Hydrogen!

[Phil Y]

Interesting stats Richard, I'm surprised that petrol ownership is so far ahead of diesel, I would have guessed it was nearer 50/50. No surprise London has lower car ownership, it is the only part of the country with decent public transport!

Much as I am not a fan of conventional fission nuclear power, I fear we may be forced to have more of it as a basic supply base. It is difficult to see how wind and solar will be able to cope with the growing demand as we turn to electric, even with storage. Wave and tidal have huge potential for the UK but there seems to be little interest from government level. Presumably because it would need some investment and longer term planning.

Rolls Royce seem keen on their "mini" reactors which could presumably be got online relatively quickly which would help, albeit with the same waste problems.

From the little reading/YouTube watching I have done, molten salt thorium reactors look like a much better solution for the longer term, nuclear without the dangerous waste or risks of explosion etc. Plenty of info out there if any of you have some time to kill

Phil.

[Chris]

One has to be careful regarding stats, less diesel cars, but I can guess they exceed the mileage of petrol cars, India and China will burn coal for the next 50 years to power future electric cars, it's a number game more cars being built every year.

Chris.

[Richard]

Hi all, yes all agreed.

We were door-knocked 10 years ago by a firm offering to install a charging point at a subsidised price, so this has been rumbling on for a good while now.

The surprising thing I take out of this article is that even now only 0.6% of cars (0.2M out of 32M) are battery electric

In our Tesco car park there are usually a couple of cars charging at the electric point and it would be easy to view it as a bright future. However, looking across the car park there are 2, 3, 4, maybe 500 cars, so statistically, (0.6%) those couple of electric cars are probably the only 2 in there

Maybe it’s chicken and egg, infrastructure before cars, or maybe electric cars will have to be half the price of petrol cars before they sell in volume given the risks and un-knowns for the buyers.

[Phil Y]

Several things concern me about battery cars, not least the fact that I am one of the 40% with no off road parking!
I've not seen any figures but surely the cost of covering the country in charging points will be huge, in copper alone. Plus all the digging and re-tarmacing. The country will be covered in road works for a decade. plus all the emissions caused by all the associated mining etc.
We also don't yet know how the batteries will last. There is a lot of people out there driving around in old but perfectly serviceable cars because that is all they can afford. What if the batteries are fairly knackered after say 70-80 thousand miles? With the cost of replacement, a car with a knackered battery will be basically worthless. So many unknowns. Last I heard there is still no way to recycle the lithium batteries so that is another potential problem.

Another more minor point, all the people currently getting cheap electric motoring shouldn't get too smug. The tax revenue from petrol/diesel is huge, the government of the day won't give up all that money willingly. You can be sure they are already planning how to tax electric cars once they become a significant part of the transport landscape.

Phil.

[Richard]

Yes Phil, the small uptake of electric vehicles and limited infrastructure looks like folk are holding back hoping something else will be found.

That brings us back to hydrogen. Here's a recent article with links which show some big manufacturers, Toyota, Bosch etc, and the government are putting money into it,

https://www.express.co.uk/life-style...yota-exclusive

[John Caswell]

If a car battery is going to last say 80,000 miles that, at current usage, is 20 years motoring for the lady wife and I. My vehicle manufacturers give an 8 year life on the battery.
OK I am fortunate to have off road/garage parking/charging.
We took on an electric car knowing full well that in the near future we will be paying some form of swingeing electric car tax, you don't get something for nothing. There is no such thing as a free lunch. There are no two things in life more certain than death and taxes (Oscar Wilde I think)
We have to do something about fossil fuel usage as it will run out and so this is my bit. Hydrogen is fine but they have been talking about it and fuel cells for at least 20 years. I come down firmly on the side of nuclear power and am convinced that the mini reactors a la Rolls Royce are the way to go to generate the amount of electricity we need. They must also be getting near succeeding with Nuclear Fusion, we shall see!
Well that's my four pennorth!

John

[Chris]

I can only see success coming from plubic transport, trams and trains, calling up a self drive car on your phone app..drops you off where you want to be and then off it goes to collect the next passenger, less cars parking up down the streets jamming up the road.

Chris.

[bob orbell]

I agree with John and Chris on this, John is thinking of today but Chris is thinking into the future and both make a very valid comment. Bob

[Richard]

Hmm, well don't take this as a vote for/against/or not a clue but I think we'll be hearing more tales like this one

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...y-Finland.html

[bob orbell]

It makes £1340.00 for my bicycle battery a bargain . Bob