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The car industry needs to better explain the overall cost of ownership of electric vehicles’
Guest speaker, motoring journalist, Steve Fowler, highlighted the benefits of electric vehicles and tackled some of the issues surrounding the sector.
“There are an awful lot of questions around electrification – it seems to be the hot topic,” said Steve Fowler, editor-in-chief of Auto Express,” while addressing delegates at this year’s Retra Conference.
Emission Vehicle] Mandate, which comes into effect next year and states that 22 percent of all manufacturers’ cars they sell must be fully electric and 10 percent of their vans, or they risk fines of up to £15,000 per vehicle over that amount.” By 2030, said Mr Fowler, that figure will increase to 80 percent for cars and 70 percent for vans, so the crossover to electrification has got to happen by that time. “The big issue that everybody talks about it is the charging
infrastructure,” he said, adding that for most people the worry is whether they’ll be able to charge their vehicle quickly and reliably when they’re out and about. “For a lot of people, electric vehicles aren’t the way forward,”
said Mr Fowler, but he said the charging infrastructure will improve in the future. He explained how there are huge incentives for owning both
Steve Fowler
When it comes to the electric vehicle agenda, there is a lot of misinformation and hearsay out there, he said. He also highlighted Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s recent decision to push the ban on petrol and diesel cars back until 2035. “In my view, this was a very political decision. Was it the right decision? I’ll let everybody else decide – I’m not going to get into that world, but what disappoints me is that the car industry had absolutely no clue that this was coming. It would’ve been nice to engage with them before a decision was made,” said Mr Fowler. He commented that the 2035 pushback was ‘a bit of a sideshow’, adding: “What’s far more important is the ZEV [Zero
‘Think about the benefits of being seen to be green’
ERT editor, Sean Hannam, asks Steve Fowler, editor-in-chief of Auto Express, what advice he has for retailers who are thinking about moving over to electric vehicles.
Sean Hannam: What would be your message to smaller independent retailers who are looking at buying electric vehicles for their business? Steve Fowler: Number one is ‘do the sums’ – from a business point of view, there are huge incentives to run electric vehicles. You need to look at the overall purchase or lease price and the running costs. If you make the right choice and you charge it at the right time – if you charge your vans overnight – the running costs can be very cheap. All that has to be offset by the fact that they [electric vehicles]
are more expensive and it might not suit your business. If your van is doing 150 miles a day – just running around locally delivering stuff – then that works, but if you’re driving from London to Newcastle then clearly an electric van isn’t going to work for, but it might for part of your fleet. Futureproof yourself if you can, because taxation is only ever going to go one way and think about the benefits of being
small and large electric vans, including tax benefits. “The car industry really needs to better explain the overall cost
of ownership of electric vehicles – the reasons for buying an electric vehicle do start to stack up,” said Mr Fowler. On display outside this year’s conference was the Auto Express
Electric Van of the Year – a Volkswagen ID. Buzz Cargo. “It’s really good to drive,” said Mr Fowler. “It has a limited range
of 260 miles, but that might be a lot for a lot of people, depending on what you do. Yes – it’s reasonably expensive, but it’s becoming hugely popular because it says the right thing about businesses and it’s quite a cool thing to look at and it’s really shaken up the LCV (Light Commercial Vehicle) market.”
Stand by your van – Sean Hannam with the Volkswagen ID. Buzz Cargo electric van, on show at this year’s Retra Conference
seen to be green. A lot of people will look at the businesses they spend money with and see how environmentally-friendly and sustainable they are – they will spend money with those that align with their own views.
SH: At the Retra Conference, you said there was a lot of scaremongering around electric vehicles. That’s putting some people off buying them, isn’t it? SF: Absolutely – the mainstream media is doing a great job of getting it wrong. I don’t know why they have this anti-EV [Electric Vehicle] agenda – a lot of it is very misinformed. We know that an electric vehicle isn’t right for everybody right now – they are expensive, and they don’t go far enough on a full charge and the charging network is a nightmare, but you’ve only got to look at the Tokyo Motor Show and the Munich Motor Show to see that battery ranges are getting better all the time and prices are coming down.
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Retra Conference Review
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