Thinking of buying an electric vehicle (EV)? Join the club! Americans bought 40,000 new electric vehicles in the first six months of 2013 — more than twice the number purchased during the same period in 2012. And that was after sales of plug-in cars tripled from 17,000 in 2011 to 52,000 last year.
According to the Wall Street Journal, a new round of discount leases on mainstream-brand plug-in cars combined with federal, state, and local electric-vehicle incentives could make a battery-electric car an extraordinarily economical way to get around for drivers.
“More and more Americans are taking advantage of the low and stable price of electricity as a transportation fuel, and that’s very good news for our economy as well as the environment,” said Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. “As the market continues to grow, electric vehicles will play a key role in our effort to reduce air pollution and slow the effects of climate change.”
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Why the sudden EV popularity? It’s probably related to more public EV awareness in conjunction with a desire to save money on fuel costs. And combined with the ability to generate electricity independently thanks to solar technology, drivers who recharge their plug-in EVs via solar panels have the unique ability to take both the utility and oil companies out of the equation!
On average, it costs $2.51 more to fill a conventional car with a gallon of gas than to charge an electric car to go the same distance, according to the Department of Energy’s new eGallon tool. The price of an eGallon tells consumers how much it costs to drive an EV the same distance you could go on a gallon of unleaded gasoline in a similar car. Because electricity prices are a little different state to state, the eGallon tool shows how much an eGallon costs in your state, and compares it to the cost of gasoline. As you will see by visiting this link, on average, fueling a vehicle with gasoline costs roughly 3 times more than fueling with electricity.
Find out what's happening in Alpharetta-Miltonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Curious which EV model is right for you? Clean Technica has been keeping an ongoing list of EVs coming to market in 2013.
Curious how much it costs to power an EV with solar? Click here to see Driving Cost Comparison: Electric Cars vs. Gasoline Cars vs. Solar Powered Cars.
Interested in powering your home and/or EV with solar? Contact us to schedule a free solar energy consultation.
