• The Forums are now open to new registrations, adverts are also being de-tuned.

The EV fact thread

BTB 500 said:

Forget electric vans, the future is hydrogen | Auto Express

Mike Rutherford wonders why the demand for electric vans is plummeting in the UK
www.autoexpress.co.uk www.autoexpress.co.uk

Renault are launching a new hydrogen fuel cell van next year:

Renault Master H2-Tech Prototype is the hydrogen van of the future | Auto Express

A range of 434 miles will be available on the hydrogen-powered Renault Master
www.autoexpress.co.uk www.autoexpress.co.uk

Loading…

media.renaultgroup.com
Click to expand...
You don’t have to be a genius to work out why sales are 40% less in the period from January to August 2024 compared to January to August 2023 - the UK Government announced that the date changed from 2030 to 2035 in September 2023.

Great to see hydrogen vans coming to market. Let’s hope that it increases demand enough to accelerate expansion of the hydrogen network. If not then the lack of infrastructure could be cited as the reason not to buy hydrogen like has been for BEV.
 
Bobby Dazzler said:
You don’t have to be a genius to work out why sales are 40% less in the period from January to August 2024 compared to January to August 2023 - the UK Government announced that the date changed from 2030 to 2035 in September 2023.
Click to expand...

Those government deadlines were only for new vehicle sales though ... in 2023 buyers were still looking at being able to get new diesel vans for the next 6/7 years (longer than most companies keep them).

My theory is that many (most?) of the users for whom the current generation of electric vans work have already got them (thanks to the various incentive schemes & discounts), hence the market is essentially saturated and sales have dropped off. That will likely change of course as battery technology evolves.
 
Time to open a hydrogen vehicle thread?
 
clk320x said:
Time to open a hydrogen vehicle thread?
Click to expand...

Maybe. Essentially fuel cell vehicles are hybrids - just like a BEV they have a battery that drives the electric motor(s), but this is charged on board (by the fuel cell) rather than from an external electrical supply.
 
clk320x said:
businessnewsthisweek.com

New Geotab data highlights how EV batteries can last 20 years or more

Business News This Week is a leading business news portal covering business news weekly for your business. Business news weekly
businessnewsthisweek.com businessnewsthisweek.com
Click to expand...

That report only addresses gradual loss of capacity over time, which is not actually a failure mode (where a pack is no longer usable because the BMS detects individual cells that have failed or gone seriously out of balance).

Yes after 20 years the capacity might theoretically have dropped by 36% (based on the big assumption that the degradation rate of the latest cell types will remain constant for year after year), but the chances are the vehicle will have thrown a pack error due to individual cell failure(s) long before that.

And produced by a company that sells fleet telematics solutions the 'report' looks more like a marketing exercise than an independent study:

Accurate state-of-health information, made possible by comprehensive telematics data, is key to helping people make the best use of electric vehicles. Telematics data insights, which can be found in Geotab’s EV Battery Health report, allows fleets to know the real battery capacity of their EVs, understand the rate of degradation and get the most value throughout their life-cycle.
Click to expand...
 
Just back from driving 2500km across and around Andalusia and like Prague earlier this year, I saw maybe 3-4 EVs entire time.
 
BTB 500 said:
That report only addresses gradual loss of capacity over time, which is not actually a failure mode (where a pack is no longer usable because the BMS detects individual cells that have failed or gone seriously out of balance).

Yes after 20 years the capacity might theoretically have dropped by 36% (based on the big assumption that the degradation rate of the latest cell types will remain constant for year after year), but the chances are the vehicle will have thrown a pack error due to individual cell failure(s) long before that.

And produced by a company that sells fleet telematics solutions the 'report' looks more like a marketing exercise than an independent study:
Click to expand...

The average lifetime of a car in the UK is around 17 years, my guess is that EVs will have sorter life spans, not because of the battery as such, but because electric and electronic tech move much faster than mechanical tech.

E.g., MB comes out with a new engine once every 5 to 7 years, while Intel releases a new processor every year. The desirability of mechanical hardware goes down at a much lower pace that that of phones, laptops, TVs, etc.

I think that the depreciation curve of an EV will be steep, simply because of the diminishing desirability factor, and even before considering practical issues such as battery etc.
 
markjay said:
The average lifetime of a car in the UK is around 17 years, my guess is that EVs will have sorter life spans, not because of the battery as such, but because electric and electronic tech move much faster than mechanical tech.

E.g., MB comes out with a new engine once every 5 to 7 years, while Intel releases a new processor every year. The desirability of mechanical hardware goes down at a much lower pace that that of phones, laptops, TVs, etc.

I think that the depreciation curve of an EV will be steep, simply because of the diminishing desirability factor, and even before considering practical issues such as battery etc.
Click to expand...

Agree with all of that, although of course an average lifespan of 17 years means many cars are used for much longer.

The fundamental issue with battery life though is that packs contain many thousands of small, mass-produced cells (connected in series to get the required voltage, and then in parallel to get the capacity). These will all slowly degrade with age/usage, but inevitably a few will eventually fail while the vast majority are still fine. Hence the growing trend for 'battery repair' companies who address this rather than the normal/expected gradual loss of capacity with age. Unfortunately though replacing cells (or more likely 'modules' ... groups of cells) with ones that have a different age/usage history to the rest of the pack isn't ideal as they won't perform identically in terms of resistance & capacity. And of course if a few of the original cells have failed then others may not be far behind. This is why vehicle manufacturers will only swap out the whole battery for a new one (at huge cost), and why repair companies typically don't give much (or even any) warranty on a pack afterwards.
 
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.
 
Skd884 said:
www.autoexpress.co.uk

EVs are less likely to be written off than petrols or diesels | Auto Express

New data shows ICE cars have been written off at twice the rate of electric cars since 2015
www.autoexpress.co.uk www.autoexpress.co.uk
Click to expand...
Modern journalism 101:

Lead article by making authoritative statement based on a specific statistic.
Conclude article by saying that in fact there's too many variables to draw any meaningful conclusion from said statistic and that they need to understand what it means, thereby rendering aforementioned statement (and thus the entire article) to be utter bollocks.
 
Doodle said:
Modern journalism 101:

Lead article by making authoritative statement based on a specific statistic.
Conclude article by saying that in fact there's too many variables to draw any meaningful conclusion from said statistic and that they need to understand what it means, thereby rendering aforementioned statement (and thus the entire article) to be utter bollocks.
Click to expand...
As are many/most anti-EV articles. 🙄👍
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 9 (members: 0, guests: 9)

Similar threads

Bellow
Truck - EV/Hybrid.
Replies
8
Views
3K
Dryce
Dryce
st13phil
Ford cancels plans for all-electric large SUV in US writing off $1.9bn
2
Replies
26
Views
3K
markjay
markjay
MSG2004
EV's and battery damage & other woes means I wont buy one
12 13 14
Replies
263
Views
16K
markjay
markjay
philnewmerc
Out of curiosity: is there a rattle and squeak free car in existence at 100k miles / 10 years + age?
2 3
Replies
46
Views
2K
philnewmerc
philnewmerc
Ardwick
Very scary...........or what you don't know about this EV issue
2 3
Replies
44
Views
9K
BTB 500
BTB 500
Back
Top Bottom