News analysis
Heard it on the grapEVine?
Word of mouth endorsements are important for EV acceptance, a panel has heard. Sean Keywood reports.
F
irst-hand reports from EV drivers will play a major role in combating misinformation about the vehicles, it has
been said.
Speaking during a panel discussion, organised by New Automotive and the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), on the UK Government’s pending ZEV mandate, which will require manufacturers to sell an increasing proportion of EVs each year from 2024, ECIU head of transport Colin Walker said that with the vehicles no longer as rare as they were a few years ago, real-world experience of using them was becoming more prevalent. He said: “I think for a long time EV
4 | August 2023 |
www.businesscar.co.uk
ownership was seen as quite a niche thing; very few people actually did it or knew someone close to them who owned an EV.
“Polling that we’ve done at ECIU recently found we’ve crossed a bit of a watershed moment, in that just over half of the UK population now have a close friend or family member who owns an EV, and 75% of those people report EV ownership being a positive experience. “That’s ultimately how I believe a lot of the kind of confusion, misinformation around EVs will be challenged, because some of the narratives people may be reading do not marry up with the experience of their next-door neighbour.” Walker said it was important to
“The way in
which doubt has now been cast on that future [of post-2030] is damaging for fleets.”
note that EVs were still an emerging technology that had seen some rapid progress, meaning some early reports about drawbacks with the vehicles were now out of date.
He said: “Battery technology has changed dramatically. There are still concerns expressed about the longevity, for example, of an EV’s battery, and a lot of those concerns are based possibly on the experiences people had with the very first Nissan Leafs, which had short range and their batteries did degrade a bit, but that is old technology now.
“You’ve got Nissan now reporting that the battery lives longer than the car; the car can be scrapped and there’s still a battery there that can be put for
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