New petrol and diesel car sales will be 'banned from 2030'

[raspy]

Post 2030 consumers will have their hands forced into buy an EV, if they have the means, because their old petrol or diesel cars will be taxed into oblivion. Meanwhile the private jets will still be flying in the skies.

And what of the vans that deliver the Amazon junk from China. All diesels currently with no viable electric vans on the market and as for the electric HGV - do me a favour.

@ChipChop Before making claims, I suggest getting your facts straight. There are quite a few electric delivery vans in the UK, not just for Amazon but for folks like DPD too, both of which deliver me "junk" that has been made in many different countries, including the UK. All the DPD and Amazon vans near me have been electric for a while now.

We shall have to wait and see whether ICE cars get taxed into oblivion post 2030. A lot can happen in 9 years.

Who said anything about electric HGVs? Why are companies like Volvo and Daimler investing hundreds of millions of Euros in developing fuel cell technology for trucks? Are they completely bonkers?

It's really surprising how much negativity, pessimism and cynicism this thread seems to be evoking.

 

[ChipChop]

@ChipChop Before making claims, I suggest getting your facts straight. There are quite a few electric delivery vans in the UK, not just for Amazon but for folks like DPD too, both of which deliver me "junk" that has been made in many different countries, including the UK. We shall have to wait and see whether ICE cars get taxed into oblivion post 2030. A lot can happen in 9 years.

Who said anything about electric HGVs? Why are companies like Volvo and Daimler investing hundreds of millions of Euros in developing fuel cell technology for trucks? Are they completely bonkers?

It's really surprising how much negativity, pessimism and cynicism this thread seems to be evoking.

My facts are straight. I said there are no viable electric vans. Unless of course you think a £52,000 + VAT Mercedes eSprinter with a range of up to 96 miles is viable as a tool for businesses.

The weight factor is somewhat of a stumbling block when you look at the electric HGV. More vehicle weight = less load capacity.

 

[markjay]

This has been covered here before:

Tesla Earned $428 Million With Carbon Credits In Q2 2020: Why That's Bad

Tesla earned $428 million with “regulatory credits”, which means it would not have “a positive free cash flow” without legacy automakers to help.

insideevs.com

Tesla stands to lose lucrative business selling CO2 credits to Fiat Chrysler successor Stellantis

Stellantis said it expects to be carbon compliant in Europe this year with the help of new partially or fully electric vehicle models.

fortune.com

 

[Dryce]

It's really surprising how much negativity, pessimism and cynicism this thread seems to be evoking.

How is it a surprise?

EVs need subsidy and incentives vs punitive taxation on fuel and VED and ULEZs on ICE vehices.

You may well see electric vans in London - but without restrictions on ICE van use they are symbolic and make little practical or economic sense to most businesses.

So the real surprise is that there is not more cynicism. They certainly deserve more than they get from government and media.

 

[SW18]

I think that EV vans are still a bit niche, but that the tipping point is just arriving. I see loads of the Nissan NV200 around now; they apparently get about 120-140 miles from a charge, which for inner city use is more than plenty for a day’s work. And then they can be slow-charged overnight ready for the next day, which is optimal for battery life. There is hardly a better use case for EV than that!

My facts are straight. I said there are no viable electric vans. Unless of course you think a £52,000 + VAT Mercedes eSprinter with a range of up to 96 miles is viable as a tool for businesses.

 

[190]

EVs need subsidy and incentives vs punitive taxation on fuel and VED and ULEZs on ICE vehices.

And there is another "taxation" of a sort on the way when the Euro 7 standards are introduced. The effect will be to increase the cost and complexity of IC engines which will close the price gap between EV and ICE vehicles even faster. Small ICE cars will become unviable for the manufacturers to produce, small EV cars already are. The one certain outcome seems to be that motoring is set to get relatively more expensive, pricing some people out of the market. You could be forgiven for thinking that this is deliberate social policy along the lines of; lets make motoring too expensive for the plebs and force them on to public transport.

