EV Musings Newsletter 121
Tesla Electric Erases Homeowner’s Electricity Bill and Pays Him $1000, Heat Pumps Are Hot Property in EU. Does Britain Have Cold Feet? VW to Bring Back Buttons After Complaints About Its Touchscreens
Intro:
If you want the additional articles, commentary, and goodies that are behind the paywall then click the link to upgrade to becoming a paid member. You can even get 7 days for free!
Let's get into it.
This week's podcast
Just the one episode this week as we're at the last episode of the season.
The podcast will take a short break during which this segment will be filled with selected items from the archives.
In Episode 200 Gary (and some special guests) look at the world of electric vehicles from the point of view of someone who isn’t a guy. Are they marketed differently? Designed differently? Is there still prejudice out there towards women and cars?
Top 5 EV or Renewable Stories
Tesla Electric Erases Homeowner’s Electricity Bill and Pays Him $1000
One of the benefits of having an electric vehicle is the desire to research where your electricity comes from and how you can make better use of energy, or find cheaper energy.
This manifests itself - at an extreme - when people also buy batteries and link them into an existing service to create a virtual power plant.
The most famous of these is Tesla Electric. Using Tesla Powerwalls and some snazzy software to control it, a number of Powerwalls come together to provide grid-scale power for times when the grid is either high in demand and low in supply, or when the cost might be prohibitive.
What happens then is that the owners of the Powerwalls are rewarded for allowing the grid to use their stored electricity.
For one man in the US this meant all his electricity was - essentially - free AND he received an additional payment of a little over $1000 for his energy.
Not bad, I'd say
Heat Pumps Are Hot Property in Europe. Does Britain Have Cold Feet?
As a heat pump user myself I can see why so many countries in Europe have chosen to prioritise these vs. gas boilers. They are more efficient, better for the environment, and keep the house and hot water just as warm as a gas boiler.
Any house that can be heated by a gas boiler can also be heated by a heat pump (maybe not as cost-effectively in some cases, but it can be done.)
So it is slightly concerning to see that the UK is being left behind in Europe when it comes to heat pump installations. There were only 1.9 heat pumps installed for every 1,000 households last year, compared with 20 for every 1,000 households in France.
There was a record number of heat pumps sold in Europe and - even with a £5000 grant from the UK government - heat pump sales in the UK still lag behind most of our European rivals. The UK government has recently increased the grant to £7500 and this has had a slightly more positive effect, though.
Volkswagen to Bring Back Buttons After Complaints About Its Touchscreen
In a strange reversal of plan, it looks like Volkswagen is revising its interior design. After a slew of complaints about its touchscreen-heavy interiors, the German brand is bringing back more good, old-fashioned physical buttons.
I'm a big fan of actual buttons in cars and - being an ID3 driver myself - I understand the frustration with some of the haptic buttons that are part of the current line up. I can't help feeling, however, that perhaps more time should be focused on improving the software rather than the hardware. At the end of the day the software/UI is what differentiates the EVs (Just look at what Tesla can do with good software) and nobody has come close to Tesla yet in terms of functionality.
UK Hits 10,000 High-Powered Charge Points as Rate of Installation Accelerates
Potential EV drivers are constantly saying that the lack of infrastructure is an issue for them. Zap-Map recently announced that 10,000 rapid and ultra-rapid charge units have been installed in the UK.
That's a great milestone. It also means that the rate of change of installations is increasing and it means that 1 in 5 chargers in the country is a rapid or ultra-rapid charger.
Both of these stats are great for potential EV drivers.
US Coal Power Plants Killed at Least 460,000 People in Past 20 Years – Report
It's an interesting conundrum that most people - when they hear the words Nuclear Energy' immediately revert to the “it's dangerous” trope. In reality the number of people killed by radiation from nuclear power plants pales into insignificance when compared with the number being killed by coal power plants.
The fine particulate matter that is released when burning coal has accounted for almost half a million deaths in the US alone - most of them concentrated in the industrialised areas of Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Another reason we need to switch to renewables as soon as possible.
A Cool Thing
From Episode 200
As this was the Round Table we have Cool Things from several guests:
Imogen Boghal talked about the Candela C-12, an electric boat which cruises using hydroplaning technology
Claire Miller discussed mobile range-extender charging solution Tuel as well as wireless charging via Electric Green.
George Thurman highlighted the efforts being made by Lexie Limitless who is taking an electric Ford Explorer around the world
Gary discussed the latest in solar tech which allows solar panels to be printed onto fabric.
Final Thoughts
Tell Your Friends!
Newsletters are best enjoyed when shared with friends. If you enjoyed reading this issue and found it useful, please consider telling your friends.
It takes you a few seconds to share this, but it takes me hours to curate it.
Share this email or tweet about us. It helps me a lot!
The Mystery Box
What’s in The Mystery Box this week? Click it to see.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to EV Musings Substack to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.