I have been going down a rabbit hole of potentially buy an EV and it’s been astonishing to me, especially living in California, how unattractive it is to buy an EV.
I will give you a few reasons why:
-I have to upgrade my electric panel to support charging -I have to switch to an EV plan through PG&E, which increases my partial and peak kilowatt an hour here is the breakdown of my summer rates (winter is lower by like 10 cents for both plans)
-
E-TOU-C (current plan)
- Peak (4-9 PM): 54 cents/kWh
- Off-Peak: 46 cents/kWh
- Lower rates for usage within Baseline Allowance.
-
EV2:
- Peak (4-9 PM): 59.068 cents/kWh
- Part-Peak (3-4 PM & 9-12 AM): 48.019 cents/kWh
- Off-Peak (All other hours): 27.818 cents/kWh
- Delivery Minimum Bill: $0.37612 per meter per day.
-I have to pay someone to install a wall charger. Got a quote for $1900
-I have to pay an additional $103 a year to register an EV in CA
-On top of all these fees I don’t even qualify for many incentives as as a household we make over 300k which is honestly nothing crazy for coastal California when you factor in living expenses.
With all of these additional upfront costs and insane electric prices how does California expect people to adopt EVs?
I really want to buy one but it seems like more of a statement play and potential car performance play then a smart economic choice.
I did a cost comparison between a used Tesla Model X, a new Ford F-150 Lightning, and a new Toyota Grand Highlander Hybrid. Here’s a summary including assumptions and formulas used.
Assumptions:
- Prices: $70,000 for the Tesla Model X, $65,500 for the Ford F-150 Lightning (after rebate), $56,000 for the Toyota Grand Highlander Hybrid.
- Annual miles driven: 13,500.
- Gas price: $5.73/gallon, Electricity price: $0.27/kWh.
- Toyota MPG: 31.
- EV maintenance costs are 60% of a gas vehicle’s maintenance.
Formulas:
- Annual Fuel/Electricity Cost:
(Miles Driven / Efficiency) * Price per Unit. - Total Cost (5 Years):
Purchase Price + (Operating Costs * 5). - Total Cost (10 Years):
Purchase Price + (Operating Costs * 10).
Results Over 5 Years:
- Tesla Model X: Approx. $77,797.
- Ford F-150 Lightning: Approx. $78,064.
- Toyota Grand Highlander Hybrid: Approx. $73,665.
Results Over 10 Years:
- Tesla Model X: Approx. $85,082.
- Ford F-150 Lightning: Approx. $90,628.
- Toyota Grand Highlander Hybrid: Approx. $85,141.
Conclusion: The Toyota Grand Highlander Hybrid is the most cost-effective over 5 years, while the Tesla Model X becomes more economical over 10 years due to lower operating costs.
The big unknown for me is I’m fairly confident the Toyota will be working well well beyond 10 years. We’re still yet to see how EVs and the batteries hold up over that period of time.
Would love to hear everyone’s thoughts. Coming back to the title if we feel the electric rates are at all time highs due to inflation then maybe the cost analysis is off however, I would assume gas would follow suit. I guess it depends at what percentage one would fall or increase over the next 10 years.
I think gas prices will crash after there is serious demand destructive n caused by EV adoption.
It will be slow, with lots of ups and downs but gas will get cheaper as more people drive EVs.
The flip side is EV and EVSE equipment will get cheaper too and they become more widely adopted and mass produced.
Installing an EVSE a one time pain the it’s pretty easy to replace one once you have one.
Most homes and apartments will allow for EV charging, and the cost of electricity at home will still be cheaper then gasoline most places for a long time
Public chargering prices will level out for market demand, prices will likely end up being about the same or a little cheaper on average per km then gasoline for public charging.
That’s my predictions.
Have you heard of OPEC?
OPEC can’t raise prices when demand is too low. They will eventually splinter as low-cost producers pump more to maintain budgets and high-cost producers collapse.
Even though we talk more about it when OPEC forces prices up, they have always had far more power to lower prices than raise them. They did it before in 2014 to try to fight against the shale oil boom.
If anything OPEC (mostly Saudi) will contribute to a crash by trying to kill high-cost producers in Western countries, preserving their market share.
that cannot be presumed. remember that car gasoline production will go DOWN as demand drops (refineries will instead pivot to diesel, jet fuel, etc), so pump prices will likely remain high. prices might even soar as car gasoline loses economies of scale.
I was at my brother in laws last night and were talking about how installing a evse to home or even a condo can be recouped not just by you but also when you sell.
I brought up how it will get to the point that everyone will just pass it forward with charging. You go to their house and charge, they come to you and charge.
I hope you are right, but you have to factor in that oil supply will also be reduced if demand weakens. The OPEC will keep prices at a level that maximizes their profits. I have no idea where the price is going to go, but if you expect a crash you might be in for a disappointment.
OPEC controls Oil prices now because they control a large portion of the current production, and many OPEC countries have some of the cheapest to extract oil in the world and can tolerate very low prices.
In the future, as oil demands fall, OPEC will have less and less power to drive prices up. They will still have the power to lower prices, competing with high-cost Shale and Tar Sand production in North America and, to some extent, the offshore oil produced in Western Europe.
More recently, particularly after the pandemic, oil prices have impacted Gasoline prices less.
The biggest driver of high gasoline prices right now is refinery margins.
Refinery capacity was lost during the pandemic when demand and oil prices plunged, and it has never recovered.
The current profit margins for oil refineries have been at ridiculous all-time highs for the past few years because they never brought capacity online to meet the demand after the pandemic.
That lack of capacity caused gasoline and diesel prices to balloon higher than when oil was over $100 per barrel in the late 2000s, even though inflation-adjusted oil prices are far lower. Even right after the shock of the Ukraine invasion, oil prices we far lower than what they were in the late 2000’s.