My friend Carlos is a brave man. One day he went from Mexico City to Laredo in an e-Tron which, you know, is totally electric. And an EV on the road, especially a long drive, takes time, planning and, well, some luck. The latter did not do him much good.
Near the end of the trip, the GPS It marked 25 miles away from the hotel where he would put the car to charge. The Audi batteries pointed to a range of 37 miles which gave him a lot of peace of mind, until the Texan weather did its thing. A cold front, including a storm, dropped the temperature to negative numbers in a matter of minutes. And the e-Tron’s battery began to lose power like a gas tank with a major leak. 35, 32, 29 miles. The nerve was growing in her mind as she desperately searched the GPS for a nearest charger. There was not. Seven miles before reaching its destination, the car ran out of reserves. It was a Monday, January 2, at night. It took her a lot of work and a dozen calls to get a tow truck. She was grateful to be in the United States, because who knows if, in Mexico, the more than two hours she had to wait by the side of the road would have been safe. She made it clear to him that, despite the fact that his circumstances were extraordinary, an electric car is not for any moment.
In Mexico, the lowest-priced electric is the Jac e10X, which costs 439 thousand pesos. Subcompact, very small rear space and little security, 2 airbags and ABS). But, it can be a solution to save fuel for short trips. Its autonomy, according to Jac, is 360 kilometers, which I reserve the right to doubt. But even if that autonomy is true, traveling with him is an exercise in faith. I explain.
Risks, sacrifices and pleasures
It is necessary to know that the autonomy must be enough to go and come back or, if applicable, be sure that it can be loaded again before return. And if in the big cities and Mexican highways it is difficult to find a charger, in the smaller ones the problem is even greater. Most of the public chargers are located in shopping centers and almost all of them charge at 220 kw. With this you need around 5 or 6 hours to charge 80% of the battery. If you don’t plan that stop in advance, you may be in for a nasty surprise. If you use a home socket to charge, you will need 24 hours or more. In other words, even though there are people who have made or are taking long trips with an electric, it took a lot more travel time and planning, plus some good fortune. And time, which everyone already knows, is money.
In Europe you do find ultra-fast chargers but their quantity depends on the country. Norway is full of them. Germany not so much. Spain and Portugal have very few. Even with these chargers, it is necessary that your car has the capacity to receive that charge and only the most expensive models accept it.
In the world, including Mexico, Tesla owns the most chargers and in the United States, GM and Ford They have already recognized this and reached an agreement with Tesla to use their charging network, creating a very useful standard that will facilitate the toadoption of electrical Mexico should think the same way if it wants to increase the number of 3,462 electric cars that were sold in the country last year. But it must also increase and improve the amount of electrical energy produced, mainly renewable energy.
Yes, it’s great to drive an electric. Its absence of noise and vibrations, its immediate torque and low center of gravity, give it a unique refinement. But the modern ones, which accept fast charging and have a lot of autonomy, start at 800 thousand pesos, like a BYD Yuan. Despite the fact that it fell in price, the cheapest Tesla goes for about 950 thousand. To this we add that we need another car to hit the road, since even with fast charging, spending more than half an hour waiting in a place today, in Mexico, is increasing the risk of being a victim of violence, we realize that it is still a toy of the rich Maybe not rich because they earn a lot of money, but at least because they live in a first world country, or closer to that than Latin Americans.
