BBC Panorama Are We Ready For EV's

[johnb80]

Ive just watched BBC's Panorama about EV's, for once, it was an almost balanced view presented. All the usual garbage was in there about how expensive it can be to charge and when they mentioned home charging he reported about £20 to fully charge which is a bit out, £5 being nearer the mark. There were a few comments from the public and clearly some that really dont know what EV's are all about.
It did highlight, correctly in my view, the ridiculous situation with public chargers all wanting different methods of payments - apps - cards etc. We have surely missed a trick here, we should have had a universal agreement, a standard that all public chargers followed so that one payment method is used, preferable a card, a switch or credit card being best of all.

 

[Robf]

Octopus are making a good start with this, their app is pretty handy too (route planning etc)

Octopus Electroverse

One-tap access to 651,325 EV chargers across the UK & Europe

electroverse.octopus.energy

 

[Gadget Geek]

Contactless payment was supposed to become mandatory;

All new rapid chargepoints should offer card payment by 2020

New government ambitions will encourage uptake of UK's chargepoint network through widespread 'pay as you go' functionality.

www.gov.uk

But as usual, our government is about as effective as a chocolate teapot.

 

[Gadget Geek]

I've just watched the program on iPlayer, and I've got to say it was a lot better than Channel 4's effort last year.

Very fair and interviewed those for and against, although just saying "I'm a petrol head, end of" isn't much of an argument for discussion. Some people who were being forced to drive EV's by their company I think were still in the ICE van mind set and therefore were encountering problems. A few others were just repeating urban myths they'd heard in the pub. But on the whole, quite a good representation.

One woman made me laugh when she said she had to plan "pee" stops and she didn't want to have to plan charging stops as well. ~(Someone tell her)

Maybe it's just me, but when I used to drive an ICE car without sat-nav; if I was going on a road trip, I used to get out my trusty old AA Book Of The Road and plan my route with appropriate rest stops.
And then when I had my Prius with sat-nav, I used to look at the route it had picked for me, again looking at where the services were. So what is so difficult about seeing where the chargers are on a planned route?

 

[kin]

I think to be fair, we all have a bit of range anxiety. If we didn’t plan it properly, we could run out of charge.
The only time when I genuinely did not have any range anxiety was when I had my Tesla because of its superb charging network!

 

[Gadget Geek]

I like to think I have range awareness, I'm never anxious about it.

Now charger anxiety . . . well, that's a whole different kettle of fish.

 

[kin]

I like to think I have range awareness, I'm never anxious about it.

Now charger anxiety . . . well, that's a whole different kettle of fish.

Charger anxiety, this is where Teslas chargers beats the rest, always works!

 

[Gomev]

Contactless payment was supposed to become mandatory;

All new rapid chargepoints should offer card payment by 2020

New government ambitions will encourage uptake of UK's chargepoint network through widespread 'pay as you go' functionality.

www.gov.uk

But as usual, our government is about as effective as a chocolate teapot.

It said 'all new', the later ones are contactless, it is the older one's that aren't.

 

[evcog]

I watched it also, on iplayer, never have time to watch live TV. I also thought it was quite good and balanced. You could tell that the presenter had fun and learnt so much by the time he had finished. He did travel in some beautiful places although to an outsider they may feel we obviuosly have no main roads at all. Reminded me of the old Hammer Horror movie locations which made it look like a backward medievil country but was really Epping Forrest. Still the M6 in comparison to the back roads of the Lake District and Scotland was a very photographers choice really.

 

[bowfer]

I thought it was abysmal, very poorly researched.
Can’t be bothered explaining why, just pick any of the righty critical comments on Twitter.

 

[Rolfe]

Linky? To the Twitter comments I mean. I don't pay the BBC tax.

ETA: It's OK, I found it.

I'm not sure how much effect that will have anyway. It's getting to the point that many people know someone with an EV and most EV owners are very vocal about how much they love the EV driving experience.

Yesterday as I cycled home from a meeting in the village, under half a mile, I counted the EVs I saw. Three parked by the side of the road and two being driven. The second one I saw running was an MG, but not an MG4. With that level of penetration people are going to be listening to friends with actual EV experience, not a stupid TV programme.

 

[Ruislip Resident]

There was some very extreme pavement parking to charge at home shown. Basically anyone vision impaired was forced into the road. They wouldn't even be able to squeeze past on the pavement.

 

[Rolfe]

I saw people commenting on that. That's simply illegal and should not have been shown as a viable option at all. The thread about cable protectors has shown how pavement parking and EV charging can work. Even a basic cable protector so long as the council gives permission and the car is legally parked at the kerb.

 

[Derek25]

I thought it was abysmal, very poorly researched.
Can’t be bothered explaining why, just pick any of the righty critical comments on Twitter.

Truly abysmal. It highlighted issues such as some rapids not working, confused payment systems, lack of government support for things such as required grid improvements at motorway services and a future UK EV industry, a lack of acceptance from large swathes of the country and many councils failing to offer help to EV owners without a driveway. We all know these are non-issues and that, instead, this news programme should have been a glossy portrayal of the current EV nirvana.

 

[Rolfe]

Well, I didn't see it, but from the comments I read the problem seems to have been lack of balance. For many people an EV works brilliantly and saves a lot in running costs. If they didn't include such examples as well, it was not a fair programme.

For me, my nearest petrol station is nine miles away. On the road I take when I'm going to Glasgow, there is no petrol for 25 miles. My life with a petrol car was constantly mapping my projected journeys in my head and figuring out where to stop for petrol to avoid having to make an 18-mile round trip just to fill up, but at the same time avoid arriving home without at least ten miles of range under any circumstances. I can tell you it was close sometimes.

