2100 miles/3380 kilometres trip on an EV and Charging as a Service (CaaS) — A Perspective

It's 2024's second weekend and I am writing this to share my experience of a recently completed 2100-mile road trip on an #Electric vehicle on the East Coast of the United States which has been fun-filled, exciting, and bestowed me with many enlightenments alongside the glimpses into rich history, arts, cultural melting pots, and cities of global west. Between 22-30 December 2023, this was by far my 5th longest road trip beyond the other four lengthiest ones in the #Indian subcontinent (above 2200 miles).

From the below illustration, the one on the left is the trip that I have just completed at 246 wh/mile at an average temperature of around 10 °C or 50 °F which needed heating.

Yes, that's the new way for #mileage i.e. watt-hour/mile and we will get used to it like we do for #ICE (Internal Combustion Engines) 20-30 miles/gallon. In this article, I am going to provide some fascinating insights on why, how, and what of EV road trips and the experience of one such vehicle.

2100 miles road trip on an #AWD (All Wheel Drive) EV costs you 4.5 hrs. of charging time at superchargers and is ~22% cheaper (fuel/charging cost) in winter than Gas cars like Toyota AWD Rav4 which will give a mileage of ~27-30 miles/gallon in winters and comes with 14.3 gallons capacity where you spend ~2 hrs. time of refueling and breaks (5-6 break each of 15-20 min)***

Now one would say that my breaks at the #Gas station are just 10 min and the mileage of the other car that I am using is better and I don't disagree. There are many variables and I have used Toyota's most common AWD SUV in the western hemisphere in 2023 for minor user comparison.

***These all are my personal experience and standard calculations which I just did while writing this article (EVs like Tesla provide all track of charging and stats). Also, I drove around at 36-39 PSI however, (due to temperature variations), Tesla recommends 42 PSI. Keeping at 42 PSI would have improved cost by 5% at least. I validated some of these and took some screenshots on the way to ensure that the stats on the computer and road matched. I never bothered about all of these as I was fully committed to my trip and its experiences with my long-term travel partner with whom, I have been on road trips crossing 100,000 #kilometres since 2016. It took me two #weekends to write as the first two weeks were packed with getting back to the office also, I wanted to converge and refine all data, and invoices and do some MS Excel validations before writing it up. I have done a decent homework to make it easy to understand; the experience and cost of driving and would be happy to answer any questions.

Trip Experience: Had the opportunity to drive through New York's streets when they were at their best, tunnels and sea bridges connecting New Jersey with New York, #Washington's central areas, monuments, and some of the finest arts, culture, and science museums. Was mesmerized by the details of the Smithsonian Institution and its collections of gems, geology, arts, and artifacts. Spent time taking a historic tour in the morning and by Christmas lights in the evening among the streets of Washington and New York while appreciating the grand scheme of cities built by immigrants and people across the globe. Drove through some of the fertile and vast planes of the eastern coast. Saw the second-largest Hindu temple in New Jersey (BAPS - Akshardham) and a grand display of #arts, #architecture, and #culture.

Breaks: I took a break every 170-200 miles and spent ~20 minutes in each charging session which was auto-planned by Tesla with some stretches, bathroom breaks and then snacks and home theatre experience on the TESLA screen.

Podcasts that I tuned to were from #HBR (some leadership, design and engineering talks) and some of Joe Rogan, Neil De Grass, and Elon Musk. Music I listened to ranged from country music, jazz, and hip-hop to Bollywood mashups, and MTV unplugged. Using YouTube music made the experience more seamless (Tesla has these inbuilt- Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, Apple carplay, etc.).

This is all while 60-70% of my road trip was on Auto-pilot i.e. I had to only keep my hands on wheels and just watch the scenery, talk to my partner and enjoy some snacks and podcasts. The degree of freedom and autonomy is impeccable, and you won't feel the best of it if you don't drive it regularly. This is just like you won't get the hang of Android if you are an iPhone user or vice versa. You surely don't rent iPhones or other Android phones and then give a user feedback. You have to use it daily to arrive at the actual measure of experience.

No wonder one of the last decade's brilliant engineering and marketing initiatives has come to fruition and solved a "Chicken and Egg" problem of manufacturing and adoption i.e.

"Should we build a Supercharging network first, or focus on Manufacturing inspirational and durable Electric vehicles at Mass?"

Charging as a Service (CaaS): Today TESLA boasts 50,000+ charging stations and it is one of the major sources of recurring revenue. This is the first car manufacturing company to solve both end-of-problem manufacturing and ease of adoption. And we just heard that some models are best-selling cars in 2023 (in numbers too). Charging as a Service ( #CaaS ) will be a force multiplier for Tesla in upcoming years when subsidies wane out and EV adoption doesn't need a viable gap funding (VGF) by governments and environment-friendly agencies and organisations.

Government, Policy support, and Tax subsidies are major adoption amplifiers and made it easy for the aspirational middle class to afford some of these cars. There has been some skepticism in the market recently however, I would say Tesla is still ahead of the curve with many competitors even though it needs to get back to the drawing board again in 2024 to keep up with the competition and make it further more of a common man's car.

Having driven 90000+ kilometres in my last hard-earned compact Ford SUV on Indian roads in the last 6 years (including the pandemic) and now taking road trips on TESLA I feel that TESLA still has a little catch-up to do on being a perfect Road trip car. In India where I did many 1000-mile plus (the longest being ~2400 miles - the right one in the above map illustration) trips, I can't do that yet with near-perfect ease on timings with TESLA. Any 500-mile road trip is still smooth and timely and is stress-free. The last longest trip I have done on TESLA was 1500 miles i.e. Atlanta to Miami and back and that was a very smooth experience as 50% + of the drive was on autopilot. This has improved over time and the latest experience has been the best, automated and amazing.

In North America, the critical density of Charging stations has been reached and road trips are not looking anymore a big problem anymore, as I hear from my peers across Europe and APAC.

While it's one of the safest cars with many sensors and alerts and the least stolen car in the industry it's still not free of the teething problems with services and supply chain streamlining. The next biggest investment other than superchargers would be service centers.

Here are some things I can appreciate

• Being a new driver in the US from India where people drive on opposite sides. This car has made it a cakewalk due to its sensors and autonomy.
• It lets you enjoy the experience of driving where you can look at the highway and scenery more peacefully. Somehow, I feel it is a field or road trip car.
• There is debate on the environmental impact of batteries and charging, however, I still feel it's far better than the Gas car which used to distribute a significant amount of CO2 during my trips.
• Today (2023-2024) the cost of ownership of an Electric SUV is the same as any starting-range SUV in the Western Hemisphere. This is due to Viable Gap Funding and Tax subsidies. Hope further mass adoption will ease it to the extent that it will be cheaper than most of the starting-range ICEs.
• It's one of the most stress-free cars to drive, I can recount driving Lexus, Honda CRV, Ford Ecosport and TESLA in the last few months and TESLA stands out with autopilot, ease of driving, and safety features. Below is a snapshot of 10,788 miles of drive since May 2023 where my office and home changing is subsidized.

I would like to go on another road trip and continue my journey of exploring cultures, arts, science, and geographies. While EV or not an EV what matters is a great company and a strong will and sensibility to drive carefully and leverage the tech and automation to the best of you can.

While on TESLA Y: It's a great city car and a very good road trip car! Well, this might not be the case with all EVs on the road at the moment.

These are learnings as an avid Traveller, Artist and Product Owner.

Disclaimer: These are experience and stats factoring 100's of variables and conditions of this trip and shouldn't be compared directly with any other article, or report or claims. This is an experience memoir as an user.