{"id":12423,"date":"2023-08-02T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-08-02T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pditechnologies.com\/?p=12423"},"modified":"2024-01-02T13:01:10","modified_gmt":"2024-01-02T18:01:10","slug":"why-millennial-didnt-buy-ev","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pditechnologies.com\/blog\/why-millennial-didnt-buy-ev\/","title":{"rendered":"Confessions of a Millennial: I Bought a New Car, and It’s Not an EV"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It was March 2019. The sun was shining, the average person had never heard of the difference between a surgical and N95 mask (or FFP-2 masks, as we call them in Germany), and I was working in a regular business office like most professional workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe need to get you your own car,\u201d a message on my phone read. It was my significant other, who was going to start working from home three days a week, and whose car I would be driving to work on those days. Because we live outside a city, having only one car available is a big inconvenience. Thus, I needed to find a new car.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To EV or not to EV?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Yes, that was my question. So, what exactly was I looking for in a new car? It had to reliably and economically get me to the office and back on weekdays\u2014and I\u2019d need it to run errands and buy groceries on the weekends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s it. No long holiday trips without a speed limit on the Autobahn, no big IKEA hauls. Those trips would be covered by the \u201cKombi,\u201d the German word for an estate car. Sounds like the ideal scenario for an EV, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately, an EV just wasn\u2019t a viable option for me in 2019, and to the extent of my knowledge, it still isn\u2019t a great option for me in 2023. But maybe it will be by 2035 (the year when the EU will mandate zero CO2<\/sub> emissions for all new vehicles).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The price is (not yet) right<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Like Bethany Allee says<\/a>, EVs are part of a still-maturing industry, so prices will hopefully decrease over time. We\u2019ve even seen EV prices dropping<\/a> on numerous models recently, so there\u2019s hope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the price of a new EV was and still is a bit out of my comfort zone. The secondhand market for EVs was practically non-existent in Germany before the pandemic, and according to the Technical University of Munich<\/a>, an EV\u2019s battery longevity is influenced by driver behavior. So, I would think twice before risking paying for the \u201csins\u201d of a previous owner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond the cost, my other primary concern about EVs is how and where to charge the battery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Charging challenges at home<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For me and the rest of the 58% of households in Germany that don\u2019t own the place they live in<\/a>, home-based EV charging is not likely an option. Wall boxes are no longer being subsidized, and the cost to connect to and disconnect from the building\u2019s electrical network is in most cases yours and irretrievable. And, depending on each building\u2019s infrastructure, you might not be able to take your wall box and install it in your next residence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Charging challenges with public infrastructure<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Although there are significantly more charging points than there were in 2019\u2014thanks in part to ambitious plans from BP<\/a> and TotalEnergies<\/a> for investing in Germany\u2019s charging infrastructure, and it will only get better after the EU\u2019s mandate for more chargers<\/a>\u2014I still have concerns about public charging.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the risk of sounding overly demanding, here are my primary issues:<\/p>\n\n\n\n