UK switching to electric vehicles discussion

[Peter Sarf]

Several thread-contributors have mentioned salary sacrifice schemes, to fund your EV(s). So, for illustrative purposes -

Let's say your finance option gives you somewhere between 12,000 and 15,000 miles usage per year (two previous roles necessitated me driving 12,000 to 26,000 miles per year, as I worked between various UK offices).
Now let's add you then are made redundant. You need to buy out the finance agreement, or give your EV back.

Hypothesising? During the past three years, I've been made redundant once - my wife was made redundant twice - and two EV-leasing work colleagues (different companies), had to give back their EVs (thus they'd paid money for nothing) because the Stat' Redundancy was nowhere near enough to "buy out" their EV's finance agreement.

Sometimes, ICE ownership is a necessity, not a choice.

This is the thing. Lots of attractions to buying a new car involve a loan or other such finance agreement. I do not like loans *, I would rather save up and buy what I can affords rather than commit to a payment scheme regardless of what happens to my income. Otherwise the purchaser is paying for the loan companies profit.

* = I make an exception for a mortgage. Because it is a loan secured on something that increases in value the interest rate is low. Furthermore rent has to be paid otherwise and that cost increases due to inflation.

Also, when retired, most people will not be able to afford a car on finance or salary sacrifice. Then again they will not need to commute etc for work so hopefully will not need a car enough - that is my position but then I live in London.

I think that's a gross generalisation
Not everyone who drives BMWs is arrogant and self centred. Yes they do attract that sort but so does any German car

True, there is a risk of stereo typing. I could add that a lot of SUV drivers seem a bit arrogant - probably because they are in such a large high up car that they cannot see smaller cars alongside. Then again anything big is instinctively seen as threatening so all lorry drivers risk being branded evil (very few of them are) !. Nothing to do with EVs except perhaps the occupants are higher up because they are sitting on the batteries.

Thees lots of chat in this thread about public chargers. I've used them three times in two years of having an EV. They're typically 5-10 times per KW/h than I pay at home and their use destroys the value proposition.

I know not everyone can charge at home, but this will change as solutions develop and I hope public charging gets cheaper, but for that to happen the wholesale cost of electricity in "rip off Britain" needs to drop, along with the removal of the stupid linkage to the price of gas

Yes, one can only hope public chargers drop in cost as supply reaches demand and initial set up costs are covered. But, sadly, I feel the best way to view it is that home charging is cheaper, not so much that public charging is unreasonably expensive.

The price of electricity will always be linked to the price of gas (and force up the price of gas) because gas is used to generate electricity.

 

[Topological]

Those are very high mileages, average is about 10-13K pa. If you put those in on a PCP the deals you will get are very poor. You may be better leasing for those mileages but of course you own nothing at the end.

The only real downside of cash for used cars (if you have it) is that you are tying it up and you could do something else with it e.g. invest. And I'm yet to find a better deal on any finance at all (bar 0% deals) better than I can get on a personal loan, albeit with higher monthly payments as you are paying the full capital, and the car is then also a financial backup as you can sell it at any point but keep the loan going.

I have no idea how I end up at those mileages by the way, it is just what the car says it has done so must be right. My weekly journey for work is 110 miles per week (return from my house to Pontypool) and is only made about 30 weeks per year.

My only concern with a personal loan would be that the balance of the loan would not match the depreciation of the car. I would not want to be relying on the car being worth more than the loan.

I will probably go salary sacrifice to replace the GLC with an electric and then use the cash for an alternative investment. Famous last words though as not even Manchester is safe from the turmoil in the university sector.

 

[Bletchleyite]

My only concern with a personal loan would be that the balance of the loan would not match the depreciation of the car. I would not want to be relying on the car being worth more than the loan.

That can happen but it's only a major problem if you default or if you want to sell, pay the loan and have no car (rather than get the lump sum and keep the loan going, which I'd do if I was made redundant, say).

And if you do default on a PCP or HP and don't go bankrupt, you can be sure they will pursue you for the extra, so that isn't really any different.

 

[Bald Rick]

Those are very high mileages, average is about 10-13K pa.

The average mileage for a car in this England is around 7,000 miles.

General facts and figures about roads and road use

FAQ section about roads, cars, licence holders, vehicles, car sales, petrol and diesel

www.racfoundation.org

Q32) What is the average annual mileage per car in England?

A32) The estimated average annual mileage per car in England has decreased as the number of cars per household has risen, falling from around 9,200 miles in 2002 to 7,100 miles in 2024.

