Author Archives: lukefrugalev

Currently solar economics are driven by “net-metering” policies. Briefly, you are allowed to deduct generated electrons from your power bill. Thus, depending on your usage, there is a limit to how much solar you can get paid for generating. Some say that is fair, as sometimes excess electrons cause more problems on the grid. Nevertheless,Continue reading “Marginal solar?”

February of last year, I installed an energy monitor in my electrical panel. Briefly, these devices can tell you how much electricity each of your appliances at any time. We find that our heat-pump is the king, by some margin. Next comes the car charger, followed by the hot water tank. The largest breaker inContinue reading “A year of energy monitoring”

Mr. Trump has made much fuss over the US’s energy purchases from other countries. The US imports most if not all, of the Alberta Oil sands production. Mostly, as its cheaper than what the US themselves produce, and current US refineries, particularly in the mid-west, are ill suited to drink the premium juice coming outContinue reading “Mr. Trump’s gas price dilemma”

In the summer of 2024, some Nissan dealerships in Colorado found a way to leverage the state’s generous incentives to come up with a very cheap lease deal. Briefly, you could lease a brand new Nissan LEAF for as little as $20 (US) a month, with $2500 (US) (source). This caused a lot of stirContinue reading “Is there a market for a cheap EV?”

Kempower is a vendor of DC fast charging stations that are in use all over the world. It mostly operates in Europe, but its hardware has reached our shores. Their charger has some advantages when siting large charging-parks with many stalls. While travelling in Europe I recently visited a Kempower charging station, overall it workedContinue reading “Using a Kempower fast charger”

As keen readers of this blog might have noticed, I drive a 2018 Nissan Leaf, which cannot plug into the Super-Charging network (although a complex adapter arrangement might make it happen source), however I recently did a road-trip in the Toyota BZ4X, with its CCS plug, can under certain circumstances. With a non-Tesla, you needContinue reading “Using the Tesla supercharging network”

Recently I rented an EV from Hertz, the experience was fairly pleasant, but lets peer into my receipts, and see what we can surmise about the economics. From the renter’s perspective, is EV the better deal? As discussed, fuelling costs can be quite a bit cheaper with an EV (source). Assuming you can get anContinue reading “Is EV the cheaper greener rental?”

Much has been discussed on unfair competition from Chinese automakers, in particular, when it comes to Chinese EVs. The discussion always struck me as strange for several reasons: First, as we shall see, there really are no cheap EV’s, Chinese or otherwise, or at least ones priced at parity with internal combustion cars in otherContinue reading “Tarrifs?”

A buddy of mine asked me what the break even point is between gas and EV? This topic has come up before, I did respond that he might have a hard time filling up for a $2 (source), like I do every night. Also, a comparison between the Nissan Leaf and the Nissan Versa (source),Continue reading “Break even point, EV vs Gas?”

Recently, I rented a Kia-Niro EV on my Tremblant run. Naturally, the teenagers were most pleased that they could get to Tremblant faster. Personally, given the time it took to pick it up, return it, and of course the somewhat rushed experience of loading and unloading, its a tie time-wise for me. But had weContinue reading “Longer road trips?”