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by edude03 767 days ago
I used to have a bmw i3 then a model y while I lived in an apartment building. In my experience although public charging is more expensive the amount you pay overall is cheaper than an equivalent gas vehicle such that it’s probably not worth trying to find the cheapest station more than once.

For example to go “500km” in the model y charging at home with the cheapest electricity it’s about $6. At a super charger I pay about $30. 5x more expensive but for my f150 I pay $120-150 for the same distance. Between the two options charging at the super charger every time is still 4x cheaper than gas even though I could save even more charging at home

2 comments

Over 10,000 miles, my EV saves me roughly £1300/year compared to my previous petrol car on the basis of being able to charge the EV overnight at home for £0.09/kW and the petrol costing around £1.40/L before. If I were relying on public charging in the UK, that story would be quite different.

A typical public 7kW AC charger here would start at around £0.45/kWh, at which point the savings would only be £300/year and that is assuming there is somewhere close by that I could leave the car charging for hours at that speed.

If I had to rely on a typical 50kW+ DC charger here in order to get charged up more quickly, that would start at a much higher £0.79/kWh, at which point driving the EV would be £700/year more expensive than the petrol car.

What’s the weight difference between the SUV and the f150?

F150s aren’t known for having the best mileage

Quite a bit (can't find a reliable number, but looks like 300-1000kg and yes, I realize that's a wide range)

The fuel economy is actually quite reasonable unloaded - I'm getting 11L/100km vs 13 on my 370z.

The point I'm trying to make though is that it's probably not worth it to look at saving cents/kw when you're likely to come out ahead either way.

And yes, maybe more to the point of the original article - yes, if you have no car and you're only concerned with the cheapest to operate vehicle I'm confident something like a Prius driven gingerly and only filled up while gas is historically low (over a week window or whatever) you could beat an EV. On the other hand, that doesn't describe most people with cars already so for most people even living in an apartment they'd likely save money.