use the charger.

[Doug Garson]

In your neck of the woods, the government feels otherwise and has passed this law effective 2021:

For new buildings, the city of Vancouver mandates:100% of new residential parking stalls must be EV-ready with Level 2 charging. Visitor parking is exempt.

Unless you have a charging outlet at home or at work, it's an inconvenience compared to an ICE car. And many people avoid buying them, or aren't happy because of that.

This for new construction only and I think is consistent with what I was suggesting in post #20 ie no need to retrofit all existing buildings. Note I wasn't aware of this new bylaw when I posted.

[Alex Zeller]

The cost of driving a mile on fossil fuel vs the cost of driving a mile electrically.

When people are able to charge their car from solar cells on their roofs as opposed to paying for gas or diesel, there will be more EVs on the road.

jtk

People will need batteries to store the power before that can take off. Hard to charge a car at work with solar panels on your house.

[Jason Roehl]

People will need batteries to store the power before that can take off. Hard to charge a car at work with solar panels on your house.

Cost will have to come way down, too. A typical solar installation at a house of 5, 10, or even 20kW (in full sun, so not while at work like you mentioned) isn’t going to charge a car very quickly. And then the house won’t have much off-grid power, either.

[Alan Lightstone]

Cost will have to come way down, too. A typical solar installation at a house of 5, 10, or even 20kW (in full sun, so not while at work like you mentioned) isn’t going to charge a car very quickly. And then the house won’t have much off-grid power, either.

Peak power on my solar array is in theory 31.6kW. In practice, I never reach more than 24kW. It's a big array. I don't pay for electricity, they pay me for surplus.

My car charges at 48amps (11.5kW) and easily charges in a few hours. No batteries, and no off-grid power, as cost, as you said is crazy for that now. And Tesla's new Powerwall+ doesn't increase capacity (just charging rate), so that was a big thumbs down, unfortunately. One Powerwall can easily charge a car, but leaves very little if any for the rest of the house while doing that off-grid. The vast majority of people won't be off-grid, though.

[Stan Calow]

When the first gas-powered cars became commercially available, a cross-country network of gas stations didnt instantly appear either. It only took about twelve years for that to happen. The power of the marketplace.

If I get an EV, it will be because 95% of my trips are 50 miles or less. Anything out of town, I can rent a gas powered car if I need to.

[Bill George]

When the first gas-powered cars became commercially available, a cross-country network of gas stations didnt instantly appear either. It only took about twelve years for that to happen. The power of the marketplace.

If I get an EV, it will be because 95% of my trips are 50 miles or less. Anything out of town, I can rent a gas powered car if I need to.

In the old days before cars, hardware stores carried gasoline, as the farmer owned hit and miss engines used gas.

[Keegan Shields]

Some people are determined to hate electric vehicles...


Interestingly, there's an emerging market for electric tractors in agriculture. Why? They have 1/3 the operating cost of ICE tractors.

When I asked one particular farmer about the challenges associated with electric vehicles, he told me "for 1/3 the operating cost, we'll figure it out."

With any technology, some people are early adopters, most will adopt with the majority, a few never will.