CNET News stipulates that plug-in hybrids get more mpg and emit fewer pollutants than standard cars or hybrids, but objects that it would take decades of driving to actually save any money by driving one. According to several months of data from RechargeIT.org, plug-in Priora only use about 88 fewer gallons a year than unplugged Priuses in urban driving, saving between $158 to $250. A $15,000 CalCars conversion would take 60 years to recoup, and a $55K AC Propulsion upgrade – well, forget saving money there. Motion granted, but CNET misses two a Priori points: First, many people didn't originally buy Priora to save cash, they bought them to save the planet – and to be seen as saving the planet. RechargeIT's engineering product manager, Alec Proudfoot, says, "the big focus … is on the CO2 savings, not the cost savings." Second, many people who remember sitting in gas lines, see plug-ins as a hedge against having to do so again. Nevertheless, unreliable batteries may dissuade even the most ardent eco-warrior from relying on a plug-in to get there and back again.
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c|Net’s results can’t be extrapolated outside the realm of their experience – plug-in conversions. It’s likely that a PHEV Prius built as such will not only do better than the conversion but I think we can rely on it to be pretty reliable.
A more alarming cost comparison will be the Volt versus anything, if GM charges $40K for it.
It would be a real gas (so to speak) to see Ford drop a PHEV Escape on the market before the Volt hits, too. I say this because every time Maximum Bob opens his mouth, he annoys me. Having Ford come out of nowhere would really put GM’s tardiness in stark perspective.
The economics of these cottage-industry conversions are clearly not viable. But I’m going to guess that Toyota will charge about $5-6k for the plug in option to the 2011 Prius.
I’m working on a piece comparing the Volt to the (future) plug-in Prius. Stay tuned.
Even if you save $250 because you put 88 fewer gallons of fuel in your car, what about the extra cost of electricity from plugging in your car? Last time I checked electricity isn’t free. Basically energy is energy, and sometimes you can get one form of energy cheaper than another form, but generally it’s all close to the same price. And even if right now electricity is cheaper than gas per unit energy, you can bet once people start plugging in their cars the demand for electricity will rise and the (relative) demand for gas will fall, which will equilibrate the costs. You can bet the arbitrage markets will make sure everything evens out.
I’d buy one for <$25k.
CNET is barking up the wrong tree comparing the "boutique" Prius conversions to what it would cost Toyota or Honda to offer plug in capability.
For some duty cycles like Taxi driving I could see it being more attractive. For the typical person with their 15k mi/yr squeezing out a 10-20% decrease in gas burned versus the already efficient Prius or Civic Hybrid is really reaching for the fruit at the top of the proverbial tree.
miked,
c|Mon. c|Net isn’t that stupid; they factored at electric prices.
Paul N,
That’s true but they do sell a continuous trickle of overpriced units. There’s market demand out there, somewhere, just waiting for the right mainstream product.
I don’t agree that Toyota’s plug-in will necessarily be that much cheaper than CalCars, et al. For one thing, Toyota claims they’re either losing money or just breaking even on their Priuses now. Second, the additional batteries aren’t cheap, or light, and the load from driving on them for dozens of miles at low and high speeds will be much more demanding than what they do now.
And even at $5,000, that’s a twenty year payback.
BTW, Honda’s doing a hybrid-only model:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/03/honda-affordable-entry-level-hybrid-car-2009.php
In California, we would need to radically change the utility billing laws. Here, you are allowed a certain allowed ‘baseline’ amount of electricity. Going over the baseline means that additional kwh are charged at higher and higher costs. My marginal cost per kwh is about 31.5 cents at 200%-200% of baseline. and I have energy efficient everything. Were I to get a plug in, my marginal cost of power would be 36 cents per kilowatt hour (assuming I was over 300% of the allowed power quantities.) For that reason, plug in hybrids will not take off in this state. FYI, I am allowed about 11.2kwh/day, with electric heat in the winter.
Rix: My buddy managed to recharge his EV-1 in his garage every night, and at a reduced rate. Would that not be possible now?
No matter who makes them, PHEVS and EVs in general won’t really give monetary returns until we have much more reliable and inexpensive batteries.
Until then you buy electric because you like electric, because it sure isn’t cheaper.
