to think the penny hasn't dropped yet, for many people, that the trade in new petrol and diesel cars is really ending in 6 years

[JadeClade]

I think the price of second hand cars will go through the roof, at first, when new cars are no longer available, and people buying new homes now really do need to be factoring in where they are going to charge an electric car, and all sorts of preparations and plans are simply not being made

YANBU - we need to be planning and preparing, as individuals and society.
YABU- we don't need to think about it.

If it happens before 2050 I'll be surprised.

Where will people who live in flats charge an electric car - one or two chargers for the whole block? Or people in a street of terraced houses who struggle to find a parking space every day? Will we need multiple chargers on every street lamp? Yes, new houses should be built with charge points, solar panels, heat pumps etc, but that won't address the problem for millions of existing properties.

As for hoping the number of cars on the roads will be reduced; public transport in many areas is poor. It's non-existent where I live. Cars are a necessity for many people. What about disabled people who need cars to get to hospital appointments etc.

And if you need to charge your car away from your point at home, it is outrageously expensive.

I just don't see it working. And I have an electric car that I already regret.

Lol, well, you're pretty naive then!

For those saying they’ll get a petrol or diesel car just before the deadline and then run it for 15+ years - when petrol/diesel cars start disappearing, and there’s less demand for fuel, are you certain your rural area petrol station will remain in business? If the demand is for fast charging stations- why would they keep the costly petrol pumps for reducing numbers?

Even if the petrol stations remain open I suspect the government will make it ruinously expensive to run a petrol or diesel car. The road tax will go through the roof and they'll hike up the duty on fuel to force the remaining cars off the road.

The OP is right though - if you are making large life decisions in the next few years - where to buy a house, schools for dcs, moving jobs etc - the lack of affordable petrol cars (lack of any affordable cars!) should be factored in if this is a “more then 5 years” decision.

100% won't happen by 2030. The infrastructure isn't there. The little that exists is unreliable. It isn't practical to have to stop for an hour to recharge every couple of hundred miles (though in reality much more frequently), the grid cannot cope with the demand it'll place upon it and people can't afford to buy electric cars which have a short life battery requiring replacing at a substantial cost after 7 or so years.

Aside from that, they aren't green. Lithium isn't an unlimited resource, and the mining of it has catastrophic consequences for the environment.

I don’t believe it will happen that early. MPs are already asking for it to be delayed. There is simply not the infrastructure and won’t be for decades. To many places simply won’t have electric charging points or be able to install them. Bus travel won’t exist as it’s already dying

Where I live you're lucky if the one bus per hour (9-5) shows up

But at least you're supposed to have a bus service, even an infrequent one

I live in an east midlands city suburb, quite heavily populated, and all except one bus route have been stripped (and the one left is a very long walk away)
"Use public transport!!" cry our idiot council ... errr, WHAT public transport??

And this is what'll kill the 2030 aims; today's documentary stressed the need for local councils to be proactive in issuing permits for chargers, and good luck with that. As so often central government will insist they've "invested £xxx", local authorities will insist they've never had it, and so it'll go on

Thought what a joke it was Gove insisting this will go ahead whilst he's jetted off on holiday abroad to Greece..

A massive change in attitude needs to take place to all aspects of personal life especially MPs leading by example with environmental issues.

If that bit is easy why haven’t they actually done it? It’s not easy. What about flats? Terraced houses? Long journeys where you don’t have time even for a quick charge of half an hour?

Yes exactly the carbon tax (required to pay for all of the government funding to make the CCS initiatives work economically) will make the cost of petroleum fuel horrendously expensive

Don't think it will happen. Diesel was very popular with the govt and now isn't. The same will happen for electric cars, they have too many problems associated with them.

EV's have so much more flexibility that they're much more likely to be a help than hindrance. I expect solar to help and with 'vehicle to load' advances, EV's will help balance the grid. The vast majority of EV owners charge overnight, so already help balance production. Vehicle to load will help reduce consumption during the day. Your location might well need assistance but much of the rest of the country can benefit.

Also not everyone in 2030 will have an EV so the change isn't going to happen overnight.

This isn't the type of thing most people have the luxury to plan for. Moving to a town, campaigning for public transport...it's delusional to think that it's achievable for the average family to plan and enact this sort of change. We just don't have the capacity and resources and the challenges are going to often be fairly insurmountable. Not sure what the answer is.

It is yet another example of non-joined-up thinking.

We have very elderly, very frail parents who live in a rural place 2+ hours drive from us (and from other family in different directions). The emergency care and social care provision is abysmal. At any time we have to able to drive to respond to emergency calls for help. Then, once there, to be able to drive to hospital. pharmacy, shop.

Imagine having had a day out (in our normal life) battery charge low, and we get one of these emergency calls... "oh just wait while we charge our battery..." Or we get there - a rural community with no fast charge - and we haven't got enough battery to take someone to hospital.

It's just not going to work.

I just can’t see this working in rural areas at all. The infrastructure won’t be here and people won’t be able to afford to make the change. And if secondhand petrol or diesel are too expensive I think there will be serious unrest here.

Agree, but only for hospital/emergency stuff. I don’t know how things are where you are but my bloody GP practice is hardly offering any appointment that is not done over the phone. I suspect that technologies will be further developed to do enable better ways to diagnose without the patient being necessarily being present (think of better interactive technologies AND medical tests done in the way STDs are tested, we may even get dear old Royal Mail back to health even! 😁)

Will they though? If it adversely affects the economy (it will).
I get it, it’s important to address climate change, but this isn’t the way. The batteries aren’t compatible with green goals for a start, and most electricity is also not green.

@MaidOfSteel - I don’t have an EV but friends do - it costs them £20 to “fill up” at the local charging station. It’s less expensive than filling my car with petrol.

They can add charging points to every lamp post if there’s demand to do it.

it’s perfectly possible, but if there’s an interest by the government/local government to actually do it until there’s a crisis, there’s a different issue.

I struggle to remember to charge my bloody mobile phone so fuck knows how I remember to charge a car

Of course we don’t - most of us can’t afford “electricity cars”

.

I think hydrogen fuel cell technology will improve and take over from electric cars. There’s a lot of money and time being spent on this and hydrogen cars already available for sale.

I lease my car from motability so I don't know what I am going to do when this happens. I don't have facilities to charge a car at home but being disabled I'm not really able to use public charging as a permanent solution either. I wouldn't get finance for a regular lease and I have nothing to buy a car with. The longest you can keep a car on the scheme is currently 5 years, so once they stop making petrol motors there is a clock ticking for me, eventually I will simply have to stay at home.

OP, cost aside, how are people who live in houses with only on-road parking and in flats going to be able to charge their vehicles? What plans are in place to ensure the infrastructure exists?

The cynical part of me thinks there’s no point to over thinking, we can’t sort it ourselves as individuals, and we may be too late as a group anyway: We may have rendered the country inhabitable due to climate changes by 2050. 🤷‍♀️