Is 25 to 40 mile range enough for everyday?

Well, it could be worse.

 

Personally i can live with about 30Miles range as i have access to employees plugs at work. However, that 25\30Miles range melts like snow on a hot spring's driveway during winter and i can't make it to work using only the battery. My request for the Next gen Prime would be a 11\12Kwh battery. That i could definitely live with!

 

Would there really be a 50% reduction on that long of a trip? It seems like the battery would be nice and warm after a few hours of driving. It might depend on if the vehicle has a heat pump, and if the weather is warm enough for it to work.

 

I don't know how the Tesla range is affected during winter for those who live in a cold climate. I would think it is not just the temperature of the battery pack. if that is the case, then by just keeping the car in a heated garage, the winter EV range should be as good as summertime, but that is not the case. Heating the cabin using only electricity must drain the battery very fast. The ~50% EV range reduction of my PP most often happens on a day when the temperature dips below 14F. On those days, the engine is coming on to provide the heat, but still, I get a net reduction of EV range on those cold days.

 

Anecdotally in the Montreal-Quebec City corridor, I know some Tesla owners and their reported loss of range at -15C is about 40%. The heat pump and overall battery management system is pretty good. My gas powered vehicles tend to be down around 35-40% in those temperatures as well. They’re just quicker to refuel, so it’s not a major issue. However, I have occasionally gone quite far north in Quebec in winter and the range reduction has cut things close where gas stations are few and far between.

We’re not out of the toddler stage as far as available DCFCs go. In a few years (about 3 in Quebec, in any case), DCFCs will be numerous enough to make long hauls feasible with a very modest extra time (recharging only in fast part of the curve to say 60-70%, even with an extra stop, will make 600-800km drives close enough in travel time for those in a hurry or in winter). My guess, of course.

 

We have had our 2021 since April and are avg.about 230 mpg.We are both retired and about 1/2 our our travel is around 50 miles round trip.More Ev would be great but (except for a 600 mile trip) the majority of our travel is the 40-50 mile round trip.Love our Prime and we cannot say that increased EV is necessarily needed but it would be nice.Either way love the car.

 

I've only just started to see how well I can do with the EV range in my town. (Still using HV mode a lot to get through the break-in period sooner.)
But the other day I had to drive into town for an appointment at 9:30, then back home, and back out again at 11:30. Running around doing some errands each time. Home again at 1:00PM and ran out of EV range 2 miles from home. Plugged it in and went back out before 4:00PM with about 12 miles of range - made the round trip fine.
That much back and forth is rare and about 5 miles each way is a 55mph road - doing 60mph. Most days it would be fine. But when I drive my mother's RAV4 Prime it sure feels luxurious to worry about it less.

 

Thumbs up to another Red Prime owner! Strangely, since the pandemic, the relatively short range is perfect for our lifestyle with a PHEV. My work is 14 miles away but even when we're going back to the office, they'll allow us to wfh 2-3 days a week. If we could, we would switch to a BEV but modifications to get a L2 charger were too expensive.

 

Another Red. Cheers.

 

Present!

 

Pre-pandemic something like half of all vehicles were driven less than 25 miles a day. If you figured destination charging (commute to work for example) nearly 80% would be covered by 50 miles. Toyota has quoted these figures when talking about the Prius Prime's EV range.

One thing to keep in mind is that the EPA-rated 25 miles, (or 35+ if driven efficiently) doesn't mean that' the max you can drive it in a day. Apart from about 5 long trips a year to see family in another state, it's rare that I drive more than 30 miles without getting out of the car. It can take some effort and route planning, but Level 2 chargers are often at destinations. Given the choice between two stores, I'll opt for the one with EV charging every time.

A few days ago I did a suburban loop around Chicago running errands (shopping, meetings) and traveled more than 100 miles without using a drop of gasoline.

 

I’m very jealous of your charger availability but not of the Chicago driving.

 

Even around the Los Angeles metro area it is almost impossible to find chargers where needed to stay driving in electric mode. Chargers are actually very rare here, believe it or not. There isn't even a public charger in my city at all, and that's not uncommon. When you can find a charger the 3.3kW charging speed is excruciating. If you were driving on a highway at 50 mph, the maximum you could average over ~50 miles is 14 mph when including charge time. Somehow I bet "maximum average electric cruising speed of 14 mph" wouldn't be a huge selling point.

 

SCE eliminated the lower overnight electricity rate in December. It is now the same price overnight as it is during the day. Between 4-9pm the price doubles. I have the "cheap" plan TOU-D-PRIME only because I qualify by having an electric vehicle. People without an electric vehicle are stuck paying $0.30 during off-peak time. My SCE bill 10 years ago was $0.148/kWh with all taxes and fees. If I didn't have an electric car today it would be $0.365 - a 9.5% annualized rate of inflation.

Time-Of-Use Residential Rate Plans | Rates | Your Home | Home - SCE

Notice the "Baseline Credit." That's a sneaky tax on people with solar. You see where it says you get a credit of $0.08/kWh for up to your baseline. Well, the calculation for that credit is $0.08 multiplied by all kWh under your baseline. If you're a net electricity producer, everything you produce is under your baseline and it's negative. That means you pay the utility $0.08/kWh of electricity you donate to them.

Between these hidden rate increases and the pending "solar tax" I'm trying to get a movement going for people who have rooftop solar to set their inverters not to export power to the grid. If enough people do it California utilities will be crippled.

 

Had to slip another Red reply in. My commute is 31 miles each way, so I'm on the hairy edge of range. I'm fortunate that my employer provides Chargepoints (I believe we have ~20).

It's a fun game to see if I can make it all the way in or home on EV, I've only managed it once since I bought the car last month.

 

Almost universally I get more range on the highway than city streets, but that may be because of living in an urban area. Traffic lights are red more often than not and they can be every 1/10th mile to every 1/4 mile. All that stopping and starting really drives the efficiency down, even using careful regen and slow start.