14 June 2020 | Epic Listener Survey Of Plug-In Hybrids

Citroën ë-SpaceTourer to hit markets in 2020 | Volkswagen rolls out ID. Charger | Tesla poised to roll out speed limit recognition and roundabout support | Renault ends battery leasing in Spain | Electric shuttles to start service in south Sacramento | DPD Switzerland gets electric truck with 680-kWh battery | Question of The Week Answers

Show #809

 

Good morning, good afternoon and good evening wherever you are in the world, welcome to EV News Daily for Sunday 14th June 2020. It’s Martyn Lee here and I go through every EV story so you don't have to.

 

Thank you to MYEV.com for helping make this show, they’ve built the first marketplace specifically for Electric Vehicles. It’s a totally free marketplace that simplifies the buying and selling process, and help you learn about EVs along the way too.

 

CITROËN Ë-SPACETOURER TO HIT MARKETS IN 2020

"PSA is accelerating its push into commercial electric vehicles as Citroën has now announced that it will also launch the compact van Spacetourer as a BEV – called the ë-SpaceTourer – by the end of the year." says electrive: "Peugeot will follow with the sister model Peugeot e-Traveller scheduled to hit the markets before the end of 2020. Both use the same technology with an electric motor of 100 kW, and there is a choice of two battery versions with 50 or 75 kWh. The latter enables a WLTP range of up to 330 kilometres. The third electric van in the group, the Opel Zafira Life, is announced for early 2021. Like its commercial vehicle counterparts Peugeot e-Expert, Citroën ë-Jumpy and Opel Vivaro-e, the Zafira Life also uses the well-known PSA drive. The individual leather seats in the second row can be turned, and a table can be folded out. The particularly strongly tinted rear windows are intended to provide the necessary privacy, for example, for chauffeur services and VIP shuttles."

 

https://www.electrive.com/2020/06/12/citroen-e-spacetourer-to-hit-markets-in-2020/

 

VOLKSWAGEN ROLLS OUT ID. CHARGER

Volkswagen has started sale of the ID. Charger for quick and easy home charging for electric vehicles. The wallbox can be ordered online or from Volkswagen dealers in eight European countries2. The first boxes were delivered to customers recently. At an introductory price of €399.

The ID. Charger will be gradually introduced in three versions. All have a charging capacity of up to 11kW, a permanently mounted Type 2 charging cable and integrated DC residual current protection for maximum safety. The two top models – the ID. Charger Connect and ID. Charger Pro – will also be fully connected and can be easily managed via smartphone. Customers can therefore control charging processes, and enjoy the advantages of practical functions such as remote maintenance, managing access via a charge card and regular software updates.

The ID. Charger Pro also offers an integrated electricity meter that can be used, for example, to bill electricity costs for company car drivers.

 

TESLA POISED TO ROLL OUT SPEED LIMIT RECOGNITION AND ROUNDABOUT SUPPORT

"Tesla is poised to improve its Autopilot functionality and its Full Self-Driving suite by rolling out speed limit recognition and roundabout support worldwide soon." says Teslarati: " Tesla hacker @greentheonly posted a tweet on the evening of June 11 describing the company’s intention to release the upcoming and highly-anticipated Autopilot improvements. It is unknown when the updates will roll out to Tesla owners, but the noted Tesla hacker indicated they would likely be coming soon, and that the features would be released worldwide. Tesla seems to be utilizing 3D-rendered icons for the upcoming features. This suggests that speed limit recognition may be integrated directly in the in-car displays of the company’s vehicles, similar to stop lights, stop signs, and other vehicles on the road."

 

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-speed-limit-recognition-roundabout-support-worldwide-release-date/

 

RENAULT ENDS BATTERY LEASING IN SPAIN

"Renault is slowly removing the option to lease the battery from its electric cars. First it was the UK, now it’s time to remove this option in Spain." reports PushEVs: "The battery of the new generation Renault ZOE is made with NCM 712 cells from LG Chem and the cost at the battery pack level is already below 100 euros per kWh. When compared to Clio, its ICE (Internal Combustion Engine) counterpart, the ZOE looks extremely overpriced."

