Montreal City Weblog

Kate 07:44 on 2021-10-18 Permalink Reply  

• Kevin 09:40 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  If the price of bread was on giant signs outside every grocery store, people would be obsessed with that too.

• dhomas 10:57 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  My 10 year old minivan was stolen right in front of my house at the end of August. I’d always said that my next car would be electric. Every time I pass the gas station, I’m very glad that my replacement car is an EV. The 3 kids are a little cramped in the backseat compared to the minivan, but it’s workable.
  TBH, I don’t understand why more people don’t buy EVs in Quebec. Even if you only look only at the financial aspect and don’t consider the environmental impact, the total cost of ownership for an EV can be much lower than a gas car. Not only do we have the cheapest electricity in North America, but EVs require practically no maintenance. No oil changes, brakes last twice as long, and, most importantly, NO GAS. Right there, I’m saving about 200$/month (maybe more now that gas prices are going up) that I would have spent to fill up. I instead apply that to my monthly car payments (ok, electricity costs go up a bit, but nowhere near 200$/month).
  My sister has had a Nissan Leaf since 2014/15 and I don’t think she’s EVER brought it in for servicing.
  I guess the upfront cost might scare people away a bit. And then there’s the “range anxiety”. But still, new EVs go ~400km on a full battery and there are rapid chargers popping up everywhere. It just makes sense to buy an EV, if you absolutely need a car.
  @Kevin: there was actually a class action about price fixing of bread: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/class-action-bread-pricing-approved-quebec-1.5404365

• jeather 11:31 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  A lot of people don’t have garages where they can set up a charging station (and if they do, that’s another fairly large upfront cost).

• Joey 11:45 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  Have had an EV for nearly two years. My observations:

  Higher monthly payment is basically offset by gas savings (esp. at $1.50/L) – my monthly cost for a new Leaf is equivalent to my previous car, a new Golf (both on leases)
  Plan was to charge at work (there are stations provided in parking lot), but COVID wrecked that
  Don’t have a parking space/home charger, rely on charging network – it’s basically been fine, with a little planning/inconvenience offset by good fortune of being able to access EV-only spaces downtown, etc.
  Wish the green onions were better at ticketing non-EV cars parked in front of charger. It happens all the time.
  Range anxiety is real but not a big deal – by car gets 180-230 km per charge depending on weather and driving conditions, but it’s almost never full so any kind of longish trip requires some planning. Have done one run to the country, stopping at a fast charger in the Laurentians for 20 minutes and charging via ordinary extension cord connected to an exterior plug overnight at the destination, plus another 20 minutes on the way back; still certain trips (Toronto, NYC, etc) are out of the question but really who cares?
  Given plans to go all-electric sooner rather than later, I am not certain the charging infrastructure will keep up with the demand – then again, batteries keep improving
  Demand seems to far outstrip supply – manufacturers and especially dealers really don’t care about the EV market for the moment and it shows – I got a Leaf in 2019 because it was available, it was my sixth or seventh preference. Things seem to have improved but the offering is very far from gas-powered vehicles

• Spi 11:47 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  People greatly overestimate how expensive owning a car can be. There’s a reason why there are still so many 10-15+ year old cars on the road, one being that Quebec doesn’t require emissions and safety inspections (unless the car is coming from outside the province).

  Someone that doesn’t drive very much (less than 10 000km a year) and owns a fairly old car would simply insure it one way, wouldn’t be overly obsessed with maintenance (maybe one oil change a year), brakes every 2-3 years, if it’s an econobox you can get away with reasonable gas consumption.

  All in costs of owning and operating a car could be less than a few (2-3k) thousand a year.

• Joey 13:01 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  @Spi I often wonder what the cost of doing all our family’s driving by taxi/Uber a year would be. Communauto lasted for a good long while but became very tiring with a small child.

• Blork 14:13 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  We finally said goodbye to our beloved 14-year-old Honda Fit this spring and considered getting an electric car to replace it. In our case we drive so little that we couldn’t justify the price. (We spend $40-$50 a month on gas on average). So we have a three-year lease and will consider it again in 2024.

  Even hybrids don’t really make much sense when you don’t drive much. All the extra expense and complications of having two power systems and all those batteries for the sake of saving $20 a month? Nope.

• Ephraim 14:52 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  I love how RBC wrote the loans on EV vehicles and then sent people publicity for 3c off per litre with PetroPoints.

• Meezly 16:26 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  Gas prices in Norway are at least double the price, which is why they’re going, eff this, let’s go all EV by 2025: https://electrek.co/2021/09/23/norway-bans-gas-cars-in-2025-but-trends-point-toward-100-ev-sales-as-early-as-april/

  Love it or not, Norway is what the future is going to look like as gas gets increasingly expensive.

  Also, price for gas goes up due to demand, so does price for food. Everyone needs to eat.

• Spi 20:03 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  To say gas prices is the primary driver of EV purchases in Norway is to ignore all the other factors notably that EV cars are exempt from sales taxes which like all Scandinavian country is extremely high (25%) and a host of other combustion engine car taxes aren’t applicable. Sure petrol is expensive but more often than not an electric car is the cheapest option before even factoring that.

• Meezly 21:28 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  True, forward-thinking government policy is the primary driver, something which is sadly lacking here.

• Joey 21:55 on 2021-10-18 Permalink

  Forgot to add the only way an entry level EV was comparable price wise to an entry level VW was because of major subsidies from the federal and provincial governments.

• Raymond Lutz 19:08 on 2021-10-19 Permalink

  Je rajouterai que la voiture électrique en lieu et place d’une voiture thermique ne changera pas grands chose dans nos émissions. La seule solution: transport en commun (train) et vélo. Au mieux les voitures électriques ont un facteur trois moins d’émissions. See lifecycle gr CO2 equiv per km graph (from DOI# 10.3390/app9214597)

• Chris 08:41 on 2021-10-20 Permalink

  It’s infuriating that our government gives people direct subsidies to buy electric cars, but won’t even eliminate the sales tax on bicycles.