Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

Grumpy_chap

michaels said:

I then though I might need to drop my DD1 that evening so dropped in to use the free fast charger at the local Nissan dealers and filled up to 85% in 20 mins, no cost for 12kwh.  In the end DD1 decided not to go out so I plugged the car into the V2G and exported 10kwh receiving 26p / unit - total £2.60

I know yours is a V2G trial, but do those financial figures ever hope to achieve a sustainable future? 
Getting free charge from Nissan then selling the energy may be an extreme example, but if V2G is to thrive then any kind of free charging will become non-existent.
Even ignoring that, selling V2G power at 26 pence/kWh when typical domestic rates are <15 pence/kWh does not work well for the electricity company

Martyn1981

Grumpy_chap said:

michaels said:

I then though I might need to drop my DD1 that evening so dropped in to use the free fast charger at the local Nissan dealers and filled up to 85% in 20 mins, no cost for 12kwh.  In the end DD1 decided not to go out so I plugged the car into the V2G and exported 10kwh receiving 26p / unit - total £2.60

I know yours is a V2G trial, but do those financial figures ever hope to achieve a sustainable future? 
Getting free charge from Nissan then selling the energy may be an extreme example, but if V2G is to thrive then any kind of free charging will become non-existent.
Even ignoring that, selling V2G power at 26 pence/kWh when typical domestic rates are <15 pence/kWh does not work well for the electricity company

If the electricity company is paying more than 26p/kWh on the open market at that point in time, then it will make sense for them. Remember, they sell to most customers at an average price, based on the high and low rates they expect to buy at through the contract period. So any chance they get to buy below the wholesale price, is good news for them.
Obviously during the trial rates are fixed, but there are already battery to grid financial models (particularly in Australia), where storage is discharged and sold to the grid by a managing company. These are called VPP (virtual powerplants), I think one trial in Aus went well using Powerwalls, so is expected to expand to 50,000 properties with Powerwalls. At times wholesale leccy prices hit A$1,400/MWh, and householders received A$1/kWh for export, roughly 55p/kWh.

michaels

They charge about 16p incoming on all units, even if we only count the round trip units and exclude charging losses then they only need a 10p difference between the cost of the incoming electricity that they put in in the night and the outgoing electricity that they export in the evening to still make a profit despite paying us 10p on the turn.

Martyn1981

OK, anyone able to translate a conversation I had today?
So, I arrive at the rescue to do some daily socialising of some feral/street cats, only to find a big AMG G wagon parked sideways across two parking spaces (for the paintshop) and also the lane access for the rescue. So I sit behind it waiting.
Out comes a passenger, looks at me, I smile and point at the lane across the vehicle, so he climbs in and does nothing. Then eventually the driver comes out, starts putting stuff in the boot, but keeps looking at the car.
Then he comes over and signals for me to put the window down, then he signals me to turn the music down (co-incidentally, exactly before the line "F ... you, I won't do want you tell me" plays), so I do, and he asks how far the car will go on a charge.

I'm 50:50 as to whether he wants to know, or wants to knock, but I say 350 miles. He looks a bit disappointed, and asks how long a charge then takes, so I reply 'minutes'*. Again he seems disappointed, and then he asks 'Is it zero emissions', and I think 'here we go, coal generation!', but when I say yes, he proudly explains that his is too.
He goes on to say that it has a hydrogen tank. So I ask does he mean it's a fuel cell vehicle, and if so, why does it still have an exhaust?

He then explains that he had it added to his vehicle (and all his others), and it mixes with the diesel and you get zero emissions.
I ask if he means Adblue (ammonia / hydrogen ..... perhaps I can see where he's coming from), but he says no, he has a tank of hydrogen, and he also gets zero emissions.

I ask does he mean PM2.5's, as there will still be the same CO2 emissions, but he insists that at MOT's they have to test the vehicle multiple times to check their equipment isn't faulty, but the readout shows zero emissions.
At that stage I started to wonder if I've met GA in person, so I just smiled and nodded, and he wandered off happy, and finally got his truck out of the way.

So, any ideas what he's talking about, as he mentioned diesel several times, so it can't be a LPG conversion, and was adamant he had a tank of hydrogen (Doh! should of asked him where he gets it filled, I bet he would have said when it's serviced), which leads me back to Adblue and some questionable sales tactics?

*Technically true. One argument is that it takes 30s at home, 15s to plug in, and 15s to unplug. But even hrs are made up of mins!

QrizB

Well ... MoT's don't measure CO2 emissions, just CO/HC/NOx/PMs, so "zero emissions" is a bit of a stretch.

