The writer has been questioned,”How can an EV make 100 MPGe?” and, “If an EV can do that, why can’t any ICE powered car do the same thing?” The explanation is buried in how the cost of the fuel is calculated, and also the efficiency of generating electric power for recharging the batteries.
In doing these calculations the writer has standardized upon gasoline costing $3.50 per gallon which include road taxes etc. This is an immediate tipoff since the electric power as generated for general industrial and home use does NOT have a road tax, at least as yet. Electric power here on Long Island costs about 22 cents/kWh. Once you get off LI the going rates do not exceed 14 cents/kWh. So here on LI, $3.50 will buy about 16 kWh of energy. Once off the Island the same $3.50 will buy at least 25 kWh or more. Some states charge only 5 cents per kWh so in that case you can buy 70 kWh.
Typical battery size for an EV powering you for 100 miles is 22 kWh. So if you assume the net charge/discharge efficiency is 0.8 or 80% that yields 22/0.8=27.5 kWh to completely recharge the EV battery to drive the vehicle 100 miles. Just a little more arithmetic yield that $3.50 will do the recharge for the 100 miles so long as you don’t pay more $.13 per kWh. That is anywhere in the US!
This is all very good news, but many readers are quick to point out that petro fuels are being burned either in the car engine OR at the power plant generating the electricity so how can there be such a difference? A partial explanation is that with the availability of natural gas, NG, the efficiency at the power station IS nearly double what you can achieve burning it in a ICE. The writer predicts that in a few years all electricity will be generated using NG if at all possible. The plants run much cleaner and the exhaust gases are principally only water vapor and CO2 and the CO2 is more easily captured if required to do so by regulations.
The remaining question is what about road taxes? Just at the moment that is no road tax on electrical energy------But politicians, particularly Liberals, will see this as a major source of new revenue that they can spend for new projects. The writer’s opinion is that I don’t object that strenuously to a nominal road tax with the proviso, “That it has to be used for highway maintenance ONLY and cannot be pushed into a general fund and used at the discretion only of the politicians.”
Unfortunately this is a political discussion and the outcome unknown.
INTERESTING---