What do they do? (you idiot) THEY RUN ALL DAY ON A FEW CENTS [sic] WORTH OF ELECTRICITY!
I'm trying to decide if you're delusional, just plain ignorant, or indulging in some rather extreme hyperbole, here.
At some point, I happened to take a close look at a charging station, and took note of what the price was per KWH. I don't recall the number, but I did calculate at the time, that it was equivalent to paying about $10/gallon for gasoline. I should be able to calculate back from there. I know that gasoline has about 33.7 KHW of energy per gallon. $10 for a gallon of gasoline would equate to 10Ć·33.7=29.673ā¦ call it about 30Ā¢ per KWH. That sounds about right.
Now, if we can assume that an electric car is three times as efficient as one using an internal combustion engine (which I have to say, is a generous assumption), then the cost per mile ought to be about comparable to running a conventional car that is burning gasoline at about $3.33 per gallon.
Of course, that charging station that I saw is probably costing a premium, compared to what you'd pay for electricity to your home from your utility, so you could probably charge your car more cheaply at home than at a charging station.
But still, if you're buying electricity from a utility at any kind of normal rates, you are most certainly not going to run an electric car all day for only a few cents' worth of electricity, any more than you're going to be running a conventional car all day for only a few cents' worth of gasoline.
Just as an aside,
here's what my own utility charges me for electricity. The 30Ā¢/KWH from a charging station is comparable to the very highest rate from SMUD, in peak summertime hours. It's possible, I suppose, that the charging station that I observed may charge different rates at different times, according to what SMUD is charging the operator of that station. I only ever looked at its stated rate one time. It's probably meant to make a profit for its owner, who probably isn't going to sell electricity to its customers ever, without charging enough above whatever SMUD is charging him at the time for that electricity to make a reasonable profit.
And the vast majority of Tesla/EV owners CHARGE UP AT HOME, when necessary, so they NEVER have to wait in line. And do you honestly think that the shortage of charging stations will persist? They will PROLIFERATE until the wait times will be down to nothing in five years.
Unless there's a huge advance in the ability to quickly charge batteries, the wait time, once you get to a charger, will still remain much longer than the wait time while refueling a conventional automobile.
In order for the wait time in line to get to a charger to be comparable to that to get to a gasoline pump, the ratio of chargers to electric cars will have to be much greater than the ratio of gas pumps to gasoline-powered cars.
