Originally Posted by rsmurano (Post 2441064)

IMO, hybrids are a joke. You get 20+ miles on electric power? So you are paying a premium for a car that gets you a few miles per tank let alone the cost of maintaining a hybrid.
Somebody is wrong, gas prices are going lower, much lower. You can’t claim a blip for a day means much in gas prices. I’m paying < $3 a gallon and that includes all taxes which EVs will be starting to pay road taxes in the future and no subsidies.
Electrical grids: I worked at gas/electric utilities for over 32 years and the country gets very little power from hydro dams. 99% of the power our utility provided was from hydro but that is rare. Our utility started making new power generation plants using natural gas, wood chips, fuel cells, and nuclear. Currently, all talk and all investors putting big money into this country are for power plants to produce energy for our new AI server farms that are coming online, not EVs. Most of them will be nuclear or gas. Wind and solar generation is a joke, they are so inefficient, ugly, needs so much space to get so little power. Nuclear Fusion is the ultimate way to produce power but not there yet.
EV byproducts are hazardous to the environment. Their batteries require hazardous waste methods of storage that can pollute aquifers in the future.

Originally Posted by rsmurano (Post 2441064)

IMO, hybrids are a joke. You get 20+ miles on electric power? So you are paying a premium for a car that gets you a few miles per tank let alone the cost of maintaining a hybrid.
Somebody is wrong, gas prices are going lower, much lower. You can’t claim a blip for a day means much in gas prices. I’m paying < $3 a gallon and that includes all taxes which EVs will be starting to pay road taxes in the future and no subsidies.
Electrical grids: I worked at gas/electric utilities for over 32 years and the country gets very little power from hydro dams. 99% of the power our utility provided was from hydro but that is rare. Our utility started making new power generation plants using natural gas, wood chips, fuel cells, and nuclear. Currently, all talk and all investors putting big money into this country are for power plants to produce energy for our new AI server farms that are coming online, not EVs. Most of them will be nuclear or gas. Wind and solar generation is a joke, they are so inefficient, ugly, needs so much space to get so little power. Nuclear Fusion is the ultimate way to produce power but not there yet.
EV byproducts are hazardous to the environment. Their batteries require hazardous waste methods of storage that can pollute aquifers in the future.

Originally Posted by rsmurano (Post 2441064)

IMO, hybrids are a joke. You get 20+ miles on electric power? So you are paying a premium for a car that gets you a few miles per tank let alone the cost of maintaining a hybrid.

Originally Posted by Bill14564 (Post 2441074)

The PHEV electric-only range is more like 30 miles today (KBB.com)

90% or more of my trips locally are less than 20 miles round trip or 100% electric. One gallon of gas lasts a very, very long time when you use none of it.

Many of my medium trips are down to Orlando (120mi RT) or Tampa (150mi RT). If I can only recharge at home, that still gives me 20% to 25% electric, a not insignificant savings.

The HEV (Toyota Prius, gas + electric) at about 50mpg is still considerably cheaper to operate than a non-hybrid at 25-30mpg.

The cost of maintaining a hybrid? LESS than the cost of maintaining an ICE. An oil change is an oil change but the (typically) smaller hybrid engines require less oil. Fewer miles on the gas engine of a PHEV means less frequent oil changes. Regenerative braking means you may never need to perform brake work on a hybrid. Smaller 12V batteries with less stress means you may never need to replace one. Nothing about a hybrid requires more maintenance and many items require less (or less expensive) maintenance.


Yes, gas is available today at $2.95 or so but that is new and may or may not last long. "In the future" when EVs start to pay road taxes gas may be up to $4 and electric may be down to $0.06/kWh. How do I know? I don't but if we're simply speculating then....




What is the byproduct of an EV, a whistling sound as it goes by? Certainly not the exhaust fumes of the ICE engines.

I don't know that recycling lithium batteries (those materials are in short supply after all) will pollute the aquifer more than disposing of the acid or lead from a 12V car battery. I do know that I've had to replace the 12V batteries in most of my vehicles (though not hybrids) but I have yet to hear someone say they needed to replace the lithium batteries in their EV or electric cart.

Originally Posted by Bill14564 (Post 2440904)

I have a feeling the laws of physics would get in the way of that idea.

Pure water + energy -> hydrogen + oxygen -> fuel cell -> electricity + pure water + heat

The excess oxygen would be consumed by the reaction in the fuel cell to produce heat with pure water as the byproduct.

The electricity generated by the fuel cell could be used to drive a vehicle. The heat from the fuel cell could be used to separate the pure water from the fuel cell into hydrogen and oxygen. And if all that worked you would have a perpetual motion machine.

Instead of fighting the laws of physics, generate the hydrogen offsite, ideally with clean(ish) energy, then transport it to filling stations just as gasoline is produced offsite and transported to gas stations. A car equipped with a fuel cell would then be an EV with a hydrogen fuel cell rather than a lithium battery.

Hydrogen safety in transport and storage is a big problem but maybe solvable.

Originally Posted by CybrSage (Post 2441090)

Same car, one ev and one ice, the ev costs about $10k more to buy.
If I save $1000 a year in fuel costs, it will take me 10 years to break even.
Then I have the EV hassles to deal with.

It is a losing proposition if being done for the money savings.

Many live the tech Eva come with and how quiet they are. Those age good reasons, money savings is not.

Originally Posted by Ptmcbriz (Post 2441089)

Duke Energy encourages EV’s. They just started a new program that they will reimburse you (by a check) for up to $850 to install your 220 plug in the garage for charging your EV. My total bill for install was $875, so Duke paid all but $25. Obviously, with that perk they are encouraging EV’s.

Originally Posted by Aces4 (Post 2441106)

You do realize that Duke is in the business of selling electricity for profit and encouraging consumers to use more of their product to increase their profits is the goal, right? EV chargers will nicely pad their bottom line and thus the encouragement and discount to install the 220 plugs will be recovered quickly.:rolleyes: