This was on a Facebook group for my local area. I've mentioned it before on this thread about the fans in my cab giving it some during the hot weather. I'm keeping my head down 😬
My new fully EV Kona Arrives in a couple of weeks. Very much looking forward to the experience
im doing a salary sacrifice lease £348 a month covering insurance , tyres , breakdown cover and free home charger fitted
Are you likely to be doing any long journeys in it? If you do would love to know what the real world range is fully loaded. If I can get 250 odd miles from a car that size with my wife and kids and all the shit things they take when going away it becomes doable for me as a main car.
I understand from various reviews that real life miles is around 270 per charge. A full charge on the most powerful chargers is about 45 mins. A coffee or lunch. I do few journeys of 540 miles plus to be fair
Thanks, will be interested to hear how you and others get on. I’m going to start giving this some serious consideration now. It was primarily range that was holding me back
I have a BMWi4 M50 290 miles to a charge 50% vat back on purchase £52 per month taxable benefit 0-60 in 3.4 seconds I love it
What colour? I looked on the website and some of the options are pretty awful, although I can’t make my mind up about the orange.
Metallic black. I test drove one in Orange and I didn't want to pay that much extra for a marmite colour.
I went in on the Thursday in April to order my car - was told it would be end of Dec / early Jan but whilst there a customer cancelled an order and I managed to buy the one in the showroom.
Picked it up the Tuesday morning. 4 working days! Very lucky to have that happen.
I have a BMWi4 M50 290 miles to a charge 50% vat back on purchase £52 per month taxable benefit 0-60 in 3.4 seconds I love it
What colour? I looked on the website and some of the options are pretty awful, although I can’t make my mind up about the orange.
Metallic black. I test drove one in Orange and I didn't want to pay that much extra for a marmite colour.
I went in on the Thursday in April to order my car - was told it would be end of Dec / early Jan but whilst there a customer cancelled an order and I managed to buy the one in the showroom.
Picked it up the Tuesday morning. 4 working days! Very lucky to have that happen.
The wife and I were looking over the weekend as our lease on our XC90 is coming to an end in the next 9 months and we wanted to get our order in sharpish.
Looking at Tesla Model X/Y, BMW iX, Merc EQB/EQC. Will look at test driving all of them in the next couple of weeks before we make a decision.
It coincides with our need to return back to being a 2 car family what with now having 2 kids under the age of 4 needing to be in different places at the same time. So likely to be large SUV and a medium-sized run-around able to comfortably fit two car seats but we haven't ultimately decided whether the SUV should be electric or the medium. I quite like the look of the Cupra Born and the Formentor.
The wife and I were looking over the weekend as our lease on our XC90 is coming to an end in the next 9 months and we wanted to get our order in sharpish.
Looking at Tesla Model X/Y, BMW iX, Merc EQB/EQC. Will look at test driving all of them in the next couple of weeks before we make a decision.
It coincides with our need to return back to being a 2 car family what with now having 2 kids under the age of 4 needing to be in different places at the same time. So likely to be large SUV and a medium-sized run-around able to comfortably fit two car seats but we haven't ultimately decided whether the SUV should be electric or the medium. I quite like the look of the Cupra Born and the Formentor.
I have an IX 40. It's brilliant, love it, and really refined / luxurious with superb tech. Feels faster (although not on paper) than my previous 435d. Was worried about range (and not going for a 50) but not a problem at all in and around London. Getting 250 miles plus real world to a charge in Summer and rarely need to go below 50%. Charge it once a week or so over night and only used paid for public charging twice - once in a hotel and once early on when i was new to it and overly anxious. Sometimes top up a bit at free pod points in Tesco.
Appearance is a bit marmite but have been approached numerous times by strangers, asking me to wind down window etc, and commenting on the car - 'it's sick' (deliveroo cyclist at lights), 'looks like it's from outer space' (bloke in car park), two guys jumping out of a lorry and asking to take photos - a few examples that stick in the mind.
Taking it to south west France next week, so will see how that goes - but have planned well I hope and you get first year Ionity subscription from BMW.
