Electric cars - so worried

[Northernlurker]

I keep worrying about being forced to buy an electric car when I change my car in a few years.
Reason being the long journeys and (mostly) self catering we love. In Scotland.
We need a range around 50% higher than the current max. It's no good saying charge it on the way if there are no fast chargers. Been looking at details today, even the fastest chargers need just over 30 minutes. Thousands of people drive UJ the Highlands and Islands annually. There won't be anything like enough chargers to cover that. We can charge overnight using an ordinary plug but it's not going to hit the max. Feel like we will spend the whole time worrying about finding a free charger in the middle of nowhere.
How is this ever going to work? It takes two Minutes to fill up a tank with petrol, electric is going to take hours!

I’m not totally convinced about EVs myself but I think your position is looking at this whole thing backwards.

Look how far ranges and availability have come in the last five years. Assuming we continue to see improvements, as well as investment in charging infrastructure which is becoming the major hurdle now, then you will probably be able to switch pretty seamlessly to an EV in a few years’ time.

Oh yes, no chance electricity for EVs will go untaxed. And when was the last time your energy company wrote to you to say your bill was going down?!?

I would imagine over time running an EV will attract similar taxation levels and costs as running a petrol car now.

Otherwise you’ve got huge, huge budgetary gaps — and the roads need maintenance, especially with increasing numbers of two-tonne plus EVs rumbling around on them.

@Boxowine

I'm so tired of people saying that it's not a big deal to run charging cables across the pavement to their car. Of course it's a big deal for people who are jogging, pushing babies, in wheelchairs, etc.

Don't worry, they'll realise it's a big deal when they get sued for someone tripping over it. Then they'll likely not only lose their ev, but probably their house too from the lawsuit.

Unless they are going to put charge points at every single parking spot across the country, which they could never organise or afford, then its pointless everyone having electric cars. Considering they still haven't managed to provide gas to every house in the UK (in how many years?) to replace oil, then I have no hope for them managing that.

It is quite possible to put sufficient charging points in without cables everywhere and without every parking place being electric

Street charging is the biggest problem, either our pavements become a trip hazard, especially at night, or there'll be fights over access to the charging point on a lamp post that has to serve 30 addresses.

@Lunar27

I’m not claiming to know something car manufacturers don’t - clearly they know all about hydrogen already. Same as they did with EV but were incredibly slow to change due to decades of investment in production and supply chain for normal cars. It’s not until companies (like Tesla) spot a trend/demand in the market combined with huge government pressure that car manufacturers have HAD to change.

I don’t believe for a second EV cars will be here for 20-30 cars being charged as we know it now - given the small problem there isn’t actually enough lithium in the world and mining it is very difficult and oh - fuel intensive!

Not read the whole thread, but we did the NC500 2 years ago and there were charging stations at almost every petrol station. A 20 min stop isn't a problem, by the time you've plugged in, grabbed a cuppa and checked mn you're done

@2DogsOnMySofa

Not read the whole thread, but we did the NC500 2 years ago and there were charging stations at almost every petrol station. A 20 min stop isn't a problem, by the time you've plugged in, grabbed a cuppa and checked mn you're done

It's fine when there aren't many electric vehicles. But when there are a lot more EVs on the road, then it's not just going to be a few people trying to charge up.

So there needs to be a lot more charging points in many locations with enough space to cope for the increased demand.

@cakeorwine but you're saying that like it isn't happening, near where I live (SW) we have huge numbers of chargers going in at a furious rate, and not just one or two in a location. We've got whole stations opening dedicated to EV charging and that's happening across the country.

Anyone who wants to keep up to date with this stuff should try watching Fully Charged (on YouTube and various other places). They have some of the most up to date information out there on new vehicles, new technology, future plans etc.

[quote Keladrythesaviour]@cakeorwine but you're saying that like it isn't happening, near where I live (SW) we have huge numbers of chargers going in at a furious rate, and not just one or two in a location. We've got whole stations opening dedicated to EV charging and that's happening across the country.

Anyone who wants to keep up to date with this stuff should try watching Fully Charged (on YouTube and various other places). They have some of the most up to date information out there on new vehicles, new technology, future plans etc.[/quote]
I live in a Northern city.
Not seeing it here.

Leeds and Middlesbrough as examples look ok to me…

I am an anxious person. I’ve also got an EV. The range on the car is 300 miles, this is quickly becoming standard now and the range will only keep increasing. For longer journeys (I’m on the south coast so a lot of journeys are longer ones) it means charging once, and guess what, on a long journey you need a break anyway. New chargers are being installed all the time and there are some EV charging companies who are doing an excellent job of installing rapid chargers at service stations

Re on street charging I live in a city that is overwhelmingly terraced houses. The council are installing on street chargers with designated EV parking bays. Some are in lampposts but others are standalone chargers on the pavement edge. I suspect over the next few years more and more places will do this in areas where houses don’t have off street parking

OP as I said I am an anxious person and can be anxious about anything, but this has never ever worried me. Particularly as you can buy petrol cars for the next 40 years.

@mudgetastic

It is quite possible to put sufficient charging points in without cables everywhere and without every parking place being electric

Oh it is. Just not with our government planning it.

*@TalbotAMan lameasahorse

"Maybe people who live in homes without off-road parking won't be able to own cars."
Bloody hell.

Why does their incovenience give them the right to pollute the environment for the rest of us? *

It wouldn't be inconvenience when I had no way to transport my husband to his radiotherapy sessions 30 miles away from our very small town where the very infrequent buses go in the wrong direction and are unaffordable on a daily basis. By the end of 5 weeks of daily treatment he definitely would not have been fit to do what would amount to a 2 hour journey each way on a bus, a train and then another bus, and we'd have been at breaking point financially at about £20-25 a day in fares. He wouldn't be inconvenienced, he'd be dead.

