On this episode we're gonna help you
figure out how much it's gonna cost to charge your model 3 next on Now You Know so maybe you're already on the
reservation list for the model three or maybe you're still running the numbers
to see if it makes sense for you either way you know that traditionally one of
the biggest expenses in owning any car is the cost to power it
we've been driving our Model 3 for a few months now so we have a good idea of
what it's going to cost you we've all grown up with ice or internal combustion
engine cars so most people know what they cost a fuel you take the number of
miles that you expect to drive in a year and divide that by the miles per gallon
and multiply that by the current price of gas per gallon so for instance this
2018 outtie 84 which starts at 36,000 dollars is a pretty good equivalent to
the model 3 in terms of size and price and it gets up to 27 miles per gallon
city 37 miles per gallon highway if we were considering buying this Audi and
let's say we drive the number of miles that an average American does every year
12,000 miles and the price of gas is 2 dollars and 49 cents per gallon we'd be
looking at around 375 gallons of gas or 933 dollars per year in gasoline with an
electric car it's a similar calculation but the terms are new and a bit strange
to us because we're not used to them yet to help us compare apples to apples when
looking at different cars the EPA rates electric cars with mpg II
or miles per gallon equivalent even though EVs like the model 3 don't burn
gasoline the model 3 has an MP GE of 126 now that is helpful if we compare it to
the Audi with an average mpg of 32 because we can see that the model 3 gets
almost a hundred miles more per gallon equivalent but it's not exactly helpful
in figuring out our actual electricity costs in running the model 3 with the
model 3 we now have to deal with the price of electricity or price per
kilowatt hour instead of the price of a gallon of gasoline and we have to adjust
ourselves to miles per kilowatt hour instead of miles per gallon okay so
let's figure this out first let's figure out how many miles per kilowatt hour it
takes to drive the model 3 the rated miles per kilowatt hour for the model 3
with the long range battery is four point one five miles per
kilowatt hour a kilowatt hour of electricity costs anywhere from about
eight cents per kilowatt hour in Washington or Louisiana to our home
state of Massachusetts which has one of the highest prices of electricity at 22
cents per kilowatt hour the average cost of electricity in the
United States is 13 cents per kilowatt hour so let's say you plan on driving
12,000 miles a year in the model 3 and you live in Washington State so you
divide 12,000 miles by four point one five miles per kilowatt hour and you get
two thousand eight hundred and ninety two kilowatt hours of electricity now
multiply that by the price in Washington of eight cents per kilowatt hour and we
get 231 dollars if you live in Massachusetts that same twelve thousand
miles would cost you six hundred and thirty six dollars you can look at your
electricity bill and see the rate you were paying and figure out how much it
will cost to charge at home keep in mind that many states have lower rates during
off-peak times of day and you can usually take advantage of this by
telling the model 3 when to start charging in fact you're helping the grid
to when you charge off-peak so it's a win-win if you want to know how much it
will cost to charge at a supercharger just go to this Tesla link and look up
the state you'll be charging in and use that price per kilowatt hour if you
don't want to do any math but just want to get a sense of what the model 3 will
save you compared to a comparable ice car like the Audi a4 then let's use
averages we'll pretend that you drive the average 12000 miles per year and pay
the average 13 cents per kilowatt hour for the Model 3 and 2 dollars and 49
cents a gallon for that ow d so here it is what the math done for you the Audi
will cost 933 dollars and the model 3 will cost 375 dollars that's 558 dollars
less per year as you can see electric cars like the model 3 are far more
energy efficient than ice cars and cost a lot less to power the average American
keeps their car for about 7 years so that would be a savings of almost $4,000
and this is if gas and electricity prices stay where they are because oil
is a finite resource and gets harder to cover drill and pump it is expected to
go up in price whereas electricity which is being made more and more by the Sun
and wind every year is going to get cheaper as these two prices continue to
grow apart it will get cheaper and cheaper to drive electric and more and
more expensive to drive an ice car now you know thanks so much for watching now
you know we work hard to bring you videos about things that we think you'll
find useful but we need to know from you what you want to see so leave your
comments below also don't forget to go over to our patreon page where for as
little as a buck a month you can watch our patreon bonus story every week on
Tesla time news thanks again we'll see you soon
