@Alexandra2001
so what about long range drives, say to S of France etc? where time is of the essence, say to make a ferry or accommodation?
At the moment, you would need a Tesla for that. The Supercharger network can work at up to 350kW. By the time you’ve been for a wee and grabbed a coffee, the thing is charged. Other cars/platforms are starting to come along with similar capabilities.
Cold weather range?
In my experience, lose around 20% of good weather range.
Battery life is 10 to 20 years and £5k to 20k to replace?
Evidence is that after the first year, battery degradation might only be around 0.5-1% per year. You don’t necessarily need to replace the whole battery - individual modules can be replaced. Expect that to become much more widely available, and cheaper. And expect new batteries to become cheaper too, if a replacement is needed.
Are these batteries recyclable? if not, where do they go?
Yes, they are. Some get a second life as home storage batteries. The metals can be recovered and reused - I saw up to 97% recyclable. The industry to do that isn’t there yet, because the demand hasn’t been there. But as the demand comes, so will the industry.
Should my Skoda Diesel engine die, it'll be recycled and will cost far less than 5k to replace, expected life of the 1.6 tdi is 250 to 300k, so on average mileage 20 to 25 years, some taxi Octavia's are on 400k..... How long does the motor last? how much to replace?.
I can’t answer that. The oldest EV’s are 12 years old. I don’t recall hearing about motors being replaced. I do know that motors are far simpler than engines, I would think that translates into lower probability of failure.
How do people without access to work chargers or off street parking manage?
A combination of things:-
Chargers in car parks.
High power chargers in electric forecourts (like a petrol station for EV’s)
On-street chargers
Sharing someone else’s home charger (there are apps to facilitate this)
My previous car was a diesel Golf. Loved it. In the time I had it, it had an EGR valve failure and a water pump failure, necessitating a cam belt replacement as well (which had already been done on schedule at 60K miles). Expensive things, which EV’s don’t have. When it was 9 years old, at over 80K miles, an injector went. Cost over £500 to fix. It still didn’t run right - turned out two more injectors were failing. Rather than shell out another £1K, I traded it in for my EV. No regrets.