There have been various studies to try to gauge the different impact on CO2 output of electric versus petrol or diesel vehicles.
There is general agreement that making largeĀ car batteries for the electric vehicle greatly adds to the amount of CO2 during the manufacturing of the new vehicle. The electric car may produce twice as much CO2 in its manufacture than the petrol or diesel similarĀ vehicle. The amount required to make the rest of theĀ vehicle apart from the battery is very similar for a comparableĀ Ā vehicle with a different power system.
There is also general agreement that if collectively we scrapped diesel and petrolĀ cars early before the end of their working lives to replace with electric vehicles, that would generate more CO2 as a result of all the extra manufacture.
The degree of saving on running theĀ vehicles is also not a straightforward win for the electric vehicle. Clearly if the electricĀ vehicle is owned and used in a country that does generate all or most of its power from renewable sources there is a a considerable saving on CO2 from use. In practice most of the large vehicle using countries like China, the USA, Germany, UK still dependĀ heavily on gas and coal for generating substantial amounts of power, so there is much less of a CO2 saving from using an electric vehicle. If an electric vehicle is recharged from coal based electricity there couldĀ be an increase in CO2 compared to a diesel of petrol machine.
It requires a driver to use the electric vehicle for above average miles each year in a country with a reasonable amount of renewable electricity in the mix for there to be a decent saving of CO2 from electric car purchase and use. When it comes time to get rid of the old battery of an electric vehicle that also generates more CO2 in its disposal. There are alsoĀ environmental issues about mining the minerals needed for battery production.
October 11, 2022
There is not only environmental issues over the mining of the minerals but also the moral issues regarding the use of child labour in the supply and production chain.
October 11, 2022
And do you think that the moral issues around countries which supply oil, but which e.g. execute minors whenever they want are less serious?
October 11, 2022
Well the lefties seem quite happy to play football there – so I guess they’re not too bothered.
October 11, 2022
I don’t think you’ll find slave labour drilling for oil and gas.
October 11, 2022
or building cars?
October 11, 2022
Yes. Slavery they call it when they want to cow us with their history ( not OURS since we too were slaves).
Itās rather like time travel reallyā¦back to the late 1700s.
October 11, 2022
I had an interesting chat with the teenage granddaughter of a friend recently. She’s been learning about the Slave Trade at school, so I asked her what she knew about William Wilberforce. She’d never heard of him and also seemed to think that slavery had only existed in plantations in the US and Caribbean. A little piqued, I asked her who she thought had built the Pyramids and was promptly informed that it was “the Egyptians of course”.
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
a bit like weren’t the Romans brilliant soldiers, when the foot-soldiers typically were not Italian.
October 18, 2022
a bit like werenāt the British brilliant soldiers, when (a large fraction of) the foot-soldiers typically came from the rest of the Empire.
October 11, 2022
Sounds about right with the current state of school re education
October 11, 2022
Cuibono, quite, my grandparents didn’t own cars, my parents only had one between them and my Mum would take Dad to work drop him off and go back to pick up him so she could use the car minimally because even then they couldn’t spend too much on fuel at the time.
My recent ancestors were brush makers, and farm labourers I feel no guilt over our past at all, perhaps that’s why King Charles and some people like Bill Gates feel so guilty because they consume so much.
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
I used to deliver news papers as a 13yr old.I used to deliver Xmas post as a 15 yr old
I have picked fruit in summer.I had Saturday jobs at 15yrs.Would you class this as child labour.I personally got pleasure at saving for my first blouse at 21 and11 .I enjoyed saving for .y first leather coats as a mod.
October 11, 2022
i.e , 21 shillings and eleven pence
October 11, 2022
Good morning.
With respect Sir John, I know you are only talking about CO2 as that is the central driver of all legislation, agreements and policies but, I think it is important to look at and compare the overall environmental impact between ICEV’s and EV’s.
The extraction of materials, manufacture, running and maintenance and eventual disposal has to be looked at and assessed on the whole. We also must look at the social and economic impact.
Then we have to look at logistics. Do we have enough energy capacity to replace ALL the ICEV’s ? Do we have enough charging stations ? Basically, our whole infrastructure is largely based around the ICEV. From food production to delivery.
Those that are pushing Net Zero have made decisions in haste and we shall be the ones that will be made to repent at leisure.
October 11, 2022
They wonāt repent at all. There is no intention on the part of government to provide enough charging infrastructure to enable as many electric cars on the roads as there are ICE cars.
October 11, 2022
@MPC
I do not believe that the Government “provided” the charging structure for ICE vehicles.
If the Government did decide to provide the replacement charging structure for electric vehicles to replace all ICE vehicles, how much would it cost and how should it be funded ?
October 11, 2022
Why should the taxpayer/government provide the EV charging infrastructure ā¦.the taxpayer/government doesnāt build petrol stations?
October 11, 2022
The intention is to effectively force a very large number of drivers to give up their personal cars through increasing the cost and making it increasingly inconvenient for them. How do you charge a car if you live in a flat, or have a house with no off-street parking?
Remember the aim “you will own nothing.”
October 11, 2022
Two thirds of our population live in flats or terrace housing and therefore canāt charge from home ā¦just see those queues at charging stations
Under the Highways Act 1980, c.66, part IX, Section 162, āLawful and Unlawful Interference with Highways and Street, it is illegal to run a cable along a public highway because it is classed as an obstruction
No person shall fix or place any overhead beam, rail, pipe, cable, wire or other similar apparatus over, along with or across a highway without the consent of the highway authority for the highway”
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
but sure as Hell is fiery and difficult to imagine, I can imagine a fiery reaction when cars are taken away from us!
October 12, 2022
Looking at London from afar, Donna, they are now building flats with no parking and no roadside parking permits; ironically, the council flats are the only big blocks of parking.
Then they want you to rent a car for the occasional trip outside the City (that they leave parked on the street – the problem comes when they try to bill you for a prang someone else had in it that you didn’t notice when you pick it up at night!) and use just public transport and taxi, the problem is that public transport is always letting people down and holding them to ransom. It makes me wonder why the Elizabeth line isn’t a DLR.
October 12, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
Tory party and govt has been implementing the cultural destruction of our society through its mass immigration policy, energy policy to rid us of jobs and industry transferring them east, education policy to brainwash children of tender years, public services like police, NHS and local authorities to change the way we think and speak. The Tory party has become quite dangerous to our way of life. It needs to be disbanded to history.
The Tory party aim is to get rid of petrol/diesel cars without us having a say. Using mad false claims to scare into compliance. Put it to a referendum. The scare tactic and inflammatory language to scare people witless is their only tool.
Not once has JR accepted responsibility in his recent blogs for his party and govt resounding failings over 12 years which have led to these net stupid policies. Same for education from 4-21 years. Cultural destruction is his partyās aim. 35,000 illegal immigrants this year, 1.2 million visas issued. The bar so low the doors are wide open! Do not challenge or you are racist, homophobic, transphobic etc. No we are society built on Judaea Christianity.
October 11, 2022
+ millions Hope. I also feel this is deliberate policy by the CONS. Not that the other main parties are any better. WHY????? Why is the UK and its people being sacrificed, deliberately?
October 11, 2022
In case you missed the figures & at the risk of being a bore, some up to date stats:
19 to 25 Sep incl: 2553 / 53 boats
26/9 to 02/10 incl: 693 / 14 boats
03/10 to 09/10 incl: 1693 / 36 boats
( 2 days so far this week: Sun 09 Oct – 1065 / 25 boats + Mon, yesterday 10 Oct – 539 / 13 boats )
Nobody should be labelled anything at all for questioning or feeling concerned by these figures and what is going on behind the scenes.
October 11, 2022
The French mustāve been searching at the wrong beach
October 12, 2022
The EU needs rubber boat manufacturers to have to register every sale of a boat that can carry more than four people and get confirmed passport identity of the people who they sold to. They don’t want to do it. The UK government seem complicit in this operation now, giving the French more money, for what they’re doing nothing about it and don’t want to keep the people in France so nothing will change, stop going out to pick them up, otherwise the dangers of the crossing will treble in bad weather and we will be blamed as always for the French negligence in patrolling their border.
October 11, 2022
Hope
Very good post and I agree as the political and upper echelon of this country are so fixated with being seen leading the world. Let’s throw a brick in the pond and become a world leader in having a referendum on NZ. I accept that the sticky and smelly might hit the fan, but it would generate fully open, honest debate and politicians of all parties would have to unfold their real plans and costings. Now that is something to be a first in.
