For most people IMO a 500 mile battery is a solution looking for a problem. I'd always choose a (real world) 250 mile battery and have a lighter/cheaper/roomier car.

And why would you want to go back to the "petrol station" model of filling up once every week or two? For one it would take 28 hours to fill the car even at 7kW so your car would be out of action for a whole day. And secondly why take the risk? What happens if you suddenly want to take a longish journey the day before your weekly charge.

The joy of electric motoring is that every morning the car has filled back up. I don't charge my car every night because I need to; I charge my car every night because that's objectively better than doing it once a week.

 

I pretty much disagree: Speed was not mentioned most long journeys are motorway or high speed A roads. Everyone avoids saying excess speed for obvious correctness but fact is fact. Petrol ⛽ 300 - 400 miles EV that range at high speed perhaps not?. So all my gas guzzling buddies won’t even contemplate EV until they have to; not 2023, 2030 - 2040 perhaps.

 

If they offered a 400 mile EV, I think it'd be amazing. I know Tesla can handle 300 odd and that is the perfect range.

I know charging would take longer, but in all honesty, it'd be like having splits of the battery, where if you only want to do 100 miles, then you could charge only that part of the battery, and so on and so forth.

By that point, rapid chargers will charge at much faster rates.

By that point, I also imagine home chargers could too, using batteries to store energy taken from the house (like Tesla's house energy storage), to deliver more rapid energy to the car when it is plugged in.
Then the electricity supply would again fill the batteries in the unit for the next charge, so 28 hours wouldn't be so bad if you consider that would just fill the batteries whilst you are busy doing other things.
Potentially it could also go back to the house if you wanted it to, i.e only wanted to use 30kwh of it.

That is the answer imo. I'd personally only charge when I needed to, if it could rapid charge at the house this way in the same space of time as one can now.

 

Well, charging speeds would also have to increase obviously. Chademo is going to 150 kw eventually. With enough power charging a big battery is like charging several small ones at the same time. Personally I would also go for 250 miles at lower cost, but I'm just thinking what might eventually be possible. If a new type of battery has double the energy density, the Teslas of tomorrow could have a range of 500 miles without increasing the size or weight of the battery.

 

If it`s true and not just BS,then it`s great news,don`t forget,electricity doesn`t weigh anything,so all you would need to do is just keep the pack topped off at maybe 80% and have a safer margin at the bottom,maybe with a manual reserve which needs switching over,like an old motor bike fuel tap,which would mean much longer battery life expectancy,also smaller packs would do the same job as what most folks are already living with,so town and short hop cars could be much cheaper and perform loads better.

Edited to add,

could be legitimate
Lithium–sulfur battery - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

I like the idea that you could revitalize an old EV with a new battery which would weight half as much but with the same performance. In 2023 you will probably be able to pick up an old Model S for £1000 on ebay

I have no idea about battery technology, would a different chemistry battery require different electronics / software? I imagine it would.

J

 

It's great idea, but it doesn't work...

Id love to have a 250 mile range, it would cover 100% of my needs. But if im going to use that range I can't have my car out if action for a day to recharge not at the destination or at home

It's not just the capacity that is the issue, if we are talking batteries that big then every 7kw charger is almost pointless and there just isn't enough rapids to cope with the demand that this sort of car would create....

 

It's great idea, but it doesn't work...

Id love to have a 250 mile range, it would cover 100% of my needs. But if im going to use that range I can't have my car out if action for a day to recharge not at the destination or at home

It's not just the capacity that is the issue, if we are talking batteries that big then every 7kw charger is almost pointless and there just isn't enough rapids to cope with the demand that this sort of car would create....

Why does everything have to be "either/or".
Since most drivers will plug in when the vehicle is not in use, the majority of cars will have full tanks most of the time. That 'out of the blue' longer journey will not cause problems for the majority. With EV take up at high levels the number of rapid charge points will increase to meet the demand.
In the two and a half years that I have owned a LEAF the number of rapid chargers has kept up with the sales of new cars, and slower chargers are becoming much more common. No where near to the ideal, but the number of chargers is following demand.
If you stick to the fossil fuel idea of 'filling up when you go to the supermarket' you will have problems. The majority of EV owners top up whenever they are at a pump, of whatever size.

