The big fat Electric Vehicle bashing thread.

fred990

Would it be fair to say the entire thread of ev fans are only interested in saving money and not the planet? 

Volvo tell us that it takes >90k miles on a non-renewable energy supply to be 'greener' than their ice car equivalent........shocking. 

yessuz

How much of power these days is non-renewable really?
Coal is gone in UK. Gas is peaking only.

fred990

Indeed...even with 100% renewable energy it's about 56k miles to 'better' the ice version. 
We're nowhere near that. 
It'd take us >15 yrs to be 'greener'....still it's about saving money really? 

yessuz

Do you have figures to compliment this? How do you calculate the CO2 emissions of the pure EV vs ICE? Do you take inly the engine CO2 emissions or you take same petrochem/power emissions which are quired to convert oil to fuel?

Grumpy_chap

yessuz said:

Did you go to Volvo website to see how mum non-pure electric xc40 would cost!?
XC40 recharge Plug-in hybrid on the road FROM 41150.
XC40 recharge pure EV on the road FROM 45750

NO, but thanks.  Yes, that is a far smaller delta and £5k will be a no brainer in terms of lower overall costs.  I have now looked at the website and I understand why you saw that from the Volvo as the default view does show ICE XC40 at £41k (£680 monthly) or EV XC40 at £45k (£670 monthly).

Look in more detail and the XC40 is from £36k (£540 monthly) while the EV XC40 is from £45k (£680 monthly)


I am not convinced that there are that many "aspirational families" that can fund £45k cars - the extra £130 per month is a big amount in finance commitment.

yessuz said:

In short, if your monthly payment is 150 more than similar ICE but running costs lower by 300...?

Yes, I agree fully. 
I have said before that the total cost of ownership can be lower for an EV even ignoring edge case such as all energy is free from home solar.  Lower running costs acknowledged in the post just above and earlier in the thread.

However, is the extra £150 per month finance available widely to the target market for this type of vehicle?
Do lenders give consideration to how much petrol is purchased when assessing credit facilities and affordability?  I know that mortgage lenders ask for a full budget and spend break down but I am not aware that the same level of detail is considered for car finance.
What about the company car user-chooser given a monthly lease budget?  When I last had a company car, the budget was £X per month and asking for (£X + £150) to get exactly the same car but EV would have been an outright "no".

I really want to understand how all the stuff about lower overall costs gets to work for the majority of new car buyers.  Can the "aspirational family" that would seemingly be the main target market for the XC40 and similar cars get into the EV in the first place?

TooManyPoints

Gas is peaking only.

Where on Earth did you get that idea? Looking at the last 24 hours, gas generation ran at about 15GW for the twelve hours to 8am this morning. It dropped off during the day to bottom out at around 7GW at around 1pm but since then has slowly climbed and by 5pm it was back up to about 13GW. Over the last month it rarely dropped below 5GW and from 27th April to 6th May, trundled along at around 18-20GW, rarely dropping below 15GW. The usual daily demand on the grid varies between 25 and 35GW. As I write, gas is providing the same percentage of demand as wind (both around 40%). For much of yesterday, wind provided less than 1GW of power (that is less than about 3% of normal demand).

Gas is not a peak demand stop gap fuel providing a bit of "top up" here and there. It is fundamental to the UK's energy supply and provides a huge percentage of the UK's power. For much of the fortnight straddling 1st May it frequently provided a good 50% of the grid's requirement.

yessuz

Grumpy_chap said:

yessuz said:

Did you go to Volvo website to see how mum non-pure electric xc40 would cost!?
XC40 recharge Plug-in hybrid on the road FROM 41150.
XC40 recharge pure EV on the road FROM 45750

NO, but thanks.  Yes, that is a far smaller delta and £5k will be a no brainer in terms of lower overall costs.  I have now looked at the website and I understand why you saw that from the Volvo as the default view does show ICE XC40 at £41k (£680 monthly) or EV XC40 at £45k (£670 monthly).

