[Omkar]

EVs have seen wide acceptance in India over the past few years from the people as well as the government. Nirmala Sitharaman, Minister of Finance & Corporate Affairs in her interim budget speech stated that the government will strengthen and expand the EV ecosystem from manufacturing to charging infrastructure (Source). The number of electric vehicles in metro cities is on the rise and we regularly see news from manufacturers hitting new sales records with their EVs.



Things aren’t all rosy though. The global EV market is also changing, and we’ve seen the graph flatten. There have been reports stating that EV sales could decline globally this year. Some automakers have even gone on to say that “EVs aren’t working” (Source). India specifically is still in the growth stage, but there are still some challenges.

High initial purchase cost

The initial purchase cost of EVs is still high compared to IC engine cars. However, as EVs are becoming more popular, the gap is reducing. Also, most importantly, with battery cell prices having softened in the recent past, manufacturers like MG and Tata have extended the benefits to the customers by reducing the prices of their cars.



Rapid devlopment

The kind of development we've seen in just 4-5 years is incredible in the EV space. Just see how much the Tata Nexon EV has developed since its launch in 2020. Not only that, we're constantly seeing more development in EV technology internationally. So, it's bound for some people to think that they'd rather wait for the next-gen EVs that would make the current lot of EVs obsolete.

Battery range

As is the case with technology, we’ve seen improvements in battery technology and packaging. The real-world range for most cars is now ~300 km which is good enough for city use and the occasional highway trip. And while that may be enough for some people, people who love doing very long trips, the ~300 km range might not be enough.



Improvement in the charging infrastructure

We’ve seen BHPians do 1,500-2,000 km road trips in EVs taking full advantage of the improved charging infrastructure. However, there have been cases where the charging station wasn't working or completely occupied, which left the travellers stranded. The charging infrastructure is still improving and is much better than it was a few years back.



Lack of options

We have been seeing a lot of EV launches, but the options are still limited. However, this might not be the case for long as manufacturers are planning on introducing a lot more cars in different segments. Maruti Suzuki will be introducing the eVX this year and Tata also has a bunch of EVs lined up. All in all, this year and next we will see a lot of EVs being launched in the Indian market.



Uncertainty regarding battery life and repair costs after 5-7 years

This is a factor that hasn’t changed much. Some manufacturers like MG have buyback options after ownership of 3 years or so. However, doubts over long-term ownership still prevail among car buyers.



Of course, there are more case-specific reasons like the unavailability of parking space for the installation of a home charger, long charging times compared to IC engines, safety concerns, etc. These reasons aside, there are a lot of benefits as well for you to buy an EV. The real question is, has your perception towards EVs changed from what it was a few years back? Would you buy an EV today? If not, why would you not buy an EV?

Note: Multiple choices allowed in the poll

[Iyencar]

I’m happy with the range we get today, happier with the prices and happiest with the subsidies and road tax situation in MH. But I’m greedy. I want to see what the fringe or non existent players like BYD, Suzuki, the Korean twins and Honda get and also the new EV models from the established players like Tata, Mahindra and MG. A really perfected small electric EV seems so so close now.

[shankar.balan]

Ive been affected by Rajaijah Juice and now clearly have EV Fever.

So Im in the process of buying the Kona. Of course the fact that they are giving it to me at a very nice price helps. Add to that the Company Lease which helps with Income Tax. Then the fact that the GST is only 5% and there is No Road Tax. Then the very reasonable running costs and the perfectly acceptable range. Add to this, the excellent Kona Owners Group with lots of experts in it.

All in all I think it is a great time to get an EV and become Electrified.

Especially a CKD which feels European in every way when compared to our Indian ones and the MG too. And is priced at an equivalent level too.
There are three people on teambhp who have been a big influence and help.
1. Cool_dube
2. EV Fan
3. GKR9900

[Samba]

There are times I cover 1000+ km in a day.
I visit remote places where electricity is not stable. There are days local home-stays use generator for electricity. Last time when I was at Kaza in January, there was no electricity for the whole three days I was there. Local petrol bunk dispensed fuel manually.

With my type of usage, at most I can consider a strong Hybrid, but not an EV as my primary car.

Being said the above, I won't mind an EV like the Comet or the Tiago for my local city usage. Small foot print, automatic transmission, fun to drive, low running cost with an on-road price of less than 10L should be good!

[vattyboy]

Cars 24 guys in my city told me that they don't buy EVs when I got my Compass evaluated by them recently, they told me that there is very little demand for EVs in the used car market, which means the resale value of EVs is low and on top of that there is the uncertainty of battery life, reliability and repair costs in the long term.

Also, if I buy an EV then I will pay a couple of lakhs more than its ICE counterpart. Okay, additional money spent I will recover in a couple of years but again down the line I will get low resale value and in that, I will lose some money. So overall money spent will equal out with its ICE counterpart.

