I drove a Tesla Model Y for 1 year and 30,000 kilometers, here’s how much it cost me compared to the Thermal

The Tesla Model Y is undoubtedly the least original electric car of 2023, with electric car sales figures never seen before. After traveling 30,000 kilometers a year across Europe, it’s time to take stock of the total costs between charging at home and on the road, to see if we really benefit as big electric drivers.

Tesla Model Y propulsion needs no introduction as we see it everywhere – it is also the best selling car in Europe in 2023, all powers combined! 2024 has barely begun, and it will undoubtedly be another good year in France for what is still the cheapest Tesla.

The 2024 ecological bonus remains valid for the Model Y propulsion produced in Berlin and, with the restoration in the coming months, there is no doubt that many customers will turn to the electric SUV instead of the Model 3, which has so far been deprived of the bonus. ‘On further notice.

Our Model Y is only a year old and has just crossed the 30,000 km mark. We drove in four seasons, consumption sometimes light, sometimes very high, temperature and weather variability put all electric cars to the test. The first return after 10,000 kilometers was published in early summer 2023, focusing specifically on the experience and everything that involves stepping into the Tesla ecosystem.

In this file, we will take stock of the financial situation, particularly at the level of charges, whether at home or roaming, where major changes have taken place in 2023. This way we can check if Tesla’s promises are kept. The brand advertises significant savings compared to equivalent thermal vehicles on its online configurator.

Charging at home is almost cheating

If something is not a must-have to charge at home in 2024, we must admit that it is a comfort that once achieved we will not want to do without. Indeed, a network of public charging stations, whether fast with direct current or slow with alternating current, is now well developed. This allows anyone with an electric car to still benefit from electric mobility without the possibility of charging at home.

However, with the right electricity subscription at home, it is clear that apart from comfort, the financial aspect is simply unbeatable. In this case, people charge their electric cars at home, the EDF Tempo subscription can be compared to a cheat code for driving while paying less than 2 euros per 100 kilometers. Against more than 10 euros per 100 km in thermal.

Indeed, with most charges for 0.11 Euro/kWh, it is hard not to consider this offering as an ideal partner for an electric car. Only those who can charge elsewhere for free (free supercharging or offered at work) can do without it, for others, it is in almost all cases more interesting than other offers on the market.

Tesla Superchargers are much cheaper

In 2023, fast charging has evolved significantly, both in terms of the number of available terminals and the price. In the summer of 2022, prices for Tesla Superchargers were very high, often making long trips more expensive than a similar thermal vehicle in Tesla: its height!

Fortunately, Elon Musk’s generation knows how to adjust quickly, and after several price adjustments, we are at the beginning of 2024 with prices per kilowatt hour that are around 0.30 to 0.35 cents across France.

Compared to charging at home, in the worst case it remains 3 times more expensive, but if we compare with the regulated rate which is currently €0.23/kWh, superchargers do not seem that expensive. Furthermore, when we compare the offers of other fast charging operators, Tesla is still the cheapest to date: Ionity, Totalenergies and Fastned are at €0.59/kWh, almost twice as expensive.

For Tesla drivers, favoring other charging operators has only one benefit: avoiding leaving the highway on certain roads. We’ve already explained why superchargers are mostly out of service areas, but it’s something to keep in mind. To limit charging costs, you often have to get off the highway, which requires a few minutes of travel.

Charging for free becomes an exception

In 2024, we must accept to mourn what was at first common, then increasingly rare, namely free charging. Indeed, if some places managed to attract electric car drivers by offering to charge the battery for a few hours a few years ago, today there is an exception to find a free charger.

For Teslas, thanks to sponsorships, there is still a way to charge outside the home for free. When the sponsorship program was relaunched, the brand offered to convert its points for free Supercharging, which allowed certain profiles to recharge for free.

Of course, this is not a common case, so we shouldn’t imagine that Tesla’s road carving will be a free-for-all. But even if you pay all the charges, what would it cost to drive 30,000 kilometers in a Tesla Model Y Propulsion?

In Statistics 2023: The Nominal Value of Use?

