14 July 2019 | Huge EV Boost For Company Car Owners, Harley Davidson Livewire Impresses In New York and Question Of The Week Answers
Hyundai Kia Builds Nationwide Charging Network In South Korea | No Company Car Tax On Electric Vehicles, Says Uk Government | Tesla Takes 28% Share Of Western Europe Bev Market In H1 2019 | Seres Stops Us Launch Of Electric SUV SF5 | Harley-Davidson’s Livewire Is More Electric Motorcycle Than I’ll Ever Need | Question Of The Week
Show #528
Good morning, good afternoon and good evening wherever you are in the world, welcome to EV News Daily for Sunday 14th July 2019. It’s Martyn Lee here and I go through every EV story to save you time.
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.
We have another PRODUCER of the podcast to join the gang it’s CRAIG VLADIMIROVS
HYUNDAI KIA BUILDS NATIONWIDE CHARGING NETWORK IN SOUTH KOREA
"Hyundai Motor Group (Hyundai and Kia) decided to prepare the ultra-fast charging network for upcoming new models in South Korea." says InsideEVs: "Through investment of 10 billion won ($8.5 million) Hyundai-Kia intends to install roughly 100 DC fast chargers rated for 350 kW in 20-30 locations. The South Korean media reports that the network reminds it of Tesla Supercharging, although Hyundai-Kia will keep the chargers open to all other models compatible with the CCS Combo 1 inlet."
https://insideevs.com/news/359565/hyundai-kia-nationwide-charging-network-south-korea/
NO COMPANY CAR TAX ON ELECTRIC VEHICLES, SAYS UK GOVERNMENT
In the UK: "The Government says that company car drivers choosing a pure electric vehicle will pay no benefit-in-kind (BIK) tax in 2020/21." reports FleetNews.co.uk: "for a pure electric vehicle with zero tailpipe emissions, company car drivers will be taxed at 0%, paying no BIK tax at all. Furthermore, the zero percentage rate is also extended to company car drivers in pure electric vehicles registered prior to April 6, 2020, who were already looking forward to a much reduced rate of 2% for 2020/21."
Let me explain BIK and why it's important.
Take a Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus.
The government put a value of £42,400 on it, which is the list price before incentives. The current BIK charge is 16%, so you take 16% of the list price of £6,784. Then you apply your tax band for your income tax, and you either pay 20% tax or 40% tax in England (Scotland slightly different). Anyone earning over £50,000 pays 40% tax. So for those higher rate earners buying a Tesla Model 3, the individual had to pay 40% of £6,784, so £2,714. That for a Model 3, if you go to a Model 3 Long Range Performance, and chose that as your company car, an individual would be £6,307 a year.
There are also additional costs for our National Insurance employer contributions.
TESLA TAKES 28% SHARE OF WESTERN EUROPE BEV MARKET IN H1 2019
"In the first half of the year, the Tesla Model 3 and Tesla brand took a solid first place in the Western Europe BEV market." according to Mark Kane at InsideEVs: "Since the introduction of the Model 3 in Europe, Tesla has become the top choice for those buying all-electric cars. Tesla's position is nowhere near the dominance seen in the U.S., but according to industry analyst Matthias Schmidt (schmidtmatthias.de), in the first half of 2019, Tesla was the #1 BEV OEM with 44,900 new registrations and 28% market share in Western Europe. 37,300 new registrations of the Model 3 allowed for an easy first place among all BEVs (and plug-ins in general)."
https://insideevs.com/news/359636/tesla-28-western-europe-bev-market-h1-2019/
SERES STOPS US LAUNCH OF ELECTRIC SUV SF5
"The Chinese EV startup Seres, formerly known as SF Motors, has fired 90 employees at its Silicon Valley base as well as officially putting off the US launch of their electric SUV SF5." says a report by Electrive: "An unnamed employee said that before the cuts, around 300 people worked at the factory and that cuts affect all areas of the business, and people have been let go from “sales, marketing, IT, HR, legal, operations, and design”. The company itself was not available for comment."