My only long term concern is we are moving later this year to a new flat. Currently charge through our ground floor kitchen window to parking space outside, but where we are moving to has an underground car park with EV chargers for some bays but not all. Still not clear whether we will get one. I'm sure I'll work it out somehow as there is street charging nearby.
Think there is quite a delay on factory orders, as with many brands atm, but I managed to pick up a UK stock vehicle in May with only a couple of spec compromises.
Also, the savings (charging versus diesel and leasing through my company) are significant. Wouldn't go back...
The wife and I were looking over the weekend as our lease on our XC90 is coming to an end in the next 9 months and we wanted to get our order in sharpish.
Looking at Tesla Model X/Y, BMW iX, Merc EQB/EQC. Will look at test driving all of them in the next couple of weeks before we make a decision.
It coincides with our need to return back to being a 2 car family what with now having 2 kids under the age of 4 needing to be in different places at the same time. So likely to be large SUV and a medium-sized run-around able to comfortably fit two car seats but we haven't ultimately decided whether the SUV should be electric or the medium. I quite like the look of the Cupra Born and the Formentor.
I have an IX 40. It's brilliant, love it, and really refined / luxurious with superb tech. Feels faster (although not on paper) than my previous 435d. Was worried about range (and not going for a 50) but not a problem at all in and around London. Getting 250 miles plus real world to a charge in Summer and rarely need to go below 50%. Charge it once a week or so over night and only used paid for public charging twice - once in a hotel and once early on when i was new to it and overly anxious. Sometimes top up a bit at free pod points in Tesco.
Appearance is a bit marmite but have been approached numerous times by strangers, asking me to wind down window etc, and commenting on the car - 'it's sick' (deliveroo cyclist at lights), 'looks like it's from outer space' (bloke in car park), two guys jumbling out of a lorry and asking to take photos - a few examples that stick in the mind.
Taking it to south west France next week, so will see ho that goes - but have planned well I hope and you get first year Ionity subscription from BMW.
My only long term concern is we are moving later this year to a new flat. Currently charge through our ground floor kitchen window to parking space outside, but where we are moving to has an underground car park with EV chargers for some bays but not all. Still not clear whether we will get one. I'm sure I'll work it out somehow as there is street parking nearby.
Think there is quite a delay on factory orders, as with many brands atm, but I managed to pick up a UK stock vehicle in May with only a couple of spec compromises.
Also, the savings (charging versus diesel and leasing through my company) are significant. Wouldn't go back...
We both love the look of the iX. Please post back in a couple of weeks when you get back from France. Would love to hear how you fared. The one longish drive I do a few times a year is to go and see my bro in Liverpool. Its around 240 miles to where he is. I think that would give me range anxiety trying to do it on one charge but hey. Part of the reason I think for keeping one of the cars in the family as petrol or diesel.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I just think we are entering a time where we should give all cars - electric or not a greenhouse number based on the whole picture. We have already seen the issues major manufaturers caused by misrepresenting diesel emissions knowingly. Or if not a number, a graph showing this over a mileage period - 30k, 40k 80k etc... I have a nagging suspiscion, and I may be wrong, but that buying a small economical petrol car and driving it for a decent number of years may be less severe on the environment. I would like that to be much clearer one way or the other rather than trust info which may purposely ignore key factors.
I just think we are entering a time where we should give all cars - electric or not a greenhouse number based on the whole picture. We have already seen the issues major manufaturers caused by misrepresenting diesel emissions knowingly. Or if not a number, a graph showing this over a mileage period - 30k, 40k 80k etc... I have a nagging suspiscion, and I may be wrong, but that buying a small economical petrol car and driving it for a decent number of years may be less severe on the environment. I would like that to be much clearer one way or the other rather than trust info which may purposely ignore key factors.
How we drive our personal transport is among the biggest factors.
