Category Archives: Electric Cars

News and reviews of the latest electric cars (full electrics and plug-in hybrids).

London Mayor announces doubling of EV charging points across London

August 29, 2017Charging, Electric Cars, News, Reviews and CommentJo

Electric vehicle (EV) drivers in London, UK will soon be able to access 1,500 new EV charging points across the city thanks to a £4.5 million investment announced by London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

The residential charge points being installed across 25 London boroughs are aimed at Londoners currently without access to off-street parking, in a bid to try and encourage more citizens to transition from polluting fossil-fuel vehicles to new zero-emission vehicles. They will add to the rapid charging points that Transport for London (TfL) is already installing, the full complement becoming available for drivers by 2020.

“This substantial investment in electric charging points will make a real difference, making electric vehicles an easier and more practical option for Londoners across our city”

said Mr Khan.

“We have a bold ambition to make London’s transport system zero emission by 2050, and working with boroughs to roll out more charging infrastructure is a vital part of making this a reality”.

But it’s not only in London that momentum towards an electric vehicle future is increasing. Auto Express reported recently that the Government is to pass a new bill requiring motorway and major fuel stations to install charging points. The Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill was announced in the 2017 Queen’s Speech. It also requires easy access to charging points, establishing a seamless network of points across the UK that conform to the same technical standards.

An investigation by Auto Express has found that charging infrastructure is struggling to keep up as EVs become more popular. Ownership of electric and plug-in cars has increased dramatically from 2,254 vehicles in 2012 to 85,983 in December 2016.

A report by the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) predicts that there will be around 700,000 EVs on Britain’s roads by 2020, meaning that an additional 60,000 chargers will be required over the next three years to service them.

Source: Renewable Energy Magazine

The car is dead, long live the car, thanks to Tesla

August 29, 2017Electric Cars, Model 3, News, Reviews and Comment, TeslaJo

Established carmakers may scoff at Elon Musk’s firm, but like Apple and the iPhone, it heralds a massive shake-up of the auto industry.

Tesla Model3 (Image: Wikimedia/Carlquinn)

Two interesting things happened last week. One was Tesla’s delivery of the first batch of its Model 3, the company’s first “affordable” car. (If you think $35,000, about £26,500 – is affordable, that is.) The second was a “diesel summit” held in Berlin, a meeting where the bosses of Germany’s leading car manufacturers (VW, BMW, Audi, Ford, Porsche and Daimler) got together with ministers to ponder the industrial implications of the emissions-cheating scandal and the decisions of the British and French governments to outlaw petrol cars and vans from 2040.

Although no one in the car industry will say so, diesel technology has been a dead duck since the emissions-cheating scandal erupted, followed by the revelations of how polluted London’s atmosphere has become, with emissions of nitrous fumes from diesels being blamed for much of the problem. And the fallout is already being seen in the sales figures. In January, for example, UK registrations of new diesel cars were 4.3% down on a year ago, while petrol car sales were up by 8.9%. If you’re a rural resident who doesn’t worry too much about the environment or resale value, then you can already grab real bargains in the diesel car market. And for the time being petrol heads can feel (relatively) cleaner than thou. But ultimately, the game is up for the internal combustion engine.

UK Tesla Model 3 production won’t begin until 2019 as electric saloon’s specification revealed

August 29, 2017Electric Cars, Model 3, News, Reviews and Comment, TeslaJo

Deliveries of electric car maker’s more affordable saloon begin in USA, but right-hand-drive models are some way off

The first deliveries of Tesla’s more affordable electric saloon began on Friday, but UK advance orders won’t be fulfilled until 2019 at the earliest.

The electric car company’s much-anticipated “more affordable” Model 3 saloon has been pitched as the car that brings EV technology to the general public thanks to a $35,000 (£26,000) price tag.

However, following Friday’s launch event, it became clear that while it is possible to buy a Model 3 at that price, very few cars will ever hit the road in base spec.

In a likely nod to the Ford Model T, introduced in 1908 and widely regarded as the first affordable car, the only standard colour is black – silver, blue, white and red all cost $1,000 (£760) extra.

The standard car has a 220-mile battery, though a long-range version with a range of 310 miles is available starting at $44,000 (£33,500). The latter also offers faster acceleration and shorter recharging times.

Meanwhile, the premium upgrade package, which includes heated seating, upgraded interior materials and a premium audio system, costs $5,000 (£3,800).

Charging Our Car at Devon Cliffs

August 28, 2017Blog, Charging, Electric Cars, POD PointTrevor Larkum

We are currently holidaying in the Devon Cliffs Holiday Park at Sandy Bay, Exmouth. We arrived last week from Northampton, having charged on the M4 at Chieveley and on the M5 at Sedgemoor.

