8. Why should anyone care about electric vans?

In the latest episode of "Insiders Guide to Energy," Paul Kirby, an acclaimed electric van expert, dives deep into the transformative world of electric vans and their impact on businesses and the environment. As he eloquently points out, vans are not just transportation vehicles but crucial tools that generate revenue for drivers. This episode unravels the hidden potential of electric vans in revolutionizing the commercial vehicle sector. Kirby passionately addresses the significant pollution and carbon emissions caused by diesel vans, emphasizing the urgent need for a shift to cleaner, electric alternatives. He presents a compelling case for electric vans, highlighting their role in reducing air pollution and contributing to a greener planet.

The conversation with Kirby takes an interesting turn as he discusses the often-overlooked mental health benefits of driving electric vans compared to their diesel counterparts. This aspect of the discussion brings to light how electric vans offer a quieter, smoother, and less stressful driving experience, which can have a positive impact on the mental well-being of drivers. Moreover, Kirby touches on the importance of educating drivers and fleet managers about the advantages and practicalities of electric vans, dispelling common myths and misconceptions. He stresses the need for informed decision-making in this transition, which is crucial for businesses and the environment alike.

The podcast episode also explores the practical implications of the shift to electric vans, especially considering the 2035 deadline when the sale of new diesel and petrol vans will cease. Kirby delves into the logistics of this transition, discussing the readiness of fleets to embrace electric vehicles. He provides insightful analysis on the current state of electric van technology, its evolution, and what the future holds for this sector. By offering a blend of expert opinion and practical advice, this episode of "Insiders Guide to Energy" stands as an essential listen for businesses, fleet managers, and anyone interested in the future of commercial transportation and its environmental impact.

@electricvanman – Youtube 

Website – www.evessentials.com 

The EV café on Linked in and Youtube: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theevcafe/?viewAsMember=true / @theevcafe2064 

Transcript

Transcript 

00:00:04 Speaker 1 

Broadcasting from the commodity capital of the world, Zurich, Switzerland, this is insiders guide to energy. 

00:00:20 

Addition to insiders guide to energy is brought to you by fidectus. 

00:00:24 

Go to www.fidectus.com For more information. 

00:00:59 Speaker 2 

This episode of Insiders Guide to Energy EV Miniseries is powered by power. Power helps your business transition to electric vehicles by simplifying charging, managing payments, and optimizing your charging data. 

00:01:12 Speaker 2 

Welcome to insiders guide to Energy EV miniseries, Neil. We're at another episode. What are we going? 

00:01:18 Speaker 2 

To talk about today. 

00:01:19 Speaker 3 

This is a topic which I am not so familiar with, but have been getting much more familiar with. Recently. We're going to talk about vans and specifically electric vans, and there's got a huge application potentially for businesses. But what's most interesting to me is I have now been in and driven an electric van, but today we're going to speak to someone who really knows about electric vans. 

00:01:40 Speaker 3 

So I'm pleased to welcome to the show today the electric van man, otherwise known as Paul Kirby. So I'm hoping that we're going to get a good story here around how the journey will work as commercial vehicles transition into their electric space. So what have we got to say, Paul? 

00:01:58 Speaker 4 

Hello I suppose is a good place to start, right? Yes. I'm Paul Kirby. I'm the electric van man. I first drove an electric van back in 2004. Like a long, long time ago. And something must have got in my blood. But equally, my first job was driving. 

00:02:18 Speaker 4 

A Ford Transit sprinter Ford Transit sprinter. 

00:02:21 Speaker 4 

Before transit, before transit. 

00:02:25 Speaker 2 

You started driving an electric fan in 2004. My dad seemed to mention milk trucks when he was a kid, and I'm not that young, and it was well before the 2000s. So electric vans aren't a new thing. I don't think maybe it's just for. 

00:02:39 Speaker 2 

Us they're new. 

00:02:41 Speaker 4 

You're absolutely right. 

00:02:42 Speaker 4 

And and and even before that, if we take all the way back to the early 1900s, particularly in America and also in the UK. 

00:02:50 Speaker 4 

Trucks and vans were electric and in the race between combustion engine vehicles and electric vehicles, electric was winning out in efficiency in driver acceptance. And all of those good things. But suddenly oil. 

00:03:08 Speaker 4 

Burst through the ground and you know everybody wanted to make money on all. So that's that's where we lost out that time. 

00:03:16 Speaker 3 

So Fast forward 8090 years and along comes Paul Kirby. 

00:03:21 Speaker 3 

How did you get into this space? I mean, was your first job driving vans? Have you always been a van person? And was that the journey from there? 

00:03:27 Speaker 4 

Yeah. So it kind of was. So listen at school. Well, I did go occasionally, but not not very often. I came away with a big fat 0 in terms of anything of a serious qualification. 

00:03:43 Speaker 4 

My my my school reports were must try harder or could do better simply, uh. Summed up my my academic experience. So I have 0 qualifications and no desire really to learn in the academic world so. 

00:03:58 Speaker 4 

That's not my gig. 

00:04:00 Speaker 4 

UM, I I my first job was as a van driver. 

00:04:06 Speaker 4 

Due to my upbringing, I got in quite a lot of trouble as a kid, and so when I applied for certain jobs I just got laughed out of, you know, really look, no qualifications at all of this list of no, no, we we don't want you here. So I got a job with a a library supplier here in the UK. 

00:04:25 Speaker 4 

And drove a Transit van, smashed it up on my first day? Yes. So that was a classic for resilience testing. You know. How do I press through this? Turned up on the doorstep with the, with the keys and had smashed up van sort of over there. 

00:04:42 Speaker 4 

Uh, really sorry. Uh, the guy that employed me was brilliant and he just said, listen, that's not going to happen again, is it? And I went. No, Sir, it's definitely not going to happen again. And it didn't. So I kept my job and that was my first job. And I was, I was 21. So by that, you know, a lot of life had travelled by by that point. 