October 11, 2022
Our politicians (bar-one) are so insecure that our leaders need the constant adulation of other world leaders ā¦how about just trying to get the adulation from the UK voting public
October 11, 2022
How does an independent minded and independent voting backbencher have responsibility for what the government and civil service, including quangos, NGOs, local government, and judges decide? How does a backbencher have responsibility for the overmighty 24 hour media? The permanent Blob plus the media are mightier by far than a transient government, and the transient government is not a backbencher. If a backbencher were to apologise for it all as if he were responsible, he would lose credibility. Alas, we live in an age where demands are made all the time for people to apologise for what they never did and have no responsibility for. What is such an apology worth?
October 11, 2022
Silly post Rose. And quite defeatist.
JR is an MP and stands to be elected on Tory party manifesto. If he has no say in his party and just does what he is told, quite frankly he or the other MPs are no use to anyone. Based on this we need a handful of MPs not 650 and another 800 parasitic Lords. Only second to China.
If you strongly disagree you leave! If Brexit was left to the Tory party the UK would be further entwined. There are meant to be Chanelās to influence, if you have forgot four PMs in a few years!
October 11, 2022
when did backbenchers being single minded vote against Government (ie PM policy)?
That is EXACTLY why we do not see democracy in the H of C.
October 12, 2022
You can look up how they all vote. There are too many rebellions to list. I would draw your attention to 28 Conservative backbenchers voting against MV3 under Mrs May, despite huge pressure and a three line whip. This was very costly to them in ways the public could not know.
Also NB the abstentions of Owen Paterson and Sir John over the final Brexit deal, because of N Ireland and the fish.
October 11, 2022
Hope, individuals can be overcome by Stockholm Syndrome but who would have thought almost all a country’s political system could become enslaved by it.
October 11, 2022
MarkB, I’d like to hear an interview with Elon Musk to answer all of these questions. As a pioneer of electric vehicles.
October 11, 2022
I strongly recommend Dr Tim Morgan’s Surplus Energy Economics website(“Tim Morgan SEEDS” will get you there) which developed out of his 2013 book “Life After Growth”.
He conceives the economy as an energy system and the role of money as a claim on it.His model uses an Energy Return on Energy Invested(ERoEI) formula and his forecasts are not for those of a nervous disposition.
Last month his newsletter focussed on President Macron’s recent conclusion that the “age of abundance” is over-unsurprisingly he totally concurs with it.Always an informative read-as is the comments section which attracts responses from very knowledgeable people.
October 11, 2022
The electric vehicles are much heavier and so a lot more aggressive on tyre usage even for the more steadiest of drivers. That in turn has a far bigger impact on the wear and tear of road surfaces.
Both bring in environmental issues and extra costs with the disposal and replacement of those items.
Nobody has really come up yet with a structured costed plan fot the disposal and possible recycling of both turbine and panel components. Both have an environmental and cost impact on the consumers..
October 11, 2022
The green lobbies and the converts to the STW sect are very well marshalled, financially supported, with strong backing in the media and high society which has become all powerful in fighting against CO2 especially in the country.
The problem is they have never been called out called out and challenged over all the other aspects and consequences of their beliefs and teachings. Our woke society media chooses to ignore it and its impact as do 92% of our politicians.
October 11, 2022
and there lies the major problem in just about everything we are having to tolerate.
The airwaves are dominated by one set of people with one view, anyone who dares go against that is persecuted and their voices never heard again.
Past and present governments have been woeful in tackling this monster, so I can only assume they are more than happy with its stranglehold.
It’s a funny kind of land of freedom and democracy we are so keen to lecture others on, when dissenting views here are often smothered at birth.
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
+1
Itās called Mass Formation Psychosis.
Think Nudge Units.
You formulate and push a viewpoint which divides the population.
Push it vigorously and viciously in the media.
Get most onside so the ādissentersā are outcasts.
(Many regimes have done it).
It makes people too afraid to stand up for what they KNOW is rightā¦they have too much to lose.
October 11, 2022
I was never more surprised than by what happened with the Brexit vote.
The Leave result was not matter of factly accepted and acted upon.
Oh no!
And see what is happening now!
October 12, 2022
Cuibono, don’t you think that is why we’ve had 4 PMs since the Brexit vote, when they’re not holding the office they actually think they can make a difference, they take the post then realise they don’t have the power they thought the position held.
From the day Truss took office the machinations against her are fascinating to watch.
October 11, 2022
+1. Many just have no science and so trust the “experts” the BBC types push & others have too much to lose so go along with the prevailing group think/fashion however mad it is.
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
Just like now….there is no Climate Emergency, there is no panic over CO2 levels, it only exists in people’s media fed alarm.
When are we going to address plastic, sewage and other pollutants on our land, our rivers our oceans?
Something worth get mad about!
October 11, 2022
@turboterrier
“The green lobbies and the converts to the STW sect are very well marshalled, financially supported…”
Many of these lobbies are charities which are financially supported by the taxpayer ?
October 11, 2022
Oldwulf. Yes many are funded by the taxpayer and I didn’t get asked first. If they had asked the answer would be a resounding no.
October 11, 2022
oldwulf
Thanks for that comment pal very interesting.
My answer to that is take away their charitable status. It makes a mockery of the word charity.
Too many organisations take public money to pursue and support political causes. Should be stopped.
October 11, 2022
We had a choice to vote for the Green Party in the last general election ā The people chose not too
October 12, 2022
The Green party have one seat, is everyone there driving EVs? Are they using less power than the rest of us, taking less holidays than the rest of us, using more public transport? Are they paying higher council taxes to pay for the green program they want to force on the rest, have their shops stopped selling meat and milk? Just what is going to happen when they convince these youngsters through school and university to fall in line.
October 11, 2022
I don’t buy products pushed and peddled by a deceitful and malicious political ideology whose carefully concealed purpose is authoritarian in nature.
Those who buy EV’s are participating in the construction of a world which in time will impose limits upon the very thing they cherish most, the freedom to go from A to B
October 11, 2022
Very much agree, Dom. But EVs allow the very affluent among us to signal their virtue so prominently! They are doing almost as much harm as the puppet politicians.
October 11, 2022
Well said Dom, use cash and buy local produce. Make your own way of life, ignore the greenies!
October 11, 2022
…and in every EV there’s an overwatch OFF switch controlled by big brother
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
We are being sucked into the start of London’s ZiL lanes for the elite – currently those who can afford to run EVs.
Congestion charge is another step, it won’t be long before ‘somebody’ decides to halve the authorisation of cars used within the M25 on a day to day basis. Monday/ Wednesday/Friday car’s regn plate starting A-L permitted, Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday car’s regn plate starting M-Z permitted. Sunday EV only?
October 18, 2022
Such a system with odd and even ending number plates has been in place since 2019 in Paris and Lyon during summerās high pollution levels, usually lasting a week or two.
I do not think French civilisation has collapsed following these restrictions ā¦
October 11, 2022
Exactly and we have no spare low carbon electricity to charge all these new these EV cars with anyway. Nor will the grid cope with them (especially with the equally misguided push for expensive and impractical heat pump heating systems). Even wind power is not even that low in carbon if you account properly for their manufacture, backup and maintenance, burning wood at Drax is clearly not low carbon electricity either.
The other problem is the short battery life perhaps eight years or so with the range perhaps decaying to 60% or less over that period, the slow charge times (rapid charging decays the battery even more quickly). Also the vast expense and loss of taxes from EVs. Even with all these tax breaks a new electric care might cost about Ā£1 a mile just in finance costs and depreciation so vastly more expensive than keeping your old car and more CO2 too. Not that CO2 plant food is actually a problem.
October 11, 2022
Rather than an EV with a large, heavy, short-lived Ā£15,000 battery then make 15 hybrid batteries for only Ā£1,000 each that can do ~30 city miles on battery without the slow recharging, limited range and vast depreciation issues. A report is out on this and other related issues, I think tomorrow from FairfuelUK.
October 11, 2022
The Tories are promoting forcing councils to charge traditional vehicle owners out of existence in town centres!! The price of fuel still extremely high through Tory taxation, no other reason. Other countries have much lower petrol and diesel prices. This is the Tory party and govtfuel duty and VAT. Fuel Prices could be slashed overnight if the govt wanted to help the cost of living to people. No expense spared for illegal crim8 als entering our country as highIighted by GB news last night!
I was notified by my energy provider it is now going to read meters each day but I could change for every half hour!! Big brother Tory state at work for net stupid! Why should I even want to know? The prices of energy in a modern first world country should not be an issue. The govt should have a long term plan knowing energy will increase for people and business especially if it aggressively has a mass immigration policy!!
October 11, 2022
The govt does have a long term plan, Hope: to price us out of fossil fuel use. The plan is called Net Zero. We voted for it, apparently.
