FAQ: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

What is an electric vehicle? There are three main types of electric-powered vehicles: Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV): Runs entirely on battery power and an electric drive train, with no internal combustion engine. Can be plugged in at home and charged overnight, or at charging stations. Range for most models varies from 150 to 250 kilometres.

Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV): Runs mainly on a battery that is recharged by plugging into the power grid. It also has a gas-powered internal combustion engine that can recharge the battery or replace the electric drive train when battery power is low. Range on electric charge is only 35 to 85 kilometres, but enough to cover most Canadian commutes. Extended power offered by the gas engine gives cars range of over 500 kilometres.

Hybrid vehicles (HEV): Hybrids have a gas engine and an electric motor, both of which can be used to power the drive train, reducing gas consumption. Hybrid cars cannot be plugged in and charged from the power grid — their energy comes from gasoline power and regenerative braking, where the electric motor assists in slowing the vehicle and generates power.

How do you charge an EV?

Most cars can be charged at home from a standard 120volt outlet, but a full charge can take from 12 to 16 hours. A 240-volt outlet, the kind typically used for a dryer, can do the job in three hours for a plug-in hybrid and six for an all-electric vehicle. Installing a 240-volt charging station for a plug-in electric vehicle costs on average $1,500. Quebec offers up to $600 in grants to offset the expense.

A 400-volt, DC quick charger can charge a battery to 80 per cent capacity in 30 minutes.

There are roughly 1,500 public charging stations in Quebec, 110 of them quick chargers. A 240-volt station costs $2.50 per charge, or $1 an hour, billed by the minute. Quick-charging stations cost $10 an hour, billed by the minute.

What’s the cost of buying and driving an EV?

It costs about $1 to fully charge a vehicle at home. Annual costs for a car that is charged every night and runs about 20,000 kms a year is $300 — one-eighth of the cost of a conventional car when gas is $1.35 a litre.

Quebec offers rebates of up to $8,000 for an all-electric vehicle, $4,000 for a plug-in hybrid, and none for a hybrid starting with the 2018 model year. In a pilot project started in April 2017, Quebec offers rebates of $4,000 for used electric vehicles, for up to 1,000 vehicles in total. Better hurry. As of May 31, only 266 rebates were still available.

What about the batteries?

Dead batteries that cost thousands to replace used to be the bane of electric cars, but now electric vehicle batteries are covered by eight-year manufacture warranties, and the batteries can last much longer. They are still expensive to replace ($5,500 for a Nissan Leaf, for example), but prices are expected to drop substantially by 2020.

René Bruemmer, Montreal Gazette

Sources: Canadian Automobile Association; Association des Véhicules Électriques du Québec; Quebec government