The estimated average annual mileage was 6,200 for petrol cars, 8,000 for hybrid cars, 8,300 for diesel cars and 8,900 for battery electric cars in 2024.

Source: Table NTS0901

 

[gazthomas]

The price of electricity will always be linked to the price of gas (and force up the price of gas) because gas is used to generate electricity.

I hope not forever, I would hope battery storage will make renewables more suitable for base-load scenarios, reducing our reliance on gas for electricity generation.

 

[Topological]

The average mileage for a car in this England is around 7,000 miles.

General facts and figures about roads and road use

FAQ section about roads, cars, licence holders, vehicles, car sales, petrol and diesel

www.racfoundation.org

Thanks for all those statistics. It means that the finance quotes that appear based on 6,000 miles are not too misleading. Arguably, the adverts should default to 7,000 miles but it is not the worst example of making things seem cheaper than they would be.

 

[Peter Sarf]

I hope not forever, I would hope battery storage will make renewables more suitable for base-load scenarios, reducing our reliance on gas for electricity generation.

Indeed. Its a sin really as iirc gas was originally meant to fill in for the peaks (as it is quick to start up a gas turbine aiui) but has become too heavily relied upon.

Obviously the nicest would be to use as little electricity as possible. But I suspect the energy saved by switching to low energy light bulbs is not as much as is now being used to charge EVs. But it is reducing ICE use. Heating would rely less on energy dependency if homes were better insulated and that must be significant as heating is a heavy energy use (lighting never did not use much energy by comparison). It is the same in the car - air conditioning takes a chunk out of the EV battery range.

 

[Bald Rick]

The price of electricity will always be linked to the price of gas (and force up the price of gas) because gas is used to generate electricity.

Not so much today!

Gas has been about 5% of the energy mix since 0900 this morning. And not coincidentally, the marginal wholesale price has been negative. All the owners of those big batteries will be very happy.

 

[Peter Sarf]

Not so much today!

Gas has been about 5% of the energy mix since 0900 this morning. And not coincidentally, the marginal wholesale price has been negative. All the owners of those big batteries will be very happy.

That is a good sign for the future.

It has been quite bright over in Croydon today of course. The sort of warmer out than in weather !.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Indeed. Its a sin really as iirc gas was originally meant to fill in for the peaks (as it is quick to start up a gas turbine aiui) but has become too heavily relied upon.

Obviously the nicest would be to use as little electricity as possible. But I suspect the energy saved by switching to low energy light bulbs is not as much as is now being used to charge EVs. But it is reducing ICE use. Heating would rely less on energy dependency if homes were better insulated and that must be significant as heating is a heavy energy use (lighting never did not use much energy by comparison). It is the same in the car - air conditioning takes a chunk out of the EV battery range.

The main thing home EV charging threatens is the viability of Economy 7 storage heating, as most home charging is overnight.

To be honest, though, anyone using those should probably switch to a heat pump, they really are junk.

 

[Energy]

To be honest, though, anyone using those should probably switch to a heat pump, they really are junk.

Those on storage heaters are probably worth waiting it out till the government sorts the £2500 BUS grant for A2A.

 

[The Ham]

The thing worth noting with the finance deal I talked about above, whilst there's a risk that we'd have to pay it back early if one or other or both of us lost our job (and that declines over time as the outstanding amount reduces), there's three things to note.

First, the monthly payments and the final amount is less than the on the road price of the car (mostly because of the deposit, but even accounting for that it's still a bit less).

Secondly, even if you only put the extra (let's say £10,000) money into savings and earn 1% that's £406 extra over 4 years (that £10,000 is the final payment amount, so can sit in a high interest account for 4 years, so 1% is likely to be a fairly low rate of interest).

Thirdly, if we had a £15,000 cash amount to buy the car (like some are saying that they like to do) that would have left us with savings so that if there were job losses things would be easier. The big risk would be needing to not make the final payment of we lost our job(s) right heart the end of the finance.

The other thing which has come to light in the press recently is that there's a government report which says that just one Ukraine like shock (was mostly written prior to Iran) would increase costs by more than the extra cost of going to net zero. Given it maths on if the deal was worth doing was based on fuel prices in December, the current shock is only going to be making our maths better than it was.

For example, paying £1.37 per litre vs £1.33 would have been an extra £4.50 per month for each of the months it's at the higher rate. Is worth noting that the current data from RAC has average supermarket prices around the £1.38 mark, and I suspect that prices are likely to creep higher if the conflict in Iran continues.

