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Car buyers should have 'long, hard think' about diesel
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Thanks for the explanation on fuel card and taxes.
Also, in keeping with the theme of the thread. You could have possibly got better deal with a petrol-hybrid?
£400 service pack for 74k miles, it puts you at additional 0.5p per mile. For high mileage driver, it's a great deal. Also have to point out this is cost to do the whole car, very difficult to find service cost for ICE powertrain alone.
There are also cars that have low maintenance, unfortunately they are sometimes more expensive to buy. My Previous Merc C220 had chain instead of belt, gearbox oil for life. At 19k every service, I only had to do 3 services over 60-odd thousand miles. Overall 45mpg per-mile cost actually works out very close to 55mpg Skoda.
So, if you must use fossil fuel, I'm currently of the opinion a used low-maintenance petrol-hybrid is the cheapest form of motoring.
I didn't need to include maintenance for my EV example because the powertrain did not require maintenance. After the final finance provided free servicing in a month or so time, I'll not be doing anything to the car beyond taking it to MOT, brake fluid change every few years, DIY cabin air filter change. I have zero plan to do any maintenance on the powertrain.
Also, in keeping with the theme of the thread. You could have possibly got better deal with a petrol-hybrid?
Only asking because it's an additional cost that many people forget to factor in. For example, my Skoda need timing belt done every 5 years at £490, DSG oil every 40k at £190. At 10k a year, it's additional 1.5p per mile many people forget to take into account.Did I factor in ICE maintenance? No I didn't but you didn't factor in any car maintenance in your example either so, you know, fair enough
Can I ask that you please refrain from quoting maintenance figures as these differ vastly from car to car and person to person. I have mentioned previously in this tread (back when service costs were being thrown about) that I got a service pack with my car, covers up to 74k miles, total cost for servicing is £400 (I'm pretty sure that's correct although it may have been £500, don't have the details with me). So, that DSG oil change that my car may or may not require, included in the service pack (if required), I'm not sure if it needs to be done so god only knows how you know
£400 service pack for 74k miles, it puts you at additional 0.5p per mile. For high mileage driver, it's a great deal. Also have to point out this is cost to do the whole car, very difficult to find service cost for ICE powertrain alone.
There are also cars that have low maintenance, unfortunately they are sometimes more expensive to buy. My Previous Merc C220 had chain instead of belt, gearbox oil for life. At 19k every service, I only had to do 3 services over 60-odd thousand miles. Overall 45mpg per-mile cost actually works out very close to 55mpg Skoda.
So, if you must use fossil fuel, I'm currently of the opinion a used low-maintenance petrol-hybrid is the cheapest form of motoring.
I didn't need to include maintenance for my EV example because the powertrain did not require maintenance. After the final finance provided free servicing in a month or so time, I'll not be doing anything to the car beyond taking it to MOT, brake fluid change every few years, DIY cabin air filter change. I have zero plan to do any maintenance on the powertrain.
Nod
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IF...
busses were cheaper (currently £2.50+ each, each way) compared to street parking (£1.90 for an hour - car parks are around £2 for the first hour the a quid an hour after that, some with free charging thrown in as an extra);
busses were more reliable (early morning ones simply aren't and Mrs Nod needs to be in town by 06:30 at least twice a week.)
busses got us where we need to be (sometimes have heavy stuff to get in and out of the city centre)
busses were clean
we might use them but until then, we'll stick to driving in (almost always in the Leaf unless I'm dropping Mrs Nod off on the way elsewhere.)
Walking into town is always possible (unpleasant though if it's persisting down!), walking back up the hill with a load doesn't appeal.
Problem there isn't with the cars, just the infrastructure. Get that sorted and long journeys will be far easier in EVs.
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What an odd thing for an ex Oil & Gas person to say, somewhat hypocritical?The thought of never visiting a petrol station ever again is very appealing; I physical hate putting fuel in a car.
How nice would it be just to 'plug in' at home!
All that money saved from buying sweets/drinks from the petrol station as well!
EV is very, very tempting for everyday use
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DK602
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I don't see the link you are making?