The Solar Charge Points at Devon Cliffs - and only 2/3 of the cars shouldn't be parked there! (Image: T. Larkum) — The Solar Charge Points at Devon Cliffs – and only 2/3 of the cars shouldn’t be parked there! (Image: T. Larkum)

On arrival we found a pleasant surprise – a solar powered charging bay in the main reception car park. I have since learned that it was installed about a year ago in a joint venture with Bourne Leisure (owners of the park), Solarplicity and POD Point.

Having last charged at Sedgemoor, about 60 miles back, we didn’t need to charge again for the first few days. Then I started looking into how to start a charge – doing some Googling, searching on the POD Point online map (which didn’t show the charge point), installing the POD Point app, etc.

However, it all turned out to be unnecessary – I called POD Point and they explained that it was a private charge point – hence not on the public map – and that it was free to use. In hindsight I should have just plugged in and tried it!

The POD Point charge points at Devon Cliffs (Image: T. Larkum)

We have since made good use of the charge point, leaving the car on charge overnight most days. It is marked as a 7kW point which should charge our i3 in about 4 hours. In fact I am seeing charge times significantly longer than that so I would guess it is actually running at about half that, 3.5kW. Perhaps that has something to do with being solar powered, e.g. a reduced charge outside sunny hours, I don’t know. Anyway, the car is fully charged every morning so it doesn’t really matter.

The charge point has been a real boon – allowing us to go on long trips out most days without needing to find anywhere else to charge.

And all our holiday motoring for free.

Electric car sales in sharp rise as diesels run out of gas

August 28, 2017Electric Cars, News, Reviews and CommentJo

SCOTTISH motorists are turning in increasing numbers to all-electric and hybrid vehicles as uncertainty reigns over the future of petrol and diesel cars that are due to be banned from 2040.

Electrical charging ports are installed in some of the big cities

Latest official figures show a 64.9 per cent surge across the UK in new registrations of Alternatively Fuelled Vehicles (AFVs) to the end of last month – when the Government announced the policy – as drivers invest in the latest environmentally friendly technology.

There were 437 sales of either all-electric, hybrid or plug-in vehicles last month, compared to just 193 in the same month of 2016 north of the Border – with 3,684 new registrations of such models so far in 2017. Scottish Motor Trade Association (SMTA).

The vehicles now account for a record 5.5 per cent of the British new car market share with 70,000 registered already this year.

Diesel model sales are continuing to plummet amid uncertainty over possible higher taxes, or even bans on them being allowed into big towns and cities, because of the health impact, particularly on young children, of the nitrogen oxide (NO2) gases they give off.

New diesel car registrations fell by 20 per cent, and by three per cent for petrol models, across the UK in July, according to figures from the The Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders (SMMT) .

In Scotland, sales of diesel cars were just 4,440 last month, down by 1,214 on the same month in 2016, with petrol sales down by 744 compared to July last year, said the SMTA.

Sandy Burgess, SMTA chief executive, who said uncertainty over the Government’s Brexit plans was also weighing on drivers’ minds, urged the Government to provide “clarity” over its plans for diesel and petrol cars.

Garage forecourts are struggling to shift diesel models, despite the fact the latest models are equipped with cleaner, more efficient ‘Euro 6’ engines,= Mr Burgess said:

“We are experiencing a drop-off in consumer and business confidence and there is no doubt this is having a knock-on effect on demand in the new car market.

“Our Government must act quickly to clarify the position on the use of our current vehicles and, of course, share its intentions on Brexit.”

Number of electric car charging points in London to double in 2018

August 28, 2017Charging, Electric Cars, News, Reviews and CommentJo

The prospect of thousands of electric cars driving round London’s streets came a step closer today as Sadiq Khan announced a £4.5 million investment in 1,500 new charging points across the capital.

Sadiq Khan announced a £4.5 million investment in 1,500 new charging points PA

Transport for London and the capital’s town halls will roll-out the new green charging infrastructure – which will almost double the number of points – over the course of 2018.
It comes after the Government last week announced a ban on sales of petrol and diesel cars from 2040 to help tackle the country’s toxic air problem.

But Mr Khan, environmentalists and some motoring experts accused it of falling short of what is needed to deal swiftly with toxic air — which is blamed for a death toll of about 9,000-a-year in the capital alone.

The chosen boroughs – 25 of London’s 32 – will each receive up to £300,000 of government cash to install the standard charging points, which take between four and eight hours to charge a family car, in residential areas.

Town hall officials will now identify sites where charging points could be installed. Some of the cash could be spent on new approaches such as using lamp posts as the base and power supply for charge points, which would be cheaper and quicker to roll out with less impact on the streetscape.

They believe the scheme will help motorists without access to off-street parking to make the switch from polluting vehicles to zero-emissions ones more easily. More money will follow next year if the scheme is successful.

The new points will be in addition to the network of 150 rapid charge points for taxis and commercial fleets that TfL is installing by 2018.

