EV Discussion thread

noitsnotme

Grumpy_chap said:

JKenH said:

Made me wonder how we attribute value for money with EVs? 

As for the reference to speed, this is also about perception.  We did test-drive a TM3P and that was blisteringly fast.  Our TM3 is a lesser model and really feels quite slow - even pedestrian - at times.  The MG5 we test-drove felt faster to be honest.  However, outside the young drovers, do people actually care about speed if that references acceleration?  No-one wants a painfully slow car (which my previous Focus was at 90 BHP) but beyond that, one can only accelerate at the rate of the car in front.  Speed when cruising at the legal limit is the same whether in a Mini, Rolls Royce, Ferrari, MG or Tesla....

I’m not actually much of a car person but I’ve owned a Subaru Impreza WRX for the last few years.  I got it fairly cheap and it was by far the quickest car I’d ever owned.  It was a lot of fun and the noise it made always brought a smile to my face.  Then in the last couple of years I had regular access to a TM3 LR.  After experiencing the acceleration of that, the Impreza never quite felt the same.

Now I have a TMY RWD.  I really wanted to go for the LR to have that same acceleration but at what would work out at around an extra £5k in leasing costs over the 3 years I felt it wasn’t worth it.  I’d had my fun in the TM3 LR and got the “drive like you stole it” phase out of my system.

The RWD is still quick, probably just as quick as my Impreza which has lost a few horses over the years.  I much prefer driving the Tesla now, perhaps that’s an indication of having “grown up”.  I’ll always miss the burble of the Impreza engine though.

JKenH

Tesla reignites price war in China after local rival vows to ‘demolish’ Western rivals

Tesla has renewed its price war in China just days after its biggest rival in the country vowed to “demolish” Western rivals.

Elon Musk’s car maker on Monday reduced the price of two versions of its popular Model Y electric car by about 4pc.

It is at least the second round of price cuts in China so far this yearand means some vehicles have been discounted by as much as 16pc.

The latest round of reductions follows flagging sales and intense competition from local electric car makers.

Last week, Chinese electric car maker BYD urged domestic players to wage war on Western rivals and “demolish” their competition.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/08/14/tesla-reignites-price-war-in-china/

JKenH

Van fleet operators stick with diesel over EV range concerns

Fleets hit pause on transitioning to large electric vans despite claims of over 300 miles of range

The range of bigger electric vans is particularly sensitive to payload and many businesses have scaled back their electrification plans until models with greater ranges and better able to handle heavy loads become available. 

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/business-electric-vehicles/van-fleet-operators-stick-diesel-over-ev-range-concerns

Initially I was surprised by this report from Autocar Business (note, I have not been able to read the whole article because of a firewall) compared to the comments below from SMMT on the July van registrations. Reading the SMMT article, reference is, though, made to projections for 2024 being scaled back. 

UK new van market grows for seventh month running

• Britain’s light commercial vehicle market grows 44.2% in July, the seventh consecutive month of growth, with 26,990 units registered.
• Electric van demand almost doubles – up 94.6% in the month.
• New outlook expects LCV market to grow by 16.1% to 328,000 units in 2023 and edge up 0.5% in 2024.

https://media.smmt.co.uk/july-2023-new-lcv-registrations/

Edit: looking at the tables in the SMMT press release (linked above) we see diesel vans ( somewhat surprisingly) marginally improved market share (year to date) with a slight loss for BEVs. 

silverwhistle

JKenH said:

According to this report it won’t matter whether the government lifts its ban on ICE sales by 2030 as the demand will have disappeared. I’m not convinced, myself. I think sometimes these organisations exist in a bubble out of touch with the real world. With the Sun campaigning for the ban to be lifted, I’m not sure they’ve gauged public opinion correctly.

I'm not sure that a campaign in The Sun is a sure fire arbiter of opinion, although they are good at identifying and stoking populist causes. It's the sort of newspaper where you'll have a shock horror story of EVs depreciating and on a different page a lament about cost.

