Tesco Maynooth

Sesshoumaru · 03-01-2012 3:16pm

MYOB wrote: »

We are long past the point of mass production for lithium batteries. There is no improvement, only a worsening, to be made in the cost of the raw materials which compose the majority of the price!

I'm upset that the Green Party committed us to wasting money on their toys and that our new govt. hasn't put them back in the box. Hopefully they will.

You're wrong of course and I've previously proven you wrong on numerous threads, so no need for me to go there again. I've pointed out to you before, you rarely if ever provide evidence to support your view point. Everyone is just supposed to take what you say as fact.

What I'm more interested in knowing is how you propose a small island nation secure its energy supply? Do you think cheaper oil is here for the foreseeable future? If so where will we get ours from? How will we protect ourselves from supply shocks from unreliable suppliers? Middle East war, a belligerent Russia / Argentina and increasing demand from BRIC countries for limited oil supplies?

If it's not going to stay cheaper for the foreseeable future, what's your alternative to electricity and the existing infrastructure we have to distribute it?

Do you only know how to say no? or have you got any solutions to our energy issues? I'm genuinely very curious to know what your opinion on this is.

L1011 · 03-01-2012 3:24pm

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

You're wrong of course and I've previously proven you wrong on numerous threads, so no need for me to go there again. I've pointed out to you before, you rarely if ever provide evidence to support your view point. Everyone is just supposed to take what you say as fact.

You've never proven me wrong. You cry "opinion" and nothing more, and cling for hope to impossible improvements in cost and battery tech, citing "investments" that are a fraction of what has already been spent and expecting 100 years of improvements to be matched on a tiny subset of the product in a few years.

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

What I'm more interested in knowing is how you propose a small island nation secure its energy supply? Do you think cheaper oil is here for the foreseeable future? If so where will we get ours from? How will we protect ourselves from supply shocks from unreliable suppliers? Middle East war, a belligerent Russia / Argentina and increasing demand from BRIC countries for limited oil supplies?

If it's not going to stay cheaper for the foreseeable future, what's your alternative to electricity and the existing infrastructure we have to distribute it?

Do you only know how to say no? or have you got any solutions to our energy issues? I'm genuinely very curious to know what your opinion on this is.

Surely its you, as someone using an EV who expects there to be electricity easily available once fossil fuels run low, who needs to answer that?

Any of those scenarios are going to leave you just as grounded as an ICE driver. If you think that driving EVs is going to "secure our energy supply" you're more delusional than the Green Party were when they subsidised your car.

03-01-2012 3:35pm

But you see I like cars, I don't see the appeal of the Leaf at all

I have an automatic at the moment, I'll happily drive a manual again.

MugMugs · 03-01-2012 3:40pm

RoverJames wrote: »

But you see I like cars, I don't see the appeal of the Leaf at all
I have an automatic at the moment, I'll happily drive a manual again.

I remember when the TDI first came out, an avid petrol head laughed at me when I got my Passat.

We went for a spin and he called me all sorts of names unable to accept that a Diesel actually had a bit of Oomph....

I never thought that a Diesel would have a good bit of kick.... But they do now.

Who's to say that the Leaf v3.4 won't be able to crap all over a 1.8 / 1.9 Petrol equivelant at some stage ?

keithclancy · 03-01-2012 3:41pm

RoverJames wrote: »

But you see I like cars, I don't see the appeal of the Leaf at all
I have an automatic at the moment, I'll happily drive a manual again.

Different strokes for different folks I guess, similarly Petrol heads would balk at the idea of getting a Diesel.

Diesel lovers hate the idea of having a low mpg petrol.

Irish people hate the idea of getting an Estate over a saloon, whereas here Estates are really popular.

Electric car people love the idea of having a car they can fuel up from the wall at home.

As electric cars go, the Leaf is a pretty good affordable electric, especially if you live in a city.

Anyways, a Tesla is FASTER than an Elise

.. just I can't afford it, either of them actually!

