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Random EV thoughts.....

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  • Registered Users Posts: 2,819 ✭✭✭Silent Running


    Apartment dwellers' charging could mostly be solved if there was an understanding management company involved, allowing charging posts to be installed at parking spots. If management companies aren't willing to move forward, legislation could be enacted to 'encourage' them.

    On street parking could mostly be solved by lamp post chargers or roadside compact chargers.

    Where there is political will there is a way. It's not impossible!

    I agree that BEVs aren't for everyone, but not because of charging constraints.


  • Posts: 7,499 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    What about apartment/terraced home dwellers? The suburban family home with driveway is far from the norm in most markets.

    Tuff titties :D


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    Tuff titties :D

    It makes the vehicles a rather esoteric pursuit though, it's weird there seems to be such a push towards them from government and even manufacturers, when for large segments of the potential market, the vehicles are pretty much useless.


  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 19,037 Mod ✭✭✭✭slave1


    It makes the vehicles a rather esoteric pursuit though, it's weird there seems to be such a push towards them from government and even manufacturers, when for large segments of the potential market, the vehicles are pretty much useless.

    Because (bluntly) the ICE alternatives are literally killing us

    My stuff for sale on Adverts inc. EDDI, hot water cylinder, roof rails...

    Public Profile active ads for slave1 (adverts.ie)



  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    slave1 wrote: »
    Because (bluntly) the ICE alternatives are literally killing us

    OK, but EVs don't actually solve the problem, not properly. We can have all the best intentions in the world but demand for transport from what I can see will always outstrip what EVs can deliver.

    They're mostly beloved by 1st world, relatively wealthy countries in any case and I hate to be blunt but, even if we all magically switched to EVs in the morning, it fixes nothing, we're not the problem, in fact we create a bigger problem environmentallly: the things are expensive as they are, to push the prices down there is no way they can be manufactured in Europe, so we push production to China, India etc to fulfill our increased consumption, but those guys aren't buying EVs and those production facilities are run on...dirty dirty coal.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 4,446 ✭✭✭McGiver


    Apartment dwellers' charging could mostly be solved if there was an understanding management company involved, allowing charging posts to be installed at parking spots. If management companies aren't willing to move forward, legislation could be enacted to 'encourage' them.

    This must be legislation driven, as in the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and even Germany. Irish business, such as the management companies are stiff, won't move. Legislation is the only way. Just follow Norway.

    1. Mandate all new builds to make provisions for communal charging in the design / planning.
    2. Right to plug - make the ability to request installation of a charging post a property owner's and tenant's right.
    3. Create a process for individual, group of individuals or cooperative to request installation of a community charging point from the local authority.
    4. Mandate car parks to install chargers.
    5. Mandate rest places and petrol stations to install chargers.
    6. Mandate malls to install chargers.
    7. Mandate gov buildings to install chargers.
    8. Create rules and regulations for the charging point market operation and then liberalise the market.
    9. Create tax incentives for business to install chargers.

    Did I forget something? :)


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,446 ✭✭✭McGiver


    They're mostly beloved by 1st world, relatively wealthy countries in any case and I hate to be blunt but, even if we all magically switched to EVs in the morning, it fixes nothing, we're not the problem, in fact we create a bigger problem environmentallly: the things are expensive as they are, to push the prices down there is no way they can be manufactured in Europe, so we push production to China, India etc to fulfill our increased consumption, but those guys aren't buying EVs and those production facilities are run on...dirty dirty coal.
    Wrong.

    China has had the most EVs until 2021 only to be surpassed by the EU recently (1.3 ve 1.2M EVs).
    China remains the top EV market and a very dynamic one. China has more EV models than the EU and also more pure EV car makers, some of which started exports to the EU or are close to it (Xpeng, Nio).
    China is undergoing a huge renewable energy revolution (40% installed capacity as of now).

    Wrong on the production too.

