Electric vehicle charging points

[LightGEN]

From what I here though battery lease prices will come down, with service centres swapping out the batteries at points along the journey to enable you to travel further.

I'm sure battery prices will come down significantly, probably to the point where leasing wouldn't be a consideration. The battery swapping station concept is also out there, though some form of battery standardisation and an easy approach to swapping the battery will be required for this to be workable, I'm less convinced that this idea will fly...time will tell.

Battery leases are quite new and it is possible they will fluctuate with usage both in milage and charging method (i.e. Excessive Boost Charging will have a premium). The EV is in its early days and prices will come down maybe sooner than we all think.

Consumer uptake is clearly the key to all of this.

 

[The Solar King]

The sums given out to local authorities are paltry. This whole thing may end up like PV - viable when the price of fossil fuel is so high it is the only viable alternative. This impoverishment of the masses seems to be the cornerstone of Government policy.

I would love to see EV take off. However, caution is required. If this ends up as a rich person's toy, it will not lead to a mass market. In terms of carbon reduction, whilst EV is more efficient, there is little point simply moving emmissions from the exhaust pipe to the power station.

The British Gas deal in London will effectively exclude you from the market.

 

[Glen Powell]

However if companies can invest in charging pods that are near self sufficient then this could be a consideration and would not require mass usage of power from the powerstations.

Our company is working on the maths of this at the moment so cannot say if it is viable or not yet.

 

[Glen Powell]

The British Gas deal in London will effectively exclude you from the market.

British Gas usually sub things like this out you just need to be on their preffered supplier list

 

[Fin170]

In terms of carbon reduction, whilst EV is more efficient, there is little point simply moving emmissions from the exhaust pipe to the power station.

Alternately, moving exhaust fumes from city centres out to remote locations or to N/A emissions sources (solar, nuclear etc). Public health, cancerous fumes and all that

Plus the clarkson logic misses that central generation is considerably more efficient than several smaller generators scattered about the place (part of the reason the individual does not have a generator out back and AC won the war of currents)

 

[Glen Powell]

I think the biggest reason AC won over DC was the factor that DC is more lethal, but I not looked into the true reasons lol

 

[The Solar King]

I love the wishful thinking and positivity of this thread.
I do not have to hand the figures for the predicted size of the EV market for this year, but more importantly 2013 -2015. It is not big and should be viewed as a niche.

Do not overook the fact the new car market is very depressed and this will in itself depress the potential for EV. There will be further consolidation and change in the manufacturing base in an effort to control costs.

There was also an interesting article in either the Telegraph or Sunday times comparing the whole life costs of a Ford focus, a Vauxall Ampera, a Nissan Leaf and some other traditional alternatives. Needless to say the Focus was considerably cheaper.

Currently this is the rub. Despite the number of EV launches this year, the improvements in the efficiency of internal combustion engined vehicles pushes back the point of parity.

I really want to see a thriving EV sector supporting secondary and tertiary jobs and activity. There will be opportunities, but not on the scale you may wish for.

As I have already said proceed with caution.

 

[Glen Powell]

I totally agree and when we joined the PV industry over 10 years ago the same sentiments were about, however we took the plunge and all was good in the end.

I would say do not depend on it as a sole income as there are many more sectors to explore such as micro wind as I have seen a large swing that way from our side on investment and domestic.

 

[The Solar King]

Yes, micro wind looks exciting. I hope you responded vigorously to the phase 2b FITs consulation that proposes banding for small scale wind which will effectively kill it.

As Dorothy Parker said 'this is what happens when you put all your eggs in one *******'. Ours being DECC.

I've been auto-censored!!! She was using the word for one born out of wedlock.

 

[Glen Powell]

Our company is fighting hard to improve the longevity of micro wind, this has a future with the improved performance over the years. The govenment opened one gate in december by relaxing the planning rules for micro wind only to try and slap us in the face with FIT reductions.

However commercial Biomass is a good route also along with commercial LED lighting, however to save hijacking the topic matter. If a mixture of technologies are part of the future business plans of companies then this could give further jobs in the future.

 

[BBS]

Hi from France,

Working yet on EV charging points, hoping manufacturers will agree on plug types...

Here is an example of PV+EV on my soft :

 

[moggy1968]

If you want to save the planet buy a diesel panda.
EV are very poluting, not because of the charging, but because of the batteries manufacture and destruction.
Even a conventional car produces most of it's emissions in it's manufacture and destruction. Because of the limmited lifespan of batteries and their costs EVs will probably become economically non viable and scrapped much sooner than traditional vehicles, compunding the problem.

