Fuel costs

[Jon]

I was talking to a coworker yesterday and he wanted to know how much it actually cost to drive the Mitusu i. I never really compared electricity to gas, so I told him that I have a 16kw battery, but I usually charge at no less than 1/2 battery level, or 8kw. at $.12/kw it comes out to $.96 and that's for roughly 30 miles.
His reply, "$1 to travel 30 miles. Crap, my SUV cost about $8 to go 30 miles!"

 

[TaosEV]

An easier way to put it for someone is "I get the electric equivalent of 112 miles per gallon." I think the EPA number is based on gas at $3.70/gallon and electricity at 12 cents kw/h. That works out to just under three cents a mile to operate the i.

 

[fjpod]

Electricity for me is 25 cents per Kwh in NYC. Gasoline right now is about $4.15. I've figured that fueling an iMiev is no less costly than fueling my Prius which gets 50 mpg.

 

[jennrod12]

fjpod,

Does NYC have any alternative billing plan for electricity for EVs? Here in CA we can get on a different rate schedule so that the cost is very low at off peak times, usually between midnight and 7am.

Jenn

 

[fjpod]

fjpod,

Does NYC have any alternative billing plan for electricity for EVs? Here in CA we can get on a different rate schedule so that the cost is very low at off peak times, usually between midnight and 7am.

Jenn

They do have a time of use plan (nor just for EVs), where from 10PM til 10 AM, the rate would be lower...but the rate in the daytime would actually be higher than normal, so it's a gamble. I've been trying to get more specific rates, but I get a run-around. They say they will put you on the time of use plan and monitor your useage for a few months. If it doesn't work out for you, they will let you go back.

 

[JrCRXHF]

In michigan from 11pm-7am M-F we get .06kW and then weekends all day is .06kW other then that in the summer it is .12kw during peak and summer it is .20kW.

They give all of the house that power rate when you buy a electric car and also pay up to 2500 of the cost of a level 2 charger and install.

So vs driving the lifted cummins truck the diesel bill pays for the miev's payment.

 

[fjpod]

In michigan from 11pm-7am M-F we get .06kW and then weekends all day is .06kW other then that in the summer it is .12kw during peak and summer it is .20kW.

They give all of the house that power rate when you buy a electric car and also pay up to 2500 of the cost of a level 2 charger and install.

So vs driving the lifted cummins truck the diesel bill pays for the miev's payment.

I think I'm moving to michigan. In NYC, our supplier, ConEdison, does no such thing.

 

[JrCRXHF]

housing is really cheap to and you can get land but jobs don't pay what they do out east or west.

 

[PlugWiz]

Hi - Im new to the forum, but interested in this topic, which sadly died. A new report shows only 6% of utilities offer EV rates and was wondering if users are actually taking advantage of them given the added costs or lifestyle shifts required.

Interested to see if people are experiencing significant savings.

The article:
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...le-tariffs-for-their-customers-163384196.html

 

[danpatgal]

I'm in Central PA, but have an archaic Municipal Power Company (our town IS the power company), so don't have TOU rates. Our rates go down as you use more power, so it's actually really stupid and counter-productive from a base load standpoint, but they buy huge blocks of energy from AMP Ohio, and can make a profit by buying low in bulk, selling high to consumers.

That said, it still only costs me about $2 (16kw*0.13/kwh) to charge up the i, and that takes me 60 miles ... so that's like getting $1/gallon gasoline. So it's really the high initial costs, not the day to day per mile costs, that are hard for EV owners to bear and why more people aren't buying them. I'm sure if the i was only $15k or less out of pocket, they'd sell a lot more of them.

 

[PlugWiz]

Interesting, if you had to install more equipment for an EV only rate Im wondering if that would make sense. Hopefully others that have done or considered this reply.

 

[sandange]

We drove our Honda Fit 148,000km (92,000 miles) in just over 4 years
Real world mileage was 7.5L/100 KM ( 31.36 MPG)

Here in Canada
It cost us $12,210 at $1.10/L ($4.17 gallon US)
this is the average price of gas during those years.

With out taking into consideration any future gas price increases...

If we do the same mileage on the Miev - I estimate we will
save $10,000 in the same period of time about (4 years)

Our electricity runs .06-.07 kwh

 

[MLucas]

I just heard on the news this morning that Toronto is going to see gasoline price hikes of .02 cents a litre. They'll be paying 1.31 a litre now. Since the dollars are at par this is like paying $5.20 a gallon for gas! I can't understand why people want to continue to pay this when electric vehicles are available now.

 

[PlugWiz]

MLucas - good to know. How do you reconcile this or think about savings? Would "cost per mile" be the easiest and most tangible way to look at things or maybe just look at an average monthly comparison ($ on gasoline vs $ on electricity)? Earlier in the post some were comparing equivalent cost per gallon. Would love to know your thoughts.