Now, petrol station? What petrol station? I'm hardly ever going to leave home without enough charge to do my entire day's motoring and get home. It's absolute bliss.

 

[Derek25]

Well, I didn't see it, but from the comments I read the problem seems to have been lack of balance. For many people an EV works brilliantly and saves a lot in running costs. If they didn't include such examples as well, it was not a fair programme.

For me, my nearest petrol station is nine miles away. On the road I take when I'm going to Glasgow, there is no petrol for 25 miles. My life with a petrol car was constantly mapping my projected journeys in my head and figuring out where to stop for petrol to avoid having to make an 18-mile round trip just to fill up, but at the same time avoid arriving home without at least ten miles of range under any circumstances. I can tell you it was close sometimes.

Now, petrol station? What petrol station? I'm hardly ever going to leave home without enough charge to do my entire day's motoring and get home. It's absolute bliss.

The basic premise of the programme was not to give a balanced picture of EV life. It was asking the question: are we on target to meet the government's 2030 deadline? It did a pretty good job of highlighting the issues. For sure, if you're an experienced EV driver, you can jump up and down and say but this... Or but that..... However, in the bigger picture it raised most of the main issues that need addressing.

 

[TrophyMG4]

Well, I didn't see it, but from the comments I read the problem seems to have been lack of balance. For many people an EV works brilliantly and saves a lot in running costs. If they didn't include such examples as well, it was not a fair programme.

For me, my nearest petrol station is nine miles away. On the road I take when I'm going to Glasgow, there is no petrol for 25 miles. My life with a petrol car was constantly mapping my projected journeys in my head and figuring out where to stop for petrol to avoid having to make an 18-mile round trip just to fill up, but at the same time avoid arriving home without at least ten miles of range under any circumstances. I can tell you it was close sometimes.

Now, petrol station? What petrol station? I'm hardly ever going to leave home without enough charge to do my entire day's motoring and get home. It's absolute bliss.

Agree. Effectively you have a 'petrol' station at home.

 

[Jef]

And the pavement parking lady plugging her granny charger into a 4 gang socket on an extension lead? Oh dear, fire risk.

And the presenter saying 16 amps are available from a granny charger, oh do wake up the plug fuse is 13 amps, it will not pass 16 amps.

I don't have a granny charger, my car came with a type 2 cable (very useful at the supermarket) so I have no idea what current the granny charger is capable of, perhaps someone can enlighten me.

 

[ph79]

I saw all the twitter comments before i watched and was expecting it to be worse than it was! (still not a compliment). I did pick out some fair points but i'm not sure how much a non EV person would take from it. I hate any programme with 'vox pops' of some random person with often throw away or ill informed comments when they could instead use that time for more useful actual facts!

I agree that we are not ready but 2030 is 7 years away so of course we are not ready! In the 9 months i have had an EV there has been significant improvements already in terms of rapid chargers etc so there is time but of course much more needs to be done. The different apps etc is a problem and frustrates me so hopefully more regulation will help. Let face it we have to download apps just to pay to park theses days too so its not just an ev issue its a modern technology issue.

I'm able to charge from home so 90% of the time the infrastructure is not an issue but I just listened to an episode of EV Musings podcast and Gary made a point i agree with that its is the slow 'destination' chargers that are the silver bullet not just rapids which joe public think are the be all and end all. On my recent trip to Devon i used a new Osprey site at Salmons Leap which was excellent. However when i parked in the main car park in Dartmouth i was able to plug in to a cheaper 7kw charger (only 2 spaces however so on a busy week it would be pot luck) and leave it to top up to 100% to start my journey back. The reality is car parks full of slow chargers at park and rides or main town car parks when you can lock your car and leave will solve many peoples problems and massively reduce the need for rapid charges en route or at least reduce how much top up you need.

 

[evcog]

I don't have a 'petrol station' at home. 26% of the UK population live in properties with no off street parking. So this is a serious issue for a large number of households. Combine that with the fact that those who HAVE to charge on the public infrastructure pay 10% more VAT for the privilage.
Whatever government is in charge, and they all 'support' the move to EVs, they will have to do a great deal more to encourage widespread adoption very quickly.

Fortunately, once you own an EV you learn about all the potential chargers on the normal routes you take. There are those that are available, easy to use, and don't cost the earth. Sometimes all 3 of those are availble but some numbskull planners, obviously non-EV drivers, have set parking restrictions that make it nonsensical to use. A carpark near to me had 16, 7kw chargers installed with a maximum stay length of only 2 hours. Nobody now uses those chargers.

However, when we make longer trips we are forced to use the main routeways and maybe only twice a year if its a holiday. That's when you start to notice the lack of governent action, especially when huge amounts of money have been set aside for the purpose. Planning a trip can be problematic. The ordinary car user dosn't want to take a 20 mile detour to find an available rapid charger and yes if I'm on a 4 hour journey I will pay for a rapid charger so that my journey dosn't turn into an 8 hour one.

If you have home charging and a good rate enjoy it, but there are many now, and an enourmouse number in the future, who for mutiple reasons must rely on the public infrastructure. Anybody who drives an EV has had experiences of what the presenter of the Panorama program said about charge cards, complex instructions, non-readable screens, no phone signal when you need it most. We have got used to those things but it dosn't mean we should just accept it.

As a last point I suspect that lady who runs the lead through her window while blocking the pavement has already received a call from the local council. Still the magic of instant TV fame is a difficult thing to resist by some. Just thought I could always buy a 50m extention lead, run it out my 2nd floor window, across the High Street, through the banks top window across the road then down into the carpark with the stupid parking rules and get at least 2 hours of charging a day.

Sorted.