Here's an article on the general principle of adding hydrogen to diesel:

http://writingaboutcars.com/can-hydrogen-injection-save-the-diesel-engine/

Hydrogen injection has been around since the 1970s and works by injecting hydrogen into a modified, internal combustion engine, which allows the engine to burn cleaner with more power and lower emissions. Hydrogen is injected into the air prior to entering the combustion chamber. Hydrogen burns 10 times as fast as diesel and, when mixed with the diesel in the combustion chamber, accelerates the rate at which the diesel burns.

It sounds expensive but compared to the price of an AMG G-Wagen it's probably a bargain

Martyn1981

QrizB said:

Well ... MoT's don't measure CO2 emissions, just CO/HC/NOx/PMs, so "zero emissions" is a bit of a stretch.

Here's an article on the general principle of adding hydrogen to diesel:

http://writingaboutcars.com/can-hydrogen-injection-save-the-diesel-engine/

Hydrogen injection has been around since the 1970s and works by injecting hydrogen into a modified, internal combustion engine, which allows the engine to burn cleaner with more power and lower emissions. Hydrogen is injected into the air prior to entering the combustion chamber. Hydrogen burns 10 times as fast as diesel and, when mixed with the diesel in the combustion chamber, accelerates the rate at which the diesel burns.

It sounds expensive but compared to the price of an AMG G-Wagen it's probably a bargain

Cheers. I'm so annoyed that I didn't think to ask where he gets the H2. That might have solved the puzzle for me. I'm not even sure if there is a H2 supply for cars in Wales (yet?), but perhaps a small amount of low pressure H2 can be obtained more easily, without the need for a 'proper' H2 supply for FCEV's?
Quite intriquing.

Perhaps one less H2 G Wagon, and a fleet of BEV transits instead? 

PS - He was very proud to be 'zero emissions', mentioned it several times, but also openly repeated that it's added to the diesel.

JKenH

Tesla faces hefty fines in Norway for throttling its EV batteries

It seems Tesla is being treated as harshly (unfairly?) as VW were after Dieselgate with the level of compensation levied. (I should point out that there were only 30 litigants who have actually been awarded compensation although the door is open for thousands more to pursue compensation). 

Tesla has been found guilty by a Norwegian court of throttling charging speeds and limiting the maximum capacity of its electric vehicle batteries and has been ordered to pay 136,000 kroner (£11,500) to thousands of customers.

https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2021/05/tesla-faces-hefty-fines-in-norway-for-throttling-its-ev-batteries/

Edit: article from Electrek on the same topic

https://electrek.co/2021/05/24/tesla-found-guilty-throttling-charging-speed-asked-pay-16000-thousands-owners/

Solarchaser

Interesting articles indeed.
It's a strange situation when the defendant doesn't even respond, never mind defend itself.
I guess tesla will respond with an appeal, but kinda shows a general lack of respect for the Norwegian courts if its as reported, and no reason to doubt it is.

michaels

Solarchaser said:

Interesting articles indeed.
It's a strange situation when the defendant doesn't even respond, never mind defend itself.
I guess tesla will respond with an appeal, but kinda shows a general lack of respect for the Norwegian courts if its as reported, and no reason to doubt it is.

I read this was the default fine and the default situation in Norway was not to respond in the lowest court as it will automatically go to the next level anyway. 

I'm also not sure what Tesla have done wrong, as long as the battery capacity remains above the warranty level and the charge rate does not fall below any advertised rate when the car was sold then the fact that they are lower than when new is not of itself a reason to complain?  For example my leaf battery was warrantied to be above 70% for 5 years - if it was 95% for the first 4 years then dropped overnight to 75% due to a recalibration for the next year, despite the disappointment, I don't see that I would have any right to compensation.

Martyn1981

michaels said:

Solarchaser said:

Interesting articles indeed.
It's a strange situation when the defendant doesn't even respond, never mind defend itself.
I guess tesla will respond with an appeal, but kinda shows a general lack of respect for the Norwegian courts if its as reported, and no reason to doubt it is.

I read this was the default fine and the default situation in Norway was not to respond in the lowest court as it will automatically go to the next level anyway. 

I'm also not sure what Tesla have done wrong, as long as the battery capacity remains above the warranty level and the charge rate does not fall below any advertised rate when the car was sold then the fact that they are lower than when new is not of itself a reason to complain?  For example my leaf battery was warrantied to be above 70% for 5 years - if it was 95% for the first 4 years then dropped overnight to 75% due to a recalibration for the next year, despite the disappointment, I don't see that I would have any right to compensation.

I suppose that's the crucial issue, Is Tesla trying to preserve longer life for the customers by reducing stress/strain on the batts, but within the promised levels, or are they getting less than advertised. This has been going on for some time now.
I think it's another issue that could be helped by having a PR team to explain 'their' side. Things got messy with the Chinese braking claims, and the Houston crash/fire with Tesla failing to respond to the press.