Bloomberg predicts BEVs are the vehicles of the future

seems like a reasonable time frame. what dote get if they're right? wrong?

 

20 years from now is 3 full generations, starting with the successor to Prius Prime. Keep in mind that simply stocking inventory is far from the end game. To achieve 50% penetration, some major infrastructure updates will be required. Many will face the challenge of just getting a single high-speed charger setup at home. How many cars are in your garage?

One 40-amp line will deliver 200 miles of range from 8 hours of charging. That's 32 amps sustained (20% safety buffer), which is a rate of 7.7 kW. Draw will slow as "full" capacity is reached. There are some charging losses from the AC to DC conversion too. Figure an efficiency of 4 miles/kWh for the anticipated EV travel.

So, even if affordability is reached and there's a diverse choice of electric vehicles offered, the challenge of acceptance is far from over.

 

you're thinking now. the changes over the next 20 years will seem incredible, if they could be viewed from today.
batteries, chargers, electric supply, electric generation, personal vehicles, autonomous vehicles and more.
so many things on the threshold of massive explosion.

you have to think out the box, or get left behind.

 

For those lucky enough to have a service-panel in their garage and for it to have capacity, that's great. Reality is, that's not the case for a large number of houses.

Also. to take advantage of Time-Of-Use discounts, a meter or sub-meter needs to be installed.

 

There are quite a few people with service panels in their garage. Many more than the current market share of EVs.
Within 20 years, which is the timeframe we are looking at, I expect this will be even more common.
For those that don't, wiring one can cost more, but it is a single, one-time cost for the life of the house.

 

New development here is a mix. We saw quite a few Parade-Of-Home models with service-panels in the basement no where near the garage.

Capacity has been a mix too. Some new builds are only 150 amps. Ours is 200. The old homes in St. Paul and Minneapolis are just 75.

 

Hybrids been in the U.S. since the year 2000; almost 20 years. And their market penetration is less than 5%.

I seriously doubt that electric vehicles are somehow going to magically leapfrog hybrids ten-fold in a 20 year timeframe. Electric vehicles have way more limitations than hybrids or ICE vehicles.

I'm a huge advocate of EVs and I'd love to be wrong, but I just don't see it happening.

 

The problem with hybrid adoption is at least twofold:

a) mechanically they are ICE+ so cost more than than an equivalent ICE vehicle, even though this premium cost has lessened with time; without punitively high gasoline prices or incentives/regulation, hybrids remain low to mid single digits

b) early hybrid adopters have moved on to plug-in hybrids and pure battery electric vehicles (BEVs)

That said, there is good reason to believe that BEV costs will continue to fall, perhaps within years to below the cost of a comparable ICE. Range, charging locations, and charging speeds are also improving at a decent clip, making this less of a problem every year.

My vote is for new BEV sales at 50% in 20 years as plausible for light duty personal transportation.

 

you cannot use prius history as a forecast for bev's. it is a completely different animal.

for all intents and purposes, hybrids haven't changed in 20 years. people who wanted them got them, the ebb and flow of gas prices had some effect, and some have left for plug ins.

but the next 20 years will be completely different. we are nearing the end of toyotas speculative hybrid bridge.
battery, charging and solar technology are growing leaps and bounds.

a 2038 bev will look nothing like todays, unlike hybrids which hit a tech wall very early on in the lifecycle.
governments all over the world see the writing on the wall, and the u.s. can only stand pat for so long.

oil companies are divesting and investing, car companies are doing the same. no one wants to get caught with their pants down.

 

The main thing, and probably only one to many buyers, that hybrids have going for them is in reduced fuel use. Since a full hybrid is about $3000 more than the equivalent ICE car, that has been improving in efficiency too, they are a tough sell.

Plug ins offer more than just fuel savings. There is the better potential performance upgrade, and the ability to truly shift away from petroleum for various reasons.

 

Not everyone can buy an a new car. So for the used market, BEVs will be a tough sell because of impending battery costs. This means pretty big losses for those wanting to sell their BEV.

Right now people have a hard time swallowing the $2,000 - $3,000 cost for a hybrid battery. (Just check this forum!) I'm pretty sure a 200-300 mile BEV battery will remain much more costly than the a hybrid battery. Aned even if BEV battery prices fall, hybrid batery prices will fall as well.

