BEVs deals and information

JKenH

Charge rage has arrived.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=electric+car+charging+rage&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-gb&client=safari

My wife and I regularly go to Meadowhall shopping centre in Sheffield. It has 12,000 parking spaces but only 5 charging points (installed in 2014) although a further 57 are being added this autumn. When I had my Golf GTE on order I went to check them out and the same cars were there for hours.

silverwhistle

joefizz wrote: »

Nothing is really insurmountable. People just cant be arsed.

Nothing you've posited in your longer posts as a potential situation is not going to happen, and they are all matters that may be an issue at one point or another to somebody, but your lengthy posts do come over like one of the Mail or Express articles that I sometimes get on my phone feed: "this could happen", "Mororists, you could be fined this!", and the like.



It may require common sense, or being arsed, and I agree that is an issue but not unique to EVs, and none will prevent larger scale adoption in the future.


There is a natural turnover of vehicles, my own cycle tends to be from 4 years old to 12ish as I'm not practical enough for doing too much servicing myself, and I suspect that will happen again with the current car - 2 years to go.:-) Although the last two were only given up at that age as I was changing countries and the bureaucratic costs involved - wasn't too bothered about driving LH/RH drive vehicles.
So I've got a couple of years to go before a complete change, though I might experiment with EVEZY before I do.

Solarchaser

Comparing an rx8 to a 350z is a strange comparison, the 350 has a cat.
My point about the rex was how polluting it is since it burns around half a litre of oil every km... if you are lucky, not about its cost.

Ken, yes the charging cables are very long, as you would expect, and so do indeed lie in the gutters at times when charging.
And really, why shouldn't ev drivers get annoyed at ice cars parking in the bays, think how upset you would be if you turned up to a petrol station, all pumps but one are broke, and there is an ev parked in front of the working one, the driver having gone for dinner/shopping etc.

The real problem is that most dont realise they are EV bays, they should be highlighted green.
Then again you still get a$$holes who parked in disabled bays cos they are lazy

Solarchaser

Ps. I find it quite amusing that you posted a link as proof of the rage, when the link was to a google search showing you deliberately searched for it :-D

Solarchaser

Sorry the km on the rex was supposed to by k (as in a thousand) miles, half a litre every kilometer... that would really be something, like a tranny van with blown turbo lol

JKenH

Solarchaser wrote: »

Ps. I find it quite amusing that you posted a link as proof of the rage, when the link was to a google search showing you deliberately searched for it :-D

It was deliberate to give my avid followers the chance to see several examples.:) I am sure I would get (internalised) charge rage if I had an EV and couldn’t find a charger because I’d been ICE’d. It obviously hasn’t happened yet but I remember queuing for diesel at a garage/convenience store in the west country behind someone who had decided to leave his car at the pump while he did his weekly shop.

If and when I get my EV it will be for use as a runabout so I don’t have to use public chargers. Most charging points local to me are usually empty, probably because the two council provided ones in my home town charge 30p/kWh, but this could change rapidly as BEV growth expands. Matching the number of available public charging points to demand is going to be tricky if there is a rapid take off in BEVs and expansion of the network might lag behind demand. I don’t fully understand how various types of charging points are currently financed (I believe some are grant supported) but there has to be a workable business model to recover the very substantial investment in installing new public chargers once central and local government funding dries up. The limiting factor in the immediate future may however be the resilience of the local grid.

I do worry therefore that there may be delays and frustration (and perhaps unexpected expense) ahead for those reliant on public charging.

In case anyone is interested I found, thanks once again to the magic of google, this interesting document from PWC on the future of EV charging infrastructure.

https://www.pwc.co.uk/power-utilities/assets/powering-ahead-ev-charging-infrastructure.pdf

JKenH

joefizz wrote: »

Nothing is really insurmountable. People just cant be arsed.

ICEs are wonderfully easy to live with. On average I have to fill my Golf up once a month and it takes 5 minutes. It might be cold but there is always a canopy over the pumps. If there’s a queue at the supermarket filling station I will just leave it until the next time.

No driving round looking for a spare lamp post charger within a few hundred yards of home. No need to go out on a frosty night to switch the charging cable over to the wife’s car and find the flap is frozen shut. No messing around with messy wet cables when its raining. No getting the car all connected to the charger and finding its not working so you have to move. Just walk out the door get in the car and drive away and just as easy when coming home at night.

EV fans say how wonderful BEVs are and like every new technology they will take over overnight, just like CDs killed off LPs and digital cameras killed off film. The difference is those new technologies offered convenience and EVs offer the opposite. Yes for a few of us who love the tech, have the money and can charge on our drives using our solar panels, while we show the world we are saving the planet they are great but Joe Bloggs, who has other priorities, may take a little convincing.

joefizz

silverwhistle wrote: »

Nothing you've posited in your longer posts as a potential situation is not going to happen, and they are all matters that may be an issue at one point or another to somebody, but your lengthy posts do come over like one of the Mail or Express articles that I sometimes get on my phone feed: "this could happen", "Mororists, you could be fined this!", and the like.

Sweet Jesus, Ive never been as insulted in all my life ;-) Mail or Express. wash your mouth out.


