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The Rise of the Electric Car

Graham Pipes

University of Kentucky
WRD 204

April 23, 2019

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Table of Contents

Abstract: Page 3
Background: Page 3
Methods: Pages 3-4
Findings: Pages 4-8
Discussion: Page 8
Conclusion: Page 9
References: Pages 10-11
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Abstract
The world and its population are continually growing, and new technologies are
being developed that impact things we use every day. The purpose of this report is to
inform the car community of the rising phenomenon of the electric car. It will provide an
overview of the types of electric cars, the components, driving ranges, government
involvement and potential competing technologies. This new technology is an attempt to
make our lives easier and make the world a safer place. Interest in the electric car is
growing, and we are seeing more companies that have taken action to manufacture
electric cars. One company has been around for 16 years and specializes in making all
electric cars: Tesla. Tesla has created some of the biggest advancements in technology
because they make all electric cars that appeal to the average car fan.

Background
It is a common belief, especially by younger Americans, that the electric car
began with the Tesla that was released around the year 2000 but, in fact, the first ideas
of the electric car began in 1832 by a man named Robert Anderson. More development
continue until the creation of another electric car in 1901 by Ferdinand Porsche creator
of Porsche car company. He made the world’s first hybrid car. Hybrid cars are made
with gas engines and use electricity to power the car. Sad news for the electric car
occurred between the years of 1920 and 1935 when the discovery of cheap Texas oil
arose. Gas prices became extremely low and the interest in the electric car receded.
Twenty-five years later, gas prices started to soar, and the electric car seemed like a
good idea again. All sorts of car companies began researching the idea of the electric
car and finally the most famous hybrid car of them all was released in 2000, the Toyota
Prius.
I became interested in this topic when I first saw a Tesla Roadster at a car show
and I just wanted to learn more about the topic since I am interested in cars. I want to
be able to inform people the basics of the electric car and offer my opinion on whether I
think electric or combustion engine cars are better.

Methods
The methods I used for research were mostly secondary sources that I found on
the University of Kentucky online library. When I conducted research, I mostly
investigated articles that talked about how electric car manufacturing has risen, why
people are interested in them, the advantages of electric cars, some issues with
manufacturing, and potential alternatives to electric cars. Articles I found included
surveys of peoples’ opinions on what they want in an electric car and what concerns
they have about them. I conducted a small bit of my own primary research. I interviewed
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people I know who are in automobile occupations or car club members about what they
know or what they want to know about the electric car. My questions were: “What are
electric cars? Why are they more expensive? How long will the battery last me?” A lot of
the responders were unsure about the basics concerning electric cars and that is that I
intend to explain in this report.

Findings
What do people mean when they talk about an electric car? After research, there
are a few different kinds of electric cars that have been created. There is the battery
electric vehicles (EV), hybrid electric vehicles (HEV), and plug in hybrid electric vehicles
(PHEV). The EV is the kind of vehicle that consists of rechargeable batteries and no gas
engine. Some examples of the EV are the Tesla Model S, BMW i3, and the Nissan Leaf.
The HEV is a hybrid car that is powered by an electric engine and a combustion engine.
However, the battery does not have to be plugged in to charge. The recharge of the
battery happens during the braking of the car. When a HEV is first turned on, the
electric motor is used to power it up. Then, once the car picks up speed, the combustion
engine cuts in. The PHEV is the same thing as a HEV, but the PHEV can also be
plugged in to charge. Some examples of the PHEV are the Chevrolet Volt, BMW i8, and
the Volvo XC90 T8.
When you look at the prices of electric cars, you will notice that they are quite
expensive. When looking at the statistics more closely, it is shown that electric cars are
cheaper in the long run. You may be spending more money while purchasing an electric
car, but there are less components in an electric car and they do not break down as
often as combustion engine cars. An electric engine may contain 25 moving segments
while an internal combustion engine has something like 150. Once you consider repair
and maintenance of an internal combustion engine car the savings are lost. The chart
below compares the electric car and the combustion engine car in fuel cost, annual
maintenance, and the CO2 emissions. As the chart shows, fuel cost is substantially
lower for electric cars because no fuel is used in electric cars. Finally, the graph
compares the CO2 emissions and, as presented, the CO2 emissions for the electric car
are much less than that of the combustion engine car.
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Figure 1. Pressman, 2018

The automotive industry expects that over time the price of an electric car is will
decrease because the price of production is decreasing. The components are becoming
more readily available. In 2013, Nissan dropped the price of their Leaf from $35,200 to
$28,800 just for that reason (Graham, 2014). As seen in Figure 2 (below) the number of
electric cars that have been sold have been growing substantially.

