When it was announced that the UK would be banning the sale of new cars using only internal combustion from 2040, there was only really one main reaction; outrage from motorists, and outrage from the environmentalists because 2040 was ‘unambitious’.
Scotland are (independently) looking at 2032 for the cut-off, Sweden, the Netherlands, Ireland and Denmark are set to introduce the ban in 2030, and Norway has set the date at 2025, a full 15 years before us. So when Transport Secretary Grant Shapps announced that he’d be looking to “thoroughly explore the case for bringing it forward five years”, no one was all that surprised.
It’s worth mentioning that the announcement was made at the Conservative Party conference, with no doubt an element of rabble-rousing included.
Subsidies are go(ing)
Despite all the rhetoric, just last month, Shapps admitted in an interview that the £3,500 subsidy toward buying an electric vehicle (the Plug-in Car Grant) is in danger of being stopped a little sooner than we’d like, and this means that it’s likely that the help to install a charge system will also go.
With that said, it has been announced that the government are looking to invest £400m in the public charging networks, of which £70m will fund the installation of 3,000 rapid chargers over the next five years. One could only guess at the financial model attached to it.
Shapps: “We must go further to protect our environment and improve our competitive edge. If we’re to become the world-leader in green technology, we must always be looking to expand our ambitions. The Government’s advisory committee on climate change has said that 2035 is the date to aim for”.
“Just as we rejuvenated our automotive sector in the 1980s, we’re going to work with our pioneering car sector to help them sell the next generation of vehicles around the world”.
Mike Hawes, chief executive of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) isn’t quite as convinced as the crowd at the party conference, suggesting that the government needs to do more to incentivise people to make the switch, if they want to encourage drivers to swap over sooner.
“The car industry is committed to zero-emission transport for all, however, low and zero-emission vehicles still only make up a fraction of the market, underscoring the huge challenge of fast-tracking a shift to zero-emission transport; ambition must be matched by measures that support the industry, allowing manufacturers time to invest, innovate and sell competitively”.
“This includes long-term government commitment to incentives and investment in infrastructure to accelerate the uptake of these new technologies”.
Six electric vehicles
Back in July, we reported that the Green Alliance stated that it could only take six electric vehicles charging in the same location to cause a ‘brownout’ on the national grid, unless immediate action is taken to improve the network, a fact that seems to be missing from Shapps’ speech to the conference.
And therein lies the problem with all the chest-beating toward changing the driving habits and motive power source for all transportation; the car industry could possibly swap over much earlier, but could the infrastructure of the United Kingdom cope with the change?
It’s all very well taxing internal combustion cars to within an inch of their life, in a bid to ‘promote green transport’, but the reality is that according to sources and specialised groups such as the Green Alliance, the switch over to ‘green’ may not be dictated by the willingness of manufacturers or even the buying consumers to adopt green transport, but by the limitations set in place by outdated infrastructure.
Electric vehicles are now a viable alternative (albeit expensive) for a great many of motorists, and if you’ve made the switch to an all-electric vehicle, and it works for you, that’s great. But for the hundreds of thousands of drivers that have no viable access to a charging network, or need a range above average, or just can’t stretch to the budget needed to purchase one, then what’s next?
Of course it’s easy to point out that even at 2035, that’s still a decade and a half away, plenty of time to manage the infrastructure, but environmental groups are telling the government that significant changes need to be made by 2020, and that’s simply not happening, certainly not at scale.
We genuinely believe that electricity will revolutionise the transport world, but only when everything is in place for that to happen correctly, until then, the government should at least take some of the responsibility from the motorist and stop penalising them so harshly for driving fossil fuelled vehicles.
Should the government take some responsibility? Do you believe that electrically powered vehicles will be the saviour of motoring? Let us know in the comments.
Will these electric vehicles have the capability of towing my caravan
Possibly … but only to the end of your road before recharging 🙂
If the battery in my phone is anything to go by, any tow hitch is likely to be already employed hauling a trailer mounted generator.
I myself have a motorhome, which like my bricks and mortar home, also uses fossil fuels for heating, hot water, cooking and of course generating electricity. Of course it has plug in power and battery charging, but once unplugged the batteries just powering a couple of TVs and a couple of lights only last a few hours and they weigh about a third of a ton. The microwave or air conditioner would flatten them in seconds. It may be possible to go fossil fuel free, but some type of engine is going to be needed.
That’s because you are using old technology batteries
Think positive and explore the possibilities instead of being negative
Our planet is at stake here, not your motorhome
Do we send our up grade bills to you planet saver
The environmental damage caused by the ‘renewables’ industry is staggering, and the whole CO2 problem is a hoax to start with. We’ve been getting lied to for decades and we’ve now to be dictated to by children who know nothing, whilst far too many adults are still listening to these ‘climate change’ alarmist instead of doing a little digging for themselves.
We need CO2 in our atmosphere. CO2 is a GOOD thing and right now we need more of it, not less. As a greenhouse gas, CO2 is very insignificant. The most significant greenhouse gas by far is water vapour. Should we ban clouds?
We’ve had 3 decades of doomsday predictions from the alarmist declaring that “in 10 years Manhattan will be under water”, “in 10 years the polar ice caps will be gone”, and many other ridiculous threats. Then 10 years on when nothing has changed they repeat the mantra. Now, 30 years later, we find that not one thing they predicted would happen has happened, yet they persist, and people still listen to them.
Now, 30 years after the first 10year warning, we ONLY have 12 years to ‘save the planet’.
Now, they stoop so low, as to use children as propaganda tools as they set about ensuring that those children will have no future, because our economies will have been destroyed by squandering our wealth on forcing renewable energy and electric cars on us whilst dismantling fossil fuel energy production, as we pursue the absurd notion that we can change the climate through government policy.
Some fun facts:
CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is just under 400ppm
96% of atmospheric CO2 is natural, therefore humans account for only 4%.
