EV owners: question about EV charging

MacPingu1986

LightFlare said:

MacPingu1986 said:

Lightflare - the dft already has the data - the vast, vast majority of trips carried out by UK drivers are short, local trips with an average length of 9 miles and total miles of about 120 a week. The typical driver only makes a journey of over 100 miles 3 times a year, and makes a journey of over 200 miles no greater than every 2 years. That's why the over-emphasis on long journeys is relatively unimportant re wider adoption of EVs.

Re the Youtube videos - the channel owner pumps out a steady stream of anti-EV videos, alongside a sprinkling of climate denial & conspiracy theories for good measure. It's not a fact based channel interested in any kind of objective discussion. Quentin/Fully Charged do not need to waste their time with line by line rebuttals of youtubers seeking oxygen and publicity.

There's lots of advice out there on how to structure those occasional long driven journeys - including from many posters on this form.  

As per above, how quickly you can travel 800 miles is irrelevant to all but a tiny fraction of a % of UK drivers.

IF this is true -- why are there chargers at service stations at all....

Maybe the data is that the majority of EV owners only do short trips

I do way more than 3 trips of >100miles a year - although granted, most  (not all) of the other are circa 15miles

Other factors for me are initial cost (on a like for like vehicle) and more recently insurance cost

maybe I'm just not a typical driver and hence my viewpoint. My issue is that EV owners rarely see that point of view and are adamant that ICE owners are always in the wrong.
There is surely a middle ground and there needs to be an acceptance that EV isnt always better.....

No one is saying ICE owners are in the wrong - all that is being challenged is the *over-focus* on long distance driving, or focusing on specific long distance driving scenarios as "gotchas" against EV's being useful for the vast majority of UK driven journeys. Ditto no one is arguing that EV recharging patterns will be optimized for every single driver - just that most of the time, EV range and recharging patterns just arn't an issue. Putting that to one side -  from a public emissions & health perspective there are substantial benefits over ICE cars.

The DFTs been collecting this sort of data for many years through the national travel survey and other sources, it's not EV specific. If you do lots than 3 trips of 100 miles a year, then exactly right - you're not a typical UK driver - your driving is slanted much more towards long distance driving than normal.

Chargers are at service stations because there's still enough volume from longer journeys (inc the c1% of driven journeys that are over 100miles) for them to be used. 

Grumpy_chap

LightFlare said:

IF this is true -- why are there chargers at service stations at all....

Maybe the data is that the majority of EV owners only do short trips

The data is for all cars, not just EV's.
It is available in the public domain, use the search term "National Travel Survey YEAR" to see the raw data collected by ONS. 
That is not presented in a pretty way, but it is shown simply at the following link:
https://www.nimblefins.co.uk/largest-car-insurance-companies/average-car-journey-uk
Average car journey less than 10 miles.
That data I have linked to is from 2019.  More recent data is available, but even 2022 still shows an impact from COVID (there were still some restrictions from the Omicron variant that ran into early 2022).  The 2023 survey when it is available in the latter part of next year may show whatever the new normal will be.

Why are there petrol pumps at service stations? 
That will probably be the same reason there are EV chargers at service stations.

LightFlare

I think the language and numbers is quite an important factor.

Majority  is more or less 51% - therefore 49% is not covered by that stat.

49% of god knows how many car owners in the UK is one hell of a lot that don’t fall into that category.

Most - I do t know if most has a definition. Let’s say 80%

So 20% or car owners/drivers don’t fall into the group that an EV “might” be more suited to. That’s still a hell of a lot of infrastructure that needs to be introduced and supported

I think the message from me is:
Do your research and don’t be pushed into making a potentially expensive mistake by buying something that isnt right for you

MacPingu1986

LightFlare said:

I think the language and numbers is quite an important factor.

Majority  is more or less 51% - therefore 49% is not covered by that stat.

49% of god knows how many car owners in the UK is one hell of a lot that don’t fall into that category.

Most - I do t know if most has a definition. Let’s say 80%

So 20% or car owners/drivers don’t fall into the group that an EV “might” be more suited to. That’s still a hell of a lot of infrastructure that needs to be introduced and supported 

Where are you getting the 20% figure from?

