Study: Electric Cars Are Cheaper to Own, But Not in All Cities

GRA · Nov 20, 2015

Via plugincars.com:

Study: Electric Cars Are Cheaper to Own, But Not in All Cities

http://www.plugincars.com/study-electric-cars-are-cheaper-own-some-not-all-cities-131177.html

Study: Electric Cars Are Cheaper to Own, But Not in All Cities

By Brad Berman · November 18, 2015

EV Costs, Graph by ICCT
From the earliest days of the plug-in vehicle market, sales have clustered around specific geographical areas. That’s due to prevailing attitudes about the environment, but also in no small part to varying state and local government incentives. For example, it’s cheaper to own an EV in San Francisco than in New York City—but how much cheaper?

Fortunately, in 2014, the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT)—the same outfit that revealed the recent Volkswagen diesel scandal—tracked down the value of support for plug-in hybrid and battery electric vehicles in 25 major cities. Its findings are almost a year old, but nonetheless provide insight about the value of incentives and infrastructure to spurring plug-in vehicle adoption.

The ICCT developed formulas to calculate the cost benefit of public charge networks and carpool access to plug-in drivers in each city, and added those benefits to the available purchase incentives in each city. The total value of support for battery electric vehicles—projected over the life of the vehicle—ranged from just a few hundred dollars in Detroit to more than $6,000 in Atlanta. . . .

Graphs included, and the advantages are based on gas prices in 2014, as well as incentives that may have been increased, reduced or eliminated (Georgia) in the meantime, but still useful. Bottom line, PEVs still depend on govt. incentives and perks to have lower LCC than comparable ICEs (especially with current gas prices), which isn't really news to anyone who's been paying attention, but this does provide some numbers.

ltbighorn · Nov 24, 2015

This seems like somewhat weak methodology. Not that it's necessarily wrong, just that doesn't really show what it's being billed as.

It attributes HOV lanes as the cause of the increase in sales in plug-ins, but only shows a correlation. In census tracts with higher miles of HOV lanes nearby, plug-in sales were higher.

While I'm sure a lot of sales are encouraged by HOV lanes, EVs in general do their best in areas where you can get most of what you need done within a short distance, i.e dense areas, which are typically also congested. These areas also tend to build HOV lanes as a way to address congestion.

Some sales increase in these areas is likely due to them being optimal operating environments for EVs. The same conditions lead to the creation of HOV lanes.

redLEAF · Nov 24, 2015

The whole landscape continues to change so puts things like this out of date quickly; Chicago (and the rest of IL) dropped the 10% of MSRP (up to $4K) rebate for EV's due to lack of funds (in general the state is still 'broke' with in fighting still going on about budgets) so it would drop quite a bit towards the bottom. They still are offering a 50% EVSE equip/install rebate but it requires a few hoops to jump through and still offer the much lower registration (EV plates) fees but would wonder how much longer. Lastly, even in the city, regular gas is now below $2.00 a gallon but that's a factor that applies all over ...

Study: Electric Cars Are Cheaper to Own, But Not in All Cities

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