The capital cost of an EV is more, but with the better second hand values now more people could get in to one, although I'm sure many won't even be looking as a result of the constant narrative of price.

As we've seen with Ford manufacturers have been removing cheaper ICE cars from their range too, and even a Dacia starts from 14K or so.

It's such a fluid situation, and it does need a government which is capable of actions to help rather than making announcements. There is a need to address and regulate charging companies (Geniepoint, a host of EV drivers are looking at you), help to establish cheaper charging for people without home charging, kick the DNO's into action, some form of assistance to get people into second hand EVs. A few more carrots to go with the sticks.

Exiled_Tyke

silverwhistle said:

I'm not sure that a campaign in The Sun is a sure fire arbiter of opinion, although they are good at identifying and stoking populist causes. It's the sort of newspaper where you'll have a shock horror story of EVs depreciating and on a different page a lament about cost.

The day the people realise that certain media organisations are in it for themselves and not for the benefit of the readers/viewers/listeners will be the day we finally start moving in the right direction in so many areas but RE and BEVs would be a nice start. 

JKenH

Exiled_Tyke said:

silverwhistle said:

I'm not sure that a campaign in The Sun is a sure fire arbiter of opinion, although they are good at identifying and stoking populist causes. It's the sort of newspaper where you'll have a shock horror story of EVs depreciating and on a different page a lament about cost.

The day the people realise that certain media organisations are in it for themselves and not for the benefit of the readers/viewers/listeners will be the day we finally start moving in the right direction in so many areas but RE and BEVs would be a nice start. 

All media organisations are in it for themselves. They feed their readers what they want to hear, whether it is the Sun, Mail, Telegraph, Guardian or CleanTechnica. They exist to prosper and prosper to exist. 

Grumpy_chap

silverwhistle said:

kick the DNO's into action, 

This is a definite need.
I am fortunate in that I have my own driveway which should make the provision of home charging easy.  Little did I imagine the challenge of the task.
Car ordered 18th June and collected 30th June.
Electrician quoted and ran the cables the week after the car arrived.  He cannot return to connect until the "cut-out" (fuse) and the meter are upgraded.
End July, the actual wall charger landed.
EDF will write by the end of September (inline with regulated timescale apparently) to offer a date for the meter upgrade.  No indication of how long the meter upgrade will be after that.
UKPN will not attend to assess the fuse upgrade until the meter has been upgraded first, then whatever time scale that takes.
I have no visibility of the costs for the meter and fuse upgrade and just have to pay whatever is demanded.
This is a cost that I had never envisaged plus the time and hassle is all stuff I could do without.
In the mean-time, stuck on a granny-charger which is becoming limiting.

Exiled_Tyke

JKenH said:

Exiled_Tyke said:

silverwhistle said:

I'm not sure that a campaign in The Sun is a sure fire arbiter of opinion, although they are good at identifying and stoking populist causes. It's the sort of newspaper where you'll have a shock horror story of EVs depreciating and on a different page a lament about cost.

The day the people realise that certain media organisations are in it for themselves and not for the benefit of the readers/viewers/listeners will be the day we finally start moving in the right direction in so many areas but RE and BEVs would be a nice start. 

All media organisations are in it for themselves. They feed their readers what they want to hear, whether it is the Sun, Mail, Telegraph, Guardian or CleanTechnica. They exist to prosper and prosper to exist. 