00:05:03 Speaker 4 

UM, then? 

00:05:06 Speaker 4 

I I spent a little bit of time in America. Chris would be pleased to know and then came back and sold cars. Ohh dear, I actually sold cars for a little while. 

00:05:18 Speaker 3 

You used cars or new cars. 

00:05:20 Speaker 4 

Yeah, used cars. The first car I sold was an an old Mazda RX7 with the Rotary engine. 

00:05:28 Speaker 4 

And that was the very first car I sold. But you know, my boss saw something in me. I was able to communicate. And all of that good stuff. So he gave me some opportunities and and Fast forward a few years. You know, I end up in Mercedes-Benz working for Mercedes-Benz vans. And I drive my first electric sprinter. So that got me to that point. 

00:05:49 Speaker 4 

Navigated to saw the the advent in the late naughties. I suppose they call them uh, 2008, 2009, when the veto the Mercedes-Benz Vito the first E cell veto was launched and there was modec electric vehicles here in the UK and Smiths Electric vehicles all went down the pan because we weren't quite ready for this. 

00:06:10 Speaker 4 

Electric revolution, right? 

00:06:13 Speaker 4 

And and I think this is, uh, you know, demonstrated by the journey of of. 

00:06:19 Speaker 4 

Methods and you know timing is everything, right? So early 2012, 1314 Nissan and Citroen and Peugeot Renault all started bringing out small electric vans. I wasn't really that interested at the time, but you know I I kind of they were on my radar, I was working in a big leasing company company called Lease. 

00:06:38 Speaker 4 

And uh, and and and experience and just people and experience got me to where I was. 

00:06:45 Speaker 4 

It wasn't really about my qualifications or my skills, but people took a punt on me many, many times and and I'm so grateful to all of the people that have brought me to the place in my career. But that's that's what I would. 

00:06:57 Speaker 4 

Say for. 

00:06:58 Speaker 4 

People is like, get to know people, you know, build your relationships. Relationships will always help understand that you've got skills and transferable skills that will help you. 

00:07:07 Speaker 4 

You through into into whatever you want to do, I mean. 

00:07:12 Speaker 4 

Just because you don't have the qualification doesn't mean to say you can't go and do stuff. It's it. You know, I've done some crazy stuff. Amazing stuff, you know, for a little old me and I'm constantly kind of amazed at the things that I've been able to get to do and the people that I get to know and meet, even even with, you know. 

00:07:32 Speaker 4 

You know, Neil Neil, I always call you now spell your name properly, man, but you know people that are running companies, people that are innovators, entrepreneurs, little old me, I get to talk to them. It's brilliant. And so electric vans have brought me a long way and. 

00:07:53 Speaker 4 

The the world is is changing and I get to help influence that now. And so yeah, that's that's your journey so far. 

00:08:00 Speaker 3 

I have. I happen to know that you're very passionate about Vance and what we find in the world of electric vehicles is most people are super passionate about cars. They love how fast they can go and talk and accelerate. And yes, make us. How would you make us really interested in vans? You know, why are vans import? 

00:08:18 Speaker 4 

This is really easy, right? So. 

00:08:21 Speaker 4 

You've heard of. 

00:08:23 Speaker 4 

The boy that gets given a fish and feeds himself, maybe his family for a day. 

00:08:31 Speaker 4 

Yeah. And that boy then gets given a fishing rod and he goes to the lake himself and fishes and feeds his family and himself every day for as long as the fishing rod. 

00:08:43 Speaker 4 

Works, so the importance of the fishing rod becomes really key to that. As long as it's working and it delivers the delivers the job that it's there to do. So now think of a van. 

00:08:54 Speaker 4 

A van doesn't just transport your family around. In fact, it doesn't really transport your family around. What it does is earn you a living. It's a tool that does a job and has a revenue generation potential, so it gets gets your tools to a job. If you're a builder, a Baker, a Candlestick maker. 

00:09:14 Speaker 4 

It allows you as an engineer, to take everything you need to get a job done to help Mrs. Miggins. 

00:09:21 Speaker 4 

Repair her boiler or, you know, do some other function and you know, we see it like BT keeping the Internet networks up and running. So we can have conversations like this, the emergency services use vans to as ambulances and they get converted into all kinds of different things. 

00:09:41 Speaker 4 

The the van is a multi-purpose tool in the hands of many, many individuals and people are building businesses. Massive empires. On this Amazon, DPD, DHL, UPS, FedEx are getting goods all around the world and meeting the needs of people through the use of vans. Drivers have got an income. 

00:10:01 Speaker 4 

As a result of vans, you know so much goes down because of vans. What is not to be excited about the beautiful van? 

00:10:10 Speaker 3 

And and then the thing that immediately follows off this is, as long as those vans are diesel vans, then we've got a dirty conversation to have about the fact that they're used quite heavily and therefore they're quite heavy polluters relative to cars, and hence the reason that you're sat here that they. 

00:10:26 Speaker 4 

Absolutely. And. And so the diesel conversation, I only really became aware of this, uh, 1617, maybe maybe 18, so least planned the company I was working for at the time became a a partner with the EV100. Now the EV 100 as a group of companies that have combined to. 

00:10:43 Speaker 4 

Whether to decarbonise fleet in particular and have committed to 0 emission transport by 20-30, or being net zero in their transport by 2030. 

00:10:52 Speaker 4 

Huge, huge companies across the globe. And so I began to learn and understand that actually this can make a material difference. And then as you you Fast forward a little bit now to a young lady called Ella. So Ella was a a young lady that died in 2013 of an asthma attack. 

