You Gotta Be Kidding: $GM's Volt > $GM's Cadillac

General Motors on Tuesday set a price of $41,000 for its electric Chevrolet Volt, $5,000 more than the top-selling sedan from its luxury Cadillac brand and $8,000 more than its nearest competitor, the Nissan Leaf.

With a price of $41,000, the Volt will cost as much as some luxury vehicles. The top-selling Cadillac CTS has a price starting at $35,165.

GM will limit production and will limit sales of the Volt to minimize financial loss.

The federal government and the California state government will both offer rebates totaling in excess of $8,000.

This is where we're headed folks with renewable energy. (By the way, most electricity used to charge the Volt will still come from coal-powered utility plants.)

How far can the Volt go on one charge? The promoters say 40 miles. After that a "small" gasoline engine kicks in. Someone wanna bet the promoters are exaggerating just a tad?

With each charge, the battery loses efficiency. By three years it will need to be replaced to continue to provide that 40-mile stretch. The battery is an integral part of the chassis and battery replacement is a major service component which I have not yet seen addressed.

No wonder this company needed a bailout.

I can't make this stuff up.

UPDATE, July 27, 2010: Washington Times story. 

Greg Lang sent me the following:

USA EPA plans to rate this at 100 miles per gallon for CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) calculations according to one claim I have heard. Other stories put the Volt at up to 250 MPG. To comprehend CAFE think of a lot of $20 or $30 USD restaurant tabs and then throw in a few "high roller" $100 to $250 tabs. The "average" goes way up. In the USA, the "big" vehicles tend to garner a premium price and even with all the "tricks" they use more fuel.

Basically on Volt might cover three to five big Caddy "crossover" type vehicles under CAFE. Thus the Volt will cause use of even more fuel!

There is a long history of use of electric vehicles and hybrids. They are usually lithium (like laptops and cellphones) and tend to last eight years. (Regular car batteries are designed around "Cold cranking Amps" not deep cycle. You can buy a "primo" car battery for $200 to $300 versus $50 to $100 for a three to five year car battery).

Actually, it takes relatively little power to propel a medium sized car at say 65MPH. You could drive the Volt Coast to Coast but it might need a few short "rest breaks". with the engine running toi charge up the batteries when going up mountains on the interstates at y65MPH. No big deal.

The grand scheme of the Volt is that you plug it in at night at your home/garage charging station (easy if you have the dedicated parking spot) and "go battery" when you start out. If you do a lot of short trips under ideal conditions this is great. In a perfect world scenario you would drive exactly 40 miles every day, plug it in and then it could recharge at night when electrical demand is low. Workplaces might have charge plugs but electrical demand is highest during "business hours".

As they say with EPA rating, "your mileage will vary and probably be lower". Extreme cold reduces battery output by half (same with your cell in the glove compartment) and you will need to run the engine to provide radiator heat and heated seats. Figure 20 mile battery range and that is on longer trips with hot coolant storage. When it's hot you will like AC, which sucks up a lot of power. Figure 20 mile range here.

Let's do the math here. If you figure you will just make it home 365 days a year and live in and even climate place like Hawaii (ain't many of them) you will get 365x40=14600 miles per year driving without engine fuel. At the 20 mile range scenarios you will get 7300 miles per year. Theoretically, you could do this but this is not driving patterns.

If you discharge the battery and then turn on the small engine this is not efficient. Those home backup generators can cost fifty cents per kilowatt hour to run. Worth it if you have a freezer full of meat and a power outage but pricey. Battery charging is at best 50% efficient, meaning two kilowatt hours in for every kilowatt hours out. It can work when you plug into the grid but pricey with the small on board engine.

Basically, the Volt would be ideal for a person like myself. I live in urban Minneapolis. When I worked nights downtown it was 3.6 miles to work. My (now deceased) parents lived 14 miles away from me. Most other stuff I did in the cities. I could potentially go days or weeks at a time without starting the engine or using fuel, especially if it has a built in 100 volt charger to "top off" when I was at my parents house.

Here is the quandary: When gas wasn't much more than a dollar a gallon (cheap) and I was visiting my parents and commuting to work I drove 6000 miles to work. The Volt looks like a compact to mid-size so I will compare it to the 1986 Toyota 2x4 "stick" four cylinder I was driving then which got 20 to 25 MPG like my current Ford Ranger 4x2 four cylinder "stick". These or a conventional Volt equivalent will use 250 to 300 gallons of gas per year.

Do the math. These are not consuming the fuel.

I will cross post this on my fourfiftygas.com.

Bottom line:  The Chevy Volt is a "halo" car as GM describes it. It is designed to bring people into the showroom. It will have no effect on the energy story in the US, and GM will limit its production because it will take a loss on each sale. But it will make for great advertising, marketing and public relations. Sort of like oil companies buying a wind farm.