HEVs can work (barely) because they use much smaller batteries and don’t push them that hard, so they last longer.
Donal: “And even at $5,000, that’s a twenty year payback.”
Donal, the story is not so simple. The article clearly states that the plug-ins are capable of 70-100mpg if used 40-50 miles per day. That changes the payback considerably.
All plug-ins are only fully effective and efficient if they are used in an operating cycle that corresponds to their battery capacity. Otherwise, you’re just lugging expensive potential capacity around, and not utilizing it. This will be a key issue for the Volt and production 2011 Prius plug-in. A driver using the Volt on a short (substantially less than the 40 mile max. range) daily cycle will have lousy economics. It’s the reality of batteries.
The article also suggests that a future plug-in for the Prius may be around $5k. Lithium batteries won’t be very expensive as production ramps up. The raw materials aren’t fundamentally pricy.
Here in the NW, electricity sells for as little as 5cents/kwh. That will also affect pay-back.
And there will well be tax and other incentives. The costs will come down.
Rix: Night-time charging requires a “smart” meter, and an utility that has a program to support it (including much lower night-time rates). You’ll see CA utilities offering them soon, if not already.
Certainly at some point fuel will be expensive enough and batteries inexpensive enough that the value equation will invert, but that is a ways off.
Quoting even a number like 10 years to payback is pointless unless you batteries lasts at least that long (very unlikely).
Currently not only wouldn’t you pay off the battery investment in 10 years, it would be getting worse as time went on and you needed new batteries.
Wake me when we have the 10 year/ 100 000 mile battery pack.
It will be interesting to see what any of the PHEVs have for warranty on their batteries. Currently one of the PHEV conversion shops has a one year warranty on their pack. Does that fill you with warm fuzzies about battery life in PHEV usage?
Bytor: It’s a relevant point, but there are eight to ten year old Priora running on original batteries.
As I mentioned in a previous post. HEVs don’t push the batteries that hard(Prius reportedly uses something like 20% of the capacity). Also they are nimh which have less tendency to just shelf life age out than Lithiums do.
Once you build a PHEV, then babying the batteries is out the window. You will charge to full, deeep cycle down.
Naw, they’ll probably limit the battery cycle to 80/20%; thus they’ll need a pack with 20-30% overcapacity for the job (which is why it’s not a “slam-dunk”).
I would love to be able to make my extremely short commute electrically; as it is now, even my new Elantra can’t get out of the mid 20’s, since the car probably doesn’t get out of “open-loop” mode before the 1-mile drive is over.
Yes, I know, I’m a prime candidate for bicycling to work (at least in the summer); it’s just that hill that I breeze down in the morning looks more daunting after work.
All plug-ins are only fully effective and efficient if they are used in an operating cycle that corresponds to their battery capacity.
So when I buy it, I have to choose whether I want the 50, 30 or 20 mile commuter? And if I move or change jobs, I’ll be driving the wrong distance to get my payback. Sounds just great.
Actually, I have a fundamental disagreement with blithely assigning mpg to plug-in hybrids. If I hitch my car to a team of mules and tow it halfway to work I’ve technically doubled the mileage, but I still have to pay for the oats. Current hybrids get some miles per charge and some miles per gallon, but its tough to separate. Plug-ins could drive all week in EV mode.
An 80/20% usage pattern means 40% of the battery capacity is going unused. Quite a waste of weight and money considering how heavy and expensive batteries of this scale are.
1 Mile commute. Why not walk? I am about 3/4mile I walk every day 15 minutes. 1 mile would be about 20 minutes. Perfect.
I am in total agreement on using the battery to make MPG claims. It doesn’t make any sense and is misleading. There should be two numbers for a PHEV:
Range on battery alone.
MPG when the battery is depleted.
From this you know everything you need to know to see how it will work for you in any circumstance.
Finally everyones favorite Vapor Battery tech is back in the news:
http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release.do?id=837653&sourceType=3
EEStore and their magical ultra caps are really coming this time in 2009, unlike when they were really coming in 2006 and 2007…
Donal: “Actually, I have a fundamental disagreement with blithely assigning mpg to plug-in hybrids. If I hitch my car to a team of mules and tow it halfway to work I’ve technically doubled the mileage, but I still have to pay for the oats. Current hybrids get some miles per charge and some miles per gallon, but its tough to separate. Plug-ins could drive all week in EV mode.”