Mr Khan, who wants all new road vehicles driven in London to be zero emission by 2040, said:

“This substantial investment in electric charging points will make a real difference, making electric vehicles an easier and more practical option for Londoners across our city.

“We have a bold ambition to make London’s transport system zero emission by 2050, and working with boroughs to roll out more charging infrastructure is a vital part of making this a reality.”

The money for this tranche of charging points comes from the Government’s Office for Low Emission Vehicles’ ‘Go Ultra Low City’ scheme.

Volkswagen Passat GTE Estate long-term test review: first report

August 28, 2017Electric Cars, News, Reviews and Comment, Passat GTE, VolkswagenJo

A plug-in hybrid load-carrier sounds like it should be a frugal, refined and practical antidote to the hassles of everyday life. Will that be the case here?

We’re all for diversity around here. Among the current 30-odd cars on the fleet, we have a V-twin three-wheeler, a petrol V8, a tri-turbo diesel V8, a petrol W12, an EV, a parallel hybrid, two hydrogen fuel cell cars, a petrol-electric sports car and now this, the plug-in hybrid Volkswagen Passat GTE Estate.

Those last six cars are interesting because they represent a disproportionate 20% of Autocar’s long-termer lineup – disproportionate because for now the real-world percentage of alternatively fuelled vehicles on our nation’s roads is much lower.

Diversity, then, and pioneering the future of motoring – whatever that may turn out to be. And I suppose it’s worth asking if that future is going to be one in which the plug-in hybrid prevails, and it’s a question to which I hope to find an answer or, more likely, several answers, depending on your point of view. I already have a feeling, you see, that this car is going to cause some head-scratching.

We’re pretty well acquainted with the Passat GTE. We’ve already road tested it, albeit in saloon guise, and subjected it, as an estate, to a comparison test, and the car has scored a solid four stars on each occasion. This Passat uses the Volkswagen Group’s increasingly familiar petrol-electric set-up of a 1.4 TSI petrol engine, here making 154bhp, mated to a 113bhp electric motor and driving through a six-speed dual-clutch automatic gearbox. It’s good for 0-62mph in a claimed 7.6sec, which isn’t exactly slow.

The electric motor is powered by a 9.9kWh battery, which takes about two and half hours to fully charge via a wall box charger (at the office) or four and a half hours via a three-pin domestic plug (at my house). The battery lives under the rear seats and reduces fuel tank capacity from the 66 litres of a regular Passat to 50 litres.

You can have your Passat GTE in regular form, which comes quite well equipped, or in Advance trim, which is much more generous. We’ve gone for Advance, which includes VW’s Discover Navigation Pro with an 8.0in touchscreen, adaptive cruise control, emergency braking, a panoramic sunroof and a fully configurable 12.3in-wide TFT instrument display. To that, we’ve added metallic paint, Dynamic Chassis Control (DCC, or switchable suspension settings to you and me) and the tech-tastic Driver’s Assistance Pack. We’ve also got ‘St Tropez’ leather trim.

Tesla Model 3 doesn’t have a key – and seven other things we learned

August 27, 2017Electric Cars, Model 3, News, Reviews and Comment, TeslaJo

Elon Musk’s new mass market-aimed electric car has no directly visible speedometer, comes in two battery versions and isn’t a bad option for a sleep.

lon Musk revealed Tesla’s Model 3 is unlocked by a smartphone and doesn’t have a traditional key or fob among a host of other details at the delivery event for the first 30 mass-market electric cars over the weekend.

As the Model 3 enters what Musk called “six months of manufacturing hell” as Tesla ramps up production to meet the more than 500,000 pre-orders, one of the most surprising titbits is that there is no traditional key to open and start Tesla’s mass-market electric car hope.

Instead, would-be buyers of the $35,000-plus five-seat electric car will have to unlock the car with their smartphones over Bluetooth. The car will detect the owner’s smartphone – almost all modern smartphones made in the last three years supports Bluetooth – and automatically unlock, ready to start and go.

Should the battery on your phone run flat, which is a very real possibility in the days of increased use for everything from music, cameras and now keys, Tesla has a backup in the form of an NFC key card that is apparently thin enough to store in a wallet.

Press the card against the car’s B-pillar to unlock it and place it between the seats on a special spot to be able to start the car. It’s designed for valet use, but should be good to get into the car and at least charge your phone so you can properly unlock the Model 3 and go.

But the key-less design wasn’t the only thing we learned over the weekend …

1. Two battery versions

The minimalist interior of the Model 3. Photograph: Reuters

The Model 3 will come in two versions. The $35,000 base model has a battery with a 220-mile range, does 0-60mph in 5.6 seconds and has a top speed of 130mph. It can be “supercharged” to 130 miles of range in 30 minutes and charges at a rate of 30 miles per hour via a 240V, 32A home charger.