00:11:12 Speaker 4 

A place called Catford which is right on the edge of the South Circular, a major arterial Rd. in London, our capital city here in the UK and. 

00:11:24 Speaker 4 

Her death was in 2020, directly attributed to air quality. Uhm, so you know when you think about all of that, we're we're actually. 

00:11:35 Speaker 4 

Costing the NHS the National Health Service here £3.7 billion a year in helping people with air quality related health issues, and 40,000 people are dying every year as a result of air quality related health. 

00:11:52 Speaker 4 

Issues now vans account for only 16% of the traffic, but 32% of the inner city CO2 emissions. So you know they're an extended contributor to that. And we, you know, we think of trucks in a similar way, but that's you know just on steroids. But there's much less, there's many less. 

00:12:12 Speaker 4 

Trucks, we got 4.8 million vans in the UK, less than 1% of those are electric or probably just on or around 1% of those are electric. 

00:12:22 Speaker 4 

Today got a big job to do and the material difference that we can make to our towns and cities is phenomenal by electrifying vans. Not only that, but they're so much nicer to drive. 

00:12:37 Speaker 4 

No, Neil, you've experienced this. UM. 

00:12:41 Speaker 4 

You've experienced this in in, in, in anger, going around the UK in the the the EV rally of Great Britain and. 

00:12:49 Speaker 4 

Island vans, you know, are so much easier to drive than their diesel counterparts. You may have not driven the diesel counterpart, but the deal you're changing gear. They're much noisier. Noise contributes to stress, you know, changing gear is is kind of just an angry action. So, you know, road rage, stress, anger, all rise to the surface. 

00:13:10 Speaker 4 

So giving somebody a tool like an electric van which is smooth, the power delivery is quieter. It's much easier. There's no nasty smells and. 

00:13:20 Speaker 4 

Uh, you know, I'm going to refer to Chris Uhm uh has put a question in the uh thing about do vans idle more as works keep warm and cool so vans do idle more and so there's many vans that have a thing called a run lock fitted. So a run lock means that they run at 2400 Revs. 

00:13:40 Speaker 4 

So they're running, running, running as they change tyres with the new vehicles, electric vehicles can run that same equipment without committing any emissions at all. They do draw on the traction battery, but they can still complete the same job. These are just coming out into the market now and answering those. 

00:13:57 Speaker 4 

Difficult questions around the use of of of those types of vehicles, so there's a hell of a lot going on. 

00:14:04 Speaker 2 

So what I've heard is a lot of passion. 

00:14:07 Speaker 2 

A little bit of biased. 

00:14:12 Speaker 2 

I guess you know if we kind of abstract away the passion and the bias, let's let's let's let's look at the van. Van. There's a utilitarian vehicle. 

00:14:22 Speaker 2 

That's how you described it, right? You said the workers. 

00:14:24 Speaker 2 

Use it for making a living. 

00:14:27 Speaker 2 

What are some of the compromises or advantages of changing like so? Is the is the van heavier with batteries or is it lighter with batteries? You know, I asked the idling questions the way you describe it, you know, I picture the guy writing up my receipt sitting in my driveway, who just fixed my AC because I'm American. I want air condition. 

00:14:42 Speaker 2 

And you know, they're they're sitting there idling, you know, keeping cool themselves when they write that right. Or maybe they have a hydraulic lift that they're running or something. You talked about off the battery or off the truck. So. So all those things but. 

00:14:55 Speaker 2 

At its simplest, what's inherently different? I mean, yeah, you don't have to shift. Well, OK, maybe I could. You know, I can have a transmission that could do that for me, right? But what? What is it that makes it different? 

00:15:06 Speaker 2 

Besides, it runs on electricity. 

00:15:08 Speaker 4 

So let's give give this some context. Five years ago, I couldn't give a monkeys. You know, I was a van man. I sorted out vans. I helped companies buy the right van to do the right job at the time. What I've grown aware of. And it's it's it's certainly a conversation that we've had over the last years is, you know, things around mental health and driver. 

00:15:28 Speaker 4 

Well-being, UM and that really came into focus for me and I will come to your questions, Chris. Trust me, I'll. 

00:15:34 Speaker 4 

Get there but. 

00:15:37 Speaker 4 

Mental health and well-being is is a really big trigger here in the UK. So UM, I think it's something like 40% or I need to remember the number, but uh. 

00:15:51 Speaker 4 

Is it one in four? Anyway, there's a significant number of deaths from suicide of men under the age of 40, or, in fact, the majority of deaths of men under the age of 40 is through suicide. The population of driver population of vehicles in the UK, commercial vehicles. 

00:16:10 Speaker 4 

His men under the age of 40, this has been recognised by some of the major fleet users here in the UK, like Travis Perkins, a Big fleet user and and driver population that they have. But it's it's recognised and so. 

00:16:25 Speaker 4 

A commercial vehicle is a is a working tool and and you might not think you know from a ohh I can have an automatic but the noise still and the the the the movement the jerkiness of of changing gear even in an automatic is still a challenge for a commercial vehicle, much more. So diesels are much more jerky in those those changes. 

00:16:46 Speaker 4 

For most vehicles, so that was the first thing and it began, I think I thought, oh, hang on this this is providing a solution not only for a commercial perspective, but also from a. 

00:16:58 Speaker 4 

Mental health and well-being perspective. But when I think about, you know, do I want my kid at the back of a vehicle which is sat on your drive having just done your AC, running their own AC based on a diesel or a petrol engine and your kids playing at the back of the vehicle, which is perfectly possible, right? 

00:17:18 Speaker 4 

You're playing on your front yard uhm, and uh, the there you go, you're just churning fumes into your home right beside you know, the people that you love and yet it has a significant detrimental effect. You wouldn't give them a cigarette to pull on. 

