To think there are no real perks to driving an electric car?

[MyHeartyBlueShaker]

You’d think there would be more incentives - cheaper parking, easier charging access, or some kind of priority. But in reality, it often feels like there are just extra costs and hassle. What are the actual rewards?

Exactly this. There’s a big surge in energy demand every evening from people coming home and using lights, heating, oven, appliances, etc. For many houses, that could be entirely powered from an EV battery on their driveway, which is then recharged overnight while the owner sleeps, ready for the morning commute.

Those properties then only need backup power and energy providers can focus on infrastructure, businesses and the homes where the above is not an option.

We’re not quite there yet, but agree this is the direction we’re likely to take

What's the saving overall though? Not just fuel but overall. I've calculated that my car costs me roughly £60 a week. That's for everything. Fuel, tax, insurance, the average I've spent in maintenance in the last 5 years, and a split of the capital costs I paid when I bought it outright 5 years ago.

I've heard over and over about how much cheaper it is to run electric, but it's still soooooooo much more expensive once you factor in capital costs and depreciation.

I got an EV as my company car because the benefit it kind tax was on £30 a month compared to much higher in an ICE.

Currently get around 250miles per charge on my hire vehicle but when my actual car is delivered that has a 350 mile range. It costs me under £10 for a full charge at work and the rare times I have to use a public charger it is comparable in price to fossils fuel.

Mosy though I love how it drives it is so easy to drive.

Of course the bigger picture matters - I’m not arguing against electric cars or their environmental value at all. But if we want people to make lasting, large-scale changes, the systems and infrastructure need to make it doable, not just morally desirable.

People are more likely to switch when it feels like a functional upgrade, not a personal sacrifice. So yes, the bigger picture matters but the everyday user experience does too or the uptake will stall.

This is what my DH says. The feel of the Ev is different and he loves driving it (nippier despite being a heavier car), and the fact that if his battery is running low he can stick it on charge when he gets home and not have to worry about finding a fuel station at rush hour on the way or getting up early to do it first thing in the morning. If you need to refuel on your journey the tech in the car tells you where the nearest charging station is so he’s never been caught short.

DH could take or leave the ‘green credentials’ as he feels an EV is greener over it’s life time, but shocking in its manufacture (those batteries), so he feels its pretty even compared to a fuelled car, but what he is passionate about is the fact that they reduce pollution. Our local town has less smog and his feeling is that children walking to school and the elderly are much better protected. He’ll never go back, other than perhaps to have a hybrid second car.

DH has an EV and I would get one too except my once a week commute is a 225 mile round trip and even his supposed long range car would struggle with that in winter. Having to charge mid trip would deplete the joy in having it.

I suppose I am EV-curious (currently have a small hybrid). We have good friends who have always been up to speed on cars and got a mid-size electric SUV-type car about a year ago. We have seen their car at their house and then when they drove 180 miles to come and see us (and drove us around a bit).

Some things that I noticed, in no particular order:

• Charging up at home is indeed extremely cheap. Apparently there is some very sophisticated market whereby the home chargers monitor the price on the grid during the night, and as long as you don't mind when it charges between 9pm and 7am it will find the cheapest. Our friends also have solar panels and can use that, although they tend not to because they have one of the earliest contracts and the grid still pays them a bonkers amount of money per unit that they feed in.
• Going on a long trip is still not super-easy because charging just takes time. For 180 miles they planned a charge around having lunch on the way, but that was as much about the charging as it was about lunch — with a petrol car they would probably have left at 9am, got to us at 12:30, and had lunch with us. For a 360 mile trip they would probably have had to take a longish afternoon tea break as well.
• Charging away from home is quite expensive. Probably still cheaper than petrol, but the variability in prices means that anyone of an even slightly cost-conscious persuasion will find themselves driving a few miles to charge at the equivalent of 60p per litre instead of 90p.
• Finding charging stations when you are away from home introduces all kinds of opportunities to go slightly wrong. Most of this is probably because our friends are a bit nerdy, but there were all kinds of discussions about 50kW versus 30kW, how long you can park after the charging finishes, etc. Multiple apps seemed to be involved for different charging networks. You don't have to think very hard about refuelling a petrol car in most parts of the country; the worst that can generally happen is that you fill up at 138.9p and then drive past a place that says 136.9p.

All in all it reminds me a bit of owning a computer circa 1997. Great fun if you enjoy that sort of thing, but "a lot of faff" if you're not fully committed and aren't prepared to spend time on it. The 1997 version of me would have loved this, but I'm approaching the "can't be arsed" age with regard to EVs, especially since we don't do more than 5,000 miles a year these days.

I would imagine they are fine if you can charge at home. To me it would be a huge inconvenience if we had one as we don't have a driveway.

I've got a self charge hybrid at the moment and I'm already fed up with it as I've been told I don't really do enough miles to keep the battery charged. It's less than a year old and has already had a new 12v battery which apparently is common. My previous car sat outside for months in lockdown and started first time. This one hadn't been driven for 2 weeks and needed to be jump started! I'll probably be getting rid as I'm not working at the moment and when I get another car I'll get a petrol again.