October 11, 2022
I am not sure that hybrids make much sense unless your use of a vehicle is predominantly in city driving. More gubbins to go wrong, occupy space, usually higher cills for the boot/rear tailgate, more weight. For infrequent users, the battery must be kept topped up (at least that was becessary for a Prius owned by an elderly relative who had to call out the garage to get it started, and was advised to run a trickle charge regularly).
October 11, 2022
Mark, I only refuel once weekly in the middle of the night.
October 11, 2022
Indeed mainly to keep pollution out of cities so you do the city miles mainly on battery. Also they do mean you can run a smaller ICU engine using the extra battery power when needed and run the ICU more efficiently by charing the battery also recover some energy on braking.
October 11, 2022
See the fairfueluk CEBR report now available on their web site which seems very sound from what I have managed to read so far.
October 11, 2022
Agreed.
Lower consumption and air pollution with one, and dispel range anxiety with the other.
Win-win.
October 11, 2022
āThere is also general agreement that if collectively we scrapped diesel and petrol cars early before the end of their working lives to replace with electric vehicles, that would generate more CO2 as a result of all the extra manufacture.ā
Anyone who does not agree is lying, deluded, ignorant, a propagandist or just mistaken! Plus the grid will not cope anyway. The aim seem to be to price poor people off the roads. This combined with road blocking, congestion charges and all the other motorist mugging.
October 11, 2022
If you do price the poor off the roads they will often struggle to work or to work efficiently. There commute without a car may be impractical or take 2 hours rather than 20 mins. Not so good for economic growth.
October 11, 2022
“Their” rather. Having long, indirect and very time restricted (& often unreliable) public transport commutes is hardly likely to make work pay or to improve UK productivity. Once again, the government actively damages productivity and the economy. Public transport is not very CO2 efficient either when fully considered – occupancy, end connections, track maintenance, often low occupancy at off peak times, staffing, stations, indirect routes…
October 11, 2022
Our local bus services and the train service workers have shown us just how weak the individual consumers are of public transport. In August our local bus service workers went on strike for a whole month, a month without public transport at all, they didn’t give a monkeys, they got their back pay and the massive pay increase and are happy now with their still near-empty buses. The Council if they had anything about them would have found an alternative use for all the large disability compliant taxis throughout the day than just dropping one child off at school each day and often times park up outside the school so they’re first in the queue to leave at 1530. They didn’t have to worry about the customers, they had no choice, no alternative and just had to suck it up, lose their jobs or pay extortionate single use taxis.
October 11, 2022
Of course, we got rid of nearly all our trams and trolley busses.
October 11, 2022
Lifelogic, the CO2 scam is totally a big con and nothing else as the plant food actually needs to rise to feed the rising world population
October 11, 2022
LL. Or not get to work at all when there’s a strike on the transport system. You can bet that when we’re all dependent on rail and bus services there will be many more strikes to hold the country to ransom for whatever they demand.
October 11, 2022
+1 they will be able to hold the country to ransom and they will.
October 11, 2022
I agree with you (not re your overall view on CO2) and indeed you have been making similar points for years. Sir Johns conversion years too late, more and more of the politicians untruths being exposed.
Plenty of informed articles on air pumps stating what I and I suspect you and many other people, that the cost is/can be umpteen times more than we are told, the subsidy is frankly useless, more and more insulation can cause moisture problems etc.
And in other news we were told treasury orthodoxy to be challenged, Tom Scholar to patch his bags, what has happened? Truss crumbles, his assistant gets the job plus two other time servers.
We were told that the medium term ābudgetā would be Nov 21 with denials it would be brought forward. We knew she would crumble again and of she has been with the risible so in that it is to protect people from rising interest rest rates. The OBR is packed with lefties, why do you allow that? We can guess what they will,say.
Truss said in her campaign she would keep spending but we all knew cuts would be necessary.
As with your topic why do your people constantly ālieā us thinking we are stupid? Why are you, an honourable man, party to this? Frankly time to go to the country and put you and us out iof our misery.
October 11, 2022
Nigl
Well said.
Truss as learnt nothing from watching those who preceded her.
She doesn’t cut the mustard.
Very weak and a liability. Like Johnson putting foreign friends first over the British people.
She is struggling to suppress her remainer stance a few years ago.
She will be the final flush as we go down the tubes.
October 11, 2022
+many
That has to be the aim or we would all be popping around in little Sinclair C5s.
Was that all a psyop to put us off electric cars? Making them figures of fun.
EVs certainly existed in 1930s America but were expunged by the oil lobby I think.
Now we see a decision to keep us all in our cold, dark rabbit hutches.
āSans everythingā.
October 11, 2022
Expunged for being inferior (batteries costing Ā£15,000 were poor on range, weight, cost, charging times, short battery lives, fire & safely risks… compared to a plastic or metal diesel tanks costing say Ā£20 to hold 10 times the energy) and back then they were lead acid batteries. New battery tech is better – but not really quite good enough as yet. They still have the same limitations and cost issue.
October 11, 2022
+1
Agreed.
But my point isā¦they didnāt build on the C5 ā¦improve it to VW level. And if they had triedā¦and as you say met with all those techy probs then why oh why are they still flogging a dead horse? ( And anyway whatās wrong with ICEs?).
They just donāt want us to have personal transport. Nor trains and buses probably!
October 11, 2022
All the battery manufacturers are from China, Japan or South Korea. With Chinaās CATL now holding 38% of the market.
The EU, US and Canada are scrabbling to
build even small scale factories.
EV cars are a strategic catastrophe.
October 11, 2022
Indeed and we will not be able to compete in building batteries in the UK with our rip of energy prices, OTT misguided regulations, vast over taxation and expensive labour. Not without vast and damaging tax payer subsidies that we do not have available.
October 11, 2022
From discussion with friends I understand that the owners of EV’s known to us all as a group seem to be tech enthusiasts rather than people inclined to look dispassionately at the whole picture. Our two family vehicles are 17 and 19 years old respectively and run beautifully and relatively cheaply. Why anyone would want to sink so much capital into cars that, I’m told, couldn’t have a life span anywhere near those is a mystery to me. Any EV fans out there want to defend them?
October 11, 2022
another theme that followed ‘New Car Reg Plate’ keeping up appearances.
October 11, 2022
A switch to all-electric will require a massive increase in the number of charging stations and an increase in total electricity generation capacity which even the ultra-optimistic Greenpeace estimate at 10%. Neither of these requirements are remotely being planned for. I conclude then that the switch to all-electric won’t happen but governments are too scared to say this and prefer to ingore the problem until a future government has to U-turn.
October 11, 2022
They just plan to push poorer motorist off the roads.
October 11, 2022
Surely greencr*p is a mere trifle compare to what Truss is doing?
PESCOā¦NI? She has apparently signed up to the first and capitulated forever over the second.
Seems as if she is scuttling us back into the EU?
Regarding carsā¦ordinary folk wonāt have them and with any luck all except the most elevated will be similarly ( unexpectedly) deprived.
October 11, 2022
Yes, Sir John. What’s your view on this sell-out? Why is everyone so quiet about this betrayal? This isn’t what the British people want and was one of the main reasons I voted for Brexit. Seems we have another traitor at the helm.
October 11, 2022
+++100
October 11, 2022
Correct – ordinary folk can’t afford EVs – In July 2022, the average used car cost just over Ā£17,000
October 11, 2022
that the average cost of a seconhand ICE car …..EVs are sky-the-limit Ā£30k++
October 11, 2022
Sir John sets out the other side of the coin which is so rarely if ever, heard or seen. That in itself is very worrying as to where we are heading.
People from professions qualified to know have been calling out the ‘green blob’ for a long time on their unworkable plans. These plans and schemes often based on dodgy data… aah but the computer module says XYZ, so off we go.
Again those wishing to debate that this isn’t quite as the green blob insists have been sidelined and not allowed anywhere near a mainstream platform to debate.
Why?
If the green blob and those inside it are so sure of their hypothesis that they actually intend to implement it, then it must surely be able to stand up to a few ‘climate change deniers’ and their dodgy data and views, wouldn’t you think.
In fact wouldn’t it be better to show the public just how wrong and dangerous these deniers are??
October 11, 2022
Thank you for a very sensible post. I believe in market forces, even when they don’t produce the result I want at a particular time. One has to take the rough with the smooth.
I repeat what I have asserted here before. We only have to powers, our vote and our money.
It is up to us to use them wisely.
For the foreseeable future I shall stick with my 12 year old diesel engined car, content with it’s low fuel consumption and VED.
How I will vote at the next GE very much depends on the behaviour of the current Government and it’s divided party.
