UK switching to electric vehicles discussion

[jon0844]

I'm sure manufacturers will end up finding new and inventive ways for your car to break down, forcing you to get it repaired at their dealership. They've already mastered it for ICE cars.

In terms of old cars, it depends what you buy, and you really should do your research.

They money is going to be made in the future by charging you for all the toys you might currently enjoy for free on a car. Want faster charging? £10 a month. Want to use the integrated Sat Nav? £5 a month. Breakdown call centre button? £7 a month. Activate AWD, active cruise control, blind spot monitoring.. all £xx a month.. or you can have it all by buying the deluxe ultra pack for £5k... Even add range by unrestricting battery capacity in software!

And when you go to sell your car, the new owner will have to subscribe to everything again, even if you've paid a fixed price to unlock a feature. You'll have an account for your car, and it will be connected via 4G or 5G to ensure it is always up to date with what you can and can't use.

It's more profitable than servicing too!

(Some ICE cars have subscriptions too, of course)

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Jul 2022 ==

Used Nissan Leaf?

They're too expensive right now given the crazy situation where there's such long wait times for a new car. Any that are even remotely affordable have totally shot batteries, given they're the early generation models that didn't have good battery management.

In 4-5 years, the second hand cars should be of a more modern design (even newer Leaf's) and a safer bet.

Frankly, now isn't a great time to buy a car new or old, and leasing costs have risen loads too.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Jul 2022 ==

Clearly I spend over £10,000 on servicing my car...

I spend about £1200 a year on fuel so that's a lot of miles to make it worthwhile

£1200 isn't really that many miles at current fuel rates, unless your car is doing extremely good MPG. So, no, you may not save money given the cost of buying an EV - although I'd be interested to see the total cost of ownership when you factor in the reduced cost of servicing over your time of ownership (like any car, if you intend to keep it for many years then you're better off than changing it every 3 or 4 years).

 

[cactustwirly]

They money is going to be made in the future by charging you for all the toys you might currently enjoy for free on a car. Want faster charging? £10 a month. Want to use the integrated Sat Nav? £5 a month. Breakdown call centre button? £7 a month. Activate AWD, active cruise control, blind spot monitoring.. all £xx a month.. or you can have it all by buying the deluxe ultra pack for £5k... Even add range by unrestricting battery capacity in software!

And when you go to sell your car, the new owner will have to subscribe to everything again, even if you've paid a fixed price to unlock a feature. You'll have an account for your car, and it will be connected via 4G or 5G to ensure it is always up to date with what you can and can't use.

It's more profitable than servicing too!

(Some ICE cars have subscriptions too, of course)

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Jul 2022 ==



They're too expensive right now given the crazy situation where there's such long wait times for a new car. Any that are even remotely affordable have totally shot batteries, given they're the early generation models that didn't have good battery management.

In 4-5 years, the second hand cars should be of a more modern design (even newer Leaf's) and a safer bet.

Frankly, now isn't a great time to buy a car new or old, and leasing costs have risen loads too.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Jul 2022 ==



£1200 isn't really that many miles at current fuel rates, unless your car is doing extremely good MPG. So, no, you may not save money given the cost of buying an EV - although I'd be interested to see the total cost of ownership when you factor in the reduced cost of servicing over your time of ownership (like any car, if you intend to keep it for many years then you're better off than changing it every 3 or 4 years).

I do 8000 miles per year, I use £100 worth of fuel per month.

My car does 45mpg day to day, and 60mpg on a long run.

 

[reddragon]

£100 'tank of oil' is the cost for me to drive my EV 10,000 miles

 

[paul1609]

£100 'tank of oil' is the cost for me to drive my EV 10,000 miles

It won't be once your current electric contract runs out

 

[reddragon]

It won't be once your current electric contract runs out

Oh it will, I've signed up on a 25 year supply deal

 

[paul1609]

Oh it will, I've signed up on a 25 year supply deal

Unless all your 10000 miles is in Apr to Sept it won't!

 

[reddragon]

Unless all your 10000 miles is in Apr to Sept it won't!

Home charging is spread evenly over the year, public charging in the summer on longer trips and my cost includes public charging, so total cost over the year.

Summer = 0p/mile, winter 1.25p/mile, public charging all over the place from free to 15p/mile - average is just under 1p/mile.

 

[paul1609]

Home charging is spread evenly over the year, public charging in the summer on longer trips and my cost includes public charging, so total cost over the year.

Summer = 0p/mile, winter 1.25p/mile, public charging all over the place from free to 15p/mile - average is just under 1p/mile.

