By APEV
Posted on Sept. 24, 2012. Listed in:
APEV (Association for the Promotion of Electric Vehicles) invites you to visit the discussion site and have your say on electric vehicles in NZ. You can vote or comment on the ideas already posted, or post a new topic. The most popular ideas bubble to the surface through the community voting process.
Currently the idea in first place is titled “Government’s role in accelerating EV uptake.” It states “Without the NZ government stepping up to bat with far more substantial incentives than the exemption from Road User Charges, EV uptake in NZ will continue at a snail's pace. Meanwhile, we will continue to spend billions of dollars importing fossil fuels, when vehicles could have been fueled with surplus overnight electricity, most of which comes from renewable sources. Agree or disagree?”
One of the ideas that’s quickly gaining popularity is around building an EV recharge network in Christchurch. It suggests, “… As part of Christchurch rebuilding how about government engage with private companies to build the first city in NZ to get an electric car recharge network? Unless there is a plan for a recharge network why will people be willing to buy an Electric car? This in many ways could help the city get back on heel. This could be very similar to one in Perth
To date, 45 comments have been posted and 133 votes have been cast. Rob McEwen
, Executive Director of APEV, says that the ideas, comments and voting taking place are invaluable in informing APEV’s discussions with government, EV manufacturers, electricity & energy companies and corporates. “We are all about fast forwarding NZ’s EV future and this discussion forum helps us with our strategies and areas of focus” says McEwen.
It would be foolish to the point of stupidity to commit serious funding to a project that relies on vehicles that have a useful range limited by the specialized charging facilities in a small area. Surely range and versatility, or more precisely lack of it, are the fundamental lessons to be learned from failed past range restricted Rail and CNG schemes.
Electric suffers from huge extra purchase cost and the build is hugely energy consuming. Whereas existing small 1 liter turbo diesel vehicles beat electric hands down for total energy efficiency including build cost and lifespan energy use plus they can travel outside the limit of charging devices and they can go up hills the last hill being as readily tackled as the first. when teh government gets serious and reduces the road user charges on sub 1 tonne and sub 2 liter diesels to an honest realist level we will know then the government may be genuine about general conservation. Yes Sth Is does have nightime electrical energy available but every year we hear the same cry of low lake levels and a ban on further dam construction. Depleting already spoken for electrical energy without more hydro construction to provide capacity is folly.
Better to use our extensive existing gas reserves as proven versatile CNG power. Dont be fooled by the uneducated calls for carbon restriction, The sparse population that is about only 1/30th that of England for land size in Sth Is ensures that no serious carbon problem will ever occur in our lifetime and the extensive agricultural use will adequately take can of any carbon in the natural cycle that isnt blown away to Chile, doubtful we will have any problem for 1000 years, so no use inventing one and talking expensive energy wasteful electric vehicles as a solution, because it is NOT a solution. VRW
Written in September 2012