Just realised in following the posts and then looking at the thread title I went well off topic.
My apologies to all.
@Silvaire I hope you might rethink your attitude to the world at large
Likewise I’m sure 
I’m quite happy with my world view, thank you very much including the view that the current quasi-religious ‘environmental’ movement focused on CO2 versus human well being is largely manipulation of uninformed masses. But I do agree with what you’ve said about polarization versus rational sense – that’s a big part of the point I was making. Let’s hope the pendulum swings back towards a reasonable and effective direction versus quasi-religious fantasy that along with governmental corruption has already produced too many people and not enough energy for a humane living standard in most of the world.
dublinpilot wrote:
So I should do something about it.
You will be alone doing that eventually. The climate engagement is dropping as a brick among people aged 15 to 25. It had a top in 2021 and is now in free fall. It just isn’t cool anymore I guess. Being engaged in climate is simply very 2021 
One of the kids said she didn’t want to be met with politicians telling her it’s cute that she is interested in climate. She wanted them to become angry Activism in a nutshell I guess.
Indeed; eventually the 1st world will be forced to face that x % (where x > 50) of people who drive will never be able to charge an EV. And discontent will surface long before then, and then EVs will go into free fall. Like aircraft prices are now.
The UK is not a fully representative example (and neither is Norway, by a much bigger margin) but is one data point for Europe, and here the availability of public charging points is dropping and is now approaching the “useless” level (1 for every 50 cars) and clearly this is because the installation outfits are not seeing money in it. It is also expensive to publicly charge – similar cost per mile to driving a diesel car.
Targets like xxx by 2030 and especially 2050 are ripe for getting kicked into the tall grass.
EVs are pretty slick; I work above a KIA dealership and see their latest kit every time I go for a wee
Peter wrote:
It is also expensive to publicly charge – similar cost per mile to driving a diesel car.
I have had EV for almost 10 years now. I have never paid more for public charging than for diesel. The main thing is, you don’t use public chargers a lot. It’s only on longer journeys, in total less than 5%. There is no need for chargers the way it is (soon was) need for gas stations
Tesla has a fine charging infrastructure. It used to be for Tesla only, but since every charger is unused 90% of the time, they have opened it up for all cars. It’s rather obvious by now that Tesla has been doing this the wrong way. The new charger infrastructure is part of the “shopping infrastructure” and “parking infrastructure” rather than an electric version of gas stations, as Tesla chargers are. The only need for Tesla-type chargers is when driving more than 3-400 km away from home. You do that from time to time of course, but on average less than 5% of the total. As we all know 5% is much less than 100%
It’s only a matter of time before Tesla either dismantle their chargers, or sell them. At this point in time, even if Tesla dismantle them, very few will even notice. There are other charges everywhere. Die hard Tesla fans will yell and scream for sure
LeSving wrote:
I have had EV for almost 10 years now. I have never paid more for public charging than for diesel. The main thing is, you don’t use public chargers a lot. It’s only on longer journeys, in total less than 5%. There is no need for chargers the way it is (soon was) need for gas stations
Norway is not representative. It is a small market, everyone is very wealthy and there is almost unlimited space. I’ve only been there once and absolutely loved it – some friends in the village have a holiday home there and they are there every chance they get.
Those who cannot charge at home – which in the rest of Europe is a very significant proportion of the car driving population – will be completely dependent on some sort of public charging infrastructure if they are ever to use an EV.
Public charging in the UK is very expensive and becoming more so, and the provision is not increasing. This is probably because, as you suggest, most people with EVs do nearly all their charging at home and plan their driving so as not to need public charging. Not only is it very expensive it’s also very unreliable and inconvenient as a concept – when you need it the chances of the charger being out of service or in use by someone else are too high to make it something you can rely on, plus the myriad apps and payment systems that will all fall over or demand an update when you have no phone signal at the most inconvenient moment.
Gas stations are not disappearing any time in the foreseeable future, neither here nor in most of Europe. The UK is currently kicking a whole host of climate-related commitments into the long grass and the one about an end date for new ICE cars will be next.
LeSving wrote:
I have had EV for almost 10 years now. I have never paid more for public charging than for diesel.
I’ve only had mine for a year and a half, but has had the same experience. But in this discussion it’s the UK situation that counts.
Airborne_Again wrote:
I’ve only had mine for a year and a half, but has had the same experience. But in this discussion it’s the UK situation that counts.
The UK is representative of the mass European market forces that will ultimately dictate where this all goes.
Norway and Sweden, with a combined population of less than 1/4 the UK population, and the unusual traits of very high wealth per capita and very low population density, are simply not representative of anything that is going to make a difference in the long term.
Your experiences are great, but they aren’t representative. One of the major lessons in business is realising “I am not the customer. Just because X is better for me, it doesn’t mean X will become the dominant product.”
Airborne_Again wrote:
But in this discussion it’s the UK situation that counts.
True for 99% of discussions ?
Graham wrote:
Your experiences are great, but they aren’t representative
Perhaps not, but higher population density makes infrastructure cheaper per capita, not more expensive. Especially so for electric grid infrastructure which is indeed expensive, much more so than people think (most people just take the electric grid for granted). Obviously this is a “no, cannot do” problem, or rather “no, will not do” problem I mean, everyone with a car in the UK has to park it somewhere at night.
LeSving wrote:
Perhaps not, but higher population density makes infrastructure cheaper per capita, not more expensive.
Not when that infrastructure is basically a clear space, 6m x 2.5m, per adult.
LeSving wrote:
I mean, everyone with a car in the UK has to park it somewhere at night.
Indeed. For a very large chunk of them, that somewhere is a public road – i.e. not their own designated space so they simply cannot charge from their own power source.
This is a residential street in west London. It is very typical of UK urban living, although perhaps somewhat smarter than most. In our northern cities and towns, the density becomes even more extreme. I don’t doubt that cities in France, Spain, Italy etc have similar situations – they might look different but still have the basic problem that lots of cars spend each and every night in a location that is not dedicated to that car.
