What annoys me about this plan is that every hybrid car is eligible. There are some hybrids that can barely drive 10miles on electric and thus never get charged by the owners (because installing a charging spot can be really expensive) and yet the cars count toward a total maximum.
Hybrid cars should either have their own maximum limit (after that limit the subsidy ends) or every manufacture should have their own limit (like it is in the US, the first 200k electric cars get the $7,500 off for every manucature). This would make sure that 90% of those cars are not hybrids that can barely drive 10miles on electric and people have a chance to get the subsidy when the bolt and tesla model 3 are available (I think the model 3 will not be available without reservation before the end of 2019). Currently, there are no purely electric cars that don't suck (the Nissan Leaf has a range of 100miles and looks kind of funny and is incredible expensive for what it has to offer; the model S/X are excluded from the subsidy because they are considered luxury cars).
A bit of a sidenote but I completely disagree with your dismissal of purely electric cars.
I drive a 2016 Kia Soul EV and the car is just plain awesome. It drives way better than any ICE car I've driven and is just a complete joy to drive daily. The only point I agree with is that the range is still a bit lacking at the moment (I get about 100 miles of highway traffic out of it, 120 miles in city traffic.)
Then again, where I live (The Netherlands) the density of the public charging network is already pretty good, so I can usually charge it with a public charger whenever I park somewhere. And there's a network of fast-chargers along our highways [0].
I've also test-driven a VW E-Golf and BMW i3 and both are solid cars (though imho the Soul is a better car for a better price.)
My hope for subsidies like this (even if they also apply to plug-in hybrids) is that they help make the public charging network in Germany and surrounding countries (like mine) better.
I really hate to see such a negative reply being the top comment, especially when much of it is subjective (what sucks to you is great for me).
Hybrids, plug-in hybrids, parallel and series drive trains are all different as clarified in the other daughter comments. While they use differing percentages of electric power, I still think the key is using electric for 0-10 mph and for regeneration. Once you do that, you can overcome some of the inefficiencies of the ICE.
The article doesn't go into the details of how the subsidies are allocated, so it doesn't make sense to assume one way or the other. I do like your suggested allocation, but for all we know, that could be how they are planning on doing it. Or if you are German, write to your representative to suggest it.
Finally, I have driven the Nissan Leaf and totally disagree with your dismissal of it. It drives way better than equivalent ICE cars of similar size and price range (after US gov't tax credit). For suburban driving, the range is sufficient, it just requires a home charger. Looks are subjective and I agree I find it a bit odd, but there are alternatives. There is a Kia Soul, Ford Focus, and Mercedes B-class that are electric and identically-styled to their ICE equivalents. So I really think your exaggerated claims are based on ignorance.
What it boils down to is that you can't have new products and dismiss them for not not being exactly like the old products. Somebody has to be the beta-tester.
> Hybrids, plug-in hybrids, parallel and series drive trains are all different as clarified in the other daughter comments. While they use differing percentages of electric power, I still think the key is using electric for 0-10 mph and for regeneration. Once you do that, you can overcome some of the inefficiencies of the ICE.
That is true but it doesn't really change the fact that they are still dependent on fussil, which is not the way forward.
> The article doesn't go into the details of how the subsidies are allocated, so it doesn't make sense to assume one way or the other. I do like your suggested allocation, but for all we know, that could be how they are planning on doing it. Or if you are German, write to your representative to suggest it.
You're, right the article doesn't say how the subsidies are allocated but what the article is hardly new. The deal was first confirmed on April 27th 2016 and you could read it in almost every German newspaper. And they confirmed that only the first 400,000 vehicles get the subsidies, no matter if they are hybrid or not.
Secondly, they will also build 15,000 charging stations, and tax breaks for electronic cars (the news paper called them E-cars, but don't go into detail if hybrids are included).
> Finally, I have driven the Nissan Leaf and totally disagree with your dismissal of it. It drives way better than equivalent ICE cars of similar size and price range (after US gov't tax credit). For suburban driving, the range is sufficient, it just requires a home charger. Looks are subjective and I agree I find it a bit odd, but there are alternatives. There is a Kia Soul, Ford Focus, and Mercedes B-class that are electric and identically-styled to their ICE equivalents. So I really think your exaggerated claims are based on ignorance.
I'm glad you like the Nissan Leaf, and when it was first introduced, it was great news because it was really forward thinking at the time (2010 if I remember correctly). Unfortunately, they have not improved much in the past 6 years (comparing how fast the completion improved). And since the range is only sufficient for urban driving, a Nissan Leaf can never be a first car for most families (because, at one point, you want to take a road trip and renting a car for the weekend, I have to pay about $200 just for just 2 1/2 days. In my city, a lot of people drive to the Baltic Sea on weekends and a Nissan Leaf wound not be sufficient for that road trip (it's about 250km/150mi).
