Nissan Leaf

[P-hack]

I'm just saying including fixed costs is dumb when computing $/mile for existing service, you might as well go all the way and see where your tax dollars are going, Alcohol Credit for Fuel Excise Tax ($11.6 billion)? Really? Prepare for a lot of tedium if you go that so-called "real cost" route. I think the truth is real costs are relative (to everything you can imagine and then some), though usage costs are the best predictor for the change in costs (obviously).

[user removed]

So dividing the amount used by the cost is "dumb"?

[RedDevil]

Incorrect would be more to the point.
The fixed part of the bill is there whether you charge an EV or not.
Only the cost of the extra kWh should be counted.

Take this example.
Suppose you have solar panels and produce the same amount of electricity with them as you use; so the net use is zero.
You have to pay the service fee of $17 a month though, just for being connected to the grid (and have power at night). That's your bill for electrifying the house.

Now you buy an EV and charge it. All the net energy use goes into the car.
It may seem reasonable that you'd put the service bill full on the car than in your equasion, but that means that the cost for the house part is then nil!

[P-hack]

Incremental cost of ownership is the only real cost, if you already have fixed costs for electricity (%99.9999999), they are not part of the additional usage of an EV. Yes, it is dumb to include it in cost/mile. If you have room/cash for solar or whatnot, that is a different story, but we all share in the distribution/maintenance costs of the grid otherwise.

including pre-existing fixed costs is one of a million rabbit holes.

[user removed]

Cost of solar panels including interest (if any) repairs and maintenance. Cost of grid electricity added to true cost of solar. Percentage of total use required by electric vehicle, including losses from meter to vehicle (CU quoted 15%). The power company does not sell it back to you for the wholesale price they pay you for your surplus.

You can play all the games you want to support your perogative of showing lower cost numbers per mile, but you still have to pay the bill.

As I posted before. It reminds me of the gent with the wvo Benz who was reporting 1200MPG in his garage, on this forum, since the WVO was free, it's volume did not count, so his 35 MPG diesel was 1200 MPG.

Cost per mile definitely lower.

MPG is a joke.

regards
mech

[RedDevil]

What...

If you add the fixed costs of the electricity bill to car costs then the remaining part of the fixed cost, for electrifying the house, gets smaller, no?

If you split the bill and make sure the house cost stays the same then the car cost is just the extra power usage.

[P-hack]

To frame it as a perogative is dumb, you should know better. My costs are simply a function of usage, not access, it isn't hard to comprehend, adding in existing costs is completely arbitrary. Your perogative is to play the rabbit hole game, you can play with yourself.


It is arbitrary because the costs in tax dollars towards transportation makes access charges look like nothing. And we pay those too, but you aren't accounting for that nor does it matter for the immediate impact of purchasing an EV.

[user removed]

Depreciation
Insurance
Property taxes
Much higher title tax (Va is 3.5% some states much higher)

If you bought a Leaf for 12-13k used then how much did it depreciate from the original purchase price.

It's actually ludicrous to separate the connection fee from the total eletric bill, but hey go ahead, I guess since it makes your per mile cost seem lower. Consumer Reports actually did use a dedicated meter and found the 15% losses in charging, also conveniently ignored, or just attack their credibility, either way it does not reduce your bill and it gives an inaccurate accounting of the true cost.

I did the math and couldn't justify it and while Neil likes to quote lower maintenance costs, that ignores the inevitable replacement cost of the battery and the fact that at the point in time when the battery has to be replaced, the car will not be worth the cost of the replacement battery.

I counted all the beans.

I'm not against the idea of owning an electric car, just be honest about the true cost of ownership. For me it does not work at this point in time.

regards
mech

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by Old Mechanic

It's actually ludicrous to separate the connection fee from the total eletric bill,

Quite the opposite is true. This debate is not a matter of opinion. It is factually incorrect to include fixed electric costs into the incremental cost of owning an EV. The whole point is to see how much more you will pay each year by having an EV, and the monthly connection cost to the utility has absolutely no bearing on the additional cost of owning an EV.

If a person still wants to incorrectly include the monthly connection fee to the cost of EV ownership, they must also include it in the cost of a gasoline vehicle, effectively cancelling out the cost when comparing the price difference between vehicles.

Why should we include the electric connection fee to a gasoline vehicle? Sometimes you need to put a battery on the charger, or perhaps float charge a battery over winter, or use a shop vac to clean the interior, or run a compressor to fill the tires, open an electric garage door...

While it is incorrect to include the connection fee when figuring the incremental cost of EV ownership, it would be equally improper to apply it only to an EV, but not to a gasoline vehicle when considering the difference in cost between the 2.

My cost of vehicle ownership calculator can handle the absurdity of adding in the monthly connection fee. Just be sure to add it for all vehicles to get an accurate representation of the price difference between them.

To Old Mech's point of maintenance costs of an EV due to the battery degrading, in my example I depreciated the EV vehicle down to $500 at the end of ownership to represent the battery being totally bad, and the vehicle only being worth junk yard price.

Without running the numbers and showing them, speculating the cost of EV vs gas cost is pointless. There is no reason to speculate about the topic when a person can actually simulate with numbers. Speculating without running the numbers is foolish and dishonest. Why take a religious stance on this topic when math can easily be applied?

[P-hack]

I had existing costs that were not affected by the decision to add the leaf, and it is a lot more fun at higher efficiencies, despite being rather heavy, and comfortable (mid sized) and costs considerably less per mile. It had as much impact on the service fees as adding a gasser in my case, and %99 of cases, and that is just the honest truth. No reason to act like it isn't.

I'm still a big fan of the beater 5 speed econobox (and a little jealous of the cbr250r), not everyone will be able to sort out an electric anytime soon. I don't expect to make up for the purchase price in cost/mile (and I did address the battery in a previous post), but you can (and I am) also experiment with electric (I have an old gs750 in the garage and a ac24ls and some leaf batteries), and since I don't have any idea what the resale is or how many miles it can go, it is kinda ridiculous for me to come up with a "real" cost per mile. But so far it has been very reliable (plenty of non starting cars in the neighborhood this week).

Purchase/conversion price can be whatever you want, that isn't what I'm talking about when I say $0.03/mile. Why would anyone feel compelled to "call me out" on that in the first place?