Graham Butcher

You're going round and round in a circle. I have never mentioned anything about what type of pylons; in fact, I don't care what type they use or care about what route they take. All I was ever pointing out to you was that the subsea cable system was coming ashore in Norfolk; the rest of the route was always overground on some sort of pylon.

@lol-lol the option of going underground has already been suggested and thrown out on the cost factor alone. Extending the subsea cable has also been thrown out. What they are chewing over now I think is the final route of the pylons.

Yes, you can edit your posts; simply click on the 3 dots in the top right corner of your post and select the last option (Edit) and away you go, make your changes and then scroll down to the bottom of your post and click on "save", job done

Err, you are partly right on that one. There is a subsea cable going into Norfolk that is correct, but it is then planned to go up on pylons all the way to Tilbury in south Essex, on the Thames. As this article shows, 15th Jan 2026 is meeting stiff opposition. Huge line of pylons will 'irreversibly destroy' Essex countryside - Essex Live This is the planned route for the Essex part of the line.

Nobody is disputing what you are saying in essence; yes, anyone could do this or that, but they first of all have to have the money, what you call a little money might be an impossible amount to others. There are so many reasons why a person cannot or doesn't want to do it. Maybe if your batteries were to fail and take your house with them, then maybe you might think to yourself that just maybe, you took it a bridge too far? For many people this is a real concern for them. Who knows? My wife wouldn't like me to go down that route, it was bad enough getting the solar array accepted, and even more so when it sat on the roof for a year, dead as a dodo, after the company looking after it did not want to come and fix it. Like I said earlier, you really could with your unbridled passion for all things electric and your unshakeable belief that there are no problems with it, get yourself a job on the Fully Charged Show. You need to accept that others don't see it as clear-cut as you; there are conflicting scientific reports on the subject from many respected universities. Why is that only those backed by the government get the oxygen? After all, the government are only career politicians in the main; very few of them have any scientific background or engineering degrees or experience, and they seem only too willing to back the ideas put forward by think tanks. Who also happen to bankroll many of them, for example, the Lettuce who only held office for 44 days. 😁 Liz Truss: UK Prime Minister’s campaign funded in part by wealthy who stood to benefit from controversial tax cuts | CNN These people don't provide backing without the prospect of getting that back with a massive profit margin built in Politics is a dirty business don't you know?

@lol-lol yes, we all get that and how it affects you and also how you use it and plan to take it with you should you move etc. The thing is even if everybody was to do that, bearing mind that plenty could not afford to do that or even wish to have solar arrays or storage batteries for cost or many other reasons, not forgetting that for many home charging is impossible. That is still not going to be able to meet the energy needs for all of the EV vehicles in time for the governments plans with the HGV's etc and the power stations and transmission lines from Scotland will take far longer to get in place and operation to meet the plans.

Do you believe all the BS that is out there from parties with a political agenda, in this case the BBC being a government mouthpiece? They are no better then many other sources often quoted who have vested interests in a certain outcome where they gain some benefit from. All of these people so many EV'ers claim are biased against them actually do not know the truth. All they want is the same as me, the freedom to make their own mind up. Like the other examples I have shown you. If the products are really genuinely far superior and the public can see that, then they will migrate towards them naturally, no pressure required. Look back in history and see how many things you used to have/use in your past but you have moved on along with the rest of the world, where are the cassettes, vinyal records, Betamax, VHS, Laser Discs CRT tvs and monitors, Incandescent and CFL lamps, Steam engines, etc., etc.? All gone and no legislation required to make the switch; the consumers did that globally. So they will with EVs if they really are that good and they can prove themselves, but currently, they are not doing a good job of it are they?

You are still not seeing the larger picture, I large battery storage unit is not going to solve the UK issues is it?

To anyone with logic, surely the bleeding way forwards is before you start planning and mandating things, you get the technology in place and working first to ensure the first basic promise that was made to UK public, make damned sure that the UK was 100% self-sufficient for energy, bring the cost down to enable the UK to become competitive again and give families some well-earned respite from crippling bills. Not force the things onto people which is so obviously currently not even remotely possible for vast masses of the population. Be that for physical, financial, or infrastructure reasons, so that practically everybody currently with a ICE car could also afford to switch over. And that does not also involve the other elephant in the room, and that is ensuring that the technology is perfectly safe, or at least as safe as current ICE vehicles are. Until we find methods of doing that, a fire in any car park or anywhere where cars are parked, gathered or stored together is a real major disaster just waiting to happen. We have all witnessed the terrific consequences that a few EV cars bring to car-transporting ships, where only a part of the cargo were EVs, resulting in the total loss of those ships. In a few years almost every car will be EV so that potential will be everywhere. We need politicians to understand why their plans are not working, but that will never happen, I fear, as they lack the vision for the future and the possible consequences of getting it wrong. They only care about themselves and a 5-year plan. If it all goes tits up, they get removed at the next election, and the massive mess they leave behind is left for others.

