Cars Sold In The UK By 2040 Will Need An Electric Range Of 50 Miles Or More
Last summer, the UK government caused widespread confusion in the automotive industry by proposing that all petrol and diesel cars would be banned from sale by 2040. Nothing particularly out of the ordinary given that many other countries are planning similar restrictions, with some supposedly kicking in much sooner than 2040.
The problem was no one was 100 per cent sure what the government meant - will hybrid cars included in the ban? Will only pure electric cars be available, or would a 48-volt mild hybrid system be enough to keep something with an internal combustion engine on sale? Now, the exact nature of the 2040 proposal has finally been clarified.
Any car on sale from 2040 onwards must be able to travel at least 50 miles on electric power alone. If such a ban came into force now, it wouldn’t result in just conventional petrol and diesel cars going off sale - no current hybrid vehicle can manage quite that distance without internal combustion intervention, so they’d be for the chop too. Only about two per cent of cars currently sold in the UK comply with the rule.
Of course, a lot will change in the car industry between then and now, but the government hasn’t made any mention of what it intends to do to put the necessary infrastructure in place to make such a ban feasible. The wording of the proposal isn’t final, either - the Financial Times reports that it’s currently under discussion between multiple government departments.
The Department for Transport meanwhile was quick to say that hybrids won’t be banned. “It is categorically untrue that government is planning to ban the sale of hybrid cars in the UK by 2040,” it told the publication.
Meanwhile, Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) chief executive Mike Hawes said: “Unrealistic targets and misleading messaging on bans will only undermine our efforts to realise this future, confusing consumers and wreaking havoc on the new car market and the thousands of jobs it supports.”
Source: Financial Times
Growing up on a diet of World Rally Championship highlights and lengthy Gran Turismo 2 sessions, a life in cars was as good as inevitable for Matt.
Comments
So the v12s survive
Just as long as they’re hybrids
[DELETED]
If they have a hybrid system with 50 miles of range, even if it’s just an alibi, then nothing would speak aganist that for now.
honestly at the rate at which Electric cars are being experimented with
i have a good feeling that Electric cars could manage the same range as an ICE car of today
lets just hope they still look good
Yeah. I think they could potentially have better range than ICE cars due to a lighter weight and better efficiency, allowing more batteries. Graphene would allow this, but at the moment they’re either extraordinarily expensive or flawed. Once the production process is refined, they will have incredible efficiency.
Just remember that most of the people who made this pledge will be out of office, retired or quite possibly dead by 2040. Things will change between now and then, both in politics and in the car industry.
I bet the reason why they made this pledge is that they will die by 2040 anyways… reminds me of brexit voters
Indeed; I’d be surprised if the target doesn’t get continually pushed back, or even quietly dropped altogether. For instance, when I was growing up, the local government at the time was pushing a “no waste by 2015” policy - three years on, everyone still has garbage bins.
The simple fact is that this is no more than a pledge, and a pledge can be broken. And the fact that the deluded government is demanding every single new car to have similar efficiency to the Prius while still being affordable for the average for the average person, all within 22 years means that this pledge is unlikely to be met.
22 years is a very long time in terms of development, you’re not very enthusiastic
The fact that all of these bans just happen to come into place on round numbers shows that the governments enforcing them have no idea about the technology or the timescale needed. Just shows how thoughtlessly arbitrary these dates are.
Compare the Prius Mk.I to the Prius Mk.IV and tell me how it advanced. The fuel consumption has been halfed and the electric-only range increased from 0 to 50 km over the years. Mind that these only were 20 years inbetween. 22 years are plenty of time for development.
Besides, there is absolutely no logical connection between your argumend and the conclusion you take from that.
Guess I’ll never go going to the UK then.
Yesss I need to be able to afford a 6.5L naturally aspirated V12 hybrid by 2040
I hope that I’ll be able to buy an M5 by then
Does this mean that older petrol powered cars will still be road legal?
I believe so. It’s a ban on the sale of cars, not on the use of them. But increasingly emissions-oriented taxes will probably mean that running one will become more and more expensive.
So pure bread gastoline cars will be banned but hybrids will still be a thing. In the words of the great James May, “Its good news!”
Hybrids suck cause of a few reasons, you can’t make them loud because of their small engines and electric motor and their electric motor doesn’t even last long. I.e the Prius it can only go like 100 miles before you have to recharge,
In the United States especially Texas, at least 50 miles is almost not near enough to go a town over, good thing it’s only happening in the UK
Every country is different and requires different solutions to what may be nearly identical issues. 50 miles of range is conveniently the range to get through the entirety of greater london and then out of populated areas. Its just preparing for the fact that the majority of cities will be EV zones only