It’s also about lifetime. Internal combustion engines, with a bit of inexpensive maintenance, can be used for many decades.
When batteries catch up on both fronts, the game definitely changes.
When batteries catch up on both fronts, the game definitely changes.
It's easy to think "battery => wimpy, gas => hefty", but it's just not necessarily the case these days, depending on the tool. The only way a gas-powered chainsaw is better than a battery-powered one is that it's fast to refill the gas tank when it's empty, while recharging takes a bit. But if you have two batteries, then the recharge time is about the same as the charge-life, so you can just keep swapping.
Consumer Reports has a review of it, too, and has done a test pitting it against a gas chainsaw (I'm not a member so can't see the conclusion, maybe they like the gas better?). My personal experience, though, is that for casual/amateur usage, of cutting down a tree or sawing up a big branch that's down, it's fantastic. It's a completely different user experience not having to start the darn thing with a crank and have it turn off the moment you take your finger off the trigger.
I would say I paid more for the gas chainsaw, but the battery died on the electric one after only a year or two. Buying extra batteries to get a reasonable runtime and dealing with failing electronics more than makes up the difference in price.
More fundamentally… why did we stop using rakes? Once the leaves are more than a few inches deep, blowers become ineffective. Rakes keep working.
Maybe not a rake, but a broom would be a welcome change. And honestly not much slower.
Having used both brooms and a blower to sweep out my garage, a blower is exponentially faster.
If you get a wide shop broom, it makes pretty quick work of a garage floor, and gives your arms a little bit of a workout as well.