This means we can only reduce atmospheric CO2 by 4% at most.
400ppm is only 0.04% of the atmosphere.
We are destroying our economies and our children’s futures in an attempt to reduce CO2 concentration by 4% of 0.04%. That is, by 0.0016%
Worth it, huh?
Around 1800, atmospheric CO2 concentration was about 180ppm.
Below 150ppm, plants start dying. THAT would be a genuine global disaster for the vast majority of life on earth, though some organisms, and the planet itself would survive.
As CO2 levels rise, plants thrive. This is a good thing. Environmentalism is leading us down a path of self destruction, not CO2.
Plants grow better with higher CO2.
Without the CO2 being between 350 & 400 ppm the plant crops could’t support the current world population and there would be mass starvation & death.
As a retired meteorologist of some 40 years I know quite a lot about atmospheric processes. For at least 800,000 years atmospheric CO2 varied between 180 and 280 parts per million, until the industrial revolution. It was 280 ppm in 1800, not 180. Since then it has risen to over 400 ppm. The 96% natural, 4% man-made idea is quite wrong. In fact over 90% of the CO2 produced from fossil fuel combustion since 1750 has been dissolved by the oceans, and only 7 to 10% remains in the atmosphere. But that is in danger of reversing as the oceans warm and become a net source of CO2 instead of a net sink. Warmer water can hold less dissolved gases.
Water vapour is the main greenhouse gas, I agree, but we can do nothing about that, except that as temperatures rise, the air can hold more water vapour in a positive feedback effect.
With no greenhouse gases at all, the surface air temperature would be 33 degrees C colder than it is.
Adding more CO2 is like double-glazing our greenhouses. We feed the ongoing rise in greenhouse gas concentrations at our peril, or more precisely that of our grandchildren.
It’s nice to see an informed response to the laymen that draw their own conclusions from facts without understanding them!
Is it not true that we have always had peaks and troughs of warmer and cooler weather so this will just blend into that trend but while we are in it there is a perception by some tube surfers in Canning Town that it is the end of days. All the news seems to be turn vegan to save the planet but do they not realise how much processing goes into certain vegan foods? Government believes it can change behaviour using nudge theory. I believe it is going to take a lot more than that. Right it is lunchtime so I am for a steak in my car 🙂
We still have to come back to the point that CO2 is a really insignificant contributor to any greenhouse effect, not only because it’s such a small proportion of the atmosphere, but also because CO2 itself is a poor greenhouse gas. Fossil records show that there have been periods of relative warmth coinciding with relatively low atmospheric CO2 concentration and ice ages during periods of relatively high atmospheric CO2. It’s all very well citing atmospheric CO2 over the last 800,000 years (during much of which we’ve also been under glaciation, coincidentally), but fossil records have indicated atmospheric CO2 concentrations upto 1700ppm, so we have a long way to go before we start pushing the envelope. In the relatively short term we need more atmospheric CO2 to support sufficient vegetation to feed the growing human population. As to whether or not the climate will warm concurrently, we can only wait and see, but there has been such unfounded alarmism over recent decades about rising sea levels and the like (weren’t the Maldives supposed to have disappeared beneath the waves by now?), so I am inclined towards scepticism. Our grandchildren will not thank us for hamstringing (if not destroying) our economies in pursuit of climate propaganda goals. History shows that periods of warmer climate have engendered remarkable human innovation and life standard improvements (Greek and Roman civilizations, for instance) and colder climate has tended to bring periods of human calamity (the Black Death, for instance). If there is any peril at hand, it is in madly pursuing meaningless targets.
I’ve seen this argument before, and the pseudo-scientific conclusions stemming from the misunderstanding of facts.
These two articles reference these figures, but put some proper informed context to them;
https://earthsky.org/earth/6-things-to-know-carbon-dioxide-co2-greenhouse-gas
https://earthsky.org/earth/why-carbon-dioxide-co2-influence-earths-climate-greenhouse-effect
You can’t deny that glaciers are receding at a faster rate than a few years ago.
No, the planet is not at stake. There’s zero evidence that says CO2, let alone man’s tiny contribution, has any effect on temperature or climate. To believe so is to claim that 1 extra molecule of CO2 in 10,000 of the total atmosphere is responsible for the mythical climate catastrophy – an extraordinary claim. Not even the IPCC supports that claim. All these claims are based solely on climate models that are programed to show a temperature response to CO2, which is the opposite to reality. They exhibit GIGO.
Err, yes there is. It’s been known for a very long while that CO2 acts as a greenhouse gas, and was demonstrated well over a hundred years ago. It’s a scientific fact.
You may want to argue how much it effects global warming, but you’re showing pure ignorance if you say it doesn’t contribute to it.
This has nothing to do with saving the planet, which is fine. It’s everything to do with grandstanding politicians and redistribution of wealth from the poor to the already very rich.
Oh yes, lithium ion batteries savior of all but look at a lithium mine and the processes required to refine, transport to several locations around the world before the battery is even manufactured. They are filthy, dangerous, leave a massive carbon footprint and then at end of life say 8-10 years if you’re lucky they need renewed and the old ones disposed of. Toxic, massive carbon footprint and still require to be charged by a grid that cannot possibly supply enough energy to sustain a complete switch to EVs. It’s all pie in the sky bullshine.
Battery powered cars are a ridiculous idea, let alone battery powered freight transportation. At least invest in hydrogen if we’re intent on killing off the internal combustion engine (although we needn’t if that was the case). Even if we accept the CO2 greenhouse effect stories, there is nothing wrong with the ICE, it’s the fuels that we use in them. There is no need whatsoever to switch to battery powered cars, but there is a massive business and political opportunity in doing so.
If the real reason for making electric vehicles the only choice is the environment, then why target the car owner? Surely, a better way to tackle pollution would be commercial vehicles / public service vehicles first. They are mostly diesel, which is apparently more harmful (now), there’s a lot of them around, and the drivers have to stop for breaks regularly anyway.
