A DRIVER was left stunned when he received a $15,000 bill for his electric vehicle after switching from a petrol car to an EV to save money.
O Canadian EV owner was shocked to discover his plug-in hybrid battery repairs were costing more than half the price of vehicle.
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When Peter Birovchak bought the hybrid, he loved it at first, but that quickly changed when he discovered how much it would cost to replace the electric battery, Global News reported.
He felt like the money he thought he would save on gas with his 2018 Hyundai Ionic Plug-in didn’t even matter because of this.
The driver said he felt the money he saved by avoiding the gas station was “in vain.”
“I liked the idea of going to the gas station once every three weeks instead of once a week,” Birovchak explained.
He said he saved about $300 a month on his gas bill.
The driver purchased the hybrid in 2017.
Late last year, his engine light came on while driving and that was the beginning of his thoughts about changing EVs for good.
The EV owner took his car to a Hyundai dealership and discovered he needed to replace the battery.
“I got a quote the next day for $15,272,” Birovchak said.
“Not including labor.”
He purchased the vehicle for around $30,000.
To make matters worse, his car only had 190,000 kilometers on it.
This meant it was already past the 100,000-mile warranty.
The EV owner asked: “How is it statistically possible that a component of a vehicle could be worth almost as much as the vehicle?”
Electric vs gas vehicles
Pros and cons of electric vehicles versus gasoline-powered vehicles
EV PROS:
- Convenient (when charging at home)
- Cheapest (depending on the state or city)
- Cheaper maintenance due to lack of mechanical parts
- Great for commuting
- Reduced CO2 emissions
- Federal and state tax incentives
- More performance (speed, handling – depending on make and model)
EV CONS:
- Higher initial cost
- Higher Insurance Rates
- More frequent tire and brake replacement intervals
- Higher tare weight (thus causing faster wear on crucial parts)
- Low resale value
- High depreciation rates
- Lack of charging infrastructure
- Unreliable public loading (related: slow loading times)
- Poor performance in winter and summer
- Lack of clean energy alternatives means more “dirty energy” from coal and nuclear sources
- Range anxiety
PROS OF GAS:
- Highly developed refueling infrastructure
- Fast replenishment
- Cheapest insurance rates depending on make, model and configuration
- Established repair industry
- Lower initial cost
- Greater range before refueling, especially with hybrids
- Many manufacturers produce engines with almost fewer emissions
- Cheaper refueling depending on location
CONS OF GAS:
- Finite resource (related: heavy dependence on oil)
- Carbon emissions/greenhouse gases
- Higher repair costs
- Higher insurance rates depending on make, model and configuration
- Varied costs at the pump depending on the state, city and municipality
Source: Driver, Perch Energy, Automatic Week
Birovchak said he hasn’t received much help from Hyundai.
“You feel like you’ve been kicked in the face,” he emphasized of the situation.
He’s also not alone in his changing feelings toward electric vehicles.
The Texas Public Policy Foundation published a study that found that if the cost of charging an EV was translated into how much it costs to fill up a car, it would be almost $17.33 a gallon.
Even with subsidies from the Federal Inflation Reduction Act, the enormous costs of EV ownership make them more expensive than a traditional gasoline-powered automobile, the researchers wrote.
“Adding subsidy costs to the actual cost of fueling an EV would equate to an EV owner paying $17.33 per gallon for gasoline,” the study says.
“And these estimates do not include the additional hundreds of billions in subsidies from the Inflation Reduction Act.”
This story originally appeared on The-sun.com read the full story
