Silence the EV critics with the 2.5 kW solar pledge [View all]

[txlibdem]

http://solarchargeddriving.com/news/solar-charged-driving/407-silence-the-ev-critics-with-the-25-kw-solar-pledge.html
Silence the EV critics with the 2.5 kW solar pledge
Monday, 26 July 2010 20:48 | Written by Christof Demont-Heinrich, SCD.Com Editor

There’s also a lot of stuff out there that questions whether electric cars are in fact greener than their gasoline powered counterparts. The preponderance of evidence shows that even when the electricity in an electric vehicle’s batteries has been produced by a coal-burning power plant that, on the whole, the EV is greener than its ICE counterpart. Plus, an EV is far more efficient.

Of course, the more of the electricity in your car’s batteries produced by renewable energy, the better. As we’ve noted in our series on what you’re plugging your EV into, if you live in the U.S., there are some great (Idaho, 90 percent renewable energy generated electricity) and not-so-great (West Virginia, 98 percent coal-produced electricity) places to plug in.

It’s simple: Anyone who buys a new EV pledges to put a 2.5 kW solar system on their home, garage, or elsewhere on their property.

In the vast majority of places in the U.S., and in terms of the average miles driven annually by most Americans (10,000 to 15,000 miles), a 2.5 kW solar system is enough to cover all of the miles you drive in your EV per year. More concretely, with a 2.5 kW solar system, we’re talking about a system that can produce between 5,000 solar-charged EV miles in extremely cloudy spots in the U.S. to up to 15,000 miles in ideal solar spots with the out-of-pocket cost for the system somewhere between $4,000 and $10,000 in most places in the U.S.

Is it going to be cheaper for you in the long run to own a solar array to power your vehicle instead of driving a fossil fuel burner vehicle? This article takes a stab at the math:

Re-doing the solar math on the Nissan LEAF
http://solarchargeddriving.com/editors-blog/on-evs-a-phevs/321-re-doing-the-solar-math-on-the-nissan-leaf.html

Needless to say, the more expensive your solar installation, the less savings you will get in the long run.