    VW, BMW and others are working on battery production supply lines in Europe. The cars themselves are also produced in Europe. Tesla and also Korean as well as Chinese battery companies are building battery factories in the EU.
    Also, there is a European Battery Alliance which was setup exactly for the reason of ensuring production in the EU and reducing dependence on Asian imports.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    McGiver wrote: »
    Wrong.

    China has had the most EVs until 2021 only to be surpassed by the EU recently (1.3 ve 1.2M EVs).
    China remains the top EV market and a very dynamic one. China has more EV models than the EU and also more pure EV car makers, some of which started exports to the EU or are close to it (Xpeng, Nio).
    China is undergoing a huge renewable energy revolution (40% installed capacity as of now).

    Wrong on the production too.

    VW, BMW and others are working on battery production supply lines in Europe. The cars themselves are also produced in Europe. Tesla and also Korean as well as Chinese battery companies are building battery factories in the EU.
    Also, there is a European Battery Alliance which was setup exactly for the reason of ensuring production in the EU and reducing dependence on Asian imports.

    So, given there are plans to outlaw ICE vehicles in the medium future in a few European countries (no doubt our hapless gob****es will jump on board without thinking it through properly).

    Where will all these vehicles charge? Public facilities that take hours or even assuming every one is fast charging (lol) 30 minutes + to refuel would represent massive step backwards in terms of convenience, let's be honest a major selling point for private cars.

    Somebody mentioned lamppost charging, to give an example, I live on a relatively long urban street comprised almost exclusively of terraced housing. Lampposts are at best 75-100m apart, often already doubling up as electricity/telecoms transmission poles. You would be lucky to get parked at/near one once a week and that wouldn't be consistent or reliable.

    The cost is significantly, often to the point of being prohibitively more expensive than the ICE equivalent. And that is with the vehicles currently being subsidised, 2nd hand vehicles will likely suffer from battery degradation and poor range and/or require expensive battery replacement. This will make motoring too expensive for anyone not comfortably middle class. A massively regressive step also.

    Range is a massive problem, sure top end Teslas and the latest prestige marks can likely match a full tank of diesel. But its akin to an Opel Corsa salesman telling you a McClaren can do 200+ mph. It will take many generations before the models intended for mass market get near those ranges.

    Too many questions and it's frankly very weird that what's being put forward as the only alternative to the current offering is something with deep and obvious flaws that there just doesn't seem to be answers to.


  • Registered Users Posts: 12,333 ✭✭✭✭DrPhilG


    2nd hand vehicles will likely suffer from battery degradation and poor range and/or require expensive battery replacement.

    Ah dear... You were actually doing OK til that point.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    DrPhilG wrote: »
    Ah dear... You were actually doing OK til that point.

    Battery life reduced to 80km so in a 10 yo vehicle? That the asking price is on a par with perfectly use able and non limited ICE vehicles. Whats normal about that? There's threads on this forum about people considering buying 2nd hand EVs and encountering that exact issue.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 2,819 ✭✭✭Silent Running


    DrPhilG wrote: »
    Ah dear... You were actually doing OK til that point.

    There are none so blind...

    Some people just will not see that there are answers. All sorts of excuses will be dragged up, like 'I can't park at a lamp post' Well you would be able to if it had a charger and was an EV only parking spot.

    'Batteries degrade and need to be replaced.' Pointing to the first Leaf as an example. Technology has moved on. The blind need time to catch up to this. Not everyone needs 500kms of range every day. I certainly don't. A lot of people would be more than happy with 80kms a day. Look at your own mileage. If you do 500kms a day, only the long range EVs would suit. But do you?

    Only high end Tesla... Yawn... My Kia can keep up with Teslas in range.

    What's next? 'Electric cars can't be driven in the rain' You sound like a cretin certain Kerry politician.

    OK a challenge to the naysayers: Burning fossil fuels has to go, it's killing us. What do you propose as an alternative transport solution?


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    There are none so blind...

    Some people just will not see that there are answers. All sorts of excuses will be dragged up, like 'I can't park at a lamp post' Well you would be able to if it had a charger and was an EV only parking spot.

