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On the one hand pushing for net zero is going to cost people a lot of money at a time when nobody can afford it.
But on the other hand it protects the environment which is handy because we’ll all be sleeping in it the way things are going with the economy.
Buying a used car is going to cost more than buying new one after 2030 because most people simply don’t want electric cars.
There’s a difference between wanting an EV and affording one. Most people won’t mind an EV but they are not £5k. What you’ll find is the 2nd hand EV market will also be mature, plus they last hundreds of thousands of miles more than a petrol car ever will. In 2030 they will be cheaper 1st and 2nd hand, so you can pay more for an old petrol if you like. My bet is, the cost will win out and people will just buy an EV.
If they last longer then surely there won't be much of a used market for electric cars in 2030?
at the moment you can get a decent EV for under £10k. The people buying new and selling on used will still exist, they havnt vanished. ill tell you what will be expensive: Petrol. As demand drops there will be less petrol stations and they wont be able to justify the ludicrous subsidies.
Which models should I be looking at for this kind of price?
Earlier models like the Zoe, the e-golf, there’s a few. The tech has moved on a lot even in the last two years, so you’ll be getting city car runabouts rather than a giant volvo diesel equivalent. If you do under 10k miles a year those will be totally fine
Yeah but what I'd really need it for is my day job, which takes me to random addresses sometimes I'm gonna do 2/3 in a day which can be far apart. I was looking at the older electric berlingos but they're still pricy and the range doesn't cut it unless you go for the latest ones and then it's far out of my price range. That's why I'm currently driving a 2003 Kangoo for that and we have a hybrid Lexus ct200h as the family car/my wife.
You really think people will stop trading in their cars after 3 years to get the latest model ? I sincerely doubt it. Rolling over the lease is built into the finance model (it's not financially smart but that's a different discussion).
No I don't doubt that at all. I just don't think we're going to have used car forecourts packed solid with EV's in 7 years time, let alone them also being affordable to the masses.
EV Percentage of total vehicles sales has been rising each year for the past 10 years. Exact number varies country to country but for most western countries it is now between 10 and 20% of sales per annum (obviously 100% in Norway).
Vehicle fleet turns over about every 15 years in Western nations (give or take depending on country) i.e around 90-95% of cars are less than 15 years old (there will always be very old collectors cars, but that's an entirely different ball game).
So in 7 years time unless EV sales suddenly plummet, at the very least 20% of used cars sales will be EVs. However EV cars are tracking perfectly to S curve of new technology take up (very small number to start then it explodes). So there is every reason to suspect that today's 20% of sales will be significantly higher. In fact it is expected that they will be the vast majority of new sales in most western countries, particularly those like the UK who are banning ICE sales from 2030.
There will therefore be a reasonably large number of second hand EVs, an even larger number of hybrid PHEVs (as a lot of those have been sold over the past 5 years) and there will be an even larger number of very very low cost ICE vehicles as people exit the technology.
People will buy what makes sense for them.
The car may last longer but the batteries won’t last as long as a petrol or diesel engine.
Batteries degrade every time they go through a cycle and eventually they will barely last long enough to get to the next charger. However a petrol engine will last far longer with proper maintenance.
This isn’t the case. However I don’t want to get into a row about it except to say it’s nearly impossible to argue against the myths people make up in their own mind. Peace brother
Every other device I use with a rechargeable battery suffers hugely with degredation. Can you explain why an EV battery would be an exception (cause I would love it to be!).
Surely if its a very common myth that you know to be wrong you should be trying to correct that.
Fair question. EV batteries do suffer degradation, it’s to do with the nature of lithium. When it allows electrons to pass through a vein is formed in the substance, it looks like marble and over time these veins become larger and the overall capacity of the lithium is lower. This happens in all lithium. In an EV you need a higher grade, more expensive substance because what driving requires is instant power to the drive train for longer so it’s not like a laptop battery which is lower grade. There have been teslas doing over 1 million miles and suffering lower degradation, and current models of EV other brands are seeing a few percent per year in a heavy mileage year. In practice this translates to a minute extra charging. It will take decades to get into a situation where you can’t go anywhere but you’ll most likley have changed vehicle by that stage, if the average ownership is 5 years.
Batteries degrading isn’t a myth my friend.
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But that is the fuel, not the motor. The motor has almost no moving parts, a petrol motor has lots more and is generally a complex and over engineered solution to move a drive train by comparison. What you are saying is that petrol doesn’t go off, it does and that it’s a preferable fuel - it just isn’t by any measure. Repair and maintenance of electric motors is far easier and cheaper, and motors last a lot longer.
I was only talking about the batteries. I never mentioned the motor.
A battery replacement on an electric car more often than not isn’t economically viable as costs a large percentage of the overall value of the car.
But as you mentioned the motor once that dies you have to replace the whole unit. There aren’t many scenarios where replacing a whole engine is required.
Then there’s the range to consider. I can drive the length of the UK in a single day in my diesel car as it takes 2 minutes to fully refuel. That can’t be done in an EV yet.
The point is we are lot more than 7 years from being in a place where EV’s can replace internal combustion. If it ever can.
Hydrogen powered cars on the other hand are capable of replacing fossil fuelled vehicles but they aren’t being developed at the same rate as battery cars.
Apologies, but when you said ‘batteries won’t last as long as an engine’ I was answering you. You’ve conflated the two possibly by accident.
I totally disagree with everything else you say. All the best
I also am uncertain about the 2nd hand value of electric cars. Don't know how much battery degradation kills their range...
There is a lot of FUD paid for by the oil industry on this subject.
BUT in EV circles, you see stories like:
https://insideevs.com/news/592845/tesla-model-s-passes-1-million-miles/
Generally the battery will out last the rest of the car. The warranty on the battery is normally 8y/100000 and it will absolutely last longer than that.
Batteries that out live their car are already a thing and getting a second life as static power storage. I know if some in homes, but I also know of plans to have them in big banks for grid level backup.
I’m not sure if EVs have something similar to iPhones battery monitor so you can the health of the battery. But yeah it’s going to be risky buying a used EV.
It's not that risky, the battery are designed to last in a way iPhone battery aren't. iPhone batteries if anything are designed to not last!
At the cost saving, maybe the "risk" is worth it. My commute was costing me £16 a day in diesel, now it's £8 of kWh and as of Friday, when I get the night rate, £2 a day. So yes, my monthly repayments are a bit more than they were on the diesel, but minus the fuel saving of electricity over diesel, it's substantially less.