00:17:37 Speaker 4 

You know, at 1012 years old, you know, but that's effectively what we're doing and it it's a revelation, right. And and I sound, I sound all evangelistic and all of that kind of stuff, but actually it takes people to be a bit evangelistic to rattle people's cages and get people thinking in a different way because. 

00:17:57 Speaker 4 

Actually transitioning to an electric vehicle, does it affect weight? Yes, the vehicle could be. 

00:18:02 Speaker 4 

Heavier, but vehicles that are commercial vehicles operate at a given weight. They Max out at 3 1/2 tons due to the weight of the batteries, they could be allowed to operate at 4.25 tons here. Sorry I can't convert that off the top of my head into pounds, but it's sort of the 9000 dish pounds. 

00:18:23 Speaker 4 

The restrictions that you've got in the states if if you're listening there. 

00:18:29 Speaker 4 

All of these things are yes, they're compromises in some cases because you can't go as far in one day. But that's really the only significant compromise that's left at the moment with an electric vehicle charging sometimes can be a challenge. Getting energy into the right place can be a challenge. But listen, these are all challenges that we've got to embrace. 

00:18:50 Speaker 4 

We don't really have a choice. We've got legislation here in the UK and Europe where. 

00:18:55 Speaker 4 

That won't be any, UM, vehicles sold after 2035 that have any kind of emissions at all. We're decarbonizing the grid here in the UK, 2035. Then the grid will be net 0. 

00:19:11 Speaker 4 

UM. 

00:19:13 Speaker 4 

So that that transition is is legislated for and the vehicles that we've got have less to do in terms of maintenance because like brakes, we barely use brakes because we have a thing called regeneration in the. 

00:19:29 Speaker 4 

Vehicles and that slows the vehicle down automatically through retardation of the motor, and that means that we don't use the brake brakes as much, which actually brake dust is a contributor to the air quality issues that we've got. And so we're reducing the amount of brake dust that is going into the air, which is actually a significant polluter. 

00:19:51 Speaker 4 

Particularly in our towns and cities. So if you talk to a taxi driver in London, the most happy bunch of people ever in existence. 

00:19:59 Speaker 4 

UM, they actually tell you that actually maintenance is so much better with an electric electrified taxi. They're not quite fully electric, but they are electric most of the time around the centre of London, they never. The engine, never kicks in, and that's significantly reducing the emissions in the in the city, but also the brake dust in the city. 

00:20:20 Speaker 4 

Reducing the maintenance and downtime and also once we get in energy independence. 

00:20:26 Speaker 4 

We are in control of our own energy costs. At the moment we've got a war going on in Russia. Hopefully that doesn't time date this too much, but it's it's it's a thing that's happened. It's caused an issue around the cost of energy, which has put the cost balance in a little bit more debate. 

00:20:46 Speaker 4 

UM, but now we're thinking solar. We're thinking, how can we mitigate? How can we gain energy independence to get control of that? 

00:20:56 Speaker 4 

Sorry, I know I'm I'm going on and on and on, but there's so much to say. 

00:20:58 

This is this. 

00:20:59 Speaker 3 

This this is great because you listen to what you're saying and you go well, why haven't all these businesses converted to electric? We save children. There's opportunities to, you know, do everything we used to do. But now we're doing this. 

00:21:09 Speaker 3 

A better way? What's stopping people? Why? What's holding businesses back from converting to electric? 

00:21:15 Speaker 4 

So simply energy I think is is one of the main things I think range still people are concerned about that. 

00:21:24 Speaker 4 

And uh, so the people are still concerned about range the some of the practicalities around weight and things you know taking power off the vehicles, some of those solutions haven't been available yet and so we're still migrating to get a full change in, in the electric. 

00:21:43 Speaker 4 

Like for like. I don't think we'll ever get like for like in terms of ultimate range. But the question is, do we really need it? No. 

00:21:51 Speaker 4 

The other question is about how do we get energy into the right places so that energy can be deployed overnight to charge vehicles on streets. So we've got we've got a population of people here in the UK that only have in the van world, probably 20 or 30% of those people are able to charge on a drive overnight. 

00:22:11 Speaker 4 

Invariably, they're going to have a second car, and that car will probably be the vehicle on the drive from an insurance perspective, they might be local covenants that mean you can't park a van on your drive overnight. 

00:22:23 Speaker 4 

And so all of these things kick in and make it difficult to do what we've always done. So we are having to think differently. And also we've got supply issues around just have we got enough vehicles to replace them, it wouldn't be wise to go wholesale electric tomorrow. It would be too much. It would be too much on the grid. It would be too much on the fleets. 

00:22:45 Speaker 4 

Concerned be too much on the drivers. It'd be too much on the local infrastructure, so we've got to go gradually and we've got to handle the easy stuff 1st and that's why it's taking a little bit of time. 

00:22:56 

So you, you. 

00:22:58 Speaker 2 

Paint the picture of where we're going. You you say it's a little bit early. 

00:23:03 Speaker 2 

Your early description I picture mom and pops driving these vans, but. 

00:23:08 Speaker 2 

I would think that we're still at the stage of maybe early fleets going to electrification of vans and that the the you know my my local plumber, the, the, the, the local guy that just owns his own business painted on the side of the van or has a decal put on the side. 

00:23:22 Speaker 2 

Are are they there yet for electric? Is that not mainstream yet, or is it still that you know I have a fleet of 100 vans and I'm going to, you know, do something and we can put a charging station in and. 

00:23:30 Speaker 4 

We can, you know, manage all this is that where we are? Yeah, we're definitely that, that that the the latter part where you said there the the market as a whole. So you know if we look at the market here in the UK. 

00:23:42 Speaker 4 

We look and see that the majority of the one to three-year old vehicles typically go into a fleet or business of some kind. There is a significant retail part of that, but not so much in the van sector. So new cars get bought, but new vans are going into some sort of. 

