ULEZ

That's from Tesla though... I was looking at a US EV owners forum the other week and there were a number of owners who had a different opinion.

 

Sure they could lie, but then they'd be taken for billions in a US class action suit. So, my money is not on anecdotal evidence but serious studies of thousands of vehicles.

 

Big companies lie on a regular basis, I'm sure their lawyers will have worked it out that the figures they give are not a guarantee.. you only need to look at the MPG figures they put out, or the number of manufacturers caught in the emissions scandal.

 

Well sure, look at all the manufacturers who lied about diesel performance.

 

If those figures are proven right in general practice, I can’t see a problem.
Based on my annual mileage and age I’ll be ok until I’m 138

 

That data - https://electrek.co/2020/06/06/tesla-battery-degradation-replacement/

 

I've no axe to grind in this discussion, purely repeating what disappointed buyers are saying... but interestingly perhaps the video is dated 2020 and the vehicle in question had new batteries in 2018. Obviously they could be just over 12 months old, or just under 24 months old, but what I would say is this incredible mileage, 400,000 in that period slot, is between 550 miles and 1100 miles per day... every day.. seven days a week, taking charging time into account I would think this may not be normal use by an actual owner. It sounds more like a team of company employees doing the driving.

Others are suggesting Electrek perhaps might not be the honest broker they purport to be.

As you say "that data"...

"Since the site’s founding in 2012, Electrek’s relentless commitment to forwarding the rosy Tesla narrative has made it a favored conduit for positive Tesla leaks, a regular feature in Musk’s influential Twitter feed, and created a large, fast-growing and fervently pro-Tesla readership."

https://www.thedrive.com/tech/21838/the-truth-behind-electreks-dark-alliance-with-tesla

 

That was exactly the point I was making... they are prepared to lie.

 

Yes, agreed. But just dont buy new cars. Keep your old one.

Keep your old dogshit vehicle because it's not 1985 and cars functionally last 20 years minimum now. Wild thought, but we could have 5 years of zero emissions from the car production industry if people just had a short hiatus from upgrading. You can't tell me for a minute thats better than the alternative fractional drop in emissions from Darren driving a 2023 BMW 3 series instead of a 2018 one.

 

I don't think I agree with point A (Petrol cars are less polluting than electric) - the tech is evolving and something akin to Moore's Law is likely to happen to the cost of batteries.

Point B however, I can get behind. Although it would be hard to enforce - maybe some kind of environmental stamp duty on cars unless it's been at least five years, or including exceptions like a baby or an insurance write-off that wasn't your fault.

Point C - the Civic isn't small. A Jazz is small.

 

Only if Grant Schapps makes him.

 

Ceasing car production would be an economic disaster. 90% are shipped abroad. If this nation really cared about emissions, it would half it’s meat production & consumption. The impact of which equates to removing 8 million cars from the UK’s roads.

 

I drive a Dacia Logon. The least noticeable car in the car park. Massive boot, that you can hide a full PA in. 900 cc engine , with a turbo. £20 a year road tax. Not a chick magnet,,, That is the future of rock & roll.

 

Can’t your personal assistant sit in the front?

 

My personal assistant is a cockerpoo, called Jess. The other dogs sit in the boot.

 

Come on ULEZ!

 

For an internal Combustion car, 10% of it's emissions are generated during it's production and 5% during disposal , thus 85% during use.
Comparative figures for EVs isn't known yet, very few have reached the end of their operational lives other than through collisions.

For an electric car, the average CO2 during production is 8.8 tonnes against 5.6 tonnes for ICE cars. So yes they cost more in CO2 terms to make but not massively so considering their almost zero output during use. The average operational live of EV's is going to be shorter though, not because they wear out faster but because insurance companies are writing them off after very minor damage because of the uncertainty about battery damage. Lithium batteries are a severe fire risk.

All of this is very interesting (fascinating for a geek like me) but the only real solution to CO2 reduction is less use of private cars. This would be a good thing for all sorts of reasons; noise, brake dust, safety (quieter roads produce fewer accidents) etc etc. How many times have you had your day spoilt simply by the problem of finding somewhere to park or sitting in a queue after an accident on the motorway?

Prioritising public transport would be a good start - particularly the railways - along with promoting working from home where feasible. HS2 should never have started, the vast sums of cash spent on it (to benefit who exactly?) should have been spent on the whole railway network. If that had happened we would be back to having the best and most efficient railway in Europe (possibly the world).

Hope this helps.

 

Problem is this Tory pile of ***** don't give a damn, Shorting the pound over Brexit to make Rees Mogg money & driving the nhs & social care into the ground. Not exited by Starmer, but please, please, please let's try something else. I'd like proportional representation personally, but for once in my life...

 

If I've done my maths right then a family member of mine drives an 11 year old car that is in perfect working order and looks brand new to be honest. It emits 110 grams of co2 per kilometre according to the government checker I just looked at. To replace it would be on average 5.6 tonnes of co2 for an ice car and 8.8 tonnes of co2 for an electric one. So that means they will have to do an extra 51,000 kilometres before they produce enough emissions to equal what it will take just to build the replacement ice car or a massive 80,000 kilometres before it produces as much emissions as a replacement electric car will take to make. Considering they've only done 70,000 miles in those 11 years so again if my maths are correct it will take almost 8 years of use before an electric car will break even for them.

With that in mind how can it be better for the environment to dispose of something and replace it at this point? I think that the low emission zones are flawed for that reason because all it does is forces people to dispose of their vehicles and replace them with a new one (even if they buy a second hand one it forces someone up the chain to replace with new) that damages the environment.

I think it would be far more beneficial to simply outright ban the sale of any that does more than say 90mph (or ban their use on the road) and ban the sale of any ca with more than a 2litre engine as that level of power is simply not needed, sure it's fun to be able to do 0-60 in 4 seconds but it's not needed at all and it does far more damage to the environment (and life) than Mavis (hi Jamdrop) keeping her 1.3 fiesta for an extra 5 years.

Also completely agree with you regarding public transport but I think the focus should be on better bus services. It's absolutely criminal that it would take me 2 hours to get to work by bus but 15 minutes in a car. But it's always been like this anywhere outside of London.

 

You're not kidding that you're knowledge is limited. Sorry, but you've been reading far too many anti EV FUD stories in the mainstream media.

Every single EV manufacturer provides a warranty on the battery that lasts a minimum of 7 years. Some are 8, some are 10. That warranty does not relate to the battery being dead. It will be fixed if its state of health drops below 70% of what it was when it was new. Even at 70% state of health, it still has a useful life for years to come for users who don't need the range but the manufacturers would consider it to be not performing to expectations if it reaches that level in 7 years and fix it.

The reality though is that it will almost certainly not get close to reaching even that still very useable state within 7 years otherwise manufacturers would be spending millions replacing everyone's battery. The reality is that it will almost certainly outlive the car. There are thousands of examples of EVs being run as taxis with hundreds of thousands of miles on them.

Geez, the MSM media are doing a cracking good job spreading this drivel and getting people to swallow it.