Ban on new petrol/diesel cars by 2030 - AIBU to be excited?

[almostautumn]

The government are set to announce a ban on sales of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030. As someone who lives in a polluted city (London) and worries about the effect that carbon emissions are having on my family’s health, I’m so excited by this news because I think it will really change our children’s lives for the better. And it’s fantastic that it’s only 10 years away!

www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-54981425

I find it interesting that people can't find charging points on the edges of cities
I had a look for a few personally known locations to see how they faired and there are definitely regional disparities
I live in a village in the NE (admittedly we are lucky to have good EV infra structure up here thanks to Nissan in the north part of the region) within 10miles of my house we have 20+ locations most with multiple points. There are at least 8 free charging points in the closest town atm.
Family in a south Somerset village not quite so well served but still 15+ locations within 10miles
Family in West Yorkshire town only 6 points in town but 20plus within 10miles
Family in SWales town 7 locations (2-4 points at each) within town 20 plus within 10miles
Family in Shropshire village none in village or even local town (which was a surprise) but 15 locations within 10miles of their farm
I would say that the maps of EV charger locations are however often unclear and incomplete, you can get different data depending on which app or map you use.
So as well as the infrastructure needing to improve I think the signposting to it needs improvement too.

But it is not going to happen overnight as it is only for new cars. New cars make up a small proportion of all vehicles. It will take a long time for everyone to have electric, and like broadband or other tech roll outs it will be easier for some than others. Some situations will require different solutions. Something needs to be put in place to incentivise the change to start with. Legislation like this does it!

I don't think the infrastructure is as tricky as crossrail though! I think if you cannot charge at home or in situ at work it may become something like going to a charging station just like heading to a petrol station now. Albeit for a slightly longer time- perhaps depending on how charging develops. Not everyone will be in that situation tho, and increased ranges will mean it is less needed.

@Bwlch

The infrastructure isn't there to allow this

A lot can happen in ten years.

A lot of areas still don’t have decent access to the internet, let alone ample charging points.

@BrrrrrrWentTheAlarmClock I don't think it will take a "long time", yes new cars might be a small minority, but most people I know and on the estate I live on, cars are less than 10 years old. We are not high earners but tend not to buy a car older than 5 years old, so whilst it might not be a huge issue straight away in 10 years, I think the delay in people catching up is likely only to be a further 5-10 years after that which again isn't that long for the amount of infrastructure required for such a huge change.

@Duckduckduck123

As someone who lives in the Highlands and Islands, this ban really worries me. We've regular road closures resulting in 60 mile detours on roads that then get shut due to flooding and accidents from all the extra traffic. Even with the best will on the world, they can't be enough charging points built alongside the big motorways to stop you having a hours wait for a 20 minute 80% charge

You clearly have got the message that London is all that matters! Many people live in areas where this will present problems but as long as it ticks yet another pc box.......

Should read 'you have not got the message'!

Ok, so I just had look on a map to see where the nearest EV charging points to me are. None within 8 miles which wasn't a surprise.

So get to the nearest city 8 miles away, a mid size city but still a decent size. According to the map there are 7 charging points. 4 of which are in pay and display car parks, 3 at petrol stations. I know there will be more in some business/company carparks but these aren't accessible to the majority.

Think id better start saving for an electric car.

I drive an electric car. I love it. It saves me a fortune in fuel.

For the first month I didn't have a home charger. There are a couple of free public chargers down the road from me. So it wasn't an issue.

I did 1000 miles and it literally cost me nothing. I plug in everywhere I go. I am on a home charging tariff now my charger is in and it's around £4 for a full charge.

There really needs to be a huge investment in the infrastructure to support the ban of petrol and diesel cars.
85% of councils don't have any on street charging.
Most shopping centres don't have them either.

So this needs to change. We need multiple chargers on streets, shopping centres, supermarkets and motorway service stations.

We also need people who park their petrol/diesel cars in electric charging points to be fined.

Last week I went to a local supermarket to charge. There were plenty of parking spaces for people. But both electric charging spaces had petrol/diesel cars parked in them. It's very frustrating.

Meant to add.

We lease our electric car. We didn't want to buy outright at the moment as technology is moving on all the time.

I previously had a Mercedes. It cost £430 pm lease with road tax on top.
I spent £250 per month on diesel.

My electric car costs £300 per month on a 2 year lease at 12,000 miles a year.
No road tax and minimal home charging.

