2
0

New York City says electric cars are now the cheapest option for its fleet


 invite response                
2019 Apr 10, 11:34am   3,144 views  38 comments

by kt1652   ➕follow (0)   💰tip   ignore  

“All early indicators are that we are achieving the fuel, emissions, and maintenance benefits of this exciting transition away from the internal combustion engine,”
...the city analyzed fuel and maintenance costs for 1,893 of its 9,196 light-passenger vehicles in 2018...
https://qz.com/1571956/new-york-city-says-electric-cars-cheapest-option-for-its-fleet/
Not much left to argue about really. No emotion, just real documented data.
If one lives in a sunshine, solar friendly state, has proper sized PV generation at home and drives more than average.
It is almost a no-brainer, EV cost/mile will be much lower than ICE, for like-class vehicles.

Edit: link

Comments 1 - 38 of 38        Search these comments

1   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 11:44am  

Again, the maintenance ##s in that table are beyond fucking ridiculous. For example, what's there to "maintain" to the tune of $1,285 per year on a new Ford Fusion? Two oil changes? What else? Anybody on this board shells out $1,200 per year maintaining their new gas cars? If you do, please share the details. I'm genuinely fucking curious.
2   kt1652   2019 Apr 10, 12:05pm  

"NYC Fleet has more experience with electric vehicles than most, so we took a look at last year’s maintenance costs with the DCAS client fleet to see if these service benefits are materializing. Right now, servicing costs with our all-electric vehicle models is dramatically less than with gas, hybrid, or hybrid plug-in models. In general, our hybrid models also achieve benefits from gas models, though the most dramatic results in this report are with the all electrics."

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/dcas/downloads/pdf/fleet/NYC-Fleet-Newsletter-255-March-8-2019-Reducing-Maintenance-Costs-With-Electric-Vehicles.pdf

Form ATRI- Cost of Trucking 2017
Repair and Maintenance: 2016 $0.166/mile
Important, cost gone up every year. ($0.103 in 2008)
At 15,000 miles annual use = $2490
New vehicle - low maintenance. Older vehicle - high maintenance.
Businesses have new and old mix.


3   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 12:36pm  

kt1652 says
Repair and Maintenance: 2016 $0.166/mile.... .


The table in the OP says "maintenance", not "repair and maintenance".
4   kt1652   2019 Apr 10, 12:46pm  

Is there a point to this?
Total cost of ownership does not include repair?
I dont have OCD... yet.
5   Bd6r   2019 Apr 10, 12:50pm  

Hugolas_Madurez says
Anybody on this board shells out $1,200 per year maintaining their new gas cars?

I don't shell out $1200 maintaining a 6-yr old gas car. Maybe 600 at most, and some years $200.
6   Tenpoundbass   2019 Apr 10, 12:55pm  

Hugolas_Madurez says
Again, the maintenance ##s in that table are beyond fucking ridiculous. For example, what's there to "maintain" to the tune of $1,285 per year on a new Ford Fusion? Two oil changes? What else? Anybody on this board shells out $1,200 per year maintaining their new gas cars? If you do, please share the details. I'm genuinely fucking curious.


My last two Leasers I changed the Oil twice the whole 2 1/2 years I had each car. The last one I had to replace the tires the first one I did not.
The last one needed replacing because in South Florida's Commie's effort to coral and force people to the world's shittiest Public Transportation, they installed those lane reflectors every 6 inches along most of i95 to keep people in their single lane. Can't have people going around the Public workers who are conditioned at Public worker's rallies to impede the traffic flow anyway they can(This has been confirmed) by driving 45 in the far left lanes on i95. Using their public funded Sun Pass to drive in the express lanes and go 45mph. So if you want to pass people anyway, You'll destroy your tires within 6 months of daily commute if you pass most of the idiots toddling along.

The point is I get three years out of these cars with minimal maintenance.
7   Rin   2019 Apr 10, 1:35pm  

Here are the things which go wrong with ICEs ...

Starter - $500
Alternator - $600
Belts - $200-$400
Muffler - $200-$300

If all of that goes wrong in one year, then the next year is pretty much $0 in repairs.

If you need to start to regularly replace CV joints, radiators, exhausting piping, and a host of other things then switch cars at that point. Your vehicle is old but at that point, for many cars, we're talking 170K miles.

ICE fluid changes are $35 and the once in a blue moon transmission fluid change is $100. Tires & Brakes are common to all vehicle types and need regular maintenance.
8   EBGuy   2019 Apr 10, 1:58pm  

Rin says
Tires & Brakes are common to all vehicle types and need regular maintenance.

