Re: Electricity vs Petrol/Diesel prices
"Over to those living on the left side of the pond.."
well, there are (to be honest) a LOT of factors involved in gasoline "total cost" and electricity "total cost", particularly when you factor in wear, replacement, engine efficiency, and things like that.
I once modified a gas hog car engine to run on 4 cylinders most of the time [carbeurator mod], but kept the V8 power for whenever I "punched" it, and not only did it run better and stopped backfiring when I shut it off, but I got significantly better "around town" mileage. It was hard to codify, but my gasoline consumption was significantly lower, maybe half of what it was. This not a new idea, but brings up the efficiency of gasoline and diesel engines in 'around town' driving. This is where electric actually makes sense. [if the hybrid vehicles could sufficiently OWN this, by running on battery only, we wouldn't need pure electric vehicles, but stupid gummints require the engines to 'cycle' all of the time because the catalytic converters won't heat up otherwise - go fig, yeah].
THAT being said, we're talking trucks now. MOST of the fuel usage will be highway miles, for THAT kind of truck. If it were delivery vans and 'attached bed' trucks [most of which do local 'around town' kinds of things] I could see the desire to cut costs by going electric. But not long-haul 'semi' tractor/trailer rigs. It makes no sense.
Fuel cost here is around $3.20/gal aka around $0.84/l [higher now, because, Cali-Fornicate-You] and electricity varies depending on who you are and how much you use [yeah, it's all political]. but my last SDGE bill was $21.40 for 16 'therms' (natural gas), and $152.56 for 582 kwH. yeah all of those computers and compact flourescent lights going 7/24, and REFUSING to wear thermal underwear around the house. Anyway that works out to around 26 cents per kwH and $1.34 per 'therm', which [if I get the exchange rate right] is somewhat MORE than what you're paying. The taxes and "you must use 'renewables' extra cost", that's why.
San Diego is known for its high energy prices, so this should be no surprise to anyone.
in any case, gasoline cost per kwH would be around 11.5 cents, using these metrics, less than HALF of the cost of equivalent electricity.
That being said, 'thermal power' isn't enough for engines. Carnot efficiency of a gasoline engine is less than 50% as I recall, and actual piston engine efficiency is in the mid-30's (typically), reduced somewhat from having pollution devices slapped onto it. Modern engines 'get it right' by improving other aspects of the design, work WITH the pollution devices, that kind of thing, to improve overall efficiency, but it's still going to SUCK when you're going slow around town and spending a fixed amount of fuel per hour on just keeping the thing spinning while the car's not moving [or is moving slowly, where only a fraction of the power consumed actually spins the wheels].
You compare that to electric cars, and ideally the electric motor doesn't heat up too much, and neither do the batteries, and so you get twice, maybe 3 times the efficiency of a gasoline engine.
On the other side, there are power losses during battery charge. We'll say "85 percent" going into the battery, as a ballpark. The rest of the energy is lost as heat.
Then you have battery capacity losses over time, requiring EXPENSIVE replacement. Or you can go 100 miles instead of 300 after 2 years' worth of battery cycles, whatever...
and the inconvenience and extra cost just isn't worth it.
Now... if hybrid cars worked as they SHOULD, i.e. allow you to charge the batteries OR run on gasoline/diesel, at your OWN discretion, such that they take advantage of NOT spinning the engine unless it's loaded down 50% or more of its capacity, and shutting it OFF when it's running on the battery, then it would be GREAT to have an electric hybrid vehicle. Otherwise, it's a waste. Why? because MOST electric power worldwide is STILL made by burning oil and coal. So all of the environmental arguments are completely WORTHLESS here. What you have left is UNNECESSARY expense to the owner, coupled with INCONVENIENCE and less "freedom of movement" (which is what THEY wanted in the FIRST place, right?).
Biting the hand that feeds IT
