15 Oct 2018 | First Showroom For Polestar, Formula E Promises Exciting Races and Insuring Electric Cars
Formula E Must Have An Exciting Start | Polestar Opening Its First Showroom In EV-Friendly Norway | EV Sales For Netherlands And France | What Has Europe Done To Plug In Hybrids? | Are Electric Cars More Expensive To Insure? | Two Electric Citroens Coming
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Good morning, good afternoon and good evening wherever you are in the world, welcome to EV News Daily for Monday 15th October 2018. It’s Martyn Lee here and I’ve been through EV story today so you don’t have to.
Thank you to those Patrons who pushed us over 100 supporters – and I just checked Patreon again, yesterday’s supporter who was only known as ‘Paul’ is now showing up as Paul Stephenson. So I can finally give him a full credit! I was probably looking at the wrong page. And a new supporter earlier today MARC WILLIAM GANEY is a new Producer of the podcast. Nothing gets made without Producer and so thank you to everyone who helps make this podcast.
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.
FORMULA E MUST HAVE AN EXCITING START
- The last few days have seen a handful of Formula E Gen 2 car launches from various teams. And now we hear from the Formula E CEO Alejandro Agag courtesy of Autosport. He says it's very important that from the moment the lights go out for the first race, the new electric cars give is some exciting racing. This is the first time for Formula E without a mid-race car swap and the cars have twice the power of the previous generation cars.
- "In an attempt to guarantee on-track action with no need for pit strategies, the 2018/19 race format will feature FE's attack mode concept, which allows drivers to use an extra 25kW of power at certain pre-determined times throughout the race." says Autosport.
- The first eprix will be on 15th December and I've talked about before, my concern that some of the previous street circuits were fine for lower powered cars but we need to be thinking on a larger scale now for electric racing, Alejandro Agag says the circuits will be very large with plenty of opportunities for overtaking.
https://www.autosport.com/fe/news/139367/agag-important-first-gen2-race-is-exciting
POLESTAR OPENING ITS FIRST SHOWROOM IN EV-FRIENDLY NORWAY
- "With assembly of the first pre-production prototypes underway in Sweden, Polestar is now focusing on opening its network of showrooms." reports CarScoops: "The first Polestar Space will be located in Norway, and more specifically on Øvre Slottsgate in downtown Oslo. That’s not far away from parent-company Volvo’s home base in Gothenburg, Sweden, but they’ve chosen Norway for another reason. That’s because the country is “one of the world’s most important electric vehicle markets”. Norway has some of the highest gasoline pump prices in the world. At $7.66, gasoline is nearly two and a half times as expensive in Norway as it is in the United States."
- Polestar boss Thomas Ingelath says: "Polestar Spaces are an important part of our customer experience, and where we will physically meet our customers. As Norway is one of the world’s most important electric vehicle markets, it is logical to begin the Polestar Space story in Oslo. Polestar Spaces will be staffed by non-commissioned product experts rather than hard-selling sales executives.”
- Whilst the Polestar 1 is a $150,000 plug in performance car, from the Polestar 2 onwards the brand will be pure EV and more affordable.
https://www.carscoops.com/2018/10/polestar-opening-first-showroom-ev-friendly-norway/
EV SALES FOR NETHERLANDS AND FRANCE
- It's that time of the month when all the EV sales figures are being updated and once again, the increases just keep on coming.
- In the Netherlands last month they love their Tesla's. Out of a total of 2,986 plug in cars sold, the Model S was way out in the lead with 1,052 sales, versus Model X on 593 and the LEAF on 292. It's a small market but that's the best since 2016. In The Netherlands there will be much higher taxation of expensive BEV's from next year so well done to Tesla for shipping cars to a market which is hot for their products.
- And whilst the Zoe doesn't do well in Holland in it's home market of France they can't get enough of them. In France the Zoe was easily number one with 1482 sales, the next closest being the LEAF with 390. Generally France was up 10% for EV's over the months.
- So why are pure electrics doing well and PHEVs not so well, especially here in the UK where that trend has been the opposite? I can tell you...!
WHAT HAS EUROPE DONE TO PLUG IN HYBRIDS?
- A reminder than Europe now has a new test cycle for measuring emissions and efficiency called WLTP, in force since Sep 1st.
- Until now drivers, and particularly company car drivers, have been blessed with incredibly low taxes on PHEV's. Some of them didn't care about the range, or even getting a charge point installed, or EVEN charging the things. It was all about that lower Benefit In Kind tax due to lower CO2. Or rather the reported CO2.
- Using the old way of measuring which has been done for decades, called NEDC, car makers had worked out how to game the system.
