Mike's Minute: Are EVs having their moment?

I note the whinging has started from EV owners as their fixed price deals for recharging their Nissan Leafs at home come to an end. 

Some claim the new deals will be 50% higher. How can you possibly be surprised? 

Did you think you would get away with it forever? 

For a while the more deluded lauded the road tax loophole, until it got closed as well. 

The power companies see EV owners as a new revenue source. 

As petrol may or may not become a commodity not worth bothering about, at least for cars, car dealers will be licking their lips that a product three and a half short weeks ago they couldn’t shift for love nor money, may have a wait time as the desperados clamber in for something that unshackles them from the tyranny of oil. 

But equally if it becomes a “thing”, and it's way too early to say whether it is or not, but if it does, power companies will not believe their luck. 

An almost entirely new revenue stream, not just a whole new series of customers, but old customers paying way more now that they are hooked in. 

We must remember power prices are rising because of renewable investment and basic line maintenance. 

The Commerce Commission has allowed big increases for you and me to upgrade infrastructure so maybe the way to see an EV is not about the cost, although it is still cheaper. 

But it's more about the convenience and despite the doom merchants, we are no longer running out of power. 

In fact, in one of the countries more upbeat stories is we have seemingly transitioned, or will, pretty well in terms of base load and meeting ongoing, if not growing, demand. 

It's why Sri Lanka has turned the neon signs off and told office workers to kill the air conditioning – they don't have Clyde or the Taupo geothermal. They need oil. 

This won't be a moment for public transport. They've blown that. It's too unreliable. The current burst of patronage will vanish as quickly as it arrived. 

But EVs might be having their moment. Once you are in one you may not go back. 

That critical tipping point might have been provided by a war.  

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