Octopus Energy Tech Summit

[Stinsy]

... "Less lithium, more neon!" in reference to addressing range anxiety. He suggests that instead of ever increasing battery capacities, rapid chargers should be lit up like petrol stations and not tucked away on a dimly lit industrial estate...

I TOTALLY agree that EVs don't need bigger batteries. I would also add that they don't need faster charging either!

In my mind the "typical" EV should have the following: 50kWh battery, 4mi/kWh on the motorway in winter, 100kW charging*. We also need to bust the myth that "the infrastructure isn't there yet". Sure there are a few charging-deserts here and there, and some charging facilities leave a bit to be desired. Bit for the most part charging provision is great.





[* I can see the reason for a tiny minority of "service engineers" or similar who genuinely drive over 200 miles every day to have a 75kWh battery, but these really are the 1% (or 0.1% of drivers). And there definitely should be 25kWh EVs for shopping/local errands but these seem to be non-existant.

[dan_b]

As a space nerd I loved the two presentations from Chris Hadfield and Prof Brian Cox - they were less about renewable tech per se but more about the power of technology and what you can do if you don't restrict yourselves.

The thing that made the biggest impression on me was the discussion with the head of the National Grid in Ukraine, and the follow-up from Emma Pinchbeck from the Climate Change Committee.

The fact that Ukraine's grid is still fully functional after having had basically all of its traditional centralised thermal power generation sites destroyed by Russia - they've built several GW of wind, solar and batteries during an active war, and have a more resilient, decentralised, renewables-focused grid as a result - during a hot war.

If they can do that, there's simply no excuse for any other country to not just get on with it.

https://renews.biz/101366/dtek-octopus- ... nitiative/

[SimonSays]

The thing that made the biggest impression on me was the discussion with the head of the National Grid in Ukraine
...

The fact that Ukraine's grid is still fully functional after having had basically all of its traditional centralised thermal power generation sites destroyed by Russia - they've built several GW of wind, solar and batteries during an active war, and have a more resilient, decentralised, renewables-focused grid as a result - during a hot war.

Wasn't there a comment that it's been so successful that Ukraine has been exporting on several occasions to neighbouring countries?

[dan_b]

Yep, they're exporting electricity to their neighbours. During a war.

The thing that made the biggest impression on me was the discussion with the head of the National Grid in Ukraine
...

The fact that Ukraine's grid is still fully functional after having had basically all of its traditional centralised thermal power generation sites destroyed by Russia - they've built several GW of wind, solar and batteries during an active war, and have a more resilient, decentralised, renewables-focused grid as a result - during a hot war.

Wasn't there a comment that it's been so successful that Ukraine has been exporting on several occasions to neighbouring countries?

[SimonSays]

Octopus' announcement of the BYD Dolphin including all home charging, £299/month on a lease. It's bidirectional and requires you plug in for X days/month. Quentin Wilson and Damon Hill there to launch it. Damon's daily is a Polestar and his other claim to fame (apart from winning a Formula One World Championship) is that he thinks he got the UK's first EV speeding ticket.

Here's a video of the launch

[dan_b]

Was quite funny after that announcement that Greg said "oh, we forgot to work out how to get the car off stage"!