Is electric really the answer

[ChrisJ]

@yeller77 - Not heard of the Kia Seltos as it isn't available in UK

Any chance of reformatting your 2nd paragraph

 

[yeller77]

Apologies on both counts. I’m drinking now. I know, hard to believe I wasn’t before.  

[Rambo]

9 hours ago, ChrisJ said:

 

Any chance of reformatting your 2nd paragraph

 

🤣 Try reading it on a phone with a small screen 😯

[Bibs]

Oh dear. Anyway, Eric, excellent post and correct on so many accounts.

[Rambo]

Yes, I enjoyed reading it but, bloody hell, have I got a headache.

[ramjet]

I don't think that the take-up of EVs in Australia is very good. I have only seen public chargers down at the waterfront in Geelong and I think I have seen only about 4 Teslas on the roads down here.

I am not sure how many other EVs cars we have on sale in Australia so have not noticed if there are others. Given that I see a LOT of ICE cars, I'm still sticking with the 'really low take up rate'.

That and the price of an EV is roughly twice of the equivalent ICE car.

[madmax]

I was speaking to someone the other day about the planned rollout of EV's and she brought up a question I couldn't answer - just as there is concern for EMF health issues with mobile phones, WIFI, Bluetooth and all manner of modern electronics, do electric vehicles also have potential health issues with Electric Magnetic Field radiation?

It's not something I had thought about but potentially everyone with one is sitting on a massive source of EMF. Depending on what you read, this doesn't appear to be particularly good for us.  

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

It will make any regular occupants go infertile, resulting in the families of EV owners dying out within one generation. This will leave only the Master Race of ICE owners to survive and prosper in a post apocalyptic world. But that’s presumably what you’re hoping for anyway @madmax!

[yeller77]

On that note..  

[Rambo]

OK, it is The Sun, but they do have some valid points ...🤔

https://www.thesun.co.uk/motors/20942130/government-should-scrap-electric-vehicle-deadline-economic-disaster/

[Rambo]

End of the road for electric cars?

The President of Toyota is now questioning this e-philosophy 😲

[jonwat]

Giles Coren in today's Times:

The spark is gone — you’re better off walking than relying on useless, unreliable vehicles and chargers that never work.

 I watch my family strike out on foot across the fields into driving rain and gathering darkness, my wife holding each child’s hand, our new year plans in ruins, while I do what I can to make our dead car safe before abandoning it a mile short of home, full of luggage on a country lane, it occurs to me not for the first time that if we are going to save the planet we will have to find another way. Because electric cars are not the answer.

Yes, it’s the Jaguar again. My doomed bloody £65,000 iPace that has done nothing but fail at everything it was supposed to do for more than two years now, completely dead this time, its lifeless corpse blocking the single-track road.

I can’t even roll it to a safer spot because it can’t be put in neutral. For when an electric car dies, it dies hard. And then lies there as big and grey and not-going-anywhere as the poacher-slain bull elephant I once saw rotting by a roadside in northern Kenya. Just a bit less smelly.

Not that this is unusual. Since I bought my eco dream car in late 2020, in a deluded Thunbergian frenzy, it has spent more time off the road than on it, beached at the dealership for months at a time on account of innumerable electrical calamities, while I galumph around in the big diesel “courtesy cars” they send me under the terms of the warranty.

But this time I don’t want one. And I don’t want my own car back either. I have asked the guys who sold it to me to sell it again, as soon as it is fixed, to the first mug who walks into the shop. Because I am going back to petrol while there is still time. 

[Rambo]

I'm surprised Giles took so long to work this out. Electric cars will never save the planet. In fact, they are doing more damage 😯

[C8RKH]

You're just a heretic @Rambo and will die a painful death at the hands of the tree huggers who will then shred your body to provide fertiliser for their plants.

I'll be all over the raised bed next you.

I got an electric car for Christmas. I love it. And so far it has been 100% reliable and is only taking me around 15 minutes to get to full charge, but as I have a spare battery, it means the fun never has to stop.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Techyd]

Stick a dash cam on it, a little trailer and drive it to the corner shop for your mornings milk!

