[Technology] Petrol and diesel cars banned from 2035...

[Hugo Rune]

Up to 15 years of exhaust pollution to come, marvellous. Appreciate there is no quick fix and these things need phasing in slowly for many logistical reasons. Hopefully within 10 years most petrol and diesel cars will be gone.

This.

It’s a climate emergency FFS. Give the car companies 5 years or 10 at the most. I see brands like Volvo are already ahead of the curve on this.

 

[beorhthelm]

This.

It’s a climate emergency FFS. Give the car companies 5 years or 10 at the most. I see brands like Volvo are already ahead of the curve on this.

the infrastructure and physics are not problems the car companies can solve.

 

[GT49er]

I wonder what will they do with all the diesel, petrol and hybrid cars which have been manufactured but not yet sold when the ban kicks in? Maybe ship them to other countries which are left-hand-drive..

We carry on driving them until they finally croak.

 

[GT49er]

So you don't think there will be any advances in battery technology in the next 15 years, to enable an electric car to sit in low power mode for a long time?

Of course there will. Just in time for us to realise in 2035 we suddenly have a worldwide pollution problem with toxic, un-recyclable used batteries!

 

[southstandandy]

Agreed. And the first question would be how on earth can a charging infrastructure be rolled out in 15 years ? Imagine many of the streets of Brighton and Hove where people have to park a couple of streets away from their house - that's a lot of very long extension cables required.

No problem for me - I've got a box in the loft with loads of unused extension cables. I could link them all together and reckon I could at least reach the next street!

 

[schmunk]

the infrastructure and physics are not problems the car companies can solve.

That is a very defeatist attitude. With enough belief we can do ANYTHING.

 

[zefarelly]

I think this is all bullshit and bluster, not so say it doesn't need doing . . . . . there are millions of cars all over the world . . . . we have 6 . . . . 4 of them between 57-63 years old, they're not going to disappear in a hurry and they'll outlive me.

add to that bikes and scooters . . . . . massively increasing fuel tax will do the job, but not without producing sufficient viable alternatives . . . as it stands we can't even build a basic railway line so It aint going to happen in 15 years.

 

[Sorrel]

Does this only apply to cars? Or will non-electric motorbikes also be banned?

 

[beorhthelm]

That is a very defeatist attitude. With enough belief we can do ANYTHING.

its realism, understanding the scale of the problems. as posted:

There will need to be a massive upgrade of the UK's power network.
A quick "fag packet" calculation shows we will need to more than double our generation capacity to support large scale electric car charging.

We are, at the time of this post, using 43GW (http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/). There are 32.5 million cars in the UK, if 25% want to charge overnight using a 7kW charging point, they will need 56GW to be supplied. That's the equivalent of 50 nuclear power stations or 143 Rampion wind farms.

That's going to cost a few quid....

car companies are not going to be building power stations and upgrading national grid and local electric distribution.

 

[Coldeanseagull]

I drive a fairly big, old(ish) diesel Nissan X trail. I would welcome an affordable, reliable alternative to fossil fuels but what? Use bio fuel and people say under developed countries will starve as the price of plants used in the making of these will be more than food crops. Is it financially viable to pursue other routes like electric and hydrogen without the infrastructure in place?
How quickly can technology be released to the masses without breaking the bank?
There will be no cheap way to do this and it will piss people off whatever way they go.

 

[PoG]

Improve the infrastructure and make the EVs cheaper and people will make the switch. Simple really.

 

[worthingseagull123]

Misleading thread title.

 

[worthingseagull123]

Yeah, I was just wondering whether it's been said more for the Green headline without it being fully thought through. It is always swings and roundabouts, From an overall resources perspective I'm not sure a sodding great SUV is necessarily environmentally better than a small petrol hybrid, even if it is all-electric.

Private diesel cars, yeah ban 'em tomorrow - along with all SUVs.

Still, it does concentrate everybody's minds so I'm not totally opposed. If it ends up as Johnson's worst-ever decision we'll be fine!

Yes comrade.

Can you not afford one?

Hence the bitterness?

 

[Creaky]

Of course there will. Just in time for us to realise in 2035 we suddenly have a worldwide pollution problem with toxic, un-recyclable used batteries!

VW reckon that 97% of the materials in EV batteries are recyclable for the manufacture of new batteries. Mind you VW are hardly the Holy Bible when it comes to environmental statements.

 

[happypig]

I drive a fairly big, old(ish) diesel Nissan X trail. I would welcome an affordable, reliable alternative to fossil fuels but what? Use bio fuel and people say under developed countries will starve as the price of plants used in the making of these will be more than food crops. Is it financially viable to pursue other routes like electric and hydrogen without the infrastructure in place?
How quickly can technology be released to the masses without breaking the bank?
There will be no cheap way to do this and it will piss people off whatever way they go.

Car have become very cheap to own and run in the last 40 years and virtually everyone who wants one has one; more than that they are seen as a right. The next couple of decades are going to see them go back to being a fairly expensive luxury and we are going to have to find other ways of getting about.

 

[Norman Potting]

That is a very defeatist attitude. With enough belief we can do ANYTHING.

...Necessity is the mother of invention!

 

[Notters]

Ah ok. I'm pretty sure Air Quality has a direct impact on climate change though. So this policy is positive for both climate change and health reasons.

It usually has the opposite effect, e.g. diesels are better for air quality or worse for climate change. Equally we advise people they need to build a bypass to take traffic away from people's houses which leads to increased carbon emissions.

 

[FatSuperman]

Very much this - Government has a very poor track record of picking the right technology. We'll all pile into electric cars, only to be told 5 years later that we have ****ed the planet by mining all the lithium.

There is a lot of lithium out there, but it tends to only be found in relatively small amounts. Luckily, it’s highly recyclable, so secondary supply will be great. Fuel cell vehicles are probably a better option long term, but they are a fair way behind lithium in terms of large-scale deployable tech. As others have said, we absolutely must have this sort of target, or the relevant industries won’t do anything about it.

Battery tech in 15 years will be massively better than it is today.

 

[Doonhamer7]

We’re going to move to predominantly hydrogen not electricity.

 

[schmunk]

its realism, understanding the scale of the problems. as posted:



car companies are not going to be building power stations and upgrading national grid and local electric distribution.

Fine, but they could get cracking on changing physics, though.