    'Batteries degrade and need to be replaced.' Pointing to the first Leaf as an example. Technology has moved on. The blind need time to catch up to this. Not everyone needs 500kms of range every day. I certainly don't. A lot of people would be more than happy with 80kms a day. Look at your own mileage. If you do 500kms a day, only the long range EVs would suit. But do you?

    Only high end Tesla... Yawn... My Kia can keep up with Teslas in range.

    What's next? 'Electric cars can't be driven in the rain' You sound like a cretin certain Kerry politician.

    OK a challenge to the naysayers: Burning fossil fuels has to go, it's killing us. What do you propose as an alternative transport solution?

    You see that's part of the problem, sneering at questions, referring to people as idiots and then rather provide credible solutions claim the technology is perfect rather than accept it's very very flawed. And the lamp post point? Remember in the hypothetical scenario, every has an EV now so it's a dedicated charging point, but for public use. The same problem persists. Does everyone get their own charging space outside their home? This would require massive investment. Will these be free chargers at cost to the state? Or personal charge points linked to domestic supply(again this would require significant legislation change relating to the roadside directly outside your home no longer being a "public road" if it contains a parking space and charger designated for your sole use).

    It's myopia and I'm all right Jack stuff. Your Kia without even checking I would guess is not nor will be in even 5 years the type of vehicle one could purchase on a less than managerial/professional salary. Not even close to attainable for a lot of people and definitely not the norm in fairness. Have a look around at the general age/price profile of vehicles on the road.

    Look, I'm on roughly the same book if not the same page. I know fossil fuels are crap and I wish EVs were truly the easy peasy solution to that problem like they are presented to be, but we know they're not and are not likely to be without massive improvements in technology on the manufacturing and infrastructure end and cost reductions.

    For the record I drive a PHEV that runs on a squirt of petrol, I fill the tank (32L) roughly once a month. An 80km range Leaf or 500+km range modern EV would require me parking overnight at least on occasion at the nearest public charging point some 2km from my home. Who wants to do that?


  • Registered Users Posts: 15,546 ✭✭✭✭AndyBoBandy


    So, given there are plans to outlaw sales of NEW ICE vehicles in the medium future in a few European countries

    Just made a slight adjustment to your sentence there, as no one mentioned that on Jan 1st 2031 petrol & diesel cars will be no longer allowed on the roads, just no more new registrations will be allowed.


  • Registered Users Posts: 15,546 ✭✭✭✭AndyBoBandy


    Does everyone get their own charging space outside their home?

    no, the same way that everyone doesn't get a petrol pump installed outside their front door.

    People who (for whatever reason) cannot get home charging, will utilise public charging to meet their needs,

    whether that's slow lampost charging on the street, or slow/fast charging in their local Tesco/Lidl/SuperValu via chargers that will give cars up to 70%-80% battery in around 20 minutes...

    The problem in Ireland is we simply don't have the infrastructure yet to support that.
    Thats not to say we won't have the infrastructure when the demand is there, as everyone likes to earn a buck or 2 (just like petrol station companies), only this time, any location with an electricity supply can be a forecourt...
    An 80km range Leaf or 500+km range modern EV would require me parking overnight at least on occasion at the nearest public charging point some 2km from my home. Who wants to do that?

    Thats why (fast) chargers need to be installed in convenient locations, like supermarket/shopping centre carparks, so you can get that same overnight's worth of charge in 20-30 minutes.


  • Registered Users Posts: 10,658 ✭✭✭✭MJohnston


    OK, but EVs don't actually solve the problem, not properly. We can have all the best intentions in the world but demand for transport from what I can see will always outstrip what EVs can deliver.

    They're mostly beloved by 1st world, relatively wealthy countries in any case and I hate to be blunt but, even if we all magically switched to EVs in the morning, it fixes nothing, we're not the problem, in fact we create a bigger problem environmentallly: the things are expensive as they are, to push the prices down there is no way they can be manufactured in Europe, so we push production to China, India etc to fulfill our increased consumption, but those guys aren't buying EVs and those production facilities are run on...dirty dirty coal.

