Guest essay by Eric Worrall
British sales of Electric and Hybrid cars have surged in the last year. But there might be more than green conscience driving the rise in sales.
According to GoUltraLow;
Last year over 28,000 electric cars were registered across the country. That’s more than the combined totals of electric cars sold every year since 2010, and marks a phenomenal 94% annual rise compared to the previous year.
Plug-in power is fast becoming a mainstream option for drivers alongside petrol and diesel, and EV popularity shows no sign of slowing.
We saw every region in the UK record improve year-on-year registrations for plug-in cars. Ultra low emission vehicles (ULEVs) proved to be the most popular in the South East of England, closely followed by the South West and the West Midlands.
Read more: https://www.goultralow.com/blog/electric-cars-on-the-road-to-phenomenal-growth/
Why are electric cars becoming so popular in the UK? Apart from the obvious, a rise in government fleet procurement of electric cars, part of the reason is likely that the government is flooding the market with significant taxpayer funded incentives, to encourage commuters to switch to electric.
- The price of gasoline in Britain is horrendous, averaging around £1 / litre ($5.40 / gallon). This creates a tremendous price advantage for electric cars; according to the UK Government, fuel for a typical petrol car costs £12.50 / 100 miles, vs around £2 / 100 miles for an electric car.
- Lots of government grants to cities which embrace electric car technology, such as a recent £40 million grant for cities which embrace electric car recharging technology.
- A waiver for the notorious British “congestion charges” – tolls paid for entering some city centres.
- Poor public transport infrastructure. Unsafe, crowded, unreliable, expensive. Even with the cost of parking in London, the cost of buying and driving an electric car is likely comparable to the cost of commuting by train.
Whether the popularity of electric will last is anyone’s guess. Britain has a dangerously overloaded electric grid. If the majority of electric car owners recharge using off-peak power, this won’t be an issue – but if a significant number of drivers choose to charge during peak time, the surge in demand could cause the grid to fail.
There might also be some long term safety issues. Quite apart for the unfortunate apparent tendency for car batteries in some models to catch fire, Britain occasionally experiences severe blizzards which strand drivers on snow covered roads. A stranded petrol car can keep burning fuel, and can keep the car interior safe and warm for many hours. An electric car, not so much – especially if the battery starts to freeze.
And of course, there is the cost of replacing the batteries. The batteries in electric cars are a significant proportion of the cost of the cars. If they only last a few years, replacing them will become a significant issue.
Don’t get me wrong, I would likely be seriously considering going electric, if I was still commuting into London every day. People are making a rational decision, based on the available options, even if the options have been significantly engineered by government policy incentives.
There are some unanswered questions. As electric cars become more popular, how long will the generous government incentives last? Who is paying for those incentives – maybe poor people, who can’t afford to buy an electric car? As with any scheme sustained by the whim of politicians, the surge in demand for electric cars, could disappear as quickly as it appeared.
Battery systems in EVs should last well over 10 years, although there is a degradation in capacity of several percent per year, as I recall. By the time you need a new batery, their costs should be considerably lower than they are now. Last I heard, Tesla’s gigabattery factory hopes to reduce costs by 33%.. Current
costs I’m not sure of, but I’d guess somewhere between $200 and $300 per kWhr.
One big advantage for British EVs is that the country is an island – not many 400 mile plus trips are possible.
They do make an attractive option for the brits with their short range driving habits. And of course it will be promoted as something to lower carbon emissions. But in reality it will just raise them. Why yes, off-peak power use is a great way to get more functionality out of your existing power plants. But if you look at the distribution of power production through the day, you can see that 100% of that energy…will come from coal.
Now they could lower emissions overall with more gas…but I’ll wager they’re not going to allow the fracking that would require. They could beef up nuclear…but I somehow doubt they’ll do that as well. No, everyone is going to bicker and argue back and forth, roll out trivial amounts of renewables while pounding their chests and saying how great their environmental policies are…and they’re going to quietly continue fueling those plants with even more coal just like everyone else on the planet.