We can't ignore the emissions issue but there has to be some balance in our approach while still making progress. If there is anything worse than the people who don't care about emissions it's the people who don't care about the social impact of the most extreme green policies. As ever extremists are dangerous whatever their views.

 

[SW18]

On the broader discussion, I feel that a lot of the heat in the discussion is caused by the observation that EVs are not a perfect solution to the carbon problem. And thus that governments are disingenuous for promoting them as such.

However, we have to remember that the wealth to which we (and 25% of the world) are accustomed is largely based on extracting raw materials from the earth and making stuff with them. Unless we cease doing that (and get markedly poorer in the process) we can’t entirely stop environmental degradation. I know of no-one who thinks that is a viable solution to environmental damage (except perhaps a few XR protesters - who then drive home in their diesel camper cans and turn on the gas boiler, so I can ignore them).

Therefore, the next best thing to mitigate environmental damage is, to my mind, to promote technologies that extract as much energy as possible from zero-carbon sources (wind, solar, water) so that the huge economy that we rely on for our comfortable existence has a reduced environmental impact. Some of the steps being taken at present have only a marginal impact, but it’s better than nothing and can be built upon and improved.

As for China, India, etc, they will follow (or even in some cases lead - see China EV vehicle production stats). There will be economic benefits for leaders in the energy transition, just as there have been for leaders in previous economic evolutions. If our government has sense, it will position us to lead in the necessary technologies. They are trying with the current Environment Bill, but are they trying hard enough?

 

[SW18]

One more thought, on EV vehicle sales. Many people are slaves to fashion and will buy what everyone else is buying. Ten years ago it seemed like every large suburban house had a A-class or 1-series parked our front between the LR Discovery and the azaleas.

Now it seems that A-class and 1-series are driven by Kwik Fit staff and apprentice electricians and those big suburban houses have a lime-green Honda e outside, or other trendy EV. I’m sure in 10 years time those EVs will have become the desirable cars for everyone trying to look like they have cash to flash. Car manufactures are the masters of advertising after all. We forum dwellers are in general not their target market because we don’t make them any money.

 

[Bellow]

Clearly not, but then buying a new EV and thinking you’re the messiah won’t wash either will it.
As I’ve said before, two small things get in the way ..
1. Until people stop having babies at the unsustainable rate they are, we’ll run out of food before the apocalypse.
2. Unless you convince the rest of the world to follow suit environmentally you’re wasting breath, time and money.

1. A change of eating habits/diet and there'd be plenty food - and bio-fuels could be viable. Without a younger generation of future workers, older generations will starve anyway.
2. Lead by example. And, as mentioned elsewhere, at least one very heavily populated country is doing just that with EVs.

 

[Dryce]

2. Lead by example. And, as mentioned elsewhere, at least one very heavily populated country is doing just that with EVs.

A fashion to not travel would have a greater effect.

Covid would suggest a lot of travel - intercontinental, commuting, private cars., and local public transport ...... isn't necessary.

 

[Bellow]

A fashion to not travel would have a greater effect.

Covid would suggest a lot of travel - intercontinental, commuting, private cars., and local public transport ...... isn't necessary.

I am genuinely staggered that in all of this no one is considering alternatives to our mobility as we know it being turned on its head and possibly priced out of our reach.
Some lifestyle changes could achieve so much. Cutting unnecessary travel, change of diet, relinquishing pet ownership (not replacing current ones when they pass. In the USA, dogs and cats eats as much calories as 62million Americans do), over-reliance on the internet eg, streaming, etc.
A sign of how far we have to go is the link someone posted recently to an article about a new battery technology. All the information to understand the article was presented in text. So far, so good, so green. So why the accompanying video that added no further information or understanding?

 

[poormansporsche]

Some lifestyle changes could achieve so much. Cutting unnecessary travel, change of diet, relinquishing pet ownership (not replacing current ones when they pass. In the USA, dogs and cats eats as much calories as 62million Americans do), over-reliance on the internet eg, streaming, etc.

Laugh a minute you are. I hope I never meet you in a pub.

Just off to do some actual living by spending some quality time with my 2 quite unnecessarily large rescue dogs and feed them some meat what with them being carnivores and all that.

