Safe Speed Forums

Some initial and not very surprising output from this EV trial here:

http://www.arup.com/News/2010_06_June/1 ... dings.aspx

Another "trial" by a self-select group. It is almost certain that they are not typical of the general population and thus the results have little meaning. It is the envelope of performance that is interesting not the average.

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The only thing that should be prohibited is prohibition.

The current edition of Engineering and Technology (the IEE magazine) has a much more realistic look at the prospects for electric cars - and it isn't too optimistic.
http://kn.theiet.org/magazine/issues/1009/battery-cars-1009.cfm

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

i'm inclined to disagree it's easy for me to beleive that alot of people fit 'average' or less demanding profile. i'm probably a bit over but a large majority of work colleagues fit the bill, average daily commute <30miles, car spends 90% of time parked at work or home, other trips typically <10miles.
Therefore the stats given are plausibly typical of a large part of the population, not of myself perhaps and not of a majority of SS users perhaps.

if the distribution is normal then EVs are suitable for 50% of vehicle users for the majority of the time, and if the target is a reduction in carbon emissions, 50% is a big potential impact.

this is an output from a short period of a tiny proportion of a fairly small trial, i for one will be interested to see the output from other vehicles in the trial over a longer term.

Hmmmm. 23 miles a day, 365 days a year is only 8-and-a-bit thousand miles a year. I thought the "average" annual mileage was between 10,000 and 12,000?

But even if you only do a 50+ mile trip once a month, you will need a different vehicle to do it in, with all the additional cost and hassle.

People tend to buy a car for the biggest potential task, in terms of distance and/or passenger numbers, they will ever over the course of a typical year need it for.

Also the taxation and insurance system make it very expensive to own multiple vehicles for different tasks.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

If you only do one 50+ trip a month it would probably be economical enough to hire a vehicle for that trip. In fact, if you want to encourage people to drive electrical vehicles one of the incentives might be the occasional discounted car hire.

[/quote]People tend to buy a car for the biggest potential task, in terms of distance and/or passenger numbers, they will ever over the course of a typical year need it for. [/quote]

Not entirely true or we would all be driving large vans for the twice in a lifetime house moves.

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

yes i know.... i'm frustrated by the same problem already, having to own a big lump for relatively occasional motorway cruising but having to incur wear & tear & running costs just for 20miles each way to work.
i did the maths on alternatives, smaller cars & hiring for weekends etc but the numbers don't yet add up.

no reason not to keep looking at the options and challenging the obstacles imho.

I did say "typical year", not "typical life".

If, during the course of a typical year, you had to shift a lot of stuff, even just once or twice, you might well consider getting a large estate or people carrier.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

Fair enought. But it doesn't negate my substantive point about supplementing electrical vehicles with the occasional hire.

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

Hence my suggestion that anew electrical car should come with car hire vouchers. Unfortunately that would "send the wrong message"

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

We've got three vehicles in our household of which two could definitely not be replaced by electric cars.

The third - Mrs Theboy's MX-5 - could arguably be replaced by one, but we live out in the sticks. I can't honestly see her confidently setting off on her 20 mile commute in the winter weather we had this year.

So presumably we'd have to hire a car at the precise moment everyone else wanted one, and keep hiring it for a month or so?

As always the obvious points are left out. Although the car produces no emissions, the power plant that produced the electricity to charge the car produced bucket loads (we still have lots of coke burning power plants in this country).

It is extremely inefficient to transmit electricity from point of generation to the end user, there is a complicated set of equations to calculate elctricity transmission losses.

The batteries in the car will have to be replaced, I suspect an average useful lifespan for a battery to be around 5 years, so then there is the environmental impact of disposing of something that can hardly be considered environmentally friendly.

There are countless other downsides to using an electric vehicle. I accept that our over-dependance on fossil fuels is unsustainable, but lets not forget, without fossil fuels we would not have electricity. My opinion is that we still haven't found the answer to the problem, although hydrogen fuel cell cars are a step in the correct direction.

This assumes that power generation is zero carbon, which it isn't. Oil-powered cars are a much more efficient method of converting oil to energy than oil/coal/gas-fired power stations powering electric cars would be.

As it is, we're looking at power cuts in not many years due to successive governments - but particularly the last one - failing to provide new power stations. If there's a modal shift of that magnitude to EVs then the network will be utterly unable to cope. So not only would the lights go out, but up to 50% of the driving population would be unable to travel.

ETA: Odin appears to have beaten me to it...

yup jtb & odin..... all the above are other obstacles.. all of which are also being investigated and challenged in parallel.

yup, also an interesting article (didn't know it was available in electronic copy too) also containing some interesting 'average' vehicle use stats:

Unless it has been forgotten, the power industry was sold by the last conservative government.
Any attempt to build new ones has been met by very large and successful planning enquiry hold-ups.
Building a new nuclear station would take a few years, the planning, with its intentional hold-ups, will take 20 years.
New coal stations will cost several fortunes in carbon taxes.
So, no coal and no nuclear.
The intention to reduce pollution from vehicles in town has led to the highly-clean vehicles we now have, but not clean enough.
Soon, if you do not drive electric (and not hybrid) you will NOT be driving in any large town at all. I give it 10-20 years at most, and during that time the manufacturers will have to construct even cleaner vehicles.

http://www.london.gov.uk/media/press_releases_mayoral/plans-announced-tackle-pollution-londons-dirtiest-roads

And that is only the start.

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The world runs on oil, period. No other substance can compete when it comes to energy density, flexibility, ease of handling, ease of transportation. If oil didn’t exist we would have to invent it.”

56 years after it was decided it was needed, the Bedford Bypass is nearing completion. The last single carriageway length of it.We have the most photogenic mayor though, always being photographed doing nothing

Not [extremely inefficient - losses of about 6%

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

Just a thought: if in a few years the electricity network is only going to be running at full pelt when the wind's blowing, that's the only time all the EV owners will be able to charge their cars up.

So why not cut to the chase and just drive sail cars?

JTB-could be you're on the right tack there ,so instead of straightening out roads ,there'll be a need to build them with bends ,so that sail cars can beat into the wind .( oops have i started a punfeist )

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lets bring sanity back to speed limits.
Drivers are like donkeys -they respond best to a carrot, not a stick .Road safety experts are like Asses - best kept covered up ,or sat on