Liberty Plugins News Electric Vehicle News, Reviews, and Reports (page 4222)

Three
Years on Electricity

This week I said goodbye
to my Chevrolet Bolt EV, affectionately named, in the style
of Pee Wee Herman, “Bolty.” My Kinetic Blue 2017 all-electric hatchback served
me well for three years and 26,490 miles, but a lease is a lease and I had to
return it by January 8.

Origins

I’ve driven and tested
cars for nearly 28 years, mostly with weekly test vehicles. As I learned about
and drove electric cars, I became very interested in them. I sampled a Nissan Leaf when it arrived in 2011 and a few
other EVs, but the real turning point was when I convinced the generous folks
at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) to lend me a baby blue Fiat 500e for three months in early 2016. My happy time with that little
car, whom I named Fidelio, convinced me that I wanted an EV of my own.

Chevrolet Bolt EV — **Free from gas for three years**

I began to focus on only electrified vehicles in my auto review column and blogs. I started www.stevegoesgreen.com to write about my adventures with Fidelio, and it’s since expanded to cover other climate-related topics, many of which are shared here on Clean Fleet Report .

The Bolt EV was a revelation—with its 238 miles of range it
would be able to handle almost anything, including the 165-mile round trip to
visit my granddaughters. I ordered my car in October of 2016 without ever
driving or even seeing a real car. I was hoping I’d like it.

I impatiently waited for delivery, and finally, the very first
week of 2017, I got the phone call that my Bolt was on the truck and being
delivered. In a day or two, I was down at Boardwalk Chevrolet in Redwood City,
CA to pick it up.

Exactly What I Needed

I took to my new car immediately,
and it proved to be exactly what I needed and wanted. It may look compact,
because it has almost no front or rear overhangs, but the Bolt is spacious for four
or five passengers and the hatchback folds down easily to carry lots of gear,
including an upright bass or two electric basses, amps, and the works. The high
roof means abundant headroom, even for tall folks (I’m only 5-8).

One of the wonders of EVs is how quickly they accelerate, and the Bolt, while not Tesla fast, is as quick as a Volkswagen Golf GTI – about 6.3 seconds zero-to-sixty. The weight of the 960-pound battery means a low center of gravity for taut responses and level handling.

And it does it all virtually silently. If you turn off the audio
system, you’ll hear a very low hum from the motor, and wind and tire noise are
muted. Since there’s nothing reciprocating, like pistons in a gas engine,
there’s no vibration. You get used to it, and gas cars then feel rough.

Electric cars don’t need transmissions, since maximum torque is
delivered from the first moment the motor spins, but the Bolt has an “L” (Low)
setting on the one-speed transmission’s lever. If you use D (Drive), it feels
like a normal automatic transmission, but in L, when you lift off the
accelerator pedal (not the “gas”) the car slows down quickly—even to a complete
stop. When you get used to this “one-pedal driving,” it feels natural, and you
can barely tap the brakes as you slide into a red light and stop on a dime. It
feels like downshifting a manual transmission. The regenerative braking helps
charge up the battery, too.

Chevrolet Bolt EV, solar panels — **Escaping the grid to run on sunshine**

I ordered the light interior—white and light gray–which felt
airy, but by the end of three years, the white leather on the driver’s seat was
looking grayer. But other than that, and one little hook for the rear cargo
cover that occasionally popped out, everything in the interior was solid and
worked as it should.

Of course, the best thing of all is that my Bolty didn’t use one
drop of gasoline for three years! At first, I plugged it in at work, but last
April I finally installed a Level 2 (240-volt) charger in my garage when my
solar panels went up (on Earth Day). So, for more than half of 2019, Bolty ran
on sunshine.

Strengths and Weaknesses

The Bolt embodies all the strengths and weaknesses of EVs. The
obvious strengths are the low environmental impact, quick acceleration, and
quiet operation. There’s essentially no service, either, except tire
rotations—no oil changes, no radiator flush. There are a lot fewer moving parts
to have problems. And when you use regenerative braking, the brake pads last
practically forever.

