Category Archives: Renault

News and reviews of Renault electric cars (including plug-in hybrids).

Electric superminis to cost the same as petrol cars by 2020

May 29, 2017Electric Cars, News, Reviews and Comment, RenaultJo

Renault’s EV boss says the cost of electric cars such as the ZOE will drop, bringing them in-line with conventionally-powered cars

Renault’s head of electric vehicles believes EVs like the ZOE will cost about same as similarly sized, conventionally-powered cars by the year 2020.

Gilles Normand, senior vice-president for electric vehicles at Renault, said that sales of the firm’s small EV, the ZOE, have jumped 90 per cent between 2016 and 2017, thanks to the introduction of a larger battery capacity. And he believes that as more manufacturers and suppliers invest in battery development and manufacturing, the prices of EVs will take only a couple of years to reach the same level as petrol-engined cars.

Speaking at the Financial Times Car of the Future Summit in London, Normand said, “We are moving faster than we expected. When we introduced the first ZOE back in 2012, we didn’t think the new battery capacity would come in 2016; we expected it by 2018.

“There’s now a huge amount of money being invested by OEMs and by suppliers, tier one suppliers. This will bring further technology breakthroughs in battery tech. And then it’ll further help sales, because it’ll be more affordable.

“So we mustn’t forget that the prices of combustion-engine cars will go up, and EV prices will come down. If you go for B-segment [cars like the Ford Fiesta], by early next decade we consider the prices of EVs will be on par with combustion-engined cars. With the C-segment [cars like the VW Golf], it’ll be the middle of the next decade. And in industry terms, the year 2020 is like tomorrow morning at 8am, right? And this will be another trigger point for more and more adoption.”

Source: Auto Express

People are really starting to embrace electric cars

May 28, 2017Electric Cars, News, Reviews and Comment, Renault, ZOEJo

Sales of green vehicles in the US and Europe are spiking.

As with any new transportation technology, it’s not as simple as building your first vehicle and expecting the whole world to change. And yet, it appears as if the world is finally cottoning on to this whole electric cars are better and cheaper to run thing.

The European Automobile Manufacturers Association has revealed that EV sales in the first quarter of 2017 are spiking. Overall, sales of so-called “Alternative Fuel Vehicles” have increased by an overall 37.6 percent compared to the first quarter of 2016.

Those figures seem to mirror Bloomberg’s research into the state of the US electric market, which has seen demand trend northward. In the same period, American sales of electric vehicles jumped 49 percent, with sales totaling 40,700.

As heartwarming as the stats are, it’s worth noting that the law of small numbers makes them sound a little more impressive than they actually are. For instance, Germany’s 117 percent rise in EV sales reflects a jump from 2,332 cars in Q1 2016 to 5,060 now.

Around a quarter of European greenhouse gas emissions come from transportation, as well as it being the primary cause of air pollution in cities. So there’s something of an imperative to get on with getting everyone to make the switch, which should be helped by cheaper, newer EVs, like the Renault Zoe.

Source: Engadget

In Q1 2017 Renault ZOE Sales Were Up 57%, Looking For 40K By Year’s End

May 24, 2017Electric Cars, News, Reviews and Comment, Renault, ZOE, ZOE Z.E. 40Jo

Renault opens 2017 with an electric car sales surge, as the new ZOE is selling like proverbial hotcakes.

The first quarter of 2017 ended with some 9,220 ZOE sales, which is 57% more than year ago (around 5,900).

Most of the sales comes via France – 56% (5,191) where ZOE holds an astounding 70% of all electric passenger car registrations, and notes growth of 60% year-over-year.

“Against the backdrop of a particularly vibrant and rapidly growing (up 22.9%) electric passenger vehicle market, the ZOE with its increased range of 400km NEDC has seen its sales figures climb close to 60%, and it alone accounts for 70% of the market with 5,191 units registered.”

Sales also hit new high in March – around 3,800 (41% of the total first quarter), which gives us hopes that ZOE may be able to reach up to 40,000 sales for the year (in 2016 it was around 22,000)!

Source: Inside EVs

Cheap Car Lease

May 23, 2017Blog, BMW, Buying/Leasing, Electric Cars, FAQ, Hyundai, i3, i3 94Ah, IONIQ Electric, Leaf, Leaf 30kWh, Leasing a new car, Nissan, Renault, Sales, ZOE Z.E. 40Trevor Larkum

Cheap Car Lease

Many people are in the market for a cheap car lease, and that’s something we can help with. We source our cars from around the UK and have negotiated some great deals, so talk to us.

