To be honest, we will probably be virtually there by 2040 regardless of the governments plans. Now that the big guns like BMW, Merc, VAG etc have got on board, things could move quite fast. Yes, there will be issues such as charging, range and grid capacity to sort out but these are not insurmountable and we have got 23 years..

Anyway, my understanding is that the government are saying that no new cars sold after 2040 are to be petrol or diesel. That is a lot different to saying all petrol/diesel cars will be banned from the roads in January 2040.

I think thats why they have come up with this 2040 because certain car companies have already said there will only be Hybrid/all electric by 2030

As for grid capacity, a couple of years ago one electricity supplier warned of electricity cuts during a bad cold spell, if they cannot keep up with demand in winter what will happen when thousands of cars want charging at once, and that has to happen at some point whatever anyone says

To be honest, we will probably be virtually there by 2040 regardless of the governments plans. Now that the big guns like BMW, Merc, VAG etc have got on board, things could move quite fast. Yes, there will be issues such as charging, range and grid capacity to sort out but these are not insurmountable and we have got 23 years..

Anyway, my understanding is that the government are saying that no new cars sold after 2040 are to be petrol or diesel. That is a lot different to saying all petrol/diesel cars will be banned from the roads in January 2040.

Yes. I think the point of the 2040 target is that it will indicate the glide slope to a gradual total conversion, and nfluence investment. A big bang change is neither desirable nor possible.

Latest version of the report confirms that petrol or diesel powered cars with a hybrid powertrain will still be allowed after that date.

At that point it's not exactly going to be a difficult target. Even if that were made law tomorrow we could carry on much the same. Hybrid cars (other than in supercars) may be a bit boring but are perfectly functional.

I was already considering one of the better ones such as the Lexus IS300h or Passat GTE as my next car on the grounds of reliability anyway.

Toyota are developing a new battery system with 30 minute charging: production 2022.

tinyurl.com/y9fz9zwq

All fine and well, but e.g. a Nissan Leaf uses 0.34kWh per mile. So a car with 200 mile range would need c 70kWh for full range from empty. At 100% chargng efficiency charging in half an hour would require a 140kW supply. At 240V that is a supply current of c. 580A.

A typical home might have 100A supply fuse.

I suspect fast chargers use higher voltages and lower currents, but as the supply coming into the house is 240V then transforming the supply to feed the car won't help.

So home charging will probably be at no more than 30A or 40A. At 40A, using Nissan Leaf efficiency, a 200 mile charge would take 7 hours - presently just right for Economy 7.

A separate network of high voltage charging in residential areas would presumably need its own substations and metering. And Economy 7 would be on its head, with millions of vehicles charging overnight the electricity might be cheaper during the day.

Using Nissan Leaf effciiency, 10 million average cars doing 32 miles per day (12,000 per year) would need a total of 111GWh of electricty per day(night).

Even in a world of very fast charging, most vehicles would need to be charged mostly at lower rates to make infrastructure and peak generating requirements realistic.Super fast charging would be useful for en route recharges on long journeys.

Not intended to be super-logical, just a stream of consciousness. Hope I haven't misplaced any decimal points.

Although I am as far from Mr Gove's politics as is possible, he is correct in that we cannot carry on as we are. The horsepower race, cars and trucks becoming bigger, more powerful, more widespread ownership, it's consumption gone mad. I freely admit I'm a petrolhead and I've loved owning different bikes and cars, it's been great fun during my lifetime. But when you look at the bigger picture, our needless greed for more and more cannot be sustainable. My kids ( now adults) are much more in tune with our need to develop sustainable processes and see over-consumerism and excess as unethical and selfish. That I think is the mood of the next generation. I can't say I disagree with the goal, and it's going to be fascinating watching battery development and charging infrastructure taking shape over the next decade. I suspect that a good many of us on here will be driving hybrids within the next 10 years or so, and I also believe they will improve so much over current offerings that we won't have a problem with it either. I certainly won't though I may miss my clutch and gearbox for a while. Change is always difficult and we have 100 years of petrol engine culture to rid ourselves of. It's going to be interesting!

What a depressing chap you are GB. You sound like me!

Realism the way things are going i think, remember i've been permanently on the road since 1973 and seen the constant increases, despite weights and volumes carried being massively increased.

twenty odd years ago when there was no M25 we'd navigate our way around via favourite routes to criss cross the south east, now there's a steady stream of commercial vehicles almost filling two of the four lanes and the old routes are absolutely chocka too, it doesn't take much imagination as to what another 20 odd years will bring, and thats just the M25 district, M1 and M6 are heading to 4 lanes and by the time the 'smart motorway' misleading term is finished that extra lane will be rammed solid too.

Sorry for the gloom predictions, but we are going to reap the results of what we have voted for.

More ecomentalist blocks.

New cars made from pure unobtainium driven by unicorns gently f***ing channel no 5.

what it brings we'll just have to wait and see

I think Hydrogen will get further than all electric as that can also be used to power a house,apart from charging stations and keeping the recharge price at a reasonable level I think theres more to like than using mains charged cars

Hydrogen is the ideal fuel- plenty of it and clean, but it's expensive to produce by current methods and hard to transport and store. To liquify hydrogen would mean cooling it to -423.17 degrees farenheit, then storing it in insulated fuel tanks. That would take a lot of energy in itself.

I wish I lived in a world where there was a quarter of the population and there were still vast swathes of forest keeping the atmosphere pleasant, so that we could carry on as we are but unfortunately the human ape is too greedy and self destructive, and I wager will last nothing like as long as the dinosaurs.

Edited by corax on 26/07/2017 at 21:28