Didn’t you know that the EU and Government Regs are shutting our coal plants?
So the cars won’t be getting their electricity from coal, the way things are going the the UK energy policies they won’t be getting any electricity at all.
ULEV? How is the ULEV defined? It’s not JUST electric vehicles is it? Hybrids and LPG vehicles are under this guise too??? In which case the figures for EV sales are being conflated by including the other forms of fuelling.
…in fact California defines an ULEV as “[vehicles that] emit 50% less polluting emissions than the average for new cars released in that model year.”
28,000 electric vs 2,600,000 fossil fuel cars in 2015 sold in UK. Very slightly over 1%, despite all the financial incentives.
Leonard Lane asks – “How can electric cars be a good solution to anything?”
The one problem they could help with if they are adopted in large enough numbers is the ghastly local traffic pollution in cities. That is worth having! Electric fuelled buses and trams would also help. It the moment in London the buses are major polluters with their diesel fumes.
But you do not see the downside I, and others, explain above. Please consider them.
again: nuclear power is the elephant in the room for any proposal to shift personal and public transportation away from fossil fuels
I suspect many commentators here don’t live in the Big Cities and thus do not appreciate the toxic horror of gasoline burning or worse, the diesel burning vehicles cause.
emsnews
I suspect many commentators here who live in the Big Cities and do not appreciate the toxic horror of
gasoline burningtrying to live two days WITHOUT the incredible benefits and life-saving value that diesel burning vehicles in the trucking, farming, food-processing, shipping, heating, service, and support industries cause. Cities will immediately become toxic cesspools of dead and dying people two days after fossil fuels and the electricity generated by nuclear energy, fossil fuels, gas and coal cease production.emsnews actually believes that all the air pollution in cities is the result of cars.
Sure, electric buses are found everywhere. I saw them most recently in Guangzhou. They need cabling but that’s not very onerous in inner city. They do make a difference to air quality in cities. And they don’t need 4t of lithium – just an overhead cable.
Nothing to do with EV cars though.
I think in a way, one can at least see the current crop of electric vehicles making for good city cars, but I definitely wouldn’t them for any longer trips (where it takes more than an hour to get to the destination).
Right now, the main weaknesses are the range due to the slow advances in battery technology and the sheer amount of time they take to charge up. Before anyone calls me out on this let me say that I do not support the idea of forcing electric cars on people, but that it can at least be considered a good thing that people now have options as to what kind of car they want.
It’s not like the choice now will be limited to gas or electric either anytime in the future, Toyota for instance is resuming research on vehicles powered by Hydrogen. Another nice thing about alternative fuel vehicles is that the supply would be in far less danger of being cut off in the case of geopolitical conflict (if the Middle East goes up in flames for instance than it’s almost expected that gasoline prices will skyrocket, taxes or not).
How could any sane person believe that importing wood pellets from North American trees and then burning them for electricity is good for the Earth ?? Wouldn’t those trees be more useful sucking the CO2 out of the atmosphere ? Doesn’t burning trees release CO2 ?? NUTS !
..Electric cars are NOT green !!
I saw one the other day, it was orange.
You spend more public money in subsidies and rebates to encourage people to buy and drive electric vehicles, so they can pay less in fuel taxes. And as an added benefit, if you’re wildly successful you will need more electric generating capacity, which under a “renewable” mandate will no doubt entail other subsidies.
Now just where do you think that policy is going to take you?
Fracking has totally changed the situation. Unless the government does something quite stupid (which is always possible), electric vehicles won’t make economic sense where I live for the next century.
I see very few electric cars here in Lincolnshire. A few hybrids, but that’s about it.
Reasons?
1) Lincolnshire isn’t a rich county, even with the £5k bribe to buy one, electric/hybrid cars are bloody expensive.
