As lack of charging infrastructure is holding back electric cars being as convenient as they might be, Could lamposts be converted to charging posts and if they could, what are the downsides?

Everyone plugs their car in at peak times and a total national grid melt down.

But everyone wanting to, will still plug in at the time they want, wherever they are , so wouldnt the draw on NG be the same? A problem yes, but not surely because of the positioning of the charging posts?

We all switch our kettles on in the commercial break for Corrie and they can't cope

Yes Venice you are right, I do lead a sad life

Lol, thats when I stick the kettle on too, its the one soap I like to watch when I can.
I cant see how the electric car market can expand at anything but at snail pace because as Dilly said, the NG is the main problem . The Gov on the one hand is saying all petrol and diesels must by off the road by 2040 , but at the same time , far from increasing the output of the NG, they seem to me to be threatening the output even more by closing power stations , and spending money on windfarms and solar power which even all together arent going to be able to cope with the increase in demand , especially when you consider that domestic properties are all likely to be looking to turn greener with electric heating too, to help reach Gov targets.

Yet STILL the Gov isnt insisting that all new buildings have to have the major roof area facing South and equipped with voltaic panels.
I reckon to meet their targets , the only way the Govt can make its agreed targets, will be nuclear power stations . Perhaps thats why it appears to be flapping about uselessly now, so it can push for that as 'the only way' later.

Still interested to know is the NG COULD cope, could lamposts be converted and work as charging posts?

Possible, but at what cost?

And what about other issues:

When a streetlamp goes out it can take weeks for the council to sort it.

What about the lead that goes from the charging point to the car. Can you be sure someone won't tamper with it?

Who will pay for the electric used? How will it be costed to the car owner?

Dont know, it was a random idea, so this is just exploring it. Good points. Most things can be paid for by a CC . Yes the lead could be tampered with , but I wonder if they would be , wouldnt people be too scared of electrocuting themselves? I guess they could unplug though unless there was maybe some kind of lockable thing for the owner to use to keep his 'plug' in place . As for the Council repairs, thats addressable.

The pikeys would have the leads away for scrap

Dont know Gibbo it was a random idea, so this is just exploring it. Good points. Most things can be paid for by a CC like on a parking meter.Maybe youd have to pay up front for a chosen number of units . Yes the lead could be tampered with , but I wonder if they would be , wouldnt people be too scared of electrocuting themselves? I guess yobs could unplug though unless there was maybe some kind of lockable thing for the owner to use to keep his 'plug' in place with a punch in code for the owner to release on pick up. As for the Council repairs, thats addressable.

Dilly you're probably right at the end of the day! How irritating that such yobs spoil all sorts of possibilities .

Apologies for the duplication .

Another thought on the vandalism side. Topping up for electric cars probably has the potential to become much faster , so when it comes down to 5 minutes or so, it becomes less of a problem as youd be sat in your car by the lampost.

It's already being done in London here's the link press me

Electric cars are a joke which is why so few people want them. Who in their right mind wants the extra task of plugging in your car as you arrive home (If you can find an unoccupied lamp-post charging point) when you can simply lock it and head for the sofa and a cuppa? And who wants to decide on a cold journey, whether to turn on the heating at the cost of perhaps not making your destination?

I can put almost a MegaWatt-Hour of energy into my diesel in perfect safety in about two minutes. Were I to be taking on the same amount of energy in electrical form in the same time (With a perfect battery) I would have power levels of 30 MegaWatts to contend with. That's 3,000 Amps at 10,000 volts! People would not be allowed to be anywhere near that!

Now imagine a motorway service charging station with perhaps 30 connections. If all are in use simultaneously, the power levels are almost 1,000 MegaWatts - the output of a medium-sized power station!

The fact that the batteries are crap, and cannot be charged at this rate disguises this problem, but it is fundamental and cannot be overcome by technological improvement.

