Improve and subsidise public transport whilst simultaneously encouraging and facilitating active transport options (cycling, walking etc)
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@Giminion I was joking on the not braking point, but I’ve seen enough studies and so on with daft ideas over the years, that politicians latch onto.
For me to use public transport it would need to be dramatically improved and much, much, much cheaper. For me to forgo the 19 mile round commute, the journey would need to be shorter than the 1½ to 2 hour one way trip if everything’s ontime (3 buses) and not £13.50 return. I’m not the only one like this. Plus public transport would remove the flexibility I have.
So yes improve public transport, but not just in towns and cities.
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Indirectly, we won’t.
Looking ahead to 2040, & only new electric cars = a huge increase in generated energy will be required maybe even another nuclear power station (Chinese reactor??) in the UK.
Distribution of that power at “local source” will require huge investment / tech changes to cope with the loading / capacity / demand. Not so easy as turning on a hydro-electric generator to provide the surge demand when everyone puts their kettles on during the advert break in Coronation Street! Home storage will not be sufficient to charge an electric vehicle (or more than one!) over-night. Multi-accommodation living (blocks of flats, etc), will have huge problems in supplying enough charging points.
Local town garages will not have the footprint to allow more than a few cars to charge up - currently, drive in, fuel (liquid from the pumps), pay at pump or kiosk, out in 5-6 mins.
Don’t forget, the lithium has to come from somewhere - not always with positive knock-on effects. Who dominates lithium-ion battery production? Have a guess! Battery life / recycling - not really under consideration. Tesla quote 70% retention of capacity in their warranty = a big hit on range:
" * Model 3 - 8 years or 100,000 miles, whichever comes first, with minimum 70% retention of Battery capacity over the warranty period."
All the current Government tax revenue from liquid fuel, etc, will disappear. All the current VED “benefits” for zero emission cars will have to change.
All for being “green” but we need to tread very carefully.
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The problem of overall environmental impact is certainly far broader, extending beyond direct emissions from emissions from vehicles. And we do need to consider methods and means of product and infrastructure development and fabrication…
However the specific point I was referring to was dealing with direct vehicle emissions - and the steps (or potential steps I can foresee being taken that will mitigate other forms of vehicle pollution such as brake and tyre “dust”) following thereafter.
It makes me laugh how people will scoff at the idea of solving one problem, just because it leaves or creates another. Necessity is the mother of all invention - we will find a way, just like programmers who fix one bug to uncover 3 more find solutions.
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I’ve long thought that the diesel/petrol thing ought to be looked holistically - which may not change the end decision, but still - diesel is certainly a dirtier fuel, but you burn much less of it than you do petrol for the same journey.
On a 600 mile motorway journey I’ll use about 50 litres of diesel. In a petrol car of similar size and age I might burn 70+ litres.
Less is pumped out of the ground, less is refined, less is transported, less is distributed and stored - and, of course, less is bought from either unfriendly or unpleasant states that we’d rather not be beholden to…
Very true - BUT it does seem to me that there are many “full circles” being turned by nervous governments responding in a knee-jerk way to unproven environmentalist claims.
Don’t forget that back in 1998, the EU promoted diesel as a more environmentally friendly fuel, with lower fuel taxes than petrol, etc. Now, improved design of petrol engines means diesel no longer holds any climate change advantage, so diesel is the fuel of the devil! However, against all expectations, sales of diesel cars in UK haven’t plummeted as forecast. Emission level changes may have been an indirect cause here. That said, there was a large drop in 2017.
So, what will change / reverse in the next 20 yrs?? 
The grid will be fine - a little known electric car fact is that refining the petrol for an average petrol car uses around the same electricity per mile as directly powering a battery-electric car. The end-user infrastructure will need some work though to be most effective.
Not net greenhouse gas increases without a lot of different projects. Mazda have finally released their evolved petrol engine as one example.
The diesel/petrol situation is an example of ever evolving tech and knowledge that displays the desire and inclination towards innovation through necessity - either market forces or legislative pressures. Diesel is now “bad” because of NOx, not because it is any different to what it what it was. NOx wasn’t considered a necessary focus in 1993 - it’s only now really relevant in the most urban and congested areas where the levels build without dilution. It’s less of an issue outside of metropolitan areas.
Even in that area, innovation has continued and Bosch has done some promising work in reducing NOx emissions from diesels.
This is important work as these vehicles will still be around for a long time.
So - battery life and life cycle is a problem… Innovation occurs and better batteries are created. Recycling… How many more materials are able to be recycled compared to 20 years ago? It wasn’t that long ago that large-scale/large capacity power storage (and delivery) wasn’t yet feasible and now we are at the point where a battery installation can almost instantaneously pick up the slack when production is interrupted or a surge in demand occurs.
I have no doubt that we will meet all of the necessary challenges.
Not so sure, even OFGEM suggest that flexible charging might be necessary.