2) Lincolnshire’s a big county with no big cities. When out seeing customers, I can easily do 70+ miles/day, so the range of these things would be a problem, especially in winter when lights & heater are required.
As for embracing electric cars? Hmm, I think that’s stretching things a bit. In cities, I can see a reason for them, no noxious fumes (Oxides of Nitrogen) and short journeys, combined with punitive taxes for driving conventional cars in certain city centres.
I wonder how many have been actually bought by members of the public, from money in their own pockets, rather that bought/leased by companies.
I don’t want to get into the specific debate about the pros and cons of electric cars, but I am concerned about the growing trend by government to use taxes and subsidies to manipulate and influence consumer choice for reasons that may be highly politicized. For example, the taxpayer is not consulted on many green issues which may be a complete waste of money, a gravy train or a net cause of damage to the planet.
It is easy to create pressure groups to delude ignorant politicians or drive social media petitions but who is looking after the interests of the taxpayers? I know, it should be the politicians.
Unfortunately, liberals believe that the purpose of govt is to force everyone to live as the liberals want.
After buying an all electric auto, how many autos does the person or family then own:
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, more than 5
In the Columbia River Valley of Oregon and Washington, since 10 P.M. on the 25th until now (11:17 A.M. on the 26th) a massive wind turbine system has produced zero output (likely the towers are in parasitic mode). Temp was -8°C., this morning at daybreak.
BPA Balancing Authority
The chart changes every 5 minutes and shows the sources of power and total load.
The green line is wind – now flat as road kill.
In Holland, some years ago they decommissioned a wind turbine known as “De Ambtenaar”, i.e. “The Civil Servant” – since it rarely ever worked.
I don’t know if I’d use the phrase Britain Embracing Electric Cars
According to the DVLA (government agency which registers all cars in the UK)
Best ever performance in new car market in 2015 after fourth consecutive year of growth.
Unprecedented 2.63 million vehicles registered after 6.3% rise in demand, exceeding forecast.
Biggest December on record sees registrations boosted 4% with 180,077 new cars registered.
Fleet demand at highest ever level, surpassing 1.3 million vehicles in 2015.
So 28000 represents just over 1%. About half that of the Volkswagen Polo in 2015
In North America we drive for longer distances in our commutes, I believe. We are spread out more and so, electric cars are impractical in many cases, I think
I got a Toyota Rav4 D4D 2.3litre diesel. It has electric heater and aircon ; electric windows; electric tailgate; electric seat adjusters, seat heating, all round cameras and self parking and a new battery will only cost £80. Here in France diesel is 98 centimes a litre (73 UK pence) and I get a range of 560 miles on a tank. It is big (by UK standards), comfortable, powerful enough to tow my boat or roof rack two kayaks. Now why oh why would I even consider an electric car? Ask me again in 20 years if anything significant changes to make them as good as the RAV.
Although we have plenty of sun in South Africa , no electric cars are commercially available in Cape Town , (and there are no incentives whatever) so I had a small four year old Fiat 500 converted to all electric drive for considerably less than the cost of a Nissan Leaf . It has a range of about 150 to 200 km on a charge .
Now , our municipality (utility) makes a substantial portion of its income from re-selling electricity , so they have every incentive to make rooftop PV as difficult as possible . I import very little grid power at all with my rooftop PV so , as I may not export more than I import , I am on a different “no-export” contract with my supplier ( not permitted even as a free gift of my surplus to the municipality !) . Thus my little electric city runabout mops up quite a bit of otherwise curtailed surplus PV output during the day . I believe this is a good use for an electric car in a sunny environment . As many have expressed earlier , I am lucky enough to have a conventional diesel car for longer trips I just have to make sure the battery supplying my house is near full in the evening after charging my little car , so as to keep the house powered for the night . Can be tricky at times , so it is useful being retired . Great fun buzzing about the short city trips each day under solar power .