The other day I saw a lunatic - the CEO of a company that makes supercapacitors - claiming that they could be used in cars and charged in 10 seconds. The supercapacitors probably would stand that rate of charge, but the power level during that ten seconds would be 360 MegaWatts which would require a supergrid connection and a dedicated substation!

Personally, I think hydrogen cars will take over. These are now practical and growing in popularity in California where hydrogen filling stations are growing in number. The nice thing about hydrogen is that it can be derived from oil or natural gas until excess electricity from wind and solar is available to produce it by electrolysing tapwater.

I was watching one of them 999 shows on sky sorry can't remember the name, there was an electric car that had a crash and the ambulance and police said they can't do anything as the car could be live :shock: they had to wait for the fire crew to turn up before they could get the guy out to see if he was ok

One of my customers an indian chap has a battery tesla car.. very smart. The whole car shell is the battery. Takes him less than 2 minutes to connect and disconnect the lead as he has a charging point on his garage wall ...so less time than standing at a petrol pump. Says its not much different to remembering to fill up with petrol. Possibly the only downside is if you suddenly find you have to do along journey...but he has topped up at motorway service stations..

Well well, so LOndoners are already onto it. £1000 a conversion . Wow that means the electric cars COULD really take off , and if they do, the NG definitely wont be ready to deal with the demand .

Bit worrying the point about the emergency services feeling worried about dealing with an 'electric ' crash . Hopefully it was a one off particularly awkwardly damaged car.

Hydrogen is starting to take off in a few places but not the UK because of no infrastructure.

As you quite rightly say, battery and super-capacitor technology just doesn't entirely add up, although using mega-battery and mega-capacitors at the recharging station would help.

BMW (I think?) are bringing out a battery/hydrogen hybrid car which makes more sense, the fuel cell can be smaller and cheaper because it doesn't need to cope with large surge requirements. Much better than petrol/battery hybrids as only one engine(motor) needed and its carbon free.

BMW are also bringing out a wireless charging plate you park your car over for an option on their electric cars iirc.

There is a small chance we could even return to carbon technology in effectively a closed loop, great advances are being made in splitting carbon dioxide. I've not checked the energy density compared to water.

my new car

I hope that timber is from sustainable forests

I think the bottom line is that batteries are simply not good enough for an all-battery car. The energy density - after over 150 years of battery development - remains at about 1 to 2% that of a tank of fuel. There seems little realistic prospect of a 'breakthrough' which will change this in the near future.

Add to this the fact that they take ages to charge, and they become even less attractive.

In this country, it is worth remembering that well over half the population do not live in houses with garages or even carports or space where a car can be plugged in overnight, and park on the street This means a search for a charging point near your home will be necessary, and given that many have difficulty in even parking near their homes, this makes them a no-no for over half the population.

None of this has been lost to the punters. Despite a £5,000 bribe to buy them, and freedom from congestion charges and road tax, the take up outside London is miniscule.

The use of smaller batteries (or supercapacitors) in hybrids seems a better idea. They can take advantage of electric power in slow-moving city traffic where petrol or diesel is inefficient, and greatly improve overall power consumption. These are more complicated than a conventional car which must reduce their reliability to some extent, but ultimately they are fossil fuelled.

I think there are two problems in a crash situation. One is an electric shock, but the other is the possibility of the battery packs going up in flames. Lithium batteries have a tendency to do this if they are short-circuited, (or overcharged) and are equipped with electronics to prevent this. In a crash situation, however, it is possible that this will be damaged and will not work. Once ignited, they burn very fiercely and adding water to exposed lithium metal actually helps the fire due to the release of lithium and further heat being produced.

Hydrogen filling stations are as rare as hen's teeth, but I noticed one - I think it's on the M1 near Sheffield - that uses a wind turbine to provide the power to electrolyse water to produce the hydrogen! Possibly a bit of a gimmick, I don't suppose it can produce enough to supply many cars but as there are so few hydrogen vehicles around I suppose that doesn't matter much.

This all sounds very expensive ! I might go for the same as Assassin in due course. Thanks for all the info everyone.