The only bit of my previous job I liked was the pay - quite honestly the rest of it was s***e (..........and I can't think of one other person who would think otherwise - you do it for the pay.)
My love for oil is for the classic cars I own; From what I have been researching EV certainly gives better performance than any ICE vehicle. I think when manufacturers start producing a varied range of EV's their sales will go through the roof.
For some doing lots of business miles the battery technology will need to improve but who does more than 200 miles in a day? As a 'second vehicle' they just make sense.
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This is an interesting debate about diesel's and London. Most major cities are on major rivers as was the main transportation many centuries ago.
So fog and mist will always be a problem in a river valley.
So fumes will linger longer in a valley !
Problem with London is it is just over crowded !
Why not just banned all fossil fuel vehicles from london and have electric buses, taxis, lorries etc. The technology is there just no one wants to spend and only tax Joe public for owning a fossil fuel car. As if we have a big choice many years ago !
Perhap london businesses should relocate to better situated area of the country. Then congestion, house prices will go down !
So fog and mist will always be a problem in a river valley.
So fumes will linger longer in a valley !
Problem with London is it is just over crowded !
Why not just banned all fossil fuel vehicles from london and have electric buses, taxis, lorries etc. The technology is there just no one wants to spend and only tax Joe public for owning a fossil fuel car. As if we have a big choice many years ago !
Perhap london businesses should relocate to better situated area of the country. Then congestion, house prices will go down !
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So you were quite happy to help "mine" a polluting fluid, expect others to use it (without them there would be no market) so long as the pay was good, as I said, hypocritical. And now you want to use EV, which pollute during manufacture, because they have better performance than an ICE, again a hypocritical attitude.
As someone who also works in Oil & Gas (as I have stated a few times) I'll take it on the chin that my "employers" pollute, all car ownership creates pollution one way or another but I'll not say the EV's are the answer to pollution, far from it, we need less people on the Planet (as I have stated many times).
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Just watched a Wheeler Dealer episode where they completed the conversion of a Maserati to an electric vehicle. Interesting episode.
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Unlikely, unless they've killed off Mike Brewer.
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Cruel, vicious and unkind. Though probably justified...
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DK602
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Still don't see the hypocritical links TBH; I do see a personal attack though and I'm not sure why?
I don't recall ever saying EV was the answer to pollution but I'm sure it's a lot better for the air quality than diesel cars?
EV gives better performance - what is wrong with that?
You say they pollute during manufacture - surely a lot less pollution than the oil burning of an ICE over it's life span that also has to be manufactured?
Not sure how you plan on having less people on the planet - sounds a bit horrific to me!
I was self employed but not sure how being contracted to work in the North Sea amongst other places should make me 'life long loyal & grateful' to those companies - it was a job that paid well.
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To sustain so many people on this planet, we need to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy (this just happen to be Tesla's mission statement). Continue to burn carbon-based fuel, however evolutionary tweaks you do to your machinery, is not enough to be sustainable.
EV is the best answer we have today, just like ICE was the best answer back in early 1900's, for private personal transport. This mode of transport is not going to be sustainable for much longer. May be tomorrow it's some other technology that is even more efficient, may be in the future it's some sort of new vehicle ownership model. But only focusing on EV manufacturing, current grid renewable mix or tyre dust, ignoring EV pollutes less over its whole life, is very misleading.
EV is the best answer we have today, just like ICE was the best answer back in early 1900's, for private personal transport. This mode of transport is not going to be sustainable for much longer. May be tomorrow it's some other technology that is even more efficient, may be in the future it's some sort of new vehicle ownership model. But only focusing on EV manufacturing, current grid renewable mix or tyre dust, ignoring EV pollutes less over its whole life, is very misleading.
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Revised mission statement.
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The original mission statement was "accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable transport". That was when they were called Tesla Motors and only sell cars. Now they also sell solar roof and stationary battery: the whole energy solution. From the sun to all your energy needs.