But yes if the person loves Crazy acceleration and contributes to saving Environmental pollution then EVs are the best bet

[ottocycle]

Great thread. Actually what I am looking for is an EV with below

• ~400km of real life highway range
• Ventilated Seats with all modern safety features like ADAS
• And on-road price (in Telangana) of not more than 35Lakhs
• My wife has added one more constraint - a 7 seater on top of above

I have found none of the EVs satisfying above criteria as of now. Hoping that late 2024 and early 2025 improves the situation.

[SmartCat]

I start getting anxious when my smartphone battery falls below 35%. I'll probably have a debilitating panic attack if that happens to my EV.

[Axe77]

Originally Posted by SmartCat

I start getting anxious when my smartphone battery falls below 35%. I'll probably have a debilitating panic attack if that happens to my EV.

Hahaha - my sentiment exactly.

On the topic at hand, I’m simply not convinced about EVs yet. At this point, battery tech continues to evolve far too quickly and I fear that it will be a depreciation disaster whatever EV one buys today.

My sense at this point too is that even if I buy a car 3 - 4 years from now, I will likely veer to a strong hybrid or turbo petrol more than an EV. If I do buy an EV, it will likely have to be at such a price point where I don’t mind owning it for 5 - 8 years and at the end of that period, mentally I should be willing to write off the entire purchase amount (i.e. get whatever I get at the end of it, which could even be zero). I doubt I’d want to buy one unless it has a minimum real world range of 500 kms and comes within a 25L price point (if I’m to be willing to write it off completely).

Simply put and as an example, if I had to plonk cash on a second car today, I think I’d much rather buy a Camry / Hycross strong hybrid as a 10 - 15 year purchase rather than an MG ZS EV / Ioniq EV as a 6 - 8 year purchase. Of course the sophistication and performance of the EVs will continue to play on the mind but the ownership longevity and practicality of the strong hybrid will be the counter pull.

[psbali]

EVs as a use case can only be successful if there is AC fast charging at home. Companies discourage DC fast charging every other day and the only option of slow charging remains.


It is very difficult to get a 11Kw power supply at home for 7.4 kw ac fast charging. The society which has a better power suppply load doesnt want to invest in charging infra.

So EVs are left with the option of slow charge at 3.3 kw. Which is alright for cars with battery lower than 30 kw but not for cars with 40kw and above.

I have a nexon prime and initially it was all rosy but now the charger just over heats within few minutes and stops charging. We have to constantly monitor every few mins. All four lights are on with bottom yellow and red light blinking.

At my shop I point a fan at the plug while charging but at my dad's place where the tata charging box has been installed there is no such provision. Both the places have no earthing issues as well.

A lot of people do not realise that they will have to mostly charge at 3.3 kw. Over a long term it is more of a hassle.

The only benifit from EVs are the auto gearbox like drive. I was tempted to pick up Punch or New Nexon for myself as mostly my dad drives the EV but I have dropped the plan. I cant spend hours monitoring if the car is charging properly.

[Mystic]

I voted other.

I am not sure why the safety option is not in the list. I agree nothing is safe on Indian roads but the probability of an electric vehicle getting self destructed and burnt is more.

The battery technology is not developing at the same rate as expected. I am waiting for a revolutionary path breaking find in battery technology and we are no where near it as of now. I prefer to wait. I am sad to see photos showing the acres and acres of grave yards of EV vehicles in China. Why waste limited resources in our generation and leaving nothing to posterity to enjoy automobiles.

I saw a documentary on Le Mans race in Amazon prime and the reason for the birth of that race exactly 100 years back is to show the world that IC engines are more reliable than horse drawn carriages. I want another similar circuit to come and tell the world that electric vehicles are more reliable than IC engines.

[Rajeevraj]

Pretty much checked all options. They are still expensive, choices are limited, range for me is a concern. I even like to avoid filling petrol in the middle of a trip. My Vento with its close to 60 liter tank capacity takes me 500+ km easily before I need to refuel. I would like to see EVs comfortably hit that range while driving at allowed speed limits.

Home charging infra is still a problem especially in apartments with the rules and approach not stabilized yet. While on road charging infra is expanding rapidly, it is still limited and with the charging speeds of EVs, my sense is that it will become a bottleneck as EV adoption scales.

Keeping all that aside. One major niche reason for me. Where are EV Sedans? My first choice is always a sedan. There seems to be one fantastic but expensive option coming which is the BYD Seal which seems to address 2-3 of the key concerns.

I would also prefer a plug in hybrid which would give the best of both worlds. Not sure why there is not enough focus on that.

Finally all this is assuming a single car garage. If it is a 2nd City run about, one can compromise on some of these issues.