Thing is though, I do tend to post from real life experiences and actually out there talking to people rather than what is theoretically possible and what really should happen.
Your point about the mail and express clickbait is a valid one in that do they drive peoples opinions or do they reflect them or is it a bit of both.
It is easy to dismiss my comments and reasons given for people not buying EVs as flippant or easily overcome but being a petrolhead and good with my hands Ive been out with test drives with most of my friends and colleagues down through the years and when people dont buy a good car because they dont like the colour then having to go out in the wind and rain and switch cables over or forgetting to charge or whatever is a step up from that, dont you think?



Nobody has come back to me yet on this thread arguing that replacing cars regardless of drivetrain that are less than 8 years old is cumulatively adding to emissions.
Every time someone orders a new car they are pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere than I do in 5 years of existing on the planet. As you mention the owning cars for 12 years, other than accidents theres no reason why the 6-7 year average life of a new car purchased today cant be 12 years (and indeed the new types of EV may well get that but I already own at least 2 vehicles with a 1/4 million mile capable drivetrains). The political will has to be there to ensure this and this comes from public opinion. Public opinion is driven by the 'oh shiny, shiny' rather than utilitarian view though.

Now ideally to help the situation none of us should be driving, having kids and worse but thats not going to happen and Im realistic about that.
Ive had training in end to end environmental auditing and am sad enough to try to implement that in what I do (stopped buying new cars as a result) and try to justify any new purchases with that view in mind. How much does the purchase contribute to emissions, how long do I have to keep that to make it neutral, what is the maintenance like and can it be recycled in some format when it does pack it in.
This thread has been useful for me because for the first time Ive realised that my savings in oil heating over the last couple of years havent just been monetary savings (with the price of oil its not that big a saving) but has been more heating oil saved than I use driving in a year.

That doesnt make me carbon neutral and I doubt I can reduce that any more (short of stopping driving which isnt really an option) but most people cant be arsed doing what Ive done.
My household bin gets emptied once every 3 months or so, again most people cant be arsed with that as its not convenient and takes a bit of effort.



BEVs are the saviour of the planet, no they are not, just like diesel wasnt. Thats not to say that if I do come to the end of the road with my other cars that a BEV wont be top of my list (well first port of call would be a 3 year old outlander phev in the meantime).
Like dieselgate and the now demonisation of diesel engines who is to say BEVs wont be demonised in 10 years time for the polluting way cobalt or nickel or silver is mined and the leftover toxic waste dumps from all those leaking corroding battery packs... or whatever is invented to make us all change to the next breed of 'new and improved' car tech.



People tend to blame big oil etc etc as its easy to blame them, its also easy for me to blame car companies with inbuilt obsolescence and scrapping cars before their time to keep their sales going but ultimately we are the ones who are the problem.

Martyn1981

joefizz wrote: »

No.
One parked on the drive, one parked on the street.... its sometimes the simple things that get overlooked.

You seem to be going around in circles as we've already addressed this. You charge the visitor's vehicle, then when they leave, you charge yours.

In the case of a household with multiple BEV's, you'd simply alternate - once again, average UK mileage is 22 miles per day, that's less than one hour of charging at 7kW.

Obviously you can imagine lots of problems, but I think we should stick with reality and not overfocus too much on the extreme edge cases - after all, if we really are going to base the entire BEV rollout on 60A homes, with limited parking, multiple BEV's and frequent visitors requiring charging, then progress will be even slower.


Personally, and I fully admit I have no BEV (yet*) I just don't see these problems. What about daytime charging when BEV's are home and owners have PV, or at work/roadside with smart chargers 'dumping' RE excess at low rates into what will become a simply vast intra-day battery storage. What about charges at the supermarket, gym, cinema etc..

Basically, what I'm asking is why, in reality, will this 'fleet' of discharged BEV's all descend on one property, at the same time, and all need a full charge for the next day?


*Hoping to get a cheap (that's the problem) sh BEV as a second car, but, will it be classed as the second car? We currently have/need a Zafira, which is useful for larger parties, having 7 seats, moving 2+ large dogs at times, and building materials like lengths of wood and board.

But, I'd guess that at least 3/4 of our mileage is easily covered by a smaller BEV, even at a guaranteed range of say 60 miles in the winter. Could even be 90% of mileage, in which case is it still the 2nd car, i'd suspect it becomes the first car, and that seems like a great thing.

joefizz

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Personally, and I fully admit I have no BEV (yet*) I just don't see these problems.

Yes you do....

Martyn1981 wrote: »

We currently have/need a Zafira, which is useful for larger parties, having 7 seats, moving 2+ large dogs at times, and building materials like lengths of wood and board.

You just dont see your 'problems' as 'problems', just other peoples.
My own 'problems' are pretty much the same as yours plus I need something that will do just over 250 miles in all weathers, in all traffic conditions without more than a 20min 30 min delay.
Right now maybe 1 EV (Tesla) will do this but it wont carry my gear as well, so I'll need 2 cars so why bother?



Yes I could get a leaf or a phev for the small journeys but again Ill reiterate my point, buying a new car just on the basis of this will add considerably to the problem that we are all trying to solve...


As for charging a BEV during the day from PV, well if I could sit and charge it at home all day from PV then I probably dont need it in the first place! The vast majority of people would need their car during the day, hardly extreme edge cases.