You’re probably aware of this already, but just in case. There is a new government initiative offering to meet the costs for businesses investing in lower carbon transport. This appears to include both the infrastructure – so charging stations for evs etc – as well as the vehicles themselves.

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/10/new-uk-100m-low.html

Don’t know if Ecotricity has call for many company vehicles, but as you probably know the Smiths electric vans are now available with a 100 mile plus range and 70 mph, might look nice in ecotricity colours…;)

Cheers graham

Last century our emissions were at a sustainable level. I’d have to say the future of a modern world’s sustainability lies with applying modern technology to ensure that nutrient cycles Nitrogen, Carbon, Oxygen etc) maintain their natural balance (sustainable).. whilst achieving massively increased energy consumption compared to last century. Biofuels grown and managed responsibly have to be a part of the package of solutions for the future.

Regards

Adi

Cheers.

The idea that petrol stations will fade out is really unlikely because (apart from the car being as common as shoes to our mentality now) how will larger vehicles – machinery, buses , lorries etc be powered to reach remote places? EV’s can just about work on a car level but EVs become really inefficient on heavy vehicles.

What is likley to happen in transport as with electricity provision is that there will be a package of solutions supplied by a variety of sources in the future.

With a 10% EU biofuel commitment by 2020.. future filling stations are at least going to have fossil fuel and biofuel blended together. (Germany currently has over 1000 dedicated biofuel pumps but blending is more popular). Alongside the internal combustion engine – charging points may evolve too. {Even hydrogen filling points like the one I saw in Reykjavik may follow suit, though I suspect EV charge point will emerge before fuel cells}. Anyhow here’s an inpiring bit of news showing how the fuel verses fuel debate is turning into a “fuel AND fuel” debate. Just look at the amazing yield difference!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:
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The Biodiesel 2020 study finds algae may hold the key to meeting large-scale, sustained feedstock shortages in the US, Europe and Asia. Using conservative estimates, algae can produce up to 10,000 gallons of biodiesel feedstock per surface acre per year vs soybeans at 48 gallons per acre and canola/rapeseed at 120 gallons per acre. Due to these factors, algae is attracting a great deal of interest and investment in the US, Europe and world-wide.

Algae are the fastest-growing plants in the world. Like other plants, they use photosynthesis to harness sunlight and carbon dioxide. Among biofuels related projects, algae is commonly grown in two scenarios. The first is in ponds or lakes (both open and closed). The second type is grown in closed, translucent tubes or containers also called photo bioreactors. In both cases, energy is stored inside the cell as lipids (the source for oil) and carbohydrates, and can be converted into fuels such as biodiesel and ethanol.
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Biofuels (plants) -like wood which has always been used for fuel- are, in principle, all renewable and carbon neutral providing that which is harvested is regrown. The RTFO Regulation here in the UK secures that all is sustainably sourced since April 2008 but but more regulation is needed internationally. With Algae.. even these concerns may disappear. So future filling stations will probably cater for many kinds of refueling systems.

Regards

Adi

That is great news. Are you aware that there are government grants of between 40 and 65 per cent available towards the cost of installing charging points for electric vehicles?

http://www.cenex.co.uk/igp_index.asp

I’m going to ask the owners of the site at Green Park if they’d allow us to install a charging point at the base of our turbine. Might be a good place to start.

Cheers.

I too drive a Berlingo and am working on a longer range car – I sometimes use a fast (1 hour / 14kW) charger if I need to do a lot of miles in a day.

I would be interested to hear about (or could help advise on) the technical details of your charging points.

I agree with you about the tyranny of the car, we do need to reclaim our streets and town centres. But we need to be realistic, we can’t all ride bikes everywhere can we? You say that people are expected to commute vast distances and that the vast majority of journeys are under five miles, all in the same sentence. That appears to be contradictory.

There’s no quick or easy answers to the problems we face. Banning the car certainly won’t do it.

Transforming it from a resource gobbling climate change nightmare to something sustainable and clean will make a big difference. That’s our goal. Cheers.

phewee. there’s an understatement if ever i saw one. bring on the crunched numbers. seems pretty impossible to me in my head.

More importantly, is it worth it?

Rather than a world where people are expected to commute vast milages every day, and where the vast majority of journeys are under 5 miles – a journey that could easily be cycled – how about a world without cars. Without congestion, without 3000+ people killed on British roads each year, with communities centred around living streets not traffic hell, without all that smug machismo that sees these things as desirable and part of life.

All this effort needs redirecting… we don’t need to save the car!

You pretty well prove that what we’re talking about here can be done. You manage with a range of 60 miles, within a year or two I reckon 200 miles will be possible. As the range goes up the need for ‘in journey charging’ goes down.

Charging at our turbine sites is possible in principle, and we hope to do some in a limited way. In practice a lot of our sites are quite remote and you’d need to drive off the beaten track to find them, which might be self defeating a bit. And then there’s a few health and safety issues we’d have. Turbines like the one at Green Park though could work as charging stations, it’s just off the M4 after all, so no real detour from a major transport route. Might be a bit of fun to set that up too, I’m going to think on it.

Actually, now you come to mention it, we’ve building a series of turbines soon at motorway services (not announced it yet so can’t give more details) – they would be perfect sites to provide some charging from. That is a really exciting possibility. I’ll see if we can factor this into our plans.

Re Lotus, yes you’re right, they make the Tesla Roadster at the moment at Hethel. I think that by the time we build our turbines, late next year we hope, production may have switched to the US, but maybe not – in which case the Tesla will be built 100% using wind energy. Which would be pretty cool.