Also, the more renewables are the main source of energy, the higher the likelihood that the pricing of electricity gets decoupled from gas prices.
As a case study, 10 years ago Spain had some of the highest electricity prices in the EU, they now have some of the lowest and these are predicted to hardly change due to Iran, as so much of their energy is from renewables.

 

[Bald Rick]

As a case study, 10 years ago Spain had some of the highest electricity prices in the EU, they now have some of the lowest and these are predicted to hardly change due to Iran, as so much of their energy is from renewables.

Whilst this is true, their energy mix isn‘t that different from GB. Just over20% of Spains electricity was generated by Gas in 2025, compared to 27% here. Solar and wind combined there was 42%, here it was 37%. They have a lot more hydro and a bit more nuclear, we have imports and biomass instead.

The point is that is the structure of the market in Spain, and the capacity of their transmission network, that has made the switch to renewables change their pricing. We need some change to the market too, as well as much more deployment of batteries. I reckon next year we will start to see changes to peak pricing.

 

[Snow1964]

Also, the more renewables are the main source of energy, the higher the likelihood that the pricing of electricity gets decoupled from gas prices.
As a case study, 10 years ago Spain had some of the highest electricity prices in the EU, they now have some of the lowest and these are predicted to hardly change due to Iran, as so much of their energy is from renewables.

If you can charge at home, then electricity is subject to a price cap (although of course any Government subsidy ultimately gets added to tax bill, so is a bit smoke and mirrors). Petrol station prices can be volatile.

The Ukraine war, seemed to have spurred renewables expansion in UK, and within 4 years some of those new big National Grid links from wind farms go live, 4 years time Hinkley Point C power station goes live, so dependency on gas for UK electricity also falls.

I have noticed recently that some ultra rapid chargers that were 85-89p last year have cut their prices a bit, now some others have cut cost to 69p. Thats still 10 times price of overnight home electricity, but is now bit cheaper than petrol.

keeping maths simple 100kwh of electricity gives around 350-400 miles
at 69p (was 85p) ultra rapid charger is £69 (down from £85)
at 7p (overnight home charging) is £7 for 350-400 miles
a petrol car At £1.40 per litre costs about £75-85 for 350-400 miles

So for many, instead of filling up with petrol once every 2 weeks, charging at home (with average 16% rapid chargers when away on long trips) saves £100-150 per month on fuel, perhaps £12,000 in 10 years.

 

[Class 317]

I hope not forever, I would hope battery storage will make renewables more suitable for base-load scenarios, reducing our reliance on gas for electricity generation.

Watch this space. Market reforms to weaken the link between gas and electric prices are being consulted on.

With lots more wind, solar and BESS capacity hitting the grid gas will end up determining the price on far less occasions.

 

[Mawkie]

If you can charge at home, then electricity is subject to a price cap (although of course any Government subsidy ultimately gets added to tax bill, so is a bit smoke and mirrors). Petrol station prices can be volatile.

The Ukraine war, seemed to have spurred renewables expansion in UK, and within 4 years some of those new big National Grid links from wind farms go live, 4 years time Hinkley Point C power station goes live, so dependency on gas for UK electricity also falls.

I have noticed recently that some ultra rapid chargers that were 85-89p last year have cut their prices a bit, now some others have cut cost to 69p. Thats still 10 times price of overnight home electricity, but is now bit cheaper than petrol.

keeping maths simple 100kwh of electricity gives around 350-400 miles
at 69p (was 85p) ultra rapid charger is £69 (down from £85)
at 7p (overnight home charging) is £7 for 350-400 miles
a petrol car At £1.40 per litre costs about £75-85 for 350-400 miles

So for many, instead of filling up with petrol once every 2 weeks, charging at home (with average 16% rapid chargers when away on long trips) saves £100-150 per month on fuel, perhaps £12,000 in 10 years.

I think your 'simple maths' should crystallise the savings for everyone - and to labour your point, even 100% charging at some of the most expensive chargers in the country (with zero home charging) will still work out cheaper than petrol/diesel.

Although prices do fluctuate, the Supercharger prices near me went down after the Iran conflict started. So at 20p off peak/40p peak, with your simple maths, it costs me £20/£40 to fill up, which is still much cheaper than Dino Juice.

"Charging is expensive" is a relative term. It's expensive compared to charging at home*, but still cheaper than petrol.

*without any special charging tariff, my Octopus rate is currently 24.19p/kWh, so off peak Supercharging is actually less than charging at home.