Yes it's one of the readond as to why I can't seriously consider an electric car as no driveway so nowhere to charge it at home. Not just cost but the faff of having to find somewhere to charge it every couple of days. There are a couple of charging points locally but people park there and leave it there all night so no one else can get a look in.

my friend just got a second hand electric car and has had a nasty shock re car tax in the next few years as it will be much more expensive as it will be based on the original list price

I think some posters have not had great petrol cars! Ours have been amazing fun to drive and even demist windows! However they are expensive cars. We have now added an EV to our Tizer fleet.

Good news is that having bought it at 8 months old it was a whopping £23,000 less than the new list price. The bad news is we will be paying road tax because its list price was over £40,000. We have a drive with a charging point. EVs are only really a great idea if you can charge them readily. Street chargers are the same price as petrol. Then there’s finding a charger available or one that works. That’s been an issue when visiting DDs.

I do like this car. Is it as good as DHs Porsche Macan? Not really. Would we go on holiday in it? Probably not. Would I let it reverse itself into a parking space? No. The demo at the garage didn’t give me confidence. Does it do more than the Macan? A few things in terms of gizmos but does it drive as well? Absolutely not.

Electric cars are great for your little communte diwn the road. So it will fit most people to do that.
If you want a car to do longer journeys! Forget that.
eg I couldn’t go agd see my dcs at Uni (between 1.5 to 2 hours drive each way). I’d need to recharge somewhere, where? At much greater cost and most importantly the time. At best it will take 1/2 hour to recharge so a 2 hours journey becomes 2.5 hours…..
Of course, if you’re in the middle of nowhere it’s even worse…..

Also the ‘infrastructure’ matters more for some than others. I don’t use public chargers, I charge exclusively at home, so the infrastructure doesn’t matter to me at all.

@doodleschnoodle that means you’re only using your car for short journeys.
Fair enough.
But how do you manage going away on hols in the U.K.? Even for a weekend.
Or if you need to go to an airport (ours are 1+ hours away). Etc….

Unless you either have another petrol car or you rely on one (like a taxi), OR you need the infrastructure. There is no way around it really.

IMOHumbleO, running costs are similar over full life of vehicle I/C or EV.
Saving the planet? Mixed reaction.
The ores that are mined to provide the metals and minerals for an EV generate much waste material. Most have 99% waste to useful metal ratio.
EVs use more copper than an i/c car. Mines are profitable at 0.5%. All the high grade mines are worked out. Cobalt and Tantalum are produced in the DRC, much with child and forced labour.
Their is no ethical tantalum in the world. The Japanese, Chinese and Israelis have snaffled it.

Another huge issue with EV? Theyre not disabled friendly.
As in none of the charging points are accessible if you’re in a wheelchair.

In that case, what are you supposed to do??

We live in the middle of nowhere, have DC over 4 hours drive away and my DH does I excess of 20 000 business miles in his EV on top of our domestic use. And I can't remember the last time we charged for as long as 30 minutes on a journey.
It really isn't that difficult.

Some people are listing benefits (like heating/cooling from an app) that are available on petrol cars.

We have a drive but visiting family we’d have to plan in hanging out somewhere long enough to charge with 3 dc and 2 dogs and that just feels like a faff. We have a newish, high spec, automatic petrol car with sports mode. It’s lovely to drive. Tax is low and repairs £0 so far. The electric version at the same age/mileage was £20k more. I’m not persuaded. When we replace our little run around second car we will weigh it all up.

All the things mobility scooter users have been told they cant do/ moaned at/ threatened with having their scooter destroyed.

Does not seem to be happening here I wonder why!!!🤔

My DD is at uni 1hour 45 minutes away and I can get there and back in 1 charge
On just one occasion due to roadworks and a diversion we were getting lower on charge than I was happy with (DH insists we could have got home) so we stopped, had a wee, got a coffee and 20 minutes later we were back on the road.

Tyres are more expensive , but not sure how often you have to change them in comparison to a normal car ? I go through a full set each year.
Also there was evidence that due to being heavier, electric cars cause more wear and tear to the road surface. The road surfaces round here are shagged anyway due to lack of maintenance, not sure we can blame that on the uptake in EV ownership ?
For me its the initial outlay cost and the fact that it would be tricky to charge at home due to renting and not having a drive.
I would definitely consider a hybrid as a lot of my driving is town driving at low speed and this would mean less pollution in built up areas ?

🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️
Youll have to tell that to the people selling EV who had nice posters explaining that on average, you can drive 2 hours and a full recharge takes 1/2 hour (fast speed).
They even were trying to sell it as ‘you need a break every two hours anyway so it’s great that you need to recharge your batteries’.

Another issue is that you need a charging point at home.
Great if you have a house with a drive. You can set up your electrical point just for yourself, out of the way etc….
What if you live in a flat? No personal parking space.
What if you don’t have a drive? Need to park on the road etc…..

Thank you @BlackBean2023

I understand they are cheaper to run once you have one, but youve got to have the money up front to buy one to start with and from when Ive seen they are incredibly expense to buy which for most people (me included) means that they cant afford to buy one.

My last car was 3 years old when I bought it - £15,000 with 18,000 mile on the clock - I luckily had savings to pay for it. When it goes to car heaven (I always run my cars until they no longer work), will I be able to buy a nearly new electric car for around £15K?

I dont want to get a loan or get the car on finance and dont want to spend more than £15K. What can you get electric for that money? I wouldnt mind an electric car but the long term investment isnt something most people can afford up front.

Slight prang to a risk area and the batteries will need replacing. If they get compromised, you can end up with a massive fire!