    You assume that slave1 meant that ICE cars are killing us because of the broader environmental effect, but you don't consider that those vehicles are killing us more directly through air pollution. Various cancers, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, increased Covid death risk, etc. Fuel burning is a health disaster, and the scale of it has been suppressed for a long, long time. Hopefully the tragic death and court case of Ella Kissi-Debrah will provide the legal obligations necessary for governments to start taking that seriously.

    As an aside, I do wonder whether in a few years, we'll have realised that cases of Covid spiked this winter because of all the smokey fuels that people burn in their homes. A few times these last few months I've gone out for a cycle and come back absolutely reeking of smoke in the fog.


  • Registered Users Posts: 10,658 ✭✭✭✭MJohnston


    no, the same way that everyone doesn't get a petrol pump installed outside their front door.

    People who (for whatever reason) cannot get home charging, will utilise public charging to meet their needs,

    whether that's lampost charging on the street, or in their local Tesco/Lidl via fast chargers that will give cars 70%-80% battery in around 20 minutes...

    The problem in Ireland is we simply don't have the infrastructure yet to support that.
    Thats not to say we won't have the infrastructure when the demand is there, as everyone likes to earn a buck or 2 (just like petrol station companies), only this time, any location can be a forecourt...

    As I've said before too, I think it's a mistake to compare our charging infrastructure as it is now, against the standard it would need to be at for everyone to be driving an EV.

    I think it's also going to be very hard for a growing network to not feel sparse and insufficient because it's trying to cover a broad geographical area for a small number of users with a huge range of differing journey requirements.

    ESB are undoubtedly behind on where they need to be, but I think this pre-widespread adoption phase is always going to feel slightly inadequate.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,819 ✭✭✭Silent Running


    You see that's part of the problem, sneering at questions, referring to people as idiots and then rather provide credible solutions claim the technology is perfect rather than accept it's very very flawed. And the lamp post point? Remember in the hypothetical scenario, every has an EV now so it's a dedicated charging point, but for public use. The same problem persists. Does everyone get their own charging space outside their home? This would require massive investment. Will these be free chargers at cost to the state? Or personal charge points linked to domestic supply(again this would require significant legislation change relating to the roadside directly outside your home no longer being a "public road" if it contains a parking space and charger designated for your sole use).

    It's myopia and I'm all right Jack stuff. Your Kia without even checking I would guess is not nor will be in even 5 years the type of vehicle one could purchase on a less than managerial/professional salary. Not even close to attainable for a lot of people and definitely not the norm in fairness. Have a look around at the general age/price profile of vehicles on the road.

    Look, I'm on roughly the same book if not the same page. I know fossil fuels are crap and I wish EVs were truly the easy peasy solution to that problem like they are presented to be, but we know they're not and are not likely to be without massive improvements in technology on the manufacturing and infrastructure end and cost reductions.

    For the record I drive a PHEV that runs on a squirt of petrol, I fill the tank (32L) roughly once a month. An 80km range Leaf or 500+km range modern EV would require me parking overnight at least on occasion at the nearest public charging point some 2km from my home. Who wants to do that?

    You seem to be doing the same old thing. Not looking for answers at all. For that you have to be asking questions. You only come in here and state as fact things like the technology is very, very flawed. Well for me and many like me it isn't at all flawed. We've been using it without much issue for years.

    There is no reason why a street can't have a public charger on every lamp post. I didn't suggest that every EV owner would have their own charger and space. That's your idea, thought up to make the whole thing sound ridiculous. Maybe if you don't invent scenarios that don't exist, EVs might look like a solution. Being constantly negative around solutions to the car pollution problem will get us nowhere.

    A lot of current fossil fuel drivers could easily transition to EVs today, but will go out and buy a new diesel, often because they read complete rubbish presented as fact. Maybe they saw Danny Healy Rae state as fact that electric cars can't be driven in the rain. Or maybe they'll read your statement that "we know they're not and are not likely to be without massive improvements in technology". We know that, do we? News to me.

