lol-lol

Not sure whether i will keep one or both of the Renaults. Was thinking of blowing some of retirement Tax Free Lump Sum after the low or 0% they are on. Car ownership is a dying thing and I can see that from 2030 onwards cars will be called up from an App, appear as a driverless vehicle abd take you where you want to go and then go to a local pool to be called up again when needed. So probably have one car but which one to be decided.

I was just not convinced by the Alpine 290, not that hot and gimmick overtake etc. Wish R5 had the regen paddles like my Scenic and the Micra has. Our Mini Cooper E, level One which has the Headup Display, has over 180 hp, 0 to 60 in 7 seconds I think is a better choice than the Alpine 290 but both cars are very limited in the rear seats hence the Scenic for carrying 5 plus luggage.

Naughty people. Quoting a "discount" when it is what the government is giving. Also I gather some of the deals are not honest ones, advertised, draw you in and they try and fit you up with a different more expensive deal. I got £1k off my already cheap 40 kwh R5 plus the £1500 government grant but had to pay for yellow though had ordered green but it was found damaged at the import centre. I could have several thousands of a Megane Etech with Blue Light discount but i felt its is too similar to my Scenic so stuck with Evolution R5.

Looking at all of 2024 and all of 2025, which of course includes Dec 2024 and 2025, shows the fuller picture.... (24% increase) and one in three cars for a December ae both pretty awesome IMO. Yes short of the 28% target but lots of reasons for that such as the higher Government grant applying to EV versions that have to be ordered as is the case for the 2025 European CoTY Renault 5, the 4, the Minis built in Leipzig and the Nissan EV from NE England. These cars will be delivered in Q2 2026 ie few weeks away with nice "26" registrations and the stonking £3750 grant. If you were to accept a non + PLUS version I expect you would want more discount though Renault have not been giving much discount as they can sell every Renault 5 they can make such is the popularity. Hope the Merc CLA electric getting CoTY this year will boost its sales, spec is just fantastic but UK will not like mainland Europe which gets it sooner of course so affect on SMMT EV sales data will not be as good if we drove on the same road size as most of Europe ! UK new electric car (BEV) registrations grew significantly from 2024 to 2025, with 2025 seeing 473,348 registrations, an increase of over 91,000 units compared to 381,970 in 2024. BEV market share rose from 19.6% in 2024 to 23.4% in 2025. SMMT EV Sales Comparison: 2024 vs. 2025 Total BEV Registrations: 381,970 (2024) to 473,348 (2025). Market Share: 19.6% (2024) to 23.4% (2025). AutocarThe new Mercedes CLA comes with a 484-mile EV option for...Hyper-efficient saloon becomes UK's longest-range electric car, while hybrid promises diesel-style MPG

Western manufacturers, perhaps with the exception of Dacia-Renault, appear to be chopping and changing, firstly appearing they were going big in to EVs and then realising they were not financial competing and losing out in the race for the EV segment and then mostly giving up. Cost them tens of billions in inefficient and loss making EV production. VW with its very poor EV software for example. I don't know which households have a mixture of EVs and ICE, be interesting to see what that split is, household like us now with 3 EV and no ICE, next door just got a BYD Surf, no hope charging, other next door now got a wall box charger but not an EV but presumably changing one of the ICE for an EV fairly soon. https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/366358/evs-are-officially-covering-more-miles-ice-cars#:~:text=That%20means%2C%20on%20average%2C%20EV,than%201.8%20million%20transactions%20annually.

A few pertinent facts- EVs on average drive several percent more than ICE vehicles per year due to cheaper running costs etc. December 2025s sales of EVs were much higher than Decmber 2024 sales as they were for the whole year. January 2026 EV sales were sluggish due to rush to declare in the 2025 year. No car company can afford to make EVs or any car and not sell them to market with months else they will go out if business and we are seeing some European and US companies take massive financial hits as they have not been able to mass produce EVs economically, poor execution. Chinese and Korean mostly winning the BEV, PHEV and hybrid technical and financial race.

