Fuel costs

[PV1]

At 10,000 miles a year (16,000 km), that works out to 8 cents/mile or 0.04 Euro/km for battery cost, bringing you to cost parity of fuel only for a 30 MPG (7.83 L/100 km) car at $3 per US gallon (3.79 Liters).

If you were lucky enough to get a warranty replacement for a failed battery, your costs are even lower. I got a new pack 2 years in for Bear, and a friend of mine got a new pack right at the tail end of their warranty, so their 10-year old car has a brand new battery, which means they effectively bought a new I-MiEV for under $10,000.

For me, we’ve made some efficiency improvements in the house, which will reduce our energy consumption to the point where the cars will no longer use utility kWhs. Instead, they will be using solar kWhs and effectively drop fuel cost to zero for home charging.

 

[Matheos]

If you swap the battery under guaranty then I agree with you that the car is economical to drive! otherwise, I don t think so! At least now. Maybe in the future when the cost of the battery falls to 6000 euro or so then it is economical to drive this car

 

[PV1]

I think it is important to keep in mind that the i-MiEV was one of the first modern EVs on the market (at least in the US, it was the fourth Lithium-ion powered EV, following the Nissan Altra, Tesla Roadster, and hot on the heels of the Nissan LEAF). With that, I would expect that some things won’t last like the on-board charger. However, compared to what DC quick chargers are like, the on-board charger is very reliable.

15 years on the battery would be fantastic. I work with electric bicycles, and while most batteries are lasting 8+ years, some at the 5-year mark are giving us headaches. The i-MiEV battery was quite expensive for it’s capacity and power output, but remember that 3rd party cells can be had much cheaper than from Mitsubishi when out-of-warranty rebuilds becomes a thing.

To make it a fair comparison, perhaps we should tally up the cost of replacements and maintenance of items that i-MiEVs don’t have (oil changes, spark plugs, belt changes, etc.) if we’re including battery and charger replacement costs that ICEVs don’t have, and that should really have a separate thread as this one only looks at the energy cost of moving the car.

 

[Phximiev]

See this post as well as the posts before and after it!

http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=3697&p=32371&hilit=Break+even#p32371

 

[Matheos]

Simple calculation :
I drive a Peugeot 307 with autogas: year costs with taxis : 75euro (gas)x12 (months) = 900 euro + 260euro (taxis/year)=1160
As for service I do it my self most of the part so I need 100 euro per year for it. 1160 + 100=1260 so 1260 x15 years = 15120 euro.

Peugeot ion: No cost for charging because I have solar panels or I charged at work. Cost for service 80 euro/year Because parts cost more than on Peugeot 307.
Charger replacement and batery after 15 years cost 10500E + 4200E euro+960E= 15660 Euro
And in all these years you have a degradation of the battery that reduces the Km from 120km to 40km without to turn on heat or AC!
As for rebuilding the battery............I am in Greece......All this stuff is neu here and will stay so for a long time !!!

Where is the economy ??? :?

 

[Phximiev]

Once you’re past the break even point, then everything is gravy and the future cost of repair is irrelevant, or sort of.

We are way beyond the break even point after almost 7 years and still get 50-55 miles of range after 55,000 or so miles of driving. Our initial plan, assuming the battery or something else goes kaput and the replacement cost is prohibitive, is to sell the car for parts ( to Kiev! ) and buy a Bolt or a Tesla.

At the moment though, it’s still going strong!

 

[Matheos]

I agree with you!