I was thinking about #EV batteries, how the infrastructure could have been imagined entirely different. It could've been like my battery-operated tools. A driver would pull into a warehouse stall and a big machine literally pulls the battery out and inserts a new one, the process finished in 2 minutes. The cars and batteries would be designed to be modular and interchangeable. The chargers themselves, drivers would never see or have to wait for. *Yes I'm already aware of your arguments, thanks.*
@Nonya_Bidniss Sorry, not willing to exchange my $15,000 battery for one with an unknown history. Charging times are not the big deal ICE drivers thing they will be.
@Nonya_Bidniss Flow batteries?
Cars as a service will come when they get self driving software up to speed.
@Nonya_Bidniss With propane exchanges, [you do own the tank](https://bluerhino.com/propane-info/faqs/buying-blue-rhino-tanks-faqs/is-blue-rhino-a-deposit-program), and because tanks are only $40 or so and are not wear items this works. Batteries are wear items, they have a limited number of charges and are effected by the type of use they receive. They also cost are a significant percentage of the value of the car.
@antares Ok forget propane as an example. So considering the other issues you noted, if one assumes for argument's sake that overall, the battery exchange system doesn't end up totaling more than the cost of the battery plus the cost of charging through its lifetime, the cost of battery exchanges over that same time would seem too high to the consumer and they wouldn't like it. That is, the cost of wear and tear would be built in to the exchange so it would seem high each time.
@antares To clarify, no one would buy a battery with their car. The car price would not include a battery, as the price of batteries would be in the exchange system. But each exchange would have wear and tear built in and customers would probably think that is too costly even if it's no different than having to buy a new battery after some number of years. And I assume most people don't ever buy a new EV battery, they just trade in/sell their car at some point.
@antares What if there was a way to address that by not owning the battery? Like we do propane tanks.