I think the car will be a mixture of …

1. Electric
2. Hybrid
3. Hydrogen

I prefer Hybrid first … 😛

The combined cost of battery rental and electricity is about the same as running a medium-sized petrol saloon car. You don’t buy one to save money.

Until you do save money, then for many, the EV route is a non starter.

I get that range anxiety versus actual range required can be different … however, the perceptions that there are hurdles to go through with an EV (limited charging points at the moment etc) mean for many that the advantages don’t yet outweigh the disadvantages. … and frankly the advantage of others not breathing fumes doesn’t carry much weighting in my books compared to other factors.

At the moment, I’m personally not convinced that battery production is clean enough environmentally to mean that the EV carbon footprint as a whole is environmentally clean.

I still think that fuel cell offers the best interim solution where you can generate the fuel from renewables (albeit not efficicently) and that the distribution could tap existing fuel delivery networks in a way that most people would relate to i.e. attend a pump, full up in minutes, and get the same range as before.

Realistically charging an electric vehicle from home is a non starter for most given the need for the infrastructure on street which is where most cars are parked.

Isn’t it more likely batteries will be swapped out for fresh ones and the old ones recharged at a central location such as a redundant petrol station for the majority with the lucky few with off street parking being able to recharge at home and swap batteries for longer journeys? It’s likely range will increase massively by 2040 making it similar to filling up today.

We may even have hydrogen by then so let’s not assume electric is the only solution.

Perhaps it would be more efficient to generate the hydrogen at the point of sale, that way you haven’t big tankers on the roads, big refineries, every petrol station has an electricity supply and most likely a water supply. Convert the underground tanks for Hydrogen and as they are underground it’ll help with the insulation most likely required.

Easier for the gov too as they can continue with fuel duties, as after all cracking Hydrogen at home at scale is a tad more difficult than running an extension lead out of the kitchen window.

Yup – that’s along my thoughts. If we are happy to distribute propane / LPG in liquid forms, then whats the big issue about doing it with hydrogen.

Refining the idea if I was an oil producing state in the middle east where it’s a bit sunny, I’ve loads of uninhabited land and my petro industry is about to tank I’d think about investing in solar to power hydrogen generation from sea water. Liquify and transport in those now redundant tanker. No digging up the road and no power cables out the kitchen window. Problem solved?

tonyf1 – Member
Realistically charging an electric vehicle from home is a non starter …

Imagine if you live on the 5th floor flat then charging your car could be a bit tricky … 😀

edit: Hybrid, then Hydrogen then electric. 😛

Great battery life with a 3210…

It also has snake. I loved snake.

Perhaps it would be more efficient to generate the hydrogen at the point of sale, that way you haven’t big tankers on the roads, big refineries, every petrol station has an electricity supply and most likely a water supply. Convert the underground tanks for Hydrogen and as they are underground it’ll help with the insulation most likely required.

Easier for the gov too as they can continue with fuel duties, as after all cracking Hydrogen at home at scale is a tad more difficult than running an extension lead out of the kitchen window.

We used to generate our own hydrogen and oxygen on site. The plant was a heap and pretty much never worked, we now bring it all in by road tanker. You would also need a pretty big plant to make it viable to supply several hundred vehicles a day so a petrol station is no use.

Hydrogen isn’t cryogenic so doesn’t need insulated either, not that you would want a gas stored underground anyway as that’s not good conditions for a tank.

It’s also not exactly hard to put your car charger on a second meter, Economy 7 anyone?

Imagine if you live on the 5th floor flat then charging your car could be a bit tricky …

Actually seen a cable running from a second floor flat across the road to the street running perpendicular where a Twizy was parked. Would have been funny to see the carnage if it got snagged by a passing lorry…

If longer range and fast charging within a few minutes become a reality then no need for anyone to charge at home.

Well that changes the discussion somewhat – I have now found confirmation of that, though I’m not sure why so little emphasis is being placed on it and so much on the idea that we’ll all be driving around in electric cars. Because if they’re not banning hybrids then I see no obvious reason why the ban couldn’t be brought in significantly earlier – the infrastructure for hybrids already exists and pretty much all the issues raised on this thread are solved!

TBH it seems like the obvious gateway solution – you lose none of the advantages of ICE vehicles, but you get advantages of the electric motors and there is incentive to improve the electric vehicle infrastructure.

