With more and more electric cars and plug-in hybrids on the road, there is a growing interest in knowing the cost of driving using electricity. Most of us keep tabs on the price of gasoline and how it impacts our bottom line. But for people with cars that plug in, what is the relevant price?
The U.S. Energy Department has launched a new website that utilizes a concept called “eGallon” to provide state-by-state data for drivers to compare the cost of fueling a car with electricity instead of gasoline.
The eGallon price is the cost of the amount of electricity it takes to drive an electric vehicle the same distance that a similar gasoline-powered vehicle travels using one gallon of gas. That price varies from state to state because electricity prices vary dramatically from state to state.
The bottom line is that on average, fueling a car with gasoline costs about three times more than fueling it with electricity. In New York, where electricity is quite expensive, the advantage is somewhat less. New York’s eGallon price is $1.80, or around half the current price of a gallon of gas.
Things to note are that eGallon prices are likely to be far more stable than gasoline prices and that there are interesting ways to reduce out-of-pocket expenses for eGallons, such as using free public charging stations and generating your own electricity with solar panels.
As we adopt new ways to power our cars, we need new metrics for assessing the cost of driving.
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Web Links
EV Sales Skyrocketing; eGallon Holds Steady
Photo, taken in January 2013, courtesy of MotorBlog via Flickr.
Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio. Support for Earth Wise comes from the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, NY.