The electric car

I have a strong childhood memory of being on the footpath of Gillygate in York, struggling to breathe, gagging on the fumes from the stationary cars.

It's a fairly narrow street of two-four story buildings with a building across one end that restricts the through breeze and, coupled with the pretty much constant heavy traffic, the fumes hang around.

It was an awful feeling, and a vivid memory. Every so often I get the same sensation and it takes me straight back there.

Most recently this happened during in August, during the covid lockdown. With people staying home from work the number of cars on the road plummeted. The air quickly got cleaner. We all noticed.

I was waiting in a socially distanced queue outside the post office where I somehow also found myself involved in a funeral... but that's another story.

A single diesel van drove past. Unusual at the time given the absence of road traffic. I felt that same, awful, gagging sensation from the fumes. From one van. 

There are two reasons we've recently made a significant financial commitment and replaced one of our two cars with an EV: CO2 emissions and local air pollution. They're related of course, but actually different issues.

I'm fully aware the Kia e-Niro sets off from the factory with an underbelly of emissions in the shape of that 64kWh battery. However I also know that over its lifetime the car will result in far less CO2 emissions than even the super efficient petrol car it replaces.

Equally important to me, this car doesn't directly pollute the air as it's being driven. I can drive past a queue of people and they won't be left gagging from the smoke and nitrogen oxide emissions, because there aren't any.

I don't consider this a silver-bullet to solving climate change and all atmospheric pollution. 

I do consider EVs are better, and the direction of travel is what's important to me.

Hydrogen wash

When people discuss electric cars, and the need to decarbonize our economy, I've noticed how quickly the topic of hydrogen power comes up as the answer to all problems.

I suspect this is a continuation of the well worn tobacco companies tactic of spreading FUD to hold on to the financial advantage for as long as possible. This is no surprise when one considers many of the petrochemical firms are investing in hydrogen production. I don't criticize them for this, just that they should have done it decades ago instead of holding us back.

The trouble is I think they're still holding us back.

The problem with considering hydrogen fuel cell powered cars to be the future is essentially it's saying "I'm not going to do anything now, because I'm waiting for this wonderful new technology". Meanwhile we carry on buying and running petrol and diesel cars... while we wait.

It's important to acknowledge that, yes hydrogen works now as a fuel for vehicles where a fuel cell is partnered with a small battery and used to power the electric motor. It's clever stuff but there are problems.

Firstly, right now, most hydrogen comes from natural gas. It may not create harmful emissions when it's used in the fuel cell, but actually making the hydrogen is far from clean or renewable.

Let's say we solve that one and can use renewable electricity to make hydrogen through electrolysis. There's still the thorny issue of how inefficient this is.

Using electricity to produce hydrogen which then has to be transported before it can be converted back into electricity by a fuel cell is considerably less efficient than generating electricity and storing that in a battery. Sure there are transmission losses in getting electricity from a wind farm to a car battery, but much lower than with hydrogen and nothing new needs to be built.... we already have domestic electricity.

Maybe we'll end up with so much renewable, clean electricity that it doesn't matter. Right now we're a long way from that.

But there's more.

If we're talking about decarbonising the UK's energy requirements we need to think about heat. The vast majority of people I know heat their home with a gas boiler. As well as the inevitable CO2 released, these are also a source of nasty air pollutants such as nitrogen oxides. Not good. With some work, the gas network could be converted to hydrogen.**

There's lots of concern about the instability of renewables on the electricity grid, what happens when it stops being windy at night, for example. Energy storage is therefore a big part of the conversation. If we're able to make and store lots of hydrogen this can then be burned in a gas turbine to make electricity.

So I agree that using hydrogen as a fuel does seem to be a good idea. Burn it for heat, pass it through a fuel cell for electricity and in both cases the waste product is water. Lovely. Providing the electricity used to produce the hydrogen is generated cleanly, hydrogen can be a carbon neutral fuel. Effectively it's a storage method for the electricity and it does have advantages over batteries.

What I don't think we should be doing is using hydrogen for cars. There are other things that we also need, that hydrogen is better for than batteries while batteries work really well for cars.

If we get to the stage there's so much cheap, clean electricity available.... I still don't think it makes sense to use hydrogen, but then... maybe, whatever.... the market will decide that.