Liquify and transport in those now redundant tanker. No digging up the road and no power cables out the kitchen window. Problem solved?

AFAIK it’s difficult to handle and tends to leak out of anything it’s stored in.

This has to the the most ridiculous thread in STW history.

Yes I know stiff competition from sticky cats and whatever but its just about a change the juice that helps lazy folk get about no big deal shirley.

The new stuff may not work for everyone today but it will soon.

In the mean time can we get the tranny van,buses and landrovers that are pumping
ploomes of black shit off the road please.

From ClientEarth, the people who keep winning in court against the government’s feeble or absent air pollution plans; the new scheme is…

…little more than a shabby rewrite of the previous draft plans and is underwhelming and lacking in urgency.
…
The 2040 diesel and petrol ban, while important is a diversionary tactic and doesn’t deal with the public health emergency caused by illegally polluted air, now.

Yup – that’s along my thoughts. If we are happy to distribute propane / LPG in liquid forms, then whats the big issue about doing it with hydrogen.

David MacKay didn’t think H was viable.

In the CUTE (Clean Urban Transport for Europe) project, which
was intended to demonstrate the feasibility and reliability of fuelcell
buses and hydrogen technology, fuelling the hydrogen buses required
between 80% and 200% more energy than the baseline diesel
bus.

Hydrogen is a less convenient
energy storage medium than most liquid fuels, because of its bulk,
whether stored as a high pressure gas or as a liquid (which requires a
temperature of -253 °C). Even at a pressure of 700 bar (which requires a
hefty pressure vessel) its energy density (energy per unit volume) is 22%
of gasoline’s. The cryogenic tank of the BMW Hydrogen 7 weighs 120 kg
and stores 8 kg of hydrogen. Furthermore, hydrogen gradually leaks out
of any practical container.E If you park your hydrogen car at the railway
station with a full tank and come back a week later, you should expect to
find most of the hydrogen has gone.E

https://www.withouthotair.com/c20/page_130.shtml

Instead of messing about with electric cars, a really ambitious vision of the future would be getting people out of cars and cycling.
36% of all citizens are commuting to work, school or university by bicycle in Copenhagen. That’s something to aim for.

AFAIK it’s difficult to handle and tends to leak out of anything it’s stored in.

You are misinformed.

Transfer is as easy as setting a pressure differential as per any gas. Get a thick enough container and it will hold it, our bottle farm holds its gas. Incidentally this is one of the reasons why H2 ICE’s don’t really work, you need a lot of tank to get a decent range which is why only buses have them (cylinders can go on the roof)

kcr – Member

Instead of messing about with electric cars, a really ambitious vision of the future would be getting people out of cars and cycling.

Absolutely.
Electric cars don’t solve a problem, they just move it.
They allow people to feel good about themselves without having to go through the hassle of actually adjusting their behaviour.

Unfortunately they’re a much welcomed panacea for those that don’t want to take responsibility for their actions and actually change their lifestyle. 💡

Imagine if electric cars were the norm and ICE cars were being foisted on us in 23 years time,
ICE vehicles are mechanically very highly complex (create a series of explosions inside a heavy explosion proof container) that require annual inspection/adjustment/repair
Require 8ish litres of oil to be changed every year and disposed of
Toxic cooling liquids
Various filters to be discarded annually
Carry upto 80ish litres of highly flammable liquid (in petrols case)
Require refilling at dedicated fuelling stations
Etc etc

They’d never catch on!

Personally I’d have an electric car tomorrow (and I’m a car tinkerer happy to get his hands dirty kinda guy) the only thing stopping me is I do bangernomics but if for some reason I bought a new car it would be without a doubt electric. I own a Fluke ossciliscope – I’m ready for electric bangernomics in 10years time!

What about lawnmowers…how can grounds firms cut acres of grass all day based on weedy electric things that last an hour? ?

Ok. I have read the full thread, but as I work for one of the power grids and most of my time is working on EVs at the moment I thought I’d chip in with some stuff.

I am not an expert on EVs – I’m an electrical networks man – but I spend a lot of time talking to EVs experts. Thing is, they rarely know anything about networks, so…

The car manufacturers are on as steep a learning curve about networks as networks folk are about EVs.

A Nissan Leaf (the new one with the bigger battery) can do 3-4 days typical driving on a single charge.

