So who's getting an i3?
Discussion
Amateurish said:
Great stuff. The total traffic volume in the UK is approx 300bn vehicle miles per year. The i3 has an efficiency of 0.2 kwh/mile. So if all vehicles were i3s, we would need 60 bn kwh / year = 164m kwh / day. If there are 180m kwh available in spare capacity each night, does this mean theoretically that we could power all vehicles with the spare capacity, and no new power stations needed?
Don't forget all the power you wouldn't have to use refining petrol/diesel - not an insignificant amount....Amateurish said:
Great stuff. The total traffic volume in the UK is approx 300bn vehicle miles per year. The i3 has an efficiency of 0.2 kwh/mile. So if all vehicles were i3s, we would need 60 bn kwh / year = 164m kwh / day. If there are 180m kwh available in spare capacity each night, does this mean theoretically that we could power all vehicles with the spare capacity, and no new power stations needed?
Yikes. I hadn't seen that total miles figure before. So yes potentially. Although I did wrote I timesed 20x6 to get 180. I meant to say 20x8 as there's bit of spare either side of the E7 window. Looking at the graphs again theres about 5GW spare in the day until 4pm so anyone needing do 80m there and 80m back could get a top up within current capacity. Dont think you'll get free ev charging for ever though. Maybe until about 5 % of cars are EVs. Fully using the current capacity would make the stations run more efficiently. If you can keep a ccgt running as baseload it costs a lot less than staying and stopping as you have about an hour of fuel burn either end where you are not generating. They're also much more efficient when running full load almost 60% vs about 40-50% @ half load. But still better than coal which only about 35% gets turned into leccy. I got into an argument with a ccgt engineer once about overall grid efficency vs individual plant efficiency with wind turbines... but one thing I did pickup was once you have planning permission he can build you a 500-1000mw plant in about 2 years.
Have you ordered one Skilly? Some PHers yesterday were being quoted June delivery for new orders!
Seems they've had nearly 10,000 orders now http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/20/us-autos...
Seems they've had nearly 10,000 orders now http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/20/us-autos...
Interesting car. I hope to have a look at one soon. I have no plans to purchase though.
The one aspect of electric cars that continues to amuse me, is that most people are still delusional about the long term running costs. They may be cheap to run, right now, but before very long, governments will be forced to seek alternative sources of revenue.
The one aspect of electric cars that continues to amuse me, is that most people are still delusional about the long term running costs. They may be cheap to run, right now, but before very long, governments will be forced to seek alternative sources of revenue.
RossP said:
Have you ordered one Skilly? Some PHers yesterday were being quoted June delivery for new orders!
Seems they've had nearly 10,000 orders now http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/20/us-autos...
Yes, I ordered it around a month ago so have a late Feb delivery with REX option.Seems they've had nearly 10,000 orders now http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/20/us-autos...
Kenny Powers said:
Interesting car. I hope to have a look at one soon. I have no plans to purchase though.
The one aspect of electric cars that continues to amuse me, is that most people are still delusional about the long term running costs. They may be cheap to run, right now, but before very long, governments will be forced to seek alternative sources of revenue.
Sure, but the price of the technology will come down. On 8,000 miles a year charging will be circa £9 month compared to petrol of £90 month. If anything, with the £5k gov grant mitigating higher tech costs, the time to be in one is probably now!The one aspect of electric cars that continues to amuse me, is that most people are still delusional about the long term running costs. They may be cheap to run, right now, but before very long, governments will be forced to seek alternative sources of revenue.
TimJMS said:
Part of me hopes they fail for that reason.
They won't though. The time to be in one is now.
Surely one would need a smart meter to be billed differently for the charging (and you don't have to have one)..and they'd have to sort out the infrastructure around this.They won't though. The time to be in one is now.
Road pricing is not going to happen overnight either.
And ev's are but a drop in the ocean in the grand scheme of things, and likely to stay so for a while, so i think there are a few years to make hay..
I see most of the naysayers seem to have evaporated. It is a shame in a way that it took the 'brand power' of BMW to get things moving a bit faster on the electric car front but if that is what it takes then fair play to them - they went with a courageous strategy rather than VW's endless toe-dipping, half-hearted teasing efforts.
danp said:
Surely one would need a smart meter to be billed differently for the charging (and you don't have to have one)..and they'd have to sort out the infrastructure around this.
Road pricing is not going to happen overnight either.
And ev's are but a drop in the ocean in the grand scheme of things, and likely to stay so for a while, so i think there are a few years to make hay..
Stick a 240v/240v transformer in and how is the smart meter going to know what it is supplying power too?Road pricing is not going to happen overnight either.
And ev's are but a drop in the ocean in the grand scheme of things, and likely to stay so for a while, so i think there are a few years to make hay..
AnotherClarkey said:
I see most of the naysayers seem to have evaporated. It is a shame in a way that it took the 'brand power' of BMW to get things moving a bit faster on the electric car front but if that is what it takes then fair play to them - they went with a courageous strategy rather than VW's endless toe-dipping, half-hearted teasing efforts.