Up to now, choosing an EV when needing to make return journeys over 150 - 200 miles without factoring in the huge increase in time required (for recharging) is to be deliberately miss the point. An acquaintance of mine, a seemingly intelligent (retired) grown up, recently punted north of £75k on a Tesla as his new car. He and Mrs were soon off on holiday to Cornwall from LB Bromley. Mrs's car is a diesel Audi A3. They opted for the new Tesla for the Cornwall trip. He hasn't stopped bellyaching about how it took 8 hours to get there rather than 4 and he spent half his week pissing about looking for chargers before another 8 hour journey home. I haven't yet found a gentle enough way to tell him he's a moron. Until the rules around the official "range" claims for battery cars make any sense at all, his story will be commonplace. The Honda E is a great looking thing, quick, comfortable but the quoted range of 130 miles is a ludicrous lie in actual usage. If you have a sub 10 mile commute and only ever use it to go to the supermarket plus have an offroad home charging set up and another car for everything else, it might work. Then the OTR price is pushing £40k for max 8 years battery life, after which it will probably be scrap value. £40k! My idiot neighbour has one - it looks great, but it's proving to be little more than a driveway ornament.
I just think we are entering a time where we should give all cars - electric or not a greenhouse number based on the whole picture. We have already seen the issues major manufaturers caused by misrepresenting diesel emissions knowingly. Or if not a number, a graph showing this over a mileage period - 30k, 40k 80k etc... I have a nagging suspiscion, and I may be wrong, but that buying a small economical petrol car and driving it for a decent number of years may be less severe on the environment. I would like that to be much clearer one way or the other rather than trust info which may purposely ignore key factors.
Not sure whether or not this is the case but would be true is if you already have an existing small economical petrol car continuing to drive it for its reasonable life rather than buying a new electric probably isn't any different for the environment because you remove all the production impacts. If you need to buy a new car that is a different question and the calculation will be very different.
Its also not only about the individual calculation but also about the wider effects. We need there to be demand for EV's to drive R&D in EV's in order to make them better. I'm really hoping that solid state battery tech takes off as that will really revolutionise the market.
I just think we are entering a time where we should give all cars - electric or not a greenhouse number based on the whole picture. We have already seen the issues major manufaturers caused by misrepresenting diesel emissions knowingly. Or if not a number, a graph showing this over a mileage period - 30k, 40k 80k etc... I have a nagging suspiscion, and I may be wrong, but that buying a small economical petrol car and driving it for a decent number of years may be less severe on the environment. I would like that to be much clearer one way or the other rather than trust info which may purposely ignore key factors.
Not sure whether or not this is the case but would be true is if you already have an existing small economical petrol car continuing to drive it for its reasonable life rather than buying a new electric probably isn't any different for the environment because you remove all the production impacts. If you need to buy a new car that is a different question and the calculation will be very different.
Its also not only about the individual calculation but also about the wider effects. We need there to be demand for EV's to drive R&D in EV's in order to make them better. I'm really hoping that solid state battery tech takes off as that will really revolutionise the market.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
A wind powered hydrogen plant is supposed to be built in Kent.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
Ammonia as a source of Hydrogen. Water. Non availability of Hydrogen ? . OK.
Hydrogen is useful in decarbonising concrete cement manufacture .
Teesside is being developed as a hydrogen hub for planned zero emissions target of 2050.
Read BM's post again - he said non-availability of hydrogen which is 100% correct. Hydrogen does not exist in isolation, it only exists on earth in compound form with other elements and therefore has to be separated, which consumes a lot of energy (electricity). There are many other issues when considering hydrogen as a fuel for cars that BM has also highlighted. Using hydrogen in industrial settings is more doable.
Solid state batteries, re-charged with renewable forms of electricity, is the way ahead for vehicle power.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
Tons of hydrogen cars out here, in fact all taxis are either hydrogen, or electric.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
Tons of hydrogen cars out here, in fact all taxis are either hydrogen, or electric.
I wonder how they're making the hydrogen. This is an interesting article that shows it's not efficient. It may, however, become necessary if we run out of the raw materials to make batteries.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
A wind powered hydrogen plant is supposed to be built in Kent.
The energy harnessed by the turbines is still more efficiently utilised directly as electricity rather than applying electricity to the hugely inefficient acquisition of hydrogen to in turn generate electricity.
It's like drinking a pint of water to obtain urine from which clean water can later be distilled - possible, technically impressive but utterly futile.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
A wind powered hydrogen plant is supposed to be built in Kent.
The energy harnessed by the turbines is still more efficiently utilised directly as electricity rather than applying electricity to the hugely inefficient acquisition of hydrogen to in turn generate electricity.