 

[cactustwirly]

The main thing home EV charging threatens is the viability of Economy 7 storage heating, as most home charging is overnight.

To be honest, though, anyone using those should probably switch to a heat pump, they really are junk.

Well heat pumps are even more expensive and have a very high capital outlay
Solution is to get a Gas boiler instead

 

[bangor-toad]

I think your 'simple maths' should crystallise the savings for everyone - and to labour your point, even 100% charging at some of the most expensive chargers in the country (with zero home charging) will still work out cheaper than petrol/diesel.

Hi,
That's really not true for us.
We have a small EV and an old diesel estate. Both fully paid for and with minimal running costs apart from fuel.

Here's a comparison of the fuel costs:
EV
44KwH battery. Full (Well about 42KwH's worth) charge will give us a range of about 140 miles.
At 30p per KwH that's 9p per mile (Home charging)
At 65p per KwH that's 19.5p per mile ('Normal' chargepoints)
At 90p per KwH that's 27p per mile (Fast chargers)

Diesel. (An old estate car)
Typical top up: 55 liters
Typical range: 460 miles
Today's diesel price £1.55 / liter
That's 17.2p per mile


Each car has it's advantages for certain types of journey. The Diesel is frankly awful in traffic and for short journeys and the EV isn't as good for the longer trips we occasionally take.
Any non-home EV charging works out as more expensive that diesel per mile so we try to avoid it by choosing the right car for that trip.

This isn't an anti-EV comment. It's just our experience of running an EV compared to the old diesel estate. I really like the EV for short trips and driving into the town.



(As an aside, I see the prices you can pay at home for electricity in England. It's a shame NI is part of a different grid and charging regime as we just don't have that type of low cost option. The best is a rebadged Economy7 tariff at 25p/KwH. Mind you, until recently our petrol & diesel prices were about 10p per litre less than in England. Oh well...)


Cheers,
Mr Toad

 

[cactustwirly]

Hi,
That's really not true for us.
We have a small EV and an old diesel estate. Both fully paid for and with minimal running costs apart from fuel.

Here's a comparison of the fuel costs:
EV
44KwH battery. Full (Well about 42KwH's worth) charge will give us a range of about 140 miles.
At 30p per KwH that's 9p per mile (Home charging)
At 65p per KwH that's 19.5p per mile ('Normal' chargepoints)
At 90p per KwH that's 27p per mile (Fast chargers)

Diesel. (An old estate car)
Typical top up: 55 liters
Typical range: 460 miles
Today's diesel price £1.55 / liter
That's 17.2p per mile


Each car has it's advantages for certain types of journey. The Diesel is frankly awful in traffic and for short journeys and the EV isn't as good for the longer trips we occasionally take.
Any non-home EV charging works out as more expensive that diesel per mile so we try to avoid it by choosing the right car for that trip.

This isn't an anti-EV comment. It's just our experience of running an EV compared to the old diesel estate. I really like the EV for short trips and driving into the town.



(As an aside, I see the prices you can pay at home for electricity in England. It's a shame NI is part of a different grid and charging regime as we just don't have that type of low cost option. The best is a rebadged Economy7 tariff at 25p/KwH. Mind you, until recently our petrol & diesel prices were about 10p per litre less than in England. Oh well...)


Cheers,
Mr Toad

And if you think that diesel is especially expensive right now and 460 miles isn't a good range for a diesel. It still is cheaper than charging at a public charger.
Normally the cost would be much bigger?

There is no reason for you to switch unless home charging is possible

 

[Bletchleyite]

Well heat pumps are even more expensive and have a very high capital outlay
Solution is to get a Gas boiler instead

I would be astonished if many people who could have gas had storage heaters. They are usually used at properties where mains gas isn't available. LPG is an option I suppose but is very costly and not everyone has room for the large outside cylinder.

 

[AM9]

There is no reason for you to switch unless home charging is possible

Unless:

journeys might involve travel within or into low or zero emission zones​

hydrocarbon fuel prices for private use escalate through low demand​

the vehicle becomes unrepairable and replacements are scarce​

you have a conscience about the environment​

 

[Bletchleyite]

There is no reason for you to switch unless home charging is possible

There are loads of reasons. Not cost, no, but the superior driving experience for one.

Unless you like rowing through gears on an underpowered modern engine of course. The manual driving experience of a sports car is superior to an EV, I'll give you, but we aren't talking sports cars.