Of course infrastructure is expanding and improving all the time, along with EV range itself, to minimize any re-charging disruption on the very small % of long distance driven journeys. 

In the meanwhile, for everything else that isn't long distance travel, range isn't an issue, there are the "private" benefits of cheap "fuel", less moving parts, etc...  and the substantial public benefits of less emissions & air pollution.

Grumpy_chap

LightFlare said:

god knows how many car owners in the UK 

So do these people:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/304290/car-ownership-in-the-uk/

"In 2021, approximately 25.6 million people in Great Britain lived in a household that owned one car. In the same year, nearly nine million people lived in a household with two cars, an increase compared to the previous year. Ovez 17 million people lived in a household with no car at all."

MacPingu1986

LightFlare said:

just to add - I am sure Quentin et al aren’t doing what they do for free either

Yes pro-EV channels will have their own biases in certain ways - but the GeoffBuysCars channel held up as proof of the unsuitability of EVs is a particularly bad offender when it comes to any remote attempt at objectivity.

A quick canter through the last few months throws up various climate denial pieces, together with 3 videos specifically on the Luton airport fire alleging a government and fire brigade conspiracy to secretly cover up an EV fire by blaming it on diesel. (The fire brigade themselves have confirmed it was NOT an EV fire)

ComicGeek

Don't people realise that they're not being forced to change to EVs yet? If the current stock of EVs don't cater to your needs, then you really aren't being forced to buy one yet.

Just wait until either you can get the EV you need, or until you have to pick the best available option if it still doesn't exist.

Most people won't currently save money with an EV, so just let the company car buyers and EV fans spend the big bucks and just wait for the future benefit.

If I wasn't a company car driver then I wouldn't be driving an EV yet. 

MeteredOut

ComicGeek said:

Don't people realise that they're not being forced to change to EVs yet? If the current stock of EVs don't cater to your needs, then you really aren't being forced to buy one yet.

Just wait until either you can get the EV you need, or until you have to pick the best available option if it still doesn't exist.

Most people won't currently save money with an EV, so just let the company car buyers and EV fans spend the big bucks and just wait for the future benefit.

If I wasn't a company car driver then I wouldn't be driving an EV yet. 

What do you mean by that?

If you mean that running an EV is not cheaper than running an ICE car, then I'd strongly disagree.

But if you're saying those savings are unlikely to make up for the additional cost of an EV if you're buying it purely to reduce costs, then I'd generally agree.

boxosox

MeteredOut said:

ComicGeek said:

Don't people realise that they're not being forced to change to EVs yet? If the current stock of EVs don't cater to your needs, then you really aren't being forced to buy one yet.

Just wait until either you can get the EV you need, or until you have to pick the best available option if it still doesn't exist.

Most people won't currently save money with an EV, so just let the company car buyers and EV fans spend the big bucks and just wait for the future benefit.

If I wasn't a company car driver then I wouldn't be driving an EV yet. 

What do you mean by that?

If you mean that running an EV is not cheaper than running an ICE car, then I'd strongly disagree.

But if you're saying those savings are unlikely to make up for the additional cost of an EV if you're buying it purely to reduce costs, then I'd generally agree.

I don't understand your comment.  You say that running an EV is cheaper and then say it's not cheaper.

 My basic sums show me that owning an EV is much more expensive than a petrol/diesel car.

Purchase price is much higher, depreciation is greater, insurance is higher.  Per mile, electricity can be cheaper than petrol if only charged at home, but I'm not sure it'd every outweigh the other increased costs.

Jenni_D

I bought my MG4 SE SR new. Cost (including 3 year service plan and first MOT) was just over £26.9k. An equivalent ICE car (Astra 1.2 automatic) was the same price, if not more. So purchase price of an EV isn't always higher than an ICE, at least not significantly-so.

Charging up at motorway service stations (at megabucks per kWh) tends to give a p per mile somewhat equivalent to ICE cars refuelling at local service stations, so running costs are somewhat equivalent. Charge at home the majority of the time and you can significantly reduce your running costs: have solar / battery storage solution at home and you can run an EV virtually for nothing.

(Yes, EV insurance tends to be higher than ICE insurance, but all insurances have gone up this year. After shopping around this year I got insurance at the same price as last year).