I bought an electric car — there are lots of down sides but the numbers don't lie

I'm a big fan of the UK's commitment to reach net zero by 2050 and limit global warming and climate change. And back in 2023, I bought an electric car (EV). I kept notes and a few months later wrote about my experience.

Given my support for any effort to reach net zero, I'd love to be able to say it was all positive from the get-go. But it would be wrong to write this article without talking about the downsides — and there are undoubtedly some big ones (you can also read my colleague's experience of driving an EV here) That said, the good news is they are all fixable (if we have a government committed to fixing them).

My Cupra Born EV arrived via a lease scheme, meaning I pay a set fee each month which includes all servicing, repair, MOT, tyres and insurance costs. It's nice knowing everything is paid for but the downside of this arrangement is that, at the end of the term, you don't own anything — the car just gets sent back (there is an option to buy it).

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It would have set me back just over £36,000 had I bought it new outright, a hefty price tag and way out of reach for many people, including me. Add on maintenance costs and insurance and the outlay would be even higher. Insurance is a particular issue at the moment, with premiums reportedly significantly higher for EVs than for their petrol or diesel equivalents (it is hoped that once they become more common premiums will stabilise). On the plus side, EVs cost less to maintain than internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles because there are fewer moving parts — you can read a colleague's experience of costs here.

The big plus side of EVs, of course, is their impact on the environment. And that was a big factor in my decision to go electric. Every time I stepped in my old petrol car I felt a little guilty and asked myself was my journey really necessary? I used it for plenty of unnecessary journeys when I could have walked and felt conscious of burning those fossil fuels and pumping out all that pollution as I drove past all the kids breathing it in on the pavements.

What's more, petrol prices seemed to be rising relentlessly and often at the whim of the big companies, and petrol and diesel cars seemed destined for the axe soon anyway — so why not take the plunge now and get used to it?

Getting ready to drive an electric car

There is one significant outlay even before you get your EV: the home charger. If you have off-street parking, and don't want to be back and forth to a public charger, it's a must. You can pick up a charger for around £350-£600 but will need a qualified electrician to install it. Mine, all in, cost just over £1,000. It's a lot but it will likely add value to my home. And the difference between the cost of home-charging and public-charging is significant (more on that later).

I hadn't changed my car in years and was rattling around in a 2009 Nissan Qashqai so switching to a new car was always going to mean getting used to lots of new tech. That is even more the case with a new EV. For example, I'd never had to scan a QR code and link my car to an app before.

After working out all the bells and whistles and how to activate and de-activate them all (as well as how to actually start the car when there's no keyhole or button to press) it was then time to actually drive it. And that meant learning how to charge it. It was actually quite simple: the home charger has an app, you set a schedule (for example, fill the battery to 80% by 7am every morning), plug the charger into the socket on the car and it does everything for you.

My home charger could even communicate with my energy provider to deliver power to the battery when electricity prices were at their lowest, generally between midnight and 5am, and takes around eight hours to go from empty to full (to preserve battery life, most manufacturers recommend keeping it above 30% and below 80%, although you can of course charge to 100% if you're going on a long journey and need the full range).

I switched to a new EV tariff with my energy provider, who offered an overnight rate of 7.450p per kWh. So to charge from 40% to 80% cost around £1.70, around 1.9p per mile, a massive saving on the typical cost of a petrol car of around 15-20p per mile (even charging at the typical daytime electricity tariff still costs far less). So, if you're always charging at home, and especially if it's convenient to charge at night when you can get the cheapest rates, you can save big time on your fuel costs.

The first big journey: 155 miles

I live in west Wales but most of my family live in England and I travel several times a year to see them. Let's look at how this went.

• Miles: 155
• Charge at start: 100%
• Charge remaining on arrival: 37%

• Cost of using public charger at services: £26.99

Getting there was fine. I didn't need to stop and still had plenty of charge at the end. It was July and the weather was fine which meant good conditions for battery range, which can fall if it's colder and wet, especially as you'll need to use the heating and wipers more.

But I knew I needed to charge for the journey home. There were a couple of chargers in a local car park, which could have charged me back up to 100% in a couple of hours. I needed an app to operate them, which I downloaded but could not get to work.

Instead, I headed to a nearby Ikea. Good old, dependable Ikea — or not, as the case was. My Zapmap app told me there were three rapid chargers there with eight connectors. Two of the three charging stations were available so I plugged in, flashed my contactless card at the screen as requested, and prepared to settle down and read my book while the juices flowed.

'Internal error' read the message on the charging station. I tried again. Same message. Was it me doing it wrong? Was it the machine? Was it the car? Had I broken my new car the first time I'd tried to charge it away from home?