So back to my initial accusation that oil companies are essentially using hydrogen as means to hold things back. I'm not sure this is even a deliberate strategy, more a 'happy' accident. What's clear is switching to electric transport threatens the existing business model of people who find, extract and refine oil in order to sell you petrol and diesel. 

If they can switch to making hydrogen, quite a lot of the business model looks really similar doesn't it. 

That's a huge part of the appeal for hydrogen cars. People understand driving to a place where they pay money to fill the tank. 

The difference with battery electric vehicles, once you've lived with one, is you realise that's something you don't need to do any more, and it really isn't something I miss.

** Hydrogen, being smaller than natural gas molecules will likely just leak out everywhere without an enormous and therefore costly effort to upgrade the network. However experiments to mix hydrogen with natural gas show promise. Whilst this doesn't lead to the possibility of carbon neutral domestic heating, it could significantly reduce emissions on the road to better heating technologies.

The getaway car

You can learn a lot about my dad's approach to car maintenance from the time it was found the car wouldn't start because the starter motor had fallen off. It was hammered back on with a mallet.

Job done.

Never particularly flush with cash my parents would buy crap cars, to be honest they were probably borderline scrap, and then spend a small fortune adding seat belts - these were 70s cars and they were knackered. I remember a blue Peugeot 504 with an engine so noisy when my dad started filling it with petrol a guy ran across the forecourt shouting "NOoooooooo" because he was convinced it was one of those exotic French diesels.

But the car that looms largest in my childhood memory was a Ford Cortina Mk4. I recall it as being a bright metallic green with a tan interior. KVY 550S was born the same year as me and given my memories I was probably about eight when we got it - I could check... I haven't. Apart from the dutifully installed rear seat belts it was the typical late 70s Ford and on anything other than the perfect day it contributed to the unmistakable suburban sound of engines turning over and failing to start.

We used to call it "the getaway car" on account of the bloody thing never starting.

With me and my brothers in the car, and my parents arguing about whether they'd flooded the engine again, we'd sit in uneasy silence before commencing further attempts in the desperate hope the battery would hold out. We'd threaten the it with the scrap yard and then it would start. A car with proper personality. 

I remember alternators and exhausts being annual consumables. A trip to a tiny auto parts shop that stocked, clearly badly, reconditioned alternators was a delight.... so filled with fascinating oily things. Early on my dad had bought a new exhaust from Charlie Brown's that came with a lifetime warranty. That warranty did for the next few years when, without fail, part of it would drop off.

Once, with everyone strapped in, my mum went to start the car but the key wouldn't fit the ignition barrel... because it was the front door key for the house. Yet she was sure this is what had unlocked the car. Later, for science, I tried a few other implements such as a discarded lolly stick. Yep, that would unlock the drivers door. In fact anything strong enough to turn what Ford referred to as a "lock" would open the door. We didn't bother fixing that.

Eventually rust ate through the scuttle panel and front bulkhead. This was structural and difficult to fix so spelled the end of the car. 

Before the final drive of doom to the scrappy, my dad stuck a for sale sign in the window. A chap came along and offered £150. Not bad... scrap was about £25. Done.

It was a few weeks later we were sat round the dinner table when the doorbell rang. A policeman. "About your car sir, KVY 550S". In the days when the DVLA was notified by the new owner of the car they hadn't bothered which, it turns out, wasn't a great surprise.

The car that would never start had been used, as the getaway car, in an armed robbery in Leeds. 

A week later, the same again. Same officer even.... Our old Cortina had been used for ram raiding in Halifax.

This family car, which can't have been more than 11 years old when terminal rust dealt it a death blow went out in a blaze of criminal glory

I was so proud.

Cars cars cars

Whilst there are too many cars on the UK roads and we all need to drive less, I still bloody love cars. I've never been one for the flashy motor though. The bigger, brasher, noisier, faster.... the less I'm interested in it. 

It's been a lot of years since I really visited this part of my psyche and it's been awoken by EVs. The possibility that I can have a car that's fun to drive, doesn't literally stink and at least has the potential to be propelled by carbon neutral energy is really damn exciting.

I've also been sucked into the world of the CarPervert, Jonny Smith. He's an engaging presenter and I enjoy that he isn't chasing the extreme, outlandish super car nonsense. The man's doing up an Austin Allegro for goodness sake. His love of cars in infectious and really all embracing. He's as interested in the cars of the everyman, the cars with stories behind them, as the engineering marvels that outperform everything else.

