ICE vs EV, the debate thread

[Pib]

 

Here's the 46th Bangkok International Motor Show 24 Mar-6 Apr 2025 sales chart.   What I was "kinda" surprised by was Toyota being displaced by BYD/Densa for the #1 sales spot.   I thought BYD would probably come in #2 again like the last motor show...but times are a'changing...and BYD has come out with a lot more models over the last year....more choices even to include HEV.   Then GAC AION and Deepal (electric car companies) coming in #3 and #4.   Honda then coming in #5.     

 

Toyota and Honda "might want to get their heads out of their ICEV hole" and get moving a lot faster on making BEVs.  Then again, maybe both of them have an awesome new traction battery and/or combustion engine "just around the corner" that will kill-off EVs---seems Toyota has been projecting such for years now.  (giggle, giggle)    

 

https://autolifethailand.tv/booking-motor-show-2025-46th/

 

[Sir Dude]

Guess a big factor is how the electricity is generated... if you just push the carbon further up the supply chain towards the sources, then it's a moot point. There are issues with EVs like where all the lithium and colbalt etc. is coming from, and the places much of this is mined is hardly the poster-boy for ethics and sustainable business in a green way. Hopefully, there will soon be an alternative to lithium batteries and they are heading toward solid state batteries but will take time. Also, making an EV has a bigger carbon footprint than making an ICE car... just takes time to clear the debt for an EV with using elecricity.

The transition will take time, and the tech has to mature and convince people they have nothing to worry about like poor charging/reliability in cold weather, insurance, repairs, expensive replacement batteries, or range anxiety etc. However, during the transition, then ICE cars are not going away anytime soon (unless maybe you live in a deluded Milliband eutopia fantasy land country), and I think the real near-time objective should be these e-fuels that have tiny-to-zero emissions that you can put in an ICE engine... that should be pushed and normalized.

[HighPriority]

We are fortunate that ice are so environmentally friendly in their resources, manufacture, running and maintenance… 🙄

[GroveHillWanderer]

For those who still worry about the time it takes to recharge at a service station while travelling or have range anxiety, battery technologies are improving day by day. For instance, BYD has just launched 2 models that can add around 400km worth of charge in only 5 minutes and have a fully charged range of 700km.

 

They do require Megawatt charging, which is not widely available yet, to achieve that charging speed, but still.

 

Quote

BYD just launched the first EVs based on its new Super e-platform with ultra-fast charging. The new Han L sedan and Tang L SUV can gain nearly 250 miles range in 5 minutes, and prices start at just $30,000.

 

https://electrek.co/2025/04/09/byd-launches-first-evs-with-ultra-fast-charging-starting-at-30000/

 

Just for comparison, if I put 400km worth of petrol in my car in some service stations with slowish pumps (like one Bangchak station near my home which I often use) it can take me up to five minutes - especially if there's someone in front of me in the queue and/or they're slow taking the money. And a full tank in my car only gives me 500 - 600km of range depending on what mix of urban and motorway driving I'm doing.

[CHdiver]

2 hours ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

For instance, BYD has just launched 2 models that can add around 400km worth of charge in only 5 minutes and have a fully charged range of 700km.

Come back when they have the charger to support this, not just one but so you can actually count on them when you travel around Thailand. Don't get me wrong, I am not against BEV's, I think they are the best thing since sliced bread. But it will take some time to get this superfast chargers installed. 

[GroveHillWanderer]

34 minutes ago, CHdiver said:

Come back when they have the charger to support this, not just one but so you can actually count on them when you travel around Thailand. Don't get me wrong, I am not against BEV's, I think they are the best thing since sliced bread. But it will take some time to get this superfast chargers installed. 

 

I clearly stated that the Megawatt chargers are not widely available yet. And this is the ICE vs EV thread, so it's about general trends, not only what's available in Thailand. There's another thread for that and I deliberately didn't post in that thread because this info isn't really relevant to Thailand (yet).

 

But in any event, it's a chicken and egg situation. When there were not enough vehicles around that could take advantage of them, obviously no-one would go to the bother of installing them. Now that those vehicles are starting to appear, Megawatt chargers will gradually follow.

 

In addition, as the previous article alludes to and this other article makes clear, you can also 'double up' to get better speeds with existing fast chargers. 

 

Quote

BYD recognizes that most chargers won't be able to max out the "Super E" platform's charging capabilities, too, so it includes two charging ports for simultaneous fast charging.

 

BYD's Five-Minute Fast-Charging EV Is Even Cheaper Than We Thought

[4myr]

More evidence that EV's are more reliable than ICE.

In this case a recent 2025 study from the renowned German motorway breakdown repair service of the car association ADAC.
They've looked into 2 groups of 2 till 4 year old ICE and EVs and compared the type of breakdown and how many per 1000 incidents.

 

And the car models that reach the minimum statistical quota of above 7,000 car registrations per group are in this study primarily European, US and Korean. No Chinese like MG or BYD yet. I can only think of only one EV, the Renault Dacia Spring, imported from China, known in China as Dongfeng Nano Box. It got a no 3 rating [2.9 incidents] within the category of budget cars.

 

 

Unfortunately the road infrastructure context of Germany is not comparable to Thailand.
Germany has quite an extensive motorway network, where on some stretches there is no speed limit.

The climate is different, cold in winter and summers are less hot and humid than Thailand.

 

This is the main takeaway:

 

Number of Incidents with 12V battery are almost the same between ICE/EV. 
EV's have slightly more incidents with tyres.
Do higher motorway speeds in Germany make things for EVs worse than Thailand?

 

These findings are in line with what I hear from an EV repair shop in Thailand. As tyre incidents are not picked up by EV repair shops,
I hear them saying that after the 12V battery the AC onboard charger [or CCU in Kia/Hyundai] is the most frequent component that needs repair or replacement. Kia/Hyundai EV's and Neta V seem to be notorious. I That's why the Ioniq scores very badly in this German study.

 

Besides the German EV's like VW IDx, Tesla model 3 score exceptionally very low incident numbers [0.n].