[Kosfactor]

It's an old technology brought back from the dead due to anxiety (Or guilt having plundered the earth) of certain influential set of people towards climate change, that somehow their high performance 0-100 in 2 secs EV will cure the earth.

In my younger years I used to create various types of toys with electric motors salvaged from toys that I used to take apart in the first place (hmm). The biggest problem was powering them with those heavy batteries which did not last all that long. Rechargeable batteries weren't great either plus you have to charge the damn thing, a 9V battery was like having kryptonite, exotic stuff.

The situation with EV is more or less the same, they are far too heavy and cannot hold much charge for my use.

I need vehicles that can do interstate trips with only fuel breaks at the maximum possible speed the roads would allow, so even with a diesel returning hardly 9-10 kmpl, I have a decent range with ~ 60L tank on all our vehicles.

In my observation most car owners in the urban areas can switch to EVs without any disadvantages that EVs have because they hardly ever leave town or use the vehicles as much.

[ghost-was-here]

I love long road trips, emphasis on long. Until public chargers become abundant like petrol bunks, or real world battery range crosses 1000kms i don't see myself putting money down for an EV.

Its not like other factors listed in the poll don't bother me, but i can overlook them if battery range or charging infra improves. All because i have had the opportunity to drive a few EVs and boy am I a convert

Originally Posted by Kosfactor

It's an old technology brought back from the dead due to anxiety...
... I need vehicles that can do interstate trips with only fuel breaks at the maximum possible speed the roads would allow, so even with a diesel returning hardly 9-10 kmpl, I have a decent range with ~ 60L tank on all our vehicles...

I totally agree with your first point. Add to that, a fuel stop will take 5 minutes at most. All pumps occupied! no worries wait another 2-3 minutes. Try that on a charging station with 4 points, out of which only 2 works and are occupied for next hour.

[GTO]

I voted for "need more options", "love my petrol & diesel cars" and "other".

Do note that I absolutely love the current breed of EVs. But I'm waiting for more fast EVs to come, like the EV6 & BYD Seal. Am also waiting for big EV SUVs as we're starting to feel the need for a large family SUV (like the stunning Kia EV9).

But even then, it'll be a tough pick between EV & ICE. As an example, I'd be pretty darn confused shopping between a Kia EV9 and a pre-worshipped GLS, X5 / X7 or Cayenne.

[antz.bin]

For local city use or for the <250km trip to my folks, an EV is a non-issue. That covers 75% of my car usage. Where the uncertainty begins is on inter-state trips which is the remaining 25% of my usage.

To check what EV I could potentially get in the future, I was doing an exercise on Plugshare app a few days back to check out how many stops I would need to do to do some typical road trips from Pune.

My first typical trip was that I should be able to reach anywhere in Goa on a 1 breakfast+ charging stop strategy so I can top up around lunch time when I am inside the state. Because this is usually how I would do a Pune-Goa drive on an ICE car. We could have had more stops but the chargers on route are too slow so this is the fastest way to do it.

I also tried to extrapolate this on other inter-state trips that I have done. And turns out, a car with a 60kwh/400km highway range battery is my sweet spot. More the merrier but I wouldn't make the switch on a smaller battery considering long term usage.

The only challenges to this were:

1. The only cars that can do this right now are prohibitively expensive. The cheapest one being the BYD Atto3. It seems that Nexon EV is physically maxed out at 40 KWh so it would be better if there are were more options offering 60KWh battery packs in the Creta segment at least.

2. There is no dearth of chargers around on most routes I checked but these chargers are pretty slow. For a 1 stop strategy, the most ubiquitous chargers were just 30kw. To top up a 60kwh battery from 25% to 80% at 30kw would end up taking over an hour! That's too long for a breakfast stop. Long stops break momentum and hinder progress on the road. The same thing on a 60kw charger would take just about 33-35 min. Just enough time to enjoy your breakfast and get on your way.

So I Voted for:
1. They're fast developing; I prefer to wait for the next generation of EVs - cars like the MG4 and Dolphin should help move the game forward on this one. Hope Tata can offer truly competitive pure EVs on par with the Chinese. I have low expectations from the Curvv. Sierra maybe.

2. Other (please specify in your post) - Dearth of *FAST* DC chargers. 60kw chargers are few and far between and inside cities, not on the highway and 120-150kw chargers are a rarity. 30Kw ones are the most ubiquitous but are too slow for the pace I desire. Current Tata EVs are capped at 30kw charging speeds so the most sold EVs in India will only clog up the faster chargers.

While it is possible to do road trips with ease with the infra that is available right now, I wouldn't want to get stuck on that pace for road trips well into the future. Any EV cheaper than the ZS EV currently sold in India is constrained to a slower highway pace for the rest of its usable life. Any ICE car can manage a much much faster pace on the road for now. Don't buy an EV that isn't capable of taking advantage when the charging infra does improve. The Tatas can't.