Is electric really the answer?

[ChrisJ]

Been in the US for a week, seen less than 10 EVs in total in 6 states so far.

[exeterjeep]

HiPhi files for bankruptcy in China

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/business-electric-vehicles/hiphi-files-bankruptcy-china?fbclid=IwY2xjawEjMttleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHa-544EEn0qkm0RyZLlcJZAzP-QYs-LH2zy83BEAZujPrFwllWo_G4BlWw_aem_lj0bOhtDfRKq5crxiLshqw

The move, made official by the Yancheng’s Economic and Technological Development Zone court on Thursday, officially ends the seven-year-old company’s desperate bid to attract investment required to restart production of the HiPhi X, Z and Y.

[pete]

[Kimbers]

Loving this. the start of the tax regime! having been on HMRC advisory groups I knew how they think.

Their losses on EV Tax (RFL) have been huge and as such they have introduced a new Tax on EV's of £10 a year.

Ahhhh, I hear you say, thats not a lot! 

Rising to £190 in the second year  Way to go to make EV's even less affordable!

Fleets fear impact of planned electric vehicle tax hike (fleetnews.co.uk)

[Bibs]

They make £850 per household in fuel duty a year, they'll need to make that back or they'll just tax us more elsewhere. Income from this tax alone is around £25-28bn a year, 2.2% of all taxes raised from us. 

https://obr.uk/forecasts-in-depth/tax-by-tax-spend-by-spend/fuel-duties/

[Kimbers]

And I've seen the white paper where they will introduce an electricity tax for any car chargers at home, that has been proposed at the same tax rate as Petrol. 

That's currently 52.95p a litre. Not too bad I hear you say? Well its about 33% of the price s imagine adding 33% to your car charging price.....THEN add 20% VAT as that will be chargeable for Electricity used as a fuel rather than for home use!

Now are you getting the idea why they are forcing you into EV's?

But how do they separate home EV charging from home use. Well, Duel phase electricity can be isolated on fuel bills by the Electricity companies and they have been encouraging car makers and even house builders to fit dual phase chargers for free. It's one of the reasons the govt have asked car makers to stop supplying 3din plug chargers as that wouldn't be taxed.

Conspiracy? nope, reality. Welcome to a greener future! EV's will actually cost more to run than Petrol cars AND more tax income for the Govts.

[Bibs]

I pay 7p/kwh at the moment for overnight charging, I doubt adding 50% to that will change my world. That said, they're a bit stuffed by those with solar and home batteries, they will get zero income from them for charging which kinda makes it a bad idea. The only way they can charge everyone like they did with fuel duty is road charging really. 

[Kimbers]

So add a third again, lets say 10p/kwh then you add the VAT on the duty as well as the price 12p Kwh.

If I fill up at a supermarket the equiv price of my fuel equates to 9p kwh on an EV. So its going to be more expensive than petrol.

[pete]

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/south-korea-holds-emergency-meeting-ev-fires-stir-consumer-fear-2024-08-12/

Wonder if EVs will have time park away from other cars 

[C8RKH]

On 13/08/2024 at 12:37, Kimbers said:

So add a third again, lets say 10p/kwh then you add the VAT on the duty as well as the price 12p Kwh.

If I fill up at a supermarket the equiv price of my fuel equates to 9p kwh on an EV. So its going to be more expensive than petrol.

Either people are not doing the math, or don't understand the math, or are just not interested as they don't think it will hurt them.

Anyone who doesn't think a rebalancin g on costs is on the cards is just putting their heads into a bucket of sand.

New taxes. Rising taxes. Car geofencing. Remote car monitoring (speed, time, locations etc). This is the real future of EV's and driving giving Governments an in-depth insight into your activities, an enhanced ability to control and monitor your movements, and of course, raise additional taxes from you. It's coming, much of the legislation is already in place, it just needs the tech to reliably catch up.

[Kimbers]

Absolutely Andy. 

If I had a couple of warehouses and a few million £'s I would be buying nearly new cars like our Sportage hybrids and ICE models, plus real Sportscars (not EV ones) that go Brrrrrrmmmmm and fill up my ware houses with them. In 20 years time people will be desperate to buy something non monitored and that drives like a normal car.