Sesshoumaru · 03-01-2012 3:43pm

MYOB wrote: »

You've never proven me wrong. You cry "opinion" and nothing more, and cling for hope to impossible improvements in cost and battery tech, citing "investments" that are a fraction of what has already been spent and expecting 100 years of improvements to be matched on a tiny subset of the product in a few years.

Surely its you, as someone using an EV who expects there to be electricity easily available once fossil fuels run low, who needs to answer that?

Any of those scenarios are going to leave you just as grounded as an ICE driver. If you think that driving EVs is going to "secure our energy supply" you're more delusional than the Green Party were when they subsidised your car.

I call it your opinion because you fail to back up your strongly held beliefs with evidence. You do state those beliefs with what appears to be a lot of conviction. So I really do believe that you think the Nissan Leaf will explode, that the range is impractical or that you're upset at EV owners using public recharging stations for free until mid 2012 etc.

So I would say although I have proven you wrong, it's not entirely necessary to do so, because your style is to simply say "XYZ is true" and then nothing. No links to studies or any kind of evidence, just "I say XYZ is true and ABC is false". All I do is shrug when I see these posts.

03-01-2012 3:45pm

MugMugs wrote: »

.......................

Who's to say that the Leaf v3.4 won't be able to crap all over a 1.8 / 1.9 Petrol equivelant at some stage ?

A 1.8 nasp petrol is a woeful heap of sh1t too

(except one or three obviously)

keithclancy wrote: »

Different strokes for different folks I guess, similarly Petrol heads would balk at the idea of getting a Diesel. .................

Indeed

That's what I was saying.

L1011 · 03-01-2012 3:48pm

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

I call it your opinion because you fail to back up your strongly held beliefs with evidence. You do state those beliefs with what appears to be a lot of conviction. So I really do believe that you think the Nissan Leaf will explode, that the range is impractical or that you're upset at EV owners using public recharging stations for free until mid 2012 etc.

So I would say although I have proven you wrong, it's not entirely necessary to do so, because your style is to simply say "XYZ is true" and then nothing. No links to studies or any kind of evidence, just "I say XYZ is true and ABC is false". All I do is shrug when I see these posts.

so you now realise you've proven nobody wrong. That's an improvement.

Your ideas of how much can be done for batteries and price are fantastical and not backed up by science.

Sesshoumaru · 03-01-2012 3:58pm

MYOB wrote: »

so you now realise you've proven nobody wrong. That's an improvement.

Your ideas of how much can be done for batteries and price are fantastical and not backed up by science.

Have a good day MYOB

keithclancy · 03-01-2012 4:07pm

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

What I'm more interested in knowing is how you propose a small island nation secure its energy supply? Do you think cheaper oil is here for the foreseeable future? If so where will we get ours from? How will we protect ourselves from supply shocks from unreliable suppliers? Middle East war, a belligerent Russia / Argentina and increasing demand from BRIC countries for limited oil supplies?
.

Well in fairness you could argue that if you go all Electric and remove your dependence on Oil that you end up dependant on Lithium instead:

Link

It has been estimated that 70% of the world’s lithium resources are located in the “lithium triangle” – a small area in South America near the borders of Chile, Argentina, and Bolivia (The Trouble with Lithium 2: Under the Microscope, 2008)

But its possible to overcome that by having second use in other applications or large scale re-cycling.

Drummerboy08 · 03-01-2012 7:12pm

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

I wouldn't call them "components", they're literally 48 batteries. Specially trained EV tech might sound great now, but in a few years time every big garage will have one of those. You're saying that like it means it should be automatically considered expensive? Either way even if I took your pessimistic assessment as fact (which I'm not), 6+ years from now replacement cost is 2018 prices, not 2011/2012 prices.

The car uploads details on itself to Nissan via the built-in mobile data connection, so we'll know in the next year or two if they will degrade as fast as you think they will.

You're still not listening to me. You keep saying there is 48 batteries in the LiB, and yes, there are. However, they only make up one major component, the LiB.

