4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
Why might electric cars be a lot more problematic than you might think? That’s what we’re going to find out.
I’m going to share 4 of the biggest issues that electric vehicles have that might make you seriously think twice before buying one.
It’s meant to educate on the serious and legitimate concerns that exist, including some extremely costly ones that need to be addressed with electric vehicles.
Driving range and charging issues
The first major ones have to do with driving range and charging issues. Now, many are probably somewhat familiar with this one, but the problem goes far beyond what most ever expect. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
It has become clear that most electric vehicles fail to actually travel as far as they claim to, and the driving range drops alarmingly fast during high-speed highway driving, during really hot and really cold weather, and especially when doing any towing.
For example, many EV owners have reported their driving range dropped by as much as 30 to 40% when driving in extremely cold winter weather. If you add towing on top of that, it can drop by as much as 60 to 70%.
Then you have public charging, which is now famous for being extremely unreliable, with chargers often being broken, and the few that are working often have really long lineups of cars waiting. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
Yes, Tesla superchargers are the exception and far better than the rest, but that’s no to other EVs until they’re able to actually use them.
Many are probably familiar with the media reports from Chicago which showed parking lots filled with dead Teslas that were frozen solid and couldn’t charge because the superchargers were also frozen, causing a total nightmare situation.
Now, I have to admit, the story was a bit sensationalized, but being that this was just Chicago, I have to wonder what it would be like in a much colder location, like, say, the Prairie provinces of Canada, like Alberta or Manitoba, where it can get a heck of a lot colder than that.
Currently, the only half-baked solution to all of this is to charge at home, where you can easily precondition or preheat the battery to help reduce range loss and other problems before you drive.4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
If you can’t charge at home and don’t have a parking spot, let alone a warm garage, well, you’re pretty much out of luck or at best, stuck doing really short distance drives.
Reliability issue
Now let’s move on to the next major issues with EVs, which has to do with their reliability.
More and more data is revealing that electric vehicles are generally not as reliable as hybrids or traditional gas vehicles. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
In fact, reports from both consumer reports and Isee cars have found that EVs are one of the least reliable categories of vehicles.
According to consumer reports, latest reliability survey, aside from the Nissan Ariya, not a single EV on the market ranked above average for reliability.
They attribute this to EV still being relatively new to the market with a lot of untested technology that still have a lot of teething issues that need to be sorted out. Just one example of this is the Chevy Blazer EV.
After major delays releasing to the market, the first batch to hit the roads had so many reported reliability problems that GM had to stop selling them so that they could come up with fixes. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
And there are many other examples out there similar to this one, which just goes to show that when you’re the early adopter of brand new technology that hasn’t had a lot of time to be thoroughly debugged, you become a quality control tester or a guinea pig, and you’re left having to deal with all these issues through the warranty.
Of course, just to be fair, there are many EV owners who have had a great problem-free ownership experience, and many claim to have actually saved a lot of money on maintenance on top of the savings from charging at home.
But that doesn’t change the fact that the majority of EVs still have a lot of work to do to catch up to the proven reliable track records that many hybrids and traditional gas vehicles have had for a really long time. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
Battery Issue
The third major issue with EVs, and perhaps the biggest reliability concern of all. That, of course, is the battery.
By now, you’ve probably heard how ridiculously expensive it is to replace a battery in an EV.
Depending on the brand, an EV battery can cost anywhere from US$12,000 to 15,000 US, or 15,000 to 20,000 Canadian on the low end, to as high as 45,000 US, or $60,000 Canadian on some models.
Luckily, battery failure seems to be very rare. And EVs do come with an excellent battery warranty. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
For most, it’s an eight-year, 100,000-mile warranty, but on some, it can be as long as 10 years, 160,000 miles, or 240,000 kilometers.
But I’m not sure whether that’s still enough reassurance for a vehicle owner that holds onto their vehicle for, say, at least 10 to 15 years.
We still don’t have a proper large sample size real-world data that shows how long batteries really last on the current popular EVs.
Predictive modeling from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory indicates that today’s batteries may last 12 to 15 years in moderate climates or 8 to 12 years in extreme climates.
Whatever the real lifespan ends up being, there’s no question that the five-figure price tag to replace an electric vehicle battery is absolutely ridiculous.
Until there are proper solutions to that, how many consumers are really going to feel comfortable holding on to an electric vehicle for the long haul?
Poor resale value
The next major problem with EVs, which is the poor resale value. It has become more clear that EVs just do not retain their value well over time.
In fact, electric models tend to be the fastest depreciating ones in the lineup.
Part of that is due to changing EV prices and incentives, changing demand, and it’s also due to older EVs being replaced by newer, better, and much more capable ones.
Ev technology is progressing and changing extremely rapidly, which dates the older EVs, making them a lot less desirable. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
But the one major factor that leads to the most depreciation, at least the long term’s appreciation of EVs is the potential fear of battery failure.
Let’s face it, nobody wants to be stuck with an 8-10-year-old EV with no warranty that has a $30,000 ticking time bomb repair bill that could go off at any time.
As it stands now, in many cases, if a battery dies on an older EV, the vehicle basically becomes worthless, and it will be a challenge for anyone to sell an older EV or at least get a decent trade value because nobody wants to take that chance.
These are all very serious and legitimate concerns that electric vehicles still have, but I still think one of the biggest concerns of all with EVs is the unaffordable pricing.
Aside from certain regions where very strong EV incentives exist, EVs remain far more expensive to purchase than a comparable hybrid or a regular gas vehicle.
And although it is certainly possible to recoup that extra $10,000 to $15,000 price or whatever it is that you pay for an EV in the form of fuel savings, in the long run, saving money on gas might not be enough to cover it.
Not when you factor in potentially higher insurance rates, certain repair costs, and the small possibility of battery failure, which would almost certainly wipe away most of your savings. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
Final Word
Now, again, I’m certainly not trying to be an EV hater or suggest that EVs are some a scam.
I believe that these are all real, legitimate concerns and concerns that I know that many consumers have that need real solutions if widespread EV adoption or supposed government-mandated adoption is to be successful in the future.
Certainly in some parts of the world, such as Norway, EVs already make up around 90% of sales, and they are no strangers to freezing winters that create hurdles, so it can be done.
As it stands right now, though, at least here in North America, EVs are certainly not Not for everyone, at least not yet. 4 Biggest Problems With Electric Cars
Not until we have better charging infrastructure, lower priced EVs with better range, better reliability, and reasonably priced battery replacement options.
Until then, I think the best type of consumer for an electric vehicle is someone who lives where there are really strong EV incentives and discounts where you can get a really good lease deal on one.