Electric Cars

[midlifecrisis]

@stindig
As Catman says energy production using renewable resources will only improve in efficiency and effectiveness. A new development offshore from Hull should power half a million homes.

North Sea Race Bank wind farm opens near Lincolnshire and Norfolk

The Race Bank offshore wind farm opens off the Norfolk and Lincolnshire coast with 91 turbines.

www.bbc.co.uk

Which is not to be sniffed at.

A similar development off the coast of Dorset was rejected by the NIMBYs of the old Conservatives. Which was disappointing

 

[stindig]

That’s progress. Another 30 or so of those fields would power the UK electric car potential. But nobody really understands the ramifications of wind fields either. Why doesn’t the government mandate photo-voltaic tiles on all new houses? We’re not the sunniest country but scale is the thing

 

[2b1ask1]

I refer to my earlier post about PV’s they are just not efficient enough yet.

 

[Doohickey]

The cheapest way to utilise nature for electricity is on land wind farms - far easier to build and to get the electricity from but unfortunately there is a general presumption against these due to the impact on the apperance of this green and pleasant land.

I'm thinking about getting a hybrid next but on the purely selfish grounds that I drive 13 or so miles to work and back 3 or 4 days a week and I can save quite a bit by doing it on electric.

 

[Wack61]

I'm thinking about getting a hybrid next but on the purely selfish grounds that I drive 13 or so miles to work and back 3 or 4 days a week and I can save quite a bit by doing it on electric.

I think hybrids are how it's going to be viable , once millions of battery only cars are on the road charging on the move won't be cheap or readily available
I get ****** off if somebody is buying a coffee and a sandwich while their car is still hogging the pump , the thought of arriving at the motorway services to find all the charging points occupied or worse would drive me nuts

 

[lifes2short]

I get ** off if somebody is buying a coffee and a sandwich while their car is still hogging the pump , the thought of arriving at the motorway services to find all the charging points occupied or worse would drive me nuts

exactly, I read somewhere that there are in excess of 30 million cars on the roads, if we are supposed to be all in ev's by was it 2040?, how many effing charging points would be required countrywide to satisfy the demand in charging whilst out and about????

 

[CatmanV2]

exactly, I read somewhere that there are in excess of 30 million cars on the roads, if we are supposed to be all in ev's by was it 2040?, how many effing charging points would be required countrywide to satisfy the demand in charging whilst out and about????

Probably not that many. Most charging will take place at home while the car isn't going anywhere. For example we own 3 cars. Only one has done anything like miles this week.
When you hit the efficiency where EV will do a normal tank range, you're looking at far far fewer visits to service stations.

Even now, Imagine you had a petrol pump at home. Even if it was only enough to put say 2.5 gallons in your car a day, how often would you go to the local BP?

Not that I'm particularly in favour of EVs but the situation now will not linearly turn into the situation of the future.

C

 

[midlifecrisis]

PV using visible light might be inefficient in terms of the broad band of the electromagnetic spectrum but they do have an impact on the overall load. Tesla have produced roof tiles to act as PV too so progress will be made in diversifying our energy production.

 

[Ewan]

I'm thinking about getting a hybrid next but on the purely selfish grounds that I drive 13 or so miles to work and back 3 or 4 days a week and I can save quite a bit by doing it on electric.

I average 13 miles a day, for my office/gym/home commute. I looked at a Renault Twizy as a cheap, fun, summer electric alternative. Turns out that at the current cost of petrol in the Strad, versus electricity in the Twizy (inc the £50 per month battery fee), it’s cheaper on fuel to use the V8 Maserati. Result!

As an example, if fuel is £1.30 a litre and your car does 30mpg, you’d need to do at least 3000 miles per year in the Twizy to make the switch worthwhile. And if you look at the second hand Twizy’s currently available, none have done 3000 miles per year, so all have cost their owners more than a petrol equivalent would have. (P.S. This sum excludes other financial factors such as servicing, tax, depreciation, etc. It’s based purely on fuel costs.)

 

[alfatwo]

Probably not that many. Most charging will take place at home while the car isn't going anywhere. For example we own 3 cars. Only one has done anything like miles this week.
When you hit the efficiency where EV will do a normal tank range, you're looking at far far fewer visits to service stations.

Even now, Imagine you had a petrol pump at home. Even if it was only enough to put say 2.5 gallons in your car a day, how often would you go to the local BP?

Not that I'm particularly in favour of EVs but the situation now will not linearly turn into the situation of the future.

C

As two thirds of the population don't have off road parking, how's charging at home overnight going happen then mate?