    As to affordability? Yes my Kia is newish, but I'm very, very far short of an executive salary.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    You seem to be doing the same old thing. Not looking for answers at all. For that you have to be asking questions. You only come in here and state as fact things like the technology is very, very flawed. Well for me and many like me it isn't at all flawed. We've been using it without much issue for years.

    There is no reason why a street can't have a public charger on every lamp post. I didn't suggest that every EV owner would have their own charger and space. That's your idea, thought up to make the whole thing sound ridiculous. Maybe if you don't invent scenarios that don't exist, EVs might look like a solution. Being constantly negative around solutions to the car pollution problem will get us nowhere.

    A lot of current fossil fuel drivers could easily transition to EVs today, but will go out and buy a new diesel, often because they read complete rubbish presented as fact. Maybe they saw Danny Healy Rae state as fact that electric cars can't be driven in the rain. Or maybe they'll read your statement that "we know they're not and are not likely to be without massive improvements in technology". We know that, do we? News to me.

    As to affordability? Yes my Kia is newish, but I'm very, very far short of an executive salary.

    Healy Rae is undoubtedly an idiot to be sure but he didn't even need such lunacy. His voters can buy a big dirty diesel sucking German saloon for a few grand second hand and drive cross country for reasonable money and unlimited range as long as they can afford to refill the tank. EVs are many many years from getting this kind of buyer to cross over. And much as we may not like it, this kind of buyer is very very normal.


  • Registered Users Posts: 12,333 ✭✭✭✭DrPhilG


    MJohnston wrote: »
    I do wonder whether in a few years, we'll have realised that cases of Covid spiked this winter because of all the smokey fuels that people burn in their homes.

    I doubt it. California is one of the greenest states in the US and they just got absolutely pumped by Covid through the winter season.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,819 ✭✭✭Silent Running


    Healy Rae is undoubtedly an idiot to be sure but he didn't even need such lunacy. His voters can buy a big dirty diesel sucking German saloon for a few grand second hand and drive cross country for reasonable money and unlimited range as long as they can afford to refill the tank. EVs are many many years from getting this kind of buyer to cross over. And much as we may not like it, this kind of buyer is very very normal.

    Yeah, agreed, and that's a problem for government to solve. It looks to me like it will be tackled by making this kind of choice a very expensive one. A carrot and stick approach looks like the best one. Unfortunately our government is populated by Danny Healy Rae and his ilk. They will make sure that their diesel selling business is protected to the last, not giving a tinker's curse about the country as a whole.


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  • Moderators, Home & Garden Moderators Posts: 6,121 Mod ✭✭✭✭graememk


    For the record I drive a PHEV that runs on a squirt of petrol, I fill the tank (32L) roughly once a month. An 80km range Leaf or 500+km range modern EV would require me parking overnight at least on occasion at the nearest public charging point some 2km from my home. Who wants to do that?

    I'll only comment on this as the rest have the rest covered?

    So you have a PHEV, but don't(can't?) plug it in.

    you'd use even less with a straight petrol engine.. or a petrol hybrid(non plug in kind)

    Save lugging around a nearly dead battery all the time.

    If you only have to fill up with 32L once a month, (avg petrol consumption, 7L/100km?) - 450km in a month?

    So Say we in 10 years time have fast chargers all over the place, at the local shops, petrol station, anywhere that you could be parked for an hour or so.

    Take the corsa e its in around 26-27k brand new currently.

    Got a range of say 300km in normal driving conditions. means that It only needs a top up say twice a month. Fair?

    Im not chatting now, As yep it doesnt suit you right now, wouldnt advise you to switch now. maybe in 10 years when the ban on new ice cars come in, maybe 20 years when the new ice cars sold in 10 years time start to come to the end of their life.