We provide all of our cars on a monthly contract so it’s much like a mobile phone tariff. These contracts take two different forms and it’s worth outlining them:

Personal Contract Hire (PCH) or Business Contract Hire (BCH). These are straight leases, also known as contract hire. Essentially they are a form of long term rental, and are becoming increasingly popular.
Personal Contract Purchase (PCP): this is like a lease. However it has the benefit that at the end of the lease you can choose to keep the car. This is done by making a large one-off or ‘balloon’ payment. A PCP is now the most popular way for people to buy their new car.

Cheap Car Lease – Electric Car

We specialise in selling electric cars. With an electric car you get a new car at a low monthly cost, and it’s also especially cheap to run. The technology of electric cars is developing very fast with new models coming out all the time with longer range and greater performance. Our advice, therefore, is always to expect that you will give the car back at the end of the contract. Then you can upgrade to a new and better model.

Most popular electric cars on cheap car leases (Image: Fuel Included)

Essentially you don’t want to be in a situation like someone paying off an iPhone 4 contract when everyone else is upgrading to an iPhone 8. That’s why for our purposes you can consider leases and PCP to be equivalent. They are just finance contracts where you get a new car with an initial upfront payment plus a regular monthly payment. The key thing is what the car is costing you per month.

The beauty of electric cars, of course, is that you can save a lot of money each month on fuel and road tax. This can virtually pay for the car, i.e. you can get a new car for free. It’s because of the low ‘fuel’ costs (i.e. charging with electricity) that many of our cars are offered with free charging. Specifically we provide the first 10,000 miles of charging at home for free. This, along with email and telephone support, is the Fuel Included service.

Cheap Car Lease – Saving Money

If you’d like us to work out how much money you can save with a cheap car lease on an electric car, try out the Fuel Included ‘total cost of ownership’ service.

If you just want to see how much an electric car would cost check out our most popular deals below. We provide both fully electric vehicles (EV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV):

Electric Car Day – Focus on Renault ZOE

May 22, 2017Blog, Electric Cars, Leaf, Leaf 30kWh, Nissan, Renault, ZOE, ZOE Z.E. 40Trevor Larkum

We were very pleased to be able to show off a Renault ZOE at our test drive event recently. It’s one of the new longer range ZOEs with the larger 41kWh battery (where the previous version was just 22kWh) so it has nearly twice the range.

Renault ZOE at our test drive event in Milton Keynes (Image: J. Tisdall)

It was a very popular vehicle, with all available slots for test drives taken. The general opinion was very favourable – this is a lovely car. Plus having the longest range of any electric car on the market (bar the Tesla) certainly works in its favour.

Prices are here: Best Renault ZOE Z.E.40 Deals

Below is a brief video walkaround comparing the Nissan Leaf and the Renault ZOE.

Our thanks go to Paul Smith of Brayley Renault for bringing the ZOE to central Milton Keynes and for taking our customers out for test drives.

Electric Cars For Sale

May 22, 2017Blog, BMW, Buying a new car, Buying/Leasing, Electric Cars, FAQ, Hyundai, i3, i3 94Ah, IONIQ Electric, Leaf, Renault, ZOE Z.E. 40Trevor Larkum

Electric Cars For Sale

If you’re looking to buy a new or used electric car then you’ve come to the right place. Electric cars are getting very popular very fast and we have lots of electric cars for sale from a wide range of manufacturers.

We are a leading independent broker with wide experience of electric cars so we are able to advise you about all the ones on the market and which ones would suit you best. We are based in Milton Keynes in the East Midlands and are able to supply electric cars throughout the UK.

In addition to pre-sales support we offer our special Fuel Included service with many of our deals. This provides ongoing telephone and email support as well as refunding the cost of your first 10,000 miles of charging.

Going Electric

If you don’t know whether an electric car would work for you economically then talk to us. We provide a ‘total cost of ownership‘ (TCO) service, for free, to help you calculate how much you might save by going electric compared to a fossil-fuelled car.

Just get in touch with us or fill in the form on our TCO page.

Widest Range of Electric Cars For Sale

We source electric cars from all the main manufacturers including BMW, Nissan, Renault, Volkswagen, Kia and Mitsubishi. We get good deals and pass them on to you.

By being independent we can advise you best on what would suit you – whether it’s price, long range, performance, looks or a combination of all these. We can also help with installing a charge point.

Prices and details for the offers on our most popular cars are below. We provide both fully electric vehicles (EV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV):

Should you buy a used electric car?

May 20, 2017BMW, Electric Cars, i3, Leaf, News, Reviews and Comment, Nissan, Renault, ZOEJo

With more coming onto the used market, is now the time to go electric?