It has enough energy to power a house for 3 days (roughly) but not enough power.

A typical day’s driving would recharge in about 90 minutes on a slow rate charger.

Unmanaged charging (30m EVs assumed) would add 60% to the peak power consumption of the country – the networks can take about a third of that without major reinforcement, but generation will struggle.

Charging overnight is probably a bad idea in a PV dominated generation world.

EVs can provide storage services – called V2G, V2H or V2X. This can help maintain the battery (technology dependent).

Slow rate charging is probably better for the battery.

Slow rate charging is better for providing storage services because the car is more likely to be connected to the charger.

Buying enough DC chargers would cost the same per annum as an entire new 132kV to LV distribution system the same size as the existing one. That’s the charger cost before they are installed and connected.

Many of the issues are perception and thinking of EVs as IC cars where you replaced the fuel tank and battery. A bit like thinking of a mobile as a landline without the wires – the first generation were, but iPhones aren’t.

The problems will diminish, if only because people like me are paid to sort them. Many problems will be sorted via logistics or societal solutions not technology solutions – so I will need help.

The solutions for 2040/50 will have to work in 2040/50 – sounds obvious but a lot of folk are ignoring that. EVs are coming but they aren’t the only change that’s coming.

kcr – Member

Instead of messing about with electric cars, a really ambitious vision of the future would be getting people out of cars and cycling.

Well… There’s 2 big seismic changes in car use coming now, this and autonomous vehicles. Both will have a big effect on our love affair with the car. Autonomous much more so but it all contributes.

Personally I think this change is actually not going to be that significant in the end compared to other disruptive changes. A lot of the issues people raise are to do with car ownership and the idea of replacing all 31.7 million cars but as soon as you have full autonomy, millions of people won’t want or need a car, it’s a huge step from ownership to being basically a service.

Cycling would be great if you could roll onto a long distance or local train, stick your bike in a slot and then enjoy the trip, and hop off the other end for a few minutes of easy cycling to get to the door.

It’s not quite that good though yet is it?

Autonomous vehicles bought as a trip / service will reduce the number of vehicles but not the miles / energy requirement.
In fact they might slightly increase the day-to-day miles / energy requirement and due to the increased utilisation reduce the available charging time increasing the power requirement. Note the distinction between energy and power.
The increase utilisation will also reduce the potential for V2G services, increasing the need for fixed storage and reducing the potential for supplementary income for vehicle owners.
The sum total of this is, while I suspect there will be a trend to mobility services, don’t bet on it being quite as clear cut as it looks.

Autonomous vehicles bought as a trip / service will reduce the number of vehicles but not the miles / energy requirement.

But I reckon it will also significantly increase viability of mass trasit, and therefore make EV usage much more viable.

Or, you could swap EVs on a long journey like swapping horses on a stagecoach. Or maybe just swap batteries into another car which would then drive itself to get recharged.

Many things are possible.

Swapping EVs on a long journey isn’t plausible though if luggage gets involved. Unless you can just swap the boot over too.

Well you’d have to containerise the luggage or the battery. But in any case not that much of a chore to swap three bags out of one boot into another.

I think as the energy source becomes more finite we might become more discerning about what we carry around. An SUV sized object with one person in it will not go as far as a smaller lighter vehicle with similar capacity.

How about a vehicle (no idea how you configure it!) that is actually two vehicles capable of carrying a single person each for their daily commute but can be combined to make a family sized vehicle with greater range for the the occasional weekend trip or to transport bigger crap round? Or a Toyota iQ sized thing for efficient transport and easy parking with the ability to snap half a car of extension to it for family journeys/ weekends away?

How about a facility at motorway services where you can rent a trailer full of batteries? Connect & tow then drop off as you leave the motorway?

It’d work on the péage.

PS keep the ideas coming I have another meeting with the government’s advisor on Tuesday – plagiarism is good for me.

How about a facility at motorway services where you can rent a trailer full of batteries? Connect & tow then drop off as you leave the motorway?

Hmmm – I like it. A layer of batteries very low down for CofG reasons and effectively a big box on top for transporting your luggage. That would not work to pick up en route though as you would have to get the luggage there in the first place. You would have to hire it locally to load at home.

edit – ah – bin dun (at least in theory)

Indeed. Thing is almost anything has been done once. It’s rolling out millions of them that’s the problem.