In the linked article, electric costs were assigned to total operating costs (@ 8cents/kwh). Also, there is an EPA mileage approved “equivalent” for electric cars; that’s how Tesla comes up with their “mileage numbers”. I’ve checked it out, and it’s a pretty conservative formula.
In any case, the economics of driving electrically are all about the cost of the batteries and the cost of the juice. If they’re well matched for the task at hand, the numbers can look great. If my wife drove a plug-in, she’d just about never have to use the gas engine. And since our electricity comes almost exclusively from hydro power, and is cheap; well it starts to look attractive.
But I’m sure most early adopters of plug-ins will be doing it for the “save-the-planet” badge of honor, and economics will not factor much into their purchase decision.
Rix:
In California, we would need to radically change the utility billing laws. Here, you are allowed a certain allowed ‘baseline’ amount of electricity. Going over the baseline means that additional kwh are charged at higher and higher costs. My marginal cost per kwh is about 31.5 cents at 200%-200% of baseline. and I have energy efficient everything.
The economic brain-stems in many of our states’ legislatures consider any sort of demand based or variable electric pricing too complex for the masses. Plus, they don’t want to cede power away from themselves and other entities (like so called ‘Public Service Commissions’).
There’s a lot that could be done here…
– Big rebates for those who choose to use little power on high demand summer days
– Networking of high load devices (like PEV’s)
– Contracts that allow compensation for service interruptions.
– Contracts that allow for your service to be limited for certain times in return for vastly lower rates.
I could go on and on…
Good discussion everyone!
The relavent mileage number for electric operation would be miles/kWh. With that, knowing your electric range, you can calculate operating costs.
Paul, do you have a link to the EPA calculations? Are they really on top of this? It seems that it wasn’t that long ago that the EPA head engineer was completely confused about the issue, coming up with non-sensical metrics like miles/kW. Then again, maybe he just shared many of his countrymen’s confusion about the fact that kW is a unit of power (like hp) not energy.
I’m working on a piece comparing the Volt to the (future) plug-in Prius. Stay tuned.
I don’t want to steal your thunder, but I can already see the conclusion: Even if everything works according to plan, the Volt would need gas @ $10/gal to make economic sense for the rational customer. Ah well, few enough of those around.
AFAIK for electric cars EPA rates range. A mpg equivalent is kind of silly.
If you want to calculate operating costs, you need to factor in battery life and cost, something people forget when they get giddy about EVs. For the Volt I am betting it gets 5 year/60 000 mile warranty on the $10K + battery.
So be sure to add about 17 cents/mile to your operating costs to cover battery replacement.
I am not putting down EVs, I love the idea of having one, they just won’t be economically competetive until we have better battery tech.
I agree with those who say that you can’t use MPG to compare cars when one car has the capability of getting a percentage of its energy from a source that comes in denominations other than “gallons.”
And yes, to also confirm something else, the Prius’ battery pack lasts so long because it’s kept around a 50% SOC (State of Charge). Rarely drops below 20%, and rarely goes above 80%. Deep discharge cycles drastically shorten a battery’s life expectancy, so the Prius’ computer system does its best to keep the SOC around half.
That’s how Toyota can afford to offer a 100,000 mile warranty on the hybrid components (and 150,000 miles in California and other places).
As for me, I hope to get a plugin Prius (from the manufacturer, not as an add-on) at some point. I also want to put PV panels on my roof to power my house electrical grid during the day, and maybe even allow me to charge my Prius in the garage during the day at a discount.
Right now, the payback on PV systems is questionable (considering the initial cost and the longevity of the panels), but in a few years with improved systems, I think it will be a justifiable poposition for me.
Engineer: Paul, do you have a link to the EPA calculations?
I found it at Tesla’s web site some time ago for a prior article, but I’m having trouble finding it today. It’s how they come up with their “154mpg equivalent” figure. The formula wasn’t Tesla’s, and it seemed pretty conservative.
The numbers will of course be more favorable once the price of the batteries lowers. Plus, what’s Calcars profit margin? 50% or 75%?
Want a good reason to get a plug in?
watch The Road Warrior