EV lots getting cleaned out.

[JeffKeryk]

Generally speaking, ICE is king for long distance. EVs, if they have 300+ mile range (the sweet spot) are pretty good.
Personally, I jump on a plane and fly. I should probably drive more.

Now, I travel 100 miles from home about twice a month, other use is less than 50 miles one way. The EV beats the snot outta ICE; it's not even close. The only rub is car insurance.

So many EV owners, even with the shortcomings, say they will never go back to ICE.There's a reason for it. My guess is, EVs will continue to take marketshare as they get better and charging at home improves (condos and apartments).

Interestingly, my neighbor told me there is a Supercharger at a shopping center near us that offers the 1st hour free. That's a lotta juice! I've never been on a Supercharger anywhere near an hour. And there is the local Community College a few blocks from here that costs 12 cents per kWh... Sheesh!

 

[nealberke]

I always get a laugh regarding this. To save maybe 1 thousand a year on fuel, people will head off to spend and most likely finance an EV vehicle at atleast $50k.for over five years. Electricity cost isn't even factored in....

The installation of a charger at home may not be factored in. And, what if your service enterance is too small already?

 

[Revving2Redline]

Impulse buys rarely work out well...

Impulse marriage has the same results.

 

[goingplacesanddoingstuff]

I have a database of all Ontario's grid data going back over 10 years, which includes our most recent solar installations, which aren't that old. That 3-4% is based on the output of those installations.

This was an exercise I did back in 2024, which was to take the entire installed solar capacity for the province, and apply the hourly output profile from our higher performing grid tied units to it, since hourly data isn't provided for the smaller installations, only the annual average (which is notably lower than for the grid-tied ones). So this is basically just our grid-tied capacity increased 5.5x for the first two weeks of January. 2nd two weeks are similar, which I can share if you are interested.
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I think this hinges on the details of the calculation behind capacity factor.

Capacity factor is the ratio of total energy output to theoretical max power * time.

If the “time” part of that equation includes night time (aka the null values flanking this data), then that would dramatically depress the ratio for solar, since there are long periods of zero generation.

And that might be your point. I mean, that’s not irrelevant to point out for grid-level infrastructure. Solar doesn’t produce anywhere near its max theoretical power because well over half the time conditions are not ideal.

If I wanted to make capacity factor look better for solar, I would calculate it by dividing total energy output by the total theoretical power adjusted for time of day * daylight time.

In other words, this adjusted capacity factor would represent the ratio of how much energy is being captured vs. how much power could theoretically be output during every hour of daylight.

I’m not saying this is the correct way to do it, just posing it as a mental model.

Anyway, my 25% figure was peak efficiency, which is different.

Photosynthesis is only about 1-5% efficient, so the fact modern N-type bifacial panels are reaching into the 25% range is impressive, at least to me.

Here’s Jan-Mar data for a mixed vertical bifacial and south facing angled N-type array on a property I own in the north-central US. It is making roughly a third of what it makes in the summer… so I’m sure the capacity factor is garbage. But still, the net energy it is producing is not nothing, especially considering this is a residential property level install. Even the lowest month, December, produced enough energy for a Mach E to drive 400 miles.

 

[Burt]

A quick back of envelope estimate on my solar array puts the cost at under 9.7 cents per kWh assuming a 25 year life span. The panels themselves are warranted to produce 92% of faceplate capacity at the end of year 25 which means the assumed life span is conservative. @JeffKeryk may have a better set of numbers given how sunny it is in Califirnia.

What kind of return on investment are you assuming? Please provide your back of envelope calculations.

 

[AuthorEditor]

My personal observation (of people I know and seen) is that the stereotypical EV owner is a pretty nerdy guy who gets into using apps for everything and gets a kick out of the extra planning and strategy required to get from A to B in an EV. OTOH someone like my wife would go into a panic if she had to plan out when and where to charge using an app on long trips, and she would forget to do it until some alarm went off. It would add a lot of stress for her.

 

[SC Maintenance]

Assuming the battery cells were not affected, a cracked battery casing is a pretty easy fix. The problem is the repair knowledge is not widespread and for those who don't understand them, it seems like basically a black magic box.

A competent EV mechanic should be a able to fix a cracked battery casing in a day. i.e., obtain new/good used case, drop existing battery, transplant components, reinstall battery, test, complete. Most mechanics don't have the knowledge and the tooling though. You need a toolset that is similar to an electrical lineman's toolset, i.e., insulated wrenches and sockets, and the correct PPE, to do it safely.

I don’t believe this is true. You have any specifics? EV batteries have a whole cooling system between the cells. Most were never designed to be serviceable - unlike the NIMH Prius batteries of old.