From a House of Commons reportt:
- Rather than increases to peak demand, the most problematic impacts of EVs on the
electricity grid are likely to be experienced on distribution networks, where the majority
of charge points are expected to be connected. If clusters of EV charge points emerge
** without sufficient planning and mitigation measures, then charging could overload local,**
low voltage networks, leading to power outages or ‘brown-outs’. The ‘My Electric
Avenue’ EV trials found that that over 300,000 UK networks could be at risk of overloading
> from EV charging, with some local networks overloading when as little as 30–40% of
customers charge their vehicle. Separate analysis by the Green Alliance has found that
“as few as 6–8 cars charging in a small cluster, at peak time through dumb chargers,
could result in significant disruptions to the local electricity distribution system.” The
risk of overloading will vary according to local conditions–particularly the amount of
‘spare capacity’ that is available to deal with additional loads. Rural networks may be
particularly at risk, since they typically have lower resilience (being connected to fewer
neighbouring networks), and because motorists in rural areas are likely to rely heavily on
home charging.
See also 3. EV impacts on electricity networks:
Our distribution and
transmission networks
were not designed for
EV demand from homes
with off-street parking and
potentially we do not have
sufficient network capacity
for mass-uptake.• It takes time to realise new
capacity, and gaps could
emerge that would lead
to power outages or other
constraints unless action
is taken
Not so much an overall capacity issue, but a localised issue of clustered increases in demand in areas not previously “scaled” for it.
An already current example is heat pumps - over a certain size you have to inform the electricity board and they may deny installation or require changes to your supply to deal with the demand. Larger charging stations already meet or exceed those supply levels.
That’s not an over reaction - I have known cases where installations have not only affected the owner’s house, but also neighbours when the unit is running during peak consumption times.
Umm how bout you all get your own eco car thread? 
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Fair point, grid was probably the wrong word.
What I meant was that the power generation capacity won’t be the problem, rather that the transmission to the user (including the local network) might be.
Yes. But most refineries, and by most read ALL can generate their own power on site.
So if fewer refineries are required, there will be fewer small power stations.
What is needed are government incentives both financial and legal to encourage every roof in the uk to be fitted with solar panels and every home and office to be fitted with a home battery.
Essentially the future is to keep the centralisation of the grid, but to decentralised power generation.
A bonus of this is of course greater power generation redundancy.
The Government gave the wrong message when they scrapped solar panel subsidies / loans / grants. Same for the scrapping of the Feed-In tariffs. The new “Smart Export Guarantee” doesn’t seem to be so attractive - for some Feed-In tariffs, companies would install the panels for free, the consumer would get the energy savings, but then the provider would get the Feed-In benefits; everyone was happy.
A typical solar panel installation could cost around £5000 or more; payback time for the energy savings can be up to 10 yrs. Obviously, building “green” technology as part of original housing construction phase is simpler, cheaper & much more cost effective. Mandate such technology = cheaper prices per unit.
In EU, they are way ahead of use for eco-friendly legislation relating to housing construction. The Dutch have been leaders on this for a while - they even want to stop the use of gas within houses!
However, you can’t build carbon-neutral / 100% energy efficient housing in the middle of nowhere - the transport “footprint” would totally negate the housing energy benefits`!
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I’ve moved all of this out of the ‘Laugh’ thread. Feel free to continue it separately.
What makes me laugh with e-car users in cities and that’s about the only place they are of any use, is they plug their toys in and magic happens and they can drive around for a couple of hundred miles until they need some more magic to happen. It annoys me that many workplace and public charging points in supermarkets are free how does that get allowed, surely there has to be a cost attached and who’s paying? There’d be hell to pay if you went to Tesco got your shop, filled the car up and just drove off, yet that’s exactly what happens at car park charging points.
That’s why I think the people with electric cars are oblivious to the fact that the electricity has to be created so they can live in their eco bubble. They are going to come down with an almighty bump when the number e-cars increases and all of a sudden it’s going to start to cost them to charge their toys.
Personally I need to cost of decent sized electric cars to come down. I’ve driven saloons all my life as the insurance was cheaper and you didn’t get pulled by plod, compared to mates in little cars. I’m not into hiring cars as seems to be the modern trend. Battery life needs to be like that of normal car’s tank of petrol, ie gives around 400 miles plus running lights, radio, wipers, heaters etc etc, even if sitting in traffic jams. Also the boot needs to be able accommodate a family holiday’s gear and not resort to the silly boxes on the roof. I got all of the requirements of many family holidays and trips (not to mention DofE) in the boot and fully laden would get 45 mpg from the 2L Sierras and Mondeos I’ve had for the last 30 years on a run. Not really sure if an e-car of any decent size can do that.
I quite like the idea of hybrids but the cost especially those that recharge batteries, but the jap ones look over designed like something a kid would draw, with funny shaped lights and angles all over the place. I would love a Mondy hybrid but the cost is prohibitive, so looking for a petrol one, but there are not that many around, like there used to be.
