Electricshocks

If by 2040 all cars will be electric, where will all the electricity come from to charge the vehicles when everybody gets home from work, the evening meal is being cooked and the TV is on?

What if there is no wind and the landscape littered with useless static turbines? What if it is dark and solar power is producing zilch? Will we have to start up the banks of subsidised fume-belching diesel generators to cope? Won’t that defeat the object of enforced “clean” transport? Won’t we just be relocating the pollution?

The green energy worshippers will say that by 2040 we will have an abundance of battery storage to go with the batteries required in every single electric vehicle.

But where will all the cobalt and lithium come from? Will all the toxic process and waste be factored into the emission savings claims in 2040, because they certainly are not today?

What will happen in bad weather when vehicle batteries run flat with all the extra heater and light use? Will electric tow trucks be able to cope? What if their batteries die too?

What if you have an emergency and a flat battery? What if all the charging points in your street are in use when you need to charge your car? Will people have to queue to use a charger – waiting for hours until the one before you has finished? What if the extreme demand crashes the grid and causes blackouts?

Like most green policies, sounds great in a desktop study but completely impractical in real life.

LYNDSEY WARD Beauly, Inverness-shire