It's like drinking a pint of water to obtain urine from which clean water can later be distilled - possible, technically impressive but utterly futile.
To be used to produce electricity - I agree. But hydrogen is used in many industrial processes - refining petrol, fertilizer production and so on. So we still need it but not to produce electricity itself.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
Ammonia as a source of Hydrogen. Water. Non availability of Hydrogen ? . OK.
Hydrogen is useful in decarbonising concrete cement manufacture .
Teesside is being developed as a hydrogen hub for planned zero emissions target of 2050.
Read BM's post again - he said non-availability of hydrogen which is 100% correct. Hydrogen does not exist in isolation, it only exists on earth in compound form with other elements and therefore has to be separated, which consumes a lot of energy (electricity). There are many other issues when considering hydrogen as a fuel for cars that BM has also highlighted. Using hydrogen in industrial settings is more doable.
Solid state batteries, re-charged with renewable forms of electricity, is the way ahead for vehicle power.
I agree but I'm also convinced that in the long term future as we move to CAV's (Connected Autonomous Vehicles) we will on motorways and major roads have some kind of power on the road setup that your vehicle hooks up to. This would also control the connected Autonomous part by keeping distances between cars etc. For smaller roads it won't be worth ousting the infrastructure in for that so it will be battery power and actual human driving.
There is an elephant in the room with electric vehicles today. We say they are zero emission vehicles because we measure what they emit but that is a ridiculous method. We should measure how much greenhouse gasses are needed for an electric car over its life against a conventional car.
The issue is, what we should measure is how the electricity used to charge the car is obtained. Also the production of the batteries. Now if we get our elctricity from sustainables, the electric car is better. But we don't and certainly the world doesn't. I have seen calculations that suggest as we are now, actually an electric car produces more Co2 over its life, including its manufacture. of course the time will come, hopefully, when we generate far more of our power from renewables and then the advantages become clear but we are measuring electric cars as zero emissions and this is not relevant as it stands.
All serious considerations. A number of recent 'real-life' ownership reviews do now suggest that whole life CO2 emissions are lower for the recent crop of EV's - actual mileage is critical to this calculation obvs. Even that is a skewed measure tho - CO2 ain't the only environmentally noxious emission in a car's life, it's just the one trumpeted the loudest.
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'. How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
I have an EV...however hydrogen power seems a better way to go. The end product is water. By the way why does nobody calculate the CO2 emissions for cyclists . They use the road in increasing numbers , bleat on about car exhausts but they contribute to green house gases more on a bike than walking.
Walking football could become the norm as well. Charlton might win something then and Aneke might complete 90 minutes.
The exhaust pipe emission from a hydrogen fuelled car is certainly just water vapour. That's a significant greenhouse gas too. Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody? You see the problems here. The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
Tons of hydrogen cars out here, in fact all taxis are either hydrogen, or electric.
I wonder how they're making the hydrogen. This is an interesting article that shows it's not efficient. It may, however, become necessary if we run out of the raw materials to make batteries.
They are definitely the older taxis which are being phased out for electric.
When I first moved here there were obviously no electric cars, but loads of hydrogen taxis, I doubt the driver care about efficiency of making it, just the cost of filling up their tanks.
I've decided, for now, against going all electric. But want to buy a 4WD mid-sized SUV that is a hybrid (e.g. Jeep, Peugeot 2008, DS..). What I'm not clear on is the difference from self-charging and plug-in hybrid. I, obviously, understand the difference in that one self charges as you drive and one you plug-in - but don't know why you'd buy one over the other? Any advice or recommended models?
I just have a gut feeling, no more than that, that hydrogen could be the future. Of course it isn't yet, but I see that a lot of work is being done looking at extracting hydrogen using sunlight. If they crack that it will change the game surely.
Comments
290 miles to a charge
50% vat back on purchase
£52 per month taxable benefit
0-60 in 3.4 seconds
I love it
They look fantastic cars, as do the Mercedes EQE and especially the EQS - although the latter is somewhat more expensive!
I went in on the Thursday in April to order my car - was told it would be end of Dec / early Jan but whilst there a customer cancelled an order and I managed to buy the one in the showroom.
