PHEVs
Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles
I don't like large lithium batteries, for a variety of reasons: they're hazardous, mining the metals needed to build them has environmental and social-justice downsides, and they're very massive - much of the energy stored in them is used for moving the mass of the batteries around.
As a compromise, I drive a PHEV until better options (like Solar Electric Vehicles (SEVs) or hydrogen fuel cell cars) are available. The PHEV design is based on a well-tested long-driven hybrid vehicle with a larger battery plus charging circuit, so it's not prone to development bugs and recalls like a Tesla. It has a nominal 40+ mile range on the battery, which I charge from my solar panel net production, so I don't load the grid. On the rare occasion of a long road trip, I get 56 mpg fully loaded by running it in hybrid mode. I use the PHEV as a compromise between the downsides of both lithium and gasoline. I buy gas a couple times a year; I figure this is offset by the surplus photovoltaic energy I send to the grid.
WaPo has an interesting article on PHEVs, which tend to get neglected in the EV discussion. I think it's a big mistake to invest all of our green capital into gigantic lithium battery designs. We should redesign vehicles from the ground up, like they did with the Aptera SEV, and like some countries are doing with fuel cell vehicles. We should also redesign our living spaces and lifestyles to be less dependent on personal vehicles. For many decades I have said "We don't own cars - cars own us."
from WaPo: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2023/05/04/plug-in-hybrids-gateway-evs/
Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, or “PHEVs,” are the vehicle world’s strange chimeras. Like electric vehicles, they can operate only on electric power — at least for somewhere between 20 and 50 miles. But after they’ve used 80 to 90 percent of their battery, they switch over to operating just like normal hybrids: combining a gas engine, energy-saving braking and the remainder of the battery to run efficiently.
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But that dual nature can make plug-in hybrids a great option for people who are EV-curious but not quite ready to take the plunge. Most plug-in hybrids have an EV-only range of between 30 and 50 miles; meanwhile, the average American drives about 27 miles a day. That means that plug-in hybrid owners charging their cars every night could easily spend almost all of their time running only on electricity.
It also means that new EV adopters can get a mostly electric car, while still having the option of fueling up at gas stations on longer road trips. America’s fast charging system is still unreliable, and while a recent bill passed by Congress includes $5 billion in funding for new fast-chargers, many EV drivers who don’t own Teslas still complain about public charging. (Tesla has its own proprietary charging network, although the company plans to open some stations to other drivers.)
And, even though they don’t get as much attention as their flashier cousins, plug-in hybrids are popular. In 2022, plug-in hybrids accounted for almost 30 percent of all electric cars sold, and their sales are rising faster than fully electric vehicles. In the United States, consumers have shelled out for the Toyota Prius Prime (44 miles EV-only range), the Chrysler Pacifica minivan (32 miles EV-only), and the Kia Niro crossover (33 miles EV-only). Six plug-in hybrids currently qualify for $3,750 or $7,500 in the federal EV tax credit.
(btw, from experience I recommend against the Kia Niro PHEV. Poor quality and poor customer service.)
WaPo calls PHEV a "strange chimera", but it's really a simple idea: take a proven hybrid design, make the battery somewhat larger, and add charging circuitry.
I can see a future after-market industry of replacing the gas engine of millions of these PHEVs with fuel cells, solar cells, or newer as-yet unknown green tech.
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