You refute the scientific evidence of the blood test of absobed ICE pollution ? You also refute the SMMT data that EV sales are increasing ? There was of course a big surge of EV sales in December 2025 for sales to hit the EV 28% mandate. 2026 mandate is 33% which like 2025 will be tough. The UK suffers from driving on the left hand side of the road so we receive most models a bit later than the RHD spec which are produced first as there is greater demand. A combination of more EVs getting the full £3750 UK subsidy, electricity becoming cheaper in April and fuel duty going up in September should help EV demand kick on from the mid 20%s into the 30% due to sheer economic argument. Also EV getting cheaper due to battery prices continuing to fall which makes Chinese and Korean EV cheaper as well as the European EVs, Nissan-Sunderland, Renault-France and Mini-Germany getting the full EV grant and others may be added. Of course the grant basically only negates the VAT so really it these cars being virtually VAT free. Hopefully public charging VAT with go from S to E or Z rated so that it becomes even cheaper to run an EV which is already much cheaper than ICE to much lower servicing cost and charging if you can charge at home but expectedly much cheaper for Public as well soon with the combination of the removal of the most of the ECO levies and VAT charging on public charging cost.

Scary news article from BBC about ICE pollution and it highlighted by "Dave Takes it on" Youtuber as well as upcoming VED shocks.... BBC NewsI inhaled traffic fumes to find out where air pollution g...BBC health correspondent James Gallagher gets his blood analysed to understand how air pollution is killing us.

Margins can vary massively for the sales of new cars at dealerships. Usually the margin on the lower end of the range and base models is super tight ie only the dealers base discount ie about 5% plus any end of period extra discounts. The Dealer margin on more expensive models and the more upper end versions of the model the discount can be well over 20% plus the 5% base dealer margin. I can sometimes see this with the "Blue Light" discounts which show super massive discounts of some cars ie 20% or so. Dealers / manufacturers will sometimes sell at a loss to get rid of stock they see only getting worse possibility of getting the projected sale price for. Dealers, traditionally, have made significant parts of their revenue of sales of finance, service plans, treatments of surfaces inside and outside of the car. Tough business. Was surprised to see when my son was buying a Mini that the seller, big BMW / MIni dealership, only got a sales commission and did not actually sell the car as a dealer, commission was only a few hundred pounds. The servicing etc was going to be its revenue earner I suppose.

Renault have cleverly kept the key features as buttons and maybe that is one of the reasons why their sales have actually gone up whilst most European car producers have gone down plus their prices look comparable to the Chinese and Korean manufacturers.

I think, as an ex Civil Servant and party member, they are torn in so many ways and with 400 odd MPs and the various government departments there is so much noise it is difficult to make a clear decision. The EU has put up large import duties on EV but the UK not at all. PHEVs may sound like they are a great solution in many way. Cleaner running in town but UK government still gets to sell petrol and keep that £25B of revenue rolling in which they badly need. Collect some nice import duties on cars like the Jaecoo 7, half the price of similar sized JLR product. Government will be quite happy with not making any massive moves to restrict choice, buyers can still buy what they want but there is a fund of over £1B for EV assistance grants even though they hardly need it now as prices have fallen so far. So torn between being greener but keeping revenue streams up. Seem to me to be a reasonable middle way and perhaps not as Draconian as the EU with its up to 48% tariff on EVs like SAIC MGs, yet they still sell quite well there. In the UK the prices are incredibly cheap with now 10% of cars sold in the UK being Chinese, mainly BEVs and PHEVs I gather. We seem to be stumbling in the right direction though it was sad when it made sense to stop running my Jaguar Type S as the emission and annual road tax were getting close to its actual value and this is happening every year now but the policy now is not to allow dirty cars to run UK roads without huge financial penalties.