[Kimbers]

Leasing companies have announced Lease and Rental rates for EV's must see a substantial rise to cover the losses they are experiencing. No matter what the car costs up front (it could be cheaper than an ICE car) it will be substantially more expensive to contract Hire, Lease or Rent in future. Further driving down demand and therefore pushing residuals even lower.

One of the Largest Leasing companies in the UK has stated that unless the Govt removes the EV Targets from the Car industry they will walk away from all EV's and refuse to fund them.

Rental rises for fleets as leasing losses mount on used EVs (fleetnews.co.uk)

[Royal]

Anybody caught the news from Samsung on their advance with EV batteries? 

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

Nope.

[C8RKH]

Was more interested in this to be honest. Looks bloomin' great!

Hyundai's N Vision 74 Hydrogen car....  

5 minute for a full recharge.

380 mile range.

670bhp.

664Ib of instant torque.

Torque vectoring on rear wheels.

I'm in lust.

[Royal]

Samsung has announced a significant breakthrough in (EV) battery technology, introducing solid-state batteries that could be a revolution. A range of 600 miles on a single charge with the capability to recharge in 9 minutes. The batteries are smaller, lighter and safer than the lithium-ion batteries currently used in most EV's. They boast an energy density of 500Wh/kg, nearly double that  of mainstream EV batteries.

This info came from a video on YT which talks about precious metals such as silver and gold. I stack both these metals

The connection to EV's is that Samsung will be putting silver into these new batteries, thus driving the price of silver upwards.

 

 

[JimmytheTurbo]

I see Labour are looking at adding an extra 10p per litre tax on fuel.

Just to help us ease into EVs no doubt.

[C8RKH]

4 hours ago, Royal said:

Samsung has announced a significant breakthrough in (EV) battery technology, introducing solid-state batteries that could be a revolution. A range of 600 miles on a single charge with the capability to recharge in 9 minutes. The batteries are smaller, lighter and safer than the lithium-ion batteries currently used in most EV's. They boast an energy density of 500Wh/kg, nearly double that  of mainstream EV batteries.

This info came from a video on YT which talks about precious metals such as silver and gold. I stack both these metals

The connection to EV's is that Samsung will be putting silver into these new batteries, thus driving the price of silver upwards.

 

 

It's years away from going into production. It's like the weekly pronouncements we get on water engines, hydrogen, etc etc. Totally unproven at scale. To think, I was being told on here just 3 years ago that Graphene batteries were going to do all that an more. Anyone heard much about these graphene batteries recently.

Not saying it is not exciting. It might even be a game changer. Just pointing out it is years away from being a reality.

[Royal]

@C8RKH "Just pointing out it is years away from being a reality".

Music to my ears.

[Kimbers]

And Geely have announced dropping their policy on going EV by 2030! Volvo in particular are looking more at the PHEV market.

Now I have seen the figures and consider that the target set by the Govt in the UK is 22% of sold cars this year rising to 30% next, also consider that for every ICE car sold, if they don't hit the 22%, they get fined £15,000. Some would say totally unworkable and based on some of the figures I concur. 

Ford: 4%
Stellantis Group: 16%
Suzuki: 0%
VW: 12%
Toyota: 10%
Mazda: 5%
Renault: 8%

Based on these figures the highest "Misser" of the target, Stellantis, based on numbers sold of ICE cars they had sold, will get a fine of £3.14 billion. That's just for UK sales nothing to do with Europe. Ford could be 5 times that. Someone mentioned that they can buy EV credits from EV manufacturers for a minimal fee (unknown) but take into account that if you buy 100% of all the number of EV's sold in the UK as credits, it doesn't even cover Stellantis's shortfall.

So what will happen? Personally I think these fines will do one of 2 things, push manufacturers out of the UK. Suzuki have already said they will withdraw if it doesn't change, or Manufacturers will simply refuse to pay them, hire some lawyers and take the UK to court for human rights/freedom of choice/anti competition/non democratic laws........ thats another point, is their law on this target even watertight?

