Quote:
Originally Posted by Bm93
I was having a look at the cost of EV car batteries, and they cost as much as I paid for my car, which makes it seem more expensive than it is I guess, but I was trying to find if theres a calculator to calculate potentisl battery degredation based on frequency and length of use plus time to get an idea of when it'd need to be replaced and how long I'd be willing to go over the average battery life with fewer mileage.
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You're right to wonder about these things, but unfortunately the oldest of the "modern" EVs is only about 12 years. The Leaf didn't have active thermal management, and as such, suffered rapid battery degradation.
Vehicles with active thermal management so far have had very modest degradation, but the oldest of those are only about 8 years or so.
Some forums have users that have plotted battery degradation through individuals that self-report. Tesla forums have the most data since they have the most cars and forum members.
Lithium ion battery construction and chemistry varies, so there will be variation in degradation and longevity, perhaps even within the same model of vehicle as manufacturers will change things within the same generation of vehicle. For instance, the Spark went from LiFePO4 to another lithium ion chemistry in just 1 model year.
We won't know how long batteries last until it's been 20 years. My wild speculation based on nothing except observing degradation between various EVs is that modern ones with active thermal management are likely to give very usable range for 15 years.
In the US, the batteries get 10 year, 100,000 mile warranties, so the manufacturer is going to build them to comfortably exceed this minimum threshold.
... so in 15 years an EV might be nearly worthless, but then again that describes most any vehicle.