The council had an electric vehicle at least 12 yrs ago, probably a lot more. It had a battery in the boot of the van.

My son did a trial for a couple of days on one only about 6 weeks ago. He liked it, and aske d if I could get a charging point put on my drive (as it's possible to have them put anywhere and he doesn't have a drive) I didn't much see the point of that, as it would lead to more stress if it needs charging in a morning before work etc. One would have to be highly organised to deal with all this. Charge morning or night for the next day.
Anyway, I declined his suggestion as all I could envisage was my electricity bills soaring out of all recognition. Someone has to pay for it !

Well, milk floats were electric when such things existed. I think the idea was that they were quiet when milk was delivered in the early morning. Sadly, the milk crates then were made of steel wire, and with glass bottles in them they made a noise that would waken the dead!

Does anyone recall these?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv3LNNwSx6M

I was brought up in South Wales and recall these monsters used to transport tar by road from a local tar manufacturing plant. They were modified to carry a large tank of the stuff, and the waste steam went through pipes in the tank to keep the tar liquid. They were capable of a fair turn of speed, too, as I recall.

How much current is drawn through charging an electric car?

Here some ideas on clean energy, hope you like them ...

They're awesome!

love it

Wirral council had a go down by Pacific Road..they installed the slots in the road for scaletrix

Those little yellow buses that ran from Woodside to B'head town centre were electric. They seemed to be ok at crawling pace.

Why is it not possible to have the electric cars with the switch to petrol when the battery dies. That would be so much more sensible .

How are we going to manage supply of all the electricity ? We keep on getting told to switch off and save energy !!

Talking to a guy today who went to Greece for a holiday ,staying with family members. Celebrating a birthday when all the electricity went off. Not knowing what was happening, he was told that different poorer areas outside the centre of Athens have their supply cut off to boost the wealthier areas !

I reckon we should be looking into cow pat in far greater detail. Back to nature

They have them, they are called hybrids. However the concept is flawed:- Battery cars have very little energy storage so need very light vehicles to give them a decent mileage. The batteries are heavy, adding a tank full of fuel and a petrol engine makes the cars even heavier and the battery range much less. Even worse, all the extra clobber a petrol engine needs these days for emission regulations adds to the weight, cost, reliability and serviceability. Petrol engines also need a heavy gearbox as they have a limited power range.

The answer is a hydrogen-fuel-cell/battery hybrid, the batteries and the hydrogen both provide electricity so there is only a need for one engine, the electric motor. Hydrogen is a clean energy, no emission control stuff required. In mass production the fuel cell cost will drop considerably and the control systems are very simple. The disadvantage at the moment is the weight of the high pressure hydrogen tank but carbon fibre/graphene and maybe other laminates will reduce that weight considerably. Either no gearbox or a much smaller gearbox are needed with electric motors as they have a very wide rev range and almost full power at all revs (compared to petrol).

Sounds like a good idea to me.

Yes apparently , as assassin said in an earlier post answering mine, its already been done in London. Thought Id hit on a new idea lol! Went to London recently and yep , sure enough, they are being used already.

All this talk of Electric cars to reduce pollution. Surely the problem of pollution is just being masked, as Power stations produce pollution while making the Electricity that charges the pollution free cars.

But the polluting power stations are being shut down mostly because they are working long after their end of life. The main reason the Government is interested in wind power etc is because they are quick to build, they haven't got enough time to build nuclear/gas/biomass power stations. We were about to run out of electricity in 2020, wind power is plugging a big hole.

Unfortunately the Mersey barrage is being looked at again which isn't good and even worse is that the Government has stitched us up with the stupidly high price and danger of nuclear stations.

Tidal turbines are the best solution but is largely being overlooked despite all the trials proving the technology.

Storage of electricity is our next problem and no clear leader is coming up but don't be surprised if you have to fork out for substantial batteries to be fitted to many houses in the near future which is another poorly thought out concept.

Maybe it's time to buy a good set of Jumper leads, just in case my battery runs flat.