Quite simply the EV world is evolving quickly.

 

also as soon as cars can go 180 miles between rapids instead of 50-60 you instantly cut out a fairly hefty proportion of people sat at a charger at any one time. As well as the obvious reduction you also eliminate an additional number of charges that wont be needed any more as the vast majority of journies (even return ones) can then be made with a single stop (or none at all)

 

When the cars have more range, there will be many more on the road, therefore more people charging at any one point in time, and there will be more chargers.

We will still need all the rapids we have and many, many more all at a higher output to cope with the larger batteries, as we don't all start at the same place!!!

For example, Porsche with their 800v, 400 mile car being charged in 15 minutes, or whatever the specs were (you get my drift).

Personally, I've only ever done around 10 journeys in my over 30 years of driving, that required me to drive 400 miles or more in one day. They were exhausting in an ice, you needed to ideally share the driving, and I was good for nothing the next day!

 

a NEDC range of 300 will be more than sufficient , that's equivalent to Manchester to Oxford and back without a recharge. any more would be like a 60Ltr tank on a car that only needs 40Ltr , you'd rarely run it dry or have it brim full , as you'd be dragging around 25-30Ltrs of pointless fuel weight . In this case why drag 220 odd additional Kg of Cells when 80% of the time they'll never be used , it'll make the car less efficient .

They would also need to address battery degradation & heating associated with rapid charging- .

 

I think the more relevant effects of having the lighter less expensive batteries would be:

• City users can run an electric car even if they can't charge at home, because they just need to use a rapid charger or a work charger once a week.
• We can have smaller lighter EVs at a price that beats ICE cars.

By that point we'll be past the tipping point into mass adoption, I hope.

 

There are a lot of quite unadventurous thoughts towards the future of EVs.

IMHO the breakthrough will come when you can charge 100 miles in the time it takes to plug in, go into the shop, browse the newspapers and select some chocolate, standing the queue, pay for your electricity, come out and disconnect.

This makes any distance a viable possibility. Irrespective of battery size.

Fast charging is the solution, not large batteries.

200 miles is enough for pretty much everyone.

As for charging up every 2 or 3 weeks, even at 500 miles you're talking 20 miles a day. You should get a bike if that is all you do!

But seriously, in 2023 the inductive chargers in your drive or on the road will charge your car up. You'll never think about how many times you charge, it'll just happen.

Even if that is not a vision that comes about - jeez - it takes me 20 seconds to plug my car in. Why would I be bothered about doing that? It becomes second nature, and takes less time than going to fill with petrol.

 

There are a lot of quite unadventurous thoughts towards the future of EVs.

IMHO the breakthrough will come when you can charge 100 miles in the time it takes to plug in, go into the shop, browse the newspapers and select some chocolate, standing the queue, pay for your electricity, come out and disconnect.

This makes any distance a viable possibility. Irrespective of battery size.

Fast charging is the solution, not large batteries.

200 miles is enough for pretty much everyone.

As for charging up every 2 or 3 weeks, even at 500 miles you're talking 20 miles a day. You should get a bike if that is all you do!

But seriously, in 2023 the inductive chargers in your drive or on the road will charge your car up. You'll never think about how many times you charge, it'll just happen.

Even if that is not a vision that comes about - jeez - it takes me 20 seconds to plug my car in. Why would I be bothered about doing that? It becomes second nature, and takes less time than going to fill with petrol.

I agree that charging speed and availability is the key.

I've owned various petrol cars with a range less than 300 miles per tank yet I never once wished that the tank was bigger or had range anxiety, even when driving around the remote bits of Scotland.

 

Yup a genuine 200miles is nirvana for me. I don't tend to drive further than 200miles without a stop/break. So long as I can get a charge around that distance and within a reasonable time frame i'd be more than happy. I'd still charge once during the week, but I'd probably be able to skip the weekend charge I normally do.

My only prerequisite is that I can cover those 200miles at 70mph and not have to pooter along at 56mph. 65mph would be just about tolerable but 70mph would still be preferable.