Cheers.

Good to know an electric Smart car is coming, it’s crying out to be done. It’s exactly the car we’re looking for for a company car share fleet – thought we’d have to build our own….:) I think the infrastructure explanation/excuse is a bit lame though, Smart cars are city and town focussed things, the kind of car that doesn’t go far enough to need charging away from home – typically. Probably just some corporate spin. Cheers.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/pressReleases/idUKN1238193020080613

Some data about the UK from the UKPIA Statistical Review 2008 :-

Aggregated financial performance of UKPIA member companies

The combined financial figures (based on published accounts) of the oil companies which are UKPIA members, show that over the last 5 years they averaged a return on their capital tied up in refining and marketing of about 7.5%, or equivalent to a profit of around 1p on every litre of fuel sold. This compares very poorly with other industries. For example, the average return on capital employed for all UK manufacturing companies over the same period was 9.3%.

http://www.ukpia.com/industry_information/industry_data.aspx

More data about the decline in forecourts :-

http://www.igd.com/cir.asp?menuid=51&cirid=111

Increases in crude prices push up costs at every step of the supply chain. You have increased demand from the petrochemicals sector, limited refining capacity, uncertainty about energy policy (witness the current biofuels debacle), higher transportation costs and ever more in depth reporting to Governmental bodies (DBERR, HMRC, RFA etc). There are also costs being passed on from the non-fuel side of forecourt retailing. Given more and more forecourts are now convenience stores, the grocery costs have a greater influence. The suppliers are passing on increased food prices to the retailers, which is also impacting margins.

I fully support what Ecotricity are doing (I’m a customer), but the energy debate is not helped by factually incorrect assertions.

Phil

I have driven an electric car (a Citroen Berlingo Electrique) as my only car for the last 6 years, for most of that time powered by Ecotricity electricity.

It has a range of 60 miles and a top speed of 64 miles an hour, and runs on relatively old technology – Nickel Cadmium batteries.

My commute is 34 miles for the round trip and I drive throughout the day for work. It is not uncommon for me to drive over a hundred miles in a day. At this point, the vehicle has done over 81000 miles from new.

So while I would agree – for most people they would only need to recharge at home – for me I often need to choose elsewhere. Even so, it is not impossible, even without the current infrastructure. After all, there are many plug sockets in the country, and an ordinary plug socket and an extension lead is all you need.

My employers (county council) have been persuaded to put in an external charging point for me that I use when in meetings. And on the rare occasions when I have not enough range, I am fortunate to have access to a petrol work car.

Even long trips are not impossible, if you are prepared to take some time. I recently drove from Shropshire to fife in Scotland, charging up at friends, family, caravan sites and pubs!

Within the next year or so I am planning on buying a Chinese electric car, the BYD F3e. It has a range of 170 miles, 80 mph speed and if you have access to a 3 phase output you can get a hundred plus miles of charge in ten minutes with their lithium batteries. It seems to retail at around £15000.

Dale, is there any possibility of charging electric vehicles at your windturbine sites – can you get a 240 v output, or are there technical reasons why you couldn’t? And could you plan to have charging bays within future developments? It would certainly help with long journeys, and make for some good photo opportunities….:)

There is a private company called Electromotive recently set up a charging network within shopping centres in major cities. There is also a community initiative I have found about and used through the Battery Vehicle Society, where members allow other members to charge at their homes.

By the way, it is exciting that you have approval for the wind turbines at Lotus in Norfolk – am I right in thinking this is where the initial Tesla electric cars are being made? I know some of them are destine for California to be charged by PV – an overall inspiringingly low carbon footprint.

Best Wishes, Steve Thayne.

The woman on the Smart EV stand said the Smart EV is due for release in 2010. I asked why it was taking so long. She said to me that they’re waiting for the charging infrastructure to be built and that the oil companies are very reluctant to put charging points in their stations.

I told her that if this was true I knew of a renewable company called Ecotricity that are very enthusiastic about the electric car, and they should make a deal together!! ! Smart should be giving free Ecotricity for a year with each Smart EV??! How about it Dale?

I have to disagree with you on oil companies and the money they make out of petrol retail. It’s a core business to them and when world oil prices spike like they have recently (doubled this year) they make a killing because their oil does not cost more to produce, but they get to increase pump prices. And, if you were right and they made very little and would be glad to be out of retail – they just would get out of it. Witness Shell and it’s offshore decision – not enough money in it so they walked. There’s noting altruistic in big oil companies, if it doesn’t pay well they don’t do it. Cheers.

So if we are getting fuel from the supermarket and taking more than 20 mins to grab groceries to check-out it leaves enough time for the car to charge-up in the carpark. That’s unless (and preferable?) we stay at home and wait for the electric (Ocado) van to deliver.

Hang on – that’s how we got our bread milk and basic groceries before we had supermarkets.

Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose

To use existing highway infrastructure, US drivers will need to be better convinced that the battery will hold, especially on the way back.

But then, hopefully rural areas and large metros will figure out how to better serve those people and connect hinterlands to the city without using Auto-Freeways.

/rant/ re: Photo :: The poor station franchisee is left holding the bag dumped onto him by the sHell Oil, who won’t offer a dime to rehab the petrol-soaked lot into something more useful.

Much to the disgust and chagrin of alpha (oil) males and shareholders the world over – I think you may be right.

I.C.E is soooo last century!

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/07/10/altairnano_grid_power_sale/

Rgds

Damon