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Electric Cars - The Future?

Rob

Rob

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I am sure that we all saw the news yesterday that the sale of all new petrol and diesel cars (including hybrids) will end by 2040 in order to help tackle air pollution.

I'd love to hear people's thoughts on this. Whilst I accept that air pollution is a problem that needs tackling I can't help but feel there are going to be endless issues. Technology is going to have to come on leaps and bounds in the next 20 years for this to be sustainable from a practical point of view.

Most electric cars have a range of up to 200 miles at present. This is going to need to be extended significantly for those who make regular long journeys. Charging points are going to need to be here, there and everywhere, and ideally charging times need to be significantly reduced (otherwise journey times will be increased as you take a break to charge your car). No doubt that motorway service stations simply do not have the capacity for such mass charging.

Will charging points be installed at people's homes and if so how much would this cost? Will that national grid cope with all the extra electricty being used? What are the government going to do cover for lost fuel duty revenue?

A lot can change between now and 2040. There will no doubt be a far larger choice of electric cars at more affordable prices by then however I am sceptical.

I'll have to make sure I get myself a nice petrol car in 2039! ;)

:)
 
I have 2 major issues with this and they are;

1) Does the footprint of removing the emissions from cars offset or better the negative environmental impact caused by the production of batteries?

2)Affordability/incentive. Right now the biggest hurdle is getting people to ditch their ICE for batteries. Of course those with plenty of pocket change will do this but there is no precedence for a second hand market in electric engines. When half the value of the car is the battery, buying a car with significant mileage is even more riskier than purchasing an ICE.

That's before all the excellent points that you have raised in your post Rob.

As you say its a long time until 2040 and more and more investment into battery technology is critical. Formula E will be as important to the future motor industry as F1 has been since the 1960's.
 
I have the same questions on my mind. For electric cars to really be the future, technology needs to make leap and bounds, and the government needs to invest A LOT to make electric cars practical. At the moment they are good for commuting, and that's about it. Charging points are few and far between in the UK, they don't last long between charges, charging is slow and there's hardly any support for electric cars to make people to want to ditch their petrol/diesel vehicles.

23 years is a while away, although I'm dubious technology will have made the leaps it needs to by then, and the government will have invested in electric cars by then for electric cars to be the future.

I imagine in 2039 petrol car sales will be very high.

Anyone seen the episode 'Nosedive' of Charlie Brooker's Black Mirror, when I saw this announced I couldn't help but think of the cars in that episode not being far from what our roads could be like in 30+ years, and the government would also needs lots of these.

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I looked at going electric for cleaner transport for my gardening round last year, after getting cut up by a delivery driver in one round town.
Apart from the cost, which would have meant two quid an hour on my punters payments, I couldn't have done the Towers and back without a lengthy recharge at the services on the way home, and as the services dont yet have that many chargers, I might have had to queue there as well...so I just didn't bother.
So I got a neighbours shed Focus estate instead, low mileage, two litre top of the range auto, for one thirtieth of the cost of the leccy car.
...and they need big amps to charge them up, so your fusebox would need an upgrade if it is anything like mine.
 
Back when they started seriously talking about Electric cards there was a lot of talk about hydrogen cars which run the same as petrol and have a better distance. the only output is water. But it seems like the govt has just decided that electric is the way forward and that's that.

There was also another Idea i saw with electric cars where instead of charging it you go into a little building like a car wash and it changes the battery out - I think this is a much better idea than having to wait for the car to charge
 
I saw this on the news yesterday and my thoughts are, it's going to be a bummer for any classic cars owners.

Electricity is not 100% green, even wind turbines generate a lot of bad green house gasses during the making on them.

With driver-less cars just around the corner and shared car clubs schemes, I can see in the future that no one will be owning their own cars. When you need to travel, you will just order a car online, a car will self drive to your house, pick you up and then take you to your destination, and then the car will then go and pick up the next person to take to their destination. There will be no more parking issues

Currently, electric cars can do around 100 miles before they need to be recharged, that means a couple of batteries change/charges just to travel to Alton Towers (and another couple for the way home again)
 
Combustion engines will be phased out, they already are. Most workplaces already have charging ports, it wouldn't take much for the government to enforce them either.

I do however think this may be much more difficult for commercial vehicles.

I agree with RoyJess that no-one will own a car in the not-so-distant future.
 
RoyJess said:
With driver-less cars just around the corner and shared car clubs schemes, I can see in the future that no one will be owning their own cars. When you need to travel, you will just order a car online, a car will self drive to your house, pick you up and then take you to your destination, and then the car will then go and pick up the next person to take to their destination. There will be no more parking issues
Click to expand...
smudge said:
I agree with RoyJess that no-one will own a car in the not-so-distant future.
Click to expand...

Maybe one day but I really don't see that happening in my lifetime at least. It just doesn't seem convenient for a start, you would not be able to just pop out quickly somewhere as you'd be arriving for what is in effect a taxi to come and pick you up. Ordering one would be a faff, specifying how many seats and how much boot space etc. you need. And where would all these cars be stored overnight when they are not in demand?

Life with no car seems far less appealing to me than life with an electric car! #FirstWorldProblems

:)
 
I like the Tesla approach. Cover your roof in solar panels (The nice ones which look like normal roof tiles, not the ugly ones we currently have), which charge a battery during the day, which then charges your car over night.

Think how much mobile batteries have improved over the last 20 years, from reduced size to increase life time, to reduced recharge rate. As electric cars become more main stream, hopefully the same advances will occur with car batteries.