 

I would say 400 mile range. Not because it's likely to get used at that but more because people have an idea that it will. Also it would need to be able to do 200 (I genuinely do 250-300miles in a stint if I'm doing very long distance) with ease so it would need spare power for heating, rain, headwinds, heavy loads, towing, hills, redundancy, etc.
I think a possible 400 miles would work out to 200+ with plenty of wiggle room in any situation.

 

Medium saloon car, 600+mi range, 5-10min recharge, 5 seats, 140mph top speed, sub 8.0s 0-60, reliable.
I don't think it will need that to get take up but if that happens the only gain for an ice is if you happen to like noise and sniffing fumes.

 

Medium saloon car, 600+mi range, 5-10min recharge, 5 seats, 140mph top speed, sub 8.0s 0-60, reliable.
I don't think it will need that to get take up but if that happens the only gain for an ice is if you happen to like noise and sniffing fumes.

that's got to be overkill given that most of us have willingly parted with a not inconsiderable amount of money for something with only around 15% of that range!

 

If batteries are also half the weight and half the cost then I don´t think the cost of "lugging around extra weight" would be significant. If nothing else changes about the car and if battery density doubles and the price halves as expected by Mercedes in 7 years the model S could have a range of 600 miles with the same price, same weight and same perforamance.

What I think is that people would plug the car in when it´s getting "low" but not every night. Say when it gets down to around 200 miles. Even for very long journeys you would probably not need to use any rapids, so I would say in a year you might only use a charger away from home once or twice a year. Some people could go for years without ever charging away from home.

 

Mercedes estimates battery density will increase on average by 15% per year, meaning it doubles every 5 years. Tesla estimates 5% per year, meaning it doubles every 15 years. That said - it is possible that some time between 2020 and 2030 electric cars could actually have more range than ICEs, in addition to all of their other benefits.

 

Sheer speculation. There is nothing that is likely to be a geometric increase of specifications inherent in the physics of electro-chemical cells. It will be a series of quantum steps, if at all.

 

Yes, but the point is that it is within the realm of possibility that this will happen one day. Whether it is closer to 2023 or 2030 I don´t know but one day electric cars could have even longer range than ICE cars. I think what Tesla was saying with their 5% is that they can make slight improvements by tweaking their battery design. Mercedes, on the other hand, is taking into account new materials like lithium sulphur and graphene. I think that eventually there will be a major breakthrough but in the meantime lithium ion is being improved.

 

Will they ever reach that kind of range though? Sure battery energy density will increase, but can it ever match the phenomenal energy density of petrol and/or diesel? I doubt it.

Sure you can increase range by making physically bigger batteries especially as costs decrease, but that doesn’t come without compromises from an engineering perspective
Be honest, if you had the choice between a genuine 200 mile car with significantly better performance, more cabin space, more passenger space the same (or better) ride and build quality and significantly less cost. Can you truly honestly say that you would go for the inferior more expensive 400-600 mile car?

I for one definitely wouldn’t and all things considered I don’t think that 99% of the paying public would either

 

... if you had the choice between a genuine 200 mile car with significantly better performance, more cabin space, more passenger space the same (or better) ride and build quality and significantly less cost. Can you truly honestly say that you would go for the inferior more expensive 400-600 mile car?...

My typical journeys (into& around town, &back) are about 10 miles-ish, and I might do these twice a week. With my battery range of appx 45 miles I don't need to re-charge between trips, and with the squally weather these last few days I'm actually on the look-out for (rare) decent sunny-spells so I can maximise use of my solar panel output. If my phev were a GTE, I be having to recharge fully for every trip. So I've realised that it's actually a help to have a battery that's considerably larger than technically necessary, as the extra flexibility means I can reduce my running costs quite a lot.

Roll forwards 10 years when I can afford a second-hand Tesla with 1000 mile range, or a swisher one with 500 mile range, I might well prefer the 1000-mile battery one as I'd be able to fill-up slowly on solar/economy-7 over a week or two, until I have enough range to take me on one of my long cross-France-in-one-day trips comfortably - 700 miles in one go.

I think there will definitely be a market for Bevs with "huge" range capability; right now I just might consider one with 500 mile range (if it existed & I could afford it) - until then I'm staying with the best Phev you can get over here.