00:24:00 Speaker 4 

And what we see very clearly is a divide between the one to three-year old mileage and then the three to seven-year old mileage of a vehicle. And what that shows is that one is going into what we would term national fleets and the other is going into local small business and the latter being the the. 

00:24:20 Speaker 4 

The the sort of three or four or five year old vans. So what happens in the market is that the van goes out into the fleet, gets used. 

00:24:27 Speaker 4 

After three or four or five years, it comes to the end of a business lease typically and then we'll go and be remarketed through auctions or Auto Trader, or whomever it might go through. And then the local business, the the Baker, the florist, the builder, the chippy, the plumber. 

00:24:47 Speaker 4 

All of those guys will come along and buy those vehicles and do much less mileage, much less impact on the on the range. So typically a one to three-year old vehicle has an average mileage of 67 miles per day. 

00:24:59 Speaker 4 

And, uh, three years three to 10 years is probably as little as 40 or 45 miles on average a day because they're travelling much less distance. 

00:25:11 Speaker 2 

Is there a difference in insuring these vehicles for operation? Is there any cost advantages or disadvantages with EV's compared to a diesel for insurance? 

00:25:20 Speaker 4 

So anecdotally, there on an individual basis, it's more expensive to insure an electric car. 

00:25:30 Speaker 4 

Electric vans often are on a fleet policy, and so there is a balance and and the reason that cars are more expensive is because the the repair could be more expensive. Anecdotally, we're still saying that actually electric vehicles are safer to drive because they're simpler and they aren't involved in accidents as much and. 

00:25:50 Speaker 4 

But when they are involved, they're more. 

00:25:52 Speaker 4 

Expensive to repair currently. 

00:25:54 Speaker 4 

And this is true of vans also, so again, simpler to drive, less likely to be involved in an accident. But when that accident occurs, it's likely to be slightly more expensive to repair, probably off the road for longer, and therefore replacement vehicles, which are much more important in vans, will cost money. So the insurers are having to do a lot of. 

00:26:13 Speaker 4 

Transition. I was literally just talking to an insurer whilst we were on this rally that we've done. 

00:26:19 Speaker 4 

UM, and it was really clear from the conversation that insurers have a big problem with this transition, not that it's going to critically hamper at this transition, but they're having to juggle the prices they're having to understand a different way of doing things. But that's not just because of electric. It's because of things like. 

00:26:39 Speaker 4 

Adas which is advanced. 

00:26:40 Speaker 4 

Of assistance systems or safety systems or something like that, but it's basically a lot of cameras and radars and all of those kinds of things that are in the front of vehicles, in windscreens and all of that sort of stuff. So the whole insurance landscape is changing at a pace. It's not down to electric vehicles solely, but it does happen to be happening at the same time. 

00:27:04 Speaker 3 

Can I ask my favorite question? Paul? You know, I love talking about charging electric cars. What's it? What's it like charging an electric van? What are the differences we need to consider what you know, we know that they're physically bigger. What else should we be thinking about? 

00:27:18 Speaker 4 

So the physically bigger thing from a public perspective is a really a really key thing, but I. 

00:27:24 Speaker 4 

Think when we're thinking about vans, we shouldn't be thinking in the public charging context. Public charging context has productivity issues. We shouldn't be turning up at a charge point and plugging in a van. It's a billboard that sort of advertises, you know, people's complaints. 

00:27:45 Speaker 4 

Why are you using the public charging network? Because I'm the same as you. You know, I need to charge. And just in the same way that we used the petrol station. 

00:27:53 Speaker 4 

But fleets are sensitive. They are conscious that actually the image of being in the way of the public charging is a problem. Public charging obviously is is less guaranteed and and fraught with unreliability to some degree. At this point, still is a feature. Sadly it will improve. 

00:28:14 Speaker 4 

Very quickly, over the next year or so, so I always advocate that. 

00:28:18 Speaker 4 

Moving to an electric vehicle, you should try and be able to do your day's journeys on one charge so that you leave your depot or your home fully charged and you arrive with more than 1% charge so that you can recharge overnight. Now that presents a problem. If it's a depot and you're putting lots of electric vehicles. 

00:28:40 Speaker 4 

In there. So we then have to consider how do we power or get energy to those charge points and that can be solar, it can be battery. 

00:28:49 Speaker 4 

Storage. It can be grid upgrades. There's a whole bunch of stuff that we need to think about in order to be able to electrify depending on the size of the fleet. But if it's the butcher and the Baker and the Candlestick maker, then they just turn up at home and they plug in at home and jobs are good and they don't have to worry about it. And probably 1 charge will deal with three days of journeys, a little bit of. 

00:29:09 Speaker 4 

Phrasing maybe where it's possible. You know you can drop on a charger if you can just plug it in, get a little bit of extra charge because you happen to be stopped near a charger or a home. 

00:29:19 Speaker 3 

That has a charger, but for everyone's benefit. Paul, what is graze? 

00:29:23 Speaker 4 

Grazing. OK. Right. Well, you you you see the cow in the field, it just kind of mooches on around and has a bite of some grass and then carries on, you know, mooching on. So really, that's the kind of idea of grazing on a charger. So you see a charger doesn't have anybody on it. You don't necessarily need a lot of charge. 

00:29:44 Speaker 4 

That you just grab a bit because you can so you charge because you're stopped, not stop to charge. 

00:29:51 Speaker 2 

So your grazing comment makes me think about educating the drivers, right. So whether it be something different in your driving school or how your vehicle performs and how you do it. But also I was driving back from Munich the other day. I live here in Zurich and we had to stop and charge and there were two chargers. 

00:30:10 Speaker 2 

And this nice Porsche decided to pull up and plug into the charger right next to us, despite having a completely open charger next to them. So our charging time basically cut in half. 