So the savings are amazing

I love the idea of electric cars, would love one myself, but I have no drive and no possibility of adding one to the property. I'm lucky if I can park in sight of home, so no chance of getting a charge point. I just can't see how it's workable to only have electric vehicles? I could understand if they were saying only electric and hybrid, because that would cover those of us who don't have a possibility of home charge points.

You clearly have got the message that London is all that matters!

Yeah, because there are absolutely no other large cities that will benefit... or the planet... let's blame it all on London 🙄

I think prices still need to come down a lot on EV's. Also we need to bump up the national grid to cope with the extra capacity needed. We need better access to recharging especially for those without driveways or garages. Motorway service areas need more charging points and more communal charging points in rural areas. Plus of course much longer range between charging at least 3-4 hundred miles (and not just for the high end models), over time with charging and recharging the battery loses capacity so range falls. I was told some time ago that for EV's the battery was a fairly high proportion of the cost of the vehicle so I'd like to have the battery replaced by the manufacturer free f charge in event of failure Better batteries and the suppliers being responsible for their recycling. For the modern EV the batteries are more like phone batteries rather than the old lead batteries in cars and these aren't very nice for the environment. Obtaining the materials is often in non environmentally friendly ways and these materials are rapidly diminishing.

Their was a report recently that the Govt was concerned about the reduced tax revenue from 'environmentally friendly' vehicles so consideration was being given to finding other ways to raise the revenue.

How reliable are EVs? How long do batteries last, will they be like phones and toothbrushes in that after a year you suddenly need to charge much more frequently?! Will batteries need replacing? How much will that cost? If servicing and repairs were reduced that would raise my confidence.

To those saying they don’t go far enough, I have recently switched to electric and I love my new car. It’s saving me a fortune in fuel. I charge it over night once or twice a week.

It goes over 250 miles, and with supercharging it doesn’t take that long to refuel and I can watch Netflix in the car as it charges itself up. I’ve had it since September and I’ve only used a supercharger once. This was a 90% charge - from 10% and cost me £11.

I can see it won’t be as easy if you don’t have a driveway at home to charge.

For everyone saying “if London’s so concerned about their asthmatic children why don’t they just go ahead and restrict Londoners driving?”

Do you realise that there’s going to be a flat cost of £12.50 a day, 365 days a year, for driving older cars inside the North/South Circular (that’s roughly a 150 square mile area) next year?

@notheragain41

I realise this might come across as cheeky, but Google is there for such questions. Electric cars are a well-established technology, and it would only take about 5 minutes to find the answers to your questions.

The range of mine is 144 miles on a full charge in sports mode (slightly more in eco mode) and it goes on charge every night on the fast charge pod we have. Most of my runs are up to 30 miles each way and if it's more I use the diesel, so I've never had to charge it anywhere but home. If I didn't have the diesel I would have to charge it elsewhere but there's an app so you can see where charging places are and book. But the range is going up all the time, they're already improved since I bought mine new in March - in 10 years time I reckon you won't have to charge them nearly as often - maybe once a week?

We drive an electric car and have no problems. Shorter journey it gets charged on the drive. Longer journeys we decide which services we’ll stop at and charge. 20 mins puts loads of charge in if using a supercharger and it takes us that time getting something eat/ toilet stops. I think fully charged the car will do something close to 300 miles. It just requires a bit of planning before setting off but I’m sure it will become the norm.

Yabu to think that electric cars en masse will solve environmental problems. Batteries in the electric cars require all sorts of metals and toxic substances. Like most things, the ban hasn’t been thought through prior to implementation. It’s like saying I’d like to graduate with a maths degree in 3 years’ time, but failing to consider that I didn’t take maths A level.

So using bakeachocolatecaketoday's figures as i do similar milage.i have a new dacia sandero for £8000 and the new leaf is £28000 so at £1320 saving a year i will break even in just over 15 years.Would the car/battery last that long making it viable?

There is no way in hell the infrastructure to support this will be ready in time. It needs to happen eventually but I would bet every penny I have that this will be delayed.

Lovely for all those who can't drive 100 miles without buying a coffee or eating something disgusting from the service station. Boring for the rest of us.

@BoingBoingyBoing

There is no way in hell the infrastructure to support this will be ready in time. It needs to happen eventually but I would bet every penny I have that this will be delayed.

So glad to see others think the same. I honestly think people are massively underestimating just how much infrastructure needs implementing and just how short 9 years is.