I think you posted this as source: http://panmore.com/tesla-motors-inc-vision-statement-mission-statement-analysis
edit: Just for laugh:
Looks like lightning produces more NOX than everyone's Euro 6 diesel cars combined:
https://www.speakev.com/threads/nox-euro-6-diesel-cars-versus-lightning.143064/
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1) We cant sustain the numbers we have today, doing that will increase the population overall and that is un-sustainable
2) I think you will find the jury is out on how much pollution an EV creates during it's lifespan, nobody has even talked about how much pollution the new factories etc have been created just so we can create a new type of vehicle.
3) too many people on this planet seem to think humans have a right to continue plundering - look at the fires in the Amazon, G7 offers help to extinguish and is rejected - how (literally) on Earth can that be allowed.
4) unless we do something drastic and very soon I believe the planet/nature will solve the problem we are creating/perpetuating, 90% of everything that has ever lived has become extinct, we are no different, we have been here for what a million years (give or take a bit) - a tiny fraction of time.
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1 and 4 sounds like you think there will be some sort of natural or man-made disaster, which will wipe out a large portion of population......... sounds very drastic. It would be better to put engineering efforts to transition to sustainable energy right now and do our best to make human a multi-planetary species.
3. The Amazon fire is a result of lack of importance placed on environmental protection. If everyone on earth, or certainly the developed countries, were required to pay for the oxygen produced by large forests, the money will go to forest nations to cover maintenance and protection costs, we wouldn't be in today's mess.
Everything we do has an impact on the environment, if money makes the world go round, so should money be used to represent our impact.
2. This is the only point related to this thread.
So your argument against EV now is the carbon emission from new factories. Moved away from questioning building them and ignoring much lower carbon emission during use.
No whole-life analysis have factored in factory building, not for ICE cars and not EV's. Factories get built or repurposed all the time. By same logic, we shouldn't be building factories for solar panels or wind turbines because initially it generates more pollution.
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I really cant go along with making humans multi-planetry creatures, what amount of the Earth's resources will that take, once again a human response, destroy life here so we can live some place else. I honestly believe what we are doing right now will result in a natural disaster befalling us, look at how many humans were wiped out by the flu pandemic after WW1, the numbers killed in WW1 were dwarfed by that epidemic.
Yes pt 2 is related to this thread, we need to rethink how we use the planet and coming up with a different type of personal transport which reduces the effect we have on the planet is of tiny consequence. Add together the whole life and creation pollution of EVs will not reduce our impact by any significant amount, we humans need to reduce our plundering of our planets resources, trying to convince ourselves that EV, solar panels etc will have any meaningful impact is kidding ourselves. We need to reduce our numbers, plain and simple.
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How will the millions of people who can’t afford to get an EV cope?
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EV will lower greenhouse gas emissions by 17-30% over entire lifecycle according to European Environment agency, it also points out the grid is getting ever greener. https://www.eea.europa.eu/highlights/eea-report-confirms-electric-cars
17-30% is quite significant, and EV will reduce our impact on the planet even more significantly in the future.
In the long term, I absolutely agree that to make any real meaningful impact, we need to change our way of living, we need to reduce our plundering of our planet resources. But in the short term, when people are not willing make drastic changes today, EV is the best answer in comparison to ICE cars. Because the biggest, most significant advantage of EV is that there is absolutely zero tailpipe emission when driving in traffic in towns and cities.
I'll leave the philosophical discussion about reducing our numbers or going to another planet to another thread.
Well, car industry experts aren't worried about those same millions of people who can't afford to get into less polluting cars. They consider this to be trickle down effect, where the poor will forever be locked into buying older cars and paying charges to drive into cities.
Thankfully EV's will break that. When there's enough EV on the second hand market and enough variants of EV's to choose from, the oldest ones will become affordable and won't be subjected to charges like ULEZ.
Your answer will be answered in 5-10 years time, if there's enough EV's getting produced today.
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But that's at a local not global level, even if you believe the figures being quoted.
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In the UK there is approximately 38.4m registered vehicles. Up to a couple of months ago, just 220k of those are EV. That is quite a lot of vehicles to replace and filter down to significantly reduce emissions.
In this link, https://www.euronews.com/amp/2019/0...environmental-cost-of-electric-car-production
It is claimed that the amount of CO2 produced in the manufacture of an EV is around twice that for a ICE vehicle and it can take 30-40k kms before an EV becomes CO2 neutral.
