THE FORD MUSTANG MACH-E DEMONSTRATES A KEY EV PROBLEM: BATTERY COST

There’s a very good reason why battery-electric vehicles are so expensive compared to their internal-combustion cohorts: battery cost. An EV needs a battery capacity rating in the dozens of kWh in order to provide a useful amount of driving range on a full charge. With an average price well north of $100 per kWh, lithium-ion battery packs like the one in the new Ford Mustang Mach-E tend to get expensive pretty quickly.

As a matter of fact, one Redditor recently found, a replacement battery pack for the Ford Mustang Mach-E can cost as much as a brand-new vehicle: $18,514.13 for the standard-range pack at one US dealer. The battery cost swells to $23,648.94 for the extended-range pack.

Now, it’s important to keep in mind that the Ford Mustang Mach-E is still – as of this writing – quite a new addition to the lineup. Remember: the Mach-E is in such high demand that already the automaker has delayed a couple of models and repurposed its entire Cuautitlán Assembly Plant just to produce more of them. Ford could be forgiven for not really wanting to sell you a battery pack that they could just as easily put into a new, saleable unit, and for pricing their replacement packs accordingly.

Furthermore, the battery pack is covered by an 8-year/100,000-mile warranty here in the US, so it will be a good long while before too many current owners have to shell out the cash for a replacement. Even those that do won’t have to pay the battery cost themselves, unless they’ve somehow managed to void the warranty.

Even still, it’s hard to overcome the sticker shock that comes with seeing a nearly-$24,000 battery cost for the extended-range Ford Mustang Mach-E. That price will almost certainly come down with time, but there’s a pretty high floor on the price; according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s latest annual battery price survey, EV battery packs still retain an average price-per-unit-energy of about $132 per kWh. At 91 kWh, the latest extended range Ford Mustang Mach-E battery pack would still cost about $12,000 at that price.

It’s enough to really make you appreciate that $43,895 starting MSRP.