Graham Butcher

I have no idea why England are so rubbish at having safe drinking water and never any shortages, and obviously being plentiful it costs so much. That's an easy one, greed is the answer.

What happens if and when a nuclear accident occurs? How many will suffer or die from the radiation and fallout as a result? They happen far too often to be dismissed or ignored. Solar and wind generation also have their negatives and their own form of pollutants, not that you ever think so, as you never ever hear anything negative said about them, just as you never hear anything said about the rising level of water table pollution rising massively where the minerals are being mined for the batteries. It strikes me that no matter what we use, there is some cost attached to it in one form or another.

Some if not all coal ones have been converted to burn wood pellets which are imported, WTF, from Canada. Think of the massive emissions that causes, surely far better to burn our own coal, quicker to get and far less damaging?

Hmm, so are our coal / wood pellet fuelled power stations days numbered. Will anybody actually commit to a date and keep to it is the real question.

@lol-lol not sure just where you are getting this info from, but I think you should seriously question it. It basically sounds like nice political sounds to me. China for a start still has plenty of dirty power stations, although they would you think the opposite. So does Australia, they have the world's largest coal deposits don't they?

I see Ford are bringing back the Fiesta as an electric car, and it is basically yet another variation of the Renault 5. No idea when or how much as yet.

Don't believe all the so-called green stuff you come across; it's just greenwashing and is designed to help the push towards the electrification of road transport, and it has a greater impact on some folk than others. Take on Google Earth satellite photos, and you will see just how few people have taken up the solar panels, and if that really is setting new records, then the rest of the world is even further behind.

I still think it is foolish to allow your battery to get that low in the first place just to avoid spashing a little cash on public charging to give that extra margin of safety. Just the other day there was an incident on a local road that resulted in a 32 mile diversion so if caught in that you would have got stuck.

I think we can take as a given in order that they can balance the grid more but I can also see that as people shift their usage times to take advantage of the lower prices on offer, those price will slowly be withdrawn. The grid will then become tuned to the demand and they will fail to keep on top of the supply. In other words we will always be claiming that demand is greater then supply to justify higher prices, and so the circle of life begins again.

What a faff, and this is the future?

It looks something like this.

You're right, I can see food prices rising almost weekly and the official inflation figures are only meaningful if people are actually buying all of the things in the basket being used for the sample set.

@lol-lol the reduction of income is from those in lower income brackets reserving car use for commuting as inflation is really squeezing them hard and they also tend to be very people who are least likely to be to home charge anyway, so it comes as no surprise.

Yes, it does indeed need replacing; in order for you to measure the voltage, you had to remove the battery from the key fob, so therefore it was an open circuit, and as such, it should be reading somewhere in the region of 3.3V for a normal, healthy battery.

And yet, What car begs to differ, granted there is not much between them, they give the win to the Renault 5.

Oh yes, these are not the latest models, that's for sure. They have so far; they only have 50 across the county, with another 750 or so to be replaced as and when. But then they also stated that these electric models are only for town policing matters and not intended for traffic or serious crime duties. Presumedly because of poor range and top speed, because if they were to be involved in high-speed pursuits, their range would plummet rapidly. So all the villains need to get would be a high-power ICE car and they could lose any chasing police cars. Thats not so good.

@lol-lol I said I'd get back to you about Essex police, so here I am. They appear to be using at the moment, some Toyota C-HR and some Peugeot E308 cars.

@lol-lol Don't forget that this country is known as Rip-Off Britain; that tells you all you need to know about how you get from less than 1p per kWh to 25p a kWh. As for the rest about the gas prices, I think you are underestimating the authorities.

True, but the lower rate of increase on electric is more down to politics than anything else, all part of the attempt to push more BEV sales. All the energy companies supply both, so loading the gas to make electric cars look even more attractive. The energy companies will make up any shortfall in profits from electric, via gas hike.

Those of you in the EV community who have not signed up for a fixed tariff or have to rely on public chargers, either in part or in full (assuming they're not company cars and the company pays the bill), then the oil crisis is about to rearend you all as I predicted. There is a massive 13% increase in electricity charges starting 1st July. So there is still insufficient green energy being generated, indicating that BEVs are still actually responsible for some of the emissions after all. Energy price cap will rise by 13% from July | Ofgem

I can't remember now, I'll check on what I see driving around and get back to you on that aspect.

Essex police now have some EV cars and I've seen them sitting in them charging at my local filling station, which has 4 public chargers. A few times they have had to just sit there and watch their colleagues respond to 999 calls in ICE cars because, presumably, they didn't have enough charge in the battery?

Hmm, yes, that could well be it. I've had Superbs ever since 2013 right up to 2025, and they have all been rock solid with no dramas. I'd still have one now if I didn't have issues with getting in and out of them, and I find that SUVs are easier at my age.

I remember that it used to be BMW drivers that were the wallies; the name was earned because of their attitude towards other road users and the general lack of use of their indicators, but these days it seems to be Audi drivers that have taken that slot over. Sorry you had a bad experience with your Octavia, but there are rogue cars in makes, you were just unlucky.

@lol-lol I remember all of those jokes and it was the same at my last company, when I joined the national manager told me no it gave the wrong impression to customers. The MD said I could though👍