Agree the stinking diesel my one and only the moho has done 10000 miles in 4.5 years so hardly a big pollute. My 'e' has done 800 miles for a total 'fuel' cost under £13.

But Gad did not relate his diesel estate experience to running costs just generally praised the utility of it. The 'e' has a tall space with rear seats down I collected a recliner chair from IKEA very successfully my Foresters would have struggled but the old Volvo 245 was like a Tardis.

It may be saved by spring/summer soon but there are some really weird prices on the Agile Octopus wholesale market tracker electricity tariff tomorrow. Max'd out price peaks 7:30-10:00 (never seen that before) and 16:00-21:30 (going beyond 19:00 so much later than usual). I guess, there is not much wind or sun and fossil/nuclear gens are down to the bare bones. We live in interesting times

 

Yes, I was mentioning in the context of justifying non performance cars I suppose. Happy to stop talking about other cars in this thread.

 

My electricity use at the minute would still be inefficient in the house though achieving 2000mpge does appeal to me .

WFH I heat the office and run all sorts of stuff while the nipper is off school as well this week
a variable tariff and no control would scare me though the smart charger integration appeals
Meanwhile I enjoy pissing people off using the local bus lane legally.. small pleasures eh?

 

Given that there's less than 10 people posting in this section of the forum with any degree of regularity ... it might as well be in 2 or 3 threads that are naturally going to wander here and there.

Electric costs are an interesting argument when you directly counter 'E purchase' against traditional fuel costs. The challenge at the moment is that fuel costs ( not prices) are so low just now as no one is going anywhere. That brings its own issues - like the desire to run something like a Monaro VXR8 because 15mpg wouldn't matter a damn just now. It's what happens in 12 months time that's the unknown.

Electricity is one of the big costs in a house like ours, maybe the 'smart' thing to do is when you reach retirement age, cover every last damned square foot of roof space in solar panels, fit an 8kw battery pack,. fit a heat pump and insulate the shit out of the place. Being completely free of electricity costs for the remainder of your life would be nice and if it's free then you'd use it for much more than you currently do - E car charging included.

So then you come to something like a Kia E-Niro ( or whatever the badge will be)

Battery size (kWh) Range (km) Motor power (ps)
Long range high power 64 Up to 455 136
Mid range mid power 39.2 Up to 289 204

That's pretty acceptable and if it had a range extender to get you home i reckon you'd never need to charge offsite. The stickler as ever is the purchase price of the vehicle. My petrol costs were about £200 a month before Covid19 kicked off and i generally buy my cars outright . For a £40k EV less £15k deposit and with their crap 4.9% you're still looking at £730 a month over 3 years. I don't know that i have any desire to own a Kia that costs that much ( or any vehicle in truth) per month.

But then the way battery prices and charging tech is moving, and with what is possible in 2 or 3 years time i think this will be a very different conversation.

 

Remember the negative EROEI, though; That's a huge capital cost for a battery that will soon be knackered and solar panels after ~20 years. The energy conversion losses are very inefficient.

The thought of a wet Li-Ion in a car terrifies me - a big recycled one in the house will be impossible to extinguish in a conflagration. I can easily drop my vape cell in my coffee, if it starts smoking. You could always lose the battery & mine crypto with it instead. That'll heat the house.

You cannot beat fossil fuels for efficiency, And Kiaundai cannot even stop their ICE cars spontaneously combusting.

Old Volvos are cheap, very noice and boring to drive - though a lot else is now. But I too cannot abide stinky clankers.

 

Have you road tested the Vapeinacup theory @Nick Graves

 

We all drive around on 30l of rather flammable gasoline but I don't wanna crash either or
£200 a month is a big bill. I reckon the first 1k miles in this cost me c£40 but I wouldn't wanna lease something unless it was cheaper (to do so).

with BEVs they are erring to caution which is only right given the changes in the industry at the mo..although if you are a renter it's a bitch I'm sure

 

Aye but you see where folk come from.

If my 'fuel' cost went from 200 a month down to 20 quid a month, that £180 saving would not pay for the purchase of any EV currently on the market. So you've either got to have the money to buy one, or REALLY want one. Or you're spanking a fortune on congestion charge and need to be inside the M25 - but i guarantee as soon as the Govt notice they are losing revenue because everyone went EV the charge will be re-levied as an 'entry' charge instead and will apply to any vehicle.

 

No sorry just curious what aspect of 'e' you were compare/contrasting with. As UF says there's few enough on here anyway!

Accepting the range, I think Honda got it wrong - or rather, assuming the charger infrastructure would cope. It plainly does not here in the UK. Even city folk like to go somewhere at weekends and holidays. For now it can find a niche in my garage and give me some fun locally. Horses for courses.

On finances, like my previous new Honda 50-50 weight distribution etc I thought the price was excessive but Y2K was lining the bank balance so I thought wtf. In the case of the 'e' even more so but cash not earning much might as well have my choice, not exactly money no object but summat like.

And spot on re house/retirement age UF. I built this after I retired in 2009 and it has all you describe and more except I think most will be thinking ASHP not GSHP as mine is, with two 90m bores under the forecourt and garage floor. My income from RHIs comes to an end in October after 7 years at £546/quarter. The FITs at £150/quarter may well see me pushing up the daisies before they stop. Not sure but I think they will go on with the house but OTOH I just DGAF. It is ironic that I am reaping the benefit of the artificial incentives introduced by the universal belief in MMGW (man made global warming) which I don't share. That said being in a part of the country with no gas main it seemed a good idea not to go for an oil boiler even though they are very efficient. The heat pump and bores cost ~£16k with another £3k the solar hot water so roughly broke even to date. UFH (under floor heating) I don't include in the calc as that was discretionary choice for space heating although it did sit well with the heat pump's being efficient at 45degreesC not the 55 that is needed for normal rads.

The 9.6kWh stack of four L-ion house batteries and Luxpower controller cost £4k about two years ago. They were on track to pay for themselves in 6-7 years (warranty 10 years) but the wholesale grid prices have gone haywire lately as we depend more on renewables and rip up the predictable fossil power and nuclear. In our lattitude the sun only shines for about half the year and they can't predict weather (winds) very far out. How the **** they can't do that but so called scientists are in total agreement on global warming beats the shit outta me

 

You all ignore the obvious reality of what will happen to electric prices once governments have everyone by the gonads and there's no alternative. For reference check out the advantages of a water meter if you live in anything bigger than a shoe box by yourself. My water bill tripled.