Also, the planet has been here for a lot longer than we have, and it will be here long after we’ve gone. If anything, it will probably be the sun that causes this planets demise long before any human invented cause.
If you believe global warming / climate change is caused by humans, then explain the Bonneville Salt Flats please?
The battery in your phone is absolutely nothing to go by. Your phone does not contain an Automotive Battery Management System to optimize how the battery health is managed. Not even close to such a thing. Which is exactly why Battery EV manufacturers provide upto 7 year battery warranties. In time individual battery cell replacement will be as available as any current car repair in and out of warranty.
Meanwhile there are 2011 EV on the roads with virtually no battery degradation using the battery tech of the day, which has been advanced on significantly since.
There’s far too much FUD spread about this topic.
Hydrogen cell perhaps?
Hydrogen cell perhaps
No, only the new small ones
Caravans need to be banned anyway……
Bit harsh
True though.
Prick
You would not be saying that if you had one
Moe Lester another total brain dead idiot
Bet you go abroad well that will be stopped ha
Why? You probably fly away for your holidays causing more pollution.
I suppose you are one of these hunts that go everywhere on a bike grow all your own food and never buy or use anything man made ? And no I don’t own a caravan
yes. why anyone would want to own a caravan though is beyond me.
persons like you need to think first, why would you want a car or a home.
Yes a cardboard box made from a rather more eco friendly tree is so much better …
Just such a biggotted comment
Tunnel vision all me me me me
Dave They don’t know any better
There is a video of a Tesla towing a Boeing 787 across an airfield. Even a totally empty 787 would weigh at least 100 tons – I’ll cheerfully wager that is a helluva lot more than your caravan!
And likely flattened its battery in less than than 1 mile.
Probably destroyed the battery.
Ill wager the costs are prohibitive and the Tesla didnt tow the airplane some hundreds of miles as would be required to take the caravan on holiday… but good try!
There is a video of A “strong man” pulling a Boeing 767, just Google it. It doesn’t make a Tesla look so good now, does it?
Yes & No….. like a mobile phone, the more you tax the battery. The more quicker it will discharge. So the quicker you will need to charge the car. Just imagine the queues to use the charging points at ALL the motorway services…..lol
Tests indicate that the range will be halved. Not many electric vehicle are homologated for towing. Tesla model X, model 3 and the soon to released model Y are the exception. Other include Audi and Mercedes. The best future for towing will be a long range Plug in Hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV). Something like the Mitsubishi PHEV but with longer range on electric only
There is a video on the Internet showing a Tesla towing a Boeing 787, which would weigh at least 100 tons. Tha That’s a helluva lot more than your caravan!!!
Maybe better to stay in a b&b towing is not very green
Great idea, but how is all the additional electricity needed to charge ??? millions of electric cars to be generated and that would probably be mostly overnight when solar panels / farms aren’t producing.
National Grid I’ve said the network is already ready for mass adoption of EVs
If you believe that, then you are truly deluded.
My understanding is the we currently are always near the edge of a blackout. Common sense will have to prevail in the end. At least we hope so.
That was proved the other week, when one power station & one wind farm tripped, thousands were without power for ages & large parts of the transport system wouldn’t re-boot! Wind farms proved not to be a viable backup, they can’t be switched on quickly like the power stations of today.
Wasnt it only a few weeks ago that two elements of the National grid dropped out and large swathes of the south were blacked out…. still, you could tell the electric vehicles in the blackout, they were stranded powerless at the side of the road.
So you didn’t read the part that mentioned about as little as six EVs causing a brownout? The German industry were reporting about this over a year ago. There is all this talk of taxpayer money being used to fund the EV charging infrastructure (so yet again the ICE driver gets screwed, as we will now be funding EV use), and where is all this power coming from? Some people seem to think that a new power station or wind farm can be up and operational in months, so no real issue if 2035 is the date to aim for. If they proposed plans today for 100 new sites of power generation, I doubt if 10 of them would be operational by 2035.
Sean Wilson…..At last someone talking sense.
And what about the fuel to run all these new so called power stations bet that makes our planet a lot greener I don’t think
To achieve Net Zero Carbon (why don’t they say CO2, carbon is a black solid, CO2 a colourless gas) by 2050, just in the UK, would need ~430 large wind turbines or 3 million solar panels deployed PER DAY, and that’s for 11,000 days! How is that even remotely possible?
We will need to put those new turbines in the NIMBY’s front and back gardens. It’s only fair because they’re the only ones who can afford EVs.
And people are also blind to the carbon footprint of wind turbines (huge) and the dangerous chemicals and elements used in solar farms.
Yet if you look at the live grid demand d vs productions margins are very tight with at least 3 major power plants due to come off the bars in the next two years…….. The simple arithmetic doesn’t stand up.
Two relatively small generators of electricity went down at the same time and cut off power to a million people at once and caused public transport chaos. The National Grid is in a very precarious state as it is WITHOUT a big rise in EV cars.
Wind farms work a night
Yep, and half of the time when I drive past them, they ain’t turning. Plus when they are turning, they generate about as much electricity as a butterfly fart.
JP, the reason they aren’t turning is because the grid can’t take any more power at that time. Also we need to think more about energy storage in this country. There’s are many ways of doing this not just by using pumped hydro as they do in Scotland and the Lake District, but by using the latest battery technology. Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries are the future. They can store grid scale energy and unlike lithium ion, they don’t catch fire. If we had more of these there’s would be no need to turn off the windmills!
Yes Flow batteries seem to be the way forward . However, Redox flow batteries use highly corrosive electrolytes and expensive rare vanadium. There are other flow batteries in development using cheaper abundant base materials and less corrosive electrolytes. These batteries would be sited near the generators, to provide power when it is needed, rather than when it is produced. The timescale is unknown.