All of this has got me reminiscing about the cars I grew up with. The fascinating Volvo Amazon estate owned by the woman at number 10 who never drove it, ever....  but kept it on the road. The VW camper a neighbour had that burnt more oil than petrol - something he seemed to be proud of, but mostly its the cars my parents owned.

I can vaguely remember a few of them. There was a Reliant Robin they had when I was really tiny.... the radio didn't work. A Renault 4 with it's weird gear stick. A Peugeot 504 with deeply questionable brakes and maggots under the rear bench seat because me and my brothers had dropped so much food down there. An awful Talbot Alpine Minx that was just the worst sounding thing every created. A white Cavalier Club special edition thing with a tiny little spoiler. Once, with my grandmother in that car, we were parked at MFI. She piped up that we were parked next to a car that was exactly the same..... It was a 911.

The car I remember most from my childhood was the Cortina. That deserves its own post.

My granddad had better cars. I think there was a Datsun Cherry, definitely a couple of Nissan Sunnys. He bought Japanese cars that worked.

My parents didn't buy Japanese cars that worked, they bought old DAF automatics and had their mechanic friend stick some second hand washing machine belts on when they'd fail.

The first car I drove was a Peugeot 205 1.8 diesel. It was great. Much better than the 1990 Cavalier my parents owned at the time. I once drove that through a puddle and it completely died.

My first car was a 1986 Golf MKII. My dad taught me everything he knew so I chose badly. It was knackered. Something like 60k on the clock and it hadn't been given an oil change in at least half that. But I loved that car and another Golf has always been on my desired list. Never happened because I've always been too practical or poor... my god I really wanted a MK5 when they came out.

Apart from that Golf.... oh and the cut and shut Volvo 340 I replaced it with, my car ownership has been fairly uneventful. They've just all worked. I do find myself craving some originality though. The Citroen Xantia estate I owned was great. Yes the boot leaked so badly the rear foot wells filled with water, and the stupid plastic clutch clip failed and left my wife stranded among rowdy football fans, but it was an interesting car and I loved it.

I'm hopeful the move to EVs will see some interesting cars come back. I may even get one.

NRG

As a bleeding heart lefty-liberal snowflake, how I use energy matters to me. More specifically where the energy I use comes from matters to me.

Like most people in the UK I use electricity from the grid to power things in my home. I have a gas powered combi boiler for the hot water and central heating and I drive a car. We're a two car household by necessity.

Bottom line is I want to reduce my carbon footprint as far as I can (without selling all my possessions and going to live in the woods). I suspect a lot of people thing the same way, so what can we do?

The easy wins are efficiency gains. The loft of our house was insulated, about 30 years ago, with approx 20cm depth of fibreglass. That's better than nothing but not by much, so a small amount of money spent on some nice wool insulation has improved things. Worth noting that although it's more expensive, the wool insulation is nice to handle and means in the future anytime I venture into the loft I'm not left all itchy from disturbing the fibreglass insulation.

Our heating system was also about 30 years old and had started taking a long time to heat the house. A new boiler wasn't so cheap, £2300 to be precise. The replacement uses considerably less gas for the same heat output. Perhaps more importantly it actually works to heat the house quickly. It isn't going to pay for itself and it isn't going to save the environment, but it reduces our gas usage and makes for a warmer home. Thing is, I'm not sure I did the right thing there....

All our lighting was long ago replaced with LEDs. They're just better. It makes absolutely no sense not to do this.

Our car purchasing decisions were influenced by carbon emissions and air quality concerns, so the diesels went and we bought the most efficient petrol cars available to us at the time.

So what next?

Other small changes include making sure the radiator is turned down in our guest bedroom when it isn't in use. I've also installed Hive heating controller - whilst I don't like or recommend Hive, it does mean we can easily turn off the heating if we're out of the house. This is beneficial as our schedule can be unpredictable.

Some years ago we visited Cruachan power station, It's a stunning feat of engineering that can provide a huge amount of electricity to the UK grid, very quickly, on demand through hydro storage. Unleash the water to drive the turbines when you need power, and then pump it back up slowly overnight with surplus electricity. It was a clever way of meeting peak demand without building huge excess capacity. The example given was balancing the grid during the ad breaks in Coronation Street when half the country turned on their kettle at the same time.