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How can entire vehicle lifecycle be considered not global level?
30-40K km is quite low for car mileage isn't it? That still means over the lifetime of the vehicle, EV will be better than ICE cars.
My Skoda was bought at 70k, the previous coupe I bought at 80k. The Leaf was bought at 18k, now 38k. So using your data, my mileage alone have offset the Leaf's production CO2 emissions. Many cars get driven beyond 100k miles before becoming beyond economical repair.
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Local as in these EVs are being bought only in certain markets, they are hardly readily available throughout the world, so their impat on World pollution is minimal.
Whilst I agree doing something (anything) is better (much better) than doing nothing the total World value of pollution reduction is at best minimal.
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UK average mileage has fallen over the last decade or so, it now stands at around 7100 miles per year. Splitting the above mileage to 35k kms or roughly 21k miles that is almost 3 years use. New car sales are on the decline in the UK as well as Europe. Last year's new car registrations in the UK were at around 2.5 million.
Even if all car sales from now on were EV , after 10yrs you would still have around 15 million cars to replace, yes you will likely have lowered emissions in some towns and cities but where ever the EV are produced their CO2 levels will have increased.
DK602
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Not so sure why some people are so against EV?
It's not just the CO2 is the other pollutants ICE pump into the air as well - if more people used EV air quality would also improve.
If UK annual mileage has indeed fallen to 7,100 miles then EV becomes an even better option surely?
Anyway - just purchased my first EV today
@MatBin - not so keen on decimating the population to save the planet - can I ask what you intend doing to your family in your crusade to save the planet?
It's not just the CO2 is the other pollutants ICE pump into the air as well - if more people used EV air quality would also improve.
If UK annual mileage has indeed fallen to 7,100 miles then EV becomes an even better option surely?
Anyway - just purchased my first EV today
@MatBin - not so keen on decimating the population to save the planet - can I ask what you intend doing to your family in your crusade to save the planet?
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My wife's an only child, we have 2 children and between them and their partners they have 3 children in total, so child neutral I would say.
I am not against EV per se, I am against them being seen as the "solution". Many a post back I said we as humans as a species produce too much pollution and consume too much of the Earth's resources with our present and ever increasing population. I don't advocate mass extermination of humans but I do think we need to curb our growth and that will do far more good than a few people buying EVs.
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Exactly. Not only ICE cars produce more pollution over its lifetime. ICE cars also dump majority of its lifetime pollution at where people breath.
Nice. What did you buy? Not a Ford I presumeAnyway - just purchased my first EV today
So after 3 years of use, the EV would have broken even compared to ICE car in its lifetime pollution so far. Yet in car terms, 3 years is still very young and loads of life ahead of it.
If all car sales today were EV, as per your calculation after 10 years, only 15m cars left to be replaced compared to 38.4m total cars. That means more than half of all cars on the road will be EV, only 10+ years old ICE cars left. Finding a fume puffing diesel outside school gates or clattering taxi outside train stations would become a rare sight. Air quality at population centres will improve massively.
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So you are saying because the areas where the minerals for batteries are mined aren't heavily populated, it doesn't matter. You obviously didn't read my link about all the pollution and radiation from mining the minerals. The problem is towns and cities being allowed to become heavily overpopulated and not having a suitable road structure to service it. Less people in confined areas means less congestion and less pollution. Cars have stop start, you won't have engines running outside schools or stations. In fact it is already being banned in some places.Exactly. Not only ICE cars produce more pollution over its lifetime. ICE cars also dump majority of its lifetime pollution at where people breath.
Nice. What did you buy? Not a Ford I presume
So after 3 years of use, the EV would have broken even compared to ICE car in its lifetime pollution so far. Yet in car terms, 3 years is still very young and loads of life ahead of it.
If all car sales today were EV, as per your calculation after 10 years, only 15m cars left to be replaced compared to 38.4m total cars. That means more than half of all cars on the road will be EV, only 10+ years old ICE cars left. Finding a fume puffing diesel outside school gates or clattering taxi outside train stations would become a rare sight. Air quality at population centres will improve massively.