The used market for electric cars is pretty attractive. If you’re buying. If you’re selling then it can be a distressing experience as the initial depreciation on many electric cars is proving very high [Fuel Included Editor’s Note: of course with a PCP lease, you get a guaranteed final value and so are protected from unexpected depreciation]. The market seems to feel concerned that technology is moving so fast that an electric car even a few years old may be ‘old tech’ fairly soon, and that is reflected in the prices. Which, if you’re buying and you understand the market, can be very good news indeed.

For example, you can pick up a used Nissan Leaf for under £6000 these days. A car like that will give you free access to London and other zero-emission zones, will cost very little to keep powered up, will be cheap to tax and doesn’t cause pollution – at the tailpipe.

Of course there are things to watch out for. Older cars will almost certainly have less range, so range anxiety really is a thing. And the other anxiety thing is the battery. Will it last? Is it included in the price or is it leased? These are vital questions.

If you buy a more expensive electric car like a Tesla or a BMW i3, then the battery is something you’ve bought along with the rest of the car. Many others are only offered with a leasing deal on the battery, with charge that scale up as mileages mount.

A Nissan Leaf or a Renault Zoe fall into this group along with many others. Battery lease costs are around £70pcm. And don’t forget you’ll need to add a charger at home. This can be in the £279 to £354 range depending on speed of charge.

So all that is something to factor in while you’re looking at fuelling costs of only about 2p per mile. Maintenance costs can be as little as a quarter what a comparable petrol or diesel car would cost too, so there are definite compensations.

Nissan Leaf

Used prices from: £6000
Real-world range: 60-90 miles
Battery warranty: from 5 years/60,000 miles

The top-selling Leaf can be had with a battery either bought outright or leased for £70pcm with an annual limit of 7500 miles. Later models with 30kWh batteries have a greater range.

BMW i3

Used prices from: £14,000
Real-world range: 80-100 miles
Battery warranty 8 years/100,000 miles

The achingly contemporary looking i3 includes the battery in the price. The looks are backed up by carbonfibre and aluminium, with the battery array low in the floor so it drives well.

Renault Zoe

Used prices from: £5000 (with leased battery)
Real-world range: 70-100 miles
Battery warranty n/a

Second only to the Leaf, the Zoe offers practical space and is a very useful car as well as being quite fun to drive. The leased battery can take a fast charge as another practical bonus.

Car Leasing Deals

May 19, 2017Blog, BMW, Buying/Leasing, Electric Cars, FAQ, Hyundai, i3, i3 94Ah, IONIQ Electric, Leaf, Leasing a new car, Nissan, Renault, ZOE, ZOE Z.E. 40Trevor Larkum

Car Leasing Deals

Traditionally in the UK we have tended to buy cars outright and then run them into the ground. That has changed in the last few years so that most people buy cars on some form of finance, and there are some good car leasing deals available. The main kinds of finance are Personal Contract Purchase (PCP), and leasing also known as Personal Contract Hire (PCH).

These forms of finance both tend to come to be nearly the same thing for a driver who wants to change their car regularly. In both cases, there is an upfront payment and then a regular monthly payment and the term of the contract will typically be 3 years. It’s much like a mobile phone contract.

With a PCP you can keep the car at the end of the contract (by paying a larger final payment). With a lease you generally give the car back (though there are even exceptions to this). If you plan to upgrade at the end of the term, they basically come to the same thing. They are both a form of long term car rental (though there are some pros and cons). Therefore people may talk about car leasing deals and actually mean PCP deals or PCH/lease deals. Really they are just looking to get into a new car for a low monthly payment – which is what we do.

Electric Car Leasing Deals

What’s interesting to note is that car leasing deals work really well with electric cars like the BMW i3 or VW e-Golf. They save you a lot of money on fuel (a fill up is typically about £3). Plus the fixed term contract means you get to upgrade your electric car every few years. So it’s just like upgrading to the latest iPhone 7 or whatever rather than being stuck with old technology.

With an electric car that means every few years you’ll get a new car with longer range and better performance. Yet they remain cheap to run and you don’t pay road tax (and often get free parking).

Electric Car Leasing Deals (Image: Fuel Included)`

If you’d like us to work out how much money you can save with a cheap car lease on an electric car, try out the Fuel Included ‘total cost of ownership’ service.

