//Well O_G, we have a very prominent Tory supporter who regularly posts on AB who openly advocates that private motoring should be priced out for working people…//
I don’t think the proposal was aimed at “working people”. Rather more at people who cannot realistically afford to run a car (many of whom may be working).
But back to OG’s point, for huge numbers of people who currently run i/c cars, the idea of running an electric car is totally unrealistic. Just a few of the problems:
1. The cost: The cheapest new electric car (discounting the Citroen Ami, which is more of a mobility scooter with a roof) is the Smart EQ Fortwo, at over £22k. This is a two seater and has a range of about 80 miles. Fine for shopping at Tesco’s (provided you don’t want too much shopping) but not much else. There’s nothing else under £25k and a car large enough for a couple and two kids will cost north of £40k.
2. Charging at home: It is estimated that about 60% of car owning homes have access to off-street parking where they may instal exclusive car charging facilities. In some areas (the West Midlands is worst) it is as low as 45%. This leaves an enormous number of car owners with no such facility.
3. Public charging points: There is a complete dearth of public charging points in the country. In my neighbourhood there are a total of twenty-one charging points (that’s total points, not locations – there are nine locations) within about a two mile radius. That’s twenty-one points in about twelve square miles and I live in a fairly heavily populated suburb. At Christmas Tesla drivers (who, apparently have their own network of charging points exclusive to their vehicles) were queuing for up to two hours to get charged.
There is also “range anxiety” and not least, the ability of the Grid to cope with increased demand.
As with many things, the target has been announced without a clue of how it will be achieved, let alone a plan of how to get there. Problem (2) is insurmountable. Problem (3) is very unlikely to be satisfactorily addressed at the current rate of progress. The Grid is on a knife edge at the best of times and will only worsen as nuclear plants are decommissioned with no reliable replacements.
Unless this lunacy is abandoned, one of two things will therefore happen: either large number of i/c vehicles will continue to be driven well beyond the target or large numbers of people will have to give up their cars. And why are they being asked to do this? To reduce the tiny proportion of UK’s emissions produced by vehicles so as to reduce the tiny proportion of global emissions for which the UK is responsible. Meanwhile China is burning more coal than the rest of the world put together with India and the USA burning most of the rest. None of those countries show any signs of changing that habit.