Sounds like perpetual motion… pump it in from the grid and then suck it out to refill the grid and so on. I guess it will depend on the cost and availability of the energy mix, and the time of day when all this is happening.
Suggest you watch the people taking apart piece by piece Michael Moores work of utter garbage!
Utter and total crap.
I *think* David was being tongue in cheek there ![]()
Not at all, just using car batteries as a storage buffer. Being able to store excess production has been the holy grail of grid management ever since grids existed.
Thank you Billy. Will give joke alert next time.
And on a macro-level, there were pump storage power stations built in the 70’s and before designed to generate during peak times using “spare” electricity during slack times. I worked for a while on Dinorwig and it was beautiful…
Mass EV battery use is also very much a macro solution, with the advantage of being nearly instantaneous. On a similar line check out the massive battery back up solutions that have been implemented in Australia to support their grid. The first one even managed to prevent a grid problem & no one realised it had done it until afterwards as it was so quick.
I’ve just ordered a Citroen ec4 which claims to have 350 km autonomy. That may be so if I drive it down the side of Mont Blanc with a following wind but I reckon I will be satisfied if I can average 250 km between charges.
So why am I buying it? Well 95% of my driving is less than 50 km. Of the other 5% most of it will be within the batteries single charge range so for the few long distance trips I make I am prepared to start out earlier as required to enable stops for charging.
Perhaps you EV owners can enlighten me. I thought that another reason for owning an EV was the lack of servicing. But I have just seen here in France an advert from Norauto that they are now equipped to service Electric cars. Service what? How often? How much?
Cabin air filter.
Brakes (although due to regenerative braking even these get less wear than an ICE vehicle).
Brake fluid change.
Suspension.
Wipers.
Lock, hinges etc.
Specialist electronic stuff.
Tyres.
That’s it.
My 30 000km first service on a Leaf cost 100€, & that was more to do with getting a battery report & their record on the warranty.
Ok we’ve only had ours for a few weeks, but after the first couple of days adapting we have hardly ever had reason to use the brakes.
Our experience of the first few weeks is that the way you drive has a big effect…wind’y mountain roads need to be driven calmly. It is very good for my inner zen.
Hmmm.
Looks like we’re still set for speed limiters from next year - which, frankly, would push me back towards ICE as it will almost certainly be after July that any EV I’d want to buy would actually be delivered. Stuck at 70 on the motorway (especially as it would be the car’s idea of 70 as determined by the speedo and therefore likely to be lower in practice) with older cars whistling by at the typical de facto motorway speeds of 80-90mph strikes me as no fun whatsoever.
Has the UK Government got nothing better to do?
It’s actually an EU thing.
Initially at least the driver will be able to disable it - but that will need doing every journey.
So no one’s ever going to take their car abroad again? To countries with…er…different speed limits?
What are they smoking, and why aren’t they spending their time on things they actually need to fix?
PS if anyone hasn’t noticed, the UK isn’t obliged to follow any new EU stuff in 2022. Notably, they aren’t even cooperating on sharing details of drivers from DVLA with enquiring European countries currently, ISTR
It’s supposed to be intelligent, not limited to a fixed max of 70mph but whatever the speed limit is on the section of road that you are driving along using a combination of GPS and speed limit sign recognition (though it would be amusing if it mis-read the French limit as 130mph, I suspect the systems will be smart enough to compensate).
No, they aren’t but in this instance the reportage is that they will.
That brings a whole new meaning to the term “Diesel electric transmission” ![]()

