Jon Alain Guzik on the Ideal Electric Vehicle
A range of 200 miles, like the Porsche Taycan pictured above, seems to be the bare minimum consumers are willing to accept on an EV. (Photo Courtesy: Porsche)
Is there an Ideal EV? A Deep Dive into the EV Market With Jon Alain Guzik
By: Lucas Rostler
Let's talk about your “ideal” electric vehicle. In your eyes, what are some qualities that you think make an EV good?
Like any car, it really depends on what the customer wants. For some customers, a pre-owned Nissan Leaf may be perfect for EV while others are going to wait for the $70,000 plus Rivian models to come out this fall. So what makes an EV good is, like anything else, really subjective. But there are two baseline must-haves that an EV needs to come with. First off, is a fast charging time. You want an EV that can accept a 150 kilowatt or higher charge so you’re not sitting and waiting forever for your car to charge when you’re on the road.
The second must-have is range. But range is funny. What’s considered an acceptable range is going to differ from person to person. For example, the new Porsche Taycan models have a range of around 200 miles and that’s enough for some people. I just test drove the new Volvo XC 40 Recharge which also has a range of about 200 miles. So it seems that 200 miles is the bare minimum of what people are willing to accept right now, especially in a new car. But in the next generation of EVs, as battery technology improves, my guess is that the range is going to improve to a bare minimum of 300 plus miles. This is akin to the average gas-powered vehicle range, so we’re getting close to parity.
How about some features that raise red flags?
Most new EV’s are going to last. The EV market has evolved to the point where the cars are pretty reliable. But in the past, there were always problems with things like the battery packs for example. There is a Chevrolet Bolt recall right now and there were recalls from BMW, Tesla, Nissan and Fiat in the past. These problems always seem to get worked out though.
Even though the market is still in its infancy, these new EV are really reliable. There have been EVs on sale for a decade now. That’s not to say that problems don’t pop up here and there, but for the most part the cars are solid. My guess is that these smaller problems - like short ranges - will start to disappear once the many different OEM’s join the fray.
The current red flags are less about actual issues with the cars and more about the range and price of specific EV’s. Morning Consult recently did a survey on EV’s and 25% of the respondents said they would only consider an EV with 500 miles or more of range and the median price they would pay is $25,000.
That’s going to be an extremely tough nut to crack because EV’s are going to get more expensive until economies of scale start to kick in. It’s also an unrealistic metric. Very few gas cars, let alone an EV, have a 500 mile range and come at such an inexpensive price. The last car that had such a giant range was a Toyota Sienna Hybrid which could travel 530 miles on a full tank. I was blown away.
On a full tank of gas most cars can get around 350 to 450 miles, so in the current generation of EV’s, it’s really the combination of price and range that raise the most red flags for the consumer but hopefully that will all change soon.
Are there any things that would make EV’s better, but just aren’t there yet due to where the technology’s currently at?
As I mentioned, the price needs to decrease and the range needs to increase. There is hope though. Tesla said that they’re going to release an EV in the next few years that comes in at under $25,000. I’ll believe it when I see it though. Tesla competes in the luxury segment so I’m not convinced that they have the ability to effectively compete in the economy car segment. It just doesn’t fit their brand.
Other than range and price, the most frequent customer complaints we get here at Borrow is that charging needs to improve. There’s just not enough charging stations around where our customers are, especially if they don’t have one at home.
For example, I’m driving one of the BMW i3 EVs from our fleet. Yesterday I needed to put it on a charger before I came into work and I had to wait for one of the public charging stations around our office to open up. Once it opened up though it was fine. I put it on the charger and did some work for a couple of hours. The car went from 0% to 84% over this time period and it cost me $4. So it was perfect. The difficulty was in locating this charging station and then waiting for it to open up before I could head into the office.
I think another thing that would make EV’s better, and it’s beginning to happen, is bi-direcitonal charging which is when you can pull power from your EV. Ford is doing this on their new F-150 Lightning.
With all the rolling blackouts in the Southwest, or what recently happened in Texas, the ability to pull power from your car can make a huge difference in emergencies when you need to power your house. Even when your power goes out briefly. Think about how useful it would be to be able to use your car as a generator. This is going to be a major incentive to purchase an EV as this gets more mainstream.
The last thing is bigger, more family friendly EV’s. My wife drives a three row SUV. We have two kids and a dog, so we like the three rows because we can store plenty of things in the back or put the dog all the way in the back if need be. There are no three row EV’s on the market right now other than the Tesla Model X which is an extremely expensive car. As soon as the EV market starts producing three row SUVs that cost under $50,000 and get 400 to 500 miles of range, that’s going to be a major game changer because it’s going to draw in a whole group of consumers who have never previously considered an EV.
This interview has been edited for clarity.
Borrow is an electric vehicle subscription company with one goal: to make driving an EV as simple and accessible as possible. Borrow is the only electric vehicle subscription service of its kind with a goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and decarbonizing the everyday drive.