I received this cost of ownership account and at first I thought this must be false then I did some internet searches to get to the bottom of it and low and behold it turned out to be true.
Eric Bolling (Fox Business Channel's Follow the Money)
test drove the Chevy 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 Chevy 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 longer to drive across country.....
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