When are you going fully electric?

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Remember there's loads of people who can't charge at home or at work. They're going to have to rock up to the petrol station and join the queue of cars spending 30 mins each, instead of the current ~3 mins each. They're going to need 10x as many chargers as there currently are petrol pumps just to get the same number of customers through, which there isn't room for, and cars would still be queued out the door and down the street.

They wont because as is already happening the amount of chargers in places like supermarkets is going up. If the public genuinely insist on filling up like for petrol then this will be an even higher amount
Think about it, the vast vast vast majority of places you an park a car could be relatively simply made a charging point.

Why would you want to go and just fill up, when most of teh time your using your car you could go and charge where you are going. Gyms, supermarkets, out of town shopping centres etc etc etc are going to be covered in charging in the future.
Honestly we are going to get to the point when kids will laugh "do you remember when dad had to go to a fuel station, just to fill up, what a waste of time that was, grandad always said it took 5 minutes in his day but often it took 15 because people went to shop as well and blocked the pumps whilst deciding which ready meal to buy, doh!"

 

[Randomface74]

I think it's unrealistic to expect so many different types of businesses and locations to collectively replace the UK's fuelling infrastructure.

I think a charging infrastructure will only be delivered when the businesses responsible for the existing infrastructure (petrol stations) are the ones doing it. They'll only do it when they can do it on their existing premises. That's only practical when the fuelling rate is sufficiently fast that you fill a car in roughly the same time you can now. And unless there's some sort of battery miracle, I think the only way of doing that is hydrogen.

 

[b0rn2sk8]

Billy you completely underestimate the lengths companies will go to make money.

Take a supermarket for instance, they want you in their shop, the longer they have you in their shop the more money you are likely to spend. That is a fact and it drives everything they do.

Why do you think supermarkets sell fuel, mobiles phones and insurance? They see an opportunity to bring in more customers or make money and they do it.

Take a hotel for instance, once they become mainstream people will just not go to hotels without chargers. Current EV owners often target hotels with chargers already and it’s only going to get bigger.

You also need to remember that these businesses will often not be the ones installing and maintaining the chargers. They’ll be renting their car park spaces to the charger provider and taking a cut. It’s actually an additional revenue stream for them and a complete no brainer for a lot of businesses.

It’s no different to car parks renting a part of their car park to the hand car wash franchises. The car park provider has no interest in operating a hand car wash but will happily take a cut from someone who does.

 

[Journey]

FFS!!! Stop using logic, just accept that there will never be enough chargers and we'll all be sat getting old waiting for cars to charge... Jebus.. I am totally sick of this use of 'logic'

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

I think it's unrealistic to expect so many different types of businesses and locations to collectively replace the UK's fuelling infrastructure.

I think a charging infrastructure will only be delivered when the businesses responsible for the existing infrastructure (petrol stations) are the ones doing it. They'll only do it when they can do it on their existing premises. That's only practical when the fuelling rate is sufficiently fast that you fill a car in roughly the same time you can now. And unless there's some sort of battery miracle, I think the only way of doing that is hydrogen.

And yet in the real world its actually happening. They are starting to appear in lots of places.

No need to think, open your eyes

 

[Randomface74]

Massive difference between there being some of them and it being enough to replace all fossil cars.

 

[Nasher]

There will never be enough unless they get charging time down to minutes. Which isn't going to happen without a massive breakthrough in battery technology (at which point all of the current EVs would be worthless). Also the local grid needs to be able to handle it without getting overloaded.

 

[jpaul]

would be interesting to know how much the ratio between public and home charging cost may change in the future,
to incorporate that in your ownership costs, for longer trips.
https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/en...ic-vehicle-charging-costs-differ-dramatically
they're showing like a ~5x ratio (7->40p unit) if you want 150KW charge rate, at which point you can be near petrol price per mile.
so how much profit are the charger folks making ? or... is the infrastructure genuinely expensive.

 

[Nasher]

Plus however much tax the government eventually slaps on top, to fill the hole left by less people buying petrol/diesel.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Massive difference between there being some of them and it being enough to replace all fossil cars.

