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Hey guys, new Sparkie owner here roaming around LB/cypress/cerritos area :D

She's still in her "break in" (is there such a thing for ev cars?) period with 254mi on the odo. So far the lifetime mpge is 133 and I get 6.2mi/kwh. Very impressed with what chevy has done with the spark!
 
49 mile commute with 4000 ft climb. 57 MPh i get to work , at 67 probably not. I tried it once, had to abort.
I will lease a Bolt until my model 3 is ready.
 
Latest update I am now up to 74,368 miles. 121 mpge. My leadfoot is really affecting my mpge. No traffic on my way to work doesn't help.
 
agdodgerfan said:
Latest update I am now up to 74,368 miles. 121 mpge. My leadfoot is really affecting my mpge. No traffic on my way to work doesn't help.
74.3 k miles !!
That's awesome. Are you the record holder? Do you log the battery capacity?

With my '14 I'm at 33.9 k miles with a 3.4 mi/kWh 'Lifetime' showing on the app. Where do you find mpge? Same thing basically, no?

EDIT: But 4.7 mi/kWh 'Since Full Charge'. And that was a fast commute! Bumped the 90 mph limit once this morning....
That lifetime number does not seem to move over time....
 
There are three main ways to calculate mpge (1) based on economy (how far you could go based on how much electricity you could buy for the price of a local gallon of gasoline) (2) based on pollution equivalence (how far you could go with the net emission of the same quantity of CO2 produced by burning a gallon of gasoline). These first two values will vary with either your local electricity rates & gasoline prices, or how clean your electric power generation is https://oaspub.epa.gov/powpro/ept_pack.charts (3) based on energy (how far you can go on the equivalent energy contained in one gallon of gasoline. Somewhat surprisingly in some areas of the country all three of these values can be quite similar. The epa/car manufacturers use a value of 33.7 kwh as being equivalent to one gallon of gasoline https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miles_per_gallon_gasoline_equivalent . If we use this latter value many of the above listed mpge values are very understated. Ecomodder has a nice mpge conversion calculator but the calculator doesn't give an input for miles/kwh, the most useful input listed for us is wh/mile, to convert miles/kwhr to wh/mile you have to invert the value (take the reciprocal) and multiply by 1000. http://ecomodder.com/forum/tool-conversions.php#_top My average mpge for my total 4,200 miles of largely winter and highway driving is 135 using method #3 and the miles/kwh quoted in the car's display (which probably does not include a correction for charger efficiency?).
 
agdodgerfan said:
Latest update I am now up to 74,368 miles. 121 mpge. My leadfoot is really affecting my mpge. No traffic on my way to work doesn't help.

What year is your Spark EV? Have you recently calculated your battery capacity using the data on the info screen? It would be interesting to all to know if and by how much your battery might have degraded over this number of miles.
 
Over 18K miles, mine shows 5.3 mi/kWh on average (I never reset the trip meter). If you go by 33.7 kWh/gal of gas, that works out to 179 MPGe.

http://sparkev.blogspot.com/2017/02/sparkev-is-most-efficient-car-in-world.html

If you assume 7.5% loss in charging with DCFC, it's 165 MPGe. If you assume 15% loss with L2, it's 152 MPGe. If you assume 20% loss with L1, it's 143 MPGe (4.24 mi/kWh).

However, electricity price has gone up by 12% in past year to $0.20/kWh and gas prices are again down to $2.60/gal. Doing the math, MPG equivalent in $ works out to 55 MPGe$ (with L1). If you factor in eVgo OTG membership for DCFC, average electricity price becomes about $0.30/kWh (I use a lot of DCFC), which makes it equivalent to 42 MPGe$ when using DCFC, 37 MPGe$ when using L1.
 
If your primary concern is environmentalist you will want to compare your EV to gasoline in terms of relative CO2 production.
When you burn one gallon of pure gasoline you get 19.64 pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) (from E10, gas containing 10% ethanol, you get 18.95 pounds of CO2).
If you go to https://oaspub.epa.gov/powpro/ept_pack.charts you can get a figure for how clean or otherwise your electricity generation is by entering your zip code and electricity supplier.
In my area of CT using UI for electricity the CO2 emission rate is given as 571 pounds of CO2 per MWh or 0.571 lbs/Kwh (a relatively clean state). Thus for the equivalent CO2 as produced by burning one gallon of pure gasoline I'll get 19.64/0.571 = 34.4 KWh (for E10 its 33.2 KWh).
Multiplying this value by my charger efficiency, I’ll use 87.8 % as my L2 charger efficiency ( https://www.veic.org/docs/Transportation/20130320-EVT-NRA-Final-Report.pdf ). Thus for the same quantity of CO2 released by burning one gallon of gas I’ll get 30.2 KWh in my battery. Since my current average is 4.1miles/KWh (it’s started going up with the warmer weather) I get a pollution mpge of 124.