Furthermore, the Nissan Leaf is frowned upon in Germany because many people think it looks like a golf car (German car manufacturers have had their fair share of it too).
Because of all those arguments, the Nissan Leaf is not an ideal car for most people and most Germans I know consider 30,000€ cars luxury cars (in 2009, the average price of new cars was 22,000€ and I know many people who only buy used cars because they think 22,000€ is too much for a car). And if you want to buy an expensive car, most Germans want a good looking BMW or Mercedes (they are cheaper in Germany then in the US because they are not imported).
My rant is mostly how this deal has been reached, considering we could have done so much better. If this subsidy was only for electric cars, German manufacturers would finally start producing good-looking electric vehicle with proper range (i don't get why it is so hard to make a compelling electric car anyways). This way, electric cars could have been adopted quicker but instead we chose a slower adoption path (this is typical for Germany). What really needs to happen is that car markers start producing proper electric cars, and this subsidy could have changed a lot, if properly implemented.
I find many of your arguments weak. Many families I know have 2 cars, even in Europe. One electric (current Leaf, Soul, etc.) for commuting, the other ICE sedan for commuting/traveling would be perfect for them. Europeans, incl. Germans drive much uglier cars than the Leaf (Multipla?). A Leaf with quick-charge port (CHAdeMO) would allow 30 min charge if there is a station half-way to the coast (which there might be already).
I do agree that electric vehicle offerings and government policies are not ideal, but your attitude (about electrics and gov't policy) boils down to "if it's only half-good, let's slam it for not being perfect." I don't see how that can help adoption.
The primary point of hybrids is that the ICE charges the battery. So a charging station isn't even necessary and most hybrids don't have a port for this reason. When energy gets low the ICE fires up to recharge the battery. Most hybrids are decent city drivers. The engine is off for rush hour where stop and go is common. Once on the highway the ICE takes over where its most efficient between 30-90km/h.
This is not the way most hybrids work. Ford, honda and toyota vehicles have power-split or series parallel where the power delivery is some percent electric/gas. In other words most hybrid cars can drive 0 miles on electric only and require some combination of gas and electric power.
The series hybrid that you describe is available in the chevy volt and an option on the bmw i3 series. The electric only range of these is 53 (volt) and 81 (i3) miles. These are very much "mostly electric" cars.
Most hybrids, in split/parallel mode, are essentially ICE cars, but with significantly improved gas mileage. This significant improvement in gas mileage (going from ~30 mpg to ~50 mpg) is a good reason to include them, but it does mean a half-assed parallel battery power system could be used to game the system.
There should probably be some minimum torque delivery or percent power required.
I've only ridden in Priuses. They are popular with Parisian taxi drivers. Creeping along at 15-30kph in rush hour traffic the engines rarely came on. It might be different for other hybrids but the Priuses of that vintage (I know the tech gets better each year) can definitely move, for short distances, on battery alone.
Definitely agree that hybrids should have some sort of baseline of electric locomotion.
The idea behind subsidizing electric cars is to compensate for their higher prices and subsequently increase consumer demand. Including hybrids would undermine that, especially given the relatively low number of options available (less so at under the 60.000€ cap) today.
But the German government's goal is to replace inefficient ICE automobiles with more efficient alternatives and not just sell more electric cars. Hybrids, though less desirable than fully electric cars, are still a significant improvement. They're plentiful, available in a number of different models across multiple price points, and available today rather than a few years down the line.
From that perspective, including hybrids makes perfect sense.
Eh... not really. Doing that is actually not very efficient because of all the losses you incur going from AC to DC, into the battery, then out of the battery, back to AC and into the motor. The Honda Accord Hybrid, Mitsubishi Outlander and BMW I3 do something like what you describe, but they take the energy straight out of the generator, which still has some losses, but is made up for by the lack of a multi-speed transmission. None of those cars will charge the battery past a bare minimum at stop lights.
Hybrid cars should either have their own maximum limit (after that limit the subsidy ends) or every manufacture should have their own limit (like it is in the US, the first 200k electric cars get the $7,500 off for every manucature). This would make sure that 90% of those cars are not hybrids that can barely drive 10miles on electric and people have a chance to get the subsidy when the bolt and tesla model 3 are available (I think the model 3 will not be available without reservation before the end of 2019). Currently, there are no purely electric cars that don't suck (the Nissan Leaf has a range of 100miles and looks kind of funny and is incredible expensive for what it has to offer; the model S/X are excluded from the subsidy because they are considered luxury cars).