Could an E-CAR recharge YOUR finances?
No road tax. Cheaper to run. And money off rewards if you buy one...
charge a battery could take more than 12 hours so a ‘wallbox’ charger is recommended. Consumer group Which? says the cost of installation and of adapters for charging on the go costs about £1,000.
But government grants are up for grabs. Those buying electric vehicles with CO2 emissions of less than 50g/km, and can drive at least ten miles without emissions, can get up to £350 to install a home charger through the Electric Vehicle Home charge Scheme.
Included are plug-in hybrids, the Audi Q7, BMW i8, and Toyota Prius. Cars with emissions of 50 to 75g/km, like the Mini Countryman plug-in hybrid, are also eligible.
Which? estimates that charging an electric car at home adds between £450 and £730 to your annual electricity bill.
It also compared the cost of charging an electric Nissan Leaf to that of fuelling an equivalent-sized petrol and diesel car, and found that, over 10,000 miles, the Leaf was £308 cheaper than the diesel and £609 cheaper than the petrol car.
WILL I RUN OUT OF POWER?
MOST new electric cars can go 150 miles between charges, and many of the latest have a 250-mile range. But many drivers worry there aren’t enough charging points.
Last year David Wright, National
Grid chief electricity e n g i n e e r, sent colleagues on a 565-mile trip to test how easy it was to make a long journey using the UK’s charging network. ‘Nine hours of driving, four hours of charge,’ he reported at a BP conference on electric vehicles.
In September 2018, journalist and author Isabel Hardman said it was ‘a stupid idea to get an electric car’ after her Nissan Leaf ran out of battery on a drive to a book festival in Scotland. She was left stranded when she found the charging points operated by Ecotricity were out of order. The Gloucestershire based firm provides the most charging points in the UK but has had poor reviews.
Parliament’s business, energy and industrial strategy select committee describes the charging infrastructure as ‘poor’ and ‘lacking in size and geographical coverage’.
Charging vehicles at home is difficult for the 64 pc of people without off-street parking. But the Government has pledged £500million towards charge points over five years.
Every month, 500 are installed and there are now 32,000 in 11,500 spots nationwide.
Go Ultra Low, the Government and industry electric car campaign body, says there will be enough charging stations by 2023, and at least six fast- charging points at every service station in England.
But doubts remain over how the national grid will cope. UK Power Networks estimated it had 63,000 electric cars charging from their stations in 2019, but predicts this will rise to 4.1 million by 2030.
Keith Anderson, Scottish Power’s chief executive, has warned that installing more chargers could put ‘a lot of local strain’ on networks.
BATTERY CAN BE A BOTHER
ANOTHER cost to consider when buying an electric or hybrid car, is that you have to either buy or lease the battery. The cost of leasing depends on how far you drive every year, but you will pay about £50-£100 a month. Leasing means you don’t have to worry about replacing it or any faults. Some car firms let you buy the battery, so you do not have monthly costs. But if it needs replacing after the warranty is up, this can cost thousands.
NOT AS GREEN AS THEY SEEM
RESEARCH from the RAC and Energy Saving Trust shows electric cars do make urban areas cleaner. But there are still concerns over manufacturing. Emissions from electric car battery production are higher than those for internal combustion engines, the European Environment Agency states. Meanwhile, an electric car is only as clean as the power it uses, so until all electric cars run on 100 pc renewable power, they will continue to use the fossil fuels that help generate electricity.