October 11, 2022
We only have TWO powers…….sorry.
October 11, 2022
EV’s are mainly bought by virtue signallers but as a working vehicle are completely impracticle.
I predict we will ICE vehicles for many years after 2030 due to non availability of many of the components for batteries and the lack of generating capability of electricity. Unless of course government wants to take most of us off the road. A distinct possibility. For our own good, of course.
October 11, 2022
Taking the majority of drivers off the road is their aim. They want us all to live in inner cities where cars aren’t needed.
October 11, 2022
The groupings of people buying EVs are The Rich, The Famous and The Climate Crusaderā¦.and those numbers will plateau soon ā EVs average cost Ā£50k+ (replacement battery in 3-5yrs Ā£30K+)
October 11, 2022
It’s not as simple as one good, the other bad – it very much depends on the circumstance and the driver.
One of my sons drives a PHEV (for tax reasons) that he generally doesn’t plug-in. His fuel consumption will be significantly worse than if he was just driving a normal petrol engines car, essentailly because he is dragging another 500lbs around with him in the form of heavy batteries. A review by Autotrader highlighted this problem (based on Citroen DS4s). He frequently drives long distances for work reasons.
One of my daughter-in-laws is considering an EV. She can charge on her drive and does a lot of daily shuttling around with her children for school and all the other activites they get up to these days (in effective a family taxi service). So many short trips, often in traffic and centred around her home. An EV makes very good sense for her needs.
I have a weekly ‘Click & Collect’ which is about 5 miles in total, so about 250 miles per annum. However, most of my driving is over longer distances visiting family and friends and on holidays or short breaks (e.g away from home). I also care for my cars, so they tend to last me. All factors in any decision.
October 11, 2022
@ BOF “EVās are mainly bought by virtue signallers …” – perhaps, although many EVs are driven by company car recipients, motivated by often very material benefit-in-kind tax considerations and guided by their employers for whom emissions from vehicles usually count in their own carbon footprint calculations.
October 11, 2022
In other words not bought to be used as essential for conveyancing, often left at home for the mother to do the school run, coffee mornings, and shopping.
October 11, 2022
Why is there no honesty? We will eventually run out of fossil fuels, but that is along way away. We have time to develop VIABLE alternatives. Wind turbines and solar are NOT viable alternatives and they take away farmland, they blight the landscape and destroy wildlife, so I fail to see the ‘environmental’ aspect of it.
We need cheap reliable energy. We need cheap reliable food. We need well paid jobs that make work worthwhile without taxpayer benefits. We need to be as self sufficient as possible. Why are we deliberately being led in the the opposite direction on all counts?
October 11, 2022
Because the UN Agenda 2030 is intended to transfer the west’s wealth to the 3rd world and the Globalists have seen a means to “own everything.”
The British Establishment, including the new King, are completely on board with the aim.
October 11, 2022
Most Tories haven’t noticed, Donna, probably thinking ‘This can’t possibly be happening’ (last words of Tsar Nicholas II before being shot by the Bolsheviks).
October 11, 2022
āāWe will eventually run out of fossil fuelsāā
New oil & gas fields are being found every day, we have enough fossil fuels reserves for a thousand years ā we donāt have to find alternatives due to supply
Governments are forcing us to find alternatives because of the UN climate crusader lobby
October 11, 2022
“cheap reliable food” – well in that case, you probably should be adding ethanol to fuel… š
October 11, 2022
That should have been “shouldn’t” of course…. š
October 11, 2022
The only real result of adding ethanol to fuel is to increase the pump prices and VAT (and a nice tick-in-the-box from the UN)
October 11, 2022
ShirleyM
How do you get cheap everything you want to buy like home grown food – alongside ‘well-paid jobs’? The farmers are telling us they need 40,000 visas to pay people to come and harvest now. If the new minimum wage is Ā£15ph as Labour wants, how much per hour will a teacher then want, the nurse (who currently starts her 35 hour week basic on Ā£15ph), the train driver, the station worker, and the 22-year old administrator at the council?
As pay increases, costs go up unless human workers are replaced; then what do we do with all the people with no pay?
What % of the jobs with benefits top-up are 37.5 hours per week or more in the different regions? Some of these benefits are the old child tax code allowance to allow parents to earn a little more without paying tax and NI.
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
“Renewable resources” includes burning wood pellets which, as well as depleting the earth’s CO2 storage capacity by destroying swathes of forests, emits the trapped carbon in the trees as CO2. We are told it is ‘renewable’ as new trees can be planted. If they are (who knows) it will take decades for them to replace the capacity removed. Net zero is a giant scam designed to impoverish and exercise control over the majority whilst enriching the few. Politicians who support this should be ashamed or perhaps they are, unlike those they purport to represent, part of the few?
October 11, 2022
Young coal as I call it. If Government were really concerned about CO2 they would chop down all the old trees and use them to build or bury them not burn them. Then grow new trees in their place as mature forests do not really take in much more CO2 than they release through decay of leaves, wood etc. Only younger growing trees do this. Strange the experts are so confused on this that they burn them at Drax instead. Still at least they have not blown Drax up with a daft energy minister grinning for the camera as he does it. There is no C02 climate emergency anyway.
October 11, 2022
Although the carbon absorption capacity can vary, it is generally considered that a tree can store about 167 kg of CO2 per year, or 1 ton of CO2 per year for 6 mature trees. This means that more than 67 trees would have to be planted a year to offset the CO2 emissions of a single Brit.
And for the denialists who wrongly assume that CO2 is plant food. “More CO2 in the atmosphere hurts key plants and crops more than it helps. The familiar adage ā too much of a good thing is a bad thing ā applies to atmospheric carbon dioxide: In higher concentrations, it is a damaging pollutant” https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/12/more-co2-in-the-atmosphere-hurts-key-plants-and-crops-more-than-it-helps/
October 11, 2022
just how high does it need to be? just asking.
October 12, 2022
Net zero is a balance scale, the ppm CO2 on both sides of the scale must be equal, regardless of how large the ppm value of each side is. Personally, I think a lot of the so called Carbon offsets are a con invented by the fossil fuel industry.
The planet is only concerned by the level of CO2 in its atmosphere, regardless of what is being pumped into it and what is being sucked out of it by trees etc. 350 ppm appears to be a consensus, 300 better.
October 11, 2022
Funny how weāve always been conned into believing that the first Industrial Revolution was a good thing.
It wasnāt.
Any more than this one is!
Last time they came for our health, land and traditions.
This time they take everything!
The trap baited with electric cars and the like?
October 11, 2022
If we had lived before the Industrial Revolution, then we would have living in a rural paradise of course! š
Well no. Most of us would be working very long hours (of heavy manual labour) with a poor diet and a very short life span. I still remember Dentist’s drills in the 60’s without being tempted to go even further back in (technology) time thank you very much!!
October 11, 2022
I very much doubt if you will have much choice.
Over the two years of imprisonment would you, with raging toothache, have settled for a 1960s drill over no treatment at all?
The aim is to deindustrialise us.
Before the First Industrial Rev life and work ordered by the seasons, the Church calendar and the daylight hours.
Once in the industrial towns all that went by the board and life became much harder.
October 11, 2022
Are you sure you would like to return to the ways of living before the Industrial Revolution? Health care was almost non existent, depending on herbal remedies. There was plenty of interference in the lives of ordinary people in feudal regimes, and few owned property.
October 11, 2022
Mark. I think you will find that ‘feudal regimes’ died out many centuries before the start of the industrial revolution.
Get a copy of the ‘Teach yourself history of England’ if it is still available!
October 11, 2022
Cuibono. The Industrial Revolution and before that, the agrarian revolution, started by Townsend’s rotation of crops, WERE ‘a good thing’. They were good for The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The crazy carbon neutral targets are part of a cover for something very sinister. My country (and it’s probably yours also) is under attack.
October 11, 2022
Well it hasnāt exactly turned out well has it? And because of greed and competition it had to end like this. A gradual game of Beggar Thy Neighbour. And we are all broke!
And now the powers that be want to repeat the process that took place in the late 1700s .
In a different direction ( yet to be fully disclosed) but still totally destroying our environment and lives.
They industrialised us, more for their benefit than ours, and now they want to reverse all that and take us back to pre industrial times but with none of the social supports we used to have.
We are indeed under attack and in great trouble.
October 11, 2022
Sir John
You haven’t included the amount of CO2 which is, and will be, generated to provide charging facilities across the country. Millions of them.
I now live in a small west country town where at least half the houses do not have off-street parking and you can’t guarantee parking your own car outside your own house. There aren’t sufficient car-parks to provide chargers there for all the cars which would need them. Where are the chargers going to go?
