The biggest concerns related to the electric car industry concern charging anxiety, the resulting limited range and the cost to replace an electric car's battery. We have already published an in-depth analysis on this last point in recent months, but are there so many cars on the road with a replaced battery?
A research carried out by Recurrent Auto examined 15,000 zero-emission cars, verifying battery status; the result is crazy. Only 1.5% have replaced a battery due to problems and malfunctions (excluding any recalls). Among the models most subject to replacement are Tesla Model S and Nissan Leaf, two cars born around 2010 and therefore more than 12 years ago. In addition, a substantial number of specimens were sold for both models and, from this point of view, the number is even more surprising.
The research also shows that replacement due to wear takes place after several years and that the degradation is slow and continuous; in short, no battery collapses inexplicably after the fateful 8 years or 150,000 km warranty of some manufacturers.
--> And those who only use fast charges? At the moment Recurrent Auto does not offer a rich database of values, but the team is following the degradation of the batteries of two cars regularly subjected to this type of charging. Only time will be able to tell us how much fast charging affects the batteries (in this specific test on those of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and Ford Mustang Mach-E), but at the moment no noteworthy problems have been reported. Judging from the data collected, it seems that the risk of spending thousands and thousands of euros to change a battery is a very distant problem, proving what has already been confirmed by the owners of the first Tesla Model S with millions of km to their credit.