Look in more detail and the XC40 is from £36k (£540 monthly) while the EV XC40 is from £45k (£680 monthly)


I am not convinced that there are that many "aspirational families" that can fund £45k cars - the extra £130 per month is a big amount in finance commitment.

yessuz said:

In short, if your monthly payment is 150 more than similar ICE but running costs lower by 300...?

Yes, I agree fully. 
I have said before that the total cost of ownership can be lower for an EV even ignoring edge case such as all energy is free from home solar.  Lower running costs acknowledged in the post just above and earlier in the thread.

However, is the extra £150 per month finance available widely to the target market for this type of vehicle?
Do lenders give consideration to how much petrol is purchased when assessing credit facilities and affordability?  I know that mortgage lenders ask for a full budget and spend break down but I am not aware that the same level of detail is considered for car finance.
What about the company car user-chooser given a monthly lease budget?  When I last had a company car, the budget was £X per month and asking for (£X + £150) to get exactly the same car but EV would have been an outright "no".

I really want to understand how all the stuff about lower overall costs gets to work for the majority of new car buyers.  Can the "aspirational family" that would seemingly be the main target market for the XC40 and similar cars get into the EV in the first place?

but that's the point!
Yes, the ADDITIONAL 150 financing is available and anyone with at least a decent situation could afford one. 
EV as for Company car user is complete no-brainer due to more or less non-existant BIK. But since I had exactly the same situation as you mentioned, I chose to take cash instead of car and now each and every business mile I am paid 45p, while 160 miles cost me a fiver...

There are no Services on EVs. no cam belts, no oil changes. even brakes almost never used due to one pedal driving.

Tesla, for example, only RECOMMENDS (non compulsory and does not affect you warranty) 1st service after two years, and it contains: check brake fluid, check cabin air filter, check tyre tread depth, check brake pads. that's it.

as what it is regards volvos, look, the base model of ICE is just much worse equipment wise. smaller rims, etc.

yessuz

TooManyPoints said:

Gas is peaking only.

Where on Earth did you get that idea? Looking at the last 24 hours, gas generation ran at about 15GW for the twelve hours to 8am this morning. It dropped off during the day to bottom out at around 7GW at around 1pm but since then has slowly climbed and by 5pm it was back up to about 13GW. Over the last month it rarely dropped below 5GW and from 27th April to 6th May, trundled along at around 18-20GW, rarely dropping below 15GW. The usual daily demand on the grid varies between 25 and 35GW. As I write, gas is providing the same percentage of demand as wind (both around 40%). For much of yesterday, wind provided less than 1GW of power (that is less than about 3% of normal demand).

Gas is not a peak demand stop gap fuel providing a bit of "top up" here and there. It is fundamental to the UK's energy supply and provides a huge percentage of the UK's power. For much of the fortnight straddling 1st May it frequently provided a good 50% of the grid's requirement.

wrong data from my side. 
still gas CO2 is quite low compared to other means, like coal.

Grumpy_chap

yessuz said:

but that's the point!
Yes, the ADDITIONAL 150 financing is available and anyone with at least a decent situation could afford one. 
EV as for Company car user is complete no-brainer due to more or less non-existant BIK. But since I had exactly the same situation as you mentioned, I chose to take cash instead of car and now each and every business mile I am paid 45p, while 160 miles cost me a fiver...

There are no Services on EVs. no cam belts, no oil changes. even brakes almost never used due to one pedal driving.

Tesla, for example, only RECOMMENDS (non compulsory and does not affect you warranty) 1st service after two years, and it contains: check brake fluid, check cabin air filter, check tyre tread depth, check brake pads. that's it.

as what it is regards volvos, look, the base model of ICE is just much worse equipment wise. smaller rims, etc.

There are two items being conflated here. 

Let's deal with the company car scenario first:

Obviously, for the company car user, an EV is a no-brainer from the BIK point of view.  We agree.

