Battery swapping is a technology that could solve one key barrier for EV adoption: consumers’ range anxiety and the long waiting time for battery charging. Wouldn’t you feel more assured on a weekend trip if you knew you could stop at a swap station and replace depleted battery packs with fully charged ones in five minutes? But this isn’t easy to do, as Tesla and Better Place’s past failures. In China, however, battery swapping has been a reality for a couple of years. How did Chinese companies like Nio make it work with 2,300 swapping stations nationwide? What can companies outside China learn from the Chinese experience?
When 52% of all trips made are less than 3 miles and less than 2% are over fifty miles, I don’t think battery swapping is something any individual needs on a regular basis.
I could get on board if manufacturers were making $10,000 sub 50 mile vehicles that were compatible with a swap station so you could switch to a larger battery for the weekend. This would have to be a standard adopted by all however, and even before that, they’d have to make small cars. Which they won’t, because we all know they are too busy making trucks and SUVs.
hear hear for small cars
PS: and walkable/cyclable cities
Do people even need a car for a 3 miles trip? You can cover that on a bike in 15-20 mins at a chill pace… Also, 28% of trips are less than a mile? People can’t walk a mile?
Not speaking for other places, but America is not made for bikes or pedestrians. It is actively hostile to them in the best cases, and filled with explicit murderous intent in others.
Drivers will actually, actively, try to hit you for daring to take to the roads. And you have to take the road because we have sparse or missing pedestrian sidewalks.
I wouldn’t wish biking 3 miles in most American cities on anyone used to a properly designed nation.
Sadly, you are speaking for a great many places. I’ve cycled in most of the countries I’ve visited and it can be relatively dangerous.
If people want to see how to integrate a public transport network with a cycle path network, places like Netherlands and Denmark are leading the way.
Over here in the UK we have one of the most regressive attitudes to sustainable transport in Europe. Our trains don’t work and cycling is barely tolerated.
This is just anecdotal, but as someone who both drives and cycles in the UK, I’d say it’s city dependent. I live in Leeds, go to uni in Leeds and work in Huddersfield. I cycle to uni, cycle to the train station and drive to work (when I can’t get a train for whatever reason). Leeds is getting there, albeit slowly but it’s getting alot better for cyclists. I like the electric bicycle scheme so I can cycle to the station and just leave the bike there. although it shouldn’t be more expensive than getting a bus.
Would be good for hauling large objects
I doubt the average person needs to do that daily over such a short distance.
Not everyone is child free and lives where it doesn’t rain
The Dutch do it… Rain or shine (mostly rain with crazy wind) with their cargo/kid bikes.
they make $10k ev’s with 250 mile ranges that are for sale everywhere except the united states & canada. you can get them in australia or western europe for a 50-75%-ish tariff depending on which country you’re in…