EV Discussion thread

70sbudgie

shinytop said:

Nobody has mentioned the elephant in the room (except maybe in passing). Most people can't, and will never be able to, afford a 400 mile range EV.  Even second hand; they just won't.  Ever. We need a charging infrastructure that properly supports real 200 mile EVs where drivers sometimes want to travel 3-400 miles.  

I keep saying this; most motorcycles have a range of much less than 200 miles but nobody cares because refuelling is quick and easy.  A 400 mile motorcycle is possible but nobody wants/needs one.     

This was part of our long conversation, but I realised my post had got a bit long to elaborate further. It is what I was referring to when I referenced a need to cater for the full range of motoring. The charging infrastructure needs to be good enough for EV versions of the current £200 banger (that new drivers use). Most of the time, they won't need to go further than 100 miles, but every so often they will want to do a 300 mile trip. Being young and carefree, they are less likely to be bothered about waiting an hour at a services for their car to charge, but they may be unwilling to wait for a charger to become available. 

In a scenario when the 20% of new cars are pushing 1000mile range (even if not quite there), there will be considerably more older EVs (1st and 2nd gen) that have significantly less than 200mile motorway speed range. They may not need motorway services regularly, but the current old ICE bangers will never be replaced if there isn't the infrastructure to support an EV equivalent.

JKenH

Martyn1981 said:

michaels said:

Martyn1981 said:

Grumpy_chap said:

Martyn1981 said:

Thanks, really thought provoking. With respect to your BiL, I don't think he's right. Whilst some BEV's may reach 1,000 mile range, I actually doubt it may happen, or be of any significant number. There's little point having such range since it won't get used often. Of course the contradiction to that is a poor charging network, but even so, 400+ miles is probably a limit when the cost and weight of extra batts makes it less worthwhile adding more.

Further reasons why the 400-mile range is a good target.

1. Overnight charging.
An efficient EV can do around 4 miles / kWh, so 400 miles requires a 100 kWh battery.
Maximum charge rate on single-phase power supply is a little over 7 kWh.  
On a 14-hour overnight stop, that 100 kWh is the most you can charge.
There are no indications that EV's achieving better than 4 miles / kWh are imminent and there'd have to be to change this part os the consideration.

2.  Driving time.
400 miles is about 8 hours driving time.
Yes, you can get 400 miles in less than 8 hours if you start and finish on the motorway, complete the entire distance at national speed limit without encountering any traffic or junctions.  Reality will be at an average speed nearer the 50 mph mark.

3.  Rapid charging.
If you really do need to do more than 400 miles in the day, even the strongest bladder is going to force a comfort stop.  That gives the opportunity to add more range without extending the overall journey time beyond the comfort stop that is required in any case.

Yep makes a lot of sense. And for cars that are mostly doing city driving, and second (or more) cars in a household, I think 200 miles may be an upper target. This would still allow for longer journeys, but will run into potential charging issues, where 70's BiL's comments come in, and offer an alternative.

Will be fun to see how things work out. Looks like some of the potential solid state batts can achieve twice or better the energy density (mass and volume), so if prices get cheap enough, then 1,000 mile range will be doable, but I'm not sure how far in the future that will be, perhaps at least 10yrs. TBC 10+yrs for batts to be cheap enough for a significant minority to consider such huge capacity (200kWh+?)

I'm off on a digression again, but I don't recall any ICE offerings of larger fuel tanks* so some drivers can choose where to buy fuel, and avoid peak motorway fees? Presumably there are after market options for extreme vehicles, but any (small) extra cost and the loss of storage, would probably not be worth it for occassional high price purchases. Obviously I appreciate that the difference between batts and fuel tanks, and 'fueling' opportunities are very different, but still, a thought.

*In essence, I suppose the vehicles expected to do longer trips had larger fuel tanks (as standard) than the smaller city cars, so quite similar to a potential BEV future.

There is 200 and there is 200 tho.  I think it was vauxhall who had a calculator on their website that showed the 200 mile e-corsa would get less than 100 miles motorway speeds in the cold.  Problem is it is the odd motorway journey where any lack of range is most acutely felt.  We upgraded to a 160 mile leaf 40 - but DW still has to be extremely careful making a 100 mile round trip to her sister's when it is cold and this is only about 60 miles motorway and the rest a mix of 20/30/40/50.

Our 28kWh IONIQ has a solid 130 miles, and can do 150 if driven properly. For wifey and I, that's more than enough, so if battery/vehicle cost is an issue, that seems enough range.

Have you got rid of the TMY?

JKenH

thevilla said:

Sandy Munro on Fully Charged the other week predicted a 1000 mile swappable super capacitor the size of a VHS cassette ( remember them?) in 20 years time.

Predicting "never" is both brave and depressingly negative.  I hope it was tongue in cheek 🙂

Technology moves on relentlessly in ways we can’t imagine. Today’s commonplace cars (300 mile EVs)  were unimaginable 15 years ago. We don’t know what the next 15 years will bring but I doubt if the cutting edge will be the battery technology we use today. Tesla may be next decade’s Kodak. We could end up with ‘000s of obsolete charging stations. 

Grumpy_chap

70sbudgie said:

The charging infrastructure needs to be good enough for EV versions of the current £200 banger (that new drivers use). 

There's no such thing as the £200 banger any more.
Of 441,740 cars listed on Autotrader today, 15 are sub-£500:
  

70sbudgie said:

In a scenario when the 20% of new cars are pushing 1000mile range (even if not quite there), 

What cars are near 1k mile range please?