I hear these new fangled electric vehicles have frictionless braking and one pedal driving. What will they think of next?
9   WookieMan   2019 Apr 10, 2:57pm  

Rin says
Here are the things which go wrong with ICEs ...

Starter - $500
Alternator - $600
Belts - $200-$400
Muffler - $200-$300


And if you're frugal or handy, most the things you list can be completed at a much cheaper cost. At the end of the day it's still much cheaper for ICE's versus EV's of the same size and features. If you bought a car cash, invested the difference between say a Nissan Versa and Leaf (same car basically - one EV & one ICE) you'd come out ahead with the Versa probably over 90% of the time (probably 100%).

Until EV's get cheaper, they're for the "green" city driving crowd that never makes a long haul trip. And until the recharge time is at parity with ICE vehicles, it's a non-starter for most people even if it was slightly cheaper to purchase and maintain. Time is money too and sitting waiting for a car to charge is not the most productive use of time if you have a $10k or even $1M sale on the line and you're sitting at 7/11 waiting to charge your Tesla while watching 8 other cars fill up and go.
10   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 3:20pm  

Rin says
Starter - $500
Alternator - $600
Belts - $200-$400
Muffler - $200-$300


WRT items 1, 2 and 4: not every car will have all of them repalced and not even some of them. Majority of the modern cars carry the original ones onto the junkyard. These things are pretty much lifetime items nowadays ("lifetime" being defined by the car industry as 250 Kmiles or 15 years, whichever comes first).

Belts: maybe once over the lifetime. Twice at most.

You forgot the spark plugs every 100-120Kmiles, but this is again twice-a-lifetime event for most cars made in this century. And pretty cheap.

Auto transmission fluid is lifetime fill on pretty much anything newer than 2010 (except for the fucking CVTs, of course, what a fucking abomination).

Still don't get the $1200-1800 yearly maintenance numbers in the OP.
11   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 3:22pm  

EBGuy says
I hear these new fangled electric vehicles have frictionless braking and one pedal driving.


Ok, scratch the brakes out. But that shit is cheap af anyway.
12   EBGuy   2019 Apr 10, 3:58pm  

ICE people, just because you don't replace your timing belt doesn't mean it shouldn't be changed.
13   Rin   2019 Apr 10, 5:51pm  

EBGuy says
ICE people, just because you don't replace your timing belt doesn't mean it shouldn't be changed.


I got mine done at 80K. Don't need for it to break on the highway to learn the lesson.
14   Rin   2019 Apr 10, 5:55pm  

WookieMan says
Nissan Versa and Leaf


I have a whole thread on the Nissan Leaf

http://patrick.net/post/1322772/2019-03-01-rin-spoke-with-prius-owners-on-the-nissan-leaf

Rin says
kt1652 says
If an ev with 200 mile range gets reduced to 100 mile in winter as a worst case, it would still satisfy 95-98% of daily trips of metropolitan drivers, without charging top-off, what is the problem?


There is this concept of 'metering'. In a sense, what the ICE did was eliminate that from the way of life. So sure, if a person is highly conservative and only drives exactly to work and back, and leaves the vehicle on a plug overnight, then sure, EVs are "a way" to go. Here's the thing, what the ICE accomplished was that it eliminated this from the horse and buggy tech of pre-1900 where yes, the animals were high maintenance and couldn't gallop across the country without rest, eating, and crapping.

Today, a person is free to go, wherever he wants and whenever, even if a sudden road trip to see a friend/relative in another state comes up or running errands around various ex-burb towns which can easily chew up 70+ miles from out of the blue. When I used to drive a lot, I would make road trips between Boston, NYC, and Philly regularly. And the worst that would happen is that when I get off that highway, exit 4 on the NJ Turnpike, I would just refill at a Wawa's to continue on my journey. If it were an EV, I'd be somewhere stuck in Connecticut, battling it out with angry drivers at the charge stations. Sorry, but no thanks, I prefer to be free and independent.
15   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 6:03pm  

EBGuy says
ICE people, just because you don't replace your timing belt doesn't mean it shouldn't be changed.


What "timing belt"? Practically nothing newer than 2008-2010 has these anymore. It's predominantly timing chains, which are lifetime items.
16   Shaman   2019 Apr 10, 6:15pm  

I have two vehicles: a 2000 Sequoia and a 2014 Camry hybrid. The Sequoia costs an easy $1200/year in maintenance, maybe higher, depending on my luck. But it’s 20 years old.

