Interestingly, brands like Mercedes do the opposite - a recent test by What Car? indicated that the real (UK) highway range of the GLC 400 4Matic Electric is just 1.4% lower than its WLTP rating - 390 miles vs 394.

I don't know about anyone else, but I always needed a short break after 450km or so. Those 390 miles are more than I would ever use without stopping to charge.

I enjoy that guy, but I've found he is wrong about what he talks about in several situations. This is probably one of them, but we'll see once the EREVs are tested. His argument here is basically, "The Volt wasn't fuel efficient so EREVs can't be". Ignoring all the has been learned about EVs since then. Plus he ignores that PHEVs and Hybrids are more complex than an EREV because they need complex transmissions and other subsystems because they need to be both an EV and an ICE vehicle.

I have an EV and a hybrid, and the EV is so much better than the hybrid - I will happily swap the hybrid for an EREV when the time comes.

Indeed this. A range extender engine will never be as efficient as hybrid

It's new in that it's not really a hybrid. It isn't meant to take over when you run out of battery. It's meant as an emergency recharge for the battery to get you to the next charging station.

Hybrids can just run on gas and not have to worry about the distance to the next charging station.

3rd sentence: It is a fully electric car with the security blanket of a gas-powered generator to charge the battery. So not your average hybrid whos gas-powered motor directly drives the wheels.

from the article: "Most plug-in hybrids on the road today are essentially gasoline vehicles with a battery shoehorned in to provide a small amount of all-electric range. EREVs [Extended Ranged Electric Vehicles] flip the concept. They are designed first as electric vehicles, and the engine solely acts as a generator for the battery, with no mechanical connection to the wheels."

This is EREV (Extended-Range Electric Vehicle) where the fossil fuel engine is used solely to charge the battery, as opposed to a PHEV (Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle) where it can also drive the wheels.

Either way, the cost is that the vehicle has the complexity of both systems. The benefit is variable, YMMV (Your milage may vary). There must be cases where it's a good idea. Especially at present, while the energy supply systems are in transition.

Could be an obvious mistake in the title to drive engagement, or as someone said in the comments of the article:

> WSJ catering to the anti EV crowd to get them to say "Har har look at those silly EVs, needs a gas engine now."

no no no no no no you don't get it.

there are EVs! with a backup generator.

but are EVs so they get all those sweet incentives

We have owned two. Trouble-free EV and trouble-free motor. The over-engineered little electrical actuators (for trunk, for gas-door opener) were our maintenance costs. The US only offers a single, dreadful tire in the correct size (Bridgestone Ecopia), which is the true achilles heel of the thing. The tiny tires seem to be made of discarded twix wrappers, are super expensive, and get destroyed by potholes and road hazards.

They're lovely little city bugs and just a pleasant place to be inside.

I drove an i3 rex, first generation. The gas motorcycle engine loved breaking down, due to disuse. Such an unreliable offence of crap. According to the dealership mechanic, the engine was packaged in a way that made the fluids collect in places they shouldn't.

Less maintenance the traditional engine. well assuming you plug it in of course but if you're plugging it in you're only using the edge for longer trips and so you're going to save a lot of money while still having range to make longer trips. Of course there is some worry about the gas going stale if you never run that engine. On the other hand gas engines get more efficient the higher the load and so a generator optimized for the engine gets everything running at optimal is going to get roughly 40% fuel energy efficiency versus a normal car which is going to be close to 20 - that was the main promise of a hybrid all along.

I have a PHEV where the engine has about a thousand hours on it my previous car driven about the same would have had about three thousand hours on it. But there are definitely plenty of reports of people who have the plugging hybrids who never actually plug it in it so don't see this advantage.

Again, the Volt already blazed this trail since 2011. The engine automatically comes on at least once every 6 weeks, and overall ensures that a single tank of gas doesn’t stay for more than ~6 months IIRC. I’ve never heard of any fuel-related engine problems on Volts.

Toyota was right, but this is not hybrid. It's a range extender engine, won't be as efficient due to power conversions

It's 1) the WSJ and 2) a really dubious headline

I don't find it surprising or disappointing that ppl aren't bothering to go read the article because of the two factors in conjunction above

Low effort? How about low effort screaming "buy Tesla or you are nazi" around 2016-2019?

Or when we tried to have a civilized discussion about low powered ICE engines, versus 2 ton luxury heavy battery cars?

The green crowd always mainly ran on low effort shit posts with state sponsoring. It is just laws of physics and politics did not really worked out as you imagined!