Figure 2. Pressman, 2018

According to Henry Lee, “Consumers purchase cars based on how they value
multiple attributes. They care about performance, aesthetics, reliability, and many other
features.” A lot of the first electric cars were hybrids and the companies focused more
on making a good reliable hybrid car that drives like any other combustion engine car.
When Tesla was founded in 2003, its goal was to specialize in making all electric cars
that hit all the points that Henry Lee discussed. Tesla has made performance cars that
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are aesthetically pleasing and reliable. The pictures below are meant to show a
comparison between the Toyota Prius (Figure 2) and the Tesla Roadster (Figure 3). The
pictures that the Tesla looks a lot more like a super car than the Prius does. This is
exactly what Tesla wanted. They want customers to look at their cars and see a
performance car. Just by looking at these pictures, one can tell that the Tesla has a lot
of more aesthetically pleasing benefits.

Figure 3 Figure 4

While I was doing research, I came across an article that talked about this man
named Mitch Medford who was so interested in electric cars that he quit his job and
created a company that specializes in turning combustion engine vehicles into full
electric cars. The first project the company worked on was turning a 1968 Mustang
fastback into an electric car. By doing so they had to take out the combustion engine
and replace it with the electric motor and put all the lithium ion batteries in. The
company used the same kind of lithium ion battery cells that Tesla uses (pictured below
in Figure 5). When the project was complete, the Zombie 222 (the name of the
Mustang) had a 0-60 time of just 2.4 seconds. The car pushes 800 horsepower and
1,800 pounds of torque (Zelenko, 2015). These statistics make this the fastest 1968
Mustang that is faster than a stock supercar.

Figure 5. Zelenko, 2018

Going back to what Henry Lee said about consumers wanting reliable cars, if you
have to travel a long distance, your electric car will have to be able to drive long
distances, but for some electric vehicles, that is not the case. Most electric vehicles
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have a driving range that is limited to about 80 to 100 miles on a full charge. That can
be a major problem for a lot of people that have to drive many miles a day. This is a
major downside for electric cars because the consumers want reliable cars. Not being
able to drive more than 100 miles on one charge turns customers away. The only
electric vehicles that are able to drive more than 100 miles in one charge are Teslas.
Teslas can drive up to 200 to 300 miles on one charge which is much more reliable than
other kinds of electric cars. Teslas are much more expensive than the other kinds of
electric cars which proves to be one of the downsides of this car. So, to be able to drive
a lot of miles in an electric car, purchasing a Tesla should be highly considered. It is
also important to remember that spending more money on a more reliable electric car
will benefit one in the long run. You will not have to spend thousands of dollars to get
parts replaced like you would in a combustion engine vehicle. The graph below shows
that as time has gone on, the more reliable these batteries have been in electric cars.
The graph shows that in 2017 electric cars had a range from 58 miles to 335 miles (the
200+ would be Tesla) and the median is 114 miles.

Figure 6. Pressman, 2018

Another key factor that people look into when purchasing an electric car is the
amount of charging stations there are. Since most cars have gasoline engines, there
are numerous amounts of gas stations on every corner. With an internal combustion
engine, you will always have a place to fill up your car. With electric cars, that is not the
case. When purchasing an electric car that needs to be plugged in to charge, most
people install a charger into their home. What do they do if they need to charge their car
when they are not at home? There are charging stations throughout the US but there
are nowhere near enough needed to be able to charge peoples cars on the go. That is
another downside to electric cars. When purchasing the charger for your home, there
are three different levels of chargers. There is Level 1 charging, Level 2 charging, and
Level 3 charging. Level 1 charging is the kind of charger that you can basically plug into
any kind of outlet and charge your car. The only downside is that it takes 22 hours to
fully charge a Nissan Leaf with a Level 1 charger (Saxton, 2011). Level 2 charging is a
step above Level 1. The Level 2 charger also simply uses household electricity but
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charges much faster, 8 hours for a full charge for a Nissan Leaf (Saxton, 2011). Finally,
the Level 3 charging is a much faster way of charging with the ability to charge a car to
80% in just 30 minutes (Graham, 2014). There is one downside to Level 3 charging,
“inappropriate use of Level 3 chargers can potentially damage the battery” (Graham,
2014).
The US government is interested in the idea of the electric car for two reasons.
The first is when a car is electric, there is no petroleum used in the engine, so the
United States does not have to rely on other counties to get the materials we need in
order to use transportation. The second reason is the most important. It is that electric
transportation is more sustainable and emits less greenhouse gas emissions than
combustion engine vehicles (Graham, 2014). In the year 2016, 41% of the total CA
emissions was from transportation alone and that is something that we want to reduce,
and electric cars are the perfect way to do that.
Very recently a bipartisan coalition introduced a bill in Congress to extend the
one-time fuel tax credits of up to $7,500 for buyers of electric, plug-in hybrid, and
hydrogen-powered vehicles. This shows the United States enthusiasm for these
alternate vehicles and helps reduce the overall costs to consumers.
Lastly, it should be made clear that the future of electric cars will not be easy to
forecast. As stated above they have been around for a long time and could still find
competition to be intense. Vehicle manufacturers are marketing cleaner gasoline
engines, clean diesel-powered cars, compressed natural gas and biofuels are also
potential solutions to better emissions (Graham, 2014).