Yes, we cant underestimate the impact this car will have, the Leaf just looks liek another dumpy Micra type thing, pretty much invisible but these have a BMW badge and look compkletely and utterly different to any other BMW, in fact any other car. it has the BMW brand kudos that the public love with the intrigue of being the latest thing, I think a few people will now decide they are passionately in favour of Electric Vehicles, once something has been made aspirational and the punters are aware of it, not just the EV zealots and car enthusiasts then it will take off.The fact it shifts a bit will help, ok by our standards, seven and a bit seconds to sixty is no great shakes but it is in one silent, smooth shove, they feel fast and completely different, suspect a passenger ride will have people scuttling down to the BMW showroom.
imagine now, the Cheshire mummies assembling for Coffee, one has a Q5, another a Mini or perhaps an Evoque and one turns up in an electric car and suddenly its the latst must have accessory.
BMW have pulled a master stroke here, none of the others have credible EV, the Tesla model S isnt here yet and its a massive, 80 grand luxury car, the Leaf is a dowdy hatch, BMW have nailed it, they have an open goal of a market to aim at.
I wonder if the experience will live up to the hype though, I sincerly hope so, we need more EV's
J4CKO said:
Yes, we cant underestimate the impact this car will have, the Leaf just looks liek another dumpy Micra type thing, pretty much invisible but these have a BMW badge and look compkletely and utterly different to any other BMW, in fact any other car. it has the BMW brand kudos that the public love with the intrigue of being the latest thing, I think a few people will now decide they are passionately in favour of Electric Vehicles, once something has been made aspirational and the punters are aware of it, not just the EV zealots and car enthusiasts then it will take off.
The fact it shifts a bit will help, ok by our standards, seven and a bit seconds to sixty is no great shakes but it is in one silent, smooth shove, they feel fast and completely different, suspect a passenger ride will have people scuttling down to the BMW showroom.
imagine now, the Cheshire mummies assembling for Coffee, one has a Q5, another a Mini or perhaps an Evoque and one turns up in an electric car and suddenly its the latst must have accessory.
BMW have pulled a master stroke here, none of the others have credible EV, the Tesla model S isnt here yet and its a massive, 80 grand luxury car, the Leaf is a dowdy hatch, BMW have nailed it, they have an open goal of a market to aim at.
I wonder if the experience will live up to the hype though, I sincerly hope so, we need more EV's
While I agree that the Tesla model S is massive, the official UK pricing starts from £49,900, which seems rather good....The fact it shifts a bit will help, ok by our standards, seven and a bit seconds to sixty is no great shakes but it is in one silent, smooth shove, they feel fast and completely different, suspect a passenger ride will have people scuttling down to the BMW showroom.
imagine now, the Cheshire mummies assembling for Coffee, one has a Q5, another a Mini or perhaps an Evoque and one turns up in an electric car and suddenly its the latst must have accessory.
BMW have pulled a master stroke here, none of the others have credible EV, the Tesla model S isnt here yet and its a massive, 80 grand luxury car, the Leaf is a dowdy hatch, BMW have nailed it, they have an open goal of a market to aim at.
I wonder if the experience will live up to the hype though, I sincerly hope so, we need more EV's
I think the i3 architecture opens up the possibility of easily developing alternative bodies - a 2 seater convertible with slightyly lower weight and frontal area would be a tempting prospect.
Amateurish said:
J4CKO said:
Amateurish said:
J4CKO said:
An electric car is around three to four times more efficient in terms of energy usage than a conventional petrol engine, and yes it does move the pollution
but it is less pollution.
If we are talking energy efficiency, then you have to take into account the efficiency of the power station (say 50%) losses in the grid (10%) and losses charging the battery (another 10%). So suddenly your 90% vehicle efficiency looks more like 35% which is very similar to a modern diesel. but it is less pollution.
covmutley said:
My commute is 80 miles a day so 'in range' but its 95% motorway. I will be interested to see what impact motorway speed has on range.
If I could do it all electric, I'd probably be looking at a 3k annual fuel saving compared to my current car.
i did this exact experiment myself as a crucial part of my test drive the other day. I did 13 M/Way miles @ around 80 and it has a 20% detrimental effect on range, ie you lose 1.2 miles in range for every mile travelled (that was in 'normal' mode, not eco+ or whatever) so in effect, no worse than an ICE car.If I could do it all electric, I'd probably be looking at a 3k annual fuel saving compared to my current car.
mine will be an EV in ginger with the twirly wheels, suite interior, DC, Park assist (because it's a brilliant party trick), winter pack and free pro nav.
They've promised mar/april, but i reckon that's all lies, we'll see.......
I'm doing it for purely financial reasons, my commute is 7 miles each way with very rare long trips that i have other cars to perform, once you take into account the 0% BIK, savings in tax of not having to take money out of the business in order to buy a car privately, 100% write down against Corp tax and 50% VAT reimburse it works out half the price to the business (which is ultimately what matters) of putting a £10k upgrade on my current car. It is an UTTER no brainer from a financial PoV. I don't care if i save a polar bear, i get a state of the art new car for the price of an out of warantee second hand car. Done.....
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