Southern California Edison users might be better off not charging

[josefontao]

I'm on the regular tiering service with SCE, and I usually fall on Tier 3.  I just got the FFET a few days ago so it will probably take me to tier 4.

 

But assuming I stay on tier 3, I pay around 19 cents for kWh.  Now bear with me on the math.

 

Reading other posts I see that it takes around 7.2kWh to fully charge the battery. so 19 cents times 7.2kwh is $1.37.

So it costs me $1.37 to fully charge the battery, which is good for 20 miles of electric drive.

My local Mobile gas station is charging $2.39 per gallon.

Assuming 40 mpg oh hybrid mode, half a gallon would last me those same 20 miles and would cost me $1.19. 18 cents cheaper.

 

So am I looking at this right?  Is it cheaper to just go on hybrid mode?

[Hybridbear]

I'm on the regular tiering service with SCE, and I usually fall on Tier 3.  I just got the FFET a few days ago so it will probably take me to tier 4.

 

But assuming I stay on tier 3, I pay around 19 cents for kWh.  Now bear with me on the math.

 

Reading other posts I see that it takes around 7.2kWh to fully charge the battery. so 19 cents times 7.2kwh is $1.37.

So it costs me $1.37 to fully charge the battery, which is good for 20 miles of electric drive.

My local Mobile gas station is charging $2.39 per gallon.

Assuming 40 mpg oh hybrid mode, half a gallon would last me those same 20 miles and would cost me $1.19. 18 cents cheaper.

 

So am I looking at this right?  Is it cheaper to just go on hybrid mode?

Look into TOU rates.

[Rexracer]

Short answer yes. Long answer, maybe.

 

If your charging on 110v it may take 8kWh for a full charge (inefficiencies in charging), so that would be $1.52. Depending on what kind of driving your doing you may get more then 20 miles out of the charge, or far less. Like now during cold months running the heater I get more like 13 mile range. And also depending on your driving you may get a bit better then the 40 mpg in Hybrid move, mixed driving I'm usually around 45-46mpg in hybrid only.

 

Now there are other factor's as well, like wear and tear on the engine. If you go all hybrid for the next few months while gas is cheap, you will likely need to do an oil change much sooner. Do it yourself $33, dealer $75. So in saving $10-$20 in electric bill, you could cost yourself a $75 oil change. No idea what it would really cost, but just giving you more factors to think about.

 

At the end of the day, I wouldn't be scared to use gas, but I wouldn't avoid electric.

[josefontao]

Now that i've been driving the car for 1.5 days, i see that I can do 27-30 miles to the charge.

My commute is 17.5 miles. 9 city and 8 on freeway.

I can charge at work free of charge.

 

Yesterday I drove all EV to work and used 55% of the battery

Today I drove EV on the city and hybrid on the freeway and only used 30% of the battery.  Even though I selected EV later, some of the freeway miles were still on EV for a total of 12.2 EV miles.  The MPG, as reported by myfordmobile, was 91.5.

I assume this reported MPG is for when the ICE is running?

 

If the 91.5 MPG is just for when ICE is running, and based on my cost per kWh, it would seem that im better off driving EV on city and Hybrid on freeway (or above 45 mph)

 

What do you think?

[openair]

The mpg reported by the trip is total miles (including ev) divided by gallons.  Even when the ev range of the battery is depleted you will still get some ev miles reported in the trips.  These ev miles are supplied by regen and the ice turning to charge the battery. 

[josefontao]

ok, so then I got 42mpg just on ICE. Which is whats advertised.

That was 0.19 gallons, which is 38 cents.

 

Those same 8 freeway miles on EV power would have used ~33% of the battery, which costs me around 46 cents to recharge.

 

Not accounting for ICE maintenance (oil changes and what not) as stated by Rexracer, its cheaper to use gas on the freeway than to use battery power.