00:30:19 Speaker 2 

Are charge going in? So what kind of education programs does a fleet need to go through and do the commercial driver's licenses need to change? 

00:30:29 Speaker 2 

For EV driving in the. 

00:30:30 Speaker 4 

Future driving licenses. Leave alone. We don't need any more messing around with driving licenses, but I will say that education is critical and it is so often missed, so I'm I'm talking to businesses and fleets and and all that comes up all of the time. 

00:30:50 Speaker 4 

And I mean, I finished. I had finishing on one of my summaries today was educate, educate, educate. We need charging policies, etiquette or charging. We will have fights at charges in the not too distant future. We will be reporting. You'll get out of your car and go and punch the silly Porsche man on the nose. 

00:31:11 Speaker 4 

For being so. 

00:31:12 Speaker 4 

Silly and that this is the sort of thing that is going to happen at charges because people are gonna go stop being so stupid. Move to the other charger. Why am I gonna move to the other charger? Because you don't realise why you you stupid you know. And. And so it goes on. That's going to happen and we are going to realize that we've got to educate. 

00:31:32 Speaker 4 

We are putting too many tools in people's hands who have no idea on how to use them. They don't really understand the public charging world. They don't even understand they're necessarily their home charger. So they're charging at the wrong times. They're not charging at the the low. 

00:31:47 Speaker 4 

The low tariffs that are available and all of those kinds of stuff, which means you don't have to pay so much money, there's a a huge education piece to do, particularly in the van driver world, because actually so here in the UK, we offer a big incentive to drive electric. 

00:32:03 Speaker 4 

UM, but van drivers don't have that same that same incentive. And so they the companies don't even have that same incentive. It's more of a a stick, really, in the van market. And so we need to offer them education at the same time to help them care about what is actually. 

00:32:24 Speaker 3 

So one of the things I quite often say is that businesses, you know, take away the diesel vehicle, hand over the electric vehicle, pass over the keys and. 

00:32:32 Speaker 3 

Then go. Good luck. 

00:32:33 Speaker 3 

And you know that form of education clearly isn't going to cut it. Your day job is speaking to businesses and companies and van drivers about electric vehicles. 

00:32:44 Speaker 3 

What else are you doing in that world of education and you know I'm. I'm conscious you're wearing a little yellow lightning bolt today. 

00:32:50 Speaker 3 

Do you want to tell us more about what? 

00:32:52 Speaker 3 

That's all. 

00:32:52 Speaker 4 

About yeah, so the the little lightning bolt and also the very large mug which has the name on it, the Evie Cafe, is actually a tool of education. So rewind to the beginning of COVID. You know, we all remember those times when we had to sit in rooms. 

00:33:12 Speaker 4 

Like this and carry out our work on zoom calls and all of that sort of stuff and we still actually the you know the zoom calls have not really gone away. We still have lots of that. But we are now allowed to go and be face to face with people which is lovely. But there was a period and we decided a few of us Johnny, Johnny Berry in particular kind of came up with this idea of having. 

00:33:33 Speaker 4 

This kind of get together every week where we would continue the conversation about this transition to electric transport and help fleets have the conversation and we we just set up this thing called the V. 

00:33:44 Speaker 4 

Cafe so. 

00:33:46 Speaker 4 

Fast forward three years and it's become sort of a bit of an accidental business, which is sponsored by some of the biggest companies in the UK, like the AA, like Geotab, which is a world leader in telematics and data and big insurance company Direct Line group here in the UK. 

00:34:06 Speaker 4 

Huge or Churchill in in specifically and so on. 

00:34:10 Speaker 4 

And what? Why have they supported us? They've supported us to help us promote the this transition to electric vehicles, help us to educate, help us to myth bust and by myth bust is to debunk all the rubbish that we get into the press that talk about these things as if they're the devil's spawn. 

00:34:31 Speaker 4 

They're not. They're they're actually trying to do something really good, trying to make life easier for drivers, trying to improve air quality and actually trying to save the world. If that's not too dramatic. But you know, that's that's where we're at and we're trying to counter that with kind of a. 

00:34:49 Speaker 4 

Sort of. Not too businessy approach to the education process, helping make it simple, helping people engage with it being a bit pokey and spiky with one another so that we can have the discussions that people would love to have but don't know who to have it with. We kind of have it together because we disagree. 

00:35:10 Speaker 4 

Because nobody's an expert, really. And this is a complete learning curve for us all. Some of us are all a little bit further than others, but it's just about handing that information back to the next person in the queue so that they can transition safely and effectively too. 

00:35:27 Speaker 3 

So we've been on this journey. We know that transitions electric bands is important. We've seen some of the challenges that we've talked about, be it cost, be it weight, be it charging. So who's going to make this transition first? What are the businesses that are leading this? What are the segments that we expect to see adopt electric vehicles fastest? 

00:35:47 Speaker 4 

Vans, typically. So there's a number of a number of big companies that have already signed up to agreements with the EV100, with the climate change organization and a few others. So companies like BT, British Gas, Mighty DPD, DHL, FedEx, UPS, Amazon. 

00:36:07 Speaker 4 

Have all signed big, big deals right to help move the needle on on vans coming into the market? 

00:36:16 Speaker 4 

So as a result. 

00:36:17 Speaker 4 

What we've also seen is UM in the process of procuring vehicles. Typically you will have a tender big companies will write a tender and say if you know we want you to. 

00:36:32 Speaker 4 

To to work with us. Uhm, So what I'm thinking of actually is that those companies that want other companies to support them, be it with vehicles or whatever, whatever work they're writing tenders and in their transport bit they're saying ESG credentials. Please, we want this. 

