UK X: Who Wants To Live Forever

[wakka]

Going back to the ULEZ for a minute, the majority of Londoners (i.e. the people it actually affects) support it, and it has already massively decreased nitrous dioxide and consequently improved air quality.

The idea that it doesn't work and no one here supports it are, not to put too fine a point on it, bollocks.

[MartyG]

What I suspect is most likely to happen is that politicians will cave to demands to drop green policies for fear of losing votes and just let the problem fester until it becomes a crisis, rather than doing what needs to be done right now as politics these days is based mostly in the short term when what is required is long term planning.

https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/rishi-sunak-net-zero-hassle-families-b2380806.html

The carpets don't get easier to clean the longer you leave them to get dirty.

[Neon Ignition]

I look out of my window and see driveways with 4 or 5 cars on them - these people drive to work, are you trying to tell me that it's not possible to install charging points at car parks at work, or in multistory car parks?

It's more than possible to resolve these things, anything else is an excuse to leave things at the status quo.

I don't believe that people need 4 or 5 cars per family. Want maybe, and that's most of the battle - people don't want to give up that convenience - it's schemes like this that ultimately force change and in this case I really do think it needs more stick than carrot.

It's absolutely an issue that many own too many cars without need like Chelsea Tractors simply to do short distance school run but in most cases it's not possible to install charging points in places like work car parks (most work places won't have a car park or at least one with enough capacity and an employer willing to foot the bill. Same for multistories, most don't have the space required which is why you're often lucky to see even a handful and they're often already taken up. If you can't charge at work where do you charge? If your home can't provide power then where else? Supermarkets can't do it, their car parks would become blocked up battery charging banks by 9.00am in the morning with people who popped in for their shop waiting another hour and a half to have enough juice for their commute. The scale of the charging issue is one that is eye watering, with nowhere near enough attention put into it.


The biggest elephant in the room that neither government wants to raise is the fastest way to cut commuting pollution numbers - home working. Instead they encourage commuting to try and shore up businesses creating a catch 22.

Whilst London is more supportive of ULEZ charging, it's also hugely disproportionate to the rest of the country when it comes to numbers of people reliant on cars for commuting and even the numbers involved affected can count into the six digit figures so it's important because it can sway bigger decisions as we're seeing now. It's why they've hit an unnecessary stumble here, by widening the reach they begin to hit areas where the common arguments in favour hold less weight and cause more of a stir. Manageable, if you don't have a halfwit like Khan blundering his way through it shotgun in arm.


The next policy in the firing line will be the 2030 fossil fuel car sale ban. It will get extended to 2035 as soon as both parties stop playing chicken trying to get the other to do the dirty work over something that makes all practical sense.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jul/25/labour-urged-to-work-with-tories-to-counter-ignorant-climate-policy-attacks

This is the glimmer of the right approach. Remove everything to do with green policies from political campaigning. Fully agreed cross party work, a more even and measured approach that no-one can start disagreeing with to score votes and is instead focused on shared aims.

[Lebowski]

What I suspect is most likely to happen is that politicians will cave to demands to drop green policies for fear of losing votes and just let the problem fester until it becomes a crisis, rather than doing what needs to be done right now as politics these days is based mostly in the short term when what is required is long term planning.

https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/rishi-sunak-net-zero-hassle-families-b2380806.html

The carpets don't get easier to clean the longer you leave them to get dirty.

Carpets on fire dude

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66289489

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-66287208

We've got to a point where massive parts of the world just aren't interested in green issues, China is not interested in cutting its pollution as its would ruin its economy, America is in a Trump funded grift where science and religion are at war. Russia wants to sell gas and oil and drop bombs on people.

Here in the UK we've just shown that if a green issue effects us personally then it can GTF, Just stop Pissing people off is the response to climate protesters. The ULEZ response from voters feels like a massive act of stupidity, voting back in the people responsible for why you cant afford to use a system aimed at cutting pollution in your local area deserves a slow clap.

[Neon Ignition]

The international aspect is where it becomes mind-boggling. If the entire UK suddenly switched to electric you'd be looking at an eye watering level of demand for battery production, all of which woudl be fuelled from other countries such as China producing them via completely non-green methods and then importing the power to charge them. Essentially, even achieving net zero by the targetted dates would be a lie, we'd be exporting it in an economic equivalent of brushing it under the carpet and hoping no-one notices. That then highlights the scale of need for the UK to go all out on growing its renewable and nuclear energy sources and that's where we circle back around to the same issue again - our politicians. Anyone - anyone - ever falling for the line from a Tory that they are good with finances and business in future needs a slap. It will be one of the biggest own goals the UK has committed this century when the lithium mining dust settles.