Sorry don't believe that's physically possible in the UK even if you were 100% optimising your lifestyle to EV use.

 

[trebor79]

Sorry don't believe that's physically possible in the UK even if you were 100% optimising your lifestyle to EV use.

It's absolutely possible with a car that does 4 mike's per kWh. 4.5p overnight power from EDD and 60p at public chargers.

 

[reddragon]

Sorry don't believe that's physically possible in the UK even if you were 100% optimising your lifestyle to EV use.

My last EV was 22951 miles for £222.30

Current one: -

Jan = 1.7p, Feb 1p, Mar 0.5p, Apr 0.1p, May-Jun lots of Rapids - 1.5p - Annual average 1.2p at the moment starting early winter so a bit higher until annual averages come in.

 

[paul1609]

It's absolutely possible with a car that does 4 mike's per kWh. 4.5p overnight power from EDD and 60p at public chargers.

To get the 4.5p overnight you have to pay a standard rate of around 50 p/Kwh on your other electric outside the 5 hours thats a premium of around 15p Kwh on the standard rate and around 30p on economy 7, once you take that in to account I stand by my comment its not possible.

 

[reddragon]

To get the 4.5p overnight you have to pay a standard rate of around 50 p/Kwh on your other electric outside the 5 hours thats a premium of around 15p Kwh on the standard rate and around 30p on economy 7, once you take that in to account I stand by my comment its not possible.

My night rate is 5p, day rate is 13.8p. I am switching to a fixed 2p/unit deal wholesale rate for 25 years in a few months. 51% charging is solar and my annual electric bill is £90, but that will drop next year.

 

[trebor79]

To get the 4.5p overnight you have to pay a standard rate of around 50 p/Kwh on your other electric outside the 5 hours thats a premium of around 15p Kwh on the standard rate and around 30p on economy 7, once you take that in to account I stand by my comment its not possible.

That's why I've bought some batteries and an inverter. Will charge them at the overnight rate and discharge during the day. Only very peak demand will be 50p.

My night rate is 5p, day rate is 13.8p. I am switching to a fixed 2p/unit deal wholesale rate for 25 years in a few months. 51% charging is solar and my annual electric bill is £90, but that will drop next year.

Where is that deal, if you don't mind me asking?

 

[paul1609]

My night rate is 5p, day rate is 13.8p. I am switching to a fixed 2p/unit deal wholesale rate for 25 years in a few months. 51% charging is solar and my annual electric bill is £90, but that will drop next year.

wholesale plus 2p is unlikely to achieve the rates you've been quoting for the foreseeable future.

 

[reddragon]

That's why I've bought some batteries and an inverter. Will charge them at the overnight rate and discharge during the day. Only very peak demand will be 50p.

Where is that deal, if you don't mind me asking?

wholesale plus 2p is unlikely to achieve the rates you've been quoting for the foreseeable future.

Join Ripple and save on your bills

Sign up to Ripple energy and power your home with cheaper, greener electricity and save on your bills.

rippleenergy.com

I bought a share in a wind farm to cover my annual bills that guarantees wholesale supply rate of 2p per kW/hr for at least 25 years, fully transportable & transferrable.

I pay my leccy bill at whatever rates that exist and the supplier deducts my windfarm benefit so that my bills stayed fixed whatever happens.

If the wholesale rate was 2p/unit leccy prices would be lower than I have now anyway but I get no reductions, hence no return on my turbine share
If wholesale rates are 15p/unit as now I get a higher leccy bill, less the 13p/unit profit resulting in a total bill staying the same.

Have a look

 

[trebor79]

Ah yes I did have a look at Ripple but found it was a bit opaque as to what the actual savings would be. I eventually determined that it wasn't very exciting.
I don't think 2p per kWh is right is it? There's network costs etc to add on to that. I'll have another look at it.

 

[reddragon]

Ah yes I did have a look at Ripple but found it was a bit opaque as to what the actual savings would be. I eventually determined that it wasn't very exciting.
I don't think 2p per kWh is right is it? There's network costs etc to add on to that. I'll have another look at it.

The 2p/kwh is wholesale. On top is transmission & billing + levy's.

Pre energy crisis, solar & wind were 2p, gas 6p, coal 8p, nuclear 10-50p per unit wholesale base cost.

Therefore the wind 2p will always be at the bottom of costs and equal fees are added. I agree that Ripple do not really explain how you benefit, it took me a while to understand it then it clicked as wow, effectively fixed energy rates at well below average rates.