Picked it up the Tuesday morning. 4 working days! Very lucky to have that happen.
Looking at Tesla Model X/Y, BMW iX, Merc EQB/EQC. Will look at test driving all of them in the next couple of weeks before we make a decision.
It coincides with our need to return back to being a 2 car family what with now having 2 kids under the age of 4 needing to be in different places at the same time. So likely to be large SUV and a medium-sized run-around able to comfortably fit two car seats but we haven't ultimately decided whether the SUV should be electric or the medium. I quite like the look of the Cupra Born and the Formentor.
Appearance is a bit marmite but have been approached numerous times by strangers, asking me to wind down window etc, and commenting on the car - 'it's sick' (deliveroo cyclist at lights), 'looks like it's from outer space' (bloke in car park), two guys jumping out of a lorry and asking to take photos - a few examples that stick in the mind.
Taking it to south west France next week, so will see how that goes - but have planned well I hope and you get first year Ionity subscription from BMW.
My only long term concern is we are moving later this year to a new flat. Currently charge through our ground floor kitchen window to parking space outside, but where we are moving to has an underground car park with EV chargers for some bays but not all. Still not clear whether we will get one. I'm sure I'll work it out somehow as there is street charging nearby.
Think there is quite a delay on factory orders, as with many brands atm, but I managed to pick up a UK stock vehicle in May with only a couple of spec compromises.
Also, the savings (charging versus diesel and leasing through my company) are significant. Wouldn't go back...
Equally important and totally suppressed by both UKGov and the car industry are the issues around sourcing raw materials critical to EV and battery manufacture: nickel, lithium to name but 2. Both are environmentally toxic to mine. Mining and refining is overwhelmingly controlled by China. Significant mining is done in various African nations but almost exclusively with Chinese aid, investment or by Chinese 'corporations'.
How comfortable is anybody with this significant economic shift towards and expanding dependency on one of the world's most oppressive and genocidal regimes?
Battery electric power for personal transportation is no panacea, it is just jumping from one toxic corrupt economic elite to a new one.
Up to now, choosing an EV when needing to make return journeys over 150 - 200 miles without factoring in the huge increase in time required (for recharging) is to be deliberately miss the point.
An acquaintance of mine, a seemingly intelligent (retired) grown up, recently punted north of £75k on a Tesla as his new car. He and Mrs were soon off on holiday to Cornwall from LB Bromley. Mrs's car is a diesel Audi A3. They opted for the new Tesla for the Cornwall trip. He hasn't stopped bellyaching about how it took 8 hours to get there rather than 4 and he spent half his week pissing about looking for chargers before another 8 hour journey home. I haven't yet found a gentle enough way to tell him he's a moron.
Until the rules around the official "range" claims for battery cars make any sense at all, his story will be commonplace.
The Honda E is a great looking thing, quick, comfortable but the quoted range of 130 miles is a ludicrous lie in actual usage. If you have a sub 10 mile commute and only ever use it to go to the supermarket plus have an offroad home charging set up and another car for everything else, it might work. Then the OTR price is pushing £40k for max 8 years battery life, after which it will probably be scrap value. £40k! My idiot neighbour has one - it looks great, but it's proving to be little more than a driveway ornament.
Its also not only about the individual calculation but also about the wider effects. We need there to be demand for EV's to drive R&D in EV's in order to make them better. I'm really hoping that solid state battery tech takes off as that will really revolutionise the market.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a40230247/solid-state-batteries-electric-vehicles/
Far more important is the non-availability of hydrogen. It has to be made. By consuming vast amounts of electricity. Pressurised and condensed for storage, using vast amounts of electricity. Storage of hydrogen is a safety nightmare. Hindenberg anybody?
You see the problems here.
The hydrogen fuel cell is a terrific bit of technical achievement. As a power plant for personal transport, the physics defeat it. Obtaining the hydrogen consumes far more energy than will ever be used to move the vehicle around.
Solid state batteries, re-charged with renewable forms of electricity, is the way ahead for vehicle power.
It's like drinking a pint of water to obtain urine from which clean water can later be distilled - possible, technically impressive but utterly futile.