Or is the real intention to make it impossible for 50%+ of the population to own a private car? I think it is perfectly logical to reach that conclusion.
Meanwhile, Pretendy-Conservative MPs need to know that Richard Tice has pledged that Reform UK’s next Manifesto will include a commitment to scrap the proposed ban on new petrol cars in 2030. That’s roughly when my small, fuel-efficient, cheap Hyundai i10 will need replacing …. so it gets my vote.
October 11, 2022
@Donna +1 you also have to ask why is it the taxpayer funding charging points. The taxpayer didnāt fund petrol stations.
You have it there, tax isnāt to fund our structures, increase our wealth and security but MPās mee-too unfounded dreams of didnāt I do well
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
Gets my vote
October 11, 2022
Indeed, the mining of rare earth elements is another environmental disaster unfolding.
Time for everyone to realise the only green machine is the bicycle. Sorry Greta, your EV isn’t going to save the world.
Plenty of spare fat around the British waistline to power it for some time to come as well.
October 11, 2022
Are there still 9 million bicycles in Beijing?
October 11, 2022
Yeah but they do have a population of 1.426 billion
October 11, 2022
yes and enormous mountains of dumped bicycles.
October 11, 2022
Virtue signaller: “Look at my shiny new electric car. Think of all the carbon it saves!”
Sceptical bystander: “You mean CO2 – it’s a gas, not a solid. Anyway, tell me what you think about the use of Chinese slave labour and Congolese child labour to get at the rare earth metals for the battery, and all the tons of earth that have to be moved for that very same purpose.”
VS: “Er…..”
October 11, 2022
+1
October 11, 2022
Plus it has to do about 80,000 miles on low carbon electricity (that we do not have) to save the CO2 that was produced making it & then it needs a new battery at about that same mileage. Oh and it costs about Ā£1 a mile more mainly in depreciation and financing costs over all (compared to keeping the old car).
October 11, 2022
The Conservatives need to abandon their fascist plan to ban the sale of ICE vehicles. When electric car technology is good enough – when graphene batteries arrive, I think – people will buy the darn things.
P.S. Are you following what’s going on in the Netherlands, where Rutte is on the cusp of seizing productive farms, under the guise of a ‘nitrogen emergency’, so as be able to house his 100,000 immigrants/year? One farmer has just committed suicide. We, and the Dutch, are governed by idiots.
October 11, 2022
Agreed, SW. We have run out hotels for the dinghy ‘passengers’, and obviously they need superior accommodation else they get violent, start rioting and destroy their ‘less than perfect’ accommodation (such nice people), so what next? Seizure of private property, and to hell with the Brit tenants? Brits can sleep in doorways like all the other homeless Brits. We are just the stupid cash cows that pay for the comfort of the ‘uninvited guests’ while many Brits are being deprived of those comforts themselves.
October 11, 2022
SW. Thank goodness for GB News and Farage and Steyn. It’s the only media platform reporting on the invasion from France and what’s unfolding in the Netherlands. As I said in my post last night there is something going on in the West and it’s not good.
October 11, 2022
The EU wants to build a supercity on the land which will span the borders of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany. A city without a country. It will house the replacement population who for some reason they think are more malleable.
At least voters in EU countries are starting to wake up to the realities of the EU. Is it too late? I’m not sure.
October 18, 2022
Reference for this EU supercity, please. I could not get anything from google.
October 11, 2022
Well the Dutch Government’s plan to seize farmland to house their gimmiegrants is only marginally more insane than the British Government’s new policy to accommodation the 1000+ criminal migrants they are importing every week in luxury country hotels/stately homes.
According to a Conservative Councillor whistle-blower these criminal migrants also have the benefit of twice-weekly GP surgeries at their luxury hotels. (Check out Farage and Steyn on GB News last night). I tried to make an appointment to see my GP last week and was told the earliest appointment would be in 4.5 weeks – so I used Beneden Healthcare, which I pay for and got the prescription I needed at private rates (Ā£42 more than an NHS prescription). I’m delighted to learn that the 36,000+ criminal migrants they’ve imported are getting “free” superior healthcare to me, when I’ve paid towards the NHS all my working life.
The next General Election can’t come soon enough.
October 11, 2022
Donna. I can’t wait for the next election either. Whatever happens I am not voting for the usual rubbish parties.
October 11, 2022
Donna
The state of the current crop of our representatives is so dire it will not matter who gets in. Not a fag paper between them.
There about 50 who you could rely on in a crisis the rest are beyond saving neither use or ornament.
October 12, 2022
Donna, do you think Labour/SNP will be any different and what do you think your taxes would be to pay for the NHS to have every 1p they want?
I am giving Terese Coffey the benefit of time to see what she does; Toynbee was moaning about her investigating the 15 worst-performing health trusts first; I read that and thought, good.
October 11, 2022
JR is dead right to champion UK food production. As European politicians destroy their farming community, we won’t be able to rely on them for imports.
October 11, 2022
Its like governments have gone mad ! Against the people !
October 11, 2022
They are not “idiots” they are tyrants.
October 11, 2022
S_W: Yes, I listened to that too. Very sad about the farmer ( reported to be just 43yrs old ) mentioned who just could not take it any longer. There was an indication though that the farmers are not yet finished and will rise again. We are led to believe it is all supported by the people. The commentator reporting on this ( last night Mark Steyn GBN ) suggested otherwise. This continues to be reported on by GBN. We don’t seem to be hearing too much about our own farmers, or at least, not enough. Governed by idiots ? Well, there are certainly, as someone else has stated, ‘sinister’ moves and many external ‘drivers’. We are not told the half of it because it is WE who are all thought to be the idiots.
October 11, 2022
I note that the farmers’ party the BBB is only just behind the VVD party of Rutte in polling, and given the trends is likely to become the most popular party in the Netherlands very soon. PVV, the party of Geert Wilders is also putting in its strongest showing for several years and is not far behind in third place. The parties in the current government could have to rely on the lunatic fringe like Groen Links (green left), Partij van de Dieren (animal rights), etc. at the next election.
October 11, 2022
The post should not be controversial. Our difficulty is that for many people, it would be construed as “problematic”.
October 11, 2022
Good morning Sir John
A good question, but as always with UK Governments these are the questions that should have been asked and well and truly answered long before the over burden taxpayer was forced in to subsidising EVās.
There should as with the trend elsewhere an environmental impact certificate needed to sell EVās in the UK. We donāt make any of them of note in the UK, therefore the manufacture is carried out by the Worlds largest polluters, the shipped to the UK willy-nilly without regard to real World impact.
Then add in the UK taxpayer who themselves canāt currently even dream of funding an EV is forced to subsidies those that can, at time of purchase, required infrastructure etc. That alone is wrong. Users of ICEās didnāt have refuelling funded by the taxpayer.
This is an aspirational dream of the powers that be just dumping on the taxpayer. In the meantime food on the table power to heat ones home is sidelined. Governments need to ensure wealth can be created in the UK, to fund its failing infrastructure, education, health and so on before the join me-too campaigns pushed on them by those that donāt and will never contribute to the UK moving forward.
The taxpayer taken for a dummy once more
October 11, 2022
If our leaders could look at the issues in purely practical and economic terms we shouldn’t be where we are now. Pursuit of efficiency with fossil power has been stopped by the eco warriors and our society, wealth and wellbeing is being forced back by them. We are suffering and will suffer, and lose, in relation to our competitors and rivals if the eco ideology continues to grip.
Sadly many leaders think of themselves and their ratings in this, purely selfishly, when claiming to act selflessly in ‘saving the planet’. I recognise there are serious threats against anyone who challenges the ‘climate change’ ideology but there are also grass root supporters, currently subdued by the same problem who are waiting to help.
We need more MPs and others to speak out for sense.
October 11, 2022
The mainstream parties all agree with net zero so like the EU we must force a referendum or vote Reform. Lots of villages have lost their idiots to Westminster.
October 11, 2022
Mostly an accurate summation but perhaps you could tell us exactly which country gets most or all of it’s power from renewables Mr Redwood?
To my knowledge there is no country that gets more than a tiny percentage of power from it’s incredibly expensive and ineffective windmills and it’s part time solar panels.
It’s all a massive scam and unless we want to end our industrial society in quite a nasty way the eco lunatics in government need to get their marching orders quick.
Reply Norway with hydro
October 11, 2022
There is no ned for evs as there is no climate catastrophe/crisis/breakdown, anthropogenic or natural.
There is no evidence that extreme weather is increasing – check the data rather than accepting the BBCās hysterical reporting. Average global temperature (land & sea) measured by satellite by the UAH since 1979 is increasing by only 0.13 degrees C per decade.
