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Comment by sp332 | Hacker News Reader

Among new cars? What advantage would ICE cars have in 20 years?

Well, there's the part where you can carry 5 gallons of fuel in a can and instantly add 100+ miles of range. Try doing that with enough battery to go 10 miles... Then there's winter, and finally, there's cost. I can get a used ICE car (not a nice one) for $2K. I suspect the value of batteries alone will prevent electrics from being as affordable?

When you buy a $2k ICE car, you have to factor in ongoing maintenance of a $2k ICE car. Electric vehicles have fewer moving parts, no oil or filters to change, no emissions tests to worry about, even the brake pads last several times longer. Combined with the lower price of electricity vs fuel, the gap in total cost is not going to be that wide.

The average American drives 16 miles each way to work. (Pre-pandemic, so it's even lower now). The kind of person who'd buy a $2k car can get by with very little battery capacity.

The ability to refuel a 6000lb. truck in 5 minutes and then drive 400+ miles towing a trailer full of livestock when the outside temperature is below freezing? This is not some edge-case thing but a requirement for a lot of people in the USA.

ability to run well in upper midwest winters

I assume they mean that people buying ICE cars within the next 5-10 years will still have them by then.

Oh, so not sales (new or used), but "install base".

It has yet to be seen if a mass produced sub-30K electric will be economically viable for a owner at the 10+ year ownership scale.

ICE is proven to be if maintained.

Battery maintenance costs may prove to be the achilles heel of Electric Car ownership, which is why so many people are pushing for a post ownership society / CAAS (car as a service) model instead of owning a car

> which is why so many people are pushing for a post ownership society / CAAS (car as a service) model instead of owning a car

This is great for dense city dwellers that don't use their car much, but horrific for suburbanites, rural Americans, and people that drive more than 15k miles per year.

Reduction in ownership is happening everywhere. Devices, media, now cars and homes. It's not a good trend for many consumers. We'll all wind up as serfs.

I have owned an EV for 4 years, no battery maintenance issues, but the real achilles heel is winter. EVs completely fail at winter, when the temps start dropping below freezing you are looking at 40% advertised range depending on the conditions. Strong winds and steep terrain will take that figure down further. The chargers can't push enough amps into the batteries below freezing so the charge rate is slower. You can't leave the car outside in the cold or it will need to heat it up to prevent permanent damage.

I would not expect so @ 4 years, now 8-10 years check back in with us.

Also if you are driving a high end one, like a Model S, that changes the game as well.

Batteries that have worn down to the point they aren't useful for transportation are still useful for grid storage. Hopefully that will make battery replacements a viable value proposition.

My post is about reality today, not hopeful or what is possible at some point in the future.

I have yet to see any manufacture come out with a battery replacement program that is economical. Look at Prius as an example, battery goes out in one of them it is basically totaled from a economic stand point unless you DIY the replacement with "unauthorized" batteries. I believe the Chevy volt is the same way

The reason no one is doing a battery replacement program is that they don't make sense. The battery is the most expensive part, and main expense, in an electric car. When it's trashed The reasonable thing to do is replace the car. If you're worried about the lifetime of the battery in an electric car. Remember that it uses the same tech as your mobiles and laptops. But the charge, drain cycles of your phones battery cells are once a day. Still they are usable even after several years. But in a car, it's cells charge, drain cycles are going to be way fever a year. I do have friends with early Model S cars, and no one of them are complaining about range loss. I'm sure they must have lost some. But not problematic amounts. I do have the impression that early Leaf cars had a bit more problems with this, and that their battery care electronics where more primitive. But in fairly sure they've sorted that on the newer ones.

I am aware, and that is my entire point. The battery is more or less the equivalent of the engine in the ICE.

Internal combustion engines however have no problems lasting for 10, 15, 30+ years if they are maintained. I know many people that have cars over 15 years old.

It is yet to be seen how long battery packs of different design will last. Or if the drive to get more and more range out of these battery packs will push mfg's to squeeze more range sacrificing longevity as competition in the past increases . That is going to be a problem.

This planned obsolescence model we have for cell phones, to cars with shorter and shorter product life spans is not good for anyone, not the environment, not poor people that generally depend on older used cars which makes electric uses cars at ticking time bomb...

the solution can not be "just replace your $40-$60K car when the battery dies like your iPhone" that is moronic

How many Chevy Volts have ever needed their high-voltage battery replaced?

There will be no new ICE car in 20 years. I think the OP was talking about used/old ICE cars.

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