Chevy Volt – 40 miles to the charge?
Feb 18th, 2009 by gmoran
Interesting release this morning by the Associated Press… General Motors says that the current developmental model of the much awaited Chevy Volt is getting 40 miles for a single charge, thanks to a newly designed low-rolling resistance tire developed by Goodyear and a more efficient Bose sound system. After the 40 miles, a small internal combustion engine will power the generator to keep the Chevy Volt going. They’re still quoting the price in the $30,000 – $40,000 range. Let’s say you buy a Volt at $35,000. You drive 12,000 miles per year. You have to make a lot of trips to the corner store or commute not much more than 10 or 15 miles each day not to use the backup generator. Let’s also say that gas stays at around $2 a gallon for the next 5 years which it won’t but let’s just say it does. If you had a cheaper hybrid in the $25,000 range and got 30 miles to the gallon, you’d spend about $800 per year on 400 gallons of gas. That’s $4,000 for gas over 5 years. That may bring you to around the $30,000 range because we know gas will go up somewhat. You will save about $5,000 over 5 years not worrying about whether you have run out of charge and whether you’re generator will run out of fuel. Seems we have a long way to go toward energy independence – but at least we’re on the way!