The climate models overestimate global warming because they are omitting to add the original energy from the sun as well as the feedback response from greenhouse gases into the input.
The data on temperature and CO2 for the last 500 million years since the start of the Cambrian explosion shows that temperature does not follow CO2 levels in the atmosphere, both of which have been much higher than today. In fact the Antarctic Vostok Ice Core Data (450,000 years) and the Greenland Ice Core Data (11,000 years since the last ice age) show CO2 following temperature when both are at historically very low levels.
Data from NASA of CO2 levels over the last 800,00 years shows that these have dropped 9 times (including at the last ice age just 11,000 years ago) to 180 ppm, just 30 ppm above the level below which plants, and hence all life on earth, cannot survive.
The current level of CO2 is historically very low and should be trebled to reach the optimum required for plant and hence food growth.
October 11, 2022
CORRECT ON ALL COUNTS
October 11, 2022
So, ALL the climate scientists are wrong and you are right?
October 12, 2022
MW :
Have you checked my data?
Around 1200 brave scientists and professionals have signed the World Climate Declaration āThere Is No Climate Emergencyā, including the Canadian Dr. Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, whose YouTube videos I recommend watching.
I suggest everyone checks the data themselves and not rely on hysterical reporting and inaccurate modelling.
October 12, 2022
They all insisted the world was flat…..
October 11, 2022
As SJR points out, it depends on the CO2 content of the generation. The UK had a content of around 500g 15 years ago and by switching between wind and gas while reducing coal and closing heavy industries, this has reduced to around 200. During lockdown it went even lower. However, our nuclear stations are closing fast, gas is in short supply and coal is increasing while it is becoming more expensive. We will be back to a higher level.
Germany was also over 500 and with all their renewables and closing nuclear, has not reduced much at all and is bound to go higher with ecoloons in government.
Poland was and is a champion in CO2 with s 700+. A Tesla there would make more than a big diesel.
France and Sweden have been goodies with nukes and hydro. But their nukes are conking out too and windmills won’t stop their levels increasing.
African countries are very high emitters but on a low base.
It’s all on this website.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/carbon-intensity-electricity?tab=table
October 11, 2022
At University a lecturer told us that in the burning, generation and distribution only 5% of the energy in the fuel reaches a light bulb in your house. If you add in charging and using energy from a battery that will be even less. In a vehicle with an internal combustion a petrol engine can be up to 36% efficient and diesel 47%. In Formula One they are achieving over 50% efficiency with their petrol hybrids. It seems to me that the figures would suggest that electric cars a hugely worse for the world if we are using fossil fuels for the electricity as the require huge amounts of extra energy. Banning the internal combustion engine is purely political and has nothing to do with engineering or what is good for the environment.
October 11, 2022
The new tech 2 stroke engines have an efficiency of 47.2% but are banned by the EU and still banned in the UK
Good article https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S209580991830715X
And 50% efficiency with the new Kawasaki supercharged 2 stroke design engine
October 11, 2022
Off topic. I pray to God the PM does not really believe āthe Ukrainians are succeedingā. They must surrender unconditionally and so must NATO – whose proxy war this is.
140 cruise missiles carefully targeted yesterday – very carefully targeted as the Ukrainian reported deaths are 11.
At least 45 more launched today – so far. Russia is NOT out of ammunition, NATO is!
October 11, 2022
NATO and Europe have been busy building ‘wind-turbines’, no money, time nor resources left be build naughty weapons & ammunition
October 11, 2022
and which country would you like to surrender next to Putin? Plenty of candidates – do we get them to agree to an unlucky dip?
October 12, 2022
It doesn’t matter much what the PM believes. Reality is taking over now and Washington is looking for an off-ramp from a military adventure that went wrong. Just as long as it’s less humiliating than the Afghanistan scuttle, that will do. NATO will take years to rearm and learn lessons from its failure, but it will. In the meantime, the drastic weakening of the German economy will be a satisfactory second-best to the US, instead of the hoped-for weakening of Russia.
October 11, 2022
All the time we’ve got strikes on our transport systems a car is a necessary item to get to work. God help us if and when we all rely on public transport. It’s rubbish in my area.
October 11, 2022
Did I hear that ānotā having a ICE car is against my human rights ā¦I must contact ECHRs ā¦.bugger, theyāre more woke than the UK government
October 11, 2022
This is more of the failure of the āsound-biteā not matching reality.
EVās without the threat to remove and punish existing modes of transport wont in there current form move forward. So punish the taxpayer, import more and degrade the UK economy make it harder for everyone to move forward.
Air source heat pumps with out the extra Ā£20-30,000 structural changes to the existing housing stock donāt work, so punish those that can’t afford to move home.
Lets not forget all these āwā¦ dreamsā set out to punish the old, the pensioner ā they are stuck on just Ā£141.00 a week after paying in for 30 years or more, with no hope of more at their time of life. Heat, light or food i would guess is a grim choice.
To many narrow views of the world by Government, to many one size fits all directives by Government. Not a Government for the People
October 11, 2022
You explain the question mark against electric vehicles very clearly. As to the mining of minerals for the batteries you could add child/slave labour to the downside. Personally I do not buy into the satanising of CO2 at 0.04% of the earths atmosphere and an essential plant food. No CO2 adds up to no trees. CO2 elimination is an essential tenet of the false religion called nett zero. Better get you political brains around hydrogen production, a much cleaner, market friendly solution to fueling transport at all levels, but too many of you prefer back stabbing to problem resolution.
October 11, 2022
Delivering a message from London to Edinburgh used to take many days journey on horseback.
Later iron horses moved people and goods faster. Now high volumes easily reach in seconds free of charge.
Teleportation may become a better solution than heavy metal. It was documented in the 1870s and shown to work in the 1950s, evidenced on film. However, a fly in the ointment caused a bad solution then.
Today electrical cars are similarly hampered by unforeseen glitches, and worse.
October 11, 2022
The communist fifth column that infest our Government, Parliament, Civil Service and institutions know that evs are expensive and impractical as well as the batteries being a danger to life from thermal runaway leading to explosive combustion and emitting gases such as hydrogen cyanide.
There are insufficient minerals, electrical power, charging units and national and local grid infrastructure to be able to replace all our existing ices with evs. A Government minister last year has already informed us that car ownership for the majority will end.
The sole purpose of evs is to restrict our freedom to travel and those in control of the charging infrastructure will easily be able to control the movement of the few who are allowed and can afford to keep an ev.
There is no climate catastrophe/crisis/breakdown that requires CO2 emissions to be curbed.
October 11, 2022
Electric cars.
It’s a more simple technology, it were not for the batteries they would be cheaper to build than an ICE car, they should also be more reliable, with less moving parts.
All vehicles are limited by storage range and ease and duration of fill up, the longer you can travel on one fill up, the greater the flexibility and potential range you have.
We run two vehicles, one a large 22 year old 3 litre V6 petrol gas guzzler, which has Zero depreciation. The other a 15 year old 50 MPG Diesel Hatchback, again with now Zero Depreciation, both still look good, are reliable and comfortable.
To replace both with new Electric vehicles would mean expenditure of about Ā£100,000 and would complicate, and extend in time, the few long journeys we make each year to the West Country and the South of France.
To purchase new or second hand (nearly new) ICE vehicles is a worry, as Government, Local Authority and City regulations and taxation are for ever changing with ever increasing penalties for emissions, clean air Zones or congestion charging, making the future of ICE motoring ever more expensive.
So what do I do ?
Like many, I will do nothing whilst both vehicles are still capable of giving useful and reliable service, and until research and development catches up with a real life requirement.
Will the present Electric Vehicles and batteries give a running life of 20 years or more ?
October 11, 2022
I used to long for electirc cars and lorries, because of the noise and pollution. Real pollution, not CO2. Since then I have discovered the cost of the whole package, from the mining to the indisposability, from the impracticalities of charging, to the particulate pollution from the tyres. At the same time, petrol and diesel cars have become cleaner and quieter. Many of them have become smaller in response to the overcrowding. However, when one goes to neighbourhoods like London’s St Paul’s where everything seems to be electric, one can appreciate the advantages.
October 11, 2022
There should be not a single luxury nor mod con in a new EV car.
No metallic paint, no aircon, no plush upholstery, nothing.
Then – and only then – can a Tesla driver lecture me, the driver of a second hand 8 year Zuzuki Alto, on the environment.
Otherwise we are starting to look more and more like a Communist state replete with arrogant and hypocritical Tesla Class. Virtue signalling about the environment when, in fact, they are just as wasteful on fashion and newness as they ever were.