The Camry hybrid is very low maintenance and gas, avg about $100/month gas and $180/year for oil and inspections and tires. It only needs oil changes every 10,000 miles instead of every 3,000, but it does use synthetic so that’s more. Overall, it’s a much cheaper vehicle to operate.
17   FuckTheMainstreamMedia   2019 Apr 10, 7:07pm  

The “cheapest cars” are from whatever company is financing the campaigns of the most city council members.

The charts are totally fucking worthless for purposes of this discussion.
18   Booger   2019 Apr 10, 7:22pm  

Hugolas_Madurez says
Again, the maintenance ##s in that table are beyond fucking ridiculous. For example, what's there to "maintain" to the tune of $1,285 per year on a new Ford Fusion? Two oil changes? What else? Anybody on this board shells out $1,200 per year maintaining their new gas cars? If you do, please share the details. I'm genuinely fucking curious.


What the government pays for stuff is typically way more than you or I would. You aren't buying stuff at grossly inflated prices from campaign contributiors like government agencies are.
19   Booger   2019 Apr 10, 7:24pm  

Hugolas_Madurez says
What "timing belt"? Practically nothing newer than 2008-2010 has these anymore. It's predominantly timing chains, which are lifetime items.


Got a link for this?
20   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 8:25pm  

Booger says
Hugolas_Madurez says
What "timing belt"? Practically nothing newer than 2008-2010 has these anymore. It's predominantly timing chains, which are lifetime items.


Got a link for this?


No.
21   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 8:25pm  

Booger says
What the government pays for stuff is typically way more than you or I would. You aren't buying stuff at grossly inflated prices from campaign contributiors like government agencies are.


The "problem" are not vehicles per se then.
22   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 10, 8:27pm  

Quigley says
I have two vehicles: a 2000 Sequoia ... The Sequoia costs an easy $1200/year in maintenance, maybe higher, depending on my luck.


Wow, I have '05 and it's not even in the sam zipcode maintenance-wise. $1200 sounds insane. What are you doing to it?
23   just_passing_through   2019 Apr 10, 9:46pm  

Tenpoundbass says
The point is I get three years out of these cars with minimal maintenance.


Reminds me of a few pages out of the book: Shit My Dad Says
24   kt1652   2019 Apr 10, 11:58pm  

Quigley says
I have two vehicles: a 2000 Sequoia and a 2014 Camry hybrid. The Sequoia costs an easy $1200/year in maintenance, maybe higher, depending on my luck. But it’s 20 years old.

The Camry hybrid is very low maintenance and gas, avg about $100/month gas and $180/year for oil and inspections and tires. It only needs oil changes every 10,000 miles instead of every 3,000, but it does use synthetic so that’s more. Overall, it’s a much cheaper vehicle to operate.
Hugolas_Madurez says
Quigley says
I have two vehicles: a 2000 Sequoia ... The Sequoia costs an easy $1200/year in maintenance, maybe higher, depending on my luck.


Wow, I have '05 and it's not even in the sam zipcode maintenance-wise. $1200 sounds insane. What are you doing to it?

What you or I do is mostly irrelevant.
Automakers live or die not for you, it's the other 99% that moves the needle.
I worked at a 6 man startup once, the boss would prob fire anyone that'd waste time doing vehicle maintenance.
This is business, there is never enough time to do everything. You hire pros/services. It is expensive.
My MD nephew wont work on his car, aint worth his time.
My lovely wife doesnt know how to open the hood of her car.
25   RWSGFY   2019 Apr 11, 12:21am  

kt1652 says
What you or I do is mostly irrelevant.
Automakers live or die not for you, it's the other 99% that moves the needle.
I worked at a 6 man startup once, the boss would prob fire anyone that'd waste time doing vehicle maintenance.
This is business, there is never enough time to do everything. You hire pros/services. It is expensive.
My MD nephew wont work on his car, aint worth his time.
My lovely wife doesnt know how to open the hood of her car.


Huh? What the matter of WHO does the job has to do with anything? The maintenance schedule for any vehicle is public fucking knowledge. I happen to know maintenance schedule for the 1st gen Sequoia pretty well because I fucking read the fucking manual when I bought it. I fail to see how $1200 per year in maintenance can be consistently racked up for that particular vehicle. Even in Bay-fucking-Area with $90-$100 per hour labor at Toyota dealership. I mean, it's probably doable if you take it to Bugatti dealer and insist it's a Veyron, but short of that I just don't see it. Even with timing belt, driveshaft lube points, etc. (It's a truck and a fairly ancient design after all). The $1800 per year in maintenance alone for Ford-fucking-Focus is a fucking highway robbery.
26   kt1652   2019 Apr 11, 12:30am  

Rin says
WookieMan says
Nissan Versa and Leaf


I have a whole thread on the Nissan Leaf

http://patrick.net/post/1322772/2019-03-01-rin-spoke-with-prius-owners-on-the-nissan-leaf

Rin says
kt1652 says
If an ev with 200 mile range gets reduced to 100 mile in winter as a worst case, it would still satisfy 95-98% of daily trips of metropolitan drivers, without charging top-off, what is the problem?