Some 30% of an average family’s CO2 is due to the Gas central heating that most of us have. The cost of replacing this with electric heating systems and the necessary power generation, will be prodigious. The most economical system would be to use heat pumps removing heat from the surrounding air. However, the effect of large scale deployment of this does not seem to have been considered.
There are storage heater solutions, using modern slimmer “radiators”, but as yet there is no system to charge these when there is surplus power. Long term think “Smart Meters” and different prices depending on power being generated.
Of course they do, that explains why nobody see’s them turning that much, it only windy at night. I suppose day time is wind is the wrong kind of wind.
Actually there is a phenomenon called “diurnal variation” which means there is much less wind at night than during the day.
Wond farms are only 20% efficient no wind no electricity too much wind no electricity and no storage we find this in Cornwall where companions are paid more not to generate at tomes its not needed
I don’t suppose you used to play Clash of Kings?
also overnight when there is a grid overcapacity and electricity is very cheap. wind still blows at night. nuclear is still generated too and cant be turned off easily
Have a think about how much energy you use in your home, compared to how much you use in your car.
Only the top strata of society will be allowed any form of personal transport. The mass of people will be on public transport and that wont be that extensive because the general population will, by circumstances, be forced into cities.
Can’t see it myself electric vehicles alright round town uaseless long distance
Unless it’s a Tesla or equivalent long range electric vehicle with hundreds of miles between charges
Yes Tesla but at what cost £150,000
teslas start at less than 40k. so the price of a decent ICE car
Well I couldn’t afford 40k either.
I, like many others, dont pay £40k for a motor car.. in fact £40k is probably more than 2 years salary, not paying bills, buying food no tax, no NI etc for a whole swathe of the population.
Graeme And you have £ 60,000 spare to invest for the cheap basic one
what is your bladder range? chances are an ev has a greater range. stop for a pee and rapid charge.
Stupid boy.
Either you have a prostate problem or your expectations of how much charge you can get in 5 minutes is a bit optimistic!
Will there be rapid charge points all around our coastline so that folk that enjoy the outdoors / angling etc can get to wherever they want to be and also be able to get home? I regularly travel 150 miles to where I and friends want to fish. I don’t think an EV will carry four with all our gear very far. Looks like in the future we’re all just going to have to stay close to home.
17000 miles in an EV in the last 6 months. No, it wasn’t a long range a Tesla either. A 140 mile range i3. Until trying it seems odd but it works out just fine. Bladder stop is usually first, I then plug in whilst I attend to that and coffee refill then carry on. No need to wait half hour then either.
My training car is also going EV next year.
Takes 5 minutes to fill my Kia Sportage once a month, and has about 450 plus range. No need to pee or shop or have a coffee. Enough said.
Nice if you can afford it.
And many pensioners live in apartments with no access to charging points… I’ve gone hybrid successfully
What happens if you dont like coffee?
That would be 94 miles a day, seven days a week for six months in a car with a maximum range of 140 miles. I presume you never need to use the heater.
Electricity is a very wasteful fuel it is only good for short distance perhaps round town.it is also a very expensive fuel . Hydro cells is the real deal
hydrogen is even more wasteful but not as much as diesel. both need massive amounts of electricity to produce. much better to put that electricity straight into your car for very little cost.
Very little cost now, but just wait. You’ll be crippled by tax when they lose revenue from fossil fuels.
JP , exactly how are they going to replace the millions screwed from us in tax on petrol and diesel
When they have got every body to buy one and they are running at a loss then that when you will stop laughing that you bought your EV because they will screw the bollocks off you just like when you were told to buy a diesel vehicle people can’t remember these government promises
Road pricing
You are correct, the government is going to have to find a way to balance the books when petrol and diesel disappear completely. This is exactly why it’s important to join in to these schemes early on, while they show real cost benefit to the user. Feed in tariffs have been another good example to get in early.
The site is also bigoted against electric vehicles. They state the upfront cost of purchase where they need to encourage review of total cost of ownership. With zero road tax for starters they need then to tell people how cheap the cars are to fuel. How about 25% of the cost per mile compared with an equivalent diesel model. Over 10,000 miles that’s easily a saving of £950. Image that, each year. Pays for another holiday each year yes? Or you could use it to over pay some load you may have to purchase the car. Or you could buy second hand, plenty around now for under £9,000 with perfect battery life.
Now go on to consider resale value increasing dramatically as people start to become more and more educated with the fact that most of them won’t have to make any compromises at all when living with an EV. You then realise you have a real solution on your hands.
My i3 costs less than 2p a mile (home charging off peak) in the six months I’ve had it done 8000 miles at a cost of £160 ironically that’s the same as the road tax £320 a year !!! So much for government help for EV’s
BMW i3 starting at £34k, that’s a bargain we can all afford! That saving you make wouldn’t go very far towards buying the car in the first place.
Except electricity isn’t a fuel, it’s temporarily converted energy from a fuel for transportation via cable. A battery provides short term, inefficient buffering of electricity, but also is not a fuel. Similarly hydrogen.
What a stupid and expensive dictatorial commandment!! Wake up people there is only 0.04% CO2 in the atmosphere of which the Earth creates 97%. CO2 is NOT the problem, SOROS and the Tyrannical government is. STOP letting these TRAITORS dictate how you live.
Conspiracy-theory climate-denying twaddle. You need to go away and learn some science.
Russell. I’m not too sure about AnonUK second sentence, but the first is entirely accurate. Carbon Dioxide (CO2) makes up 0.04% of the atmosphere with around 97% of that total coming from natural sources such as oceans and earthquakes (and there are around half a million earthquakes annually). We should all be aware and be responsible for our own climate footprint but moreso where the genuine emergency lies; the environment.
No one is denying climate change is happening, the jury is out as to whether it’s natural or man made, the big bucks are being made from the idea it is man made, so the business of going down that road is obvious to anyone with some common sense. Blinkered science doesn’t resolve the situation.
Climate change is “Man Made” by over population of Planet Earth.