 

[trebor79]

The 2p/kwh is wholesale. On top is transmission & billing + levy's.

Pre energy crisis, solar & wind were 2p, gas 6p, coal 8p, nuclear 10-50p per unit wholesale base cost.

Therefore the wind 2p will always be at the bottom of costs and equal fees are added. I agree that Ripple do not really explain how you benefit, it took me a while to understand it then it clicked as wow, effectively fixed energy rates at well below average rates.

Actually I don't think that's how Ripple works at all. As I understood it, the 2p or whatever is what it costs to run the wind farm and pay off the construction finance. To that need to be added insurance, maintenance, Ripple management fees etc. The power is sold in the normal way on a PPA. You get a discount on your bill which is based upon the delta between the PPA price and the total wind farm operating costs.
You don't get a discount on your bill based upon the delta between 2p and whatever your supplier is charging you.
It's really poorly "explained" on the website as it's dumbed down to the extent there are no actual figures. When you find some there's a disclaimer saying "your savings will be much higher due to current high prices". So why not just put the actual figure down FGS?!
But from the quotes you can get (based upon "normal" prices) it looks like a discount of a few pence per kWh. I did correspond with them to check my understanding was correct and they confirmed.

It's the discount being based upon the PPA price which was the deal breaker for me (and something which I think is deliberately obfuscated on their promotional material and website). It's a very competitive market and enourmous wind farms with economy of scale are the price setters. I work in the renewables sector and know how the market works. The wind farm is not going to make enough profit to reduce your electricity cost to an effective 2p per kWh.
What Ripple need to do is set themselves up as an energy supplier, then they really could sell you power at tuppence but of course that's more complicated and brings risks, costs etc to them.

Ripple is really just a share in a wind farm, with your dividends paid via your electricity bill rather than by banks transfer. It's made to look like something it isn't, so I passed.

 

[reddragon]

Actually I don't think that's how Ripple works at all. As I understood it, the 2p or whatever is what it costs to run the wind farm and pay off the construction finance. To that need to be added insurance, maintenance, Ripple management fees etc. The power is sold in the normal way on a PPA. You get a discount on your bill which is based upon the delta between the PPA price and the total wind farm operating costs.
You don't get a discount on your bill based upon the delta between 2p and whatever your supplier is charging you.
It's really poorly "explained" on the website as it's dumbed down to the extent there are no actual figures. When you find some there's a disclaimer saying "your savings will be much higher due to current high prices". So why not just put the actual figure down FGS?!
But from the quotes you can get (based upon "normal" prices) it looks like a discount of a few pence per kWh. I did correspond with them to check my understanding was correct and they confirmed.

It's the discount being based upon the PPA price which was the deal breaker for me (and something which I think is deliberately obfuscated on their promotional material and website). It's a very competitive market and enourmous wind farms with economy of scale are the price setters. I work in the renewables sector and know how the market works. The wind farm is not going to make enough profit to reduce your electricity cost to an effective 2p per kWh.
What Ripple need to do is set themselves up as an energy supplier, then they really could sell you power at tuppence but of course that's more complicated and brings risks, costs etc to them.

Ripple is really just a share in a wind farm, with your dividends paid via your electricity bill rather than by banks transfer. It's made to look like something it isn't, so I passed.

I agree that the major weakness of Ripple is the weak explanation on their website.

I spoke to their boss at Fully Charged with my understanding and determine that the offer simply protects me from wholesale prices rises by paying the difference between my agreed rate of 2p/unit and the rate power is sold at, which is the general wholesale rate over the year and as it is that which is out of control, nothing else I was satisfied.

 

[david1212]

I'm sure manufacturers will end up finding new and inventive ways for your car to break down, forcing you to get it repaired at their dealership. They've already mastered it for ICE cars.

In terms of old cars, it depends what you buy, and you really should do your research.

Not universally so - my local VAG independent can do anything the dealer can. While not the cheapest per hour their hourly workshop rate is half that of the stealerdealership.

Where it is an issue is sourcing parts. For VAG, Ford, Vauxhall/Peugeot/Citroen and similar for most items there are pattern parts, sometimes from the same factory as supply the production line. For others e.g. Kia / Hyundai far more tied to official parts where even if sold over the counter the manufacturer sets the price. Following on I see an electric MG as a risk long term compared to e.g. a VW ID3.

They money is going to be made in the future by charging you for all the toys you might currently enjoy for free on a car. Want faster charging? £10 a month. Want to use the integrated Sat Nav? £5 a month. Breakdown call centre button? £7 a month. Activate AWD, active cruise control, blind spot monitoring.. all £xx a month.. or you can have it all by buying the deluxe ultra pack for £5k... Even add range by unrestricting battery capacity in software!

