Driving 100 Miles in an EV Is Now More Expensive Than in an ICE

[fishwax]

38. Sure, if you factor in expenses that EV drivers don't actually have to deal with

I have a plug-in hybrid rather than a full EV, so my experience is a little bit different, but I also know plenty of people who use EVs under similar circumstances. I usually charge for free at my place of employment (I have to pay an annual parking fee, but would have to do that whether I used the chargers or not.)

That aside, these paragraphs make it clear the numbers in the study are skewed:

There were several factors AEG used in determining that owning an electric vehicle was more expensive, like home charging equipment costs, road taxes and deadhead miles. ICE-powered car owners have gas purchases taxed to fund road construction and maintenance. While EV owners don’t pay a gas tax, some states have introduced an additional EV registration fee to compensate.

The massive increase in the report for charging station users versus home chargers is accounted for by the deadhead miles to reach stations and the opportunity cost of waiting for vehicles to charge at stations. The difference highlights the lackluster coverage for electric vehicle charging infrastructure across the United States.

Home charging equipment? You can literally plug your EV into a standard outlet. Most people that I know of don't bother with the fast charging equipment at home, because there is no need for speed when you're parking the car at home. So this seems like a silly addition to the estimated costs.

Road construction? It sounds like they added this to make up for the fuel taxes that EV users don't currently pay.

Deadhead miles? I'm skeptical that most EV users have to drive miles out of their way to find a charging station. As the article points out, more infrastructure in this regard can certainly help (and it is getting better), but with the exception of cross-country trips I doubt this is a huge issue for most EV users.

Edited to add: my plug-in battery gets about 30-35 miles and takes about 2 hours to charge. When I use a public charger it is not infrequently free, but when there is a charge it is usually in the 2.50-4.00 dollar range for a full charge, which would make the cost of 100 miles when just using a charger around 8-12 dollars. The 11.60 per 100 miles is just much, much higher than my experience. I guess I'd have to see the actual study to see how they factor these extra expenses in, but I'm pretty skeptical.