I have no desire to ever own any EV. I am retired military and, an MSEE.
That said, I have much admiration for Elon Musk. He is not Politically Correct. He has a love for America and Capitalism.
And, like President Donald Trump he’s not afraid of Bucking the System and calling it like he sees it.
This is the type of man this country was founded with and in today’s world desperately needs.
The best part is, for years Leftists assumed Elon was one of them because of his EV’s.
Now after years of idolatry, they are beside themselves confronting the fact the man is NOT a Leftist but, an Entrepreneur and Visionary who is not on the Socialist bandwagon at all.
Owning an EV wouldn’t be a bad thing at all, IMHO. An electric motor is more reliable than an internal combustion engine. It has a flat torque curve. The only car production car capable of near-motorcycle like acceleration is the Tesla Plaid.
However until there is a better way to store electricity, charge quickly, and lower vehicle costs you are right. We need a battery revolution for this to happen. And about Elon Musk you are also right, he is his own man. Not a typical billionaire.
I 100% get the argument against a nationwide movement to everyone switching to EV's, the grid can't handle the load, especially during peak hours when everyone gets off work, etc. But I'm in an almost unique situation for a personal use of an EV. Last year I put a sizeable solar system (10 kW) onto my house with 30 kWh battery storage. I'm coming up on the 1-year anniversary (I installed it late spring) and it has produced 55% of all the power I consumed since then. (I'm not an EE, but I'm a software engineer, so I'm a data nerd at heart and heavily analyze the data export my solar inverter gives me by weekly dumping it into a SQL database and running queries against it.) I'm thinking an EV might be good for me because I believe I could get 40% of my power for "free" from my solar system on days I have excess power with nowhere for it to go (I don't sell power back to the grid).
I average 2.4 hours per day when my solar batteries are fully charged -- it'd be nice if that excess power was being put to use. Plus, my inverter has a feature that would let me power a separate electrical panel intermittently (only if my solar batteries at charged to a configured level, say 80%, with the idea that much would power my house through the night without pulling from the grid). On days I'd come home in the EV with, say, more than "half a tank" (of course it's battery charge level, not a tank, but I'm using the gas terms for the EV to distinguish from the solar system having a battery too), I'd plug it into an intermittently charged outlet (with the idea it won't stayed powered longer than my home solar batteries can hold enough charge to power the house through the night). But if I come home really needing a charge for my EV I'd plug it into a constantly powered outlet (knowing that some or all of that power would come from the grid and add to my power bill).
I've studied my driving habits, the avg hours of peak solar hours left when I get home from work each month, the avg # of days I work from home each month (leaving the EV charging during the day), the avg # of miles driven per week, avg # of kWh needed per day and per week to charge my normal 200-miles per week driving habits, etc. All of that I can figure out. I believe my estimates on that stuff will be about as accurate as the estimates I made on the solar system and battery throughput before I bought and installed them. (Patting myself on the back.)
The one factor I haven't been able to narrow down is the durability (read: maintenance required) on the variable speed electric motors within an EV like the F-150 Lightning I'm thinking about getting. So if you have any insight on that I'd greatly appreciate it. I like how the solar system has spared me some of the yuge electrical cost inflation over the past year, as well as the yuge natural gas inflation (because I converted my two nat gas appliances to electric last year too). I'd like to extend that to also giving me a hedge against gasoline price inflation (by getting an EV and letting that be the main car my wife and I drive).
Thanks, sir.
Bump