Electric cars - how 'green' are they?

Funkfingers

Today's government announcement is just another fudge. It fulfils a need to be seen to be doing something about the situation without actually achieving anything specific.

No mention as yet of reintroducing a scrappage scheme. Instead of parting with your combustion-engined vehicle for next to nothing, you will be paying extra taxes so that the Government can buy your car from you. 

crunchman

The problem with this announcement is that it won't really help with pollution in cities now.  In the short term a 1 penny on a litre of diesel in the next budget would have much more effect.

57Deluxe

Supermarkets are gonner need a masseeeve increase in the size of those battery recycling pods...

http://c8.alamy.com/comp/C42NJ1/battery-recycling-container-in-public-shopping-area-C42NJ1.jpg

HAL9000

crunchman said:

A very large proportion of car journeys in cities are short and could easily be cycled.  The problem does come with the journeys that are 5 to 10 miles.  Even though cycling is probably the quickest way to make those journeys in a place like London, it's a bit far for a lot of people to cycle.

One thing that would be a big game changer would be to change the rules on electric bikes.  Currently they are limited to 15mph and then the motor cuts out.  In Canada and a lot of US states they can go to 20mph.  If we changed the rules to allow 20mph, it would cut the journey time significantly and I think you would see a big uptake of electric bikes.

We rented a pair of electric bikes on a recent holiday in Cornwall. Absolutely brilliant. Although the electric assistance is limited to 15mph I still managed to get 30mph once or twice. Very good on steep uphill climbs. I'd definitely consider one for local journeys. The problem is that what was fun on the deserted roads around west Cornwall would probably be a chore on the busier lanes of West Sussex.

aord43

I bought an electric car about 6 weeks ago.  A Mercedes B class.  Not sure how "greener" they are right now but the more renewable electricity we as a nation (and across the world) generate rather than fossil-based, the better.
There are two issues with electric cars right now.  1) Range, and 2) ease of charging.

Range depends on battery technology, which has been improving at a very slow rate as far as I can tell.  The next big thing is always "5-10 years away".
Currently Mercedes quote 120 miles as the range for this car, but this is like the traditional MPG values from the car manufacturers, to be taken with a pinch of salt.
As standard we get about 75-80 miles range.  And in special "extra charge" mode, you can get about 100 miles.  But we suffer extreme "range anxiety" if we get down to the last 10 miles or so.   It seems that for a normal charge, 100% charge actually only charges to 80% of the battery's capacity. This is because it's apparently bad for the battery to charge to a true 100%.  Pressing the extra charge mode button before charging allows you to get the true 100% but at the cost of shortening the battery life somewhat.
Ease of charging is another thing altogether. Some cars use so-called "Rapid charging" which I think can take about half an hour to get you to about 80%.  My car does not support this and will take 5-7 hours depending on how run down it is.
I live 60 miles north of London and a day trip there requires planning and charging for several hours.  I recently dropped my daughter at Heathrow airport and had to hang around for 4 hours while the car charged in the short-term car park.  At least the charging is free there apart from the parking cost, which is probably less than the fuel I would have needed in my old car.  But it's a pain.
The charging networks are a nightmare, there are several disparate ones that need various smartphone apps or RFID cards to make them work.  There are several types of incompatible connector.  Often a charging post will be out of service and you might not know until you get there.  Chargers are irregularly spread around the country and may already be in use or the parking space blocked by an ICE (internal combustion engine) car.  In the short term we need the charging networks to switch to using PAYG via bank card.  If TFL can do it, why not?  And more posts, and better reliability.
In the longer term we are going to need something to make longer journeys viable without many stops for charging.  I think that unless battery technology improves by a huge factor, and allows a charge in a few minutes, the only realistic way to do it is to have swappable batteries that the equivalent of petrol stations will provide - take out the old and put in the new fully charged one in a few moments.

aord43

hotpot said:

Another thing, who is going to buy a fossil fuel car within ten years of the deadline! they will become worthless, no dealer will want to part ex one unless there is a clunker bill.

Also will petrol stations still be open in the numbers we have today running up to the deadline!

the deadline is only for new cars.  Second-hand cars will not suddenly become unusable.

aord43

chillidoggy said:

I heard of one idea that involves 'battery stations'. Basically, you drive your lecky car to one, and get the discharged battery slid out, and a recharged one slid back in. Of course, they'd have to be the same type or it wouldn't work. I can see we'd could end up with 'VHS and Betamax' syndrome cars, before one becomes the dominant battery pack.

I think this is the only viable way forward.  Standardisation is a must, true.  Although we manage to have several different types of fuel on the petrol forecourt so a couple of standard battery pack types would be doable.

Danny1969

aord43 said:

chillidoggy said:

I heard of one idea that involves 'battery stations'. Basically, you drive your lecky car to one, and get the discharged battery slid out, and a recharged one slid back in. Of course, they'd have to be the same type or it wouldn't work. I can see we'd could end up with 'VHS and Betamax' syndrome cars, before one becomes the dominant battery pack.

I think this is the only viable way forward.  Standardisation is a must, true.  Although we manage to have several different types of fuel on the petrol forecourt so a couple of standard battery pack types would be doable.

I would expect the dominant pack is going to be the Tesla as the Elon Musk's Gigafactory is capable of producing more batteries than the rest of the entire battery manufacturing in the  world put together and there are plans for more factories. 

crunchman

aord43 said:

chillidoggy said:

I heard of one idea that involves 'battery stations'. Basically, you drive your lecky car to one, and get the discharged battery slid out, and a recharged one slid back in. Of course, they'd have to be the same type or it wouldn't work. I can see we'd could end up with 'VHS and Betamax' syndrome cars, before one becomes the dominant battery pack.

