Yesterday at the Verge conference in San Jose, I got an up-close look at Chevy’s prototype Bolt electric vehicle, which I blogged about back in August. The good news: the car looks more stylish in person than on video or in photos. It has sleeker lines and Tesla-like door handles. It’s still kind of boxy, but it’s not as bad as many EVs, like the LEAF, Mitsubish iMiev, and Chevy Spark. So many of those cars pretty much scream “I’m a goofy-looking eco-car!”
The other good news is that the Chevy rep I spoke to seemed pretty convinced that the car would launch in 2017. Maybe I’m scarred by the Tesla experience, where target dates have fallen by the wayside at virtually every stage of their Model S and Model X launches, but I’ll remain cautious. I won’t be expecting a 200-mile range affordable (i.e. sub-$40K) electric vehicle until at least 2018.
Here’s a photo I took of the car’s interior:
It’s still a rough draft of the car, but the interior looked pretty spacious.
Overall, between this car, the Nissan 200-miler, and the Tesla Model III, average consumers should have some great options to go all-electric by the end of this decade.
The company is at it again. With a software update sent over the air to anyone who bought a Tesla since the fall of 2014 and is willing to pay $2500, the vehicles will now be able to do the following:
Autopilot allows Model S to steer within a lane, change lanes with the simple tap of a turn signal, and manage speed by using active, traffic-aware cruise control. Digital control of motors, brakes, and steering helps avoid collisions from the front and sides, as well as preventing the car from wandering off the road. Your car can also scan for a parking space, alert you when one is available, and parallel park on command.
Musk keeps making big promises, but this latest rollout is evidence that he might be able to actually keep them. In particular, he recently pledged that the company will be making 745-mile range batteries in completely autonomous vehicles by 2020.
No hands required.
What would this mean for the environment? To quote Trump, HUGE. On the EV side, it means an accelerated move from petroleum fuels to electricity in battery electric vehicles. It means more mobile battery storage that can provide grid services like smart charging (soaking up surplus solar power, for example) and possibly vehicle-to-grid power (sending electricity back to the grid from the car battery when it’s needed). And it means cheaper batteries more generally that can be used for stand-alone energy storage.
But it also means that a revolution in passenger vehicle travel could be around the corner. With autonomous vehicles, cars can drive more efficiently and therefore reduce tailpipe emissions, and they potentially could be more easily rented on-demand, meaning reduced auto ownership and the associated need for real estate devoted to parking (downtown parking garages and home garages, most prominently).
So even if you’re not a technophile or car person, there’s plenty of reason to be optimistic with this latest development.
For those in the San Francisco Bay Area or with internet radio access, I’ll be on KQED radio this morning at 9am discussing California’s landmark new renewable energy and energy efficiency bill, SB 350. The governor just signed it, as I blogged about this week, and it also contains overlooked but critical provisions on vehicle electrification. Those provisions compensate for the bill language on reducing petroleum fuels by 50% by 2030 that the oil industry worked hard to strip. Tune in if you can here.
Tesla made headlines this week finally unveiling the new Model X SUV. The car looks amazing as expected, but Tesla is only shipping a select version to work out the kinks among it’s well-heeled customers. It won’t be available to the greater public for another year.
The Google Self-Driving Car
Meanwhile, the San Francisco Chronicle compares Tesla’s approach to Google, with its goofy-looking self-driving vehicle:
Google co-founder Sergey Brin sees a future in which self-driving technology takes several forms. That future, he said, should still have room for people who enjoy taking the wheel on a wide-open, twisty strip of asphalt. People like Brin.
“I don’t think we’re going to see ‘no human drivers’ any time soon,” he said this week at an open house for the company’s autonomous car program. “I love the idea of being out on an open road that’s curvy and fun. But in practice, that’s maybe 1 percent of my experience. Mostly, it’s stop-and-go traffic. It’s not nearly that pleasant. And then I’m hunting for parking.”
Google has spent six years on self-driving cars. Its test vehicles have logged 1.2 million miles of autonomous driving, adding an additional 10,000 to 15,000 every week. While impressive, the results still feel like a work in progress.
For its part, Tesla fully envisions self-driving capabilities for its vehicles, even equipping with them with sensors for when the software becomes widely available.
We’re still years away, but to my mind, the future of cars is becoming clearer: they will be electric, self-driving, and rented on demand by most drivers.