So do you. You may discover that computer models are not science, they are speculation. In the real world there is nothing of any accord happening with climate around the globe.
crazy I agree. what is crazier is paying 70% tax on fuel and around 12p per mile. I’m much happier paying 5% tax on electricity and fuelling for 3p per mile. makes much more sense. no brainer really. no road tax (atm), and very little maintenance too.
Mark, your living a dream that is about to crash, government will be up s#$t creek bout a paddle. With no smokers, less people drinking, no road tax, no fuel tax. The biggest companies in the world are royal Dutch shell, British petroleum and Volkswagen. Now can you see them stopping making fuel an cars? BP made 589 billion pounds before tax last year, similar for shell. So were are the government going to get money from? Plus all the hundreds of thousands of people who work in the industry, what do they do? Disappear up their own backsides? This zero carbon is the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard. Best start digging out your new cave home because that’s were we’re heading! These crack pots talk balls and don’t know how to set up their own ideas. Ban this, ban that. They can’t tell you what replacements they have can they?
Your figures are total bull. Apple, Amazon and Microsoft and Facebook are all bigger (by share price). Shell is 19th, BP 54th and VW aren’t even in the top 100. BP’s pretax profit was £16 billion.
Ian, stop talking about American firms, f all to do with the uk an our tax money intake. This is a UK government messing up the UK.
Wait until you need a battery 😱😱
I’m with you on this. CO2 emission in the Uk is at it;s lowest since 1850 yet be bang on about pollution. Even if the UK went to electric what difference would in make to the whole world when the like of China make up 1/4 of pollution. All being brain washed by the government.
If you wanted to make a change tomorrow ban Aircraft for package holiday makers – We all know never going to happen!
Aren’t you forgetting all The other pollutants that are emitted from ICE vehicles it’s not just CO2, you have NO2, and quite a few more highly poisonous chemicals, when the London marathon is run the pollution levels drop by 89%.
At least when a BEV is driven it is zero Emissions because it has no tailpipe.
The government never said it was going to ban petrol/diesel car sales. It announced ‘conventional’ petrol/diesel sales would be stopped. This gives plenty of wriggle room if they want. What’s conventional, does it include hybrid, non-working cylinders at low speed etc etc. Don’t get over excited.
Some form of internal combustion engine is going to be here for a long time.
Exactly right, all they have to do is fit a mild hybrid system (something that uses the starter to generate a small amount of hybrid power) and it will get past the regs.
Yes but you will have to pay for it big style
James Hope exactly – plus, it is “fossil fuels” being talked about. Nothing about banning engines designed to run on biofuels.
Electric vehicles are only one option currently being developed in various parts of the world, Hydrogen is also playing a part. I did read some months ago that California was starting a push to get a network of enabled filling station throughout the state. Hydrogen does give a greater flexibility but uses electricity to manufacture.
Hydrogen is produced from gas, a fossil fuel and is very inefficient. Better than hydrogen would be lpg, it increases efficiency and the infrastructure is in place
Hydrogen is produced by electrolysing water – no fossil fuel involve if the electricity used is renewable
Science 101 fail right there.
I am no fan of electric, and think the ban on sales of ICE is draconian, but Hydrogen comes from fossil fuel?
What do you drink? What do you think the H in H2O is? Unless of course you think water is a fossil fuel.
The two Elements Hydrogen and Helium make up over 99% of matter in the entire known universe!
As I said, fail 101.
Taz: Hydrogen can be made by electrolysis of water, but in practic e much of it is made by pyrolysis of methane (CH4).
Hydrogen is not a fossil fuel gas – it comes from water (the H in H2O) and since you need oxygen for combustion (the O in H2O) the byproduct of burning hydrogen is effectively putting the H’s and the O’s back together to make water. Very clean energy. You can make it from water and when you use it, it turns back into water.
But you need ENERGY to split the H from the O2, and lots of it, so why not cut out the middle man.
Hydrogen is a gas, it is neither produced from a gas nor is it a fossil fuel. Burning hydrogen as a delusory is no polluting unless you think water is a pollutant. LPG produces Co2, CO and methane.
Hydrogen is primarily produced by steam reforming of natural gas.
Other major sources include naphtha or oil reforming of refinery or other industrial off-gases, and partial oxidation of coal and other hydrocarbons via – Ferrosilicon, sulphur-iodine cycle, plasma reforming & gasification processes.
A tiny amount is obtained by water electrolysis and other sources,
The Electrolysis of water plus compression & storage is a very energy intensive method
it is useful in niche cases but costs a fortune to make.
What will happen to all in the Fossil Fuel industry ?
They will be put to work pedalling bicycles to generate the electricity needed to charge all these EVs!
What will happen to all in the fossil fuel industry?
Not be too long before these environmentalists will be cheering when you are having your pride and joy confiscated and crushed. The motorist needs to fight back. One good idea is to take your car to one of these extinction drum banging protests and sit there with your engine on, as you can’t get through, therefore making their protest cause more pollution.
I wanted to do this at their protest in Norwich but had better things to do! I will do it one day though!
Personal opinion is that if they are stupid enough to lie down in the road and do yoga then they are fair game for roadkill. Hell I’d even do it with a Tesla to really rub it in!
I’ve got another idea. Let the environmentalist drum bangers compensate us for the loss of our vehicles, say £10,000 for each one you have.
In fact, why doesn’t somebody sue Greta Thunberg for helping cause all the congestion and inconvenience caused by the protests.
All the pressure on the drivers regarding pollution, what about the big industry, ships and the aeroplanes? the use much more fossil fuels than the car drivers. I would love to have an electric car but they are expensive and moreover I can’t charge at my house as I don’t have a drive or garage to plug the car in, and there is not a plugging point in my street! The same applies for most of my neighbours! However I guess I could have a hybrid and hopefully there will be plenty of option in the near future.