As I recall they can’t make them too big because of the weight, so on your trip to the Alps you’d need two or three trailers worth in each direction.

But possible. Now is it plausible.

I also think there should be a big market for something like an electric one of these:-

Don’t get me wrong – I like cycling and cycle commuted for years but it’s not without it’s compromises. British weather, typical British commute distances and the need to change at work if you have got yourself all sweaty will always put a lot of people off. A small nippy at least semi weather proof and easy to park commute vehicle has to be a win for a big proportion of journeys.

People like owning their own cars, camper vans, bikes or whatever. There really is no need to own a camper van that comes out of storage three weeks a years but the storage areas locally are full. The average number of days a boat moored in Arcachon is out of port is ten. And that despite the fact most people know their holiday dates long in advance and could book a rental.

Look at the number of Air X-bust-my-bike threads despite the ease of renting high quality bikes almost anywhere. People are prepared to pay extra for having their bike mishandled when they could drop theri favourite saddle in their bag and rent a bike.

I think the current model of ownership will continue to dominate with slow transition to hybrids and EVs. Most UK households have two cars, on an individual level the first aim of a government should be to make one of those vehicles an EV or a plug-in hybrid with an 8kWh battery.

One immediate infrastructure incentive would be to tax company and commercial car parks that don’t have a charging station on one in fifty car places. The proportion could be steadily increased. Exceptions could be made for car parks not on the grid or in areas with insufficient grid capacity.

There are curently four places at my local Leclerc (thanks for 3kWh this morning, M.Leclerc, while we did our shopping), currently adequate but not for much longer I hope. Yes, we do most of our shopping on foot or by bike but now and then we stock up the heavy items.

People are prepared to pay extra for having their bike mishandles when they could drop theri favourite saddle in their bag and rent a bike.

Not quite the same though. Bikes are heavily personalised, and they are also still used for the rest of the year at least weekly, so you still need to own one. The rental cost is therefore additional. If you only rented a campervan for holidays you would not then own one so it would probably be cheaper.

The only people who buy a Twizzy are drunks or road hogs who no longer have a car license, Convert.

Edukator – Reformed Troll

People like owning their own cars, camper vans, bikes or whatever. There really is no need to own a camper van that comes out of storage three weeks a years but the storage areas locally are full. The average number of days a boat moored in Arcachon is out of port is ten. And that despite the fact most people know their holiday dates long in advance and could book a rental.

OK but what these things all have in common is that they’re luxuries. People who just want a bike or car to get to the shops mostly aren’t very possessive of them and where they are it’s generally only because they have them (lots of people love their runaround but as something they have, not something they’d necessarily miss). Petrolheads, boat owners, flashy bike owners are all a minority already even without other things pushing back against it.

Also I think it’s pretty displacable- people who’re currently into cars in a lot of cases will end up being into something similar. I thought of myself as a Motorbike Guy but eventually I discovered I was just a Tinkerer Guy, I love my car and I love working on it but I could apply that easily to other things, in fact I do. The actual Petrolhead Who Is Only Into Cars is possibly quite small.

(and even then there’ll be things for the Petrolhead Who Is Only Into Cars to do with cars- restos, track or rally, that sort of thing. Bit of a shift to a US model. (isn’t it weird that a country so in love with cars has relatively little simple competition? 7 quarter mile strips, hardly any paved autocross…)

If all else fails there’s always the Endless Project. Dude down my road is going to die before he finishes his Se7en. I’ll be the same if I ever get a garage and the rustbox vauxhall firenza I want, I’ll spent 20 years welding bits into it and trying to squeeze in an LS, driving it’ll be beside the point.

The only people who buy a Twizzy are drunks or road hogs who no longer have a car license, Convert.

Maybe n France, still need a licence here regardless.

One immediate infrastructure incentive would be to tax company and commercial car parks that don’t have a charging station on one in fifty car places. The proportion could be steadily increased. Exceptions could be made for car parks not on the grid or in areas with insufficient grid capacity.

There are already planning laws that can be used to address this. You can make sustainable transport a stipulation but it rarely gets used or if it does services quickly get cut (see QE hospital in Glasgow)

I was thinking a bit smaller than a twizy. A twizy is like a tiny car rather than a covered moped. I’m not sure where I’d park a twizy around here – would it park with the motorbikes or in a car park spot? I suspect the latter.