Dave

 

[lifes2short]

Probably not that many. Most charging will take place at home while the car isn't going anywhere. For example we own 3 cars. Only one has done anything like miles this week.
When you hit the efficiency where EV will do a normal tank range, you're looking at far far fewer visits to service stations.

Even now, Imagine you had a petrol pump at home. Even if it was only enough to put say 2.5 gallons in your car a day, how often would you go to the local BP?

Not that I'm particularly in favour of EVs but the situation now will not linearly turn into the situation of the future.

C

fair points, but I can just imagine the scenarios of not enough points, stranded vehicles, arguments at charging stations where long queues, what about people that live in flats, houses with no drives??

 

[sionie1]

The Mrs has use of an electric Ford Focus. It’s a great little runabout, however it’s range is around 140 miles, which is ok for most of her trips from Stratford to Brentwood. Plugged in to a home socket though and it takes over 12 hours to fully charge. She’ll often come over to Surrey if I’m down there with work and again, the mileage isn’t usually a problem.The issues come though when the M25 grinds to a halt, in winter and she has to make a decision between turning off the heater, radio etc and arriving ( just about ) or getting stranded. On that occasion the lack of charging points was a huge issue. However as battery life and range extends I can see why EV is attractive. I’ll struggle until they come up with a range on one charge of 400-500 miles and a fast charger ( for the same range the next day) as that’s what I regularly do in a day, and over a mix of road types.

 

[CatmanV2]

As two thirds of the population don't have off road parking, how's charging at home overnight going happen then mate?

Dave

Good point! Dunno, but there are already on street charging points.

C

 

[CatmanV2]

I average 13 miles a day, for my office/gym/home commute. I looked at a Renault Twizy as a cheap, fun, summer electric alternative. Turns out that at the current cost of petrol in the Strad, versus electricity in the Twizy (inc the £50 per month battery fee), it’s cheaper on fuel to use the V8 Maserati. Result!

As an example, if fuel is £1.30 a litre and your car does 30mpg, you’d need to do at least 3000 miles per year in the Twizy to make the switch worthwhile. And if you look at the second hand Twizy’s currently available, none have done 3000 miles per year, so all have cost their owners more than a petrol equivalent would have. (P.S. This sum excludes other financial factors such as servicing, tax, depreciation, etc. It’s based purely on fuel costs.)

If it's just about cost, and at current petrol rates, yes it's probably not economical. But you didn't by a Strad for the economy

C

 

[rockits]

The cheapest way to utilise nature for electricity is on land wind farms - far easier to build and to get the electricity from but unfortunately there is a general presumption against these due to the impact on the apperance of this green and pleasant land.

I'm thinking about getting a hybrid next but on the purely selfish grounds that I drive 13 or so miles to work and back 3 or 4 days a week and I can save quite a bit by doing it on electric.

We should certainly be doing more on new developments when it is so easy to do so. Every new building should have fibre into the premises for Internet, solar tiled roof and rain water harvesting systems as a minimum but they are not at the moment which is a ridiculous wasted opportunity to do it at it's easiest most cost effective point.

You would be able to save a great deal with a hybrid indeed. I have been surprised how effective the Outlander PHEV is on my journeys. Over my first 1k miles I have used not quite one tank of petrol. It has given a real world mpg figure of 120mpg which is pretty good. We also use an energy provider that provides our electricity from renewables. We also have 16 solar panels on the garage roof all South facing on the old FIT tariff giving us back about 75% of our electricity costs.

If we can get to build a new house I don't see an issue with being able to make it a zero carbon one.

 

[stindig]

rockits - it's great that your electricity supplier manages to tunnel all of the renewable atoms to your house, leaving all the normal atoms to go elsewhere to houses that haven't selected a green supplier

 

[Ewan]

So far, in 8 months and 7000 miles of ownership, my PHEV Rangie has run on electric only mode for 17% of the time apparently. Which is many hundreds of “free” and “clean” miles. Better than nothing.

The overall mpg is 36, so exactly double what I used to get from my old Supercharged petrol Rangie.

The latest electric/petrol hybrid Rangie is several steps better again, so that’s what I’ll change to next time.

 

[daverichardson]

We have had a massive house building program in my area over the last 10 years or so.
Not one has PV on the roof. It may be inefficient but should last 20 years
Lip service is paid to insulation, Ground pumps etc could have been installed before the buildings were made etc
Governments have missed a trick here imho

 

[CatmanV2]

rockits - it's great that your electricity supplier manages to tunnel all of the renewable atoms to your house, leaving all the normal atoms to go elsewhere to houses that haven't selected a green supplier

Electrons you fule . Not atoms!

C

 

[allandwf]

The overall mpg is 36, so exactly double what I used to get from my old Supercharged petrol Rangie.

Surely negated by me running it?