The single batteries will not be offered for sale, if the battery needs to be replaced in a Leaf, the entire unit will be replaced.

Regardless of this, lets go with your train of thought for a minute. Suppose Nissan offer each battery for sale separately. If there are 48 batteries in the LiB, each of these 48 batteries will have been working for the same amount of time, over the same distance, in the same conditions.

Surely if one of these 48 batteries are losing a charge, the remaining 47 will be in a similar condition which would mean they all need to be replaced? Thus, replacing the entire unit. When the batteries in your torch fail, you don't only replace one, you replace them all.

I agree that the 2012 price for one of these units is a bit irrelevant because chances are the LiB won't require replacement for a few years yet. However, I don't believe that the cost will drop so significantly as to make it affordable. It will still be at least a 4 figure sum.

So, based on the above, your going to have a 30k car in 6/7/8 years time that will require a big investment to keep it on the road. Almost like having a petrol/diesel powered car that will need a new engine.

And now, finally, can your see my point? The Renault system of leasing the battery to the end user is a better system as it never exposes the end user to a cost like the above.

Back to your post I quoted above, I'm well aware of how the car will communicate with Nissan. However, the fact that the battery would need to be replaced after x years is not based on my opinion and thought, it's based on what Nissan have said.

I just want to go back to a point you made earlier in this thread also, about the car having an 8 year warranty in the States. It may, but this still does not cover loss of charge over time in the LiB, just as the European warranty doesnt.

Finally, I just want to say that I'm actually behind the idea of the Leaf, I've driven both it and some of the Renault EV's and I like them. I've attended training by both Nissan and Renault on the aftermarket service of EV's too so I know exactly what is being said by the manufacturer.

I just think some of your posts here are a bit fan-boyish which can annoy and rub up other posters the wrong way.

Sesshoumaru · 04-01-2012 10:49am

Drummerboy08 wrote: »

*snip*

I just think some of your posts here are a bit fan-boyish which can annoy and rub up other posters the wrong way.

I just like to point out that you're not actually providing evidence to back up your claims. You're implying you work for either Renault or Nissan maybe or at least in some way have access to inside information from these companies? and therefore you are sharing insider information and we should just take your word as Gospel? because it certainly doesn't match up with what Nissan are saying in public!

But firstly the quoted comment above struck me the most and I wanted to share why I found this very ironic. Below is your first post on this thread that I started. This thread I started was about a public charging point in Tesco Maynooth.

Drummerboy08 wrote: »

It actually makes more sense to lease the battery like Renault than to include it in the cost of the car like Nissan did.

The battery in the Leaf has an expected life of around 7 years. This means in 7 years time, the proud owner of a Leaf has to fork out up to 12k for a new battery, whereas Mr Renault EV owner doesn't need to worry about that because he never owns the battery.

Much better system IMO. It also makes sense when you consider that Renault are developing a system where you drive into an EV centre, and your empty batter is swapped for a charged battery.

*I have added the emphasis in this quote*

Your first post on this thread wasn't about the charge point in Tesco Maynooth or about charging infrastructure in general. It was to say Renault have a better sales model than Nissan, that is more beneficial to the customer. I don't think I need to explain the irony any further.

I'm just going to post some links to public statements from Nissan to respond to the rest of your post.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/8674273/Electric-car-owners-may-face-19000-battery-charge.html

Andy Palmer, Nissan GB’s senior vice-president, told the paper that the lithium ion battery is made up of 48 modules. He said that each would cost £404 to replace, making £19,392 for the entire battery pack. He said that most owners would not need a new battery for at least ten years because electric vehicles should mainly be used for short journeys.

*Individual battery replacement*

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1064332_nissan-leafs-battery-pack-should-last-as-long-as-the-car

“The Leaf battery pack is designed to last the lifetime of the car. IF used in normal conditions, it is not expected that owners will ever have to replace the battery pack,” a spokesperson told us. “Our tests suggest that the battery will be at 80% capacity after five years depending on charging and usage. Even at 80% the Leaf would give a range of more than 80 miles.”