JKenH

Grumpy_chap said:

70sbudgie said:

The charging infrastructure needs to be good enough for EV versions of the current £200 banger (that new drivers use). 

There's no such thing as the £200 banger any more.
Of 441,740 cars listed on Autotrader today, 15 are sub-£500:
  

70sbudgie said:

In a scenario when the 20% of new cars are pushing 1000mile range (even if not quite there), 

What cars are near 1k mile range please?

A few diesels can do those sort of miles.

https://www.parkers.co.uk/company-cars/2015/top-5-diesel-estates/

https://www.parkers.co.uk/company-cars/2016/top-long-range-diesel-saloons/

Grumpy_chap

JKenH said:

Grumpy_chap said:

70sbudgie said:

In a scenario when the 20% of new cars are pushing 1000mile range (even if not quite there), 

What cars are near 1k mile range please?

A few diesels can do those sort of miles.

https://www.parkers.co.uk/company-cars/2015/top-5-diesel-estates/

https://www.parkers.co.uk/company-cars/2016/top-long-range-diesel-saloons/

Yes, as I mentioned upthread earlier today:

Grumpy_chap said:

My Citroen C5 officially quoted 1,000 mile range on the fuel tank but I never managed more than a measly 980 miles

But I had understood @70sbudgie to be referencing that range in the context of EVs...

70sbudgie

Grumpy_chap said:

JKenH said:

Grumpy_chap said:

70sbudgie said:

In a scenario when the 20% of new cars are pushing 1000mile range (even if not quite there), 

What cars are near 1k mile range please?

A few diesels can do those sort of miles.

https://www.parkers.co.uk/company-cars/2015/top-5-diesel-estates/

https://www.parkers.co.uk/company-cars/2016/top-long-range-diesel-saloons/

Yes, as I mentioned upthread earlier today:

Grumpy_chap said:

My Citroen C5 officially quoted 1,000 mile range on the fuel tank but I never managed more than a measly 980 miles

But I had understood @70sbudgie to be referencing that range in the context of EVs...

Sorry, I meant future scenario. 

It has crossed my mind to wonder whether 1000 mile range is relevant in the UK, even if it becomes technically possible.

My reference was more that even if it (1000 mile range) does become a possibility, it would only apply to the high end new cars. At the moment, less than 20% of licensed cars are less than 3 years old. 

Grumpy_chap

70sbudgie said:

Sorry, I meant future scenario. 

It has crossed my mind to wonder whether 1000 mile range is relevant in the UK, even if it becomes technically possible.

My reference was more that even if it (1000 mile range) does become a possibility, it would only apply to the high end new cars. At the moment, less than 20% of licensed cars are less than 3 years old. 

Ah, OK, thanks.

Martyn & I discussed the range a little earlier in the thread and we both seemed to agree that around 400 miles was about as good as you'd ever need.
Unless efficiency gets to be a lot better than 4 miles / kWh for an EV (which is jolly good anyway compared to around 1.5 mile / kWh for an ICE).

It is technically possible to just put a big battery in an EV today and achieve the 1,000 mile range - albeit at the expense of weight and then poor efficiency.  I suppose batteries will get lighter and cheaper and, with time, the range will become just vanity numbers in much the same way as you can have a 1.0 litre car or or a 2.0 litre car or a 5.0 litre car or whatever number of vanity litres you want.  It will always make a difference whether you have a 50 kWh or 100 kWh battery, but the marginal gain will be ever decreasing if you have a 250 kWh battery.

JKenH

With bigger and bigger batteries we eventually reach a point where EVs no longer provide any significant CO2 benefit over the lifetime of the vehicle. The tendency is to compare the footprint of a large EV with a similarly large ICEv but it seems to me (possibly I am wrong) that the trend to EVs is accompanied by a forced trend to larger cars. Manufacturers are moving away from producing small cars as it is no longer financially viable to manufacture/sell  them. Stellantis have dropped the Citroen C1 and Peugeot the 108, Ford are dropping the Fiesta (having done the same with the Ka a few years ago.)

70sbudgie

JKenH said:

With bigger and bigger batteries we eventually reach a point where EVs no longer provide any significant CO2 benefit over the lifetime of the vehicle. The tendency is to compare the footprint of a large EV with a similarly large ICEv but it seems to me (possibly I am wrong) that the trend to EVs is accompanied by a forced trend to larger cars. Manufacturers are moving away from producing small cars as it is no longer financially viable to manufacture/sell  them. Stellantis have dropped the Citroen C1 and Peugeot the 108, Ford are dropping the Fiesta (having done the same with the Ka a few years ago.)

I don't disagree with you, but I think it will be a shame.

I also wonder if there will eventually be a backlash to bigger and bigger cars. The infrastructure we have (roads, parking etc, not just EV charging) is designed for smaller cars than are popular now. There will come a point where we will have to upgrade the infrastructure (fewer lanes, smaller footpaths, fewer parking spaces) which will be another expense, or the circle will turn and people will start being more interested in smaller cars again. My Zoe comfortably fit 2 child seats or three adults in the back. OK, giving my 6'6 colleague a lift mostly excludes being able to fit someone in the seat behind him, but that is such a rarity that it would by no means effect my choice of car. If both my children reach that height (not entirely impossible, unfortunately), then they will find themselves driving me around a lot more than vice versa!

And the bonus from EVs is that when designed with the batteries in the base, the seating position is a lot more upright and higher. Which, strangely seems to be the reason most people tell me they have a big car.