What I don't get is how these millions of battery cars are going to be charged up. Currently there are about 30 million cars [inc. SUVs/ MPVs/ vans etc] operating in the UK. So how will they all get charged overnight? What percentage will even have access to home charging? Flats and apartments, terraced houses, conservation / listed property areas with no driveways / garages. Where do they recharge safely and securely?
Trailing leads from public lampposts etc or across pedestrian pavements will not be tolerated, let alone the Health & Safety issues.
Won't the thieves have a heyday with all these valuable charge leads being ripe for stealing. Not to mention the mindless vandals who will unplug the cars for "fun"? Apart from those tucked up in garages, which in reality is a very small percentage of the GB car population, some cars are now physically too big to get into a garage and have the space to plug it in. Let alone the 2, 3 or 4 car family. Will home chargers be capable of supplying multiple vehicles simultaneously?
Then there's the big car fleets including councils, car hire companies, police, ambulance depots etc. where they are group parked-up overnight.
I have two garden machines - one petrol powered and one lithium-Ion rechargeable. The latter is great until the charge expires, then there's a 30+ minute delay while it charges. The petrol one, takes a few minutes to fill up. Yes I have two garden machine batteries, one in use + one charging, but a BEV will not have two batteries to call on. I cannot see recharging stations having the huge batteries pre-fully charged in the correct format type ready to swap out, even if physically the vehicle battery could be quickly removed.
Not that I ever do, but people do run out of fuel and the nice AA / RAC man comes out and refuels them straight away. So when an EV runs out of charge on the road? will it need towing / recovering to the nearest hopefully 'in working order' / 'not already in use' chargepoint?
It's these practical issues of home and away BEV recharging for the masses that I cannot see being resolved. The theory is great, but what about the wholesale take-up of BEVs?
2018 MY Facelift Macan
Well, there's two issues here: power supply and where.
For power supply, I'm not sure that there is any problem. The average UK car mileage is 7900 (here's one reference https://www.nimblefins.co.uk/average-an ... ge-cars-uk -2015 but don't suppose it's changed much) or just over 20 miles/day. So on average this is going to take say 5kWh/night - assuming overnight charging. (Of course, lots of people won't charge up every night but the mean figure still holds as a benchmark for averaged demand.) So probably this is going to amount to one hour of charging per night for a typical home charger. (Intelligent/programmable chargers and/or differential pricing will help spread just when this hour falls in the night.)
Say there are 10 million such cars then the total demand is going to be 50GW over say a 10-hour overnight period, which is going to push up peak demand by 5GW/hour. But there's already something like a 15GW difference in UK demand between night and day (see eg http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/) so there should be plenty of generating capacity.
I think these calculations are in the right ballpark but feel free to point out any obvious errors.
Where they are going to charge is I agree more of an issue. For homeowners with a drive then there shouldn't be too much of a problem. And I'm sure that this will represent the vanguard of new EV owners. But for flat-dwellers and essentially anyone who has to park on the street then yes it is more of an unknown.
But at an average of 20 miles/day then EV's with a larger battery should last for eg at least a week and maybe 10-14 days. So once a lot more rapid chargers get built out able to say 80% recharge in 40-60 minutes then aren't supermarkets and the like (out of town cinemas, shopping centres, gyms & sports centres etc) basically wherever you might spend an hour anyway, going to starting offering them for competitive reasons. So your weekly supermarket shop/gym workout/whatever will also include a recharge.
(Incidentally, I can see the demand for filling stations dwindling substantially - it won't necessarily be a natural place to recharge in future - so more closures to be expected. There'll still be some demand of course for the foreseeable future but in more rural parts it might mean a significant journey for classic cars to fill up. And I'm not sure to what extent I'd be encouraging any youngster to train as a motor mechanic - both service demands and required skills for an EV ought to be much less, though auto-electricians will probably be more sought after than ever.
Next in line is a fully electric version of the Macan SUV, Porsche’s most successful model on the market today. According to our source, it should arrive in 2022, because the German sports car maker needs a couple of years to prepare its Leipzig plant for production of electric vehicles. The Macan EV will be based on the Premium-Plattform Elektromobilität (PPE) platform and will be offered in three power stages – 215 horsepower (160 kilowatts), 322 hp (240 kW), and 430 hp (320 kW). All three will have a range of about 310 miles (500 kilometers) between two charges.
Also expected later this year - probably the Paris show - a Cayenne Coupe!
. And a decision re a Macan version!
Source: AutoBild
Also expected later this year - probably the Paris show - a Cayenne Coupe!
Source: AutoBild
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Battery tech is actually advancing very slowly in real world practical terms. There may well be a step-change at some point in the future, but it's going to take decades to make it into production vehicles. That's not to say that current battery technology has reached its peak, but it's getting harder and harder to make big gains.VanB wrote: ↑Wed May 02, 2018 7:00 pm Peteski
Battery tech is advancing at a huge rate and I don't believe that, within the foreseeable future, battery packs will come with a massive weight penalty and will be able to charge very quickly. Whilst it takes a little time for new technologies to hit the mainstream they are being developed constantly and a quick overview here https://www.pocket-lint.com/gadgets/new ... er-the-air gives a brief round up of the possibilities on the horizon. I reiterate what I said before that our thinking is constrained by what we know today and future will be here faster than an F1 pitstop!
Any EV you or I will drive in the next 10 years will almost certainly be based on current battery tech, with all its inherent limitations. That's not to say they won't make incremental improvements, but talk of practical 5 min charging a 200 kWh battery to give a 500+ mile range is not going to be a real thing in the next decade or more. The reality is that most people will still be driving around in diesels and hybrids in 2028 and mainstream EVs will only be second or third generation designs. You are more likely to see new battery tech in small devices like phones and computers long before it gets into automotive use.
I agree with most of what you say, Peteski but I do think battery technology will advance faster than you think. Regardless of that the problem of charging infrastructure isn't going to go away any time soon and the drain on the National Grid if there were, say, 1m BEVs on the road would be enormous
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See my comment above on why power supply isn't a problem.
Even if the power supply isn't a problem the infrastructure is and will require massive investment. Don't get me wrong I'm not anti the idea of driving a BEV I just don't want to be in one until I'm sure everything is in place to get seamless use out of it.
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But why do you think infrastructure is a problem? I don't see why the grid infrastructure is a major issue, especially if you assume that most charging will happen overnight - the existing grid has to be able to cope with daytime peaks which are substantially higher than demand in the early hours.
Locally, yes, there will need to be some coordination with the supply network and might constrain where it's cost-effective to locate them, but putting in a rapid charger is really no different to supplying eg a smallish block of flats.
I'm talking about charging devices rather than the grid infrastructure - there are currently under 10k devices in the UK which gives a total of a shade over 16k connections. 21.5% are in London and 15.4% in Scotland which means that they are relatively scarce. This needs to grow in scale dramatically and, whilst some people will have their own dedicated home chargers this wont be practical for everyone (e.g. if they live in a block of flats or have on road parking).
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If wireless charging takes hold (excuse punVanB wrote: ↑Thu May 03, 2018 12:34 pm I'm talking about charging devices rather than the grid infrastructure - there are currently under 10k devices in the UK which gives a total of a shade over 16k connections. 21.5% are in London and 15.4% in Scotland which means that they are relatively scarce. This needs to grow in scale dramatically and, whilst some people will have their own dedicated home chargers this wont be practical for everyone (e.g. if they live in a block of flats or have on road parking).
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