All very interesting but totally irrelevant, you are either not reading and understanding the real issues that the UK has with electricity supply and also the population does not have equal positions in life that you do. The point I'm trying to make is that with all the vehicles theoretically coming onto UK roads in by 2030, which includes all the vans, HGVs and buses that Ed Milliband is pushing for, there will not enough capacity to charge them all. There is no way on gods earth that you are going to able charge all of those from solar and storage batteries at the same time. Yet, all you keep doing is stating how you do things and what you're thinking about doing. If that is how our politicians are thinking, then it's no wonder the UK is struggling to make any headway. We all need to stop thinking so much about ourselves and think about the problems that millions of other people are faced with. Others can also see it.

You live in your own little bubble and not in the real world, it might come as a shock to you, but it has been said before by many people, not everyone has the same unique position in life as you. Honestly you could get yourself a job on the Fully Charged Show and Everything Electric alongside Robert Llewellyn as a presenter........😶‍🌫️

Apparently it would take around 8 to 12 years to build a powerline from Scotland to the south coast, and that would be running about 2 miles away from my front door if they could ever get the final plans approved. Which at the moment is embroiled in loads of red tape with councils and masses of residents all opposed to it and this has been going on for the last 3 years to my knowledge. Hinkley point C is not supposed to be online until well into the mid-2030s and even then will only generate enough power for 6 million homes 7% of UK power need. Building started last year on Sizewell C due on line mid 2030s to 2040 powering 6 million homes, 7% of UK power need. Bradwell B is still in the feaseablity stage, would take an estimated 12 years to build (always run into delays), so if construction starts this year, it would be late 2030s to early 2040s before coming online and power 4 million homes, 4.5% UK power demand. Wylfa power station, if construction starts this year would be broadly the same as the above Bradwell B online mid 2030s to early 2040s, powering 3.5 million homes, 3.5% UK power demand. So where is all this extra power coming from to power all the proposed electric cars, vans, HGVs and buses coming from in 2030, given the massive size of these HGV fleets and buses? Once again, the UK has some very grand ideas and very little forward planning on how to deliver the massive amounts of power of power that would be required to keep people and vital goods mobile then? The above power stations would possibly deliver some 19 million homes then, when we had 30.4 million homes in 2024. Wind and solar cannot make up the rest, as wind does not always blow and I frequently see wind farms where no blades are turning, and no solar at all during the night. Are we living in cloud cuckoo land or what? Hinkley Point C | EDF Building Sizewell C - Sizewell C Homepage - Bradwell B Project Site Wylfa nuclear power station - Wikipedia

I think that you are missing the point I think that you are missing the point here, which I feel you do so often, and that is because you are so passionate about electric cars and that is fine. I feel that the point here that @Dieselgate is trying to convey, to you but you are ignoring is these energy suppliers have to generate their power, and the price of doing so will be increasing quite significantly in the fullness of time.

Yes, I think you'll find it is a short term thing, all designed to try and stop the decline in adoption of electric cars which will revert as soon as possible. I was reading somewhere recently, can't remember precisely where, and also I heard it on the news that electricity was going to increase a lot in due course, especially as and when more and more electric HGV and buses take to the road. I did come across this little nugget, which shows just how much we are having to import electricity from other countries, which clearly shows that we far being self-sufficient and we are still heavily dependant on our European neighbours to keep our lights on Power surge: UK spends £250 million each month importing record volumes of electricity from Europe - Drax Global This chart shows where we are as of 2024 and it shows the massive spikes in the importation grows as more electric cars demand more power to keep them going. The chart is extracted from the above site. The report also claims that we are spending some £250 million a month on imported electric power. Maybe this is why the Russians are so interested in plotting where our interconnects are located and hence the presence of the spy ship in the North Sea, which is causing the military so much concern.

Correct, people should be free to make their own choice of what type of car suits there own requirements. It really just like BetaMax and VHS, vinyl vs cassette, v CD, laser disc v DVD v Bluray and CFL and LED bulbs, the customer will make their minds up as to which format wins out, without governments mandating everything.

All of this is true, but only if you ignore the massive depreciation if you were buying the car; plus, of course, you are working on the basis that you have the means to home charge. Try the sums at public charging prices, and that margin comes tumbling down, does it not?

True, excellent at that kind of running cost, but that bubble will be burst soon with rising energy costs in the not too distant future.