Two major points
1. Currently there is not a viable battery technology for an electric car, except for local usage or to impress your neighbor with a Tesla. The quest for a viable battery has been going on unsuccessfully for many decades. If a great breakthrough is just around the corner, it makes no sense to BUY today’s defective technology with the promised higher range, lower cost soon.
What is the incentive to buy something that is supposed to dramatically improve “tomorrow?
2. The current electric car is not sustainable. It pays no taxes like gasoline tax which pays everything from roads to mass transit to, bicycle paths, to general fund waste while getting huge subsidies from the middle and poor who pay taxes. Where does that funding come from when we “drive” all the gasoline powered cars off the road. Does anyone think our government will not replace these funding losses? When the electric car is taxed to replace these required funds, the price of electricity will skyrocket, Does anyone think all the road and other construction equipment will operate with out fossil fuels? Where will all the added electricity demand come from as we ban fossil fuel electricity generation?
Finally fossil fuel companies are the second major source for revenue to the Treasury after income taxes. Put them out of business, and your government will need to find some place to tax and replace those treasury contributions.
The concept is an economic and personal disaster.
I suspect this will all come to a flaming halt when the politicians remember how much money they extract in the form of gasoline tax. We have states here in the U.S. who are struggling to cope with the revenue losses just from increased vehicle mileage. As always there are only two things to remember when predicting how things will go. 1) Follow the money and 2) politicians are addicted to money. It answers every question.
William G,
Nah. They’ll just move the tax to EV’s. Or much worse, pass a carbon tax.
Nice to have a second car for little trips but how does anyone rationalize license fees and insurance which for any kind of normal car here in Ontario would be at least $1,500-2,000 CAN. That would buy a lot of gas for the Ford 150 I drive. With the crew cab it is a spacious people mover. Easily holds five orangutans and one baboon(middle front) on those trips to airport, shows or dinner.
I have to gloat about the price of fuel I pay for may 2013 VW Jetta TDI. Exactly ZERO per gallon. I use the $500 debit card VW gave to me. That is good through November. They also gave me a $500 debit card to use at the dealer. Before it expires I will buy a new 12 volt battery, and who know what else?. And I recently received a letter from VW offering to do the 30,000 mile service for free.
Actually it was priced in when you bought the car. Remember TANSTAAFL
We have just had some snow on the East coast. In several places it cause traffic jams that lasted in excess of 20 hours in sub-zero temperatures. Police were delivering fuel to those vehicles that might have run out so they could keep engines running and keep the trapped occupants warm. Now had one of those been an electric car – heating means using power and if they run out in the freezing temperatures there is no way they can get extra fuel they are in a rapidly freezing brick and the batteries may not ever recover. Electric cars and trips in snowy weather are a potential death trap.
Um, people died during this storm due to idling engine which then was smothered by snow….
Indeed and one of the requirements of idling your engine in snow is a regular exhaust clearing check. But that is different to sitting in snow with zero power and nobody able to give you a recharge for your rapidly freezing battery. Electric cars are a townie fad. They are unsuited to the kind of conditions that we have just had on the East coast and which pertain without much comment in the northern plains.
There is two problems with this article that I see. The first is how they compare fuel prices. One thing that I have learned over the years is that when comparing things like fuel between countries, you “do not” add in exchange rates. A dollar made and spent in the U.S. has the same value as a dollar made and spent in Canada and the same value as a British pound made and spent in the UK. Even though at this time the Canadian dollar is only worth 70 cents U.S., that Canadian dollar is still worth $1 in Canada. The only time that you can use exchange rates when discussing fuel costs is if you are in a situation like one sister who it only takes 10 min to cross the U.S/Canada border and fuel up in the U.S. for the majority of Canadians it is not feasible to do that. The proper way to compare fuel prices between countries is by price per volume. So for the UK, the average price for fuel was 4 pounds per U.S. gallon, about the same as Canada for that same time period.