October 11, 2022
In Russia it was called the Zil Lane for priviledged drivers only ….in a few years the UK will have a Tesla Lane for EV (elite) drivers only
October 11, 2022
and the bonnet, roof and boot should be solar panels.
October 11, 2022
At last! A politician willing to speak out – Well Done Sir John!
I ordered a new petrol car at the end of January. I have owned two cars from new over the past 20 years and have a good understanding of my driving habits (which have changed over time). During those 20 years I have driven about 170k miles but average much less in retirement – probably about 4-5K per year. I expect my new car to last me about 10 years and it may well be my last one. On a recent trip to North Wales, I averaged over 46mpg, with auto-cruise set to 70mph, averaging 59mph – as it is nearly all M’Way.
Volvo esimate that (in UK) you have to drive 52k miles before the carbon cost of manufacture, plus running emmisions of a petrol vechicle exceeds that of an EV. For me that’s going to be over 10 years. But current fashion would encourage me to get an EV (which I would likely lease for 4 years), so I would be on my third EV lease before I reached that 10 year point. It would also cost me a good deal more over that period, not less as many seem to suggest, if only because my new car can only depreciate to zero. So it’s capital cost will be spread over that 10 years.
PS That’s my logical argument for choosing ICE – the ‘mind’ part if you will.
The ‘heart’ part is that I’ve driven the same marque over the past 20 years (and firstly in 1979) and my new car is the last pure petrol vehicle that they will ever build. It’s a beautiful looking vehicle (at least to me) and it’s probably the best ‘driving’ car I’ve ever owned. It’s reasonably fast (not a deciding factor for me these days) although I also know that many EVs can outperform it. What a pity that I’m going to be penalised for my personal preference to promote a ‘carbon’ saving that doesn’t exist in practice.
October 11, 2022
It doesnāt matter how āgreenā electric cars areā¦its about FREEDOM OF CHOICE and its about this Tory government removing our freedom of choice and banning the internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles
October 11, 2022
All true, no real CO2 saving in most of the nonsense that pases for environmentalism these days.
Not that we really need it – the climate change lobby base their position on highly dubious stats (few people are aware of the outrageous skulduggery that resulted in their claim that 90% of scientsist agree with them).
Most climate change predictins are based on computer models and their underlying assumptions are the problem – those who are conducting actual observations are finding that there is no emergency.
If the govt had taken the approach that we must break our dependence on fossil-producing states such as Russia and the OPEC countries people might be more amenable to the idea (and to the speed at which it needs to happen).
October 11, 2022
Off topic, the Iranians have risen against their murderous mullahs. Any chance that our gouvernemong might show a smidgen of interest in this? A few words of gentle encouragement?
October 11, 2022
Businesses are being encouraged to replace company cars with electric. Kias are affordable electric alternatives. Therefore a lot of the older car flows into the general market of ex-company three-year-old hired diesel cars won’t be there for the general public to buy second-hand.
We have asked our business estate for permission to put a changing cable under the pavement, replacing the pavement as it is now, a year on and still no agreement, and we own the building and the car park, just not the pavement in between, so we had to put two of three chargers in people’s homes where they can have them, so we could have bought just one!
October 11, 2022
Wrong sort of battery (or electrical storage).
Electric drive systems can be retro fitted into existing vehicles.
This is all a long term process; nuclear fusion will surely catch up, and in the mean time, never much mention of diesel from recycled plastic, or the tonnes of metal and rare earths buried in landfill or in the mountains of electronic waste.
Climate change caused by CO2 may be completely delusional, but pollution is not so great either. If these are to be the new wave of technology and industry of the future, then maybe this is a chance to reclaim the scientific, technological and manufacturing prominence which, as is often hypothesized here, has been gradually lost due EU membership and globalism in general.
If we ever get there, maybe we keep hold of it next time?…
October 11, 2022
Off topic, I’ve just watched some members of the House of Lords swearing the Oath of Allegiance to King Charles, but as I have said before the Oath needs to be amended to expressly include renunciation of any loyalty to the EU or any other foreign body or organisation.
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/07/22/my-contribution-in-the-northern-ireland-protocol-committee-day-2-debate/#comment-1330608
Or, insist on an additional Oath of Abjuration:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/09/20/treasury-orthodoxy-and-black-wednesday/#comment-1342175
“As for those eurofederalists who still contaminate Parliament, and who are especially numerous in the unelected chamber, they should be removed from our national legislature and banned from any sensitive public positions, and the best way to proceed with that it to demand a new Oath of Abjuration expressly rejecting the EU and any similar pretended supranational organisation as well as the normal Oath of Allegiance.”
It disgusts me that later today these unelected legislators-for-life will be debating the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill and some will claim that it is “undemocratic” and “illegal”.
October 11, 2022
Interesting article in What-Car
‘An analysis by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) revealed that a combustion-engined car like a Volkswagen Golf causes around 7.2 tonnes of carbon emissions during its production process. In comparison, a similar-sized EV, such as a Volkswagen ID.3, causes around 9.2 tonnes.’
https://www.whatcar.com/news/how-green-are-electric-cars-really/n24646
October 11, 2022
Three weeks ago we drove through several densely populated urban areas on the outskirts of Paris on a sunny autumn evening. The areas were teaming with people and every street we drove down had cars parked half on the pavement on both sides of the street. There would have been no possibility of parking because every possible place was already occupied by a vehicle.
It occurred to us that there was no possibility whatsoever of those living in these areas converting to EVs.
It would be completely impossible to provide even a fraction of the number of charging points necessary and nobody could charge their car from a window in their apartment.
This is a problem in every similar area surrounding every large town and city across Europe and the USA.
The Green fanatics have no answer to this problem and until they do, residents will continue to buy diesel or petrol cars and if they are banned from sale, they will carry on running the cars they already own.
October 11, 2022
You didn’t come to a conclusion that our Government is ahead of this game? The answer is to take steps to deny car ownership using clever moral arguments and taxes.
October 11, 2022
“If an electric vehicle is recharged from coal based electricity there could be an increase in CO2 compared to a diesel of petrol machine.” – JR
Unless the owner is also generating their own electricity, there’s always significant amount of CO2 generated by waste due to inefficiencies in electricity generation and transmission to the charging points (est. 35% loss at powersatations, and 10% during distribution and transmission). As we already have supply problems to the point of blackout, is this really time to put more pressure on the grid?
Banning ICE engines is hardly efficient or practical. Switching to alternates such as biofuels and letting the vehicles run to end of life reduces waste.
October 11, 2022
If EVs are so good why the need to ban ICE cars
October 12, 2022
“If EVs are so good why the need to ban ICE cars” – glen cullen
Because the EVs aren’t as good as claimed, so the market won’t do what politics wants. There was an estimation that replacing all ICE cars with EVs would use the world’s lithium supplies by 2050. If they did, I’m not sure what they would use for phones, tablets, laptops, and all those smart devices they want us to put in our homes.
October 11, 2022
Even Germany are holding out against the planned EU wide ICE ban 2035 ā¦not as stupid as us!
October 11, 2022
Quite, Sir John. Your previous leader’s decision to stop us using and producing I.C. vehicles in the near future was based on a fantasy that it was practical and desirable.
It is not either, practical, or desirable.
So if it has passed into law, repeal it.
If it is not law but manufacturers and customers believe it is going to happen, then make it very clear to everyone that the policy has changed because, for one thing, we simply do not have enough electricity in the grid to charge so many E.V.’s.
Truss quite rightly wants to grow our economy. What better way than increasing our production of both types of vehicle?
Let the E.V. producers find new places to manufacture, because the old I.C. producing sites are not adapted for that production. As was pointed out at the time.
By encouraging both types we could potentially export more, as ell as avoid imports.
The whole world is not going E.V. mad overnight.
And by the way, what has happened to all those ‘Free Ports’ we were promised?
October 11, 2022
Let the consumer and market decide ā stop all subsidies to the automotive industry and on the purchase of vehicles and stop the ban on ICE vehicles
October 11, 2022
A good cartoon by Matt in the Telegraph, salesmen showing an EV to a prospective purchaser by candlelight
Welcome to the NWO
October 11, 2022
The customer could be invited to sit in the warm vehicle, and watch tv of their choice?
October 11, 2022
Norway has powered ahead in new Electric car sales in just ten years, from 100% of vehicles being diesel, petrol and hybrid to just 35% in 2021.
They only have 5.4m people in 385,207km2 compared to Scotland’s 5.5m people in 79,910km2 and England’s 56m people in 243,610km2. “Electric car sales increased by 186% in 2020, and EVs enjoyed another record year in 2021 with more than one in ten new vehicles being electric. ” hc.
