2040

[gov]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40723581

So by 2040 a ban on all petrol and diesel cars Petrolheads will become Electricheads

No doubt electric cars will have advanced to acceptable levels of performance and battery longevity - although they will need to make them more audible - biggest danger is you won't hear them coming - then again they will all be self driven


would have thought that a more sensible approach would be to continue to improve the efficiency of petrol / diesel egines to reduce pollution.

Then again I shouldn't be too concerned as by 2040 I will be 92

[ekimj10]

I'm no lover of diesel engined cars but always a bit confused as to why other forms of diesel driven vehicles never seem to be part of the future ban. Surely HGV's consume a very high portion of the total and you could possibly add diesel-electric locomotives, diesel generators etc to the list.
Anyone ever see what proportion of overall sales is for cars?

[mmm-five]

I'll happily have an electric car...if tf matches my requirements. I don't mind synthesised engine/exhaust sounds, and there's nothing to say a conversion kit won't be available for older vehicles.

Plus, by 2040, if any of us have still got a Z, then it will be a classic and only driven on very special occasions. Petrol should be really cheap as there'll be very low demand

Petrol/diesel have a VERY long way to go to get anywhere near the efficiency of electric car motors...something like 15-20% efficiency for petrol/diesel versus 80% for electric.

Of course, this is all ignoring the fact that the electricity has to be produced in the first place, and it's not like we've got so much excess renewable electrical generation capacity.

Then you've got the issue of the non-green recycling of batteries - or are the millions of worn out batteries a year going to all go to landfill?

Maybe the answer is a small tokamak in the engine bay?

[Taz]

This is going to have a big effect on the Arabs

[Nictrix]

If cars are all going to be electric, where will the government get all the cash it gets from tax on fuel?
Surely they cannot raise electricity prices to compensate? This would be unfair for anybody who didn't own a car at all.
Will they just hit every driver with a massive road tax bill at the beginning of the year instead? In which case its then unfair for people who don't do a lot of miles compared to those who do tens of thousands.
Put it this way, there is no way that you will be allowed to drive about for just the cost of the electricity used to charge the car.
Maybe the future roads will have metal strips in the centre like a scalextric track with non stop electric power.

[Dav the wheel nut]

So this appears to be a ban on the production of new petrol and diesel cars in which case it could take a few years to completely clear the roads of all those vehicles. On the bright side petrol prices would come down

[Neil_87]

There will have to be some sort of special road tax bill to compensate for the loss of tax from fuel..

People aren't going to get rid of their classic and expensive exotic cars though just because they are banned? I wouldn't if I owned something really special...

I will never understand why electric cars are pushed so much, aren't hydrogen powered cars better?

[Neil_87]

So this appears to be a ban on the production of new petrol and diesel cars in which case it could take a few years to completely clear the roads of all those vehicles. On the bright side petrol prices would come down

Perhaps then we would be able to keep our petrol cars forever

[enzed4]

Road User Charges (RUC) are used here for all diesel vehicles, you pre-pay for the amount of mileage you want (e.g. $xxx for 10,000km), so basically, user-pays. If you do high mileage, you pay more (as the logic is supposed to be that you're causing more damage to the roads and the environment, but since the owners of large commercial vehicles pay the same RUC but do far more damage, I'm not sure how that works, TBH).
I suppose that idea could be used for taxing electric vehicle use.

[Smartbear]

Road User Charges (RUC) are used here for all diesel vehicles, you pre-pay for the amount of mileage you want (e.g. $xxx for 10,000km), so basically, user-pays. If you do high mileage, you pay more (as the logic is supposed to be that you're causing more damage to the roads and the environment, but since the owners of large commercial vehicles pay the same RUC but do far more damage, I'm not sure how that works, TBH).
I suppose that idea could be used for taxing electric vehicle use.

How do they check how many miles you do?
Rob

[obewan]

I'd always envisaged I'd have an electric car by 2040 - trouble is it would be one of those you drive on the pavement

[enzed4]

Road User Charges (RUC) are used here for all diesel vehicles, you pre-pay for the amount of mileage you want (e.g. $xxx for 10,000km), so basically, user-pays. If you do high mileage, you pay more (as the logic is supposed to be that you're causing more damage to the roads and the environment, but since the owners of large commercial vehicles pay the same RUC but do far more damage, I'm not sure how that works, TBH).
I suppose that idea could be used for taxing electric vehicle use.

How do they check how many miles you do?
Rob

Annual MOT check - the card on the windscreen shows the 'start' mileage and 'finish' mileage depending on how many you buy (they're sold in 1000km increments). If you're over the distance you can be fined, and can't be issued with an 'MOT' until it's back in compliance.
Here's an example of a Diesel Audi showing the min/max distance (top label is the registration with the expiry date at the top)
Edit - I was wrong about trucks not paying more - they do, as they pay extra charges depending on the weight of the vehicle.

RUC.jpg (137.23 KiB) Viewed 1183 times

[Joycey]

Maybe the answer is a small tokamak in the engine bay?

Now there's an idea I've spent the last 4 years building one

[sticky]

Producing electricity is a profit making business, add on vat and anything else they come up with in between then its a no brainer easy profit. Then add on the price of charging up along the way,,,all profit. plus battery costs + environmental taxes, more profit. Tyres +taxes, more profit, I don"t think the oil taxes will be missed, the 22 years in hand is a huge time frame to get creative on how to steal MORE money from Joe Public and every one else nearby. I think by then the only place you can buy the batteries is China, they have been buying up mineral areas in Africa FAST, as well as areas in other countries, I think the price of petrol will be cheap in comparison,,,,,,,,time to bubble wrap the zed...

OH, I forgot, road tax, insurance tax

[patriot66]

What about the thousands of airliners in the air worldwide at any one time all burning thousands of litres of kerosene - based Avgas (JetA1 etc) ? We're all, including the politicians of this world; quite happy to sit on one regularly for hours on end or have your fruit & veg flown from Chile or Kenya or wherever ! Hypocrisy ?