@MikeJenvey As for the Dutch wanting to go gas free in homes, not so sure. We have a gas cooker, my wife likes gas as it gives you immediate heat control when cooking and we’ve never heard of a gas cut like the power cuts we get every so often and like we experienced as kids in the 70s. We were affected by the big power cut the other week and several neighbours have said they had food and meals ruined as they were part cooked in their electric ovens and then it went off. We said we were fine as we have a gas cooker, all we needed was some matches as the electric ignition didn’t work.
but it does charge them if they charge at home - so like the rest of us use a free source.
if i offered you the chance of 40litres of premium diesel at no cost at work whenever you wanted it to counter the £50 you put in once a week at the local BP filling station which would you take?
why??
the average car journey in the UK is less than 100 miles, why do you need more than 4x that duration?
how often do drivers fill up and drive until the fuel light comes on in one journey?
back in the late 90s/early 00s it was common place to have a (Nokia) mobile phone last 2-3 or more days on a single charge.
then technology on mobile phones increased, at the cost of battery life, but people didn’t care, people’s attitude to charging a mobile phone soon swapped over from charging twice a week to charging everyday.
The same will happy with E-cars - society will get used to plugging in a car in the same way we plug in a mobile phone daily.
let me introduce you to this “decent sized car” with ample boot space, suitable for a family holiday/day out.
I don’t speak of personal experience but know a fellow CFAV who has three kids and manages perfectly with one.
I also offer this just shy of your 400mile limit, but 348miles is a close match
ignoring range/duration of the driving period, in my opinion the one item which will generate a big step change in societies move to electric cars is the ease and speed in recharging.
it takes less than 8 minutes to full up a ICE car which will have 300+ miles, yet a e-car with half that range takes 8 times longer to “refuel”.
once a convenient recharging process has been considered i cannot see adoption of e-cars being readily accepted unless, like the mobile phone, society is happy to change it’s approach to how often it “refuels” a car
The latest Which report on e-cars & range was quite illuminating - I think that about 25% needed to be taken off the quoted figures. I bet they took a big hit recently coping with air conditioning for the 30+C temperatures!!
There will be major changes to Government policy for e-cars - all the bonuses (zero VED, no fuel tax, etc), will disappear, otherwise too much revenue will be lost. As it is, the cost of e-cars is too high for most people; personally, I think that hybrids offer the best of both worlds.
At some stage, car manufacturers will have to look at some kind of “transitional” chassis / bodywork (& phase down of number of liquid fuel cars made) that can be used on both liquid fuel & e-cars. Come the big “no liquid cars from now on” day, there will be a huge number of liquid fuel cars that immediately become scrap! As it is, the engines will be scrap as far as use in the UK (& probably most / all of EU).
Yep, I quite agree - but looking at home “self-generation” options, it’s not a player. Equally, it’s a fossil resource that has to be considered to run out at some stage - & supply is also under the control of major players, Russia for example.
i completely disagree (my bold)
if only because you’ve include “a huge number” - there is little point to state a “no ICE cars after this date” if on that date there still is a “huge number” of them, it will be a transition into “clean” cars
from 2040 manufacturers are not allowed to sell ICE cars in the UK, but that doesn’t mean that we’ll not be driving ICE cars in 2041…
Read around the subject and by mid-2020s and in 2030s e-cars will become higher sellers as we reach the 2040 deadline - but only for new car sales.
there is still likely to be a large and thriving used-car sales market.
Once such a date is set that ICE cars will not be used i would expect the vast majority of vehicles would be e-cars leaving only a small number of ICE reverting to scrap - but even then don’t believe we’ll ever stop burning petrol or diesel in my lifetime.
Why am i so sure? because from an industrial point of view I can’t see it happening, although many buses are getting greener, i cannot see the haulage industry being in the same no ICE trucks by 2040 as the time required to recharge the vehicle is time it is not on the road and thus not making money.
a quick example of transitioning from one technology to another i can think of is the transition from FM/AM radio to DAB - the Govn have suggested several times to indicate switching off the FM/AM signal as DAB becomes more popular but are yet to actually set a date but have tried several times to set one, and there is still not date suggested 20+ years after DAB technology was brought to the masses.
switch off FM/AM in 2015, reported in 2010 - 9 years ago it was expected to have happened 4 years ago
Digital Switch over by 2020, reported in 2013 - 6 years ago (3 years later) it was already put back, but still within the decade.
The transition to digital television took 5 years and although very different technologies and reasons for changing, the transition was not made or completed in such a way to create a mass obsolete pile of kit - certainly when looking at the TVs, many simply could carry on by the use of a set-top box or similar device.
I predict there will be high penalties for continuing with an ICE car, high road tax and fuel prices, but i don’t think it will stop. There are still cars on the roads which are 25-30+ years old which are seen despite the high Tax placed upon them…once the date is set i expect a very small % of vehicles will be ICE cars
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