Your scenario of taking the car allowance rather than a car and also receiving 45 pence per mile is unusual.  Many people (I think the vast majority) in that case of taking the cash allowance are only paid the AMAP fuel rate for business mileage - it is around 12 pence per mile but 4 pence per mile for EV.  If the employer pays full car allowance plus full 45 pence per mile, the employer has effectively paid twice.  Most employers that I have encountered would not do that.

Many employers simply won't want to see the monthly lease cost increase by £150 per vehicle to switch to EV's - some employers pay fuel cards as well so get the gain of fuel (energy) cost saving but those employers that do not pay fuel will not see the benefit so it would be £150 extra per month to the employer for the employee to save petrol (energy) costs. 

As for increasing lease costs, when I last had a company car, the lease was based upon an agreed rate for the appropriate grade of BMW - so I could have a BMW 1 Series ED which apparently had a monthly value of £310 or I could go out and get any car on lease for £310.  I was allowed to pay £10 per month extra.  I found an E-Class deal at £322 and happy to pay the £12 per month extra.  Outside the rules, just not allowed.  Many companies are similarly rigid on this.

Now, the private buyer:

You state the extra finance is available and anyone in a decent situation can get the money.  How does this work?

I have been using as the target market for a car such as the XC40 the "aspirational family" and when I first introduced them to the thread I considered them as "well off" with a "good" income level, but also having mortgage / rent, school trips, other financial commitments all to be met.

For the sake of discussion, let's say that the "well off" aspirational family has a "good" income level of £60k (however that is split between two parents).  

"Just" another £10k of finance (or £150 of repayments) is a big amount.  I am truly interested as to how "anyone in a decent situation" can easily raise these additional funds and dismiss the concern.  It is borrowing another 25% in the Volvo example.  I am quite sure that I could not just have another £10k for the asking and I think that applies to most people I know or know of - so who are the mystery group you refer to that will be simply thrown another £10k borrowing for a more expensive new car purchase?

I can accept that there will be many cases where the extra capital is off-set by reduced running costs so the overall cost of ownership is lower.  I do, however, want to understand how the target new car buyer (personified by the "aspirational family") actually gets into the EV to start with rather than the ICE.  If they cannot get the EV, then the lower cost of life-cycle ownership is never possible to realise.

Even more so, if the new car buyer can't get into an EV because they don't just have the extra £10k (even if it is finance) to throw into the purchase of the new car, then there are never the numbers of EV cars becoming available as used cars and those that are not able to buy new never get to convert to EV.


Finally, but it's really an aside, I disagree on your picking the spec as less good 18" wheels / 19" wheels - who cares?  In fact, I'd prefer the smaller wheel for the better ride comfort and better energy efficiency.

Petriix

I totally agree about the pricing from Volvo, and indeed most of the other legacy manufacturers. They are catering only for the affluent end of the market. I'm sure it's quite deliberate because they can only produce limited numbers of EVs at present, they may as well get the biggest margin they can for each one. It's why I waffle on about the MG5: at £18,495 for the basic 'Excite' trim on the original SR version using MG's 'affinity' scheme, it really was incredible value. I think the entry point is a far less exciting £25,495 now for the same thing with about 15% more range.

As far as I'm concerned it's weak government. Proper legislation to ensure genuinely affordable, mass-market EVs were available would not really require much effort. As things stand, prices are going up and up which seems to be penalising those who wait. Meanwhile the government grant has been slashed and companies like Toyota are allowed to perpetuate their perpetual motion myth with their 'self charging hybrids' - spoiler: they actually charge by burning fossil fuels. And millions in government funding is thrown at installing charging points while nothing is provided for their maintenance and upkeep - hence the many chargers which don't work and nobody fixes.

My point still stands. If you have access to cheap (or free) charging, particularly at home or work, or if you can run it through a business, get an EV as soon as possible. If you don't fall into this group then you're in the unlucky minority.