So, what about weaknesses? The most significant is the range issue.
Although today’s EVs easily top 200 miles between charges, and some can go more
than 300 miles, it still takes time to charge, and you may not be able to find
a public charger when you need it. Even fast chargers take longer than a stop
at the gas station. It may not matter in most situations, but on a long trip it
requires some careful planning and willingness to be flexible. I avoided it,
because the couple of times when I knew it would be an issue, I took a
gas-burning vehicle. Yes, I feel a little guilty, but that’s a good way to
drive an EV 51 weeks a year.

I expect the charging problem to be solved as charging stations
proliferate and fast charging gets really quick. And actually, most
charging can and should be done slowly at home or at work while the car sits
parked. I know this won’t work for everyone, which is why I test and recommend
hybrids and plug-in hybrids for those situations. Someday, the subscription
model may become popular, where you no longer own a car, but simply reserve the
kind you want as you need it, from a fleet. Then, you could select a
long-distance vehicle for a trip and use a less expensive, smaller low-range
vehicle when you stayed local.

Another issue with EVs is that initial costs of purchase or
lease are higher, mainly because batteries are still expensive, even though
prices have come down. My upper-level Bolt Premier with options had a sticker
price of nearly $44,000. With $5,500 in rebates and financing assistance, I put
down $10,000 and paid $332/month for three years. This price disparity will go
down over time, but it can be intimidating. However, if you look at the total
cost of ownership over several years, EVs come out ahead, with much cheaper
fuel (electricity) and virtually no service required.

A third concern is choice. The Bolt has company now, as more and
more EVs and plug-in hybrids are appearing in showrooms. There’s still is no
all-electric pickup truck, for example, but there will be soon. In the next few
years, manufacturers will fill in their lineups with many more EV and hybrid
models, from hatchbacks to sedans to SUVs.

Only One Significant Issue

The only notable
problem with my Bolt happened last year, when, after what the dealer told
me was a routine software update, my car’s battery suddenly charged only to
about 100 miles and not the 200+ it should. I tried running it way down and
charging, but it wouldn’t move past 100. That made my car like one of the older
EVs, such as a Leaf, Kia Soul EV or VW e-Golf. I complained to my dealer, but
they were unresponsive. I tried another Chevy dealer closer to my house and
they checked with GM headquarters and got the OK to do a battery swap for me,
at no charge. It restored my range and happiness.

Sharing the EV Love and
Information

As an EV driver and auto writer, I valued the Bolt for giving me a way to experience the EV life firsthand, so I could share my car and my knowledge in my columns and blogs. I could participate in events, such as National Drive Electric Week (each September) and Earth Day events in April. I hosted National Drive Electric Week events for two years at my workplace, where EV-driving employees parked their cars in rows in the parking lot and talked with other employees. I am an EV Ambassador for Acterra, a Palo Alto-based environmental organization. I now work at Ridecell, where we develop and sell software for carsharing and ridesharing fleets, including the 260-Bolt Gig Car Share fleet in Sacramento.

As an EV person, I began phasing out gasoline-only test cars in
2018, and in 2019, I tested only one—the short-term Chevy Cruze
rental I had when my Bolt got its battery swapped.

What Next?

I considered buying Bolty
at the end of the lease, but even though the bring back value was barely more
than half the initial price, it would still cost more per month to finance than
my lease. I looked at other EVs, including the worthy Hyundai Kona Electric (258-miles of range), but I
was hoping to lower my monthly costs.

I researched used EVs,
and It turns out there are some screaming deals. Second-hand early Nissan Leafs
can run as little as $6,000. I ended up buying a little Fiat 500e, just like
Fidelio, my 2016 test car. I got it at Rose Motorcars, in
Castro Valley, CA. They specialize in the secondhand EV market, and I like the
way they do business.

My new Fiat is the same
color as the first one, too, so I’ve named it Fidelio II. A
2017 with 23,000 miles on it, it feels like new, and cost just $10,000 (under
$200 a month). It’s smaller, and most significantly, has a third of the Bolt’s
electric range, but I plan to use it for my local errands. There will likely be
another EV in my future, but for now, Fidelio II should work fine.