Hopefully this is something that Formula E will help accelerate, I just wish Tesla would join it, but most of the other big manufactures have plans to join, and hopefully those investing in the sport, will help bring the benefits to consumers sooner rather than later.

Its an interesting argument, about the environmental cost of creating these batteries and disposing of them, but I think when talking about that, you need to consider the costs of having to drill for oil and refine it in petrol/diesel and transporting that all over the world, and think about the positive impact not having to do that will have.

I think the driver less technology in cars, and the ability to re-charge without wires (or with wires https://goo.gl/K5nn9j) solves a lot of the issues about ensuring their is enough charging ports, it does not solve the issue of having enough spaces for staff to park. You arrive at the office in the morning, and get out at the main entrance, the car then checks if any charging ports are free, if their is it goes and takes one, if not, it adds itself to the queue, and parks in a normal space. When its spot in the queue becomes free, it then drives itself to the spot and charges. Once it has enough charge to get the driver home, it leaves the charging space, and parks in a normal space.

I enjoy driving, I don't want technology to take all the fun out of it. But if the car can do some stuff autonomously, or stop you from making mistakes and avoid accidents, or just make the drive home a little easier after a long day in the office I am all in favour of that.

I also find it a little odd that while the government is planning to ban Petrol and Diesel cars, it is abandoning its plans to electrify large parts of the UK Rail Network.
 
Rob said:
Maybe one day but I really don't see that happening in my lifetime at least. It just doesn't seem convenient for a start, you would not be able to just pop out quickly somewhere as you'd be arriving for what is in effect a taxi to come and pick you up. Ordering one would be a faff, specifying how many seats and how much boot space etc. you need. And where would all these cars be stored overnight when they are not in demand?

Life with no car seems far less appealing to me than life with an electric car! #FirstWorldProblems
:)
Click to expand...

70 years ago we were at war, no internet and the average salary was £1300. A lot can change in a lifetime :) Hell a lot has already changed in my lifetime. I hope I'm still less than a 3rd through it too.

I picture it less like a taxi, more like a private vehicle still, that parks in the street, on your drive or in a garage. We've already got lawnmowers that take themselves home to charge.

Look how mobile phones have changed in the last 15 years. VW have committed to abolishing all combustion engines by 2030 IIRC. The tech is already there its just getting the costs down to make it viable for us as a consumer.
 
Sorry for the double post, but I thought I'd crunch some basic numbers. Let's say Kelpie was driving us up to the Blackpool meet this weekend in a current electric car.

While they can get a range of about 100 miles in city driving, at motorway speeds that drops to around 65 miles. A drive of 233 miles would need about 3.6 battery charges.

Batteries currently take 6-8 hours to fully charge, let's call it 7.
We would end up having to make a minimum of 3 "pit stops" (Granted, we would normally stop at least twice anyway, but it can be done with just one). If each stop requires at least 7 hours, it would take an absolute minimum of 25 hours for a journey that currently takes 4.


Now of course, technology can and will improve over time. But why are forcing this upon us? To save us from nasty fumes? This is the same government who recently cancelled electrifying the Great Western Main Line because "diesels do the job". More likely this is all part of the plan to keep us plebs trapped where we can be controlled.
 
They're doing it because 'expert advisors' have told them it's the proper thing to do.

Probably the same experts who told them diesel cars would save the planet, solar can produce power as efficiently as coal or nuclear and that it was perfectly safe to remove the firedoors from high-rise flats and clad them with flammable materials because 'fires will be contained inside the flat by design'.

On our way back from Towers yesterday we stopped at Warwick Services, there were four charging points and approx 300 cars parked, this is typical of modern society, make a snap decision without thinking through the practicality of it.
 
My car has been recycled for 51 years, 10 months and 28 Days. A car having to ship rare elements around the world to make batteries is a hell of a lot more producing of greenhouse gasses.
 
I personally think 2040 is rather ambitious but it does need to be done.

My only issue is do we have the capacity to generate the extra electricity for 30 million cars. That doesn't include vans, buses & regional delivery vehicles.

I understand the "filling the bathtub" but is that enough?

Nuclear is a clean & very safe option but has a lot of opposition & takes many years from application to operation.

Wind is great but it so difficult for "On demand" power & can really mess with the frequency of the gird. This is where nuclear is great as you just pop a rod in and you have power at the frequency you need.

Until we have the storage for renewables, which I personally don't believe we will have by 2040, I see this being a difficult target.

Hybrid engines with KERS systems for power when needed seems like a great option.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk
 
The announcement is just a way for the government to put off actually doing anything for 23 years... The dates on these sorts of things has a tendency to move out as it gets closer. There is no actual plan therr on jow to achieve the target.

I thought the concept of tying VED rates to emissions was a good way to help the market move forward, it just needed to include NoX and CO2 components, and the bands be tightened each year.
 
The announcement is just a way for the government to put off actually doing anything for 23 years... The dates on these sorts of things has a tendency to move out as these gets closer, especially when there is no plan on how to achieve the target.

They need to improve air quality now, but are scared of upsetting their core voters. The concept of tying VED rates to emissions was moving the market toward efficient engines, it just needed to include NoX and CO2 components, and the bands be tightened each year to keep the same percentages of vehicles in each one.

It is meaningless to set a date without a plan for how, as it has no chance of being met.
 
Right to clear up. ICE cars with hybrid tech are safe, it's just pure ICE to be banned in 2040
 
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