Musk is a cunt and Tesla are shit

ah interesting. The lack of non-tesla 100kw chargers is annoying

One thing I saw on those is that there is already long lead times on them

EVs are expensive to make, there are negative margins involved and emissions target only demands certain numbers to be sold by 2020. Read what you will from that.

from their Website

"We supply all our members with 100% renewable electricity and 10% green gas. When you switch to Bulb, we make sure that for every unit of electricity you use, a unit is produced and put on the grid by a renewable source like Llyn Brenig Hydro in North Wales. In addition, 10% of our gas comes from biomethane. That's gas produced from organic matter like sewage and manure - which is then reinjected onto the grid (minus the smell)."

But unless that is owned by Bulb, without the company existing at all, everyone would get the same amount of renewable energy in their homes.

Yes, well that would depend about the relevant wholesale costs? If the wholesale cost from fossil fuel is significantly lower then standard suppliers would prioritise those over renewables, so guess it is partially to ensure that doesn't happen?

I don't know. I have no knowledge about the topic, I'm genuinely asking how a "supplier" who supplies a product from a big mixed pot can claim that all of their customers get exclusively the good energy.
When if without Bulb, the renewable energy was still being produced, and everyone would be in exactly the same position.
Fair enough if they said our customers use this much and through our power producing sites, we produce enough to cover that volume. But they don't do they?

I don't know. I have no knowledge about the topic, I'm genuinely asking how a "supplier" who supplies a product from a big mixed pot can claim that all of their customers get exclusively the good energy.

When if without Bulb, the renewable energy was still being produced, and everyone would be in exactly the same position.

Dunno on this point, guess it depends on what happens with excess supply, not something I know anything about either.

Fair enough if they said our customers use this much and through our power producing sites, we produce enough to cover that volume. But they don't do they?

Well this is the tricky bit isn't it? Does the fact that there are suppliers like Bulb fronting the consumer side of it, lead to increased production of renewables? I can't see it being a bad thing either way.

Will be buying a Polestar as soon as they are available.

Right after I have enough money.

And a driving license.

Everyone is scared of Polestar.

Guessing he's not doing as much as you to change things, but you go champ...

Because they look mint and are doing things differently?
Joking aside, I do want a leech car if I ever get one, which I really should...

Well this is the tricky bit isn't it? Does the fact that there are suppliers like Bulb fronting the consumer side of it, lead to increased production of renewable?

If the answer to this is "no" - you are just being over charged for your electricity.

Most renewable electricity in this country is generated based on subsidies, like the Renewable Obligation, Feed-in Tariff and Contracts for Difference - all set up by the government and paid for by all electricity bill payers.

The first two in that list are now basically shut to new projects, with just CfDs remaining. Perhaps, if a new renewable electricity project can factor in being able to sell it's power at a higher price, they can afford to bid for a lower subsidy under the CfD mechanism and a re therefore more likely to be successful and more likely to get built.

Personally, I think green tariffs are all a bit fishy, but as long as they are doing no massive harm, not that bad. I just don't think people should think they are being super eco by choosing one, as I don't they are really driving increasing generation of green electricity.

Edit - here's a good article that seems balanced.
https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/energy/do-green-energy-tariffs-make-difference

bulb are cheaper though

Oh I agree with 95% of that, the bit I disagree with was the first sentence, I signed up for Bulb mainly as they were the cheapest (of the recognisable) suppliers when I looked. They can probably do this as they are not fixed rate deals, so rates could go up significantly in the future, but I will just churn away if they do.

My point about bring Bulb up at the start was the interesting side point of the fact that if electric cars become the norm, it potentially puts a huge strain on the already highly burdened national grid. Systems like the smart chargers they are trialling will have to be used to try and negate some of this, as well as potentially increase supply, which I would hope would come from renewable rather other sources. Would be a bit of a bummer if consumers flocked to electric cars as they think they are better for the environment, only for it to lead to new coal fired power stations being built.

or more succinctly put by @n3il

I suppose if they are the cheapest, and 100% green, that probably answers the question as to how much they are helping increase green generation. In reality, green electricity is floating around on the grid anyway, and companies like bulb just buy that up, at a similar price to fossil wholesale, and then sell it folks so they think they are saving the planet, when in reality, it would have been generated and supplied to the populous anyway.

No expert on this, but pretty sure Good Energy generate their own renewable energy
https://www.goodenergy.co.uk/our-energy/

subsidies

The cost of renewable generation has come down massively though, and with enough investment can easily come down further.

If you look at the data from the EU, you see a noticeable inflection around 2010 in the production of electrical energy generation from bio, solar, and wind (wind being the largest contributor). How come then?

People miss that fossil fuels are currently cheap because the infrastructure has predominantly already been paid for.

The challenge is renewables currently don't seem to offer one solution. The future looks more like it will be a mix. Still there is so much scope - even when you look at how under utilized biogas is given how much food, etc. we waste.
At the moment it seems like off-shore wind is where it's at. But even solar has dropped in cost.

Until the commercial waste collection model changes, it’s still going to be most often cheaper to send food waste to landfill, despite landfill tax, than to anaerobic digestion

If you look at the data from the EU, you see a noticeable inflection around 2010 in the production of electrical energy generation from bio, solar, and wind (wind being the largest contributor). How come then?

Thats when the subsidies really kicked in. The Renewable Energy Directive, which is the EU mechanism to achieve decarbonisation was agreed in 2009 and set targets out to 2020.

Certainly will be a mix in the future - we're probably going to need some new nuclear, but with wind and solar and some storage solutions we might get close.

Importantly you still need to create a reason to generate renewable rather than use gas - The Renewable Obligation was good because it obligated suppliers to generate a certain amount of renewable power, and provided a subsidy to achieve that. Something similar, but without or very low subsidies seems important to me.

Anyway, we're way off Musk now.

VW based electric cars should be about £18 to £25k

I'd be very surprised if they're that cheap. A VW E Up costs at least £23k and that's only got a range of 83 miles. An e-Golf costs £32k. A Nissan Leaf costs £26k+, Hyundai Kona £32k etc.

$35k is pretty much £27k but I think you're right and it will of course end up costing more in the UK. But even allowing for that the new pricing seems in line with other manufacturers.

Yep, and Ecotricity are similar.

Good Energy Tariffs are significantly higher than even the Big Six - perhaps this is because they are using there own generation, and can't play the market to pick up cheaper green energy from elsewhere - i'm not sure as I'm also not an expert either...

Good Energy and the like may well be more of a force of a good, but to get real change, the whole population needs to be forced to consume more green energy - it's not going to be driven by consumer choice alone.

Let's wait and see.

Put it this way - if I had the money, or a car (which I don't) I wouldn't be buying electric now.

It's not going to be driven by consumers not choosing Green.