I think this is the only viable way forward.  Standardisation is a must, true.  Although we manage to have several different types of fuel on the petrol forecourt so a couple of standard battery pack types would be doable.

Fuel Cells

I keep banging on about hydrogen fuel cells.  You can fill up in a few minutes like with a conventional car.  [For those who like the roar of a V8 you could potentially run one on hydrogen as well and just get water vapour out of the tail pipe].

Battery powered cars will play a part.  For two car families, they will make sense as a second car.  If all your driving is short journeys they may also make sense as your only car, but for anyone who does long journeys, fuel cells look more promising than batteries at the moment.

They would also solve the problems around supply and demand on the grid.  You generate the hydrogen when there is surplus solar/wind - which is a good way of storing it.  With battery cars, everyone would be plugging in at the same time after the evening rush hour when there won't be any solar for most of the year.  It's going to cause all kinds of headaches for the electricity companies.

There are two fuel cell cars currently on the market in the UK from Toyota and Hyundai, with a version of the Honda Clarity due soon.  The government needs to start pushing the creation of a network of hydrogen filling stations.

chillidoggy

I can see the logic in a lecky car for short runs. I have a 10 mile round trip each day for work. I don't need to run a diesel Mondeo to do that, and in fact I'd be perfectly happy with a lecky car as long as it was warm, and dry, and got me there and back reliably.

Fuel cells - why haven't they made an impact yet?

Fretwired

Well that plan didn't last long .. the UK will need a minimum of 10 new power stations and lots of new infrastructure ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/25/new-diesel-petrol-cars-banned-uk-roads-2040-government-unveils/

chillidoggy

chillidoggy said:

I can see the logic in a lecky car for short runs. I have a 10 mile round trip each day for work. I don't need to run a diesel Mondeo to do that, and in fact I'd be perfectly happy with a lecky car as long as it was warm, and dry, and got me there and back reliably.

Fuel cells - why haven't they made an impact yet?

EDIT - COST!

chillidoggy

Fretwired said:

Well that plan didn't last long .. the UK will need a minimum of 10 new power stations and lots of new infrastructure ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/25/new-diesel-petrol-cars-banned-uk-roads-2040-government-unveils/

I knew it!

crunchman

chillidoggy said:

chillidoggy said:

I can see the logic in a lecky car for short runs. I have a 10 mile round trip each day for work. I don't need to run a diesel Mondeo to do that, and in fact I'd be perfectly happy with a lecky car as long as it was warm, and dry, and got me there and back reliably.

Fuel cells - why haven't they made an impact yet?

EDIT - COST!

Costs will go down with investment and with economies of scale, the same way as they have for battery power.

Chalky

Fretwired said:

Well that plan didn't last long .. the UK will need a minimum of 10 new power stations and lots of new infrastructure ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/25/new-diesel-petrol-cars-banned-uk-roads-2040-government-unveils/

Oh stoppit! This is a thread for the usual Fretboard daydreamers who don't understand the science and just want the science fiction!  Trying to tell them that we need to increase non-renewable generation capacity by 50% to cope with the old proverbial windless November evening is just spoiling the movie running in their head!

chillidoggy

crunchman said:

chillidoggy said:

chillidoggy said:

I can see the logic in a lecky car for short runs. I have a 10 mile round trip each day for work. I don't need to run a diesel Mondeo to do that, and in fact I'd be perfectly happy with a lecky car as long as it was warm, and dry, and got me there and back reliably.

Fuel cells - why haven't they made an impact yet?

EDIT - COST!

Costs will go down with investment and with economies of scale, the same way as they have for battery power.

I wonder if my earlier analogy of Betamax Vs VHS will apply - fuel cell Vs batteries? I read that Elon Musk said they're a non-starter right now, and there's issues with hydrogen storage. There are parallels to be drawn with the battery issues, there.

rlw

Probably a sensible idea to get a late hybrid as the date approaches as it only says no new ones after 2040, not that existing ones will be banned.  I doubt that the range issue will have been sorted out even by then.  I need to be able to do 600/700 miles per day occasionally and electricity won't do that for a while.

A fuel cell would, as would a hybrid.  In the meantime, I shall continue to cause thousands of deaths by driving my 5.5 litre gas guzzling polluting monster.

crunchman

I wonder if my earlier analogy of Betamax Vs VHS will apply - fuel cell Vs batteries? I read that Elon Musk said they're a non-starter right now, and there's issues with hydrogen storage. There are parallels to be drawn with the battery issues, there.

This is a man who has poured billions into batteries.  Of course he's going to push batteries at the expense of other technologies.

Evilmags

Elon Musk os a con man and confidence trickster. Analyse how much tax payers money he has swallowed in his post pay pal career. Vast subsidies on practically every pie his finger is in. He is a classic rent seeker of the highest order and people unable to see through that need to read a bit more widely. He's just getting rich and powerful at the expense of normal people by getting the state to steal on their behalf. 

Fretwired

crunchman said:

I wonder if my earlier analogy of Betamax Vs VHS will apply - fuel cell Vs batteries? I read that Elon Musk said they're a non-starter right now, and there's issues with hydrogen storage. There are parallels to be drawn with the battery issues, there.

This is a man who has poured billions into batteries.  Of course he's going to push batteries at the expense of other technologies.

Exactly. Hydrogen has some advantages. It's easy to make (funnily enough the Arabs could make it cheaply in the desert), clean and it could be supplied via the existing petrol station network and stored. Needs more work ...