There is this concept of 'metering'. In a sense, what the ICE did was eliminate that from the way of life. So sure, if a person is highly conservative and only drives exactly to work and back, and leaves the vehicle on a plug overnight, the...

This is the same false logic, most of my neighbors own and drive full size pickup trucks that get 20 mpg.
Just in case, once a year to pick up some furniture or want to act like beautiful people in commercials.
We should all drive Yukons just in case my sons and sister in law's family all decided to vacation with us. lol.
I was at Costco gas, the monster suv in front sucked up $90 and took forever to fill.
I pumped $10 and will last me about 1000 miles. (90% EV / 10% 45mpg)
27   kt1652   2019 Apr 11, 12:48am  

The more f-bomb the stronger the argument, right?
Go back to my ATRI chart, $0.166/mile is the cost of maintenance/REPAIR.
https://atri-online.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/ATRI-Operational-Costs-of-Trucking-2017-10-2017.pdf
That is way more than I had imagined, but that is the cost of business.
That is why HVAC guy charges you $450 to replace a $50 motor I can buy on ebay.
Why dentist charge $250 for cleaning. Lawyers charge $500/hour.
Take a chill pill, come back with your source of supporting data.
28   kt1652   2019 Apr 11, 2:02am  

What Mr. Q case is not so f##unbelievable!!!
Here is Edmunds estimates for a 5y sum cost, for a 5 yr old Sequoia:
Maintenance: $3779
Repair: $773
My calculator said that's an average of $904/year for an almost new Sequoia.
Mr. Q's Sequoia is 19 years old, a bit more main&repair, no?
Notice in year 4, Edmunds said M&R is $2,372.
Certainly possible for a 19 year old suv to throw a rear end or lose an AC compressor and rack up thousands in repair.
Mr. Q may be a wealthy chap and so he uses the dealership for service, nothing wrong with that.
Mr. Q may also live in a high cost region, you wouldn't expect a Bay Area shop to charge the same rate as one in Alabama, right?
Notice the fuel cost, wow, pays for my solar panels 1.82x.
29   EBGuy   2019 Apr 11, 5:02pm  

Hugolas_Madurez says
What "timing belt"? Practically nothing newer than 2008-2010 has these anymore.

Touche! I hadn't owned an ICE vehicle for more than a decade and half, so imagine my surprise when I found out you don't gap spark plugs anymore (and only change them after 100k miles).
30   FortWayneAsNancyPelosiHaircut   2019 Apr 11, 5:08pm  

they are putting into maintenance dealer prices of unnecessary things most people don't bother doing, and definitely not at the suggested rate or time.
31   Shaman   2019 Apr 11, 7:41pm  

Hugolas_Madurez says
Wow, I have '05 and it's not even in the sam zipcode maintenance-wise. $1200 sounds insane. What are you doing to it?


Well last week it was the driver side door latch assembly which became cranky and almost unusable. I have a policy of replacing annoyingly broken things on my vehicles before I become so annoyed by them that I just replace the vehicle. That latch assembly cost $440 and I installed it myself. Good as new! But the parts...
This weekend I’ll install a new driver seat belt, and I got a discount so it was about $260. There’s half of the $1200 I mentioned. Then there’s oil changes which I usually do myself but still cost at least $40.
Over the past few years there have been tires ($800), brakes and rotors ($800), radiator ($1200), gate latches ($300x3(this model has a real issue with those)), plugs and serpentine belt ($100), and blower for heater/AC ($280), etc etc etc. It wasn’t bad on maintenance but now it’s getting bad. Idk if it will peter off a bit once I reach a certain point, but all the plastic shit on it keeps breaking. I do most of the work myself, but it’s still a lot in parts. Anyway. I want to get a few more years out of the vehicle and then find another car.
32   B.A.C.A.H.   2019 Apr 12, 7:59am  

When we had only Old Beaters in the last century, we used a trusty repair shop that operated out of a gas station. The mechanic/owner was knowledgeable, honest, and turned away lots of work.

At the turn of the century, we graduated to new cars. Out of paranoia to have a meticulous history in case of a warranty concern I only took the new cars, both Toyotas, to the dealer for service. I got lazy and only ever used the dealers ever since, except for the annual detailing.

