TonyWilliams said:
GRA said:
... the mean U.S. household income is $50,500, and the median household income $51,939 (2013 data, as of Census Bureau in Sept. 2014). As of 2013, the average Tesla _owner_ had an income of $293,200, never mind their household income. I imagine it has come down a bit given the availability of used cars now, but still several times that of the U.S. mean or median.
So, let's move to 2018-2020:
1) 100 mile EPA base LEAF, 200 mile EPA option
2) GM Bolt, probably 150-200 EPA miles
3) Tesla Model 3
4) BMW i-something with likely 100-200 mile range
5) Kia / Hyundai car(s) with 100-200 mile range
All the above selling in the "mainstream" $30k - $50k bracket with seating for 5. A "family" car at a family new car price.
All charge at home. All have THOUSANDS of public fast charging points worldwide (developed first world). All have virtually no maintainamce, and can operate for $0.05 cents per mile.
Where will that mythical hydrogen Toyota in that metric?
1) true car cost, as any mass car must be sold?
2) true cost per mile to operate?
3) available infrastructure?
All charge at home, for people who can do that, which is a slight majority of U.S. households (56% and dropping, vice 44% and climbing for those who can't), and a small minority of foreign households. I realize that this forum has a U.S.-centric membership, but the U.S. is no longer the tail wagging the auto manufacturer's dog, and hasn't been since China passed us as the world's largest car market in 2009. Last year Chinese sales were around 23 million and forecast to continue increasing, while U.S. sales were around 16.5 million and are essentially replacement only. The developing world is where it's at as far as future sales growth, because the developed world's auto markets are saturated.
And for those who can't charge at home, $0.05/mile is a fantasy. For me, even assuming an unrealistically optimistic 4 mi./kWh and paying between $0.544 and $0.576/kWh from the wall for the closest L2 public chargers ($0.49/kWh / efficiency of 85-90%), my cost would be 13.6-14.4 cents/mile. At 27 mpg (EPA HWY rating for my not very high mpg 12 year old car, but I usually get 28-31, and rarely use my car in town) and $4.00/gallon (today's price $3.06) my cost is 14.8 cents/mile; at current gas prices, 11.33 cents/mile. Maintenance cost are certainly higher, but then I haven't spent thousands more up front to buy the car, and it's far more flexible and versatile, having the benefit of longer range, faster refueling, waste heat and a century's worth of infrastructure.
So, while there is certainly a place for 100-200 mile BEVs as described above, they certainly won't suffice for all the people who can't charge at home (or work), for the decades it will take to install adequate charging infrastructure everywhere. Of course, $57.5k FCEVs with fuel more expensive than gas won't work for them either, but as I've pointed out before the automakers and fuel producers know that, and are all pushing R&D to reduce costs.
As for infrastructure, I posted up thread the rate at which gas stations increased in the U.S., and now we don't even need to start from scratch, as H2 fueling can just be added on to many to them. The big advantage of fast refueling is that you can divorce fuel stops from everything else, whereas with slower recharging, even at Tesla SC rates, any attempt to do so considerably increases your down time - you pretty much have to have amenities (food and bathrooms at a minimum) at recharging stations. Longer-ranged and/or faster charging BEVs could alleviate that. So, as I've said many times before, we'll just have to see how fast each of the technologies and related infrastructure improves, until we reach the point where we can say with far more certainty than we can now, okay, our best solution is X, Y, or X+Y.