What I’ll Miss

I’ll miss some of Bolty’s features. Fidelio II doesn’t have the
high regenerative braking (the L transmission setting), so no one-pedal
driving. My Bolt’s inside rearview mirror was a video camera—much better than a
regular mirror.

And, the Bolt’s backup system, with multiple cameras, provided a
birds-eye view of my car in the big 10.2-inch center screen—so parking squarely
in a spot and avoiding curbs was a snap.

My Bolt had the upgraded
Bose stereo for premium sound with Apple CarPlay, so I could hook up my phone and play my
music. It also used the phone for navigation, which meant I could set up a
destination before I got in the car and it was projected onto the dash screen.
I’ll miss the ability to send verbal texts (through Siri) as I drive.

For safety, I had blind spot monitoring, a very worthwhile
feature, and cross traffic alert told me if there were cars on the road behind
me when I was backing out of my driveway.

Last Thoughts

I like the styling of the Bolt—inside and out—but I’m an old
hatchback guy. I had a 1986 Honda Civic Si back in the day. Apparently the
gently sweeping interior was designed by a woman—unusual in the industry. The
use of white accents gave it a certain sparkle.

I loved the rich blue exterior paint—and enjoyed seeing my car
across the parking lot. I took photos of it in various scenic locations, just
for fun.

The Bolt is a product of GM Korea, the former Daewoo, but it’s
built in Michigan. That’s the way the auto industry works these days. The LG
battery is Korean, as well. In any case, quality was high.

My personal goal, as a Climate
Reality Leader and car enthusiast, is to spread the word on the joys and
benefits of electric motoring. We need clean cars and clean energy! I will
continue testing and reviewing every new EV I can get, but I’m going to miss my
Bolty.

Source: Electric, Hybrid, Clean Diesel & High-MPG Vehicles

Last April, Elon Musk announced that a “1 million-mile battery pack” was in the pipeline. As a recent article posted on Forbes points out, today’s typical Li-ion battery packs are more than adequate for individual EV owners, but applications such as taxi services and long-distance trucking will require batteries optimized for longevity (according to writer Ariel Cohen, the average trucker logs some 100,000 to 150,000 miles per year). Thus, long-life batteries are likely to be critical to the success of the Tesla Network (a proposed fleet of robo-taxis) and the Tesla Semi.

To be clear, no one knows precisely how long current Tesla batteries can be expected to last – the vehicles simply haven’t been on the road long enough for large numbers of the batteries to start wearing out. Elon Musk says that the battery modules used in Model 3 “should last 300k to 500k miles (1500 cycles).” One operator that can report from experience how Tesla batteries hold up over the really long haul is Tesloop, a California shuttle service that owns several vehicles that are approaching the 500,000-mile mark.

Whatever the current state of the art may be, more longevity
is unquestionably better, and a battery that’s guaranteed to last a million
miles would be a huge selling point for Tesla – not only for fleet buyers, but
for individuals as well (concerns about battery life, unfounded or not, are a
commonly-cited objection to EV adoption).

In December, Tesla, in partnership with physicists from
Canada’s Dalhousie University, filed a patent for “Dioxazolones
And Nitrile Sulfites As Electrolyte Additives For Lithium-Ion Batteries.” Tesla
claims that the new battery chemistry, which appears to build on another
patent filed in September, improves efficiency, energy density, longevity and
cost compared to current Li-ion batteries.

This battery chemistry is based on NMC (lithium nickel
manganese cobalt oxide), which Tesla uses in its stationary energy storage products,
not NCA (lithium nickel cobalt aluminum oxide), which it uses in its vehicles. It
features a new cathode crystal structure that’s designed to make the batteries
more resistant to the inevitable degradation from repeated cycling.

No one outside the company can say whether the latest patent
is related to the vaunted “million-mile” battery that Tesla hopes to have in
production this year, but as Mr. Cohen writes, “Tesla’s super battery is on the
way, and it will have major implications for electric vehicles and beyond when
it arrives. Energy storage systems – not just electric cars – are going to
benefit from quadrupling of the cycling power. This will make storage cheaper
and more efficient, further speeding up transition to electric power and
renewables.”

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Personal: Farewell to My Chevrolet Bolt EV