The other thing that I have a problem with in this article is its claim that fuel efficiency has played a part in this. I have spent the last 6 plus years working with UK soldiers, so this where i have gotten my information. The vehicles in the UK and Europe are WAY more fuel efficient than what we have here in North America. The problem over in the UK is that they are charged tax on there vehicles according Emission levels which in turn relates to engine size. My job with them related to driving them around in our Chevy Express 3500 15 passenger Extended van with a 6.0L 8 cylinder engine. They have constantly told me that no one would be able to afford to drive my vehicle in the UK, not because of the fuel costs, but because of the tax they would have to pay because of the emissions from the size of the engine. For them in the UK, a high performance engine is only 1.6L. My family car has a bigger engine.
This is in fact complete bollocks
The MAXIMUM annual tax on a car in the UK is £530
A Chevy Express will be giving you around 12 mpg if you are doing the average 12000 miles
per annum that’s 1000 gallons of gas which in the UK would coast around £4,500
The gasoline cost is the killer which is why most vehicles in Europe in that size range come with more economical diesel engines, The nearest UK equivalent is the Ford Transit Minibus which has variants with up to 17 seats. Note ANY passenger vehicle with more than 8 seats is considered a minibus. You can expect to get between 22-25 mpg from one. That’s an annual saving over the Chevy in excess of £2000
Note further that there are a LOT of cars on the road in that highest band including the venerable Land Rover Defender, the Range Rover , various models of Jeep, most Jaguars and the Morgan Plus 8.
One massive problem with pure electric vehicles is – where do you plug them in? It’s OK if you have a garage or driveway but, if you don’t live in the UK, just take a Google Earth tour through some of the back streets in my home town of Portsmouth for example and you will see the vast majority of houses have neither. Most of the time I can’t even park in my road, let alone outside my house. Even if was parked outside, I can’t think it would be legal (or safe) to trail a mains cable out through my front window and across the pavement (sidewalk)! Sorry, but until I can fully charge it up in ten minutes at a petrol (gas) station and it can take me 300 plus miles I’m not interested.
Not so difficult …
On the move: http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road/our-electric-highway
At home: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-21503532
My wife’s [workplace] already has them installed and it’s in the middle of nowhere.
AJB
A local small town needed $25,000.00 to install TWO plug-in stations for “free” refueling at TWO parking spaces in ONE garage.
You can buy a lot of gasoline on the private market for $25,000.00. You can drive a loooooooong ways on $25,000.00 of fuel in the states or Canada. Now, how much publicity and “advertising” and free government stuff (from other taxpayers) did that company get for their stunt?
Daylight Robbery 🙂
http://www.chargedev.co.uk/domestic/?gclid=CJv7ysbKxsoCFZeRGwodGYEBeQ#domestic-olev-grant-tab
Or for the company parking lot …
http://www.chargedev.co.uk/commercial/packaged-installs
You didn’t listen, did you? I, and many, many millions of drivers in the UK do NOT have a garage or drive and often cannot park outside our own houses. As for recharging points at motorway service stations, that’s great if you (a) happen to be going that way and (b) have the time spare to charge the car.
OTOH …
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-19668941
On street stuff …
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/government-funding-for-residential-on-street-charging-for-plug-in-vehicles-a-guide-for-members-of-the-public
So you might get a charging point in your road or you might not. Or it might be right at the other end of your road or somebody might be using it just when you urgently want it. Sorry, these are all pretty useless stop-gap measures. Let’s get the battery technology right first, which means ultra fast charge (ten minutes or less), long life (ten years or more) and low cost (less than 20% of the cost of the car). When that happens, count me in!