    Also drive a kia.. and im a long way away from a managerial or executive salary. - done 22k km since march. only cost me €300 in electricity


  • Posts: 31,118 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    MJohnston wrote: »
    As an aside, I do wonder whether in a few years, we'll have realised that cases of Covid spiked this winter because of all the smokey fuels that people burn in their homes.
    Nothing to do with smokey fuels, it is really down to owners of many older houses having "improved" the draught protection on the windows, thus resulting with poorly ventilated houses that allow stale (possibly virus infused) air to remain inside for far longer.
    In a house with an open fire the chimney would draw this air out whenever the fire is lit, so the exact opposite of what you say is true.
    Many modern houses are designed to have the correct ventilation.


    EV's wont solve any of these issues....


  • Registered Users Posts: 21,990 ✭✭✭✭ELM327


    OK, but EVs don't actually solve the problem, not properly. We can have all the best intentions in the world but demand for transport from what I can see will always outstrip what EVs can deliver.

    They're mostly beloved by 1st world, relatively wealthy countries in any case and I hate to be blunt but, even if we all magically switched to EVs in the morning, it fixes nothing, we're not the problem, in fact we create a bigger problem environmentallly: the things are expensive as they are, to push the prices down there is no way they can be manufactured in Europe, so we push production to China, India etc to fulfill our increased consumption, but those guys aren't buying EVs and those production facilities are run on...dirty dirty coal.
    ROTFL.


    You havent a clue mate.


    https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/03/chart-of-the-day-half-of-new-cars-sold-in-norway-are-electric-or-hybrid/


    Think of how many cars are sold in China and 5% are already EVs - in March 2019. Before Chinese model 3.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,138 ✭✭✭innrain


    Looks like hydrogen might have gotten a lifeline

    https://www.electrive.com/2021/02/02/fraunhofer-develops-hydrogen-storage-paste/

    Very early days yet, might not see this in production for 10 years and it's cost effectiveness is unknown at this point

    Has all the ingredients to be very useful though, could be the boost that hydrogen needs to become viable


    It seems it is not very very new. Even wikipedia speculates about that.

    It is interesting that the original press release says that it hints to use in light devices like scooter and drones.

    About the method of making it I hope it stores a lot of energy because it definitely uses a lot "Magnesium powder is combined with hydrogen to form magnesium hydride in a process conducted at 350 °C and five to six times atmospheric pressure" That is very power hungry. It actually reminds me of the Haber-Bosch process, process used to store H2 for other purposes. i.e agri or explosives. And that raises a lot of questions because it does not change how the H2 is produced but just how it is stored. In fact a major problem how to produce it. And just to think ahead to scaling, the Haber Bosch process is around for the last 100 years and technology didn't find anything economically viable to replace it. And while the figures are debated this process alone generates globally around 1% of the CO2. Do we really want to add another global process like that?


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    graememk wrote: »
    I'll only comment on this as the rest have the rest covered?

    So you have a PHEV, but don't(can't?) plug it in.

    you'd use even less with a straight petrol engine.. or a petrol hybrid(non plug in kind)

    Save lugging around a nearly dead battery all the time.

    If you only have to fill up with 32L once a month, (avg petrol consumption, 7L/100km?) - 450km in a month?

    So Say we in 10 years time have fast chargers all over the place, at the local shops, petrol station, anywhere that you could be parked for an hour or so.

    Take the corsa e its in around 26-27k brand new currently.

    Got a range of say 300km in normal driving conditions. means that It only needs a top up say twice a month. Fair?

    Im not chatting now, As yep it doesnt suit you right now, wouldnt advise you to switch now. maybe in 10 years when the ban on new ice cars come in, maybe 20 years when the new ice cars sold in 10 years time start to come to the end of their life.

    Also drive a kia.. and im a long way away from a managerial or executive salary. - done 22k km since march. only cost me €300 in electricity

    Sorry maybe I have the terminology confused but I have a Toyota hybrid that you fill with petrol and it runs an electric motor off that at lowish speeds (will actually work up to about 100km/h) like a mini generator, no plug in required as that wouldn't work for me. I'm not against EVs per se. I just think there's a fair way to go for them to actually replace ICE's and I'm not convinced they will be the winning formula to get the job done.