Thank god I will be dead and buried before these fanatics have their way. Good luck with a return to the horse and cart
They’d probably ban horses too as their farts cause problems, same as cows. Did you not know that the government is advocating we should have less dairy/meat products to save the atmosphere too. I might as well just curl up and die now!!!
We are v close to parity on EVs via ICE if you look at total cost of ownership.
Most people buy via lease and already prices are at parity when you factor in low service and negligible fuel costs.
Most people will charge at home. With ranges now 200miles+ and 90% of journeys being less than 20miles – the barriers are no longer there for mass adoption.
Those who can’t charge at home can access rapid chargers which can provide 70% charge in less than 15 minutes – the amount of time you’s spend getting a coffee and having a wee.
Alternatively they can charge at their destination eg supermarkets like Tesco that is putting in hundreds of charge points across the UK or at their workplace.
I had a Nissan Leaf, with an alledged range of over 100 miles, but it never did even close to 80, especially if any of the road was 60+mph. I now have a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV which only has about 20 odd miles on the E bit. As my regular drive to work is unfortunately ( My company moved office) 35 miles away, the hybrid doesn’t do enough on just the electric.
Much as I would love a Tesla I cannot afford it either. I do love the idea of it all, but the charge points have often been vandalized, and the companies are also charging a lot for the privilege of using them, if you can find an empty on that works.
I also have solar panels, and do try to charge when I can whilst they are working at home.
There is no quick win for any of this.
Er, so what about classic cars and their owners. What compensation would be available. Also, you say that ev are now compatible in costs, but you fail to mention the battery cost, as unless you lease, they only last about 5 years, but cost a fortune to replace, and many people can’t afford to lease anyway ( myself included, as I need a 4×4)
The i3 battery has been tested to 4500+ charge cycles that’s around 500,000 miles BMW guarantee them for 100000 or 8 years look at https://insideevs.com/news/338067/bmw-i3-samsung-sdi-94-ah-battery-rated-for-524000-miles/
Batteries in cars like the Leaf with poor battery management have give EV batteries a bad name
Nissan also guarantee for eight years. Try finding the cost of any vehicle battery replacement. Figures of five thousand and upwards are bandied about. Do you actually know what BMW would charge?
15 mins to wee , what are you a camel ?
I’ve yet to be able to find a car with a range of 300 miles but I do this distance at least 2x a week. Looks like my customers will be upset when I have to stop for a recharge to get them to their destination
Have you factored in the costs of growing, transporting, refining, brewing and selling all this coffee? I thought not!
Here’s an idea. Every Sunday at 12pm. Everybody should start their car on their driveway/street etc, and let it tick over for 5 minutes in protest against the extinction rebellion bullies and the government plan to ban fossil fuels in 2035.
If they want us to drive electric cars then they should buy them for us and how about all the other countries that arnt doing much about it
why should anyone buy you a car? I replaced my car with an ev why cant you do the same when its time for you to buy a new car?
Er, because we can’t all afford new cars.
Why should I be obliged to buy an EV when I have an excellent petrol-powered car that has years of kife in it yet, A swich on a big scale will mean millions of good cars being made obsolete overnight. Absolute dictatorial madnesws.
With what? Shirt buttons?
Cos I can’t afford one, simple as…….
There is no certainty that the current government will still be around in 16 days time, never mind 16 years.
Maybe Graphine batteries will help, but people need to realise that lithium mining is causing devasting Environmental change in the regions it is mined. Secondly the protesters are abusing their right to freedom of speech. They have no right to impede other citizens daily lives. They chose to attach themselves to vehicles and buildings, leave them there.
They need to bring in electric cars that charge while driving, they just don’t go far enough without needing charged
Good point, charging whilst driving is just good common sense. Just invent a car with solar panels on the roof, quite sure it’s not rocket science!
I have to laugh at people who think they are green and saving the planet by thinking that when they join an energy company that boasts that it is producing 100% renewable energy. In reality, these companies may produce 100% renewable energy, but what they don’t tell you is that they also buy electricity from other countries that may use gas, coal or nuclear to produce it, so that they can sell it to the unsuspecting customer, who thinks that because they are with a company that states it produces 100% renewable, they are some kind of eco warrior. Therefore, if they had an electric vehicle, they may well not be charging it with renewable electricity. Oh dear.
Ryanair now claim to be low Co2, wind powered aeroplanes? If we reduce Co2 we will get tree and plant dieback how green is that! Of course it will not happen as man made is such a tiny part of what nature produces.
Four months ago I bought a Citroen DS5 hybrid. A step towards electric as I have a 50ish mile commute, and no where at home to charge a fully electric vehicle (I live in a flat). That being said it is currently at the garage under repair having failed to enter ZEV (electric mode) for the last couple of weeks (thankfully under warranty). But here’s the thing, my mechanic who I trust, can work on the 2.0 Diesel engine in the front, suspension, steering, general car bits ‘n’ bobs, but not on any of the electrical gubbings. It’s not just the infrastructure that needs to catch up, but also mechanics and workshops. PS it is still an awesome car to drive so sticking with it meantime, and trying not to let it put me off hybrids, or even fully electric 🙂 G
15 years away, last chance to buy the silly car you always promised yourself. Something with a petrol V8 🙂
Already bought my new V8 Mustang – fabulous!
The car manufacturers need to give a viable alternative. I only tow light weight trailers to get a motorcycle to off road events, a dinghy to somewhere to sail and to take garden waste to the recycling centre so the maximum weight of the laden trailer is in the region of 250kg but none of the affordable electrics, plug ins or even hybrids that I have found can tow anything. The cheapest that can tow is the Tesla 3 but only if you have a factory fitted tow bar and by the time it has one it costs more than the £40k threshold so your car tax is surcharged by £320 per year for 5 years. So where is the incentive to give alternatives any serious consideration?
The new MG EV can come with a towbar, range 160 miles, 25k
Ridiculous decision
To create electricity some fuel will have to be used!
