Hyundai is making a name for themselves in the green vehicle space with their impressive IONIQ. Going up against powerhouses like the Toyota Prius, Ford C-Max, and the Chevy Volt, the Hyundai IONIQ smashes expectations and offers more trims and options than all the others combined. Establishing a strong market presence with this product line makes sense for Hyundai from both a long and short-term perspective. As this industry must adapt to external pressures such as the rising price of fuel, and a need to switch from the individual consumer to the demands of larger business accounts like ridesharing and autonomous driving fleets.
As we start seeing more of our test vehicles being hybrid or electric it has gotten us really thinking about the importance of how these vehicles work with our current lifestyle, our needs, and the infrastructures we have in place to support them. Starting at only $24,299 CND for the hybrid and going up to $35,649 CND for the all-electric model shows the importance of selecting the vehicle that will best represent your driving needs. Having the opportunity to test both the fully electric and the electric plus IONIQ really showed us how one size does not fit all.
In the end, for us, we were not as comfortable driving without having the familiarity of gasoline as a backup. That’s not to say we couldn’t see the value in the all-electric option, and easily can envision what that driver might look like. I’m sure the ideal candidate would live in a more urban setting with shorter commute times and increased access to rapid charging stations or they might be a more senior member of society who just needs to do errands around town, and is on a more fixed income unable to adjust to rising fuel costs. However, in our situation living in the far outskirts of Vancouver and having to commute all over the valley brought up challenges we felt that the IONIQ Electric Plus was more equipped to handle compared to the just electric option. For example, after a day of driving with a few hours on the road, our poor battery would be completely drained and we would be just starting to dip into the reserve gasoline system, but this was okay as the alternative was to be stuck on the road without any power or a charger in sight…(which almost happened to one of our writers)
The fuel savings alone was enough to make our team pause in interest. With the amount of driving, we do an even moderately fuel-efficient vehicle will easily be $50 a week with today’s record gas prices in Vancouver. With the Hyundai IONIQ Electric Plus, we barely put $20 in for the whole two-week test drive, due to being able to plug the vehicle in each night and start each day fresh with a full battery. So regardless of our feelings on how comfortable we are to changing and using this technology, from an environmental and economic standpoint, it is getting increasingly ridiculous to think that we will keep using fossil fuels when the alternatives are right in front of our face.
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