Wait . . . what? EV drivers are trading them on hybrids? Is that really true?

Photo above - raise your hand if you thought an $80,000 electric SUV which costs the same per mile to operate as the gasoline version was a good idea . . .

There were 3.2 million “electrified” vehicles sold in the USA last year. See the MSN link below. (Note to MSN – when you use archaic words like “electrified”, you sound like something written in 1910*. “Paw just got ‘lectrified lights for our cabin. We’ll be getting indoor water next, I expect")*. I’m okay with calling cars electrified, but let’s stop lumping battery EVs and hybrids together.

Turns out there were 2 million hybrids sold last year, and the other 1.2 million cars were battery EVs. Does that make anyone’s head explode? When I turn on the ('lectrified) TV, the only thing I see are battery EVs in the ads. Kia is the official partner of the NBA. Audi – whose EVs cost twice as much as Kia's do – is the official MLS partner. Does this imply MLS viewers earn twice as much as NBA fans? That sounds slightly racist . . .

Kia just CANCELLED their new EV9 GT 'lectrified 3 row SUV costing $80,000. (“stripped” ones start at $55,000, still more than the down payment for an average house). These Kias weigh two and half tons because they have ginormous batteries which take 8 hours to recharge at home, powering their multiple 500 hp electric motors. If you encounter a DC fast charging station while out and about, you can cut that recharge time down. But then you’ll pay about 3X what your home charger costs to top off your battery. When you use public chargers, your cost per mile ends up about the same as a gasoline SUV of the same size/weight. "Cancelled."

In October 2025, sales of the EV9 in the United States declined to 666 vehicles—less than 1/3 how many were sold the same month a year ago. There are probably great deals on EV9s already in inventory at your local Kia dealer right now.

None of this proves what MSN is claiming – that EV owners are ditching their lightning-fast lithium ion mountains for simpler, less expensive hybrids. But hybrids are now outselling battery EVs by a margin of 2 to 1. And those new hybrid drivers can’t ALL be refugees from ICE vehicles.

I’m just sayin’ . . .

I Traded My Electric For A Hybrid - And It Wasn't What I Expected – Report

Kia Just Canceled Its Most Exciting EV Before It Even Launched

This page is a permanent link to the reply below and its nested replies. See all post replies »

samueltyler2 · 80-89, M

I know some people believe that the evidence to the need to cut down on fossil fuel isn't strong, but in my work in environmental toxicology, i do find a relationship between pollution alone and health, much of the pollution coming from human activity. Also the role of mobile sources of pollution, aka ICE cars, trucks and buses, i believe, is well researched. This, the use of EVs seems justified from that aspect. The savings in cost of gasoline is really not that great, but probably if one considers the peripheral costs of ICE, the oil and filter changes, etc., have to be included in the overall cost per mile, so over the 10 year average lifespan of a car, the EVs probably are more cost efficient.

My wife drives an Audi Q5 and I drive a Polestar 3, i pay $150 USD less per month on our leases. As to charging of the P3, yes, it takes longer to charge at the charging station in our apartment house, but I have learned how to adapt to that. We have not taken the P3 on a long trip preferring not to have to stop every 275 or so miles to charge it.

My first EV was a hybrid, probably one of my favorite cars ever. The problem was that the ICE included was underpowered and getting onto highspeed highways was often white-knuckle driving. That model was discontinued by Ford, and that is when i switched to Polestars, first driving a P2 for 3 years then moving to a P3 last December.

True many manufacturers have cut back or totally abandoned their production of EVs. That is the result of their decisions about how to maximize their profits. They decided that US drivers prefer to drive SUVs and stopped most of the production of sedans. The make it difficult to really order the exact specifications you want on your car, so they have actually determined what color vehicle we want, hence the proliferation of "putty" colored vehicles one sees on the road. Part of this is directly the result of the elimination of government incentives to own EVs. Other countries have seen the economic and health advantage of non-fossil fuel burning for cars, trucks and buses, and have continued to encourage the conversion of their fleets. The US is falling well behind the rest of the world in this. The US blocking of changes in COP30 is a disgrace, it is as bad as what happened in the Kyoto COP3.

SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F

@samueltyler2 I find it ironic that in the early 20th century automobiles were seen as a godsend, and a solution to urban pollution - streets awash in horse urine and dung.

samueltyler2 · 80-89, M

@SusanInFlorida why ironic? Motor vehicles have altered our way of life, but can be improved to make them more efficient, safer and less polluting.

SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F

@samueltyler2 i had a conversation with someone earlier this week who sees a limitless future due to technology:

- lab grown meat
- affordable and spacious high rise apartments
- electricity so cheap you won't need an meter to charge for it
- free online gaming

i asked him if the present population of earth (8+ billion people) which has quadrupled in the past century will ever exceed the planet's carrying capacity, and what we get from from doubling the population every century, except for food which is ever more distant from what we evolved to consumer, and more distractions to fill our free time because there's no meaningful work to justify our existence.

samueltyler2 · 80-89, M

@SusanInFlorida there is no answer to your question, it is something that we will see in the continued evolution of society.