The depreciation is also crushing because of the cost of batteries and their limited lifespan (although battery leasing may overcome this, but only if you have a way of evaluating the charge retaining property of the battery, who wants to lease a battery with only 25% charge capacity left)

personally I don't think EV is th answer. Something like hydrogen fuel cells is more viable. However, consider the implications on the climate of all that water vapour being released, it could be a disaster.
As above, I think a variety of technologies is the answer. Bio Diesel, hydrogen fuel cells, PV, wind, etc etc

 

[Fin170]

Suggesting hydrogen fuel cells after calling electric vehicles bad for the environment is very ironic, save my fingers

wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_car#Criticism

Don't forget to factor in the infrastructure required for a 'hydrogen economy'

Even current gen electric cars are cleaner than they're combustion counter parts, central generation being a much more efficient way of producing energy than hundreds of inefficient small generators. Add in all those cancers that diesel in particular causes it's a another one up for the EV.

Manufacture? The Nissan leaf is made in sunderland and the tesla roadster is manufactured in Hethel,UK. It's also well known that a electric motor will outlast a combustion engine

Disposal? We recycle near valueless lead acid batteries, do you think we would just chuck Lithium cells into landfill? Also consider 10 years of fluids, lubricants, plugs, filters etc that a electric vehicle does not require.

I personally hope for a future of electric vehicles, the LFTR and less Jeremy clarkson

 

[moggy1968]

Your taking a simplistic view of electric vehicles as beloved by the press by looking at just 'tailpipe emissions' when in fact that is the least poluting part of the equation. You need to also consider the manufacture and destruction of the vehicle. When you consider that then electric cars are actually more poluting than some of the modern diesels (such as the panda). A Pious (yes, I know thats a hybrid), for example, has the same carbon footprint over it's lifetime as a landrover discovery.

While the vehicles may be made in this country the batteries aren't, they're the poluting part, and the raw materials for them don't come from here either. The manufacture and transportation of batteries involves shipping them around the world. The mining of the raw materials also has it's impact and is usually in a different country to where the batteries are made.. Lets not forget there is also a finite quantity of those raw materials, same as fossil fuels so your moving the problem rather than solving it.

The fact that an electric motor may outlast a petrol one is irrelevant, as the cost of batteries will mean the vehicle is an economic write off after 8-10 years anyway. Most cars aren't scrapped because their engines fail anyway so engine life is an irrelevance.

My information on Hydrogen fuel cells comes from a physist who is one of the top 5 in the world in his field, currently alternative powerplants for submarines, rather than an unsubstantiated wikedpedia article, but as I said, Hydrogen cells aren't without their problems. Cost being one which isn't a factor in submarines!! But then, only a few years ago electric cars were prohibitively expensive. Currently the technology also limits the take up, but then that also applied to electric cars only 5 years ago.

Many of the products in batteries are also highly carcinogenic and their manufacture is a dirty process, which is why it tends to happen in countries with rather less environmental controls than ours.Modern diesel engines are actually extremely clean. IN any large city in the UK the air a modern diesel sucks in through it's air intake is dirtier than the air that comes out of it's exhaust.

The battery recycling process also has a carbon cost.
An electric vehicle will also require maintainance.
The car industry is rather unlikely to develop a car that last 20 years with no maintainance. Their shareholders wouldn't like it!
Don't forget to factor in the cost of an 'electric' economy!
I still believe a mix of technologies, and therefore emissions, is the answer, including Bio Fuel and methane based fuels. Natural gas looks interesting.

But then, if the experts can't agree what chance have we got!!
Interesting discussion though!:smart:

 

[Glen Powell]

The carbon footprint of transportation from one country to the other? has anybody actually done a calculation on this? I have and the results were more in favour of import than you think.

My carbon footprint calculation was based on the fuel used to ship the products from 1 port to another compared to getting raw materials to make the product in the UK.

The carbon footprint to make a new building compared to using an existing building should need no explanation, the fuel used to transport a product is difficult to calculate, do you base it on weight, size, shape, or mass. basing it on size would be beneficial to a container load of beads as each one would have very little CO2 to transport. based on a containers having about 400 to 500 products in it (totally against the calcs as most containers will have 1000's) and the amount of containers on a ship from China you would find that the product could be less than 500g/Co2 for transportation.

OK so China have the worst power system and smog is common place in nearly all the Areas I have visited, however, buy raw materials from all the different places in europe and put them into product in the UK then we are easily upto 4kg/Co2 for a product because most of it is on smaller vehicles from different destinations.

One thing China has got right is if you sell PV products then all the PV factories are together, if you sell LED then all the LED factories are together and so on.