More battery electric vehicles (BEV) were sold in 2021 than the previous five years combined in the UK (2016-2020), with 190,727 registrations (11.6% of all new car sales), while plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) made up 7% or 114,554 cars.
The UK public has to go for hybrids instead of full electric because we don’t have sufficient fast recharge points for longer journeys; in my opinion, electric vehicles are only great for shorter regular trips. Having had one now to trial for a few months, I prefer it to my old 17-year-old BMW 325i other than this recharge issue if I journey somewhere long distance. In the UK, Scotland has the highest number of EV charging devices per 100,000 of the population (47), followed by England (36), Wales (29) and Northern Ireland (17).
Choosing an electric vehicle was nothing at all to do with being swanky, a show-off, or an eco-warrior; the car itself is very, VERY basic inside, and outside they’re not so head-turning in fact they all look samey, with no fancy nobs and dials, pleather interior; now I’m used to it I prefer it, although I do miss the leather. By the end of 2022, it’s projected that electric cars will outsell diesel and mild hybrid diesel.
October 11, 2022
But isn’t Norway planning to ban ICE cars 2025 (3 years)
Why ban ICE cars if EVs are so good
October 12, 2022
glen, so they can start to close down fuel stations perhaps. I visited Norway and I was surprised at the number of electric small cars and charging points. Everything is very expensive there even a sandwich from a shop.
October 11, 2022
The BBC today are interviewing strategic experts on whether Putin will or will not use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine, the AlJazeera News debating energy shortage in Europe and the BoE reporting of UK material financial instability ā¦.While the UK is still planning to ban ICE cars & home gas boilers 2030 ā the utter absurdity of net-zero and our governments adherence to climate crusaders is quite beyond any logic
And yesterday another 539 illegal immigrants crossed the channel in 13 boats ā No doubt transported in EVs to their new four star hotel, food and free health care for life
October 11, 2022
The big travesty over EVs at the moment is the enormous subsidy doled out to those who take one as a company car, with P11D rates of only 1-2% of list price compared with up to 40% for an equivalent ICE car, making it much cheaper to buy the ICE out of taxed income on a personal lease. The benefit for having an EV as a company car is greatest for those who pay higher marginal rates of tax. That is why many EVs are higher end models.
Green politicians need to explain why the rich should be subsidised to virtue signal.
October 11, 2022
It would be a good idea if Just Stop Oil people saw this blog. Perhaps then they wouldn’t be so pig ignorant.
Doubtless they would go to their fall back position, that people should travel by public transport. What type of public transport carriages are environmentally? All together now: “FULL ONES ARE”. Empty trains charging across the country are not environmentally friendly. And they also have the disadvantage that they are not economic. The Government would do us all a favour by privatising the railway industry (including the freehold on railway property) and withdrawing all taxpayer support. Train services would then be demand driven and there would be business class, seated class (no standing) and standing class (new carriage design required). Come on, Sir John, make it happen.
Maybe we should parachute Just Stop Oil personnel into Riyadh and tell them to spread their message there.
October 11, 2022
Off topic, this unelected legislator-for-life is still carrying on today as she was over six years ago:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2016/08/05/where-is-the-evidence-to-justify-the-banks-action/#comment-827324
Then it was:
āIf peers apply the brakes to Brexit, weāll be doing our jobā,
now it’s the same with the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill.
October 11, 2022
No actual data or numbers that can be verified.
No actual reports cited which can be verified.
Dog whistling at it’s very best.
October 11, 2022
I read once that the idea was to make all institutions look rotten
in order that a one world solution would look great.
Institutions being Religions, Parliaments, Media, Armies, Royalties etc.
All these institutions have bad/corrupt/deviant people
( who could reform themselves should they wish )
They also have good people.
I have faith in Good People. Left, Right.Catholic/Jew/Muslim/Atheist/Rich/Poor etc.
Speak the unadulterated TRUTH.
October 11, 2022
Its a ‘Brave New World’
October 11, 2022
Haha yet more censorship, donāt worry people are waking up
David Davis on the Nigel Farage show earlier saying that Net Zero will be a disaster and that the government needs to get a grip
Youāre fighting a losing battle, never mind I donāt think that many people read your diary and those that do realise what youāre up to
You could easily get a job with the CCP and teach them a thing or two about censorship
October 11, 2022
and on a much lighter note:
Chinese technology poses a major risk to the UK’s security and prosperity, the head of GCHQ has said.
In a lecture, Sir Jeremy Fleming said China’s leadership was using technology to secure control at home and abroad. He argued that this was an urgent problem that needed to be addressed by the UK and allies.
He also said Russia’s military was exhausted but there were no signs yet of nuclear weapons use.
China has deliberately and patiently set out to gain “strategic advantage by shaping the world’s technology ecosystem”, the head of the intelligence agency told an audience at the Royal United Service Institute for its annual security lecture. Sir Jeremy argued the Chinese Communist Party was aiming to manipulate the technology that underpins people’s lives to embed its influence at home and abroad and provide opportunities for surveillance. He warned China was seeking to create “client economies and governments” by exporting technology to countries around the world, and said these countries risked “mortgaging the future” by buying in Chinese technology with “hidden costs”.
He pointed to a series of examples:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63207771
read the examples here.
October 11, 2022
Sir JR
So, the BoE intervention has got nothing to do with the government mini budget?
I seem to recall that is what you told us recently?
October 11, 2022
And that is broadly correct Bill. The underlying problems we’ve been seeing recently were present long before L&K turned up on the scene I’m afraid. That doesn’t suit some peoples political agendas but this has been building for a long time – and we are not alone in the hole either!
October 12, 2022
IanT
You are right they just made it worse
October 12, 2022
And similar problems in Europe too Ian.
October 11, 2022
Ha Ha
You have to refer to Jezza before printing me .
Me, the uncorrupted Conservative voter.
Aside
Why does Quasi keep grinning like a loony ?
No idea what so ever re his policies.
They may be good, may be bad.
But the wide mouthed grinning is a vote loser.
October 11, 2022
Yes, it’s idiotic and designed to create the impression he’s somehow relaxed about the chaos now unfolding in the bond market triggered by idiots like Bailey who appears to be doing the bidding of Globalist urchins who now despise low taxes, small State and individual freedoms
October 11, 2022
Bailey’s on a Kamikaze political mission with his crazed, unhinged ramblings. What’s Bailey’s agenda?
October 11, 2022
Unless you live in Norway blessed with hydro it seems the only advantage of of electric cars over ICE powered cars is the expensive luxury of quietness, 2 pedals, no gears to change, full power available at all times and convenient home charging (providing you keep within the mileage limit).
Choice of lifestyle fads and pushing the boundaries of technology in California’s Silicon valley and cashing in on the climate change activism loons allowed Elon Musk et al to pander to challenge one of the very foundations of traditional USA big business HQ in Detroit East coast with everyone dreaming of running a V8 gaz guzzler.
The power of advertising appeals to the American Dream fantasy backed by plausible net zero and convenient no mention or idea just how this invisible electric power is generated and the carbon miles made to produce it.
October 12, 2022
Detroit desolation and abandonment happened before Telsa even IPO’d.
Quiteness is not the only advantage, but you have to work for it – put solar panels on your roof and you can fuel the EV independently of government and fuel companies, which can also make for far cheaper transportation, the EV can also provide backup power in case of power cuts.
October 11, 2022
Bash the NWO.
Coalition Labor/ Conservative/SNP/LIB
Think outside the box.
There must be a few good people
in each party.
( Don’t care if you post my posts or not x )
October 11, 2022
Most of the UK populace have caught on that something is amiss.
Unless the security services have an IQ of zero
They must have caught on too.
So what is to do ?
Tell the TRUTH
Stand up and
TELL THE TRUTH
Also give Kate a rest
Poor girl.
She’s doing a great job.
Camilla too.
October 11, 2022
Some politicians become ensnared.
eg Profumo
The good ones
eg Profumo
^Shake it off ”
and clean toilets in a homeless hostel
October 12, 2022
perhaps the same person is breaking the rule of only ONE name for contributions.
I smell a rat.
October 12, 2022
The data below is for the 24-hour period 00:00 to 23:59 11 October 2022.
Number of migrants detected in small boats: 374
Number of boats detected: 7
Just another 374 pizzas and accommodation at a prestige hotel
October 12, 2022
Hang on, it is incorrect to use the average energy mix.
This is because renewables are always delivering at their maximum capacity, at any given time.
Any ADDITIONAL appliances plugged in at that time can only by charged by the gas turbines or other fossil fuel.
Until we have 100% renewable generation, and there is excess generation capacity, EVs are 100% fossil-fuel powered.
October 14, 2022
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