I think I'll just leave this here and see what you all think about it..... Sanity check warns EVs and heat pumps deliver “no proven carbon savings” ahead of 2030 clean power target - Queen Mary University of London Electric cars deliver 'no proven carbon savings' in the UK, scientists warn in 'sanity check' study | Daily Mail Online

Not according to the searches I did just a few minutes ago, £49k to £52k seems to be the starting price, and don't forget, it does not make one jot of difference how much discount you get off it, it all depends on makers published list price that will decide if it attracts luxury status or not. Also it is neither clever nor advisable to allow your battery to ever go below 20% anyway. Most seem to suggest keeping the battery always between 20% and 80% and only ever going upto 100% if you know that you are going on a long run the follwing day. Besides that it is highly likely to cost twice what you're looking at for your Renault, so why didn't you go for one of those?

Yes, I would have thought that would be a given anyway as they are going to be so much more expensive to buy in the first instance and I'd expect the insurance costs are going to be sky high until the system has demonstrated that it is going to be more reliable and far safer than a human driver.

Yes, but once again registrations are not sales in the true meaning of the word, they are being used as a way of massaging the figures in a dual blade operation, A/ it helps the reduce the amount of fines that need to be paid and B/ it also helps the government get closer to their forced targets. That Mercedes CLA might well boast a high claimed range, but I doubt that if driven in the same fashion as ICE version it would get anywhere near its claimed range, and I seriously doubt that would get within about 100 miles of it if driven at a max of 55mph. It also costs around the £50K bracket so its OTR price price will take it into the luxury tax bracket so its not a car that will be widely adopted by many private buyers is it?

I agree, if you are able to do your charging at home, on a low tarrif and get back again to recharge each day with always having enough in the battery to meet your requirements, and you're not (assuming you purchased a new car) looking to replace at 3 years of age, but keep it far longer so that depreciation does not bite you in the arse, or you have a car provided by your employer, then yes, I'd agree an EV could well be a no-brainer to have. Like I've always said, if it fits your lifestyle and and your pocket, then they are a wise choice. But the caveat there is that first you have to be able to have the ability to home charge in the first place; public charging will destroy any financial advantage.

I don't see where or how you arrive at that deduction, in the main EV's are cheaper if you can always do your charging at home and you have one of those special tariffs, otherwise, if using public chargers to make the return journey, it is doubtful if the costs are any better. They are certainly not the case if you own the car and plan to replace it in 3 years time, as depreciation is so much bigger with EVs. Again, I cannot see that happening; unless all the dealers are bonkers, they will of course be only too aware that the 2026 target for EVs is even bigger than it was for 2025, so if they register cars in December 2025, then they have just made the target in 2026 so much bigger and even harder to hit, given that they never hit it 2025. Are you aware of the huge number of new EV's from that sector of the market you claim are returned to the dealers with long lists of faults that the dealers cannot rectify due to the parts stock not being available and difficulty in even communicating with the cars due poor quality control of the cars and software bugs etc. There are cases of some cars developing faults and throwing errors up on their dashboards before the owners have even left the dealers' forecourts? Some of these cars at the dealers have been there awaiting repairs long than they have been with the owners, so much for far Eastern manufacturers.

Whoa there, hold your horses. There are many things that affect people in many different ways. There were a couple of whistleblowers about their findings of the air quality on the London Underground, with readings many times worse than were found standing in the middle of the most congested roads in London. This was also backed up by scientific studies and reports carried by hospitals and doctors, which proved the air there was directly responsible for the men's chronic breathing and general health problems. You say that this one man's tests are conclusive when it was possibly a means to an end? I suggest that more people are exposed to poor air on the tubes then there are being exposed to the road traffic fumes on a daily basis, and those on the underground are alo more likely to be exposed for longer periods to those using the roads in the fashion that James Gallagher did for his "experiment" The SMMT figures do not show actual true sales, i.e., cars that have been sold and are being used on the roads, they only show cars that have theoretically been sold, when in reality many of these have been registered and then within days or weeks, declared as SORN and placed into storage. These cars are NOT contributing to the clean air that I keep hearing so much about are they? In fact there is an argument to be made that they are adding to overall pollution levels as they have had to be made and shipped all around the world and then become stored and later sold as used cars with delivery miles on them. The DVLA are aware of the number of new car registrations, they are also know what their drivetrains are, ie, petrol, diesel, HEV (predominantly petrol), PHEV, again petrol) and BEV. They will also be aware of how many of each type are also subsequently declared as SORN and their drivetrain types, as well as dates that they were first registered and when they were SORN and therefore can also tell how long that period was, how long the car has been with each new registered owner and also tell you who these keepers are, traders or private people. But they are not willing to provide such information, why do you think that might be??

Yes I saw that BBC report about 2 weeks ago and dismissed it as just another part of the official narrative to push electric cars. It also coincided with a whole raft of other things designed to increase the sales of electric cars as sales are dropping and making this ambitious 28% of all new car sales appear impossible.