https://www.electrive.com/2019/07/12/seres-stops-us-launch-of-electric-suv-sf5/
HARLEY-DAVIDSON’S LIVEWIRE IS MORE ELECTRIC MOTORCYCLE THAN I’LL EVER NEED
Sean O'Kane for The Verge just said: "There’s not a lot I can tell you from the 20 minutes I spent riding Harley-Davidson’s first electric motorcycle this weekend at the Formula E race in Brooklyn, New York. One thing I can tell you, though, is it’s certainly more electric motorcycle than I’d ever need. Every time I turned on to one of the long straightaways of Formula E’s Brooklyn circuit, I raked the throttle and was greeted with giddying acceleration. What sets the LiveWire apart is that acceleration almost never quits. As 50, 60, 70 miles per hour ticked by on the small digital display between the handlebars, the motorcycle never let up. If there had been more room to run, I likely would have cracked 100 miles per hour before thinking about whether I really wanted to go that fast."
https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/14/20692388/harley-davidson-livewire-electric-motorcycle-test-drive
QUESTION OF THE WEEK
First of all, props to Mikhail Grozovski who sent me a screenshot of him asking exactly this question on Twitter. He says: "You stole my question ;-)"
DAVID ALLEN
The very fact that people are now asking this question demonstrates that EVs are making progress in becoming mainstream. The question doesn’t even occur to folks until they are presented with the contradictory situation of watching EV race cars hauled to a track by diesel/petrol trucks. Once the question is asked, pressure will then mount on the racing teams to replace fossil burning transport/support vehicles with EVs. Tesla ran into the same problem with its mobile service fleet, and is now phasing out the gas-powered vans with modified S/X vehicles. That said, this highlights the need for heavy electric vans, medium trucks, and of course, the Tesla semi.
Leszek Grzyl
Yes,we should consider what we do while we promote EVs. We should be restricting our unnecessary journeys and consider travelling by trains if we need to. Train travel across Europe needs to by simplified so that we can get to Mediterranean from UK or North countries without flying.
If popularity stints are designed to improve ev awareness and involve driving ev they should continue, as they will bring lower co2 emissions as a result.
RICH FOWLER
Yes, these events are more important in terms of PR for EVs than the minimal detrimental effects they have on the environment in terms of CO2 emissions.
I say this because these events are outliers. If these events were smack in the middle of the bell curve of EV activities, then I would say they should be restricted. But since they're uncommon, and therefore designed to attract attention to EVs, I think the harm they do can be considered an investment in getting more people interested in converting their middle of the curve day to day fossil gobblers into EVs.
The only thing that could change my mind is the Fully Charged Live discussion on how tires are a fossil-based pollution nightmare. If these sorts of outlier activities generated significantly large amounts of tire-based pollution, then I might change my mind, but I'd have to see some data first.
RENE SCHNEIDER
The main problem about fuel burnt is, that it was questioned in several news around the formula-e approximately like „the need 200 diesel trucks to carry ..., so it is only a pseudo event about energy saving.“
Really relevant is moving the public:
The review of the Formula-e in Zurich 2018 states that 160’000 visitors came; 71% with public transport, which runs nearly with 100% electricity here in Switzerland.
Moving 160’000 people around is the big number, not a few 100 trucks to carry goods.
Dafydd Cheung
No doubt in my mind, that racing is a big advertising opportunity. The greater the number of people who are exposed to the idea of EVs, either as race vehicles or private/public transport the better. What is then also needed, are EV load carriers and that can tow, with a decent range. Only then will the EV racers be transported to venues by other EVs.
DAVID NYE
Yes we should burn some fossil fuels where necessary for anything which actively promotes EV’s, as they have a long way to go to become the rule rather than the exception.
The day will come when the vast majority of people drive sustainable vehicles running from clean power, but we still have a very long way to go to get there, and a lot of people with whom we need to get the message across with respect to EV’s and sustainable transport in general.
IAN SEAR
EVs should be making as much noise (not literally) and doing as many fun stunts as possible to get a buzz going, I feel we are at the Gladwellian tipping point for EV technology with the mainstream media reporting quite a few positive EV news stories and the much criticised BBC having some very fair EV articles
DEREK LYON
Anything that helps sell “the electric solution” is fair game. Some people will only care about coolness, speed or economics, (IE not saving the world.) What is great is “the electric solution” answers cool/fun & economics. People just don’t know that yet. Showing off those qualities in a race & building overpowered e-cars is awesome and speeds acceptance. Creating some sort of purity rules are short sighted and will slow electric adoption.
Send me your EV questions: hello@evnewsdaily or use social media. On Twitter use the hashtag #AskAvid
COMMUNITY
And thanks to MYEV.com they’ve set us another Question Of The Week. Keep your comments coming in on email and YouTube…
Should all chargers be open to everyone, or is it OK to have walled gardens?
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