> The price seems to be the main barrier to EV adoption IMO, and is probably the reason they are so rare where I live (it's a major metropolitan area, and yet so far I have seen a non-rail EV only once).
If you live on an area with electrified rail transit (which is where we ought to be going) but effectively no EVs that's surprising. Where is this?
Today, the price of EVs has dropped to within comfortable reach of middle to upper middle class people, who are most of the people who buy new cars anyways (the lower middle and working class are much more likely to buy used).
The bigger issue is cultural - with some areas (US coastal states and cosmopolitan cities, cosmopolitan parts of Europe, etc) being far further along in the cultural adoption of EVs.
This is changing though. On a recent trip to Michigan I saw a significant rise in EVs (I'm more well off areas) vs the not distant past and I suspect this is because Detroit automakers finally have solid EV offerings.
EVs, like smartphones, are now aspirational goods.
> If you live on an area with electrified rail transit (which is where we ought to be going) but effectively no EVs that's surprising. Where is this?
Railway lines in poorer or second-world (ex-USSR) countries were sometimes electrified since it ensured the most flexible and reliable fuel supply: you could run trains not only from oil, but also coal, gas, nuclear or hydroelectric power. Compared to diesel, the locomotives are cheaper, faster, quieter, and more powerful, and the operating costs for trains and track are lower. The ride quality is better, and it still felt "modern" to make the upgrade in the mid-20th century.
Sort by percentage electrified length on [1] and you have Ethiopia, Armenia, Montenegro, Georgia, Bulgaria, India, Poland, Azerbaijan, North Korea, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Morocco, Ukraine, South Africa, North Macedonia etc all with a significant proportion of their rail networks electrified.
> If you live on an area with electrified rail transit (which is where we ought to be going) but effectively no EVs that's surprising. Where is this?
Rio de Janeiro. Off the top of my head, we have Supervia (commuter rail, overhead catenary), Metrô Rio (subway, third rail), Corcovado train (touristic train, AC overhead catenary), Santa Teresa tram (tram, overhead catenary), and VLT Rio (tram, APS third rail). I know there are some EVs (I've seen it in the news a couple of years ago, there were something like five EVs in the whole city), but I've only seen one personally once (I believe it was a BMW i3).
The bigger issue here is IMO still price - and all EVs are AFAIK imported, which makes them even more expensive.
If you live on an area with electrified rail transit (which is where we ought to be going) but effectively no EVs that's surprising. Where is this?
Today, the price of EVs has dropped to within comfortable reach of middle to upper middle class people, who are most of the people who buy new cars anyways (the lower middle and working class are much more likely to buy used).
The bigger issue is cultural - with some areas (US coastal states and cosmopolitan cities, cosmopolitan parts of Europe, etc) being far further along in the cultural adoption of EVs.
This is changing though. On a recent trip to Michigan I saw a significant rise in EVs (I'm more well off areas) vs the not distant past and I suspect this is because Detroit automakers finally have solid EV offerings.
EVs, like smartphones, are now aspirational goods.