"Just move house," I hear you say. I would guesstimate about a third of the homes in my very small town have no offroad parking and nowhere to create any. That's quite a lot of people you're asking to move (which they can't afford to do since no one will buy our homes if they aren't allowed cars) or give up any chance of a normal life. And what of the carbon footprint of all these empty buildings?

As it happens I think that before we take away my only practical means of transport, maybe the rest of you could stop the intercontinental holiday flights and the meat eating. And perhaps you could agree to pay a little bit more tax so that we could just install a sensible number of public chargers, rather than destroying entire communities to save you having to think about any consequences of what you're proposing.

@MrsSkylerWhite

Hydrogen will be a game changer. Five years, tops.

Not a chance.

Hydrogen has a place but you still have the fundamental problem that producing and transporting hydrogen is nowhere near as sustainable and convenient as simply plugging a car into the grid, and there is no mainstream car manufacturer really buying into it in the same way as EVs. It's just not going to happen.

[quote lameasahorse]@Lunar27 there are only 20 locations. I have no idea of the amount of chargers as they all list a wide variety of type of chargers.
www.zap-map.com/locations/nottingham-charging-points/[/quote]
Over 120 charging points by the look of it (but I did give up counting). The majority of public points are universal. We went to a retail park at the weekend and the charging points were being used by lots of different cars from a Porsche to a Fiat 500.

Another aspect is that "charging" parking spaces are larger, so places like motorway service stations will end up with car parks with fewer parking spaces.

@WimpyKidYouNot

Engineers and scientists have already found ways to work without lithium. As ever, people typically find the path of least resistance to arrive at a product/solution but when things don't work (or are found to be limited) they find an alternative. That what is engineers do.

EV is a great, albeit slightly flawed, solution because electricity is everywhere and we already have a network for distribution. So no more tankers using fuel to deliver fuel.

Now that there's already been huge investment into battery technology, it's going to take something really special to shift the trajectory. I don't think hydrogen is it and neither do manufacturers, who are already phasing out the ICE and adopting EV wholesale.

@Boxowine

I'm so tired of people saying that it's not a big deal to run charging cables across the pavement to their car. Of course it's a big deal for people who are jogging, pushing babies, in wheelchairs, etc.

It's much less of a deal than parking on pavements is and people seem to have no concerns about that.

I can't really see what the issue is for "joggers" - I run myself and can see if there's something on the pavement - even at night. I don't disagree that it could be an issue for wheelchair users and other people with reduced mobility though.

Infrastructure is improving all the time. I wouldn't consider buying a new petrol only car now, we're looking at hybrid minimum but probably full electric.

I wouldn't buy an electric car yet and am sticking to petrol. This is from the advice of numerous people a few of which have had a lot of trouble charging as reps all over the country. Unless you have the cash for a Tesla...

@Infinitemoon

Infrastructure is improving all the time. I wouldn't consider buying a new petrol only car now, we're looking at hybrid minimum but probably full electric.

I wouldn't buy an electric car yet and am sticking to petrol. This is from the advice of numerous people a few of which have had a lot of trouble charging as reps all over the country. Unless you have the cash for a Tesla...

We buy new and keep our cars for 10-15 years (one lasted to 19), and are planning to replace one next year and the other in about 5 years time, both will be petrol, so that should see us right throughout the 2030's. We're not worried about the roll out of EVs and will just review the situation in the mid 30s as to whether we replace them or just keep them until they fall apart!

@Northernlurker

Saying it's fine on long journeys NOW isn't actually the point either. Yes you can plan your charger use because the number of cars is still low and the number of chargers rising slowly. But if 80% of the cars at the services want the charging points it will become much less fine. Unless there are a huge number of points - and the slowness if rollout of broadband and mobile reach in remote areas says that bit of infrastructure will not keep pace!

What is is about people that enables them to imagine future problems, but not future solutions?

Specifically, why do you imagine the number of car charging points will be less than is needed so no-one ever needs to wait longer than they currently do for a petrol pump?

The only thing stopping every car space in every car park in the country also being a fast charging point is that we don't actually need that many charging points, so the cost wouldn't be justified. There will be as many charging points as will get regular use, because that's how economics works.

I'm not saying there will never be an issue: just that it will be as rare an issue as finding petrol. (Believe it or not, from experience I can tell you that getting petrol is an issue I've encountered in central London. The Park Lane station was my emergency option on more than one occasion.)

What is is about people that enables them to imagine future problems, but not future solutions?

^ i think this is the difference between successful entrepreneurs and inventors and regular folk. Some people just aren't wired to be able think abstract or distant concepts through to solution (even unrealistic ones).

^ i think this is the difference between successful entrepreneurs and inventors and regular folk. Some people just aren't wired to be able think abstract or distant concepts through to solution (even unrealistic ones).

Also, I think people just don't like change so will find all sorts of issues to avoid changing the way they have to do things.

In my 3 years of ownership, I can honestly count on one hand the number of genuinely reasonable reasons for why an EV wouldn't work for them. Mostly it's hysteria (the OP is a classic example).

and are planning to replace one next year and the other in about 5 years time, both will be petrol, so that should see us right throughout the 2030's

Petrol will become harder and harder to find as petrol vehicles become less common. Diesel is likely to be more widely available for longer as the switch to suitable alternative fuels for heavy vehicles and plant poses more of a challenge.