David Roberts at Vox.com makes the case for this utopia, describing the huge environmental benefits. Current cars are over-engineered, as is our urban space, for bulky cars built to withstand impacts and for long road trips that we rarely if ever take.
So the future will involve right-sizing cars that can be delivered autonomously to your home (maybe you need an SUV, maybe you need an electric bike). The vehicles will have a smaller environmental footprint (literally, in some cases), and homes won’t need to waste space on garages and other parking spaces. Towns won’t need big parking lots, at least within the downtown.
The environmental upside is big. The battery-powered cars will be distributed storage for the grid, and we won’t need as much auto-oriented infrastructure. Of course, we still want pedestrian friendly, transit-oriented communities. But we shouldn’t ignore the larger technology trends that are shaping the future while we try to plan for it.
Analysts are predicting a bright future for battery costs, thanks in large part to Tesla’s under-construction Gigafactory in Nevada:
Tesla’s grid battery, the Powerwall, is currently priced at about $250/kWh, but CTO JB Strabuel said at a recent utility conference that he expects that price to drop to about $100/kWh by the end of the decade as the company ramps up production.
That ambitious estimate is now being approached by other analyst predictions.
“Our detailed battery component cost analysis details a path to 50%+ reduction in battery pack cost to $125/kWh by 2020,” [Jefferies analyst Dan] Dolov said, according to StreetInsider. Jefferies expects the battery cells themselves to reach about $88/kWh by the end of the decade, and the battery packs to reach about $38/kWh.
The Tesla Gigafactory under construction
A 50% reduction by 2020 would be monumental for the electric vehicle industry. Imagine double the range of current all-battery vehicles at the same price tag ($30K or so for the LEAF, for example). Imagine a high-end Tesla at $20-30K off the current price.
It’s worth keeping in mind that these predictions are only about 2020. By 2030, when we need all new vehicles to be battery-electric to meet our climate goals, prices should come down even more, while public charging infrastructure will only improve.
And as I’ve said before, it’s not just about transportation. These batteries will be needed in bulk to store surplus solar and wind power to decarbonize the grid.
Basically, if you care about climate change, these kind of price forecasts are the most important pieces of news in the field.
Well, this was an entertaining read. After Tesla was once again awarded the highest score ever by Consumer Reports for its Model S P85D, the conservative-leaning Wall Street Journal tried to bash one of the best economic success stories of California and the Obama Administration. But Daily Kos dissected the attacks one-by-one in an expletive-laced diatribe. Here’s an excerpt:
Let’s go to the Wall Street Journal’s op-ed pages, where peak conservative is in action:
Consumer Reports Spends Its Juice, Badly
The product reviewer raves that a new Tesla ‘broke’ its rating system, but the real culprit is in the mirror.
Consumer Reports broke its ratings system and is totally like, “Wasn’t me, it was … that guy!”
If, with their own money, Tesla and its customers want to revel in electric cars, that’s wonderful. Nobody should object. But why should taxpayers subsidize their hobby as if some vital public purpose is being served?
Pshaw, clean air and energy independence, that shit is only a HOBBY! Unlike tax breaks to oil companies which serve vital purposes to our friends in the oil biz.
And why should Consumer Reports prostitute itself in its latest review of the Tesla Model S P85D, calling it basically the best car ever, with a higher-than-possible rating of 103?
Yeah, those guys are fucking whores for liking a car that isn’t a Ford Expedition!
Prostitute is not too strong a word. Consumer Reports does not give away its content for free.
Fucking whores, charging for shit. Unlike the Wall Street Journal, which charges for shit, but isn’t a whore.
The reason became instantly apparent to any visitor who found himself waylaid on almost every page by a full-screen pop-up invitation: “Tesla’s innovation shows we don’t have to compromise. Stand with Consumer Reports as we fight for better cars.”
Consumer Reports is advocating for policies that get better cars to consumers, and they cite Tesla’s success in building a great car as proof that we don’t need to surrender to a gas-powered future. Why doesn’t this infuriate normal Americans like it does conservatives?
You can read the whole thing here.