[MartyG]

The UK isn't going to "suddenly switch to electric" though, is it? It's going to be a gradual change in line with the availability of vehicles - those sales hover around the 200K mark for EVs per year (and around 1.5 million new cars in total). It's a myth that the production of EVs (including the batteries) is just as polluting, it's around a third of fossil fuel powered cars over the lifetime of a vehicle. New processes to generate the heat required for steel without fossil fuels are also starting to come into production.

There is a new factory coming online within the UK to create these batteries from the Tata Group, and as car manufacturers don't want to fall behind their peers, others will be creating battery factories to keep up with the demand for the vehicles, so no, it's not all going to come from China.

It's perfectly possible to switch to electric vehicles, and as new technologies such as the solid-state batteries Nissan has developed (and others are trying to), it will change the required material quantities and types, whilst becoming lighter and more powerful, and only requiring a fraction of the time to charge.

It just requires politicians to look further than the next general election to put the policies in place that are needed to ensure that it happens. The technology is there and continues to advance.

[Anpanman]

It will be gradual but there is more to it than just the availability of vehicles, you have the maintenance, parts supply and of course infrastructure but not just with the charging points it is also the infrastructure which supplies those.

The Nissan solid-state battery could be the thing that really makes people sit up and think. Currently the range on EV's is bad, very bad and worse in winter.

Hydrogen is still better.

[Asura]

If Londoners cut all the cameras down at the same time that’s the ULEZ zone over with. Then just keep cutting them down in unison if they go up again.

"We" (by which I mean the British people) didn't riot when the Tories, a few years ago, created a Twitter account called FactCheckUK, posing as an independent government body, and used it to smear their opposition.

Forgot about that, didn't we?

If we're not going to - and I mean this - literally start fires and brick windows over doing something so brazen, so scummy, so absolutely against any semblence of understanding right and wrong - then there's no way we're going to collectively interfere with ULEZ cameras.

[Cassius_Smoke]

I do feel at this point, the government could roll vans down streets and just start killing and dragging people away and we'd all shrug. As long as its not us.

[CMcK]

It will be gradual but there is more to it than just the availability of vehicles, you have the maintenance, parts supply and of course infrastructure but not just with the charging points it is also the infrastructure which supplies those.

The Nissan solid-state battery could be the thing that really makes people sit up and think. Currently the range on EV's is bad, very bad and worse in winter.

Hydrogen is still better.

Where are these mythical solid state batteries? I’ve had plenty of people tell me about them since I bought my EV but still haven’t seen a car announced let alone on sale with such an option.
The range on EVs isn’t the same as a tank of petrol or diesel but it certainly hasn’t stopped me from driving from Scotland to Wales and England as I require. And at less than £4.50 when charged at home for circa 200 miles I’ll cope!
The hydrogen thing isn’t happening. Needs loads of spare electricity we don’t have to produce it. Fuel cells are expensive and have a relatively short lifespan. The storage tanks are expensive, take up a lot of space, have a fixed lifespan and need to relieve pressure periodically so waste fuel. There’s pretty much nowhere to fill up and the cost of retrofitting petrol stations is substantial not mention a huge fleet of tankers to transport the stuff. By contrast electricity is already widely available all over the place.
The electrification of transport is going to put me out of a job. It’s not the perfect solution but it’s the best we’ve got. I actually use hydrogen trailers and work on, what was at the time of its construction, the largest hydrogen purification plant in Europe so do have some idea what I’m talking about.

[MartyG]

Here you go: https://www.nissan-global.com/EN/INN.../ARCHIVE/ASSB/

https://uk.nissannews.com/en-GB/releases/release-8aef385f4e3efd0619b175c6650e5b47-nissan-unveils-prototype-production-facility-for-all-solid-state-batteries?selectedTabId=releases

https://www.electrive.com/2022/04/18/nissan-all-solid-state-battery-will-nissan-make-it-first/

It is currently being prototyped by Nissan, and they claim they have made breakthroughs with the first vehicles tabled for 2028.

