Re: China to amend rules to promote hybrid car sales Excellent move. last year I kept a log of my daily usage for 3 months and have realized that 15 days a month my usage is between 70 and 100 km, 4 or 5 days it is below 50 km, another 4 or 5 days when I'm on city outskirts it is between 100 and 200 km but the 4 or 5 days I go out of Pune it can be anything between 350 and 700 km.
If I start using a plug in Hybrid with 100 km battery only range and overnight charging, and also use the rare few public charging points, my engine will actually be used average of only 10 days in a month.
Assume a one day Bombay trip in this hypothetical situation.
I start from Pune with a fully charged battery, it drops to about 40% at Lonavala, but regenerative braking on the decent brings it back to 65%, suppose in the future the parking lot at the express malls have payed metered charging facility, I can have breakfast there and re-start with say 85% charge, I may probably reach the Phoenix mall Kurla parking with the battery about to run out, or with about 20 min of engine use. (Until charging facility at the express mall starts I may reach the end of exp way and need the engine between Panvel and Vashi.)
Return back may give me a similar situation with over 50% on the journey only on battery.
The maximum same day return trips I regularly do is for my Meetings in Belgaon which is a 670 km day for me. Even here if I get a charging facility at a hotel in Karad where I can have my breakfast and dinner break, as well as the factory where I'm having the meeting in, even with a 100km range, over 300 km of the journey is possible in electric mode.
Rahul |