The new 2016 Nissan LEAF
Nissan finally introduced the new 2016 all-electric LEAF, and as expected, battery range will increase. With advances in battery technology and declining costs, the SV and SL versions will come with a 30 kWh battery, up from the current 24kwh version. The bigger battery will give the LEAF 107 miles of range, up from its current 84 miles, plus an 8 year/100,000 mile battery warranty.
Inside EVs has the scoop on what this means for consumers:
As for pricing, the base Nissan LEAF (S) remains unchanged at $29,010, while the extra 23 miles found in the SV and SL trims see the prices increase anywhere from $1,600 (SL) to $2,100 (SV – which now comes with standard quick charging).
After the federal government’s incentive is factored in, a 107 mile LEAF will set you back at least $26,700 before any dealer or state-level incentives are applied.
Meanwhile, Nissan has made strides on battery technology:
The 30 kWh battery resides in the same battery space under the LEAF as the existing 24 kWh pack, and weighs just 46 pounds (21 kg)more.
“Improved electrode material with revised chemistry results in higher power density and enhanced battery durability upon charge and discharge.”
Basically, the introduction of Carbon, Nitrogen and Magnesium to the electrodes improves performance of the cells, while Nissan adds the “change to the cell layout also contributes to the gain“, although we aren’t quite sure how.
As evidence of a growing confidence in the 30 kWh battery’s cell chemistry (and the fact it will now take less battery cycles to go further), Nissan warrants battery loss below 9 bars of capacity (70%), for the first 8 years or 100,000 miles (160,000 km) in the US and in Europe. The warranty on the S trim stays consistent with that of the 2015 LEAF, at 5 years or 60,000 miles.
It’s encouraging to see this progress, and the extra 20 mile range could make a difference for some consumers. Personally, however, I don’t think the extra 20 miles would make much of a difference for me, and I probably wouldn’t pay a few thousand dollars for it.
An extra 40 miles though would have really helped. Many of the longer trips I take are of the one hour, 60-mile variety, and I suspect I’m not alone. Even with a 107-mile range, I’ll still need to charge to get back home. So I’m right back where I was with 84-mile range.
Ultimately, car companies need to improve range enough to make a charging stop unnecessary for intermediate trips, and I’m not sure Nissan did that with this version for most people. 120 miles is a nice target, allowing not just a charge-free roundtrip to 60 miles away but also enabling a 240-mile trip with only one stop-off to charge.
It’s been almost five years now since the first LEAF came out, and we’ve got an extra 20 miles and falling costs now, plus strong evidence that battery technology is improving, albeit incrementally. It will take some time, but eventually we’ll get to that magic 200-mile range and $35,000 cost. And when that happens, EVs will greatly expand their market share.
It was a rare defeat yesterday for California’s environmental community. After major victories in 2006 with AB 32 (to reduce greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020), 2008 with SB 375 (to reform transportation and land use planning), and in 2010 with a voter rejection of the oil industry’s attempt to roll back AB 32 (Prop 23), climate advocates were getting comfortable in the Golden State.
But the Western States Petroleum Association (aka “Big Oil”) trotted out a well-funded and dishonest ad campaign targeted at “moderate” Assembly Democrats, who gutted a provision of SB 350 that would have legislated a goal to reduce petroleum use in California by half by 2030.
So is this a major setback for the environment and public health in California? Well, maybe not. If the Assembly passes and the governor signs SB 32, the state’s effort to continue the progress on AB 32 out to 2030 and 2050, the California Air Resources Board could essentially require the same petroleum reduction goals through regulation. That agency would have broad authority to do so under SB 32, as it currently has under AB 32. Because transportation emissions are the largest wedge in the greenhouse gas emissions pie, the agency has to tackle petroleum fuels at some level to achieve the broader legislated goals.
And the state is already well on its way to achieving those goals anyway, thanks to federal fuel economy standards, improving electric vehicle technologies, and greater renewable biofuels deployment, as NRDC points out.
But the downside is real: having these goals legislated, as opposed to being in a regulatory form pursuant to a governor’s executive order, means they would have been more certain and fixed. Now a new administration could force changes to how the Air Resources Board regulates fuels, and Big Oil could use their influence during the regulatory process to water down or gut new rules. Plus, they can more easily turn to the courts to challenge regulations, resulting in delays and extra costs for the agency.
So it’s definitely a loss for the environmental community, but in the long run the path that California has to take is clear. Big Oil will see declining market share as vehicles become more efficient, people drive less, and as electric vehicles take hold. Their victory yesterday will probably be a temporary one.
