How our road trip in an Electric Corsa showed the green option isn’t always a SAFE option for lone women
I’M not going to sit here and bore you with all the usual reasons why Britain is not ready for EVs.
Because I’ve discovered something more worrying: It’s not safe. Especially for women on their own.
Allow me to explain.
One of the safest places to be is a petrol station forecourt. They’re bristling with cameras, back-lit like a Hollywood film set, and there’s usually someone at the till watching.
Even in a dodgy part of town at three in the morning, you know you can stop, bang a tenner in and be on your way again in minutes.
But what I found on a lap of Scotland ahead of COP26 is the complete opposite for electric car drivers.
You are a sitting duck.
Take Ullapool as an example, although there are many places like it all over Britain. There’s an EV charger tucked away in the corner of a car park behind a load of lorry trailers.
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No canopy. No CCTV. No proper lighting. No one to help. You’ll be sat there for 45 minutes with a big arrow above your head.
I’ve been in journalism long enough to know that one day something terrible is going to happen.
Someone is going to get snatched, or mugged for their £80k Porsche Taycan at a charging station, and it’ll be Page One news.
Rather than wait for that day to come, charging firms need to spend money now to avoid the awkward questions later.
Right, I’ve made my point, back to our EV road trip. Six days, 11 charges, 1,035 miles and scenery like nowhere else. We love you Scotland.
Our rental for the week was a Vauxhall Corsa-e. Price: £26k. Official range: 209 miles.
Not the obvious car to choose when you’re doing big miles but it’s the realistic choice for most people.
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The car itself is amazing: Quiet, nippy, massively comfy.
I have a bit of a glass back and I had no issues at all.
As a second car, and with your own home charger, it’s the EV to have. You can do your bit to preserve the planet with a Corsa-e.
The furthest it ever said it would go was 160 miles, and it did do that, even though the range fluctuated depending on whether you were going up or down hill.
And whether you chose to freeze yourself or have a bit of warmth.
The biggest problem, as expected, is the charging infrastructure. In Inverness, the capital of the Highlands, there’s a handful of public chargers for 50,000 people.
And it doesn’t help when the hotel’s only charging point is blocked the entire night by some bellend with a Golf GTE hybrid.
The further you go north, the bigger risk you take. Either the ChargePlace Scotland app didn’t work or the charging unit was offline.
We had to buy some charge time off a Tesla driver with an RFID card (debit card for EV drivers) to keep rolling. But worse was still to come.
We had four miles left in the middle of nowhere and it was only when we told the ChargePlace Scotland helpline who we were and what we were up to that they fired up the fast charger remotely.
Which won’t help you on your summer adventure next year. The simple truth is, Scotland is not remotely able to provide an adequate public charging infrastructure by 2030 and neither is the rest of the UK.
There are eight million homes in Britain with no off-street parking, and according to the latest data from zapmap.com there are just 26,574 public charging devices active today.
We’re going to need 1.7 MILLION by the end of the decade and 2.8 MILLION by 2035, at an estimated cost of £16.7BILLION, say industry experts. And we’re going to need millions of cheap EVs that everyone can afford.
Not going to happen.
Also not going to happen is my daughter recharging her EV in the corner of a dodgy, unlit car park.
No thank you.
Charge firms need to do a lot more than tick boxes. We need to BE SAFE, BE SEEN before we go green.
Leading the charge
TAXI driver Brian McKay charges his Nissan Leaf for free as part of a Highland Council initiative – saving about £8,000 a year in fuel.
He’s happy but he knows we’re not ready for the seismic shift in the way we move about.
Brian said: “There’s no way they can have enough chargers if we all went over to electric.
“You’re going to need car parks full of chargers. And faster chargers. And you’re going to need bigger batteries for distance. I just see it as a stop gap.
“They keep talking about hydrogen. They’ve just got to get the science right.
“Twenty years ago, they told us we all had to stop using petrol taxis. ‘Move over to diesel, cheaper, cleaner, etc, etc, that’s the way forward’.
“Now they’ve told us they’re putting all the diesel taxis off the road so you have to move over to electric or hybrid.
“The customers think it’s great. You’ve got the green feel about it.
"Somebody’s doing something. But it’s really just scratching the surface, isn’t it?
“You’ve got maybe six fast chargers in Inverness and two of them will probably be offline at any time or you can’t get near them, and the one at the hospital is impossible to get on.”
PEP TALK
TIME for a Pep talk on electric cars . . . from Pep Guardiola.