 

Renault ZOE Life R110 with ZE 40 battery: 29.128 euros

Renault Clio Life 53 kW: 10.267 euros

 

Renault ZOE Zen R135 with ZE 50 battery: 32.888 euros

Renault Clio Zen E-TECH (hybrid) 104 kW: 19.582 euros

 

https://pushevs.com/2020/06/11/renault-ends-battery-leasing-in-spain/

 

ELECTRIC SHUTTLES TO START SERVICE IN SOUTH SACRAMENTO

"The first of three new GreenPower EV Star shuttles will be put into service beginning Monday, 15 Jun 2020 as part of Electrify America’s more than $40 million Green Cities investments in Sacramento. The vehicles are being integrated into SacRT’s highly popular SmaRT Ride on-demand micro-shuttle program servicing the Franklin-South Sacramento communities." says Green Car Congress: "The GreenPower EV Star shuttles were assembled in Porterville, California and retrofitted with a unique side door configuration added to facilitate shuttle access for those with special needs. Electrify America fully subsidized the costs of the shuttles, the DC fast-charging infrastructure to support them, and the retrofit costs."

 

https://www.greencarcongress.com/2020/06/20200612-sac.html

 

DPD SWITZERLAND GETS ELECTRIC TRUCK WITH 680-KWH BATTERY

"DPD has purchased a Volvo electric truck with unprecedented range to use in its operations in Switzerland. The France-based parcel carrier has bought a Futuricum truck, based on a model by Volvo and developed by Designwerk, which offers battery capacity of 680kwH and a range of up to 760km (472 miles)." reports eDelivery.net: "Supplied via green-generated energy in DPD’s depot, the vehicle saves around 96 kilograms of CO2 per 100km, corresponding to 76.8 tons per year. Work has begun on the vehicle, with delivery anticipated for mid-December 2020.While DPD makes wide use of electric vans for shorter last-mile trips, using battery-powered vehicles for long distances and large payloads has generally been difficult because the size of the battery required takes up significant space and weight within the vehicle."

 

https://edelivery.net/2020/06/dpd-deploy-volvo-long-range-electric-truck-switzerland/

 

QUESTION OF THE WEEK ANSWERS

 

Pete Glass

Frankly if it can’t match the original 2012 Volt or Opel/Vauxhall Ampera’s 35miles or so, it’s completely pointless and the latest Kuga Phev or Prius Prime barely scrape past that.

Now I hear of talk of 60miles plus from Merc [?], could be good for some people but only if they have home charging. Next generation Phevs must have rapid or at less semi-rapid charging [22kW] to be really worthwhile and now only the Mitsi Outlander does this.

 Now here I emphasise and rant … if you don’t have home charging then a low miles Phev really is utterly pointless, faffing about hunting for a public charger for a few miles

 

Rich Fowler

I find that the Clarity's 35-50 miles of range works pretty well for me for now, given where I live and how I use the car, but obviously, that's not going to work for everyone. Some people can get away with even less range than that, and some will want even more.

Having less than 35 miles of range in the winter is annoying where I live, where things are a little spaced out and suburban. And it's just enough battery where I can get it fully charged up on a 120v 15A circuit overnight

 

Tom James

In response to QOTW regarding PHEV range, I think that once you have a range of between 30-40 miles on full electric, it renders PHEVs unnecessary, as most people’s daily driving will fit into this range bracket. So one might as well buy a full EV with the extra 100 or so miles of range for the rare occasion that one drives a longer distance. As an Outlander PHEV owner (which gets 30 miles EV range on a good day), it only took around 2 months of ownership to realise I wasn’t using any petrol day to day and was carrying around an engine and fuel tank for no reason. I have regretted not going for a BEV ever since, now I have to steal my wife’s Ioniq EV!

 

Alan Northcutt, waco, tx USA

answer:  0 miles because plug-in hybrids are a waste of resources now.

they offer few e-miles, emit tailpipe and carbon pollution, require much maintenance,

malfunction more frequently.  with the growing charge network, they are unnecessary

and only delay the transition to battery-electrics.  analogous to natural gas, they are not

a "bridge vehicle."   and they only delay the transition to reach "net zero" emissions

by 2050 (IPCC)

 

Dan from Canada

Ideal: 2 x your total daily commute, in a car with a heat pump - would allow for EV mode for 100% of local driving, including chores, even in winter. Use gasoline (hybrid mode) only for longer weekend/vacation drives.

Good: 1.5 x your  total daiy commute, no heat pump - allows for EV mode for all local driving, including chores, except on some winter days. Again, hybrid mode for longer drives. That’s our situation with our Hyundai  Ioniq PHEV - “as EV as we can afford”.

Marginal: 1 x your total daily commute - but may be actually good enough if you don’t need the  car for chores or you can charge at work.