I’ve been an advocate for letting electric utilities build electric vehicle charging stations for a while now. While nobody likes the ideas of regulated monopolies taking over a market, the fact is that private companies are not getting the job done, and there aren’t sufficient charging stations to meet growing demand and to enable longer-distance electric travel.
So I’ve been following with interest Pacific Gas & Electric’s (PG&E) proposal to serve the 65,000 EV drivers in its Northern California service territory with 25,100 charging stations (the number that may be necessary to meet Governor Brown’s goal of having one million EVs on the road by 2020).
But the California Public Utilities Commission would like to go slower than that, as Charged EVs reports:
[T]he state Public Utilities Commission has put a stop to PG&E’s dreams of empire for the moment, saying that it will need to hold a series of hearings before authorizing the program.
“We must consider the requirement to protect against unfair competition and the demonstrated costs and benefits of any utility electric vehicle charging station proposal,” PUC Commissioner Carla Peterman wrote in her ruling (via San Jose Mercury News). “We find that a more measured approach to utility ownership in PG&E’s service territory is warranted.”
One objection to PG&E’s plan is the cost: $654 million, which the utility plans to pass on to ratepayers. Under the original PG&E proposal, residential electricity customers would pay an additional 70 cents per month on their utility bills from 2018 to 2022.
Peterman also pointed out concerns that control of such a comprehensive network could give PG&E something of a monopoly. The utility’s plan calls for it to have control over the design and support of the charging facilities, something that other companies in the charging industry say could suppress innovation.
I think this approach could make sense. It may be best to go slow on the roll out to see how the market reacts. The CPUC could also ensure that the initial utility stations are located where there is no strong market incentive for private companies to site them. Ideally the state could end up with a hybrid system of some utility-owned stations and some private company-owned ones. The other possibility is that PG&E provides some of the underlying infrastructure for the stations, while charging companies then compete to set up chargers in those locations.
Either way, I imagine this is only the first step on a path to more utility-owned charging stations, and the result will hopefully be better coverage and convenience for EV drivers.
A lot of people are understandably wary about being early adopters of new technology. For the privilege, buyers often have to pay more and deal with unexpected problems. In the case of electric vehicles, the dynamic is the same, with many consumers worried about how long the batteries will last and what it will cost to replace them.
It’s hard to blame them. Reports from buyers of the first Nissan LEAF indicate that some batteries are failing pretty rapidly, sparking a class-action lawsuit. And some dealers of the Chevy Volt are quoting a whopping $34,000 for a full “drive motor battery replacement,” as Autoblog reports. Tesla, meanwhile, just unveiled a $29,000 replacement battery for their Roadster model, promising an additional 75 miles of range or so.
Autoblog performed a comprehensive look at what it might take to replace or repair a bad Chevy Volt battery, and the results are encouraging. For starters, after looking at the individual parts, the website found that while all three modules that make up the Volt battery add up to a fairly large $11,121.66 total, in most cases these battery cell modules do not need to be replaced:
There are many other individual pieces mounted on the battery pack that are serviceable, such as the Battery Energy Control Modules (BECM) and the Battery Interface Control Modules (BICM). These modules control and monitor the battery packs and charging system and have been known to fail while the lithium-ion battery cells are not at fault. Some have been replaced under warranty, but if you are stuck buying one they run about $255 a piece for the part. Getting a module replaced will cost you around $2,100 for parts, labor, and programming; labor can be a big hit since dropping the battery pack is required in order to service these modules.
If you are looking to replace the entire pack, the outlook has gotten better based on recent reports of refurbished battery packs becoming available for around $4,000. In these cases your entire battery pack is exchanged for one that comes from a refurbishing facility. These facilities do not produce any new parts but instead take packs that come in on exchange and combine the harvested pieces that are within spec from multiple packs to assemble refurbished packs.
Not bad prices if it buys you another 6-8 years of low-cost electric driving. The site includes a handy chart showing all the battery pack components:
Bottom line: fear of battery repair or replacement may not be such a big issue, particularly as we get more experience dealing with these used batteries coming out of the vehicles. Not to mention that there could and should be a robust market for buying these inexpensive used batteries, which would offer tremendous benefits for cleaning the grid and saving ratepayers money.
