In addition to the battery-electric version we tested, the Kia Niro is also available as a plug-in hybrid and a regular hybrid. The Niro, which has an official range of 407 kilometres, does resemble an SUV, but it drives more like an agile small car.Jeremy Sinek/The Globe and Mail
Since my first short test drive of a Nissan Leaf 14 years ago, dozens of electric vehicles have passed through my hands. But while I’ve always been bullish on EVs, the prospect of owning one stayed on hold until range and recharging issues were resolved.
That point finally seemed to arrive about two years ago. A 2,400-kilometre-return family road trip to the Maine coast in a Polestar 2 proved sufficiently range anxiety-free that my wife and I decided an EV could work as our next car. We often drive long distances, but rarely more than 600 kilometres a day, so one recharge per day would suffice.
Two years later, having tested many more EVs as part of my job (most of them, including the latest Polestar, with more range than the 2022 Polestar’s 435 kilometres), we’re having second thoughts.
In theory, I should be an ideal candidate. I inhabit the so-called Goldilocks zone for EVs – a suburban single-family with a driveway where I can set up a charger. With limited transit options and longer distances to travel, my long-term fuel and maintenance savings should offset the higher initial cost of the car. But even so, we’re not ready to switch just yet.
In part, that’s because the right electric car – with the emphasis on car, not SUV or truck – doesn’t exist in Canada at the right price. I have never drunk the SUV Kool-Aid. Where’s the EV equivalent of the 2016 Volkswagen Golf SportWagen we drive now – a compact five-door car that’s fuel-efficient, functional and fun to drive – at a price less than $40,000?
The Chevrolet Bolt once looked good on paper, but that big battery-fire recall was cause for pause, and now the Bolt is on hiatus. That leaves the Fiat 500e as Canada’s most affordable EV, but $39,995 seems overpriced for a tiny run-about-town grocery-getter with a range of 227 kilometres.
The Equinox EV looks quite sleek, almost more wagon than SUV, but it’s taller than it seems and almost 20 centimetres longer than the established gas-powered Equinox.Jeremy Sinek/The Globe and Mail
At one point, I considered the Chevrolet Equinox EV, for which GM promised new levels of affordability. It doesn’t look too obviously like an SUV and a single-motor version I drove recently was tracking to deliver well over 500 kilometres on a single charge (official range: 513 kilometres).
But given the delayed debut of the base 1LT trim, it hasn’t yet delivered on the affordability. We were put off, too, by the Equinox EV’s size – at 4,840-millimetres long, it’s more mid-size than compact. And it wasn’t much fun to drive. Incidentally, while most EVs I’ve driven predicted a reduced range in summer – typically down 3 to 4 per cent – with the air conditioning running, the Equinox showed no difference. Go figure.
The Nissan Leaf is a compact car, but its range is inadequate, even if you pay extra for the bigger-battery version (342 kilometres) which starts closer to $50,000 than $40,000.
Tesla? Too expensive – and even if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t (because: Elon Musk).
The EV that comes closest to delivering on our wish list is the Kia Niro. It does resemble an SUV, but it drives more like an agile small car, the driving position is great and it has more than enough cargo space for longer expeditions.
The Niro’s official range is 407 kilometres, but when we picked up a test car in late June, it was actually projecting 470 kilometres. With plans for a couple of longer trips, we had high hopes.
One was a 240-kilometre-return day trip, of which about 150 kilometres was on the highway. The rest was mostly rural two-lane roads interspersed with small towns and villages. Helped by a long stretch of stop-and-go heavy traffic on the QEW, we returned home with 240 kilometres driven and 220 kilometres remaining “in the tank.” Encouraging.
Our next trip brought us back down to Earth. Setting out on the 290-kilometre drive to a cottage near Kingston, the fully charged Niro was projecting 482 kilometres of range at the start. Woo-hoo! But when we stopped for a scheduled recharge after 267 kilometres of highway driving, the remaining range was down to 109 kilometres – now 376 in total.
According to the specs, the Niro EV’s 22.8 cubic-feet seats-up cargo volume is typical for a subcompact SUV, but its seats-folded 63.7 is worthy of a compact SUV.Jeremy Sinek/The Globe and Mail
At first we were shocked that highway speeds (about 115 kilometres an hour) had cost us more than 100 kilometres of range. Then we remembered the official combined city/highway range is 407 kilometres – and, inversely to gas-powered vehicles, EVs suck more juice at highway speeds than in the city. We fell 31 kilometres short on the highway, but previous urban/rural driving had delivered up to 75 kilometres of bonus range.
Officially, the Niro’s energy consumption is rated at 16.8 kilowatt-hours per 100 kilometres in the city and 20.5 on the highway. We saw as little as 11 in city driving, and even on Highway 401 the display stayed below 17. During our full 1,100 kilometres in early July, using air conditioning most of the time, it reported 15.1 over all. If it was priced a little lower (base price: $45,595) the Niro would be a contender.
Somewhat paradoxically, while low-speed city driving may provide a range bonus, it’s on long trips that range matters most – range, plus access to DC fast charging en route. Which brings us to the other cause of our waning enthusiasm for EV ownership. Although the charging network has expanded somewhat since our 2022 Maine expedition, its reliability (at least in Southern Ontario) seems to have regressed.
Ironically, the one charging network I’ve found to be consistently dependable – Flo – was a no-go on one trip last March because the charger was situated in a parking lot that was filled to capacity by a show at a nearby arena, and gas cars occupied the EV charging stalls.
More typically, along Highway 401 and elsewhere, we’ve encountered DC fast chargers that didn’t work at all, or kept cutting out after just a couple of minutes, or delivered much less power than they should have. On the plus side, we’ve never been delayed long – if at all – by other EVs using the chargers.
Pricing and billing is another minefield. Some chargers accept payment directly by credit card; others require an account. At last count, I had a dozen network apps on my phone, each with their own protocols for payment and charge initiation. Some still bill by time (for example, $20 per hour on Flo’s 50-kilowatt machines); others have switched to pricing per kilowatt-hour (for example, 62 cents at OnRoute facilities along Highway 401, typically 50 cents at others we’ve used elsewhere).
While some automakers and governments have recently wavered on their commitments and mandates for the transition to EVs, my own hesitation is more a matter of when rather than whether. I still believe in electric cars, and would like to own one. Their range is improving and the opening of Tesla’s Supercharger network to other brands promises to alleviate long-trip charging challenges.
But until some automaker offers the right electric car at the right price, I’ll probably hedge my bets with a plug-in hybrid.
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