00:36:50 Speaker 4 

Job delivered with 0 emission vehicles, so there's a cascade happening, so it's beginning at the top with environmental, social and governance policies in government, local government, big companies, the top the top 500 that are already measured on downstream emissions. So all of this. 

00:37:09 Speaker 4 

And I mean, if we go up another level, it's actually the UN Sustainability Development goals, right? So these are happening globally. These are then cascading down into government and local government and then they're cascading into the larger fleets who then want. 

00:37:24 Speaker 4 

Everybody to drive this change forward so the big fleets are the first governments are also committed to fully 0 emission vehicles by 2027. Local councils have all got targets to move their fleets to 0 emissions 25% a year. I think for the next four years. 

00:37:44 Speaker 4 

So we'll see it happening and exemplified in in government and local government, but we'll also see big fleets making a huge difference by not only moving themselves to electric vehicles, but insisting that anybody that works with them, like the Royal Mail like Tesco. 

00:38:03 Speaker 4 

So like you know, those kinds of companies will insist that anything you do, you do in a 0 emission way and we'll also see that happen with clean air zones and ultra low emission zones and 0 emission zones that are bobbing up around the UK in particular. But we know Paris is doing the same thing with trucks as of the end of this year from December. 

00:38:23 Speaker 4 

2023 diesel trucks will no longer be allowed into Paris. Full stop. 

00:38:30 Speaker 4 

So that will change the dynamic very, very quickly. 

00:38:35 Speaker 2 

So you worked for a manufacturer, you you mentioned a brand in your intro. 

00:38:38 Speaker 4 

I have to, yeah. 

00:38:40 Speaker 2 

I say how long until internal combustion engines are not on the production line and that they just, even if you want to buy a van, you're going to get an electric van because that's. 

00:38:49 Speaker 2 

What they're selling 12 years. 

00:38:51 Speaker 2 

Exactly 12 years to the day. 

00:38:53 Speaker 4 

To the. 

00:38:54 Speaker 4 

12 years in a few months. So 2035 you cannot sell. 

00:39:00 Speaker 4 

A a diesel van from in the UK and in Europe. I'm not sure about the states. Maybe the states don't have that rule yet, but the UK and Europe from 2035 is an absolute ban on any emission creating vehicle. So from 2030 all vehicles here in the UK will and 2032. 

00:39:20 Speaker 4 

I think it is across Europe. UM will have to be. 

00:39:25 Speaker 4 

A plug in version of an electric vehicle, so they might have a hybrid, but they must do at least 60 miles on electric only range. Really so that they can sort out in a city operations I'm sure. 

00:39:39 Speaker 4 

But umm yeah, so and and likely so certain companies in the UK will be 0 emission much longer before that. So 2028 Vauxhall here in the UK will be completely 0 emissions. That's Opal across Europe and I don't know if it's GM in America, but they have committed to fully 0 emission. 

00:40:00 Speaker 4 

By 2020. 

00:40:00 Speaker 4 

OK, it's uh. So the significant change forward have all promised all. 

00:40:09 Speaker 4 

Promised all electric platforms by 2027. I think it is Mercedes are going to have all electric platforms by 2026, but they'll still continue to sell diesel but by 20-30 unless there's decent hybrid options on the market, the entire UK system will be electric in vans. 

00:40:30 Speaker 4 

Possibly before cars, because cars have hybrids, but we don't operate hybrids in the van world or very little so. 

00:40:39 Speaker 4 

If you haven't got one, you can't sell one. You've gotta go electric. And so it'll be 20-30. 

00:40:45 Speaker 2 

So and and and this I'm exposing my ignorance here, but we drive on public infrastructure and when I buy fuel, at least in the US and leave here in Switzerland, there's some tax component to the fuel. 

00:41:00 Speaker 2 

That goes to this infrastructure. So if I take my nice fleet and convert it, you know take 100 things that we're buying, you know, diesel every day for and now I'm using electricity. What happens to my tax base. 

00:41:12 Speaker 4 

So I mean the bottom line is the tax will be an ever evolving thing over the next 5 to 10 years. The benefit in kind, uh, so this is personal taxation based on getting a fleet car here in the UK and I think similar across Europe. 

00:41:29 Speaker 4 

Has has obviously taken a huge dip and they're starting to correct that now, so they're starting to bring that back up to where it was before. So the incentives are being watered down. But in order to make the transition happen, we're going to have incentives. There's already an issue around public charging and the and the cost of energy being. 

00:41:48 Speaker 4 

The difference between your home charging, which is 5% value added. 

00:41:53 Speaker 4 

Tax and then in the public domain we have 20% value added tax. So the private punter as in Joe blogs that's driving a vehicle can't get that that back. Obviously a business like ourselves or a fleet can get that that back. So there's already an A a disparity in in many ways. So what we'll see. 

00:42:14 Speaker 4 

Is an ever evolving tax system. Different systems coming in we we've got a blank sheet of paper in front of us, we're going to see Rd. charges grow and grow tolls effectively cost per mile technology. 

00:42:26 Speaker 4 

Be probably coming to pass, so it's it's an open book at the moment, but what we do know is that we will lose tax in the short term and we will gain back tax in other places in the longer term and fuel will become less and less important and we'll move that tax requirement that tax burden to other areas that are still. 

00:42:47 Speaker 4 

Related to road trip. 

00:42:49 Speaker 2 

OK. Last last question for me and I'll let Neil ask the final questions. So I've never driven an electric van, I've not been in a van. So if I were to go try, I've been in a van like diesel, but electric one. So if if I wanted to go experience the latest, coolest ****** van on the market today. 

00:43:10 Speaker 4 

Ohh gosh, that's terrible. That's that's a terrible question. I I would have to divulge my favorite. 

00:43:16 Speaker 2 

And you need the answer. Come on. You have to take take a stab at it. 

