My position has always been that there is a very niche market that electric vehicles can support. They are not for everyone, and never can be.
if you have a routine commute for a short distance, have a garage and don’t need to go somewhere at any given time, then, electric vehicles may be an option. For the rest of the people who may live in a condo, apartment or not have a garage to park it inside, and have varying driving habits. The technology simply isn’t there and can’t be there by the very nature of relying on batteries for propulsion versus starting an engine.
“If you have a routine commute for a short distance, have a garage and don’t need to go somewhere at any given time, then, electric vehicles may be an option.”
I commute 106 miles round trip per day for a month or two contract then vacation for equal time. My next car will be a Model 3 RWD with LFP cells and FSD. The average daily round trip distance is 40 miles or less. @106 miles I am two sigma above the average commute. So my commute is not short distance it is one of the longest commutes anyone will regularly do as 99% of the population commutes a shorter distance. That said the model 3 has a 325 mile range and would make the trip round trip twice with ease. That particular company has 15 L2 spots in the parking deck for free use by employees or contractors. Which means my Model 3 will never need to be charged at home and every mile it is driven will cost zero in fuel cost to my pocket.
This last point alone will put $3000 in my pocket over a years time vs the S60 Volvo that does the commuting now. That S60 was also $58,000 vs $25,000 for a Model 3 and 20,000 miles used. Given the range of a M3 I will never need to charge at home as I can always make it back to the parking garage L2 and be back at 100% charge by lunch time. So from a capital expense from mile one the Tesla is already half the cost of the.Volvo per mile driven and has zero fuel cost vs 3.19 per gallon the Volvo is turbo and has to burn 93 @ 3.19 per gallon at 28 or less mpg in traffic at that.
The Volvo also requires full time steering and brake / throttle pedal work. The Tesla has auto follow mode with adaptive speed and lane following. It will come to a halt in bumper to bumper traffic and when the car in front moves it will follow it as t the distance you set it to follow at. This alone makes the car worth it, that and on the open highway you can go hands free with lane, speed, braking and speed limit changes all handled by the tech.
Should I need to go out of town with the M3 charging it off the 50 amp plug on the garage wall will put in 80% to 100% in a couple of hours while I sleep it wouldn’t be below 80% on any day coming home from the L2 since it left that at 100% and only 53 miles one way home. Leaving at 100% in any direction frok north of the DFW metroplex I am never more than 100 miles from a Tesla supercharger and significantly less to a CCS or J1772 charge point. A model 3 will take 170-250kw DC rates from a NACS or CCS plug with an adapter from Amazon. 200 miles is my limit on the bladder so with 200 miles gone and 125 remaining the M3 at 170kw takes 15 min to put back the 200 usually less depending on the bat temp.
I rent Teslas on the regular it’s a cheap fun easy test drive in real world use. Having done multiple 1800+ mile trips range nor charging has ever been a issue in any major city or along a interstate.
The tech in a Tesla is the selling point that and the free charging at destinations or work or hotels valet parking drastically cuts your fuel bill from $3.19 gal to zero.
Every major city is covered in chargers all of which a Tesla can use with the CCS adapter plug it is cheap and rated at 250kw or 240v/80amp AC do a filter for 50kw or.above those are your DC fast chargers then look at all the red dots on map those are all Tesla SC, blue and purple are CCS.
https://chargefinder.com/us/search