 

[Bellow]

Laugh a minute you are. I hope I never meet you in a pub.

Just off to do some actual living by spending some quality time with my 2 quite unnecessarily large rescue dogs and feed them some meat what with them being carnivores and all that.

For how much longer? That's the question you can't answer.

 

[grober]

I am genuinely staggered that in all of this no one is considering alternatives to our mobility as we know it being turned on its head and possibly priced out of our reach.
Some lifestyle changes could achieve so much. Cutting unnecessary travel, change of diet, relinquishing pet ownership (not replacing current ones when they pass. In the USA, dogs and cats eats as much calories as 62million Americans do), over-reliance on the internet eg, streaming, etc.
A sign of how far we have to go is the link someone posted recently to an article about a new battery technology. All the information to understand the article was presented in text. So far, so good, so green. So why the accompanying video that added no further information or understanding?

a picture is worth a thousand words---dated before the advent of video of course?

 

[190]

a picture is worth a thousand words---dated before the advent of video of course?

So it is but a picture or a series of pictures can be better than a video. The problem I have with the modern trend for everything being presented in video format is that a video is a serial format. If you just want a particular bit of information or indeed want to find out if the information is worth knowing at all then you have to sit through the whole thing which can be very tedious. Lets face it, while some are excellent, the average you tube video can take forever to get to the point of giving useful information. Text and pictures can be skimmed through vastly quicker and consume vastly less bandwidth. Videos have a place where they excel but they are not needed or ideal for everything.

 

[jimbg]

I thought I was the only one who thought pictures accompanied by appropriate text beats video on so many occasions.

There are so many links to videos and I groan when I see the length of them and I think well where is the interesting or relevant section?

 

[Bellow]

The video in question showed three images. A box with a yellow sticker and orange cable purporting to be a battery. A pile of black stuff - material not stated, and a pile of watch batteries. Pointless.
In fairness though, the article wasn't from a website promoting greenness (as I'd remembered it) but The Independent.
As usual, watching just the one video was impossible. A 30s one of footballers trying to sell me something I can't even remember preceded it.
The point though is that video streaming is a huge part of the energy the internet takes to run - on a par with the entire electrical consumption of a small to medium European country. We could/should be trimming the unnecessary stuff.

 

[Gollom]

The video in question showed three images. A box with a yellow sticker and orange cable purporting to be a battery. A pile of black stuff - material not stated, and a pile of watch batteries. Pointless.
In fairness though, the article wasn't from a website promoting greenness (as I'd remembered it) but The Independent.
As usual, watching just the one video was impossible. A 30s one of footballers trying to sell me something I can't even remember preceded it.
The point though is that video streaming is a huge part of the energy the internet takes to run - on a par with the entire electrical consumption of a small to medium European country. We could/should be trimming the unnecessary stuff.

To be fair, back when t'internet was gaining traction there was a lot of discussion around should sites be free - or should they be subscription. After all, there would always be some form of cost involved in putting them together. Indeed, some pundits firmly believed that any free site would be full of rubbish and not to be trusted!

So it came about that sites used advertising for funding - trouble is that it has now become an invasive business model per se. Hence videos being preceded by adverts for crap.

This very website is a good example - content is not trimmed if you choose to adblock but I'm sure that the revenue that advertising does bring is welcome and keeps the site alive. For which I am grateful!

 

[ChipChop]

For how much longer? That's the question you can't answer.

Well in 2006 unsuccessful US presidential candidate Al Gore featured in the film An Inconvenient Truth which attempts to convince the viewer that global warming is happening. 10 years was the timeframe used to shock the public into action. 2016 came and went without an armageddon. Ditto the adult who looks like a child Greta then gave us and the worlds children another alarmist deadline for impending doom but this time it is called climate change not global warming. Anthropogenic (through human activity) climate change is a unanswerable question by design it seems.

 

[Martinjs]

I may not have stockpiled toilet rolls, pasta and rice earlier this year, but I'm well ahead on stockpiling cars with very large engines.

Good man