  • Registered Users Posts: 15,546 ✭✭✭✭AndyBoBandy


    Sorry maybe I have the terminology confused but I have a Toyota hybrid that you fill with petrol and it runs an electric motor off that at lowish speeds (will actually work up to about 100km/h) like a mini generator, no plug in required as that wouldn't work for me. I'm not against EVs per se. I just think there's a fair way to go for them to actually replace ICE's and I'm not convinced they will be the winning formula to get the job done.


    So 100% of the energy created in your car comes from burning petrol.

    Yes, these car's regen to put charge back in the battery, but they can't regen if they don't burn petrol to get moving in the first place

    :rolleyes:


  • Moderators, Home & Garden Moderators Posts: 6,121 Mod ✭✭✭✭graememk


    Sorry maybe I have the terminology confused but I have a Toyota hybrid that you fill with petrol and it runs an electric motor off that at lowish speeds (will actually work up to about 100km/h) like a mini generator, no plug in required as that wouldn't work for me. I'm not against EVs per se. I just think there's a fair way to go for them to actually replace ICE's and I'm not convinced they will be the winning formula to get the job done.

    Yeah a phev is a plug in hybrid, has a small battery, usually can do 50 km on electric only.

    Then has the petrol for anything beyond that.

    Just don't fool yourself, the hybrid you have is great for city driving, stop start driving - just goes to show how much is wasted in idling cars in traffic, you said it yourself, it sips petrol.

    The "self charging" hybrids is better than nothing for air quality. - it's the direct fumes that is causing us harm.

    but on long journeys, it's no difference (cost/efficiency) to a standard petrol.

    Nobody is making you switch, for at least say 20 years?

    Think of the difference between cars now and 20 years ago. My sister is changing the golf she drives that is 21 yrs old, it's finally reached the end of its life. Too many things to fix to keep it on the road. Grandfather bought it new, it doesn't even have electric windows!


  • Registered Users Posts: 21,990 ✭✭✭✭ELM327


    @Andy - No, they are self charging!!

    (lol)


  • Registered Users Posts: 10,658 ✭✭✭✭MJohnston


    DrPhilG wrote: »
    I doubt it. California is one of the greenest states in the US and they just got absolutely pumped by Covid through the winter season.

    Green for the US is a low, low bar. Their cities have absolutely awful AQI, even in winter.
    Nothing to do with smokey fuels, it is really down to owners of many older houses having "improved" the draught protection on the windows, thus resulting with poorly ventilated houses that allow stale (possibly virus infused) air to remain inside for far longer.
    In a house with an open fire the chimney would draw this air out whenever the fire is lit, so the exact opposite of what you say is true.
    Many modern houses are designed to have the correct ventilation.


    EV's wont solve any of these issues....

    I think it's overly presumptuous to say that it's "Nothing to do with smokey fuels" - there are obviously a lot of overlapping problems that led to the winter surge, but AQI is tightly associated with Covid. There are some studies on this connection already:
    https://www.escardio.org/The-ESC/Press-Office/Press-releases/study-estimates-exposure-to-air-pollution-increases-covid-19-deaths-by-15-world

    EVs won't solve all air pollution, but they will hopefully lead to big reductions in long-term localised air pollution exposure.


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  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,075 ✭✭✭smellyoldboot


    So 100% of the energy created in your car comes from burning petrol.

    Yes, these car's regen to put charge back in the battery, but they can't regen if they don't burn petrol to get moving in the first place

    :rolleyes:

    Yes, but it uses a lot less petrol, and being completely honest here, the environment wasn't exactly to the forefront of my mind. I could buy the car for the same money as a similar spec regular petrol and it's cheaper to run. You'll find that's what most motorists care about most.

    Worrying about the effects on the environment even 50 years down the line goes over peoples heads. Paying more for an EV now and explaining there is a fuel cost saving payback period of say 5 years if you do X mileage per year goes over peoples heads.

    Put the savings in people's pockets from Day 1 and you will get mass buy in to EVs even in plenty of cases where they're not an ideal fit. You'll get the environmental benefits then, but only by appealling to base instincts first. Principles are useful for those who can afford them.


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