If you just want to see how much an electric car would cost – and in many cases with the first 10,000 miles of fuelling included – take a look below. We provide both fully electric vehicles (EV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV):

Cheap Cars for Sale

May 18, 2017Blog, Buying a new car, Buying/Leasing, Electric Cars, FAQ, Leaf, Leaf 30kWh, Nissan, Renault, ZOE, ZOE Z.E. 40Trevor Larkum

Cheap Cars for Sale

Like lots of people we are always looking for cheap cars for sale/cheap cars to buy. This is because so many of us spend a considerable amount of our income on our car and are naturally interested in saving money. However, it is still relatively uncommon for people to consider getting an electric car. This is despite them being notoriously cheap to run, and therefore good value when considered in terms of the ‘total cost of ownership‘. For example, what other new cars can you buy from £200 per month including fuel? That’s certainly worth considering if you’re looking for cheap cars to buy.

Most people’s hesitation with going electric is probably because they assume they’ll be expensive to buy. To be fair, they do tend to be more expensive than an equivalent fossil-fuelled car to purchase. However, it’s not true across the board. Electric cars vary in price all the time and if you’re looking for cheap cars to buy there are bargains to be had (especially on car leasing deals).

Nissan Leaf and Renault ZOE: Cheap Cars to Buy

It’s interesting to note, for example, that the Renault-Nissan alliance seems to price its Renault and Nissan vehicles alternately high and low. This means that when one is expensive the other is cheap. Of course, this may be an accidental result of launch timing. When the Leaf 30kWh launched it was expensive and the ZOE 22kWh was a cheap alternative. Then the ZOE ZE40 launched at a high price. The Leaf had been around for a while so then it looked like the cheap alternative.

Renault ZOE and Nissan Leaf - cheap cars for sale — Renault ZOE and Nissan Leaf

Currently the Leaf is sells at very low prices, partly because the long range ZOE has the spotlight. It is probably also in part because the market knows there’s a long range Leaf on the way. If you’re wanting a cheap car for sale then the current Leaf is your best bet.

The new Leaf will launch in September and should be available to buy by the end of the year. If it follows the usual trend it will initially be at a higher price. Suddenly the ZOE will again look like the cheap alternative.

Both are great cars though and, like all electric cars, are considerably cheaper to run than their combustion equivalents. Please use our ‘Total Cost of Ownership’ calculator if you’re looking for cheap cars to buy and you want to know how much money you could save.

Cheap Cars for Sale Near Me

If you’re specifically searching for ‘cheap cars for sale near me’ then note that we have bases and electric car suppliers in Milton Keynes, St Albans, London, Northampton, Bedford, Cannock, Leicester and Liverpool. This allows us to supply all around the Midlands (including London, Cambridge, Luton, Oxford, Rugby, Kettering, Coventry, Nottingham and Birmingham). However we can deliver all around the country – just contact us for details.

A Total Cost of Ownership Comparison of ZOE Vs CLIO

May 15, 2017Blog, Buying/Leasing, Cost of ownership, FAQ, Renault, ZOE, ZOE Z.E. 40CLIO, Compare, electric car, Total Cost of Ownership, ZOEJason

At Fuel Included, we have run our Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Calculator on a real-life example to help show the way the costs break down, and the considerable savings that can be made.

Today we have gone head to head with an all Electric Renault ZOE Dynamique 40 kWh, and a Petrol engined Renault CLIO Dynamique Nav TCe 90.

We have taken a commuter travelling into central Milton Keynes each day and parking as our representative driver. These tables show the total monthly cost* by summing all costs for the three year period of the lease and dividing them by 36.

Total Cost of Ownership

Electric ZOE Vs Petrol CLIO cost comparison for 20,000 miles per year

Electric ZOE Vs Petrol CLIO cost comparison for 15,000 miles per year

Electric ZOE Vs Petrol CLIO cost comparison for 10,000 miles per year

Conclusions

Even at the lower ranges of driving there are significant cost savings to be made. However, we see that as the mileage increases, the money to be saved is simply staggering.

Please contact us if you would like us to assess the cost of ownership of an electric car for your use case.

*Assumptions made for these calculations:

Petrol price from Sainsbury’s Bedford £1.21 per litre.
Electric charging is home charging plus 10 charges per year at £6 per charge from the Ecotricity rapid charge network.
CLIO mpg 52 from https://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/renault/clio-iv-2013
Both cars taken on 3 year PCP. Clio prices from http://offers.renault.co.uk/cars/clio/selection?offer=305 and ZOE prices from our current Fuel Included offer.
ZOE miles/kWh 4.5 from manufacturers real-world mileage figure divided by battery capacity.
Home charging Economy-7 unit cost 7.5p
Tax: Clio 1.2L 118 g/km CO2 = £160 in year 1 and £140 per year subsequently.
Parking costs based on person parking 200 working days per year in Milton Keynes town centre