Too low: less than your total daily commute, but may be good enough if you can charge at work.

 

Rene Schneider

The battery of the plug in hybrid car should cover the daily commute and you have to have the ability to charge at home (or at work), to make the driver happy.

This means an absolute minimum of 50–60km standard battery range for a plug-in, better 80–100km (to cover for winter degrade).

Otherwise the driver soon gets too lazy to plug in often enough and experience the joy of EV.

Fast charge:

What I most missed the last years was, to be able to „fast" charge my plug-in within less than an hour. Often it was not worthwhile to use a charger when you had an hour break somewhere.

Strong EV motor:

Key for the plug in is a strong enough EV motor (ours has 100kW). So to experience the joy of EV, and that the fossil gobbler has not to kick in regularly.

 

Joe Maher

I say a PHEV should have 80 to 100kms range. 24kwh battery should do it. I have the outlander and the 40does most days but maybe twice a week I have to do 80 to 100 in a day and I hate dipping into the tank.

 

Mike H

We bought a Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid almost exactly 1 year ago. It's got a 16KWh battery (~12KWh useable) but is pretty heavy (~5000lbs). It's range is supposed to be about 52km, but I live in the mountains and my commute goes up a really big hill. Driving around in the city where it's flat, it'll go 60+km, but going to work and back (30km round trip) uses about 75% in the summer and 95% in the winter. In the year we've owned it, we've put just 5 tanks of gas (~250 litres) while doing almost 20,000km. It's insane how little gas we've used and on longer trips where there's charging available. In fact with cheap zero carbon hydro electricity here in BC and high gas prices, I figure we've saved about $1,800 in fuel!

 

patdbean

The average commute in the UK at least is about 38 miles , so a good hybrid range is 40 to 50 miles that way , as long as you can charge at home and at work that should be enough to keep "most" hybrids  on electric  "most" of the time.

 

Bimi

I think we should demand a minimum of 60km WLTP / real world range on hybrids. Having driven ev for 6 years now i see that more and more friends/people buy plugins and they like driving on EV mode so much that everywhere they go they will plug it in and charge it. This results in less charging spots available for those that really need it.

 

Steven Bollinger

Question of the week: If hybrid cars had enough all-electric range so that their owners NEVER burned any gasoline, that would be perfect, in my humble opinion.

 

Paul F

Enough range to do all city driving so 70ks would be perfect for a plug in hybrid. ICE cars are sort of economical at constant speed but they are very inefficient at start stop. Also it does not take much power to keep a car at speed but it takes a lot of energy to accelerate the Briggs and Stratton hybrid concept from 1980 proves that an air cooled lawnmower engine can keep a car moving

 

alan baker

On question of week, PHEV's should be able to do  min 30 miles on battery to qualify for grant. Had a niro PHEV for about 18 mths  and found that I could do the majority of my local journeys on the battery, but is was nice to have engine as a back up because the Charge points in rural Wales is very poor

 

Cameron Hall

50 miles on the battery would probably be my minimum.  Not that I would ever buy a hybrid car,  way too many moving parts.

 

LTK  • 1 week ago

I had a Ford PHEV with 21 mile EV range & got gas about once a month.  I charged at home every night.  I understand people with the Volt (42 EV Range) got gas about once every 3 months.  I’d like a PHEV with 80-100 mile EV range & get gas about once a year - only for road trips and to keep the ICE parts working.

 

Josh Pritt, Space Coast EV Drivers

The 2nd generation Chevy Volt had a fairly perfect EV range of 52 miles.  That seemed to cover all of our daily driving and still have miles left to run an extra unplanned errand or two.  It even covers the weekend trips where we would go to the mall, movies, grocery store, visit parents and friends around town and still come home with 2 or 3 miles left on the battery. I would say any new plug in hybrid would have to have at least 52 miles range, otherwise they are starting out many years BEHIND a car that came out in 2015.

 

 

QUESTION OF THE WEEK

 

Tell me about a conversation you had with someone where you introduced them to EVs

 

I want to say a heartfelt thank you to the 231 patrons of this podcast whose generosity means I get to keep making this show, which aims to entertain and inform thousands of listeners every day about a brighter future. By no means do you have to check out Patreon but if it’s something you’ve been thinking about, by all means look at patreon.com/evnewsdaily

 

[mention for Premium Partners]

 

You can listen to all 808 previous episodes of this this for free, where you get your podcasts from, plus the blog https://www.evnewsdaily.com/ ...