In 15 years / 300,000 miles when the battery might need replacement, the pack (not cell) price for batteries will probably be around $50/kWh, or $5,000 for 100 kWh.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/average-battery-cell-pric...

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robomartin a day ago | parent [-]

You must not be married. That argument would last approximately two city blocks and then I'd have to shut up. She is not unintelligent, BTW, she is a doctor, not an engineer. The EV car industry has probably done a horrible job in mitigating this fear.

I get the "batteries will get cheaper" argument. If you read my comment, I said that that a guaranteed $5K battery replacement would likely convince loads of people, including my wife. Today, nobody will issue that guarantee. Today it is a lottery with a $25K hit if you have a losing ticket.

Nobody wants to buy a vehicle for tens of thousands of dollars and have a $25K surprise a couple of years later. With an conventional vehicle you would have to to launch it off a cliff to have to spend $25K in repairs. That's the problem.

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floxy 14 hours ago | parent | next [-]

https://coltura.org/electric-car-battery-life/

I have been married for more than 20 year, have 4 children (3 teen-aged drivers), and two electric vehicles. I paid less than $25,000 out-the-door (including sales tax, etc.) for my brand new 2025 SV+ Nissan Leaf. Where I live in Washington state, gas is >$4/gal and electricity is less than $0.08/kWh. I get better than 4 miles/kWh. After 250,000 miles, a vehicle averaging 40 miles/gallon will have spent $25,000 in gasoline (at $4/gal). With my electric rates, electric "fuel" costs for the same 250,000 miles will be $5,000. So a $20,000 difference in fuel costs.

Looks like it is ~$8k for a 62 kWh Nissan Leaf battery:

https://vivnevs.com/products/62kwh-nissan-leaf-battery-pack-...

Every EV sold in the U.S. gets a federally mandated transferable battery warranty of 8 years/100,000 miles. Buying new or very lightly used and getting rid of it before the warranty expires is an option for those with infant-mortality battery anxiety. We are not in the early adopter phase with EVs anymore, so it is less of risky-new-thing-that-doesn't-pan-out. It is OK to be a late adopter. But it is a much nicer of an experience. And no oil-changes or going to the gas station (I wouldn't recommend getting an EV if you can't charge overnight at home). Have you ever test driven an EV? EVs pretty much sell themselves, once you get behind the wheel.

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rasz 12 hours ago | parent [-]

Good news is you stumbled on first Leaf model with actually actively thermally managed battery so at least in theory if Nissan didnt screw anything your battery wont degrade like older 1 and 2 gens.

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floxy 11 hours ago | parent [-]

2025 model year is still Gen 2 with the passively cooled battery and CHAdeMO.

	▲	rasz 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Oh lol what a Nissan shitshow :( The proper fixed tech was "unveiled" in 2025 not released.

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dalyons a day ago | parent | prev [-]

They don’t randomly die. They degrade slowly and predictably. Your lottery analogy is misguided.