It goes to show you can't force the public into something they don't want! Look at the rise of the Motorist Alliance in Europe who won seats (called far right by the BBC by the way). I see a backlash coming!

[C8RKH]

3 hours ago, Kimbers said:

Someone mentioned that they can buy EV credits from EV manufacturers for a minimal fee (unknown) but take into account that if you buy 100% of all the number of EV's sold in the UK as credits, it doesn't even cover Stellantis's shortfall.

You can, but the fee is not "nominal" as it is a free market and each party can negotiate as they wish.

Tesla will be the winner as they are 100% EV so essentially have 78% of UK sales numbers to sell. But even though 1 in 5 of electric car on the road in the UK is a Tesla, they will only sell around 50,000 cars in the UK this year, so that is a drop in the ocean re "tokens". But 50,000 * 0.78 * 5,000 = £195m of extra cash (profit) for doing naff all really. Not a bad bit of business.

[Kimbers]

If anyone bothers. That will only help maybe one manufacturer. Someone like Ford/Toyota will need to buy 3-4 times that amount to even get close!

Frankly I think it's more likely they will simply refuse to pay and say "Whatcha gonna do cause we will fight you through the courts if you try and impose this on us" and frankly, with most of the manufacturers employing thousands in the UK the Govt just can't afford for them to drop out of the market! Toyota alone employs 3800 staff in the factories and another 1000 in admin and management etc of Toyota UK, not to mention the thousands at dealerships and thousands in parts and associated industries!

[C8RKH]

I agree @Kimbers. I was in no way trying to defend the position.

The Government have got the whole "transition" to electric wrong in my opinion. They have completely fukced it up.

By subsidising manufacturers and company directors, what we have is 2.5 ton leviathans of premium luxo barges with 600bhp+, costing £100k+, on the road. Great for the Company Directors as they just switch it from the tax to pay account to the "fun" account at no real loss to themselves, and they think it makes them look like uber successful swinging dicks for having such a vehicle. Great for the manufacturers as the profit per car is through the roof. Absolutely shit deal for the country and the average Joe tax payer.

The mass public were offered EV versions of existing cars at a 28-47% premium over the same ICE vehicle. So rightly the majority of them said fukc off you're having a life and just didn't buy them in numbers.

In 2010 there were 30m ICE cars on the road. 14 years later we have 33m ICE cars on the road, and 1.2m EVs. So despite all the bollocks and publicity and the stupid stats (a big percentage of a small number is only still a small number after all) we've sold double the number of "net new" ICE cars to EV's in that 14 year period. Ergo, the policies were crap and just did not work.

In the same period, the number of Hybrids has grown to be roughly 1.5 to 2x the number of BEVs.

Scrapping ICE is not the answer. Investing in a safe, secure, resilient, convenient, affordable, EV charging network, nationally, is. By making it cheaper, and more convenient, to charge your EV consumers will overcome one of the their main hurdles to switch, range anxiety. By keeping ZEV, it will force manufacturers to build more affordable EVs that the masses can afford. Those two things will drive the switch.

Already, I am seeing reports that homes for sale, that are conveniently located near to "fast" public charging points, are seeing a premium on their asking prices, as not everyone can have, or wants, a home charging station for various reasons.

If you live in a town or city, a cheaper EV, that is quick and cheap to charge, will soon win over many as they realise that actually, for 98% of their journeys range will never be an issue.

[Kimbers]

But I still think PHEV is the best way to go.

The new Tiguan PHEV (we have some on order) have an Electric Range of 76 miles. That's so much further than any PHEV at present. It takes 12 hours to charge on a trickle charger 3 din plug so can be charged at home for cheap running costs. Like you say, if the majority of City driving can be done by an EV then surely a PHEV with longer range BUT when the need comes to do 400 miles in one go you can swap it to Petrol, surely seems like an even better prospect?!

[C8RKH]

Cannot fault your logic @Kimbers. Just to say that most town/city people probably do less than a 100 miles a week, so an EV could cost them practically nothing to run. They could just hire a bigger car for when they needed the longer runs and space and they'd probably be laughing all the way to the bank.