 

[PlugWiz]

Please have a look at the following beta of our fuel cost and benefits tool for EVs. We are hoping for feedback from this community so we can refine and bring it to the masses of those considering EVs, but have a lot of outstanding questions. We are hoping for your comments either here or on our blog around -

Do you know what your monthly electric bill is? Do you know how much kWh you consume in a month?
Do you know how many miles you drive per day, on average?
Do you know your current vehicle's MPG?
How do you think about environmental benefits?
What other types of information do you want to know?



http://plugwizblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-plugwiz-evinformation-tool-beta-test.html

Thanks for taking the time to help us refine this tool built for the growing EV community! Leave us your email and we'll keep you updated on our progress.

 

[spirit]

How much does it cost to recharge at a recharge station? I heard a charge of $2.50 to plug in. Would that not put a dent in the savings?

 

[danpatgal]

How much does it cost to recharge at a recharge station? I heard a charge of $2.50 to plug in. Would that not put a dent in the savings?

$2.50 for a full charge is roughly 0.16/kwh, so if that were your normal charging, it would make a dent in the savings. BUT, it's still like getting $1.25/gallon gasoline. You can go 60-70 miles for your $2.50, whereas a similar ICE vehicle might only go 1/4 that distance for $2.50 worth of gasoline (depending on the price of gasoline, of course).

Using sandage's calculations for the past 4 years, it means instead of spending $1610 on electricity (at 0.07/kwh), if the price goes to 0.16/kwh then they spend $3680 on electricity for the 4 years. That's still a savings of over $8500 for the four years - and that's using the most expensive electricity available! Some time of use (TOU) pricing can get down to 2 or 3 cents per kwh, but even with an average 11 cents the savings is close to 10k.

However, I've just noticed a ***** in the armor of sandage's calculations: it assumes daily driving of roughly 63 miles! (92,000 miles / 365x4). That's technically possible, but doubt we can really rack up 23k miles of driving a year in the i. We're also ignoring battery pack degradation that will reduce range and accured costs for a new pack that must be paid in the 8-10 year timeframe. So, although the running costs are better in an EV, the fixed costs make the relative costs of an EV to an ICE closer to parity. Still, I find the driving experience so much nicer and the benefit to be driving more sustainably well worth it.

 

[Don]

Depending on how you use the car, 25,000 miles a year might not be hard to do

If you drove it 45 miles to work, recharged while at work and then 45 miles home that would be 90 per day X 5 days per week X 52 weeks per year and you'd have over 23K per year, even if you never drove it on Saturday or Sunday at all . . . . and you could be pretty much guaranteed you'd drive it on the weekends, plus many evenings after work too

We're retired, so no trips to work at all and we've somehow managed to put 3,000 miles on ours in only 13 weeks. That's going to work out to about 12K per year and should put us right near 100K at the battery's 8 year warranty point

Don

 

[nt2w]

My ICE is a VW Jetta Sportwagen TDI- here's the relative economy for me:

In 95000 miles, the TDI has averaged 38.4mpg. Current cost of diesel is $4.139 here in Northern NY. That works out to about 10.8 cents per mile traveled.

(1/mpg)*(cost per gallon)

The EPA rating for the i-MiEV is 30kWh per 100 miles (or 300 Wh per mile in EV geekspeak). When I was charging with the supplied Level 1 EVSE (maybe 1000 miles before I installed the Level 2 EVSE), I could use a Kill-a-Watt meter to measure input kWh, and I seemed to be doing a little better than 300Wh/mi, maybe 270 or so. But for argument's sake, we'll use 300. (Anybody have better measurements on this?)

My most recent utility bill was 14.8 cents per kWh, so at 300 Wh per mile, that's 4.4 cents per mile traveled.

((Wh/mile)/1000)*(cost per kWh)

That makes my 11 mile commute work out to $1.19 for diesel, and $0.44 for electric. Savings of 75 cents every time I drive to town and back. If I do it twice a day, 250 days a year, that would be $375 per year- 5500 miles driven per year.

Note- all depends on how you look at it, but the solar array behind the house supplies about 2000 kWh per year, and at 300Wh/mile, 5500 miles would use 1650kWh. That means the PV generates enough energy and then some to at least cover my commute...

Cheers-
Rich

 

[sandange]

Just to clarify our driving habits,
Angelika and I share 1 car, yes we put it through a lot of use .
Our kids live in the city so the commute to see them is 47 miles (75km) each way

If I decide to keep the car for the day, I drive her to the Train station and pick her up that evening
This makes for a double commute for that day. This happens quite frequently.

We plug in at all times possible during the day -
Except if we plan to stay close to home and are up over 50 miles (80km) on The RR gauge.
Whether or not we will continue driving at this pace is left to be seen as my wife is also approaching retirement soon.

As far as if it's possible with the I Miev - I think so