Efficiency losses during electricity distribution via the grid would already have been taken into account if the government published figure for CO2 lbs/Kwh is based upon what the customer receives, which seems logical. However, there are additional losses incurred with gasoline that I have ignored, so gasoline is in actuality dirtier than the 19-20 lbs of CO2 you get per gallon by simply burning it, because it takes significant energy to refine and distribute the gasoline… and I’ve ignored this. My ultimate aim would be to use home solar power for my electricity source then I’d generate no net CO2 from driving. Unfortunately I live in a very shady area so I’m not the best candidate for this (I don’t want to cut down multiple large trees to go solar).
 
PhilPen said:
If your primary concern is environmentalist you will want to compare your EV to gasoline .....
My ultimate aim would be to use home solar power for my electricity source then I’d generate no net CO2 from driving. ...
Right, it should be compared as 'Well to Wheel' for gassers and 'Mine to Wheel' (for the coal/nuclear portion of the grid) for EV's.

It's a really complicated subject.

Then talk about where the 'Wells and Mines' are located. But then that starts a political talk, never mind....
At least the electricity is locally produced, theoretically.
And home solar system gives you 'HOMEMADE' power !
 
NORTON said:
PhilPen said:
If your primary concern is environmentalist you will want to compare your EV to gasoline .....
My ultimate aim would be to use home solar power for my electricity source then I’d generate no net CO2 from driving. ...
Right, it should be compared as 'Well to Wheel' for gassers and 'Mine to Wheel' (for the coal/nuclear portion of the grid) for EV's.

It's a really complicated subject.

Then talk about where the 'Wells and Mines' are located. But then that starts a political talk, never mind....
At least the electricity is locally produced, theoretically.
And home solar system gives you 'HOMEMADE' power !

"It's a really complicated subject."

That is both absolutely correct and very understated.

Not even addressed were the issues of mining the raw materials to produce the vehicles, especially the impacts of mining the materials for the battery packs. Or the environmental impact of sliced, diced, and roasted birds from wind and solar power generation. Or the human costs of people dying because they cannot afford transportation or the power generation needed to maintain hospitals, infrastructure, and sanitation.

Yeah, it's a really complicated subject. Lots of unintended consequences, and even questionable intended consequences.
 
fr100 said:
My lifetime MPGe always shows 132 even though my drives are way more efficient than that. I don't know why.

http://imgur.com/a/gkO60

Things to consider:
Have you had the car from the start, or did it have a previous owner? They could have had a different driving style.
Do you live in a place where you have to use the heater and or the AC a lot during some month?
If so that would also mean, the battery conditioning could be used a lot during these periods too. Both of these will decrease your overall efficiency even if your driving style is very efficient.
 
fr100 said:
My lifetime MPGe always shows 132 even though my drives are way more efficient than that. I don't know why.
I was seeing the same dang thing. That number would never move up even though I'd have most of my drives reporting much better numbers.

Now I don't have the fancy parts of that app, so frankly my dear,,,

I now know when it's done charging or if some AH unplugged it. That's the important parts.
 
How do you figure out the MPGe? When I charge my car completely, I think it shows that I have like 85 miles available.
 
2015 2LT 20,553 miles Displays 5.1mi/kw average since new (previous owner never reset tripometer).

I've put right at four thousand miles in two months of ownership. Car was a southern California lease before it moved to South Carolina.

When people ask me about efficiency, I give them the EPA formula plus charging loss((5.1x33.7)/x0.8(L2 charging loss)) 137mpge and tell them it costs me about 4¢/mile and that my Toyota Corolla had cost me ~8¢/mile in fuel lifetime ownership.

I use a Juice Box Pro 40 Lite charger and have observed charging efficiency between .79-.85, using the Juice Box App and vehicle information.
 
How are you guys seeing the MPGe anyway? Is this ONLY via an App and having ONStar because I don't see an option for this in the car itself.

This entire winter has shown us 3.7kwh per mile and it never seems to waver :(

Yesterday I drove very conservative in L, DRL off never going above 56mph on the highway with cruise set ON and STILL only 3.7kwh per mile efficiency displayed after a 60+ mile jaunt. (It was 42 degrees at the time)
 
Chris101 said:
How are you guys seeing the MPGe anyway? ...

This entire winter has shown us 3.7kwh per mile and it never seems to waver :(

... 56mph on the highway with cruise set ON and STILL only 3.7kwh per mile efficiency displayed after a 60+ mile jaunt. (It was 42 degrees at the time)
I can't answer the MPGe question, but 3.7 miles / kWh is,, maybe normal in the winter (?), but your example should have been better, I would think.

Keep in mind there are 2 displays for energy usage.
>There is the resettable page, where a trip mileage and mi/kWh keeps an ongoing record.
>Then there is the brief trip display at shutdown that only shows your last trip data.

Hang in there...
Have you heard it's SPRING!!! :mrgreen:
 
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