The cost of electric cars has be brought down to be the s@me as diesel and petrol cars!
It looks more like governments have a separate agenda to reduce the amount of vehicles on the roads
What will happen to motorcycles ?
There is more to this this we know
That’s all internal combustion engines then? Trucks, buses, vans. That’s going to be a lot of expense for some businesses who might have to renew their vehicles around that time. I’d like to see an electric motorhome!
Well Chris, 293000 hgvs registered in the uk. That’s vehicles above 7.5 tons. Like my hgv made into battery power, not, would have to have more batteries than load. They have battery buses in york on the park and ride. Work well because of short runs and ability to charge at bus stop on park and ride site.
Policy making via listening to stupid people being bullies – way to go. Weak government.
What’s the spread on commuting distances? No one is saying this is the solution for everyone, just like people already come in many different ways.
These proposals all sound like a move in the right direction in terms of a greener economy, but is it going to be affordable to the average person or will it be just another way of a law for the rich and one different one for the poor. Better affordable public transport needs to be put in place as soon as possible to counteract the problems that this could cause in everyday life, how is everyone able to get to work or the shops if a car isn’t an option. Governments act first and think later in this country.
We remember here in Manchester the promise of deregulation of the buses would result in more buses, more routes, cheaper fares…. We now have a crap bus service with the timetable filed in the library under fiction and a tram service that reports failures to sections of the service almost daily. Wouldnt ever leave myself at the mercy of the public transport, especially as now our unelected mayor andy “useless” burnham is trying to wrest control for himself… God help the people of Greater Manchester.
I am sure they as well have robust and well thought out plans of how they going to meet the notwork and power generation capacity needed for the switch … “what … wait.. you saying no such plans?”…
Morons in government could not plan day ahead, national energy strategy for long terms is far beyond their dreams. As well pointed out in article, currently issue with EVs are no longer willingness of consumers or manufacturers – IT is lack of infrastructure. We are talking about lack of infrastructure when merely 1.47% of motorists are now driving pure EVs or plug-in hybrids. The goal here is to convert the car park to 100% EV. Just to point out – it is a fact that with current trends we will be short of electricity by 2025… that is just household goods! That is without considering change to EVs!…
However, power generation is just a tip of an iceberg… provided there is budget for it, build 10 new nuclear plants for £20bn each and capacity is met. However, distribution of the power is much more tricky and time consuming – entire country installation has to be changed for the price far higher than building power plants and this is the cost hardly anyone talks about! I am sure what will happen government will leave this to individual households to figure out at their own cost.
I think I would like to summarise here – Britain is just large herd of sheep steered by bunch of imbeciles. Democracy – stop joking, no such thing exists. Do you think that you live in democratic country, do you think your (or for that matter majority vote counts)? Sadly you mistaken. To begin with majority are too dumb to understand what this “ban means”. Let me spell this out:
1 – Cars are not even the biggest problem for environment… Worldwide manufacturing is 49% of pollution, energy generation 16%, Agriculture 14%, house hold 11% and transportation 10%. However, what you tend to see is that “private cars” generates 50% of pollution… where this number comes from? well it is derived from statistics (lie). They take 10% of pollution from transportation, then separate light vehicles from that which is half of transportation and take private cars from light vehicles which is again half. But that is just half of half of 1-tenth of all pollution – only 2.4%. If we want to tackle pollution we needs to look into manufacturing and it is fact that EV manufacturing pollutes MORE!
2- So it won’t help environment at all. Cars contribute 2.4% of pollution where power generation contributes 16%, so we going to cut cars and build capacity in power generation… yeah right. Yes on the face of it electric car is more environmentally friendly “on the road”, but to enable large portion of public to use them you needs to build power networks, generate power, install charging points, manufacture the cars etc. Overall, there is going to be very little if any environmental benefit from this – why we even doing this?!
3 – in UK there are no capacity and currently no plans to have such capacity build. This mean that you not only going to pay for the EV, you as well going to pay for power stations generation from your tax and you likely going to pay for network build from your own money. This is far more money than just switching the cars. Public totally does not understand where they going here!
4 – majority does not even want this, this promoted by handful of green idiots who represents maybe ~3% of population and enforced by government officials who acts in favours of these groups without considering interest of majority. from there probably 80% of people does not understand, 15% of the people could not be bothered and remaining 2% who are saying “this is non-sense” are branded “petrol heads” and out of touch.
Overall, I am confident this is being done because government needs excuse to increase taxes on fuel and ICE cars, business and industry are happy because this means “forced” obsolescence and new sales and finally this works as perfect detraction from real problems and government can claim they doing something.
What about when the rest of the world wants a car. That’s a lot of batteries. Environmentally friendly? My arse.
Government,yes, electric vehicles, saviour no
Interesting comments but has anyone in the ‘Green’ lobby considered the real issue. Recently there were power cuts in parts of the country because two power stations came out of the national grid, proving the point that we are in fact operating a grid system that is constantly just below capacity. That was in late summer. What happens when 20 million electric cars are all plugged-in in the next 15 years. Is the wind going to blow harder, is the sun going to shine longer, are they reducing the time to build nuclear power plants, and finding someone to finance them, No! There won’t be enough power to keep the lights on in the next five years so by default we will be moving back to candles and horse and carts much loved by the lunatic green lobby. Interesting by-line though, all these young ‘extreme puppet’ protesters will find it hard to manage without mobiles, ipads, internet and TV’s. This is what happens when you weaponize children, unintended consequences!
What does Mike Hawes and the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) actually do?
Once again someone expecting the taxpayer to foot the bill for overpriced vehicles.
Why not ask the manufacturers to invest in the environment instead of the taxpayer.