 

It may seem unthinkable now, but Tesla are already half way there at almot 300 miles. It would only take doubling energy density once to make it possible and there are many different new types of batteries being developed that expect to achieve that and beyond.

I'd imagine when the time comes there will be options of 400/500/600 miles range.

 

It may seem unthinkable now, but Tesla are already half way there at almot 300 miles. It would only take doubling energy density once to make it possible

They'd only have to double the energy density of petrol to keep up with that, then!!

 

The energy density of petrol is what is it and will never increase, whereas the energy density of batteries is increasing as the technology gets better. At the same time, batteries are also getting lighter and cheaper. So a 2023 Tesla Model S could conceivably have a range of 600 miles with exactly the same price, weight and performance.

 

I am sure that it might, not that it will. If it is possible I imagine that way will be found. The question is whether it is possible, safely, reliably and at competitive cost.

 

Next time you want to know just how energy dense petrol or diesel is, pop to the garage and put a gallon in a can. Including the can it's around 6kg and you can see the size.
Now think of it as that being 60 miles. Then try to pick up a 60 mile battery pack (hint - it will be well over 200kg).
Batteries are improving but they have a very long way to go to be the equal, let alone better on density.

 

Next time you want to know just how energy dense petrol or diesel is, pop to the garage and put a gallon in a can. Including the can it's around 6kg and you can see the size.
Now think of it as that being 60 miles. Then try to pick up a 60 mile battery pack (hint - it will be well over 200kg).
Batteries are improving but they have a very long way to go to be the equal, let alone better on density.

One thing going EV has made me realise is just how much energy we are wasting using by burning oil for such trivial tasks as getting from A to B.

 

A half of the energy for refining is heat, so it is not primary electrical energy that could have been used to charge a battery.

This old chestnut keeps coming up time after time.

It's not a bad point to discuss the electrical consumptions of petrol refining, but it amounts to about 10 EV miles worth of electricity to generate 50 petrol miles worth of petrol.

Don't forget also that all the other stuff you would get from the +gallon of cirude is then all 'free' because you've already accounted for that in the '10 EV miles' figure, i.e. that electrical energy doesn't simply generate a gallon of petrol, it also goes towards generating several more kilos of various hydrocarbon products.

So there's a lot of double accounting in those figures.

 

Again from an energy and efficiency POV that's great. But we would still need a battery 3x the size of the one in the biggest Tesla to match even a small tank of diesel for mileage - even after the inefficient ice has converted it.
I don't think anyone can dispute that an electric drive car is far more efficient but the reality of carrying that energy around just isn't in it's favour at the moment.
For what it's worth I think there is potential for batteries to have a far greater energy density than fossil fuels because it's more pure and therefore doesn't need to carry the extra density. If/when someone figures out how to contain and carry it without having to attach it to fluid/gel/etc, I can see an ev battery taking a 1000+mile charge that's the size of a small suitcase. That though I think is a long way off.

 

I know that batteries weigh a lot more than a full tank of petrol, but how much does a petrol engine, gearbox, radiator and exhaust system weigh? And anyway, who says electric cars have to weigh the same as petrol cars? If the current battery weight and size give a car like the Tesla Model S acceptable performance (which obviously it does have), then better energy density = more range without adding any weight. I'm not talking about adding weight. I'm talking about improvements in battery chemistry that would make a Tesla go 550 miles or a Leaf go 250 miles without changing the size or weight of the battery.

 

I've said before that at home, it'd make sense that you'd have a battery storage facility, that charges as it empties (you don't really have to worry about it), so when you want to charge your car, it can then rapidly do so using the charge available it has stored (like a quick capacitor), and then whilst you are driving around, charge the main box again, so many days isn't a problem for a full charge.

 

I agree that few people would need a car that does more than 200 miles on one charge (as long as you can rapid charge en route), but longer range EVs would open ownership up to those who cannot charge at home and need to go out to fill up.

 

Elon Musk: Tesla could make a 400-mile range car today

In this article Elon Musk says they could make a 400 mile car today but it would be too expensive. They could even do 500 miles now but that would require reducing the boot space to put in extra batteries. But in ten years, he thinks they will be able to provide 500 miles without changing the form of the car.