Discussion
The electric car is on the rise and there are many ways that the electric car is a
good thing to have and there are other ways where it may seem like a negative thing.
These negative things I am sure will be fixed in the near future because we can see that
the electric car has been growing and becoming better as time goes on. In the future,
electric cars will be less expensive than they are now because as time goes on, the
production of materials becomes easier to achieve and the components will be more
readily available. Therefore, making the electric car less expensive. With the issue of
not having enough charging stations around, I think that that issue will also be solved in
the future because as the interest in the electric car increases, the government will
realize that more charging stations will be needed, and they will make it happen. When I
talked about Mitch Medford creating the world’s first electric Mustang, I wanted to show
that people are so interested in electric cars that instead of going out to buy an electric
car, he turned his dream car into even more of a dream car.
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Conclusion
I believe interest in electric cars will continue to rise because of the consumer is
starting to realize this technology is a good alternative to the internal combustion
engine. As this report shows, the number of electric cars being sold has been growing in
past years. Yes, electric cars are expensive and there are not many places you can
charge them outside of your home, but these issues may soon be resolved. As time
goes on, the battery capacity, driving range and other logistical issues can be satisfied.
The production costs will decline, and the long-term repair and maintenance should be
cheaper. This will result in the base price of the electric car to decrease and make them
easier to acquire for more middle-class people. The future of any technological
advance is hard to predict, and electric cars will have competitors, but they seem to be
in the lead right now. One of the reasons for the lead is the attention from the United
States government and many governments around the world so it should have a good
chance to be the future of transportation.
.
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References
Battery Electric Vehicles, BEV, EVs, HEVs, BHEV's. (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://www.evgo.com/why-evs/types-of-electric-vehicles/

Graham, J., Cisney, J., Carley, S., & Rupp, J. (n.d.). No Time for Pessimism about
Electric Cars. Retrieved from https://search-proquest-
com.ezproxy.uky.edu/docview/1649801969?accountid=11836&rfr_id=info:xri/sid:
primo

Gorzelany, J. (2019, April 10). A Bipartisan Bill Is Introduced To Retain And Expand The
Federal Electric-Car Tax Credits. Retrieved from
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jimgorzelany/2019/04/10/a-bipartisan-bill-is-
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credits/#4ca77c1454a9

Lee. H. Will Electric Cars Transform the U.S. Vehicle Market? (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://www.belfercenter.org/publication/will-electric-cars-transform-us-vehicle-
market

Mazur, C., Offer, G. J., Contestabile, M., & Brandon, N. B. (2018, March 02). Comparing
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Meckling, J., & Nahm, J. (2018, May 25). When do states disrupt industries? Electric
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Moons, I., & Pelsmacker, P. (n.d.). Self-Brand Personality Differences and Attitudes
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Pressman, M. (2018, May 16). 4 Charts & 2 Pictures On Why Electric Vehicles Are The
Future. Retrieved from https://cleantechnica.com/2018/05/16/4-charts-2-pictures-
on-why-electric-vehicles-are-the-future/

Saxton, T. (2018, August 15). Understanding Electric Vehicle Charging. Retrieved from
https://pluginamerica.org/understanding-electric-vehicle-charging/

Timeline: History of the Electric Car. (n.d.). Retrieved from

https://www.energy.gov/timeline/timeline-history-electric-car

Zelenko, M. (2015, April 01). Dark Horse: The story of a record-shattering, all-electric
'68 Mustang. Retrieved from
https://www.theverge.com/2015/4/1/8320189/zombie-222-electric-car-1968-
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