Ronald Checks Out Electric Cars Part 2 — Range, Charging, And Trivia

April 18, 2018 2024-05-15T14:46:38 by 28 Comments

Electric cars - range and charging

Nine days ago I attended the Charge Together electric car event in Adelaide and scored some sweet electric rides.  Last week I wrote about 5 specific electric cars and today I’ll describe what I learned about driving electric cars in general from their owners.  I’ll cover range anxiety and how it’s not really a problem provided you get an electric car that suits your needs.  I cover charging at home, at public charging stations, and even what to do when out-the-back-of-Burke and desperately seeking a charge.  I’ll even cover a little bit of electric car history. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage, Electric Vehicles

Ronald Checks Out 5 Electric Cars On The Streets Of Adelaide

April 13, 2018 2019-01-08T10:38:11 by 33 Comments

Electric car review - Charge Together

Ronald attended the Charge Together electric vehicle event In Adelaide. Here’s what happened…

I attended an electric car event here in Adelaide on Sunday.  I thought it was a reasonable thing to do as I’d recently written about how electric cars don’t result in more CO2 emissions than the typical petrol car. Because some people have made apples to oranges comparisons between the greenhouse gas emissions produced by, lower performance petrol cars and larger, higher performance electric cars when charged from the grid, it seemed like a good idea to see with my own eyes that these people aren’t being fair dinkum. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage, Electric Vehicles

Craig Kelly Is Wrong: Electric Cars Are Better For The Environment Than Petrol Ones

April 3, 2018 2024-06-04T15:04:12 by 40 Comments
Craig Kelly on electric cars

Craig Kelly Is Either Illiterate, Incompetent, or Machiavellian.  But I’m pretty sure it’s the middle one.

Toyota Prius Beats Nissan Leaf And Tesla S On CO2 Emissions In Australia

It has become clear to me there is some confusion over whether electric cars offer an environmental benefit in this country.  Craig Kelly, who is an extremely honorable Member of Parliament, has told the nation they result in more greenhouse emissions than conventional petrol cars.

If you are standing up while reading this you may want to sit down due to your shock when I tell you Craig Kelly is actually wrong on this. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage, Electric Vehicles

The Six Biggest Myths About Battery Storage

March 29, 2018 2018-03-29T13:17:26 by 159 Comments
finn's battery system - energy storage myths

If you are buying a solar battery – go in with your eyes wide open.

I’ve been publishing thoughts on the solar industry since 2009. And since Tesla announced their Powerwall battery to great media hype in May 2015, a lot of those thoughts have concerned batteries.

Unfortunately, a lot of the facts I’ve published about batteries, their economics and their environmental impacts have not gone down well with some parts of the solar industry, generally the parts that have bet their future on selling lots of batteries in the short to medium term. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage

Opal Storage Review: Beware Short Cabinet Warranty And Unrealistic Savings

March 27, 2018 2024-01-26T10:33:57 by 9 Comments
ronald and opal storage battery unit

Professor of Archaeology, expert on the occult, and how does one say it… reviewer of steel battery boxes.

Opal Solar is a brand owned by the Australian solar wholesaler Solar Juice.  Last December they launched Opal Storage, an “all-in-one” home battery system. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage

Feed-In Tariffs Hurt The Economics Of Batteries

March 8, 2018 2018-03-09T07:57:01 by 100 Comments

Installing a home battery system right now will not save you money. Maybe in a year or two it will, but I have a very short time horizon so that’s almost like never to me.

As of March 2018 I know of no battery system on the market that will save money for a household that has anything approaching normal electricity consumption. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage

Hansol Technics AIO Battery System: Don’t Call It A Samsung

October 31, 2017 2017-12-06T14:11:27 by 11 Comments

Samsung has decided to let their partner, Hansol Technics, take over their residential battery storage systems. However, the rebranding probably wasn’t done by someone cosplaying as Bob Ross.

There are now over 200 Samsung AIO battery systems installed in Australia, providing battery power to households both on-grid and off.  Their manufacturer, Samsung, is a giant, South Korean based, multinational conglomerate and if you’d like snag yourself a brand new AIO battery system from them, that’s terribly unfortunate, because you can’t have one.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage

Energy Storage Echo Chamber Has Greens And Coalition Working To Increase Emissions

October 24, 2017 2018-10-22T09:17:09 by 35 Comments
Greens MP and Liberal MP calling for storage subsidies

The Greens and the Libs agree on one thing at least: that storage should be subsidised. But should it?

The mainstream media has been full of news about energy storage over the last few months. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage Tagged With:

Electric Cars Will Roll Over The Competition

September 29, 2017 2024-05-15T12:46:01 by 73 Comments
Tesla Superchargers

Tesla superchargers connected to Tesla S electric luxury vehicles in Adelaide sitting opposite Mitsubishi MiEVs.

The Electric Car Revolution Is Coming And Cannot Be Stopped

Electric cars are approaching a major milestone.  Soon they will reach 1% of total world vehicle production.

If you don’t think that’s a big deal, consider how quickly things changed once 1% of people had the internet or 1% had smartphones.  This might not seem like a reasonable comparison, as a brand new electric car costs more than twice as much as the latest iPhone, but things are definitely taking off. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage, Electric Vehicles Tagged With: ,

Peer Reviewed Study: Grid Connect Solar Helps Environment But Batteries Harm It

August 8, 2017 2017-08-08T14:14:24 by 98 Comments
academic in ivory tower

A paper published in ‘Nature’ has agreed with Ronald’s back of an envelope conclusions from last year: at the moment, most grid connected storage harms the environment.

Almost a year ago I wrote an article about how on-grid home battery storage does not help the environment but instead harms it by increasing greenhouse gas emissions and other types of pollution. I am raising this topic again, hoisting it above my head, and waving it around, because a scientific paper published in the journal Nature vindicates my position. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Battery Storage
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