Don't boil the kettle while charging your electric car because it will blow the fuse, National Grid

Uh-Oh. So do all the bragged about cost savings with an electric car included the cost of industrializing your home electric service or are you supposed to not wash clothes, cook supper, watch your big screen and keep the lights low?

Don't boil the kettle while charging your electric car because it will blow the fuse, National Grid warns



Electric car owners have been warned that if they attempt to boil a kettle while charging their car it will blow the fuse.

The National Grid expressed concerns that an average size 3.5kW battery charger would take 19 hours to fully charge a car battery, even when it is 25 per cent full.

A “thought piece” document obtained by the Financial Times warned that a more powerful 11kW device would still take six hours to charge a car battery and during that time, the use of everyday items such as kettles and ovens would blow the fuse.

“If one were to use an above average power charger, say 11kW, this would require 48 amps. When using such a charger it would mean that you could not use other high demand electrical items...  without tripping the house's main fuse.”

The warnings come just weeks after the Government announced plans to ban the sale of new diesel and petrol cars by 2040 in a bid to encourage people to buy electric vehicles.

However, motoring experts immediately expressed concern, noting that it would place unprecedented strain on the National Grid.


Most electric cars will require a battery capacity of 90 kilowatt hours (kWh) to make journeys of around 300 miles, National Grid believes.

It suggests that the ability to travel longer distances without stopping to recharge will be a “must have” if motorists are to abandon petrol or diesel cars............

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/201...harging-electric-car-will-blow-fuse-national/

 

I'm not sure what your point is. If we avoided investing in and purchasing the latest technological advancements simply because the existing infrastructure needed upgrading, we'd still be using horse-drawn wagons and there would be no broadband internet.

 

I remember everything going all dark like, for Y2K too.

 

Who's going to pay for everyone's house to get upgraded?

 

At this point electric vehicles are the most ****ing retarded and inefficient and indefensible form of personal transportation. The only people that support this nonsense are luddites who never took a chemistry course in their lives.

 

Actually, with how über has taken off, I first see an explosion of new businesses -dedicated charging stations.

Combined with uber type service, (cost added to the charging of course) this would allow for the logistics & lag time for private homes to upgrade... Or not.

 

Someone needs to raise money to buy them Brits some proper breaker switches. Fuses!!! those are so mid-Century

 

Most modern homes (In the U.S.) have a 200 amp service which translates to 48KW @ 240 volts ac. Fuses are antiquated....Circuit breakers are the norm. It depends on how many watts it takes to charge that vehicle and how fast along with wire gauge used as to whether or not you blow a breaker. Of course, utility bills will be higher but one would have to compare the cost to a gas-fueled vehicle.

 

Ya that's the first thing I noticed 'fuses'......Unless the Brits still use the word fuse for a breaker...

 

Nobody commenting on the fact that England decided to BAN the sale of new gas/diesel powered cars??

What's next? Mandatory purchase of electric cars? Because what the left doesn't want to ban, they want to mandate.

 

You're right about the breakers and you seem to know about how AC works. In the summer line voltage will sag during the day due to all the air conditioners and other stuff connected to the grid. You mentioned watts, and wattage is calculated as voltage X current.* Ohm's Law states that if the voltage drops the current draw will go up. Current is what trips breakers and every time they trip they get weaker. Plus, and I might be wrong about this, but I don't think so - power meters are based on current draw rather than voltage, that's why's they say it's cheaper to do your laundry at night when the AC is flowing at it's regular rate and current draw is less.

Probably the best way to charge a car battery would be the use of solar chargers if they exist, but that's not very practical during the day.

*to all of you who think you have a 500 watt car stereo, think about this: watts equals voltage x current. Your car has 12 volts, maybe 14. You'll need a lot of peak current to hit 500 watts. It's more likely the amp can put out an instantaneous peak of 500 watts into a certain impedance with 'only' 10% (ten percent) distortion, maybe more. What we're not even factoring here is the resistance of the car's wiring which doesn't make things any better. Your 500 watt car stereo is more realistically 50 watts.

 

Who has fuses today? Probably backwater folk like you.

 

Power Boosters & such compensate tho yes?

I mean worst case, if someone is living in a Donicker, they could fashion an amp/power booster yes?

 

Plenty of apartment buildings in NYC. Plenty.

 

Hard to charge an electric car in an apartment building, particularly older ones.

 

Yep. My building's loaded with them... Rural Wisconsin.

Plenty in Urban Milwaukee as well.

 

So basically don't keep your car at your home overnight? That seems extremely inconvenient.

 

What are you talking about? Backwater? Fuses are code in homes with electricity.

 

Yeah, I know, but there's meat on that bone. Especially near Interstates

 

you gotta be kidding

 

Nope.

I live in a democrat run area that's a large city in Texas, Dallas. Built homes for a living.

 

2 things I got from this.


1. I don't think the article in OP is suggesting the grid can't be upgraded, just the cost. And the timeline. If they started now, I doubt most of these countries could get all ofnthe upgrades done in only 22 years.

2. I'm buying a healthy portion of car manufacturer stock leading up to this. The profits from people buying gas and diesel powered vehicles in the late 30s will pay out VERY well.

 

It might be possible. But think about this: to generate 500 watts from 12 volts you would need to send to your speakers 41 amps. More than likely the tiny wires in the car would melt long before you reach that level. Here's a calculator, give it a whirl: http://www.rapidtables.com/calc/electric/watt-volt-amp-calculator.htm Start with the known voltage (12v) and then play with the wattage. I believe a lot of high end car stereo people have multiple batteries to provide the current needed for lots of clean power.

Also, for single battery usage the amp would need very large capacitors to store energy so it's there when called upon. My home stereo amplifier weighs 200 pounds and only puts out 125 watts into 8 ohms, or 210 watts into 4 ohms. The lower the resistance (Ohms) the more current it will draw because it's closer to being a dead short, so the amp has to be extremely stable. And all that weight is for energy storage.

This is the amp I have, the 9008A.

http://www.mbl.de//wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Manual_Reference-Line_Endstufen_Web-min-min.pdf

 

What does a Democratic area have to do with anything? Are you insinuating that homes are being built without circuit breakers?

 

Yeah, for sure, your wiring / powering for the system would have to have it's own circuit, or yeah, you'd have to rewire, & likely upgrade to after-market for most of your other electrical uses in the car.