I can see the PHEV buyer shouting foul like Diesel buyer did a few years back. If someone does not get their PHEV registered by April this year then it sounds like the advantages they thought they were getting will evaporate. Art Intel gave this answer...... Yes, Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEVs) in the UK face significantly higher Benefit-in-Kind (BiK) tax from 2025/2026 due to stricter emissions testing (Euro 6e-bis) and increased Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) from April 2025. Furthermore, a new pay-per-mile "eVED" tax (1.5p/mile for PHEVs) launches in April 2028. Key Changes Affecting PHEVs: Higher BiK (Company Car Tax): From January 1, 2025 (and April 2026 in GB), stricter emissions testing will likely increase CO2 figures for many PHEVs, driving up their BiK tax bands. Some projections suggest rates could rise from 9% to 24% for certain models. Increased VED (Road Tax): From April 2025, first-year road tax for cars emitting 1–50g/km of CO2 (which includes most PHEVs) increases to £110. Expensive Car Supplement: PHEVs costing over £40,000 (or £50,000+ for some models) pay an additional fee. New Pay-Per-Mile Tax (2028): Starting April 2028, PHEVs will pay a 1.5p per mile rate, added to the existing VED, as part of a move to tackle lost fuel duty. End of Low-Tax Loophole: The significant tax advantages for PHEVs are closing, with 2028 seeing 0-emission mileage differentiators likely dropped, placing them in higher tax brackets closer to traditional vehicles. Drivers looking to lock in lower, current rates should ensure their vehicle is registered before the April 2025/2026 changes.

Some UK rags are touting that BEV sales have gone in to reverse and petrol is surging back, Can't see it. Diesel down to less than 9% of sales and continue to fall, petrol down 2%. The Rise in PHEV sales is the big story I think. PHEVs that can do over 50 miles on electric, sometimes 80-ish, cover the commute and the combustion engine used for those longer weekend journeys for pleasure etc. I think PHEV buyers will find out the do use more petrol than the advertised 400 to 800 mpg and higher road tax and BIX coming down the road and the 1.5p a mile of course in 2028 and higher fuel prices from September.

Maybe ten to twenty pounds rather than £30. 45 kwh is not a common size. There are some cars round the 40 kwh, both my 5 is and also our Mini Cooper E but they are cars for local transportation and when we do journeys of 200, 250, 300, 350 mile round trips we take the Scenic. My Scenic only has a 60/65 kwh battery and the more popular variant has a 87 / 92 kwh battery and now the price is similar to the 60 kwh version i bought 18 months ago. Either Scenic, mid sized somewhere between a hatchback and a SUV, European Car of the Year 2024, could do the 167 miles London to Sheffield and either have about 25% or 45% of the battery left. Cost about £3. On the way home both cars would need a partial top up. In my 60 kwh nominal battery size I would drive about an hour so battery warm to accept a charge and to up about 20 kwh to get me the rest of the way. Cost more like £20 but if I spent a few more thousand and got the 87 / 92 kwh battery, or bought now, just probably would only need about 10 kwh or just under £10, plus the original £3, to complete the journey. Quite a bit less than £30. One choose to cruise at a true 65 or 60 rather than true 70 mph and the efficiency is much better in miles per kwh and less public charging and therefore cost. Still think I am only spending about 3p per mile including my very occasional public charges, like many EV drivers it is high 90% home charging. I do plan A road, bypass etc routes rather than just take the longer motorway routes. Certainly will be doing even more of this if / when pay per mile comes in. Sorry in advance to town and village dwellers if it increases traffic through those places.

American press saying it was the winner in the winter test but looking at the data it is clear it is due to it massive battery as its efficiency and performance in the very cold weather was relatively poor. Is it not Rivian that VW Group invested billions in ? Surprise the Chinese stare brands did so well and Tesla kind of average.

The trucking model is a bit more complex than you illustrate below. We are top 20 in terms of number of trailers in the UK but own few tractive units. An efficient way to operate is for us to completely load the trailers, think we have nearly 2,000, and then we use a haulage company we have under contract usually, rarely a spot price, and get them to collect and deliver the trailer when ready. I mention 22 kw chargers as they are cheap to install, anything DC, even from 25 KW all the way up to 1 MW chargers are big money. I saw this when my company owned Source London before it was sold to Total. This is what is oft forgotten that the price of Public charging rolls in to it several massive factors ie capital investment in the equipment, the connection charges to the grid, possibly land rental off the site owner and then finally the actual electricity cost which can actually be as little as only 10% of the price charged to the user and hopefully the company is making a bit of profit so as to continue the expansion of their public charging network. So truck operates, and this could be the companies that operate the tractive units and not so much the trailers, have the three way choice. Of course get as many 22 kw AC chargers at their premise to top up the tractive units, for the EV cars they run, as we do at most of our warehouses to also help all those staff on EV Salary sacrifice schemes and other members of staff with EVs. Secondly many trucking firms will invest in their own DC chargers even if as small as 25 KW. Link their solar to their batteries and charge the trucks and cars with cheap grid and solar power. Thirdly, like us EV drivers, use the Public DC chargers to top up at the massive power they can do so ie hundreds of KWs. A forth scenario will be for EV trucks to charge up whilst discharging their cargo and grab a few tens of KWhs then and have some sort of discount/netting price off the transportation price for getting part charge when unloading. Another video on the Gridserve rollout for e trucks. I was initially disappointed on the spec that the Exeter and Baldock (A1M J10 Nr Stevenage) truck chargers are only 350 KWs but it is a start and it sounds like there will be charge more of the half and full MW in the pipeline in the next 12 months..........

