Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

Martyn1981

And the UK Gov rolls back another pro-PEV policy. This is getting weird! I appreciate that BEV sales are rising nicely but if they keep chipping away at all the support, and possibly undermine confidence in charging, then this could backfire, and slow down the growth. Seems like a dangerous game to be playing.

Plans in England for car chargers in all commercial car parks quietly rolled back

The government has quietly backtracked on proposals to require every shop, office or factory in England to install at least one electric car charger if they have a large car park, prompting criticism by environmental campaigners.

The original plan required every new and existing non-residential building with parking for 20 cars or more to install a charger. However, the Department for Transport (DfT) has now revealed it will only require chargers be installed in new or refurbished commercial premises amid fears over the cost for businesses, according to a response to a consultation.

The move has prompted concern in the car industry and among experts that public charger access will lag behind demand, as sales of electric vehicles accelerate ahead of the 2035 ban on sales of new fossil-fuelled internal combustion engines. A quarter of new cars bought in the UK in November can be plugged in to recharge, according to industry data.

Greg Archer, the UK director of Transport & Environment, a campaign group, said: “Car parks are an ideal place for drivers of electric cars without driveways to charge. By failing to require commercial buildings with car parks to install a small number of charge points, the government has missed a simple opportunity to level up the charging available for less affluent drivers who park overnight on the road.

“It is inexplicable that a government committed to phasing out conventional cars has failed to follow through and implement its own proposals from more than two years ago, and instead say it needs longer to consider the options.”

JKenH

Tesco powers into the new year with the UK’s first commercial electric articulated HGVs

Tesco will power into the new year by launching the UK’s first commercially used fully electric heavy freight articulated trucks. Two new 37 tonne DAF electric vehicles will transport food and other products from Wentloog rail terminal outside Cardiff to Tesco’s distribution centre in Magor, Wales, in partnership with logistics and international freight forwarding company FSEW.

https://www.tescoplc.com/news/2021/tesco-powers-into-the-new-year-with-the-uk-s-first-commercial-electric-articulated-hgvs/

JKenH

M5 site eyed for £1billion electric car factory by both Amazon firm Rivian and Tesla - reports

An Amazon-backed electric car company is eyeing up a site near the M5 in Somerset for a £1billion gigafactory - but they could have serious competition from Elon Musk.

Elon Musk reportedly visited the same site in mid-2020, with rumours he wanted to build an electric car plant to manufacturer Teslas.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/uk-news/m5-site-eyed-1billion-electric-22594932

JKenH

Northvolt rolls out Europe’s first ‘gigafactory-era’ car battery

On Tuesday night, Northvolt, a startup, produced its first lithium ion battery cell at a plant in northern Sweden. It is the first of a series of new factories that investors hope will allow Europe to carve out a big proportion of the electric vehicle market – and weaken the stranglehold built up by manufacturers in China, Japan and Korea.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/dec/29/northvolt-rolls-out-europes-first-gigafactory-era-car-battery?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

michaels

Martyn1981 said:

This vid covers loads of stuff we've talked about previously. It's Fuly Charged, and Bobby gets his 2011 Leaf back after a battery upgrade to 40kWh. This particular upgrade goes back over a year thanks to Covid, and I seem to recall we also chatted on here about battery replacements in general for the early Leaf's at that time.

Bobby goes to lengths to explain that this is really just an issue for the earliest Leaf's, early battery tech, lots of recharging etc etc, and that for new BEV's now, the myth of a battery replacement is just that (other than for a faulty pack) as the batts don't degrade quickly, and may well see out the life of the car instead.

His old battery, after a hard life was down to about 40 miles of range in harsh conditions, whilst the replacement (from a crashed rollover leaf) is giving him 120-125 miles in wet, cold motorway driving. The conversion cost was £4k, which seems good value either as an additional cost for the past 10yrs of use, or as an investment for another 10yrs.

During the vid, we also see the ~0.5MWh stationary storage that the company have built using second life batts, and a 360kWh tractor conversion. This tractor will be used on a work site towing 30t trailers of rubble away, and across a public road, where the stipulations were that the work vehicle had to be zero emissions.