To cover this 30,000 kilometers in 2023, 6,000 kWh were injected from all the batteries in the car. So this gives an average consumption of 20 kWh/100 km, far from the initial promises. Indeed, Tesla has announced a WLTP consumption of 15.7 kWh/100 km for the Model Y propulsion, but in our case, more than 25%.

The reason is quite trivial: the long journey. A significant part of our journey is on regulated speed motorways, where consumption increases. If you have an urban or peri-urban profile, consumption will be less. Note that on the car dashboard this shows an average consumption of 17.8 kWh/100 km over 30,000 km, but this does not take into account consumption when stationary or under load.

The Tesla app presents a charge breakdown over a year, as you can see below, but it’s mostly wrong. In fact, the average consumption of an equivalent thermal car is assumed to be 9.43 l/100 km, which is undoubtedly an overestimate.

In any case, this allows you to highlight the nominal cost of using your Tesla, but you have to keep in mind that this is imprecise. Third-party apps like Teslamate allow you to track charges more reliably, especially to distinguish fast charges from the rest.

Of the 6,000 kWh charged in 2023, half are fast charges at Superchargers and other terminals near highways, and the other half include charges at work or home using alternating current, as well as some opportunity charges during our commute.

In the end, we took advantage of the free supercharging, which is not very representative of the cost in terms of individual evaluations. To give realistic figures, we will consider that fast charges averaged €0.40/kWh and slow charges €0.15/kWh. This is a consistent estimate given current prices, which therefore gives 1,650 euros of charging costs for 30,000 kilometers.

The cost per 100 km is an average of 5.5 euros, which is equivalent to a gasoline car that consumes only 3 liters of fuel per 100 km (at an average price of 1.80 €/liter). Considering the latest figures published by Adeyeme, this is telling Thus a 30,000 km journey in a Tesla Model Y is equivalent to 13,000 km in a gasoline car..

Note that this cost of 5.5 euros per 100 kilometers only concerns our use of the Model Y. For people who mostly charge at home, it is easy to achieve less than 3 euros per 100 kilometers, which makes electric cars financially worthwhile. Even more than that.

Can electric cars pay for themselves quickly?

In the SUV segment, the most popular thermal car to be pitted against the Tesla Model Y Propulsion will be the Peugeot 3008, which is available in a gasoline version from 33,560 euros at the time of writing these lines. In contrast, the cheapest Tesla is 37,990 euros including the ecological bonus, meaning an additional cost of 4,430 euros on purchase. The WLTP consumption of the cheapest Peugeot 3008 is advertised at 6.1 l/100 km, or €11/100 km with an average price of €1.80/l per liter of gasoline.

Compared to our usage – which is undoubtedly more expensive than most Model Y owners – this is equivalent to saying that the Peugeot 3008 costs twice as much per kilometer. thus, The difference in purchase price will close in just 80,000 kms or 3 years earlier at 30,000 km/year..

Of course, we can highlight the fact that the configurations, performance and options of the two vehicles are largely in favor of the Tesla Model Y, but starting from this basis, the Model Y becomes the best after three years, even for the priority disadvantage.

For a model Y with a running cost of €3/100 km, the curves intersect at 60,000 km., which corresponds to more or less 6 years of average car use in France. Of course, all of this must be weighed against the actual cost based on the financing methods, but this is the reality if we just look at the list price.

In addition, the cost of maintaining a thermal car from 60,000 to 90,000 kilometers will logically be much higher, because on Tesla, it is practically zero. There is no mandatory periodic maintenance to maintain the warranty or no frequent need to change fluids for example. Regardless, it’s important to consider the potential savings when going electric, but not to overestimate them.

Unfortunately, if the comparison between electric and thermal is often put forward, it is only relevant for the first electric car in the house, leaving the thermal car. The more time passes, the more people don’t use their first electric car.

It would then be relevant to proceed to the second step, which involves highlighting the difference in consumption of electric cars, rather than indicating a CO2 rate of 0 g/km. And in this small game, unlike SUVs weighing 2 tons and above, the smallest cars can definitely have an advantage.