Exactly.. Electric cars is not to way to go. We’re still going to be polluting the earth even more. More electrical requires more coal, nuclear power etc.

This is great news, I hope they’re a success!

Nuclear Power doesn’t cause any pollution. More radioactivity is released into the atmosphere from burning coal.

@Alan Lawlor. Solar panels can produce as much as 75% of the full power from a cloud-covered sky.

Journalistic standards are really slipping.

Fair enough.

Alan, you need to factor in the cost of battery replacement for second hand ones .

Actually a friend has one, he commutes a considerable distance each day and has worked out that, annually, he will save a considerable amount. He did his research before committing and hasn’t regretted his decision, plus the acceleration on those things is something you have to see to believe.

No you don’t. My wife bought a 2012 last year. There are cars with the same battery and no loss of capacity, with over 200,000km done.

Robby, Nissan have a €4k scrappage deal on at the moment that means you could get a Leaf for €17490ish which isn’t huge for a new car.

Call it Finnegan’s Wake.

Gaeltán I have a nagging feeling ‘luas’ might already be taken by another vehicle.

Beg to differ…

Bought a Tesla Model S, arrives July 13th. €85k with 5 year finance @1.2% and guarantee to buy back at 75% after 3 years. Better deal than all the other mid/high range cars.

Me or my partner are most certainly NOT hipsters…

All so called green tech is subsidised by the government. It takes money from industry they ideologically oppose through taxes such as the carbon one – and redistribute it to ideological politically ‘approved’ green business such as wind, electric car etc. – which without government intervention would be unviable.

Giz a spin when it arrives Drew!?! Stunning car!

Ever heard of climate change?

Grand but let’s see how it wears from here on. The battery will detoriate

These fears have proved unfounded. Our three year old EV has had no battery degradation after 50k – you can get full battery reports from the car. High mile users such as taxi drivers have shown the same thing – only a very small reduction after 100k. Modern battery technology is far better than before and this issue is not the EV killer that naysayers believed. When the next generation of EVs with a 300km range and price range of around €30k come in they will sell in big numbers. The fuel savings are huge and the servicing costs tiny – no oil, no coolant, no timing chain, fuel injectors, spark plugs etc. Oh, and as mentioned, the acceleration is great!

At 3 years I wouldn’t exist much degradation, it’s at 5 years or 8 years I’d expect it. Hence if buying second hand be very very careful.
I’m far from a naysayer and fully support electric cars, oil isn’t getting cheaper and solar and wind is getting cheaper esiecially if we dump the excess capacity into to cars.

Rather than time it is charge cycles that are the concern so it is mileage not age to look at. There was also a big fear that fast charging would be very damaging but again this has not turned out to be the case. The EV taxis use multiple fast charges a day and have not had problems. Where there have been issues is in very hot climates (e.g. Arizona) and it turns out that our temperate climate is ideally suited.

My dad’s one is 2011 and the battery is still great, I don’t think he’s had any replacement parts at all. It’s more than paid for itself in saved fuel costs. My mum has a regular car and they use that for long journeys, their system works very well.

VW Beetles were also assembled in Dublin post WW2, on Shelbourne Road, in Ballsbridge. Located beside that was a separate business, ‘The Swatika Laundry’, which had a massive brick chimney with that written on it – and swastika symbols also;I kid you not!

It’s a bit dated now but there’s a good film called “Who killed the electric car”.

It’s not the final word by any means but it makes a lot of interesting and valid points.

The real issue about electric cars is that we are still thinking about them as a straight replacement for petrol/diesel cars.

As pointed out, the energy density (ie = range) of batteries is way less than liquid hydrocarbon fuels.

But, if we re-think how we configure our use of vehicles, battery powered cars could be a far cheaper and more efficient means of personal transport.

We know that the average daily distance requirement is less than 30km. Eg mostly commuting and local stuff, shops, school runs etc.

So, as regards owning a car, a range of say 60 to 100km will work fine 95% of the time.

For the rest of our needs, some will find it worthwhile to have a second petrol/diesel car.

But what would work best for most of us is a streamlined, easy access, hire car (petrol/diesel) facility, available more or less on demand, for the days (or longer) we need the bigger range/capacity vehicle. Think in terms of drive in/drive out (ie park your electric car there) neighbourhood/local town car hire terminals. A bit like Park’n'Ride, but Park ‘n’ Hire.

Together with the fact that electric cars are more energy efficient anyway (especially in stop/start driving cities), most of us could own a smaller car (as opposed to the compromise ‘family’ size car) which would further reduce energy use and cost.

And accepting a range no more than needed for local use means batteries can be smaller, cheaper and lighter – in fact, already good enough to make the kind of transport strategy I’m talking about a no-brainer option for most households.

On top of these potential savings, the servicing needs of electric cars is much less than fossil fuel powered cars, especially as the latter become ever more complex adding exponential amounts of technology to make relatively small savings in their efficiency.

I really hope SCP can make a success of this car, as it looks like it would fit well in the kind of strategy or modest change in transport thinking I’ve described.

Greens seem to have an absurd, almost religous obession with public transport as their solution to replace fossil fuel cars as personal transport. The problem is that outside of single journey commuting periods, the capacity usage simply doesn’t add up. And it never will, because we need far more flexible multi-stop routing, plus convenient carriage (door to door) of things like kids, shopping and other goods.

Even a casual glance at the occupancy rates for bus, rail, trams etc. simply doesn’t show any energy/cost savings outside commuting hours. Small electric cars would be far more efficient/cheaper, even used in single occupancy for many journeys.

By all means encourage use of public transport and cycling for the situations/times it can work best, but most of us do need some kind car transport solution.

ok point taken