Return of the LEAF: Robert drives his range extended EV home from Holland

Umm - 4k sounds a good price but I thought the cost was 8k which makes the maths much harder to justify.  I was just thinking about this - I wonder how much ~nissan are paying at the pack level for 40kwh leaf batteries these days - say it is £100 per kwh that would be £4k - sadly I can't see them selling 40kwh packs at that sort of level

Verdigris

The battery comes from a written off vehicle.

michaels

Verdigris said:

The battery comes from a written off vehicle.

Yes, even for a second hand 40kwh the list price from Muxsan / Cleverly is 8.5k £/EUR which makes it a very different proposition for the 4k mentioned in the vid, sadly.

Verdigris

Presumably, saving 4 grand was the motivation for going to the Netherlands. Mind you, wouldn't Muxan still be involved to create the "translation" module; or have these guys worked out their own way of getting the car to accept the battery?

Martyn1981

michaels said:

Martyn1981 said:

This vid covers loads of stuff we've talked about previously. It's Fuly Charged, and Bobby gets his 2011 Leaf back after a battery upgrade to 40kWh. This particular upgrade goes back over a year thanks to Covid, and I seem to recall we also chatted on here about battery replacements in general for the early Leaf's at that time.

Bobby goes to lengths to explain that this is really just an issue for the earliest Leaf's, early battery tech, lots of recharging etc etc, and that for new BEV's now, the myth of a battery replacement is just that (other than for a faulty pack) as the batts don't degrade quickly, and may well see out the life of the car instead.

His old battery, after a hard life was down to about 40 miles of range in harsh conditions, whilst the replacement (from a crashed rollover leaf) is giving him 120-125 miles in wet, cold motorway driving. The conversion cost was £4k, which seems good value either as an additional cost for the past 10yrs of use, or as an investment for another 10yrs.

During the vid, we also see the ~0.5MWh stationary storage that the company have built using second life batts, and a 360kWh tractor conversion. This tractor will be used on a work site towing 30t trailers of rubble away, and across a public road, where the stipulations were that the work vehicle had to be zero emissions.

Return of the LEAF: Robert drives his range extended EV home from Holland

Umm - 4k sounds a good price but I thought the cost was 8k which makes the maths much harder to justify.  I was just thinking about this - I wonder how much ~nissan are paying at the pack level for 40kwh leaf batteries these days - say it is £100 per kwh that would be £4k - sadly I can't see them selling 40kwh packs at that sort of level

Hiya, it wasn't a new pack from Nissan, it was a recycled secondhand pack from a separate company. Robert mentions the cost in the video.

michaels

Martyn1981 said:

michaels said:

Martyn1981 said:

This vid covers loads of stuff we've talked about previously. It's Fuly Charged, and Bobby gets his 2011 Leaf back after a battery upgrade to 40kWh. This particular upgrade goes back over a year thanks to Covid, and I seem to recall we also chatted on here about battery replacements in general for the early Leaf's at that time.

Bobby goes to lengths to explain that this is really just an issue for the earliest Leaf's, early battery tech, lots of recharging etc etc, and that for new BEV's now, the myth of a battery replacement is just that (other than for a faulty pack) as the batts don't degrade quickly, and may well see out the life of the car instead.

His old battery, after a hard life was down to about 40 miles of range in harsh conditions, whilst the replacement (from a crashed rollover leaf) is giving him 120-125 miles in wet, cold motorway driving. The conversion cost was £4k, which seems good value either as an additional cost for the past 10yrs of use, or as an investment for another 10yrs.

During the vid, we also see the ~0.5MWh stationary storage that the company have built using second life batts, and a 360kWh tractor conversion. This tractor will be used on a work site towing 30t trailers of rubble away, and across a public road, where the stipulations were that the work vehicle had to be zero emissions.

Return of the LEAF: Robert drives his range extended EV home from Holland

Umm - 4k sounds a good price but I thought the cost was 8k which makes the maths much harder to justify.  I was just thinking about this - I wonder how much ~nissan are paying at the pack level for 40kwh leaf batteries these days - say it is £100 per kwh that would be £4k - sadly I can't see them selling 40kwh packs at that sort of level

Hiya, it wasn't a new pack from Nissan, it was a recycled secondhand pack from a separate company. Robert mentions the cost in the video.

Apologies for conflating two issues:
1) The cost to the customer for upgrading a leaf 24 to a 40 pack (second hand) in the UK or Holland is £8.5k not 4k
2) I was then speculating what it should cost if Nissan were willing to sell new 40kwh packs