After the two new Toyotas, the 2000 Camry and 2001 Prius, reached about 100,000 miles I tracked the cost per mile of the dealer maintenance till I parted with those two vehicles in the past couple of years at about 165,000 miles for the Prius, 170,000 for the Camry. The maintenance AND REPAIR cost, including detailing which I consider maintenance to care for the paint. Did this from the beginning for the 2006 Tacoma. This did not include body work for small dents.

2000 Camry, 100k-170k miles: $0.193 per mile
2001 Prius 100k-165k miles: $0.189 per mile
2006 Tacoma, 0 - 80k miles: $0.151 per mile

As others have pointed out, the new cars obtained in 2017 and 2018 have had zero maintenance/repair cost, except for the 3 cents per mile for detailing the 2017 vehicle (2018 too new for detailing).
33   kt1652   2019 Apr 12, 9:21am  

Love that new car smell.
Nothing smells better than $$$ burning.
Take that Edmunds Sequoia:
$26,852 (Deprec + Sales tax) , after 5 years.
OP's article was Total Cost of Ownership for FLEET Vehicles.
Businesses have a mix of newer and older. They can't buy tires on craigslist and got a basketcase turbo Starion from mechanic friend for free, like I did back in the day.
34   kt1652   2019 Apr 12, 9:39am  

Tesla's win... they have the highest cost of ownership. ha I told ya.
For consolation, Tesla's maintenance cost is damn low for "luxury class"
They are much sexier I have to admit, lol
Ioniq, Prius c, Focus, Leaf are the lowest cost of ownership.

A bit more rigorous study, confirms what seems obvious to me, hybrid/PHEVs are very good choices for high mileage drivers.
https://energy.umich.edu/te3/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/09/Final-Breetz-Salon-EV-Ownership-Costs-v3-TE3-2.pdf



Edit: Prius c
35   kt1652   2019 Apr 12, 10:32am  

FortWayneIndiana says
they are putting into maintenance dealer prices of unnecessary things most people don't bother doing, and definitely not at the suggested rate or time.

Why do you think Edmunds, Consumer Reports...etc, inflate the cost of car ownership, as you suggest?
Seems counter-intuitive to me, wouldn't they serve their self-interest better to promote car ownership, by understating the costs?
36   B.A.C.A.H.   2019 Apr 12, 5:59pm  

kt1652 says
Love that new car smell.
Nothing smells better than $$$ burning.
Take that Edmunds Sequoia:
$26,852 (Deprec + Sales tax) , after 5 years.

I hear you.

That's why I kept those Toyotas for as long as I did. The new vehicles that replaced them recently will probably be the last vehicle purchases for what remains of my lifetime. The depreciation of the 2017 model purchase made that year is about $0.53 per mile, replacing a fully depreciated 2000 Camry that had maintenance + repair cost of only 19 cents.

It's worse than that, though. The new car has collision which adds about $20/month of fixed cost, and about triple the annual registration fee in California. I could drop the collision but it's my partner's car and she will be pissed off at me if I do that for the time being. I got to pick my battles, don't want to pick that one.

Then there's the opportunity cost of the money spent on the purchase that's not earning dividends.
I hate new cars.
37   SunnyvaleCA   2019 Apr 13, 1:12am  

Wouldn't maintenance costs of a fleet be even lower (per vehicle) than for individual car owners? With a fleet you can buy in bulk and schedule things to keep your maintenance crew optimally employed.

The story doesn't list insurance costs. Maybe it's rolled into "ownership costs per year" figure? I've heard comprehensive/collision can be expensive for electrics (and sometimes hybrids) because repair shops don't want to work on them and get electricuted.

Are those three vehicles really the same "class" of vehicles? I would have thought the Fusion was a step above the Prius and the Leaf was a step below. Certainly the Fusion is a bigger car.
38   WookieMan   2019 Apr 13, 10:50am  

SunnyvaleCA says
Are those three vehicles really the same "class" of vehicles? I would have thought the Fusion was a step above the Prius and the Leaf was a step below. Certainly the Fusion is a bigger car.


Yeah, anyone here so far making claims about a EV being better than a ICE has not compared same/similar class vehicles. The OP is about "fleet" vehicles and the MAINTENANCE. Purchase price means nothing to the tax payer so let's just do whatever. Pay double or triple out the gate, but shit, that 20% savings in maintenance will save our city from bankruptcy.

Please register to comment:

api   best comments   contact   latest images   memes   one year ago   random   suggestions