 

[Mawkie]

Here's a comparison of the fuel costs:
EV
44KwH battery. Full (Well about 42KwH's worth) charge will give us a range of about 140 miles.
At 30p per KwH that's 9p per mile (Home charging)
At 65p per KwH that's 19.5p per mile ('Normal' chargepoints)
At 90p per KwH that's 27p per mile (Fast chargers)

Diesel. (An old estate car)
Typical top up: 55 liters
Typical range: 460 miles
Today's diesel price £1.55 / liter
That's 17.2p per mile

So, charging at home in England at 8p could be 86% cheaper than the diesel, but using your own numbers at 30p means your fuel cost is 48% cheaper than diesel. If you find a fast charger at 57p or less, then you're still cheaper than diesel.

There is no reason for you to switch unless home charging is possible

Even in the face of other people's real world evidence? If I avoid the Supercharger network, my absolute closest charger is an Eon at 40p/kWh for 150kW charging. It's beginning to look like you just don't like EVs for whatever reason. At that price, it's still 30% cheaper than the diesel above.

Unless:
journeys might involve travel within or into low or zero emission zoneshydrocarbon fuel prices for private use escalate through low demandthe vehicle becomes unrepairable and replacements are scarceyou have a conscience about the environment

Quite.

 

[miami]

Worth noting that petrol/diesel prices are insanely cheap. Successive political decisions have made a choice to keep petrol cheap but allow elecrcity to inflate.

In 2012 petrol as 132p/litre -- https://www.racfoundation.org/data/uk-pump-prices-over-time

That would be 191/litre today.

Even at the heigh of covid when very few of us were travelling and the pump price dropped to 107p/litre, today that would be 137p/litre. My local garage today is charging 137p/litre.

In 2012 electric was about 10p/kWh. That would be 15p/kWh today. Instead today, even before Iran, it's over 21p per mile. https://energy-stats.uk/download-historical-pricing-data/

So electric is up 30% in 14 years, petrol is down 30%.

With government policy like that is seems crazy to make long lasting decisions on capital expenses. Perhaps today electric is cheaper than petrol, but it needs a major reversal of trends over the last 15 years to keep that going.

 

[Bald Rick]

At 30p per KwH that's 9p per mile (Home charging)

not a criticism of your excellent post, but no one should be paying more than 27.69p per kWh for home charging, and this reduces to 24.67p per kWh in two weeks. That is the domestic energy price cap, and will make your pence per mile rate 7.4p.

Of course many people choose to have electricity tarriffs that have much lower rates for off peak times / EV charging etc.

 

[N1]

not a criticism of your excellent post, but no one should be paying more than 27.69p per kWh for home charging, and this reduces to 24.67p per kWh in two weeks. That is the domestic energy price cap, and will make your pence per mile rate 7.4p.

Of course many people choose to have electricity tarriffs that have much lower rates for off peak times / EV charging etc.

The poster is in NI where price cap is different. I believe standard tariffs are going up in April in NI. There are no variable or specific EV tariffs, only Economy7 where night rate is 14 to 16p per kWh.

 

[Bald Rick]

The poster is in NI where price cap is different. I believe standard tariffs are going up in April in NI. There are no variable or specific EV tariffs, only Economy7 where night rate is 14 to 16p per kWh.

Ahh, apologies.

 

[gazthomas]

EV
44KwH battery. Full (Well about 42KwH's worth) charge will give us a range of about 140 miles.
At 30p per KwH that's 9p per mile (Home charging)
At 65p per KwH that's 19.5p per mile ('Normal' chargepoints)
At 90p per KwH that's 27p per mile (Fast chargers)

Mr Toad, I'm sure you're aware but many suppliers provide an overnight tariff, not just for the EV but the whole house. I pay 7p KW/h

 

[jon0844]

Well heat pumps are even more expensive and have a very high capital outlay
Solution is to get a Gas boiler instead

With that logic, why not just get a load of super-cheap resistive electric heaters then? You can get a 2-3kW heater for about a tenner if you buy in the summer and shop around...

 

[Bletchleyite]

With that logic, why not just get a load of super-cheap resistive electric heaters then? You can get a 2-3kW heater for about a tenner if you buy in the summer and shop around...

Low capital outlay, but operating one single heater like that costs considerably more per hour than heating your whole house to a comfortable temperature with gas. They're a classic example of "it's expensive to be poor".

Yes, electric heaters are 100% efficient* but electricity costs much more per unit energy than gas. Hence why heat pumps are economic - if electricity was cheaper they wouldn't be.

* Give or take a tiny amount for a buzzing sound, a slight glow on the element or the little indicator LED. 99.9something% I guess.