What to Do to Hasten Electric Car Adoption

The UK government has pledged to ban petrol and diesel engines by 2030. This ban is surprising, not because of the short timeframe, but because it includes a ban on hybrid vehicles by 2035 too. This will have the obvious effects of helping reduce carbon and transportation emissions, and improving air quality and hence the health of those living along major transportation corridors. However, because the timeframe is so short, the government needs to hasten the adoption of electric vehicles. Here are a few ways to do so.

Provide and Encourage Additional Skills and Training

We have been building petrol and diesel vehicles for about a century now which means there are so many talented vehicle design and manufacturing experts. If the countries that have set a timeframe for the ban of petrol and diesel engines, including the UK, want their automotive industries to continue to thrive, the existing workforce has to be retrained.

Ideally, the governments should be looking to add engineering graduates and experts with expertise in autonomous and electric vehicles to the workforce to develop the new wave of electric cars. Having a huge workforce will also help cushion against a low supply that will not meet the high demand that will inevitably arise when petrol and diesel engines are phased out.

Encourage Innovation and Infrastructure Development and Improvement

One of the major reasons for the improvement of the range of electric vehicles is the development of new battery technologies. There are various ways of powering electric vehicles and it is encouraging to see industry leaders as well as university students coming up with new battery designs and technologies.

Electric vehicles will also require charging, and the current infrastructure is not adequate for everyone to drive an electric vehicle. The existing charging infrastructure has to be improved and expanded. Additionally, the increase in the electricity demand should prompt governments to start thinking about renewable energy sources to further offset carbon emissions.

Doing both of these things will eliminate any range and charging concerns that many people have about electric vehicles.

Encourage Electric Car Leasing

A major reason why some people find it hard to switch to an electric vehicle is that they are already used to their petrol, diesel and hybrid cars. They do not want to commit to an electric vehicle without finding out if an electric vehicle is right for them. The best way to get people who want to hold on to their conventional vehicles interested in electric cars is to encourage electric car leasing.

When you lease an electric vehicle, you make a medium-term commitment to drive the car and experience everything that comes with it. That could be learning about the different charger types to know how good the charging network is around you.

The good news is that there are lots of cheap electric car lease deals available through various companies so you can try different electric vehicles to see which one is right for you. These electric car lease deals also allow you to know the actual cost of owning and driving an electric vehicle and how it compares to owning a conventional car.

For more information on electric cars, charging types, EV lease deals and everything else you need to know about electric cars, visit the ElectriX website. They have electric car experts discussing everything you need to know about electric cars, whether you are looking for information about an EV lease or need to know if an electric car would be right for a family holiday.

Increase Lifetimes and Encourage Recycling

The most common type of battery used in electric vehicles is a lithium-ion battery. It is encouraging to see that the lifetimes of these batteries have improved as battery technology has improved, with many car batteries now estimated to last 10-15 years. Increasing their lifetimes beyond 15 years should help reduce the amount of battery waste that ends up in the environment.

Governments have to also think about building facilities to help with battery recycling. Even when batteries last longer, they will still lose their ability to hold a charge some time. At this point, they can be recycled or discarded. We would rather see the former rather than the latter.

Consider Hydrogen Fuel

Hydrogen as a fuel is an idea that has been around for some time now but it has been overtaken by batteries as an energy source. Hydrogen can be combined with oxygen on a hydrogen cell to produce electricity and power electric vehicles.

These cars produce water as their by-product and so are zero-carbon vehicles. While hydrogen is less efficient than batteries, hydrogen cars can be refuelled in about five minutes and there is a similarity between the pumps we have now and hydrogen fuel pumps. Both of these make an appealing fuel for those already used to the way things are now with petrol and diesel cars.

Electric vehicles are here to stay, especially considering the fact that governments will ban all petrol, diesel and hybrid vehicles in about two decades. The only thing left is to find ways to encourage people to adopt electric vehicles as early as possible.