I disagree entirely. some media organisations are privaley owned and therefore have a primary interest of generating wealth for their owners and looking after their wider interests. Others have different structures which enable them to put honest reporting first. If the public don't understand the difference which clearly they don't then there is little hope for us all.

silvercar

Grumpy_chap said:

silverwhistle said:

kick the DNO's into action, 

This is a definite need.
I am fortunate in that I have my own driveway which should make the provision of home charging easy.  Little did I imagine the challenge of the task.
Car ordered 18th June and collected 30th June.
Electrician quoted and ran the cables the week after the car arrived.  He cannot return to connect until the "cut-out" (fuse) and the meter are upgraded.
End July, the actual wall charger landed.
EDF will write by the end of September (inline with regulated timescale apparently) to offer a date for the meter upgrade.  No indication of how long the meter upgrade will be after that.
UKPN will not attend to assess the fuse upgrade until the meter has been upgraded first, then whatever time scale that takes.
I have no visibility of the costs for the meter and fuse upgrade and just have to pay whatever is demanded.
This is a cost that I had never envisaged plus the time and hassle is all stuff I could do without.
In the mean-time, stuck on a granny-charger which is becoming limiting.

You have been very unlucky. We already had a smart meter and didn’t need a fuse upgrade. Also, we were at the tail end of the gov subsidy of charger installations so they were quick to install.

That said, we could have managed on a granny charger and if we had to pay lots for it, I doubt we would have bothered.

JKenH

Exiled_Tyke said:

JKenH said:

Exiled_Tyke said:

silverwhistle said:

I'm not sure that a campaign in The Sun is a sure fire arbiter of opinion, although they are good at identifying and stoking populist causes. It's the sort of newspaper where you'll have a shock horror story of EVs depreciating and on a different page a lament about cost. 

The day the people realise that certain media organisations are in it for themselves and not for the benefit of the readers/viewers/listeners will be the day we finally start moving in the right direction in so many areas but RE and BEVs would be a nice start. 

All media organisations are in it for themselves. They feed their readers what they want to hear, whether it is the Sun, Mail, Telegraph, Guardian or CleanTechnica. They exist to prosper and prosper to exist. 

I disagree entirely. some media organisations are privaley owned and therefore have a primary interest of generating wealth for their owners and looking after their wider interests. Others have different structures which enable them to put honest reporting first. If the public don't understand the difference which clearly they don't then there is little hope for us all. 

I presume you are referring to the Guardian and BBC. The BBC is supposed to be, and is generally regarded as independent although I believe it has been referred to on this board as “little more than a Tory party mouthpiece”. That comment perhaps demonstrated how our own political standpoint influences how we see independence. Does the BBC’s independence make it more honest or less biased than say ITV?

The Scott Trust which owns the Guardian identified its central objective as being the following:

"To secure the financial and editorial independence of The Guardian in perpetuity: as a quality national newspaper without party affiliation; remaining faithful to its liberal tradition; as a profit-seeking enterprise managed in an efficient and cost-effective manner." 

Editorial independence, however, doesn’t necessarily equate to political independence and the Trust requires it to “remain faithful to the liberal tradition”. The Guardian still has to stand on its own feet financially and relies heavily on subscriptions and donations. The Guardian wouldn’t have many subscribers or receive many donations if it didn’t offer its supporters the liberal left of centre content they wanted to see. 

I doubt that many readers of the Mail or the Telegraph buy the papers because they are expecting unbiased reporting and I would imagine that the same could be said for Guardian readers. 

Fortunately, although I am a Telegraph subscriber, the Guardian content is not behind a firewall so I frequently have a look to get their perspective on stories but often I find they don’t report on the stories that interest me. For instance, I couldn’t find any coverage on the SMMT July registration figures when most of the other papers covered the story. (The Guardian had covered the good news in the September, November and December 2022 and January 2023 SMMT press releases.) I don’t know how comprehensive their website edition is but I can also read the daily edition of the Guardian on Readly and it wasn’t there either. 

While you might not like the slant it puts on the subject the Telegraph does cover a lot more EV stories, as I believe does the Daily Mail. I do, however, want to give credit to the Guardian for the Rowan Atkinson EV story although it did cause quite a backlash from its readership - the result being that 5 days later the Guardian published a “Fact Check” piece rubbishing the earlier story.