The range-extended version, which costs $44,000, will travel up to 310 miles per charge, reaches 60mph in 5.1 seconds and a top speed of 140mph. It will reach a charge of 170 miles in 30 minutes attached to a supercharger, and charges at a rate of 37 miles per hour with a 240V, 40A home charger.

The more expensive Model 3 with the longer range is currently being produced, with the cheaper version to be produced at a later date. A high-performance version of the Model 3 will also be available sometime in the middle of next year, according to Musk.

2. There are no instruments, just a 15in touchscreen in the middle

The 15in touchscreen is the only display in the cabin. Photograph: Reuters

There’s no speedometer, battery gauge or anything else directly in front of the driver. Instead there’s a large, 15in touchscreen in the middle of the dash, which displays a virtual instrument cluster along with mapping, entertainment and cabin controls.

The Model S has a 17in touchscreen in the middle of the dash, but it is in mounted in a portrait orientation compared to the Model 3’s landscape orientation.

Energy supplier Ovo launches tariff for electric vehicle drivers

August 26, 2017Charging, Electric Cars, News, Reviews and Comment, Ovo EnergyJo

LONDON, Aug 1 (Reuters) – British electricity and gas supplier Ovo Energy has launched a new tariff aimed at drivers of electric vehicles, hoping to tap a growing market days after Britain announced a ban on the sale of new diesel and petrol cars from 2040.

Ovo Energy’s EV Everywhere tariff offers customers a two-year fixed energy rate that also includes free membership of the POLAR network of charging stations over that period.

Electricity consumption by electric cars is expected to rise as consumers opt for more environmentally friendly transport and the cost for batteries used in the cars falls.

Britain said last week it would ban the sale of new diesel and petrol cars from 2040 in an attempt to reduce air pollution.

Ovo estimates Britain will have at least one million electric vehicles on its roads by 2022, up from about 110,000 now.

“Mass adoption of electric vehicles will completely revolutionise the energy sector,”

said Ovo Energy CEO Stephen Fitzpatrick, who set up the energy company in 2009.

Users of Ovo Energy’s new tariff will receive electricity from renewable energy sources, guaranteed by certificates proving its origin. The company said it was only Britain’s third energy tariff targeted at electric vehicles.

Green energy company Ecotricity and renewable energy supplier Good Energy also have tariffs for electric car users.

Alongside the tariff launch Ovo also announced two acquisitions: electric vehicle charging point installer ChargedEV and electric vehicle technology research company Indra Renewable Technologies.

Ovo declined to disclose financial details of the deals.

The independent supplier made its first acquisition earlier this year when it bought U.S. smart grid startup VCharge. (Reporting by Karolin Schaps; editing by Jane Merriman)

Source: REUTERS

Renault-Nissan Alliance Cumulative Electric Vehicle Sales Approach 500,000

August 26, 2017Electric Cars, Leaf 30kWh, News, Reviews and Comment, Nissan, Renault, ZOE Z.E. 40Jo

Renault-Nissan Alliance, after the acquisition of Mitsubishi, is now approaching 500,000 cumulative all-electric car sales – more than any other automotive group.

The Renault-Nissan Alliance includes also Mitsubishi Motors Corporation

At the end of June 2017, the Alliance counter stands at 481,151 units (some 130,000 more than year ago).

The biggest impact on the number comes from the Nissan LEAF and Renault ZOE.

The number doesn’t include plug-in hybrids – of which, new Alliance partner Mitsubishi has sold over 130,000 copies of the Outlander PHEV.

Renault-Nissan Alliance CEO Carlos Ghosn with Renault ZOE and Nissan LEAF For COP21

“Cumulative sales of electric vehicles by the companies also rose significantly to 481,151 units, reaffirming the Alliance’s role as the leading electric car manufacturer for the mass-market segment.

The increase was driven primarily by demand for the Nissan LEAF and the Renault ZOE, which remains the #1 EV sold in Europe, and Mitsubishi’s i-Miev.”

Renault-Nissan Alliance is now aiming to become industry’s number-one automotive sales group for full year 2017.

Total Renault-Nissan Alliance increased in the first six months of 2017 by 7% to 5,268,079 million.

The newly updated Renault ZOE is the best selling EV for Europe so far in 2017

Here is list of Renault-Nissan Alliance brands (excluding joint ventures in China):

Renault (includes also Dacia, Alpine and Renault Samsung Motors)
Nissan (includes also Infiniti and Datsun)
Mitsubishi

And list of plug-in models:

Renault ZOE
Renault Kangoo Z.E.
SM3 Z.E.
Nissan LEAF
Nissan e-NV200
Mitsubishi i-MiEV and other MiEV family in Japan
Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV

There is also Renault Twizy – a heavy quadricycle.

Source: InsideEvs