Man City boss Pep has a Nissan Leaf – loves it, drives it daily – and he wants more people to join team green.
Pep said: “I am proud of having fully embraced electric mobility with the Leaf as my daily car because, for me, driving an EV is a responsible choice.
“A car is a key element in people’s daily lives. By adopting more environmentally-friendly mobility, like electric vehicles, we can make a big impact on our planet.
“Zero-emission driving is one of the best courses of action for a better and more sustainable future.
“I am happy to see that the young generations are well aware of environmental challenges and most of the time they are the ones encouraging others to adopt new forms of mobility.
“If we all do our part, we can succeed in living in a better world.”
One more thing.
Don’t think EVs are just for people who wear cagoules and sensible shoes. They go well too.
Pep described the instant acceleration of his Leaf as “exhilarating”.
He said: “Electric vehicles are so much more fun to drive than the cars I had when I first got my driving licence.
“One of the main reasons for choosing an EV was to reduce my impact on the environment. However, I also wanted to keep the sense of excitement behind the wheel.”
Thank you, Pep. You’re a game-changer.
Make just one of our 6 pledges
THE Sun is urging you, our caring readers, to make at least one lifestyle change to slow climate change.
Everyone can get involved.
We have teamed up with global campaign Count Us In to calculate how much carbon you will save by ditching old habits.
Remember, even small changes help.
Find a step that is right for you and your family. Keep it up for at least two months and see how you do. It might become a habit.
When ready, try another step. All these will add to change. We will get there together.
Go online to mcb777.site/pledge and commit to one or more lifestyle changes.
It could save you money and all of your actions will go toward a global goal of getting a billion people to make changes.
So here goes . . .
- Eat more plants: Going meat-free for a day brings the same carbon saving as not driving for a month.
- Cut food waste: The average UK family throws away £700 of food a year.
- Turn down heating: With energy prices soaring, it will save cash.
- Insulate your home: Stop heating the sky with warm air escaping through your roof.
- Repair and re-use: Next time something in your home is not working properly, see if you can fix it, rather than throwing it away.
- Walk or cycle one more journey a day than at present. Petrol cars emit twice as much pollution in the first five minutes of a trip, so even short journeys add to climate change
375-MILE RANGIE
THE last car you’d expect me to feature during Green Week is the Range Rover.
The SUV. The daddy. But the big news is, there’ll be a full-electric version in three years’ time.
Range? About 375 miles. Price? A lot.
But you knew this. Range Rovers are expensive and it costs to be green. Until then, and probably my choice, is the new plug-in hybrid.
That’ll go 62 miles on the electric motor and the petrol/electric combo is 510hp. Glide up to the red carpet serenely. Get home quicker than a fat lad rushing to Greggs.
There’s so much more to tell you about the brilliant new fifth-gen Rangie, we’ve boiled it down to ten quick facts:
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- PRICES: From £94k. Expect all-singing SV versions to be closer to £200k.
- ENGINES: We’ve covered the eco stuff. There’ll also be 3-litre straight-six diesels and petrols and a 4.4-litre twin-turbo V8 sourced from BMW.
- DESIGN: We like it. Unmistakably a Range Rover at the front, super smooth side profile, but things get really interesting with that boat-tail rear end. The taillights and indicators are hidden behind dark lenses. You only see them when they are working.
- FOUR, FIVE OR SEVEN SEATS: The long-wheelbase version has three rows of seats for the first time. Adults can sit back there too, I’ve tried it. The high-lux four-seat version has a metre of legroom in the back, a drinks chiller, motorised fold-out tables, massaging seats and big screens. Proper VIP. You can opt for leather-free upholstery if that’s important to you.
- ACTUALLY, MAKE THAT NINE SEATS: The split-folding tailgate has “event seating” for two with cushions and drink holders.
- TECH: Curved central screen with built-in Alexa. Over-the-air software updates. Noise cancellation system played via THIRTY-FIVE speakers, including headrest speakers. Cabin air purification system which filters out odours, bacteria and allergens including SARS virus.
- FOUR-WHEEL STEERING: Standard on all cars. Usual benefits: Tighter turning circle; better low-speed agility; high-speed stability.
- SUSPENSION: Completely overhauled. Fully independent air suspension uses satnav data to prepare vehicle for bumps and bends up to two miles ahead.
- WADING DEPTH: It can crawl through 90cm of water, just like the Defender.
- BEST OF BRITISH: It will be built exclusively at Solihull, the spiritual home of Land Rover.
So there you have it. The new Range Rover. In a class of its own.