Much more likely to cause hassle …
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jan/25/electric-cars-to-use-bus-lanes-in-uk-cities
The battery fire problem mentioned in this article relates to the Tesla Model S. Right in the first year about 3 hit debris on the road and the battery started to burn. Tesla like most other EVs are using Li-MnO2 (or one of the other oxide lithium on the market) batteries which have the highest capacity of any lithium battery and are widely used. Note the O2 in the chemistry. When these batteries get hot or are punctured the electrode releases the Oxygen which then reacts with the lithium and electrolyte initiating a fire. Other lithium chemistry such as lithium iron phosphate will not burn.
Tesla quickly located a vulnerable area of the batter and added a titanium shield to all cars to eliminate the problem. No other EV have had any similar issue. Battery fires currently appear to be less frequent than gas or diesel fires in regular cars.
As to the heater issue mentioned a 1KW heaters more than enough to keep the passengers warm. given that many EVs have at batteries at least 50KWH of capacity (Tesla is currently using 70KWH and 90KWH batteries) a 1KW heater can be operated for at least 1 full day on a 50KWH battery and a week on a Tesla.
As to gas taxes.they will eventually apply to EVs. A number of states in the US are talking about raising the gas tax due to all the efficient cars now being sold. However if you look at the history of the gas tax. Most states have not made any changes to the tax in decades. The reason they are talking about raising the tax is simply because inflation has eliminated much of this income stream.
As to battery life most EV come with a 5 to 8 year battery warranty. Most EV batteries on the road today are still covered by the original warranty. Furthermore the batteries are completely recyclable.
Agreed. There were over 172 000 reported conventional vehicle fires during 2012 in the US alone. How many of those made the headlines?
Put a match to a lithium-ion cell. Then do the same to a small glass of gas and see what happens.
Max, if EV’s are so wonderful and efficient, why should the rest of us have to subsidize them?
@dbstealey Wait, which US motor giants were recently bailed out with taxpayers money? Subsidies. Yea, right.
I did not see DB supporting the union bailouts. (Also, you know the saying, two wrongs do not make a right)
David A,
Yes, Max is deflecting. I’m against all bailouts and subsidies. No matter how well meaning bailouts are when they start, the end result is Solyndra. Subsidies are unfair competition. for those who don’t get them, and they amount to theft for those who are forced to pay.
Max and other are singing the praises of EV’s. If they’re so great, they don’t need subsidies to succeed. I prefer IC engines, so why should I have to subsidize Max S? I could send Max my address, and he can refund that part of my taxes… if he’s an honest guy. But we know that will never happen.
Max has never answered my question from yesterday: does he like rooting around in our wallets without our permission? Because that’s what it amounts to.
Max S: “Agreed. There were over 172 000 reported conventional vehicle fires during 2012 in the US alone.”
And I’d put good money that 99.9% of those were electrical in origin.
Why lithium batteries keep catching fire
IN THE past year rechargeable batteries containing the element lithium have been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Investigators in Japan are investigating why a lithium-ion battery overheated on a Boeing 787 Dreamliner at Narita airport. Last year Boeing grounded its entire fleet of the next-generation plane after the lithium batteries on two of the aircraft caught fire. (The 787s returned to the air after being fitted with a modified system to protect the aircraft against battery fires.) Tesla, a maker of electric cars, performed a remote software update to its Model S luxury cars after two fires, which were blamed on road debris damaging the undertray containing the vehicles’ lithium batteries. Lithium batteries are widely used because of their high energy density: in other words, their ability to store a lot of energy in a lightweight, compact form. But they have a tendency to cause expensive machinery to go up in smoke.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2014/01/economist-explains-19
Yes, the battery will run the heater all day..IF YOU DON’T DRIVE ANYWHERE !!
More correctly if you haven’t driven anywhere. As you approach comfortable range and start looking for a recharge station you get caught in a large jam in the snow. Edging forward wheels slipping for 20 miles you eventually are forced to a halt. Do the electric car proponents really think that no-one will run out of power? And of course when they do – they need a tow or a car transporter not just a spare gallon from a Samaritan or a garage in walking distance.