*Battery doesn't just simply stop working when it reaches 80% capacity*

“We are confident that [rapid] charging once a day will have no impact on the expected durability,” said a Nissan representative. “A single [rapid] charge plus a conventional charge per day would give enough to travel almost 200 miles a day, or 72,000 miles a year. The average motorist does less than 10,000 miles a year. An example from our telematics shows a privately-owned Leaf in Tokyo still has 100% charge capacity after 10,00 miles and 326 [rapid] charges."

*Private Leaf that still has 100% capacity after 326 rapid charges*

“To make the maintenance of the Leaf as easy as possible, the “battery” is actually 48 batteries in a large box which can be replaced individually to keep costs low. Each is connected to the Leaf’s advanced telematics system so Nissan can monitor the health of each module remotely. The price quoted in the press of [$31,795] for an entire battery is not indicative of the actual cost. It is an extrapolation of the individual price of replacing a single battery multiplied by 48. The cost of a conventional engine and transmission built up from individually sourced parts would be similarly high”

*Batteries can be replaced individually*

keithclancy · 04-01-2012 11:40am

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

The price quoted in the press of [$31,795] for an entire battery is not indicative of the actual cost. It is an extrapolation of the individual price of replacing a single battery multiplied by 48. The cost of a conventional engine and transmission built up from individually sourced parts would be similarly high”

Well that is a load of cobblers, who would build an engine from individually sourced parts, you'd just buy a new one.

I can't think of any similarly priced car next to the leaf that would cost 24,000 euros to replace the engine and transmission.

And if it did cost that much the thing would be beyond economic repair.

Plus you can get a second hand engine, whereas you cannot do that with batteries.

Just pointing out that the statement is a little bit flawed, not a personal attack or anything.

04-01-2012 12:08pm

Andy Palmer, Nissan GB’s senior vice-president, told the paper that the lithium ion battery is made up of 48 modules. He said that each would cost £404 to replace, making £19,392 for the entire battery pack. He said that most owners would not need a new battery for at least ten years because electric vehicles should mainly be used for short journeys.

What happens after 10 years though? Also he says most would not need a new battery not most won't need a new module.

If the battery is at 80% capacity after 5 years is it not reasonable to think that after another 5 it will be worse again?

Also lets face it, there's a decent chance they're wrong or at least not 100% correct.

Mr Benevolent · 04-01-2012 12:16pm

RoverJames wrote: »

Andy Palmer, Nissan GB’s senior vice-president, told the paper that the lithium ion battery is made up of 48 modules. He said that each would cost £404 to replace, making £19,392 for the entire battery pack. He said that most owners would not need a new battery for at least ten years because electric vehicles should mainly be used for short journeys.

What happens after 10 years though? Also he says most would not need a new battery not most won't need a new module.

If the battery is at 80% capacity after 5 years is it not reasonable to think that after another 5 it will be worse again?

Also lets face it, there's a decent chance they're wrong or at least not 100% correct.

It'll be useless as a s/h car after ten years then. I'm waiting for the second or third gen EVs.

04-01-2012 12:24pm

Confab wrote: »

It'll be useless as a s/h car after ten years then. I'm waiting for the second or third gen EVs.

Will also make selling them on once they hit the 80% capacity mark a bit of a mission I would think. Of course you'd expect that wouldn't matter as environmentally friendly folk will no doubt keep them for as long as possible to ensure minimum damage to the environment etc etc etc

pajo1981 · 04-01-2012 12:25pm

RoverJames wrote: »

What happens after 10 years though?

If you replace the battery you'll be driving around in car with a battery worth considerably more than the rest of the car.

Sesshoumaru · 04-01-2012 12:27pm

keithclancy wrote: »

Well that is a load of cobblers, who would build an engine from individually sourced parts, you'd just buy a new one.

