My Big Adventure, or Life in the Slow Lane

Is driving from Portland to Salem and back a big adventure? Not for most people. In fact, I've done it dozens, maybe even hundreds of times. No big deal, right?

Well, imagine driving in a car with a 3 gallon gas tank. You get 33 miles per gallon. There are no filling stations. Now that might be a bit of an adventure. But WHY???

No, I don’t have a car with a 3 gallon gas tank, but I do have a new Nissan Leaf with a range of about 100 miles. In case you don’t know what kind of car this is, it’s a new electric vehicle (EV) that is just beginning to appear on the roads. You can find out more about it here: https://www.drivenissanleaf.com.

A lot of people seem to think this is another hybrid, Nissan’s version of the Prius essentially. Not so! The only gas in this car is the driver’s! The Leaf gets all its power from a 24 kWh lithium-ion battery pack. If you want to read more about the technical stuff, Wikipedia has a good article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Leaf.

I’ve been driving it for nearly a month now, mainly to and from work, which is a round trip of about 45 miles. Today (Sunday, 2011) I wanted to drive to Salem to help my father-in-law solve a problem with his computer. Rather than drive my Subaru Legacy Outback (round trip would be about 4 gallons at $3.75/gallon), I decided to take a chance with the Leaf. I estimated the round trip mileage at around 95 miles, although it was actually a bit less than 90. That’s about $1.25 worth of electricity. I took along the “trickle charger” that comes standard with the car. It allows me to plug into any 120 volt outlet. (“Unplug your toaster, Grampa, I need to charge my car.”) The trickle charger is supposed to take about 20 hours for a 0 to 100% charge. I figured an hour or two of toaster time would give me an extra 5 or 10 miles, just enough of a buffer to keep from getting too anxious.

So I grabbed my iPod, an extra CD (Frank Zappa’s Cheap Thrills), and some iced tea, loaded my destination into the navigation system, and set off down I-5 at a leisurely pace. The operant word here is leisurely, which my electronic dictionary defines as “moving, flowing, or proceeding at less than the usual, desirable, or required speed,” which is precisely what I mean. Let's go back to my analogy of the car with 3 gallon gas tank. If you had to make it to Salem and back in that car with little or no chance of refueling, would you drive at the usual, customary, and illegal speed of 5 to 10 mph over the posted limit? Would you run the AC, even if the temperature outside the glass compartment was 85°? Would you lay a patch every time you accelerated from a stop?

So it was for all these reasons and some others that I chose 54 mph as my top cruising speed. Most of I-5 from Portland to Salem has a posted limit of 65 mph. I have found over the past several weeks that I actually enjoy driving slower than most of the traffic. It's really more relaxing – most of the time. I don't get angry about the stupid road hog in front of me and anxiously plan a way around him. I have learned to leave for work 5 to 10 minutes earlier than I did in my fossil fuel era, and I even find myself welcoming congestion as a way to conserve power and improve range. The fuel economy of an EV is opposite that of an internal combustion vehicle. The car gets better mileage in stop-and-go traffic (e.g., on “surface” streets) then it does on the freeway, probably because it takes more energy to maintain the mass of the vehicle at the higher speed on the freeway whereas frequent slowing and braking allow an EV to regenerate electricity.

The drive to Salem was relaxing and enjoyable. It was still morning, and there was not a lot of traffic on the road. Of course, almost everyone was passing me, everything from motorcycles to 18-wheelers, but occasionally I saw a car in my rearview mirror keeping pace with me at a respectable distance. I felt a special relationship with those drivers. I presumed that they too resided with me in the abode of blissful unhurriedness. However, it turned out that most of them were too close to their exits to attempt a high-speed pass and still get off the freeway at their desired destination. But I took pleasure while it lasted.

The return trip was more anxiety producing. Although I was not concerned about running out of electrons, and I even ran the AC for a while, the big yellow semi snuggling up to my rear bumper and blasting his air horn upset my wa (harmony, peace, balance). The truck speed limit was 55 mph, but most obeyed the unwritten overage requirement, too. Up until that moment the truckers approaching my rear changed lanes and passed me on the left. So what was the problem with this guy? Did he want me to move into the lane to my left? Should I speed up? Should I pull onto the shoulder? I did what any 15-year-old is taught to do in driver's ed class when someone is tailgating you: slow down. I clicked the cruise control down one notch. 53 mph. Honk honk! Click. 52 mph. Another blast from the air horn. Well, that driver was very rude! I considered lowering my window and gesturing in a way that demonstrated I was quite capable of rudeness myself, but I refrained for two reasons. First, lowering the window at freeway speed increases drag and reduces the Leaf's range. Second, and more important although not my first thought, Leaf drivers do not behave rudely. (We are on a mission.) I decided to return to my maximum cruising speed and ignore the unhappy person behind me. Not my unhappiness. He took the next exit.

A few miles later I had forgotten about this incident and was enjoying my cruise when a movement on my right caught my eye. It was a red Dodge Charger wagon with blackout windows passing me on the shoulder at about 70 mph. What should I do? What could I do? In the time it took my brain to process the situation the Charger had already pulled in front of me and accelerated on into the fast lane, rejoining all the other drivers who were anxious to be somewhere else.

I arrived home with 13 miles to spare.