Electric Vehicles – What’s The Point?
Monday, 10. September 2018
A couple of weeks ago I was asked to appear on ITV’s Tonight programme that went out last Thursday (6th September). However, with just half an hour available and the main theme of the programme the decision that drivers face as to whether to choose a petrol, diesel, hybrid, plug-in hybrid or electric car next they dropped what was to be a section on finance.
All had their merits, petrol – short around the town trips, diesel for high mileage drivers, hybrids in town but with no ability to plug the car in at home or at work, plug in’s if you have access to electricity and electric for those on low mileage in a city subject to congestion charges with easy access to chargers.
However, they sent a couple on a trip from their home in the north to a party in the south of England in an electric car. A trip that would normally take 4 hours but actually ended up taking over 6 hours, making them 2 hours late. The reason, finding somewhere to charge up the battery en-route. They found at service areas chargers that were broken as well as chargers that couldn’t fast charge. It seemed like a nightmare and got the couple very irritated and worried that they could end up stranded.
One gentleman with a plug-in hybrid found that he needed to charge his car for 6.5 hours at home using the domestic power supply in order to be able to cover something like 25 miles on just the electric motor, think he should change to Duracell Ultra batteries! The programme also questioned the environmental differences claiming, as many others have, that the manufacture of electric vehicles and their batteries come at an increased environmental cost and they still affect the environment as there are particulate emissions from tyres and brakes.
So whilst not all great news electric is the direction of travel and since BP bought out Chargemaster EV charging network we will see many more fast charge points with the next generation able to ‘fill up’ a car in just 5 minutes. Added to which there are already cars that can be used as electricity storage devices. Left plugged into the house electrics any stored electricity could be used when the cost of energy is high then charge the car overnight when energy is low.
Lots happening but I’m yet to be convinced. And the idea of charge points in lamp posts – as was shown on the programme is likely to end up with drivers in A&E as they come to blows as to who was at the lamp post first and whose needs are greater. By Graham Hill
