In August the gasser "won" the cheap transportation (in more ways than one!) contest costing me only $18.53 to carry me 316.3 miles or 5.9 cents per mile. Although I don't include maintenance costs in these analysis, the car is likely going to cost me something down the road. Oil has to be changed as soon as the project is done since I am only 300 miles from that right now (have over 700 miles on gasser in Sept so far...)
The other possible thing is tires. But whether I get new tires or simply dump the car is dependent on the range of my next EV. I would like to dump the car I think but we shall see...
The LEAF cost me almost double at $34.52 for the month aided by $4.68 in public charges but did go 1608.3 miles or 2.15 cents per mile. High water battery stats; 261 GID, 20.2 kwh available, 60.45 ahr, 92.12 Hx. Lows (mostly near the end of the month) 252, 19.5, 58.11, 87.91.
Today is the somewhat unofficial kickoff for Drive Electric Week but mostly because NRG is offering FREE CHARGING starting today and running thru next Sunday (central standard time) at midnight nationwide! So hopefully, the queues to charge won't be too bad. As always my off the charts work schedule will aide me in charging when no one else is basically conscious... still trying to decide if that is a good thing?
And NRG has been in the news a lot lately. Recently we LEAFers became preferred customers of NRG along with preferred pricing!
Pretty cool eh? Either way, NRG seems to be making the most noise right now in the public charging front (unlike our illustrious state :( ) and there is news that more stations are coming on line.
Fife Nissan also made a splash announcing a while back that they were putting in fast charger that would be free to LEAFers but an apparent change in management derailed the plans. The charger is still happening but when is anyone's guess. I checked it out the other day and its in the ground but no paving has been done yet meaning no power yet. Soon I hope...
And finally, more stories about crazy deals on LEAFs and they are starting to extend to 2016 SV/SLs as well. One LEAFer decided to buy his 2013 SL for just over $9,000! A very good deal! Some others who leased 2016's less than a year ago are getting discount offers of several thousand dollars and lease forgiveness if they decide to buy now.
All this has me thinking Nissan is trying to get as many titles transferred as possible before "something" happens. Well we can only guess what that "something" is. We all know that "motivated" battery research has only been in high gear for a relatively short period of time. Previous to the EV, the big push was not more powerful batteries, it was designing battery operated devices to use significantly less power. That is a great idea especially if its something you carry around in your pocket but a car doesn't have nearly the weight consideration issues.
Its been a year since 30 kwh came out, over 5 since 24 kwh. Its way past time to see a "real" upgrade and considering the competition coming real soon from Chevy, I think Nissan is poised to give us a significant bump in range. 40 kwh has been mentioned and makes sense simply because sure we want a 500 mile range battery just like we want a 500 mile range car but my car only has a 350ish mile range and I deal with it. Yes, its a compromise. EVERYTHING is really. Its all in how you want to deal with the various bumps in the road of life.
Either way; exciting times are just ahead. Hopefully, NRG stepping up will motivate other charging companies to do the same. Hopefully, Chevy putting 200 miles on the road this year will motivate others to at least boost their range. We have gone a lot of years with no changes. I think heading into 2017 we will be seeing our best year ever and here is hoping someone does it by December 20th!
The charger at Fife Nissan is working now. I used it on Wednesday.
ReplyDeleteFast Charger?
DeleteMichael, thanks for the heads up! I am charging on the chademo right now! Now if you had registered your charge on plugshare, we coulda all been down here sooner! Dont forget NRG has free charging thru this sunday so free charging all over the place!
DeleteI haven't gotten that notice from Evgo. I did sign up with them as part of that lawsuit settlement and used them to travel up I-5 to BC. The DCQC picture you have is interesting. Its the same unit that was installed by Fort Dalles Nissan in The Dalles, Oregon. It was pretty easy to operate and although it had a place to insert a card a card or for was not needed. I charged for free to see how it worked before I went to the nearby Aerovirnment DCQC at Fred Meyers where there are more services to pass the time with. - Pat Campbell, Vancouverf
ReplyDeletePat; You will get it soon. There was almost a week between the first guy who announced getting his email and the time that I got mine. If you don't receive it by next weekend, I would call them.
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