You need to do more research rather than guess. The public chargers for the e trucks that Gridserve have just put online are 350 kw ones. I have 400 kw charger a mile from my house and provided by MFG who are a massive provider of EV charging as well as liquid fuel abd seem to be ready as anyone in the uk for the transition to electric motive power. The UK lags many European countries and perhaps this is due to the extra land needed for the charging slots for EV trucks but as with EV cars the existing disel pumps will ve converted to EV chargers. Something you have missed that us EV car drivers should ve careful what we wish for is as both more EV trucks come along and more massive battery mega packs come along they will buy the cheap night tine electricity, that 7 and 8 p per kwh stuff and we will have to pay much more or increasingly look at generating our own. This is where the UK National Grid us actually transmitting less because there is much more local generation. Whether it is individual companies taking MWhs of power or households generating KWh for their own consumption meaning less needed by the grid in industrial and residential areas. Road side will need more but bith the capacity of production is due to climb massively, I can see circa 100GWs being in the various electricity producing tech ie wind, tidal, solar, pump storage, with massive battery banks smoothing demand and production and oft placed at the car and truck charging sites. A fantastic business for thise companies that get it right. I keep looking at my battery storage options and I would not be surprised that I get a DC charger myself. Going from the batteries to DC for my EVs would be great. Get the earthing sorted out seems the challenge as AC from mains charging has earthing sorted but trying to charge from non mains charging seems challenging ie from batteries or V2L from one EV to another EV via a Granny charger. A tech problem to solve. In Europe my company is already doing long haul EV trucking. We have access to MW chargers from country grids that already have excess capacity from renewable so the electricity is half the price than in the UK. UK will get there eventually but, as usual, is lagging some European countries for a host of reasons.

Think you have made a a whole bunch of assumptions there that are incorrect. Truck firms, and my uncle had they largest private one in Cornwall with dozens of trucks, have choices which will suit each individual firm. Yes they will probably have 3 phase and therefore can install their own AC chargers. They would be 22 kw would have thought and act as we home charging people do ie how much do they need, maximise any cheap electricity periods and then top up more if they have not got enough ie what they need on the day rate if needed. Beyond that there is a whole bunch of choices. My uncle bought diesel by the tanker full, ie 20,000 litres at a time as it was cheap, of course, than going to the pumps. Bigger trucking companies, those that are smart and want to cash in on the saving better electric trucks and diesel powered trucks, especially with the rise in fuel duty coming in in just over 200 days time, would be preparing. Getting their own DC charger, with site battery, which go from 25 KWs last I heard. Another great part is one can, any many have already, get some solar panels on the roof, get your batteries charged up during the daytime and have some power from your batteries to further reduce ones traction power costs. There are other options that are operating in parts of the world such as the batteries which are mounted similar to the 1000 litre or so saddle tanks can be swapped in and out, depleted ones or fully charged one. Other systems like the top of the 40 foot container top or curtain covers having solar collecting covers, I have several portable solar "panels" which are flexible and they can collect several KWhs of power when driving or when parked, more energy on the cheap. Each haulage firm needs to look at its potential and cost savings. Most of our warehouses already have EV charging for staff but as more of the trucks become EV then we will no doubt put EV charging over for them as well. What JLR has been doing is awesome. 18,000 panels on their engine plant, over 10 MW at peak day time so probably tens of MW on a decent day. I am impressed the solar I am getting even on this January day, more than I need for the day time consumption.... https://media.jaguarlandrover.com/news/2025/08/jlr-powers-ambition-lower-carbon-global-operations-renewable-energy-drive

Another step forward for electric trucks .........