- "WLTP results are now closer to real-world usage than the figures created by the previous New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) tests. As a result, nine of the top-10 best-selling plug-in hybrids in the first half of the year have either been pulled from sale or are no longer rated as offering less than 50 grams per kilometer of CO2, the figure below which the car is rated as being ultra-low emission and therefore eligible for tax breaks." reports Automotive News Europe: "The danger for plug-in hybrids is whether governments reduce or remove incentives for people to buy the models as the UK has just done. The market halved in the Netherlands in 2016 after the government slashed generous company car tax incentives because it determined that the cars were not being plugged in."
- So that just leaves the valuable incentive, free money from the Government, and as I told you over the weekend that was announced it will be going on Nov 9th, remaining for pure EVs only or very long range PHEVs.
- Auto makers could have added battery size to increase all-EV range, lowering the reported CO2 emissions. However what we've seen is rather than have them put through the new WLTP cycle and get them certified, they have been removed from sale.
- Cars which were popular like the Passat GTE and Golf GTE have sold well up to now because of subsidies. But without their cars coming in under 50g/km of CO2 they won't get those subsidies. With battery prices dropping those cars should get a longer range, if the manufacturers can source the batteries.
TWO ELECTRIC CITROENS COMING
- "Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the 2018 Paris Auto Show, Citroen CEO, Linda Jackson, was the one to indicate the possible direction of their upcoming city car.", the C1, reports CarScoops: "While PSA is investigating an electric approach for the next Citroen C1 and its Peugeot sibling, the 108, Toyota is still undecided about a zero-emission Aygo. Nonetheless, PSA and Toyota have about 1 year to decide whether it’s best to keep collaborating on the three models for the third generation, too."
- "Citroen’s new C4 electric car is set to rival VW’s new I.D but petrol and diesel power will be on offer too" according to AutoExpress: "The next-generation Citroen C4 hatchback will have a pure-electric option in 2020, Auto Express can reveal. PSA Group engineering vice-president Gilles Le Borgne revealed that instead of EMP2, the next C4 will use the longest variant of the group’s new CMP platform. PSA initially announced that e-CMP would support battery packs up to 50kWh in its supermini-sized EVs. However, Le Borgne hinted that this would open up the possibility of a bit more battery capacity for the new C4 electric in a longer-wheelbase car, still on e-CMP. That would, in essence, become Citroen’s Volkswagen I.D. rival."
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/citroen/c4/104925/citroen-c4-to-return-with-electric-power
ARE ELECTRIC CARS MORE EXPENSIVE TO INSURE?
- It's a question often asked AFTER people have spent many hours choosing their perfect EV - how much will it cost to insure? What Car? has been asking that question. Jim Holder points out: "Early adopters of electric cars such as the Tesla Roadster, Nissan Leaf and Renault Zoe reported difficulty getting cost-effective insurance for their cars. This was because insurers had no historic data to work on regarding the cost of repairs, and as a result, many insurers were extremely cautious in their predictions, raising premiums or even declining to insure electric cars, leading to higher prices and less choice for owners."
- "As electric cars become more commonplace and there is more data for the cost of repairs, so more insurers have entered the market and so costs have come down."
- "Highlighting that insurance premiums can vary, owners contacted by What Car? also reported they had experienced a drop in their insurance premium over the petrol and diesel engined cars they traded in. Paul Farrant, a driving instructor with a Renault Zoe, told us: "My premiums for the Renault Zoe are around 30% cheaper than they were for a Renault Clio 1.2 petrol."
- Something I have experience of with the Renault Zoe battery lease, calling around to get quotes, so many of them didn't even know what to do with that information. Which I why I called PlugInsure. Sam knew exactly what I knew about the battery, I just wanted to hear an insurer tell me about how Renault goes down in value every year, and how to insure the leased battery.
- "If you buy or lease one of the electric cars that requires you to lease the battery, such as the Renault Zoe, it is also important to establish whether you have to take out separate insurance to cover the battery as well as the car, in the event of suffering accident damage or theft."
- As a Polar+ member there was also the added bonus of free legal cover, which I opted to not to tell them about so I paid the small extra on my premium for it. It's probably mostly profit for them but I wanted to support them - how weird is that? Getting car insurance is usually a pain, it's adversarial, it's about saving every penny. But because I had such a pleasant experience with Sam at PlugInsure I opted to pay extra? As if that would ever happen with a business involved in fossil cars!
https://www.whatcar.com/advice/owning/are-electric-cars-more-expensive-to-insure/n18043
COMMUNITY
And thanks to MYEV.com they’ve set us another Question Of The Week. Keep your comments coming in on email and YouTube…
What's more important...size of battery or efficiency? Tesla recently topped efficiency charts and the Hyundai IONIQ is another model which does well. But the race for a bigger battery is also on. So what would you rather on a new EV - a large battery or a smaller more efficient battery, even if it meant you had to stop more often?
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