Electric cars.. Nothing new

[slowmotion]

Car manufacturers stiff the punters????????????????

Say it ain't so.

 

[mustang1]

Funnily enough my Wife and I were discussing the viability of EVs as we briefly queued at a petrol pump on Sunday. If we refill (almost empty) petrol tank in under 5 minutes (pay at pump with card), how long for EV? It would appear a Tesla can do 50% in about 15 minutes, but most cars even partial 'fill' can take up to an hour. Will this get quicker? Only by putting a lot more energy through the charging cable. Being generous, if we say 30 minutes to refill completely (as per our petrol), that's 6x! The land required (filling stations?) or more likely car parks in supermarkets will need 6 times the capacity to keep up with 'the normal' filling of vehicles, along with the great number of cables and a VERY BIG mains cable - has this really been given enough thought by the government?

But don't forget the lorries that take time to deliver petrol and diesel to the petrol stations. And the oil tankers out at sea that have to deliver the fuel to these parts in the first place. Oh yeah and there's the refinement of the oil into petrol. Uhm plus the extraction of the oil in the first place. Oh and that new buzzword, fracking. Then earthquakes.

Maybe the real reason to go to electric cars is to stop the petrol protests when the fuel at the forecourts ran out and those long, long, loooong queues waiting to fill up with petrol where the government was held ransom, those guys in parliament don't want that any more.

The thing I will miss most about ICE cars is the sound they make, well, the sports cars anyway, and these days only some of them (most of them just make a silly obnoxious noise). But then again, most ICE vehicles make too much noise in the city, no serenity!

Now a quick note about prices. I do recall the time when we moved from measuring petrol in gallons to litres and there was a significant price bump around that time because "no one would notice". I reckon a significant price bump is around the corner for EV too. Watch this space!

 

[CXRAndy]

Tomorrow I take my daughter to collect her new Tesla. New inventory model, less than 10 days from order to collection. She's chuffed to bits, model Y

 

[DRM]

But don't forget the lorries that take time to deliver petrol and diesel to the petrol stations. And the oil tankers out at sea that have to deliver the fuel to these parts in the first place. Oh yeah and there's the refinement of the oil into petrol. Uhm plus the extraction of the oil in the first place. Oh and that new buzzword, fracking. Then earthquakes.

And don’t forget all those lorries delivering biomass to the power station in order to generate the electric

 

[icowden]

And don’t forget all those lorries delivering biomass to the power station in order to generate the electric

Well hopefully the new lot will do something about the Drax nonsense. We frequently have enough wind or solar to enable free electricity from my provider.

 

[DRM]

Well hopefully the new lot will do something about the Drax nonsense. We frequently have enough wind or solar to enable free electricity from my provider.

Not just Drax, it’s Ferrybrdge too, plus all the smaller power stations that burn household non recycleable waste too, HGV’s delivering anything aren’t going anywhere

 

[mustang1]

Damn

And don’t forget all those lorries delivering biomass to the power station in order to generate the electric

Damn that biomass!

 

[icowden]

HGV’s delivering anything aren’t going anywhere

No, but they will turn electric. It's already started.

 

[DRM]

No, but they will turn electric. It's already started.

They’ve a very long way to go yet, feeble range for starters, and excessive cost, doesn’t add up, an HGV needs to be working, not sat unused & charging, this from a transport manager who had one dropped in his lap, said it’s nice to drive, but hopeless in all other respects

 

[Andy in Germany]

They’ve a very long way to go yet, feeble range for starters, and excessive cost, doesn’t add up, an HGV needs to be working, not sat unused & charging, this from a transport manager who had one dropped in his lap, said it’s nice to drive, but hopeless in all other respects

I suspect that long term there will be a move back to rail hubs with electric trucks delivering locally. This will take longer than it needs to because there will be such a strong desire to maintain the status quo, so people will follow anyone promising a simple solution.

 

[Salty seadog]

That's Duncan Pittaway on the back 'stoking' his wife steers. Duncan is more famous for owning 'The Beast Of Turin' amongst other Classic race cars

I did a Google and watched a few vids. Now that's some workshop he has. And I've seen that yellow steamer on every vintage London to Brighton run I've cycled on.

 

[dicko]

According to Sunday Telegraph our Government has given the word that Hybrids phase out in 2035 and not 2030.

 

[DRM]

I suspect that long term there will be a move back to rail hubs with electric trucks delivering locally. This will take longer than it needs to because there will be such a strong desire to maintain the status quo, that people will follow anyone promising a simple solution.

Germany had the foresight to keep a decent rail network, unlike the UK, who under DR Beeching got rid of all the smaller lines in to towns that were underused, but would have been ideal for transporting goods, down to money, they had no idea how clogged the roads would become, the biggest problem now is new lines would have to be built going into an industrial estate, in order to transfer goods off the trains, into a warehouse ready for onward transport by road, the majority of rail links are to get people into city centres, the last place you want HGV’s going to pick up a load

 

[Andy in Germany]

Germany had the foresight to keep a decent rail network, unlike the UK, who under DR Beeching got rid of all the smaller lines in to towns that were underused, but would have been ideal for transporting goods, down to money, they had no idea how clogged the roads would become, the biggest problem now is new lines would have to be built going into an industrial estate, in order to transfer goods off the trains, into a warehouse ready for onward transport by road, the majority of rail links are to get people into city centres, the last place you want HGV’s going to pick up a load

The joys of decentralised planning; local governments decide what is closed and kept open, which is why a lot of lines here are owned by the state or even by local towns.

It's not easy to predict how this will pan out, for one thing, despite claims by certain companies, Electric cars won't be able to replace dinosaur powered cars on a 1:1 basis. Of course this will mean the roads are less clogged with private cars and therefore there's more space for local truck movements, so a system of deliveries on the outskirts, taken forward by truck to their destination, would work.

In cities blessed with trams, I expect we'll see a rejuvenation of freight trams carrying food and similar into cities as well; this was common in Germany and in at least one city there's a freight tram delivering parts to factories. Ironically that's for a car company, but you get the idea...

 

[classic33]

Germany had the foresight to keep a decent rail network, unlike the UK, who under DR Beeching got rid of all the smaller lines in to towns that were underused, but would have been ideal for transporting goods, down to money, they had no idea how clogged the roads would become, the biggest problem now is new lines would have to be built going into an industrial estate, in order to transfer goods off the trains, into a warehouse ready for onward transport by road, the majority of rail links are to get people into city centres, the last place you want HGV’s going to pick up a load

There's a scrapyard, with a rail link, on the outskirts of Bradford that may be cleared for just that use. The former Crossley Evans site just outside Shipley is being converted to such a site. And it has the rail link.