It would take a pretty big shift in consumer's mindest to get past the idea of needing a gas engine as backup for when you want to drive further than a BEVs range. We don't want to be limited in our ability to roam the country at will. Or be fearful when there is a power outage or emergency, or the range hit from cold weather.

Additionally a large percentage of the population does not have access to overnight charging. Apartment dwellers, people in high-rises, many condos, etc, etc.

Again, I would like to be wrong. But I just don't see it happening.

 

or lose our livelihood repairing gassers.

 

Here’s why I’m more optimistic:

The hybrid battery premium will always be there over the internal combustion engine. No way for hybrids to beat ICE on up front cost without subsidies.

Although a BEV will always have a more expensive battery than a hybrid as it has much greater capacity, this does not mean that it will always be more expensive than a hybrid vehicle.

One of the turning points will be once BEV batteries and drivetrain up front costs are cheaper than an internal combustion engine vehicle with associated drivetrain. That’s probably not more than a few years away.

Charging infrastructure/speed will be orders of magnitude better in 20 years than now. Even for apartment dwellers who have very limited or no access to overnight charging, at current rates of development there should be new BEVs at current 2018 prices for less than $35,000 that have a range over 300 miles and can get 80% or greater charge in less than 5 minutes. Essentially it would be very nearly the same routine as current apartment dwellers going to fill up their local gas station.

 

If nearly instantaneous charging came to pass, I guess I could see how that would be a game changer. Definitely would need to meet or beat gas fill ups.

Perhaps I haven't followed it closely enough, but I have not heard much about anything viable in that arena. Or at least nothing that is coming on line soon enough to jumpstart the mass adoption of EVs.

I remain skeptical.

 

By the time a hybrid needs a new battery, it is because the car is reaching the point at which it can't be driven. If the capacity of a 200 to 300 mile BEV's battery is low enough that it only has 100 to 150 miles of range, it is still a usable car to many people. Used BEV prices are skewed by the generous incentives for new ones, and the ongoing advancement of the technology at this time. Teslas seem to hold their value though.

No one is going to ban the PHEV, so people that want an ICE can have it, yet still be an EV owner.

 

Aside from the battery, the BEV should cost a lot less to build than an ICEV. Just think of all those EPA regulations governing the building and sales of ICEVs. Once the cost of the batteries falls to mass production levels I think it is reasonable to expect the cost of a BEV to fall below ICEV. It is just so much simpler a machine! As the cost of the batteries falls the technology will hopefully march on and yield a battery that charges faster, weighs less and costs less than what we got today. Considering what Moor's Law does to electronic development, we can perhaps expect something similar in the battery space. Just think what your cell phone looked like 20 years ago. You could barely make call on it. Now you can still barely make calls on it, but it is also a computing powerhouse capable of recording and playing back video (20 years ago you needed a tape cassette for that feat), audio, GPS location, and on and on. If this kind of thing happens to a vehicle battery we'll be way more than 50% BEV, I think. The big thing is refueling. Once that hurdle is overcome the floodgates will open and very few will want to keep driving an ICEV.

It is a huge "IF", of course and the powers that be are still very much invested in oil (US economy hinges on oil markets trading in USD. Until this shifts I am not expecting any real support from powers that be for BEV revolution). It will be interesting to see what happens.

 

isn't tesla showing that battery degradation can be substantially slowed with proper bms? yes, it costs more, but those costs will also come down with more tech and mass production.

i think our idea of battery longevity is skewed by prius. (and leaf)

 

Skepticism is good!
Personally, I spend less time fueling my BEV than I did any ICE or hybrid. Please note, I am only including the time it takes me to locate a fueling station, pull into it, plug in and wait.
When I plug in my BEV, I don't wait. I go eat dinner, watch TV, sleep, and other things I would normally be doing.

True, not everyone has the convenience of a plug in their garage. But a lot more than 4% of car owners do (which is the peak market share hybrids ever reached).

We shall see over the next few years how rapidly plugin vehicles are adopted. It was about 1% last year. This year I expect it to be just shy of 3%. By 2020 I expect it to surpass the 4% peak hybrids hit (Tesla alone will be close to 2%).

Time will tell, but from the crowds I spoke with at the MN State Fair today, a lot of people are interested and ready.