Are fuel prices pushing you towards an EV?

Everybody loves a niche experience to be fair. For me it was on the 24th of July 5 few years ago. Some people might be aware that it's the date every year of the Applegreen 24/7 sale.

So I queued for about an hour to fill up my diesel tank at a "reduced" rate. A rate multiples of what filling an EV at home would have cost. Like yourself I had kids in the back crying and my wife hated it. Had a couple of other bad experiences with having to get up after dinner on a sunday to go out, hopefully find a petrol station open and spend 15-20 minutes filling up at the absurd prices these forecourts charge

I now fill up my car mostly at home for €8 and it takes me about 10-20 seconds to unravel the cable and plug her in.

The is true, most EVs are in the "compact crossover" segment. However you do have cars like the Tesla model 3 and MG4 which would leave the S-Line Audi and GTi Golf in the dust. The only luxury SUVs I can think of are the BMW iX and the Mercedes EQA/S ranges

There are more coming, of course, but at the moment the EV market seems to be concentrating hardest on the crossovers and small car segments

That's a really interesting list, my only thought is there's an awful lot of 2's and 4's in there. Great to see the likes of 144 on the M1, 32 on M11, but how in the name of god is there only 36 (and 8 initially) at Naas - on the busiest stretch of road in the country!

If everywhere else is 2's and 4's fair enough. But how does a major motorway not have 144 like the M1? Is it there already and this is just adding more? Please tell me it is!

That's the "update" list. The M7/M8/M9 corridor is already the best served in our country for charging infrastructure. There's very petrol stations on on that route that doesn't have multiple chaargers. The M1 has been sorely lacking by comparison so it makes sense for them to get a boost in infrastructure

It's called justification.

The base problem was no home charger, everything else is just smoke.

What a trip! You get to see a lot of places. Don’t know about continental Europe now but few years ago in France and Italy I counted very very few electric cars on the roads. And further away into the country I went the less frequent they were.

Only 4% of France's total car fleet is fully electric. Exact same as here.

Ah right, I didn't know that re it being locked. Good to know. Yeah were on a busy enough road with lots of footfall, passing traffic, etc so don't think it would be a runner. If you are in a quiet estate its a no-brainer.

To be honest, if I was using my car more I'd still buy one and use the public infrastructure, but at the moment our car moves a handful of times a week so its hard to justify the upfront cost of something which will just sit around outside. My total fuel bill for last year was just under €900 and most of that was probably to visit family in the country and the odd work trip which I'd have got expenses back for.

If I had off-street parking and used it more it would be a no-brainer. But I suppose not using a car a lot is a good thing at so many levels.

Don't know how feasible or legal etc it is but we got a lead pipe replaced a number of years ago and a lad came along with a "mole" and literally burrowed a trench underneath the paving slabs, etc up to our house. Could you do similar in your situation? You'd probably need a lining etc I suppose but I'm sure its possible too.

I'd be very surprised if those people in those articles actually had to take away their car chargers. A recent case I heard of and the council tried to argue a charge arm, 7.5ft in the air, was a trip hazard. I believe the judge laughed a little before throwing it out

All these cases set precedence's to get the law changed. I'm not sure if the law change will be this year but it will definitely happen as more and more people without driveways invest in EVs

Indeed and hopefully they pull the finger out on that point haha

Could you not position the box against your house, run the cable in under the footpath and plug it in to the car from there?

Like the pic in the link above looks like its a new development - it is stone wall crazy that new developments aren't being planned with car charging (beside the car parking spot designated to the house) and solar panels on the roof of every new house in the country.

I had some faith in Eamonn Ryan as Minister for Environment - to his credit he at least pushed forward the decarbonisation agenda and improved cycling infrastructure where he could albeit with loads more to do on both, but I'd have none in Darragh O'Brien. His role is "Climate, Energy and Environment" - what has he done in the last year?