And when you go to sell your car, the new owner will have to subscribe to everything again, even if you've paid a fixed price to unlock a feature. You'll have an account for your car, and it will be connected via 4G or 5G to ensure it is always up to date with what you can and can't use.

It's more profitable than servicing too!

(Some ICE cars have subscriptions too, of course)

I really hope having just read this it is a bad dream.
As it is the only way I will be able to afford the significantly higher initial cost of an EV similar to a Ford Focus / VW Golf is a lower ongoing cost.


For electricity I hope I am being pessimistic but by 2030 in todays terms I envisage overnight home charging being at least 20p/kW so 8p/mile at 2.5 miles/kW and 50p/kW at 'captive market' fast charge service areas. For slower public charging maybe 35p/kW. Then in addition however actually charged around 8p/mile to the government in place of fuel duty and VAT. Overall more expensive than fossil fuel at £2/litre.

 

[trebor79]

I agree that the major weakness of Ripple is the weak explanation on their website.

I spoke to their boss at Fully Charged with my understanding and determine that the offer simply protects me from wholesale prices rises by paying the difference between my agreed rate of 2p/unit and the rate power is sold at, which is the general wholesale rate over the year and as it is that which is out of control, nothing else I was satisfied.

But what are the arrangements of the Ripple PPA (what "rate is the power sold at")? If they are selling at say 6p, you'll get a 4p rebate if costs are 2p.
How much of the production is hedged? At what price? For how long?
If it's all hedged then wholesale price is irrelevant. If none of it is hedged then it's difficult know what your returns will be.
Who gets the benefit of any curtailment fees? Do Ripple pocket that or is it returned to shareholders?
If you think you'll be paying an effective price of 2p per kWh for your domestic electricity I fear you are going to be sorely disappointed.

IMO the website is deliberately obfuscated and that made me cautious. My digging eventually yielded the answer, but it really isn't easy to get to.

 

[py_megapixel]

For electricity I hope I am being pessimistic but by 2030 in todays terms I envisage overnight home charging being at least 20p/kW so 8p/mile at 2.5 miles/kW and 50p/kW at 'captive market' fast charge service areas. For slower public charging maybe 35p/kW. Then in addition however actually charged around 8p/mile to the government in place of fuel duty and VAT. Overall more expensive than fossil fuel at £2/litre.

Likelihood is that petrol/diesel motoring will get more expensive though.

For a start, any road pricing scheme will surely have to include all cars, not just EVs, otherwise people will view is at a penalty for buying EVs from the very people that have been telling them to buy EVs for years. Secondly I imagine there will be clean air zones all over the place. Thirdly I doubt fuel prices will stay at or below £2/litre until 2030.

 

[david1212]

Likelihood is that petrol/diesel motoring will get more expensive though.

For a start, any road pricing scheme will surely have to include all cars, not just EVs, otherwise people will view is at a penalty for buying EVs from the very people that have been telling them to buy EVs for years. Secondly I imagine there will be clean air zones all over the place. Thirdly I doubt fuel prices will stay at or below £2/litre until 2030.

The road pricing will be to cover the fossil fuel duty and VAT that can not be directly applied to electricity. Hence if it applies to all cars the duty and most of the VAT will have to be removed from fossil fuel.

I can envisage more clean air zones. Regarding the relative fuel costs will electricity increase less than fossil fuel?

 

[paul1609]

But what are the arrangements of the Ripple PPA (what "rate is the power sold at")? If they are selling at say 6p, you'll get a 4p rebate if costs are 2p.
How much of the production is hedged? At what price? For how long?
If it's all hedged then wholesale price is irrelevant. If none of it is hedged then it's difficult know what your returns will be.
Who gets the benefit of any curtailment fees? Do Ripple pocket that or is it returned to shareholders?
If you think you'll be paying an effective price of 2p per kWh for your domestic electricity I fear you are going to be sorely disappointed.

IMO the website is deliberately obfuscated and that made me cautious. My digging eventually yielded the answer, but it really isn't easy to get to.

Glad you also came to that conclusion too!

 

[AM9]

The road pricing will be to cover the fossil fuel duty and VAT that can not be directly applied to electricity. Hence if it applies to all cars the duty and most of the VAT will have to be removed from fossil fuel.

I can envisage more clean air zones. Regarding the relative fuel costs will electricity increase less than fossil fuel?

