EVs are now 9 times cheaper than petrol or diesel to drive in the UK

cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/tech/p/1429718/evs-are-now-9-times-cheaper-than-petrol-or-diesel-to-drive-in-the-uk

www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-evs-are-now-nine-times-cheaper-than-petrol-or-diesel-to-drive-in-the-uk

By “nine times cheaper,” they mean the fuel for the EV can cost as little as 1/9th as much as the fuel for a gasoline / petrol car.

That’s great, as far as it goes, but depreciation per mile is usually a bigger cost than fuel. Other costs like registration taxes, insurance, and maintenance shouldn’t be expected to follow this 1/9th pattern either, of course. You’re not going to switch to an EV and find your total expense drops to 1/9th.

It feels to me like they’re telling an incomplete story on purpose.

A large portion of depreciation and insurance is fixed, not based on actually driving. And maintenance is lower with EVs as well.

Still though, you are right, 1/9 is specific to fuel, and it’s deceiving. If it.were truly 1/9 we wouldn’t be having this conversation because all vehicles would be EVs.

Oh and don’t worry, if ICE vehicles go away, the politicians will find some way to levy an 8/9ths tax on something else to make up for not having those fuel sales.

Toll roads for everyone?

Where im at registration is a factor of 2/4x to make up for the fuel tax. Fun times.

I mean yeah?

Roads are not free. Fuel was a reasonable proxy for usage previously. Without that it just leaves non drivers to subsidise driving.

Im not disagreeing, it just kinda sucks that im in a VERY low paying with VERY high taxes for our area. In theory that means we should be getting better services. But its quite the opposite.