I believe it’s just an easy publicity winning solution for the government that actually does not take into account the wider environmental implications. Yes electric vehicles are undoubtedly better for air quality in the place they are driven, but the production of the vehicles and their batteries has a number of damaging effects on the environment in other parts of the world and ultimately for the world as a whole. The mining of lithium for the batteries is often carried out in a manner that would shock anyone who looks into it – damaging the environment, dangerous conditions, child labourers .. in Chile,. fossil fuels have to be burned to evaporate the salt water involved in extraction, greatly reducing any idea of cleaner air. Then there is the issue of SF6, the man made has used in electrical applications, with a climate warming effect 23,000 times that of co2, and leaks in the EU in 2017 equivalent to putting 1.3 million cars on the road ( https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49567197)
Then the massive inefficiency and carbon footprint of producing new vehicles instead of maintaining existing ones .
To say electric cars are ‘green’ is such an over simplification, but the government are happy to accept it as it gives them bonus points amongst voters who want to ease their conscience whilst carrying on life as us, and most have no clue of the consequences
It an ambitious plan 2050 more doable electric cars need to do miles of a tank of fuel 500 miles electric cars cost to much for normal people hybrid cars would be best at present
When they can produce a car that has a range of 400-500 miles between charges, and you can be stationary to get a full charge within 15minutes, then and ONLY THEN, will the none fossil fuelled vehicle have arrived!
According to the Scottish Government
Electric vehicle drivers in Scotland benefit from one of Europe’s most comprehensive charging networks – almost 1,000 publicly accessible charge points, including over 200 rapid chargers. The average distance from any given location to the nearest public charging point is 2.78 miles.
I travel up the A9 and the A 90 regularily and would very much doubt that few of the 1000 chargers are within 2.78 miles of any point on these roads. The petrol stations are further apart than that but at least I know that if my petrol tank is full when I leave I will get to my destination. The Scottish government should be looking at the upgrade that will be necessary to the National Grid to power lots of electric cars. Its bad enough when everybody switches on kettles at the same time. What would happen if we all decide to charge our cars when
we got home from work.
live on the 10th floor on a 15 floor block of flats , to start with cannot get my car any where near the ground floor as to children’s play ground , so how are we going to charge electric cars, no thought gone in to this
It will never happen, there is not enough materials in the world to make batteries for the UK without the rest of the world trying as well
the trouble with electric cars is that they are still not environmentally neutral. All the impact of mining lithium, colbalt and other materials is destroying South America and elsewhere.
The batteries cannot be recycled and need replacing every few years.
The electric car rhetoric is a con and we’ll all be talking about hydro cars instead within 5 years – this is why no-one is investing in the infrastructure.
How many Nuclear Power Stations will have to be built which i oppose to generate enogh suppky of eletric Enviromentalists will strongly oppose and protest
What’s the point in ‘joining the discussion’, when there are so many cretinous comments already made, from both sides of thr argument.
Why read and bother putting a comment the ?
It will not happen. The politicians can’t event sort Brexit.
It will take to much effort.
However peg their wages to the progress to a greener environment, then we would see a rapid move.
I was keen to buy an electric car this time but the rules are so tight about charging that unless you have a driveway it was impossible! I’m in a terrace with an allocated space outside on a new build estate. Clever!
All this going green rubbish is just another way the government can tax us more.. Firstly the planet earth has a cycle which no matter how green you go isn’t going to change. Cars and the internal combustion engines are a tiny part of the alleged problem. Industry is the biggest problem as you can’t manufacture steel without pollution. A steel works most probably emits enough pollutants every day as 10000 diesel cars do in a year.
But of course they don’t want to admit that they are actually wrong in saying cars and transportation in general are the problem because there’s other ways to produce steel more cleanly, but it inherently expensive.
I’ll stick to petrol thanks.
Until council and private modern housing has been built with garages with electric vehicle charging points and the electric vehicle costs from £10,000 to purchase and the full charge gives you a drive distance of over 400 miles.
What ever happens the motorist will be hit in the picket hard top up fees and with the current road fund coming into the coffers and with electric cars at £0 they will want that revenue they lose as well so they will get it back other ways so increase in vat on electric as we will not have the EU ruling on vat anymore
Having worked in the petrol industry it is no surprise this is happening as in 15 to 20 years of current usage and no big oil deposits being found fuel is going to run very low and unless governments start to really seriously think about future power in different ways things could become very sticky as countries will start to cling on to their own oil reserves
I did a technology course in the early 1980’s. it this we were told that oil would have run out completely by the early 2000’s. got that wrong didn’t they. So I wonder what else?
Surely there is a sensible solution in accepting that both ice and electric traction have a role to play. Start with the cities which have the biggest air pollution problems, with ALL public transport and taxis being electric. This is achievable quickly given the will. Stop the production of overpowered polluting performance vehicles, which in the main are quite unusable in the modern regulated world. Concentrate on high efficiency ice powered vehicles for the vast majority who require a versatile and economical mode of transport for which the infrastructure is already in place. The panic to appear GREEN and force the universal adoption of electric traction is neither possible or desirable given the environmental impact of current battery technology and the lack of facilities for charging.
At a minimum I do 150 miles a day but with journeys outside the city this can easily rise to 400 miles. Whilst as a taxi driver I would love to change to electric, I just can’t afford to. The cost of the vehicle, finding somewhere to charge and limited range all are against it. But I bet within 5 years local councils will impose this on taxied, whilst haulage and bus owners will not be so treated.
I have no interest in an electric vehicle so I like most will be weighing up the options a few weeks before the cut off. Prior to that I will be driving a trusty petrol powered car. I have family members at the other end of the country so how many charges would that be on a battery. It is just more reliable to go petrol. It is the only type of car I have ever driven and have intention of driving as things stand but I am sure over the next 15 years things will improve and I may change my mind but for now my 15 year old car is doing just fine.
Electric or Hydrogen car, you will eventually be taxed out of this world by the robbing government. Not to mention the cost of the car itself and the additional taxes on battery’s and charging points. You think you are overtaxed now, well just wait until 2040.