Posted on : By : The Electrifier Posted in : EV & Policy Analysis

Major UK Government incentives for EVs

At the start of the new tax year on 6 April 2020, a major uprating of UK Government tax breaks and incentives for EVs comes into force.

When employer and employee tax breaks are combined with other hard cash savings of EV ownership, the total financial benefits of owning and driving and EV for business use, compared to a old-tech car, could amount to 100% or more of the sticker price a new EV over three years and 45,000 miles of use.

Document updated 27 May 2020 to reflect the elimination of the “luxury supplement” of £320 Road Tax from Year 2 onwards, but only for all battery electric vehicles. More expensive ICE cars still have this penalty.

The full report is is here.

Thanks to CleanTechnica for featuring this report. Link here.

Posted on : By : The Electrifier Posted in : Monthly Updates

February 2020 Performance Report

February 2020 was a month of severe storms (Ciara, Dennis and Jorge) which brought widespread flooding and general misery to much of the North of England. Fortunately, all the solar panels stayed firmly attached to the roof and even managed to generate a bit of electricity on the few sunnier days between the downpours.

So, once again, the bulk of the emissions-reducing and cost-saving contributions came from the Octopus Go tariff, providing dirt cheap, green-sourced, electrons to the two EVs and the Powerwall between 00:30 and 04:30 every night. Click the button below if you’d also like to sign for 5p/kWh electricity sluiced into your EV or domestic storage battery in the small hours.

Octopus Energy

As usual, the detailed monthly performance report is available by clicking the image at the end of this post. The headlines are as follows.

  • £460 financial benefit in the month. This saving compares the cost we actually paid for all the electricity we used (overwhelmingly during the night on the Octopus Go tariff to charge the cars and the domestic storage battery) versus the cost we would have paid at the UK average rate per kWh. It includes a saving of £232 for the petrol we did not have to buy to drive the 1,545 miles charged to our EVs during the month.
  • 404 kg of CO2 emissions avoided by using only 100% renewably-sourced electricity versus the emissions that would be caused by using electricity produced at the UK average generation mix of renewable and carbon-based sources.
  • 311 kg of CO2 emissions avoided by using only 100% renewably-sourced electricity to power 1,545 miles of motoring in EVs, versus the emissions that would have been caused by covering the same distance at the UK average g/km CO2 emissions rate.