I can't think of any similarly priced car next to the leaf that would cost 24,000 euros to replace the engine and transmission.

And if it did cost that much the thing would be beyond economic repair.

Plus you can get a second hand engine, whereas you cannot do that with batteries.

Just pointing out that the statement is a little bit flawed, not a personal attack or anything.

No worries, no offence taken. I'll just explain my understanding of it and you can tell me how it sounds to you?

The price to replace one of the 48 batteries as per the Telegraph is £404 UK pounds. The Telegraph then multiplied that by 48 to get the total cost. What I understand as Nissan's point is that £404 was the total cost to replace a single battery, including all costs such as labour. You don't do all the work to take out the battery pack, replace one of the 48, put the whole battery pack back in and then repeat for the second one battery etc

So you can't really say the battery pack costs £404 multiplied by 48. Maybe Nissan's analogy wasn't great, but they have a valid point. If you were going for complete replacement of the battery pack, then you'd put in one complete new battery pack in one go. Same as you'd do for an ICE engine, a complete engine swap of a complete engine if one was required.

Anyway none of those calculations assign any value to the battery pack after 5 years of use. If it still had 20kwh of capacity after 5 years it would still have significant value for secondary uses. I could imagine it in my home charging on cheaper night rate electricity and powering my home during the day. The first generation of this technology goes on sale this year. I can't find a quote right now, but Nissan have said powering your home has so little energy draw compared to driving a car (the battery pack has a maximum output of 90kw) that it has negligible effects on the battery.

In the demonstration, the Leaf was powering a specially-designed Smart House but Nissan is confident the technology could be used with existing homes. The power control system box will go on sale at the end of March next year in Japan, where more than 8,000 Leafs have been sold since the car launched in December 2010. The box will cost more than £4,000.

Read more: http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/884798-nissan-unveils-technology-enabling-electric-leaf-car-to-power-family-home#ixzz1iUIdTHh7

Sesshoumaru · 04-01-2012 12:30pm

RoverJames wrote: »

Will also make selling them on once they hit the 80% capacity mark a bit of a mission I would think. Of course you'd expect that wouldn't matter as environmentally friendly folk will no doubt keep them for as long as possible to ensure minimum damage to the environment etc etc etc

You can look back on posts I've made in the past about my Leaf if you like. But I've stated previously I do want to keep this car a minimum of 10 years. I feel it will last a very long time, I've gotten into a lot of debates about the longevity of the electric motor and other parts

I bought this car as a long term investment.

04-01-2012 12:31pm

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

You can look back on posts I've made in the past about my Leaf if you like. But I've stated previously I do want to keep this car a minimum of 10 years. I feel it will last a very long time, I've gotten into a lot of debates about the longevity of the electric motor and other parts I bought this car as a long term investment.

I wasn't referring to you

I was speaking in general terms.

pajo1981 · 04-01-2012 12:33pm

If they sold in any kind of number, I'd imagine there would end up being a market for partially spent batteries (from crashed leafs), suitable for older cars.

04-01-2012 12:43pm

... there might well be a market for stolen batteries too.

Sesshoumaru · 04-01-2012 12:59pm

RoverJames wrote: »

Andy Palmer, Nissan GB’s senior vice-president, told the paper that the lithium ion battery is made up of 48 modules. He said that each would cost £404 to replace, making £19,392 for the entire battery pack. He said that most owners would not need a new battery for at least ten years because electric vehicles should mainly be used for short journeys.

What happens after 10 years though? Also he says most would not need a new battery not most won't need a new module.

If the battery is at 80% capacity after 5 years is it not reasonable to think that after another 5 it will be worse again?

Also lets face it, there's a decent chance they're wrong or at least not 100% correct.

We've talked about replacing the whole pack and individual modules. My understanding of the Leaf battery pack is that it is a traction battery pack and these do stress individual cells to different degrees, so replacing individual modules is a viable possibility to restore performance over time.

