Chinese Electric Cars

I see a Chinese automotive company has become the first major manufacturer to decide all their new products will be electric of hybrid within a few years.

Neil

Must have really long extension leads in China !

You will probably have to recharge it several times befoere you get out of the driveway !

Yes, that will be Volvo. They're a subsidiary of Zhejiang Geely Holding Group. Co, Ltd.

Go on, spoil it before we get all the knee jerk responses!

Neil

<Would I troll...?>

One problem that I foresee for the UK market at least is where are these cars going to get recharged.

Modern housing units seem to be built without garages and in some cases there isn't even a parking space attached to the property.

Agreed, it's going to be one of the big challenges. Expect new builds to include a requirement for charging points.

Neil

The houses on some of the roads near me are mainly victorian with the only parking being in the road the front gardens are too small to park in.

This might mean lots of cables trailing across the pavements from house to car.

Not all of these hybrids need a charging point. Some can be charged by the ICE on the run. Useful for ends of journeys where low emissions are required.

The announcement today was for volvo (to be the first car company to go electric) so, the Chinese claim if obviously a version of the truth slanted for another audience..... there is currently new legislation being quietly negotiated so that local authoritiies can charge electric car owners for the installation of charging unit an dcable under the pavement in areas with only street parking.

In my road (16 miles from central London) there are now four electric car families, none with garages. One of these was recently telling me that it works well for around the area driving but tricky when they go down to Dorset,...and, economy (for big Volvo electic 4x4 type estate) works out at 168 miles to equal I gallon petrol cost.

Smoke and mirrors I'm afraid: Volvo have just finished replacing all of their models with new ones. Their models have a very long lifespan compared to most other manufacturers, so there won't be any new products within a few years.

I wonder how the authorities will tax electricity used in cars when we buy far less petrol ! Colin

Colin, they obviously cannot tell if you are charging your car or running the electric mower/cooking/storage radiators, etc so the only way will be an annual tax on vehicle's KW rating, much the same as cars now pay 'Road Tax' rated by their emissions.

DaveD

Only slanted by me

But Volvo is chinese owned now.

Neil

It annoys me that electric cars are advertised as zero emission. They are not. The emissions are just shifted from one place to another. In the U.K. it would appear that the CO2 emissions resulting from the use of an electric car will be higher than that from a diesel car. The situation is better here in France where most electricity is nuclear generated.

Russell

We all need to be a bit careful when we claim something as a 'first'. I'm sure that there were firms who only made electric cars around 1900-1905. Some went on to use IC engines, but not all, surely?

For examples - Tribelhorn (Swiss), Jeantaud (French), Baker (USA), Woods (USA), Rauch & Lang (USA), Hupp-Yeats, Waverley, Detroit, and Ohio, all USA.

I suppose it could be claimed that none of these were 'major' makers, but weren't they really, in the days when there were more electrics than smelly new fangled explosion motors?

Cheers, Tim

Quite right, Tim.

4 wheel drive was around in the second decade of the last century, as was overhead camshafts and likely loads of other items claimed as "new" by the advertising/marketing sector who simply hype up anything they want to sell.

Electric vehicles can be zero emission and zero energy cost to the user - they just need a large PV array and likely a large storage battery (if the vehicle is in use during sunny times!). Not cheap installations, but getting cheaper....

Electric cars will get the diesel treatment

It's great! it's fabby! buy electric! until everyone adopts it...

...then they'll be condemned as contributers to global warming and environmental pollution once everyone's got one and the government will increase taxes accordingly

They'll probbly do GPS backed mileage taxes in the future

Once they cotton on to it councils will solve the 'where do I charge when I can't park next to my house' problem with loads of charging points along the street. If they are cunning they will then couple that with your annual parking permit fee charged in many dense housing streets so you enter your code in the machine and charge at the rate they decide.

Did i read this right somewhere, that the battery is rented? It seems the batteries are not long lived and soon deteriorate in performance, and expensive. Anyone have experience?

I heard the batteries were leased as well. I also heard BMW just scrapped thousands of their electric cars in the US once the lease expired after just three years. They do have their own "BMW" scrap yard in Europe, I expect to keep prices artificially high ...