Do you suggest we do nothing to prevent further climate change? Should we reject all.advancements in technology?

In many countries the rate of population growth has declined significantly, so your worries may be misdirected

ArishMell · 70-79, M

@SusanInFlorida Of those:

1) (the meat). Maybe, but I think it would take a long time to attract enough buyers to be worth manufacturing commercially.

2) "Affordable" to whom, though?

3) That prediction first appeared in the 1950s with the development of nuclear power... Still not arrived. The electricity we use will still have to be paid for somehow, and if anything our consumption is rising, not reducing.

4) Do you means games as in entertainments or a synonym for gambling? The former still has to be funded, perhaps by carrying advertisements; the latter obviously always and only takes its customers' money. Besides, just what major problem do silly games solve?

Whether the population rise will be generally exponential, as you describe (doubling at regular time increments), or will be very irregular or even decrease, I think would be very hard to determine now. Nevertheless, it is a serious problem and one so delicate no-one dares really try to discuss it.

In the end, the "someone" has not done anything differing much in principle from the soothsaying or 100 years ago: promoting the notion that Science and Engineering will solve all of humanity's problems. They haven't so far.

Nor can anything really be "free".

SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F

@ArishMell i'm a traditionalist. i believe

1 - the average income should be sufficient to purchase the "average home".

2 - at least half of working americans should be net taxpayers, and not getting entitlements from DC.

3 - local communities (residents) should have the final say on activities like liquor stores, gambling, strip clubs, pot dispensaries, and school curriculums.

ArishMell · 70-79, M

@SusanInFlorida I agree - or if the homes are still too expensive at least the rent is reasonable.

I think a population of which over half have to live on benefits would make a sustainable economy very difficult. One aspect that does help is that the more people earn, the more they have to spare for non-necessary purchases, so do pay sizeable totals in indirect tax where those are levvied.

In the UK, EU nations and many others much of this indirect income is from Value Added Tax, on goods and services. The rates and exceptions are set by the individual country for its own economy: it's currently 20% in the UK; with most foods, children's clothes and a few other things VAT-exempt or 0%-rated. (There is a subtle but important difference.)

Here we also pay a tax called "Vehicle Excise Duty" based on vehicle type and now, exhaust-emissions specifications; and the fuels are quite heavily taxed so the further you drive you more you pay.

I don't know if you have equivalents in the USA.

.
I take your point about "local communities" but while that might work in a country the size of a continent it would be very messy in a crowded place like the British Isles. The Scots and Welsh do have considerable "devolved" powers (and want more) but it leads to peculiar inconsistencies.

So instead we have national laws but local councils and police forces can decide within those on licensing or refusing alcoholic-sales premises, night-clubs and the like, and they will usually listen to local concerns about businesses like betting-shops and strip-clubs. Most canned and bottled (i.e. unopened) alcohol sales outside of pubs are licenced but now in supermarkets and convenience-shops.

You won't find "pot dispensaries" here! The stuff is illegal.

There are difficulties with local bodies trying to set school curriculae.

It depends a lot on whether you have national minimum contents and standards, which should facilitate both reasonable quality and breadth of education, and the gaining of qualifications recogniseable by further-education institutions and employers anywhere else in the country.

My own nephew is a case in point. Educated in his home town in England, he passed his chosen "Advanced Level" school exams sufficiently for a university in Wales something like 250 miles from home, graduated and now works back on England, but still 70 miles away.

Tiny distances by US standards I know, but large in this country, and in towns and countries with their own councils.

I worked with someone who attended school then gained her Degree and PhD at university in her home town in Scotland... now lives and works in my area, 400-500 miles from home. My own parents did not travel quite so far: only 200 miles!

Had their school curricula been set parochially, unless by very well educated, broadly-based committees working to national guidelines and standards set by education professionals, these people might never have had such opportunities.

Worse, the danger of a local residents' committee setting a school curriculum in anything smaller than a major city, is of it being very limited to only what those worthies know and believe. Which could be very broad and ambitious, or could be limited by the old "Not for the likes of us round here" mentality - or by special interests.

Assuming of course the local schools being able financially, physically and academically to provide a good standard of education - and that comes down to money and attracting suitably talented teachers.

On the American scale, this means a resident with suitable qualifications from a school in a rural town in, say, Florida having the chance of higher education in New York hence worthwhile employment in Los Angeles. So need a broad education offering the chance of suitable, widely recognised qualifications. Would many "local communities" be able to provide that even if impartial, not infiltrated by narrow party, business or religious interests?

Assuming they can afford a mortgage or rent there, of course...

That is becoming a serious difficulty Over Here, in London, even for professionals like teachers and nurses. Many end up still living with their parents. Others do find their own homes but even as far as 100 miles from the City, if they can commute by train and can afford such a life.