[Mark Blanchard]

Here's an article on the kids working in the Chinese owned Congo cobalt mines.   

There is going to be an out cry about this in years to come.  But while everyone jumps on the EV bandwagon people are remaining quiet.

Electric cars need up to 15kg of cobalt per car. 

https://www.themainewire.com/2022/12/maine-ev-goals-put-green-ideology-over-lives-of-cobalt-mining-congolese-children/

https://www.imd.org/ibyimd/sustainability/urgent-action-is-needed-to-protect-congolese-cobalt-miners/

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

There’s a self-certification scheme in place for companies using Cobalt. You have to prove all the way down the supply chain that your raw material does not come from that part of the DR Congo and surrounding regions, for the above reasons. It was originated from some 2010 USA legislation called the Dodd Frank Act. Basically if you cannot confirm that your Cobalt is from a “conflict free” location, then you cannot sell your goods. I guess if most of the mines are owned by the Chinese, then they just ignore it. There’s also an organisation in Washington making a fortune out of all the questionnaires being passed around the globe, but that’s another story.

[jonwat]

Average EV fast-charging costs soar above petrol 

[Bibs]

2nd hand Tesla prices are down 20% year on year due to charging costs and the cost of living. 

https://cardealermagazine.co.uk/publish/tesla-prices-are-in-free-fall-as-latest-used-car-data-shows-huge-drops-in-value/277342

[jonwat]

Maybe Lotus will have to reconsider the Emira being its last ICE vehicle as today’s Times reports:

British and European manufacturers are slowing down production of electric vehicles because they are too expensive for the vast majority of motorists, an industry body has said.

The Advanced Propulsion Centre, which disburses taxpayer money to push the automotive industry towards a zero-emission future, said in its latest quarterly review of the market that British factories would produce 280,000 fully electric cars and vans in 2025, out of a total production of 1.1 million.

It previously forecast 360,000 battery-only vehicles to be produced out of a total one million. If correct it would mean only a quarter of UK assembly output will be electric within two years, compared with the prior forecast of more than a third.

In its report, the centre said: “An uncertain economy is expected to drive buyers towards cheaper models and reduced BEV [battery electric vehicle] production is planned on that expectation. Buyers are expected to stick with cheaper options for longer. Although BEV production is reduced, overall production is increased, with more plug-in hybrids and hybrid vehicles [both of which include petrol engines].”

 

This is not just a UK phenomenon, the centre said. It is now expecting electric vehicle production across Europe to be 1 million units lower than expected at 12 million, thanks to the impacts of the rising cost of living, inflation and the vehicles’ affordability. It added: “A recovery for 2030 that gets BEV production back on track is uncertain due to an uncertain geopolitical situation and potential supply issues.”

 

 

[exeterjeep]

And petrol prices down a bit (for the moment).

Not a good time to be producing expensive/very large electric SUV's?

[DarrylV8]

Yep shame Lotus haven’t gone hydrogen route, and so we are staying with Eletre along side GT430

[exeterjeep]

Opinion: 2023 will be the year to wake up from electric cars dream

https://www.am-online.com/opinion/2023/01/11/opinion-2023-will-be-the-year-to-wake-up-from-electric-cars-dream

 

[jonwat]

Harry's take on electric cars

 

[exeterjeep]

On 10/01/2023 at 11:18, Bibs said:

2nd hand Tesla prices are down 20% year on year due to charging costs and the cost of living. 

https://cardealermagazine.co.uk/publish/tesla-prices-are-in-free-fall-as-latest-used-car-data-shows-huge-drops-in-value/277342

And....

Tesla slashes price of Model 3 and Y in move that will damage used prices further

https://cardealermagazine.co.uk/publish/tesla-slashes-price-of-model-3-and-y-in-move-that-will-damage-used-prices-further/277651

Tesla has announced it has dropped the price of the Model 3 from a starting price of £51,090 to £42,990 – a near 16 per cent drop.

The Model Y Performance variant – the most expensive in the range – has dropped overnight from a starting price of £67,990 to £57,990 – a near 15 per cent price cut.