Strictly speaking, an ‘eve’ should probably happen the day before a significant event. You know, like Christmas Eve. But this is Petrolblog, and punctuality has never been essential to a good pun.
So welcome to Electric Car EVe: the morning before the afternoon a Renault Mégane E-Tech arrives on the Petrolblog fleet for a six-month stay. That’s half a year of electric motoring for a blog that tends to favour old metal and petrol engines. The clue’s in the name.
I’ve driven electric cars before, including, most recently, the rather wonderful Fiat Grande Panda. Prior to that, I drove a Kia EV3, and I’ve also driven a Tesla Model S to Amsterdam and a Renault Fluence Z.E. Dynamique along Green Lane. I couldn’t find Electric Avenue.
The point is, this isn’t my first electric car rodeo. But this one feels different. It’s not a launch event, a quick drive or one of those carefully managed press-car encounters where you spend 90 minutes pretending to understand regenerative braking before being given the keys to a car with 100% charge and no risk of draining the battery a mile or two short of Leigh Delamere.
I’ve written about electric cars for as long as I’ve been a freelance motoring writer. In that time, the range of a typical EV, if there is such a thing, has gone from ‘you’d be lucky to make it to Bristol’ to ‘you might reach Lincoln on a single charge’. That’s from Devon, by the way.
I’ve seen the charging network go from patchy to comprehensive, and I’ve seen new electric car prices drift from ‘bloody hell, how much?’ to ‘actually, that’s realistic for some punters’. I’ve also seen more and more people switch to home charging, cheaper overnight tariffs and the slightly smug joy of leaving the house with a full battery.
That said, I’ve also seen the social media posts from journos limping to a public charger only to find it broken. Or occupied. Or attached to a queue. Or unwilling to take payment. And yes, I’ve read the reports that show plummeting range estimates when there’s an R in the month or you risk using more than one in-car accessory.
You can’t accuse me of being unprepared for the EV adventure. Like a hiker preparing for a long walk, I’ve packed the essentials. An all-electric Renault Mégane, officially on test for Diesel&EcoCar magazine. An Ohme Home Pro charger – the one with the tethered cable – attached to the stone wall of what used to be the pig barn. A switch to Octopus Energy for a dedicated EV tariff. And several smartphone apps in a folder called ‘All about EVe’.
The plan is simple: use it like a normal car. That means local journeys, longer trips, Dartmoor roads, Waitrose runs, motorway miles, trips to Brentford to see the best team in west London, and hopefully the occasional jaunt across the Channel.
I’ll charge at home whenever possible to take advantage of the lower cost per kilowatt-hour, but I’ll also enter the hit-and-miss world of public chargers and the range anxiety that goes with it. I’m mildly amused by the Mégane’s ‘Comfort Range’ battery, which has to be preferable to ‘Anxiety Range’, right?
I’m going in at the deep end. After what I hope is an uneventful overnight charge, tomorrow sees a 120-mile drive to Homewood near Bath for a Kia range day, followed on Thursday by a 43-mile hop to Stanton Manor Hotel just off the M4 for a Western Group of Motoring Writers driving event. That leaves a 136-mile drive home in the evening.
On paper, the Mégane E-Tech is capable of 285 miles on a single charge, so I’ll need to find a charger at some point over the two days. What was I saying about the battery running dry just short of Leigh Delamere…
Don’t worry, Petrolblog isn’t about to ditch tat for kilowatts, but this promises to be quite a ride. And one that I’m looking forward to with a mixture of excitement and trepidation.
Wish me luck.