It's brilliant, but... turn it on its head. Rather than attempting to have generation meet demand, instead regulate demand to the available generation capacity. It's the principle behind the old Economy 7 system that remotely turned on electric heating at times of lower demand, and charged less for that electricity.

In the past I've always switched to the cheapest energy provider, this time I looked at who I thought was the best and went with Octopus Energy (yes that's my referral link).

Octopus are at the innovative end of domestic smart-grid development and it's really exciting. If you have a compatible smart meter and know what you're doing, for the true nerd they have an agile tariff that tracks the wholesale electricity price and updates what you pay every 30 minutes. It won't surprise you that wholesale prices are high at peak demand and lower at other times. So if you have a load you can shift around such as heating water or charging an electric car, not only can you save money but you can help reduce the load on the grid. Right now I don't have the big load I can shift, but if it cost me much less to move my cooking time back by 40 minutes, I'd be likely to do that.

Another increasingly viable option is battery storage. Tesla were in the headlines a little while ago for their work installing the world's largest on-grid battery in Australia. The headline purpose was to provide power continuity on that part of Australia's grid - which is stretched out pretty thin. Worth noting however is Tesla make money from this by storing electricity when it's cheap, from renewables, and selling it when it's expensive, from fossil fuels.

We all ripped out old hot water tanks in favour of gas combi boilers, but they're going to make a come back. New, highly insulated, mains-pressure hot water tanks will become the standard. Heated by solar where possible and topped up with cheap off-peak electricity.

The next big change we're all going to make is the switch to electric vehicles. Right now they're either too expensive, not available, don't have the necessary range or a combination of these negative attributes but, crucially, they're being built and in increasingly large numbers.

I expect one, if not both of our cars will be fully electric in the next 18 months.

Lots has been said, mostly by those with a finger in the fossil fuels pie, about how electric vehicles will devastate our electricity grid and require new power stations and lots of nuclear and they'll make everything worse. This is designed to spread Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt among the public. It's all about holding back the inevitable.

Here's what's going to happen.

Everything will become electric. To heat our homes we'll eventually move from gas to heat-pump systems, though this will take a long time. Faster will be the return of the hot water tank, heated with off-peak electricity from the grid, or solar from your own roof.

Every daily driver vehicle will be electric, and these batteries can also provide buffer to the grid.

Those with room will install domestic battery systems to make the most of their roof solar.

Energy companies (Tesla has just applied to become a UK energy supplier) will build grid battery systems.

All this electricity will come from renewables.... eventually I really do think all of it will. Every last bit. We'll have enough generation capacity between solar and wind coupled with enough storage to make that work through the night and on the quiet days.

It's going to take time to get there, but I rather suspect it's going to happen quicker than most of us suspect.

Meanwhile I try to use as little energy as I can. I turn the heating down, I insulate (myself and my home), I don't drive unless it's necessary and I use an energy supplier that invests in renewables and at least lets me offset my gas use.

Brexit day reflections

I can't think of anything recently discussed in the UK that has raised quite as much ire as brexit. Well now we've "got it done", in that the relatively easy part of officially leaving the EU has now happened, there only remains the really difficult part of diplomacy, compromise and negotiation to sort out all those trivial matters of how we, as a nation, go about pretty much everything in this connected world.

As a stupid, lefty, remoaner, as opposed to being a wise, lefty, brexiter (like my parents) this is a sad day. I see no gain, only loss. 

It's going to take the rest of this year to understand what this really means for how we interact with EU countries, what it means for business, how the border between the UK and Ireland is going to work.... All the big uncertainties of the past few years remain just as uncertain today.

Given some of the people involved in our government I can't say I trust them to do anything well. Offered the choice between retaining alignment with the EU and throwing away decades of sensible policy for the sake of jingoistic soundbites I have my suspicion which way they'll go. We'll see.

For me it feels like the UK is like an amazing guitarist who, believing they're being held back by the rest, quits the band and goes out on their own only to realise, too late, that actually not many people want to hear 38 minute solos. Meanwhile someone else has stepped up in the band and they're actually doing quite well without us.

My prediction (I'm almost always wrong) is for us to re-join the EU some years down the line with a much smaller role. We'll probably have to be guitar tech, or coil the cables.... or something.