There are other companies like QuantumScape also working on it - there is a big investment in this tech: https://www.quantumscape.com/technology/

[fishbowlhead]

What I suspect is most likely to happen is that politicians will cave to demands to drop green policies for fear of losing votes and just let the problem fester until it becomes a crisis, rather than doing what needs to be done right now as politics these days is based mostly in the short term when what is required is long term planning.

https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/rishi-sunak-net-zero-hassle-families-b2380806.html

The carpets don't get easier to clean the longer you leave them to get dirty.

Doesn’t matter either way now, the planet is long past the point of no return for saving it.

Edit. Well saving it for humans to live on anyway.

[Hirst]

Funnily enough, as a non-EV owner I've never had too much worries about the EV charging side. The longest journey I'm likely to make in the year is to the seaside and that's about 100 miles, which I'm pretty sure almost any new EV could do without grief. I could get a car charger put in at the house, no worries. That side doesn't really bother me.

The problem is more that I'm one of a sizeable amount of the population who have only ever owned cheap used cars that I've bought outright with my own money and EVs haven't been around long enough that this segment exists. The cheapest Nissan Leaf (generally regarded as the cheapest workable EV you can get) I can find is £3375 and at this stage the battery only gives about 60 miles range, which really isn't going to cut it as-is but will only get a lot worse until the point where it packs up completely and leaves me with a car-shaped brick where the cost of battery replacement would outweigh what I paid for the car in the first place.

I can't just pull thousands of pounds out of my pocket like that, nor can I commit to paying hundreds of pounds every single month without fail to a leasing company for a car I didn't even want. I've been involved in the motor trade for a long time and I wouldn't touch a lease, very few in the trade do (we always called it quicksand - once you're in the leasing segment, it's hard to get back out). Maybe in 10 years, you'll be tripping over cheap used EVs and some guy on the industrial estate will swap a new battery pack in for a few hundred quid, but that's not really any good to people who are in that position right now.

If the alternative is public transport, I could write a book about my experiences with that - my favourite chapter would be the one where I list all the routes they quietly discontinued during Covid and never brought back.

[CMcK]

It’ll take time for a decent amount to second hand EVs to be available but that will happen eventually. I do wonder if they’ll ever get quite as cheap as the ICE equivalent though as there is good value in the batteries even way down the line. The early Leafs didn’t have particularly sophisticated battery management so have lost a chunk of range over the years. Once better cars filter down hopefully more useful vehicles will be in good supply.
Have to agree with you about the leased car conundrum. I have a friend who’s not on great money that puts a fair chunk of his wages into leasing a car. He’s due to change it but with the present interest rates he’s going to have to drop to a smaller car. Worst of it is he doesn’t do many miles a year, he’s twice had perished tyres during a lease, and has no real need for the shiny new car.

[Neon Ignition]

I'm considering leasing when we next change the car in the next couple of years. We do a fair bit of mileage per year and so face a situation where I could finance a car but if I finance a second hand car over 4-5 years then at the end it's not long into another finance agreement to replace it then I'm not really gaining much. We paid our current car off around 2 years ago but now lockdowns are gone the rate of repairs coming due is increasing so it's cheaper atm but there's a timer meaning I waver as to what the best replacement approach will be next time.

In terms of charging, the only way it would work at our house would be if the council fitted charging points outside the front side of every home and then made the road space in front of each house private to that home. That would only cover around 2/3 of the properties though as their isn't room for everyone. There would then need to be a ban on public parking paid or not on every single residential street in the area to stop residents being blocked from being able to charge their cars - and some sort alteration as otherwise councils will be sued left right and centre for the hundreds of charge cables strewn across the pavement.

As for the EVs. The long term tech improvements are a given but also circle the discussion back around to the short term issues and concerns. The Government are aiming at massive milestones within almost less time than they spent 'getting Brexit done', how much faith can anyone have that that is likely and won't cause more issues than needed simply to try and beat the EU? Also, what are the exit plans for ULEZ schemes when the issues they address no longer apply?

It all comes back on the politicians and the decisions they make and the way they communicate it. In principal I have no issue at all owning an EV right here and now if I have the means to keep it running. But I also already know that in 3 or so years time when I next change my car that it will 100% be another petrol car because there's absolutely zero chance the issues blocking me will be addressed and given it's essential to our household I can easily see why a smug politician trying to reach into my pocket for hundreds of pounds every month whilst calling me a near Nazi would see my vote go to his competitor. If we're genuinely that close to cutting emissions by severely cutting the knees out from under the fossil fuel industry, we don't need to be that blunt with struggling families.