Another possibility is that Nissan are opening a Leaf factory in Sunderland, so perhaps they'll have the option to send the battery pack over there for refurbishment? I'm not claiming that as a surefire fact! Just putting it out there as there are still hundreds of Toyota RAV4 EV's in the US going over 100,000 and 150,000 miles on original battery packs, some of which have been reconditioned.

Sesshoumaru · 04-01-2012 1:04pm

RoverJames wrote: »

I wasn't referring to you
I was speaking in general terms.

Sorry didn't mean to come across as touchy

It wasn't meant like that! What I should have added is, I've spoken to other Leaf owners and while I definitely can't speak for all of them, Some of them have expressed to me the same desire to hold onto the Leaf as a long term investment. So at least some owners are thinking along the same timescale as myself.

September1 · 29-02-2012 7:57pm

pajo1981 wrote: »

Whatever about your other points, you can scratch that one if you want to sound remotely credible.

-Fossil fuel burning station are considerably more efficient/cleaner than ICEs.

LEAF can do about 4kms per kWh and 1kWh in Ireland needs about 500g CO2 to be emitted - that means that LEAF is 125g/km emission car so realistically band B. I would mostly charge at night, when wind generation is quite strong so as I look at eirgrid data on CO2 that could mean that on good nights I get 400g from 1kWh that still would put LEAF in 100g/km range - which is much better but still not that much superior to some diesel engines.

Marcusm · 29-02-2012 8:48pm

September1 wrote: »

LEAF can do about 4kms per kWh and 1kWh in Ireland needs about 500g CO2 to be emitted - that means that LEAF is 125g/km emission car so realistically band B. I would mostly charge at night, when wind generation is quite strong so as I look at eirgrid data on CO2 that could mean that on good nights I get 400g from 1kWh that still would put LEAF in 100g/km range - which is much better but still not that much superior to some diesel engines.

But as the Leaf is more suited to short run driving, surely a diesel shouldn't be the comparator.

dr.fuzzenstein · 29-02-2012 9:22pm

dharn wrote: »

its only a matter of time before someone in a daesil parks in one of those bays

More like mammy wagon with 17 brats parked across both charging points, "I'll only be a minaaaaa!" before disappearing into Supermacs for two hours with their brood.
And then into the newsagent for redtop rag, packet of fags, ice cream all round, lottery ticket and scratch card (Whaddaya wan'? I'm shoppin'!)

Jimdagym · 29-02-2012 9:37pm

dr.fuzzenstein wrote: »

More like mammy wagon with 17 brats parked across both charging points, "I'll only be a minaaaaa!" before disappearing into Supermacs for two hours with their brood.
And then into the newsagent for redtop rag, packet of fags, ice cream all round, lottery ticket and scratch card (Whaddaya wan'? I'm shoppin'!)

:eek:

September1 · 29-02-2012 9:40pm

Marcusm wrote: »

But as the Leaf is more suited to short run driving, surely a diesel shouldn't be the comparator.

They do, most of Prius/CT200H are 89 and new Skoda TSI is 119. I think that LEAF not competitive in price for short run use, with high initial cost you really need to use it to get some return on low fuel costs.

I also made a point that there is no considerable improvement in CO2 emissions, not that it is worst polluter ever...

L1011 · 29-02-2012 9:43pm

dr.fuzzenstein wrote: »

More like mammy wagon with 17 brats parked across both charging points, "I'll only be a minaaaaa!" before disappearing into Supermacs for two hours with their brood.
And then into the newsagent for redtop rag, packet of fags, ice cream all round, lottery ticket and scratch card (Whaddaya wan'? I'm shoppin'!)

Supermacs is about 8 minutes walk away. McDonalds on the other hand is about 40 seconds

dr.fuzzenstein · 29-02-2012 10:11pm

MYOB wrote: »

Supermacs is about 8 minutes walk away. McDonalds on the other hand is about 40 seconds

Aaaw! 40 seconds!:cool:

Tesco Maynooth

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