The future with electric cars

Blimey, not sure I'd be quite so honest if I was selling them but I guess the earlier adopters have all been back into the garage moaning that their cars are broken. 

I'm not surprised about a range of c100 miles if the WLTP is around 130, especially at this time of year, but on the plus side it won't take long to charge up a battery that small.

I just stuck it through the salary sacrifice quote out of interest and see that you can get it with brown (or black) nappa leather so no need to cloth trim. Not cheap at £40k in the top spec level with leather and a couple of other things, but fairly cheap through a SS scheme.

Edit, it's got a smaller battery than the new PHEV Range Rover.  Only 32 Kwh usable, can't be many smaller, but as it's a city car, I can't see the point in carrying around more battery/weight than you'd need 99% of the time.

I thought it was well known that the Honda e was basically designed as a city car and therefore has a miserable range.
What happens if you have a storm (or flooding) and a power cut of a few days remains to be seen.......

If the black box thing happens, I can always run about in the 911. No tech on that at all!

This is what the MPs think about road pricing:


The government must overhaul motoring taxes as it phases out new diesel and petrol vehicles, according to MPs.
MPs on the Transport Committee say the government must come up with new policy options by the end of the year. A ban on the sale of new diesel and petrol vehicles will be introduced by 2030, which means £35 billion will be lost in tax revenue.
In a report entitled Road Pricing, the Committee favoured a road charging system based on technology which measures road use.
Any scheme would include the drivers of electric vehicles, who would be required to pay for road usage. It would also cover vans and HGV vehicles, as well as overseas vehicle drivers.
Huw Merriman MP, Chair of the Transport Committee, said:

'We need to talk about road pricing. Innovative technology could deliver a national road-pricing scheme which prices up a journey based on the amount of road, and type of vehicle, used. Just like our current motoring taxes but, by using price as a lever, we can offer better prices at less congested times and have technology compare these directly to public transport alternatives.

'By offering choice, we can deliver for the driver and for the environment. Road pricing should not cost motorists more, overall, or undermine progress on active travel. Work should begin without delay. The situation is urgent. New taxes, which rely on new technology, take years to introduce.

'A national scheme would avoid a confusing and potentially unfair and contradictory patchwork of local schemes but would be impossible to deliver if this patchwork becomes too vast. The countdown to net zero has begun. Net zero emissions should not mean zero tax revenue.'



Internet link: Parliament website

The problem for introducing any fundamental tax changes, of which road pricing is one, is that MPs are inherently keen on maintaining their income and lifestyle so anything which looks like a sure fire defeat at the next election is a bit of a tricky one. Imagine rural, conservative constituencies where there is one bus a day being told they’re now being charged by the mile when they’ve forgotten the Bisto and have to nip to the nearest convenience store on a Sunday, a 10 mile round trip.

The other issue with such systems is revenue collection and modelling. These technological solutions need to be paid for and maintained, so part of the road pricing is lost there. Then the initial model assumes pricing at peak hours at X price when suddenly everyone starts driving at cheaper times and the rates need to increase (like when fewer fines manifested when the C Charge was introduced in London). Collecting tax through the price of of liquid fuel is so simple that replacing it will only be an abject failure by comparison.

Definitely (b) for me - I'll get my mileage wound back before every MOT.

My mate, who is getting the iX, has just been quoted £1900 to put his home charger in. He's in a new build but his distribution board is about as far way from the garage where he parks his car as possible. They are going to have to dig an 18" deep trench across his front garden, round the side garden, under a path, to a new DB in the garage.

The easiest option would be to fit every electric vehicle with a coin slot. Put a pound coin in and you’d get 10 miles of motoring. Once a month a guy would come round with a key and empty the coin collection box for the Government. An additional bonus would be the extra jobs created.

I suppose the cash collectors would also drive electric vehicles and these would have a coin slot too. Obviously they wouldn’t be allowed a key to their own vehicle’s coin box so more jobs would be created by cash collectors emptying the coin boxes on the cars of the original coin collectors.

Sometimes I surprise myself with my genius.