Do you not see that if production of an EV produces around twice the amount of CO2 compared to ICE vehicle production as EV sales increase and ICE sales decrease, CO2 levels will continue to rise.
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According to this, EV cars emit less Co2 over their lifetime, including when you factor in manufacture and using the most polluting energy generation.
https://www.transportenvironment.or...iesels-even-when-powered-dirtiest-electricity
https://www.transportenvironment.or...iesels-even-when-powered-dirtiest-electricity
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But not in the UK, so that's OK.
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On a singular basis yes. But with almost 40million cars to replace in the UK alone and EV manufacturing producing twice the CO2 levels of ICE vehicle manufacturing you are going to have to wait a lifetime or more to see that improvement on a global level.
What would more likely solve it would be the conversion of existing vehicles. A start up company is prepared to do just that for $9k.
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The supply chain for EV's is in its infancy. Ethical supply will eventually happen, just like we have stopped going to wars for oil...... oh wait.
The extra pollution comes from production of the different powertrain. While I have nothing against conversion, your argument of "conversion is the solution" doesn't make any sense. A converted car would still produce the extra pollution during production of battery and conversion process. Net pollution would be similar between EV and converted cars.
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The only ethical supply will be a pollutant free supply. With the amount of supply required to replace the majority of the world's cars that isn't going to happen. Even small improvements will only push up costs.
Converting an existing car will cause less pollution. The car is already built. All that needs to be built and installed is the powertrain, battery and wiring. You don't need to manufacture a whole new car.
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I'm sorry. But your logic does not make sense. Unless you've made the assumption that we must have certain percentage of pure EV's by a very short deadline. I'm all for this for better air quality, but it's a massive assumption to make.
Natural replacement of vehicles, like you've mentioned above, that over 10 years 23m cars will be replaced, means having a meaningful fleet of EV is not a problem, as long as we are mass producing EV's today. The net lifetime pollution for building a brand new EV, verses net lifetime pollution for building an ICE car, then after a few years covert to EV is going to be similar, if not better for new EV.
Just like arguing in favour of ICE cars based solely on EV production pollution. Your argument is constructed based on pollution produced as result of manufacturing a new car, ignoring the big picture.
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EV are still to expensive. The least expensive may not be a viable option because they are too small, low range and expensive to buy. It would be a lot easier and more cost effective for a lot of people just to have their existing cars converted. That is why people converted their existing vehicles to lpg.
A car of any age can be converted to EV. No one mentioned buying a new ICE and then having it converted a few years down the line.
Ignoring the added performance factor, replacing the alternator with a BISG motor and adding a small battery in the boot, to any car from the last 10years or so would see a good reduction in pollution levels.
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Sorry, I thought that was your line of reasoning based on the last few post: manufacturing EV pollute more --> conversion of ICE cars would cut down pollution
No, you didn't say "buying new ICE cars to convert them". But you did bring up conversion of existing vehicles in reply to a post pointing out lower whole-life pollution of EV's. So I'm just pointing out whole-life pollution of ICE car converted to EV will likely be more than an EV that is built to be an EV from day one.
The cost of EV's is coming down quickly. If EV were mass produced on the same level as ICE cars today, they would not be more expensive.
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True. They are. The only EV that meets my range needs is either a Tesla or a Jaguar I-Pace.
My old car is in need of updating, as it's 12 years old and getting more expensive to maintain. I'd love to be in the position to buy a Tesla, but I'm not, or could not justify spending that amount on a car until the mortgage is clear anyway.
So instead looking at second hand cars with decent MPG, possibly another diesel. Local garage to me who I use for all my repairs has a 61 plate Focus Titanium X 1.6 TDCI. Which I know won't be particularly quick, but will be a lot cleaner to run than my 12 year old pre-DPF CMax.
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You are overlooking or not knowing one thing. Profit doesn't all come directly from the sale of a new car, it also comes from the sale of parts for servicing, maintenance of the vehicle. As you keep pointing out, an EV will require less maintenance and fewer parts so they have lost a source of profit and the profit will have to be made at the point of sale of the new car. This will also impact the profits of dealerships as the number of ICE cars decreases.
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