Via California - March/April 2020 - 29

I bought my first

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electric car a decade
ago. It was a small, battery-powered Nissan Leaf hatchback with just 84 miles of range-not exactly a longdistance highway cruiser. But from day one, it felt like
driving a little piece of the future.
Ten years later, my wife and I are embarking on
a five-day, 1,000-mile road trip to test-drive an allelectric E-Tron SUV on loan from Audi. Sure, we could
have taken the trip in our own electric car, a batterypowered Chevy Bolt that has better range than the
Audi's 204 miles per charge. But the opportunity to
cruise Northern California and southern Oregon in a
swank, $86,000 sport-ute was irresistible.
The E-Tron is just the latest all-electric vehicle to
hit the United States market, which now includes a
dozen models. According to Sam Abuelsamid, principal analyst at Navigant Research, that number will
rise to more than 100 in the next five years, ranging
from compacts to full-size pickups and SUVs. Market
forecasts for electric vehicles are all over the map, but
it's indisputable that the EV revolution is real, and it's
happening now.
In almost every way, the transition from driving a
gas-powered car to driving an electric vehicle is seamless. But as our trip made clear, traveling long distances
reveals some significant differences between EVs and
their internal combustion counterparts.
Most of those differences make driving more enjoyable, at least for me. I vastly prefer the quiet, consistent
hum of an EV to the rumble of a revving gas engine.
Even in a relatively mild-mannered EV, accelerating
away from a stoplight can feel like launching into hyperdrive; the slight pause and surge as gears shift are gone.
And it's a joy to know that my car doesn't produce any
tailpipe emissions.
The biggest difference between an EV and a gaspowered vehicle is the attention you have to pay to
driving range. From my first 84-miles-per-charge Leaf, I
upgraded to an all-electric Toyota Rav4 SUV, which had
a range of 103 miles. Three years later, I got the Chevy
Bolt that we still drive now, which can go 238 miles
between charges (the latest Bolt goes 259). These cars
all cost roughly the same amount, but in six short years
the range nearly tripled and will continue to improve.
In the United States, the typical driver covers 40 miles a

left: Getting a charge in Point Arena, Calif. right: An Audi E-Tron
quietly cruising the coast near Mendocino, Calif.
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Via California - March/April 2020

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