There are pros and cons of both electric and hydrogen approaches for cars. The way I see it neither is really ready for mass adoption yet, but for political reasons electric cars are being rushed into use anyway.

Unfortunately hydrogen is very energy-intensive to extract in the first place so the efficiency of a hydrogen electric car is about a quarter that of a battery electric car - if and when we have so much clean energy generation that we can reserve capacity for extracting hydrogen then it might have a chance; until then it will remain a niche, underdeveloped technology. Battery charging speeds are increasing rapidly, perhaps not quite to the point of being comparable with 'filling a tank' but probably not far off within the next decade or so especially if results do come out of the research into solid state batteries. The battery charging network, or lack thereof, is likely to continue to be the main issue though without major investment.

The issue with electric is you will never get complete mass adoption. There are many people who cant afford an electric or hybrid car. Or live in areas where home chargers arent possible. Trucks, vans, heavy goods vehicles etc wont go electric, that model doesnt make financial sense. All of this additional need for electricity adds to more fuels being burnt in powerstations to generate the electricity and hence more emissions.

The 3rd world arent going to go electric. Places like india, nigeria etc. Brasil use a mix of gasoline and ethanol that is heavy on the ethanol. Electric vehicles for me arent the future they are a false dawn.

A full lifecycle analysis on cars tells you the best option is to keep whatever car you’ve got for as long as possible, reduce how often you use it, and consider carefully how to best deal with disposal when it finally turns obsolete.

With most consumer appliances, we would be ideally served by ditching our ‘replace’ mentality and returning to a ‘repair’ mentality. Cars are the biggest appliance we own.

True, yeah. And that’s something that should never have been encouraged.

They are more complicated as there's a lot more parts features and computers. The days of adjusting things at home with a screwdriver are long gone. Everything needs to be scanned now

There's also stuff that you didn't used to have. Trust me they're a night mare.

I'm also of the belief they make things more difficult on purpose these days. Having to take off front wings to change light bulbs, for example

MattyJ wrote:

I'm also of the belief they make things more difficult on purpose these days. Having to take off front wings to change light bulbs, for example

Im pretty sure that’s just the Bentley continental

poprock wrote:

Renault Megane.

No, wait. That was the whole front PU you had to remove.

Nah you can turn the wheel and Access a panel

My mate's Alfa GT involved taking half the car apart for a bulb.
That or employ a Victorian child with small, dispensable hands.

Changing them on my 1 Series is like that bit with the tree stump in Flash Gordon.

That's the thing though, I guess we have different ideas of "complicated". How long does it take to change the cam and injector timings now compared to twenty years ago??? Yet a supposedly simpler task lime changing a bulb has gone the other way

God bless Bangle

No idea in truth, I was never a fan at the time, but many of his designs have aged pretty gracefully. Whether that's because he was so influential that a few years after his designs they were copied and therefore became contemporary, or because they were actually better than my younger eye saw I don't know

Most comprehensive policies would only cover you for 3rd party F+F in a vehicle other than the one named on your policy.