Does everyone use an electric car? No
do we need enough now to supply as if everyone had an electric car? No
Did petrol stations immediately crop up to support millions of petrol cars within a couple of years of them being invented? No
Are petrol station numbers already dropping before we even think EV? Yes
Are the imitations to installing chargers into most locations way way easier than adding petrol station capacity? Yes
Are luddites going to struggle to adapt? yes as always
Will they have to adapt? Yep as much as they wont like it

Supply and demand, it will conquer all. Its all you need to realise.
Market economies are good at one thing, supplying to meet demand.
If demand is for more chargers, in more locations then thats what will happen.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

There will never be enough unless they get charging time down to minutes. Which isn't going to happen without a massive breakthrough in battery technology (at which point all of the current EVs would be worthless). Also the local grid needs to be able to handle it without getting overloaded.

There will easily be enough, it will be different thats all. You wont be limited to a few locations like you are with petrol stations, as said before just about any dedicated car parking spot can easily become a charging spot. Its really so simple its so hard to see how people don't get it.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

would be interesting to know how much the ratio between public and home charging cost may change in the future,
to incorporate that in your ownership costs, for longer trips.
https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/en...ic-vehicle-charging-costs-differ-dramatically
they're showing like a ~5x ratio (7->40p unit) if you want 150KW charge rate, at which point you can be near petrol price per mile.
so how much profit are the charger folks making ? or... is the infrastructure genuinely expensive.

Its difficult to tell, but with the massive increase in capacity plus more smart charging competition will likely keep it sane
Right now I am sure there is fairly high costs to get onto the map
I see it personally as going a bit like when cable was the massive roll out, lots of spend, loads of work, then competition forced most of them to sell up, which is pretty much where the virgin group came from, buying out most of the cable companies.

For sure though right now its a different position to what it will be in future. Only a tiny fraction of cars are electric right now, so efficiences of scale hardly apply to the companies. once its into the majority (or probably in advance of that) then it will change.

 

[Malevolence]

Local petrol station has put a couple of chargers in.

And I bet they still shout at you over the Tannoy for using your mobile on the forecourt.

 

[Nasher]

It might arc!

 

[McPhee]

so how much profit are the charger folks making ? or... is the infrastructure genuinely expensive.

The infrastructure is expensive for the current level of demand.

Rising range and demand for higher power (more expensive) chargers isn't helping on that front. A typical driver in a 50kWh EV is going to be less reliant on charging infrastructure than one in a 20kWh EV.

Ecotricity have previously stated that Electric Highway hasn't broken even yet. They installed their first charger nine years ago.

 

[b0rn2sk8]

It doesn’t help that people actively avoid ecotricity chargers though, they are pretty poor and unreliable compared to other networks.

 

[sovietspybob]

Yeah i don't think anyone should pay much attention to what ecotricity says, they're like the case study in how not to do it and annoy as many EV drivers as possible along the way.

 

[Journey]

Ecotricity have previously stated that Electric Highway hasn't broken even yet. They installed their first charger nine years ago.

Lets all hope for everyones sake Ecotricity go bust, and other companies take over the MSA areas. They only bothered with it due to getting big fat cash injections from Nissan, and don't really give two hoots about the network at all.

I think now that growth of BEV's is growing rapidly year-on-year the economies of scale will start to come into effect for both the actual chargers, and total installation cost with local infrastructure upgrades etc. If not we can all just wait on Tesla doing it right.

 

[jpaul]

so how much profit are the charger folks making ? or... is the infrastructure genuinely expensive.

one of articles I'd read on charger install costs https://evse.com.au/blog/evchargercost/
so thats about £50K per bay + £50k common electrical work for a 150KW ...
5 year lifespan say , so need to earn say £20k per charger a year £50/ day ... so if it was used 10 times a day £5 premium ..
and if you throw in property rent/maintenance ... probably double that ... so a £10 premium for a charge , so, could/should be maybe 3x home charging £5 cost.

 

[Journey]

5 year lifespan say

Lol.