Had a company car about 20 years ago, not allowed Skodas as deemed too down market at the time but had SEAT, Volvo S40, basically a Focus at the time, awful 1.6 diesel engine in it, and Audi A4 and A3, 1.9 PDI, turbo variable blade geometry went on one of the Audis. Don't remember the company car tax being too bad but would have had an Octy if my own choice. Since 2010 had a car allowance thru payroll. Get whacked for tax but at least could what I wanted as long as 4 door and kept tidy. Since I resigned last week it is the loss of car allowance is one of the biggest outgoings i am concerned about. Renault 5 on interest free and after a 40% deposit it is only £86 a month. Scenic is over £400 a month and at 4.9% finance so need to do something about it, maybe payoff a third or half to bring the payments right down. It is a case of looking at those monthly payments that I am sure buyers do whether car company finance or mobility scheme. My company was suppose to get on the Octopus EV Salary Sacrifice EV scheme but did not round to it and new company did not get us taken over staff on their scheme but just kept us on the car allowance scheme. Got a sneaky feeling that not have my own cars will be the way forward and just getting one delivered when needed will be the increasingly common scenario, maybe keep the 5 at end of PCP. If uk drivers increasingly choose to not have a car on the drive the effect on government finances would be massive. Whilst I gave been happy to take on cars since the General election I would not do so if certain parties were in power in Westminster. Presumably the 3p per mile would ve collected from the hirer as part of the rental rather than after the annual check ?

91% of cars are bought on finance and I suspect the majority are on PCP arrangements. If one is gappy with that monthly PCP payment then that is what you pay for the next 2, 3 or 4 years. With electric cars the servicing can be as little as £9 a month, road tax is a tenner for the first year and then the standard £195 a year on many EVs. With PCP, whilst knowing your monthly outgoing you are protected from any dip in market value. If its lower you just give it back and walk away. If the value is higher then pay the balloon payment and either keep it or sell it and make a profit. Renault 5 I just got is on 0% finance for the balance after deposit. Both the 5 and the Scenic have modular battery packs so if the rare scenario happened that cells needed replacing this can be done at a module level. Six hours driving during last week, 230 miles, no need to public charge, cost about £5, nice.

The Public charging providers have been quite open about their costs ie the very high capital cost of the equipment, grid connection costs and lastly the electricity cost and of course the VAT at 20 %. What I think most public charge providers have been rubbish at is offering cheaper rates when electricity is cheaper like we have at home. I would like to see the combination of cheaper periods to charge, like 20p kwh as we have at home plus the 15% less of the VAT which should take about 30p per kwh on charging at certain times.

Good to hear the specs and actual F1 cars coming out and electric power being equal to ICE power ie with 350 kws coming from either ie total of 940 hp in a lighter and smaller car. Not quite sure how the boost / overtake feature works ie allows the electric side to go to near 400 kw ? I don't whether we have upped our sponsorship for Ferrari but our logo looks much bigger than last season's car. Test coming up soon so we will get an idea how they go. We will see the new Gen4 Formula-e at the end of this year and see how they compare !

If the 6p a litre rise on diesel, and petrol, does happen on September first, £5 a tankful or thereabouts, and EV charging drops by a similar amount per charge up due to the removal or eco costs on electricity the running cost gulf will be even larger. EVs are falling in buy price as the price of new EVs fall quickly as the power train cost ie particularly the batteries, is falling so quickly which has a big effect on the second hand market values naturally. Add to this EVs are increasingly getting more range, incredible performance the difference to ICE is just getting bigger. Whilst choice is something we pride ourselves with in the Western world the death of diesel car sales seems to be inevitable looking at uk SMMT data and how long the second hand diesels command value will depend on those running cost difference as well availability of diesel. The UK does not even produce half the diesel currently needed so it has to be imported. It is the very quick migration of goods transport vehicles from diesel to electric that will see diesel rapidly become a fuel not required much and unecomical for fuel retailers to sell. My company's move, and all others logistics companies transition from diesel to electric trucks and vans is moving at a blistering pace.