@fossil fuel duty cnnot be applied to electricity because increasingly, is isn't fossil fuel. It can still be applied to vehicles that do pollute the environment by combusting hydrocarbons and add to atmospheric CO2 in the process. Once vehicles that don't cause pollution by combusion are freely available, any UK government will use cost disincentives to encourage those that haven't made the change to do so.

 

[The Ham]

The road pricing will be to cover the fossil fuel duty and VAT that can not be directly applied to electricity. Hence if it applies to all cars the duty and most of the VAT will have to be removed from fossil fuel.

I can envisage more clean air zones. Regarding the relative fuel costs will electricity increase less than fossil fuel?

Yes and no.

Yes road pricing will be sold as replacing the list taxes, however no they won't only be applied to EV's as a lot of them will be sold as to reduce congestion. As such what's likely to happen is that there'll be a small reduction in fuel duty to compensate for the road pricing charges (say a reduction of 10p/l assuming that fuel is about 200p/l).

This will be popular in rural areas where there's unlikely to be much in the way of road pricing, except on the trunk road network.

In urban areas is likely that some of the charging would be required to fund public transport (as that would be popular with those who already use public transport and for those who would if things were a little better/a little cheaper).

Over time, as the number of ICE vehicles falls, the duty would start to rise again as fewer and fewer people would be driving such vehicles. As the "cost" to the government of losing their vote would be small.

Even if there were still significant numbers of plug in hybrids the extra cost would likely be small to the users as even if someone was doing 100 miles a day chances are over 1/2 of them would be on electric even if they only charged once a day.

Sucha change wouldn't happen now (where 2% of cars are plug ins of any type), but probably when they reach about 1/3 of all cars. Again the road charging would be limited in scale and price to begin with but would become a lot more prevalent quite quickly (say starting in key urban areas before spreading to trunk roads) and slowly increase in cost (RPI +1%).

The other selling point would be, we're doing this so that all those foreign vehicles that come here have to pay for the roads that they use. Also because they have to register, including their insurance details, we can fine them for breaking the rules and we know that if they damage property you'll be able to claim against them. Meaning lower insurance costs due to being able to trace those involved more easily.

 

[reddragon]

Cities are beginning to ban all new petrol stations

Cities are banning new gas stations. More should join them | Nathan Taft

Gas stations are environmental liabilities and hugely expensive to remediate. Electric cars are making gas stations obsolete – with 80% projected to be unprofitable by 2035

www.theguardian.com

In 2021, Petaluma in California became the first city in the world to prohibit new gas stations.

There are plans afoot in the UK to ban new petrol stations in a race between various UK LEZ cities to be the first. I wonder who will jump first, now the first city in the world has initiated it? Fulham is the site of the first Petrol Station in the UK to become an EV charging hub only. In rural areas diminishing returns will result in more Petrol Station closures.

Fuel availability will trump cost in many areas.

 

[AM9]

Cities are beginning to ban all new petrol stations

Cities are banning new gas stations. More should join them | Nathan Taft

Gas stations are environmental liabilities and hugely expensive to remediate. Electric cars are making gas stations obsolete – with 80% projected to be unprofitable by 2035

www.theguardian.com

There are plans afoot in the UK to ban new petrol stations in a race between various UK LEZ cities to be the first. I wonder who will jump first, now the first city in the world has initiated it? Fulham is the site of the first Petrol Station in the UK to become an EV charging hub only. In rural areas diminishing returns will result in more Petrol Station closures.

Fuel availability will trump cost in many areas.

Indeed, petrol/diesel as a retail product will become like coal, difficult to procure, expensive as an energy source, it's use banned in an increasing nummber of places and probably only surviving as a specialist fuel for classic vehicles running occasionally. The image that some seem to have that denial of the demise of ICVs for everyday use will come crashing down when it is unaffordable except as a hobby.

 

[ashkeba]

Of course e-bikes are an acquired taste and many would question how useful they are. However whilst the weather isn't terrible and they can cycle the rural roads at a time when there's not too much traffic, they're happy to do so.

When the weather is bad, ebikes overcome most of the problems of an old style rain cape until the wind is gusting too strong, maybe 50mph.

 

[Bletchleyite]

When the weather is bad, ebikes overcome most of the problems of an old style rain cape until the wind is gusting too strong, maybe 50mph.

You're never, ever going to sell cycling in the tipping rain/strong wind. It just isn't nice even with appropriate clothing. If living without a car, that's a day to take a taxi/the bus/the train, or if it's an option to work from home.