00:43:21 Speaker 4 

Well, so look, if I wasn't so annoyed at Ford for publishing a a really high sort of predicted mileage and not performing at it, it doesn't make it a bad van, by the way. But it just means that they're saying one thing and it's actually delivering another the Ford. 

00:43:40 Speaker 4 

E Transit is a great van. It it's a good good van. 

00:43:46 Speaker 4 

The Vecho E daily has just come out and is answering a hell of a lot of questions around, you know, commercial vehicle specific and that is is definitely going to be a van that I'm going to be spending some time with and enjoying that. 

00:44:03 Speaker 

If I was. 

00:44:03 Speaker 3 

Is that is that the world record holding ban? 

00:44:06 Speaker 4 

Yes, yes, it is. The world record holding Van. It is, uhm, completed a world record of towing 153.58 tons on one van, so basically towed. 

00:44:20 Speaker 4 

Three other trucks that were heavily laden over over sort of 50 tonnes each, or on average, 50 tonnes each. And and yeah, this little old van stuck at the front of it, towed them the required distance to break the the world record. So a pretty powerful van. But if it was a a sort of a van in the mid sector, you know that you'd wanna drive. 

00:44:41 Speaker 4 

Every day the the vehicle that Neil took around the the UK is a pretty good van. The Mercedes-Benz. 

00:44:49 Speaker 4 

So it's nicely finished and it's it's relatively comfortable, but then there's another vet. So the Chinese vans are kind of coming out of left field as well with the maxes. These deliver nine, you don't really expect it to be good, but it is and then they've just brought out a mid sized van called the DE Deliver 7 and that looks really quite good. 

00:45:09 Speaker 4 

Haven't had any time in it yet, but that looks like a really good man. So ****** fans, we don't really have them like you guys might do in the states, but the 40 transits probably the safest bet they say here in the UK, nobody ever got fired for buying a few. 

00:45:25 Speaker 4 

So probably that and the the transit E custom when it comes out is not far away will probably be pretty cool, but the the speed of change by the time you're listening to this, maybe it's it's changed and there's a better one come along. 

00:45:42 Speaker 3 

So this is fabulous, Paul. You've clearly shown a personal passion for vans, but you've also given us insights and very good logical reasons as to why we should care. The number one thing I'm taking away is this idea that vans generate revenue for the driver, which is fabulous. 

00:45:58 Speaker 3 

You took us on a little tour. Mental health well-being air quality. Obviously a big issue in here. I love the grazing analogy. Absolutely Fabulous. 

00:46:06 Speaker 3 

Good, good for. 

00:46:06 Speaker 3 

Users to know about that one. So that kind of leaves me with one final question that I'd like to wrap up on, which is we've talked a lot about your professional experience. What about your personal experience? What do you drive? Why? 

00:46:12 Speaker 3 

You know. 

00:46:17 Speaker 3 

And you know, do you drive a van? 

00:46:22 Speaker 4 

So I would be slightly mad if if my personal vehicle was a van. However, I would be open to that if anybody's listening and wants to give me one, that's fine, I'll take it and drive it. But so I drive electric vehicles and I drive electric vehicles because I. 

00:46:38 Speaker 4 

And one of those stubborn sods that want to prove to everybody that it actually can work. So my wife was a little bit nervous when we took our second electric vehicle. So we got 21 sort of one family car and one smaller run around car and. 

00:46:55 Speaker 4 

Yeah. So when we went but but within a month, she was she did. She did a little vlog for herself. Yeah. So, UM, she's Evie under score. This is how it really is. If you ever wanna follow her on Instagram. She does still occasionally post, and she did a really great blog about getting out there and doing it and all that kind of stuff. So I'm one of those stubborn people that wanna prove that it works. 

00:47:16 Speaker 4 

And we have without question, I've. 

00:47:19 Speaker 4 

And thousands of miles in my E Nero. So I have an E Nero and a Zoe. But I also get to drive lots of. And so for two weeks in the winter, I had a 40 transit and drove that religiously everywhere. At the moment I've got a Maxus mefa 9. It's a car. It's A7 seat. 

00:47:39 Speaker 4 

It's a sort of commercial vehicle really, because it's going to be used by hotel operators and chauffeurs and those kinds of things to experience it, to review that vehicle, to understand what's good and bad about it. So I'm doing that with vans all of the time. So I do spend a lot of. 

00:47:55 Speaker 4 

Time in vans and I have. 

00:47:57 Speaker 4 

I'd like to say every van on the market, I think I would be right in saying that every van that is available for sale, I've driven for some period of time and have an opinion. 

00:48:08 Speaker 4 

On it. 

00:48:09 Speaker 3 

So that there's. 

00:48:09 Speaker 4 

Might not be the right one, but. 

00:48:10 Speaker 4 

As an opinion. 

00:48:11 Speaker 3 

There's the challenge for our van listeners. Have you got a van that Paul? 

00:48:14 Speaker 3 

Cobby hasn't driven. 

00:48:15 Speaker 4 

Yeah, yeah, I've probably not driven one model within a particular range. I'm sure that's the case. So you could trip me up, but yes, I I think most of them, I would be good to go. 

00:48:29 Speaker 2 

Well, Paul, thank you so much for the conversation. The passion, the sharing, your experiences, it's been great having you as a guest and insiders guide. Thank you. 

00:48:37 Speaker 4 

My absolute pleasure. 

00:48:40 Speaker 2 

For our audience, we hope you've enjoyed this content as much as we have. It's been a great journey, loved finding out about vans. It wasn't something I thought I'd want to find out about, but it seems. 

00:48:49 Speaker 2 

Pretty exciting and I hope you enjoy it too. If you did, follow subscribe, find us on Facebook, find us on YouTube and we'll see you again at the next episode of the EV Mini Series bye bye.