Meet Rubee!
So BIG news!!!
After my 2011 Hyundai Santa Fe (170K miles!) died on an off ramp of the highway <when I was showing homes!!>, I texted my electric car loving friends & said HELP ME FIND AN ELECTRIC CAR PLEASE!!! & they delivered.
Within an hour I was test driving a 2017 Chevy Bolt EV that had just come off a lease at Paddock Chevrolet.
I was blown away…. It feels like you are driving a spaceship! SO quiet & smooth with incredible acceleration & response.
SO… with the help of my friends, Rubee has landed!
I AM SMITTEN!
Just know, I am not a car girl by any means-BUT I am passionate about the health of our planet & climate change is REAL….Rubee, when she is charged at my home, WILL BE POWERED BY THE SUN, because our electricity comes from Community Solar.
Click here to get more info on how you too can get your electricity from the sun, without the investment of installing panels on your roof)
I feel so good about this change. LOTS to learn. Will have to crack the code on charging stations & how to road trip to see our kids, both 6 hours away. I will share what I learn with you.
Please share what you know & ask me questions!
Much more to come, but WELCOME RUBEE!!!!!
Some abbreviations I had to decipher:
EV- Electric Vehicle
ICE- Internal Combustion Engine
SOC- State of charge
DCFC- DC Fast Charge
The 300 Club- Driving 300 miles or more since last full charge
The charging cable is called an EVSE (Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment)
Fun Facts:
Check out the film- Who Killed the electric car? on Netflix! A 2006 documentary film that explores the creation, limited commercialization, & subsequent destruction of the battery electric vehicle in the US, specifically the General Motors EV1 of the mid-1990s. It tells the story of why electric cars were never even given a chance. I learned a lot about how much the auto industry is dictated by the oil companies. Disheartening to think how we much carbon we could have saved from our environment if the electric car had been marketed properly & widely enjoyed.
The EPA estimates it will cost $550. to drive 15,000 miles. (compared to Toyota Prius which will cost you $800, & a gas powered car of similar size & shape will cost $1450-$1550.)
The Chevy Bolt gets 117 MPGe (miles per Gallon equivalent)!
Jan 2, Day 2
<1st road trip in Rubee>
Drove Rubee, my EV (Electric Vehicle) instead of driving Stephen’s car, an ICE (internal combustion engine), 220+ miles to & from Pittsford, NY for a day out.
By choosing to take the all electric car, we saved about $25. in gas & prevented over 75,000 grams of CO2e (Shorthand for “carbon dioxide equivalent,” CO2e is a standard unit for measuring all of a vehicle’s greenhouse gas emissions. A higher number of CO2e emissions = more global warming pollution.)
Lessons Learned-
You get much better range/mileage on back roads at low speed vs. high speed on the thruway. Starting at 90% SOC (State of Charge), on the way there we took back roads arriving with a fair amount of SOC, 50%.
We took advantage of the public parking FREE charge for several hours while we explored the area & ate yummy crepes, topping off the SOC at 70%.
Home bound thruway driving at 70 MPH & periodically turning on the heat quickly depleted our SOC to 35% in about half the distance home.
Discovered higher speeds & using the heat quickly uses up your charge!
I panicked a bit & worried we may not have enough charge, so we stopped for a quick 15 minute charge stop 1/2 hour from home to be sure we had juice enough to make it home (we did!)
My 1st range anxiety.
Jan 4, Day 4
<Charged Rubee 20 miles for free>
Charged Rubee, my electric car, for free with Town of Aurora municipal charging station while I walked the 2 doxies for 2.75 miles in 1 hour, which gave me 6.6 kW of charge. At my current winter average of 3.7 mile/kWh, that gave me almost 20-25 miles of charge! (A free ride to Buffalo!)
When more people utilize the free municipal chargers at Town Halls, public parking & State parks, the greater the incentive for municipalities & companies to provide more charging locations to the public, expanding the EV charging infrastructure. In turn, this will encourage more consumers to drive EVs!
Feb 27, Day 58
<Learned how to drive my electric car more efficiently>
The amazing thing about driving an electric car is that it has made me so much more aware of how my driving habits affect my range & how many miles per kWh I am getting.
Speed, acceleration, braking, climate control, the outside temperature, extra passengers, & hilly terrain all affect your range!
There are several ways to get feedback on my driving. On an info screen with a graph it shows how many miles/kWh I am driving in 5 mile increments & my average over the last 50 miles. I have to say once I learned this, I obsess about this way too much & challenge myself to drive better & keep my miles/kWh above the red average line!
Also, on the dash by the GOM-(Guess O’ Meter-the car’s best estimate of the maximum, average & minimum mileage you can expect with current charge) there are indicators that show if I can expect the towards the high or low end of the range.
I try to get the most range I can.
Makes me drive a bit like a grandma, but I love saving energy!
March 5, Day 63
<Calculated carbon footprint of an electric car (EV) vs. gas powered car (ICE)>
Electric cars tend to produce less carbon pollution than gas-powered ones—but just how much less? I was curious how much more CO2e my 2011 Hyundai Santa Fe gas guzzler emitted vs. my 2017 all electric Chevy Bolt, Rubee. There are several calculators you can utilize to determine the carbon footprint of your car.
THIS ONE tells you how clean your electric vehicle is & compares it to gasoline only cars, plug in hybrid electric & battery electric cars. Enter your ZIP code below to see how different types of vehicles stack up in your area. Entering a make, model, & year will narrow results to a specific EV model.
+Because I charge my car 99% of the time from home where we have Common Energy Solar which offsets our electric power with solar power, my car is super clean & actually has even less impact than what the calculator estimates!
March 6, Day 64
<Determined my electric car’s yearly carbon footprint vs. my old gas guzzler>
Another calculator can compare two cars; my old 4 wheel drive 2011 Hyundai Santa Fe to my 2017 all electric Chevy Bolt.
I love this one because it spells out the yearly impact of each in lbs of CO2e & also the equivalent to planting what number of trees.
The Chevy Bolt wins by a lot.
+Because I charge my car 99% of the time from home where we have Common Energy Solar which offsets our electric power with solar power, my car is super clean & actually has even less impact than what the calculator estimates! fference.