I tried the other charging station. Same message. Beginning to suspect it was me, since another car was happily charging away on another charging station, I watched keenly as another vehicle pulled up in the space I'd previously occupied. When they began scratching their head and unplugging and replugging their EV, before staring at the machine (more head scratching), I realised, with some relief, it wasn't just me.

But it was relief mixed with frustration. My first attempt at public charging, and all the stories I'd read of chargers not working and people having to drive from one to the next in search of one that would work were starting to ring true. I re-consulted Zapmap. A mile away at the M4 Reading West services there were 14 rapid chargers. So I left the not so "wonderful everyday" of the Ikea car park and headed there.

On arrival, there were plenty of free devices so I pulled up, plugged in and flashed my contactless card once more, full of trepidation. A couple of clicking sounds and a green light told me it was working and my car was charging. I would not spend the rest of my day driving from charger to charger until my battery was dead and I was in tears.

I read my book while the car charged back up to 94% in around 45 minutes. Travelling home later, we had heavy rain and lots of congestion and I forgot to switch the car back to 'range' mode, which squeezes a little extra juice from the battery. We made it home without having to charge again, but with just 17% battery life.

I plugged back into the trusty home charger and set it for 80% by the morning.

The second big journey: 214 miles

• Miles: 214
• Charge at start: 100%

• Charge remaining when I needed to refuel part-way: 37%

• Cost of using public charger at services on journey out: £24.49

• Cost of using second public charger: £24.49

• Cost of using third public charger at services on journey home: £24.84

The advertised range of my Cupra Born is 263 miles, but the reality is that real world ranges are much lower. For my car, it's closer to 215 miles, which can be reduced further depending on if you have to use the air con or heating, along with the weather conditions and other factors. So a 214-mile journey with no stops is not really possible, unless you love to live life on the edge.

Having faced a lengthy detour due to an M4 closure on my journey from Swansea to Hertford, I decided to stop at Membury services on the M4 when the charge dropped to 37%. But there were only a couple of charging stations with dual charging on each. One of the people ahead of me was having issues with a charger which kept cutting out and there was someone else ahead of me in the queue. I overheard her say she would head on to the next services, Chieveley, so I decided to do the same.

Once again, there were two charging stations and three suitable connectors for my car. All the spaces were full, so I decided to wait. Luckily for me, the driver filling up at one of them returned as I was standing around, suspected I was waiting, and made sure he let me drive into his space as he left. And that's another thing: there is no queuing system for the public chargers.

Imagine if you went to a petrol station and it took 45 minutes to an hour to fill up so all the spaces were usually taken and everyone had to pull up in a nearby car park, then make a dash for it when a space became free. It would be carnage. Of course, there are fewer EVs than petrol cars right now but demand is growing but there is no way of knowing when you pull up to charge whether the chargers are going to be taken, whether you are next in line or if there are five cars parked up and waiting nearby for a space to become free. This needs sorting out. There needs to be a system.

Luckily, I had no issues, topped up to 100% again and was back on my way within 50 minutes. The day after arriving at my destination, I stopped at another charger to top back up as I was going on holiday the next day and wanted to be fully charged for my return. No problems there: I found place nearby with eight rapid charging stations and 16 connectors. I was the only one there.

The journey back home to Swansea was plain sailing. I stopped at the dependable Moto Reading West services, where I had some food as my car charged itself in one of the many free bays. I arrived home later (after the usual M4 traffic jams) with plenty of charge to spare and plugged back into our trusty home charger to top up for the week ahead..

Conclusions

Having experienced being an EV owner for around four months, and with a couple of long journeys under my belt, I felt ready to write this article. And, I have to say, I was happy and didn't regret getting an EV one jot. In fact, I was very glad I did. But that's not to say I didn't have concerns — I very much did.

First and foremost, driving an EV around Swansea and anywhere within 75 miles or so was just a dream. The car was quiet, easy and fun to drive, with tonnes of safety features and loads of fancy kit which comes as standard on a lot of EVs. It's like driving an iPhone: user friendly and just a bit cool. Plus no emissions, so no guilt.

It also felt like my fuel costs had become non-existent. Just travelling locally, I used to have to top up with petrol at the start of the month, at a cost of around £70-£80, with at least one or two more top-ups through the month, depending on usage. So I was spending anything between £120 and £160 a month in total. After converting to electric, I was filling up every 10 days or so, but only from 40% to 80% at a cost of about £1.70 (or £5.10 every 30 days).

But when I took longer journeys it became more mixed: there isn't much cost difference between using a public charger and filling up with petrol.

The main problem was the lack of infrastructure. If everyone swapped to an EV tomorrow, the country would grind to a halt. Zapmap said that at the end of September 2023, there were 49,882 public electric vehicle charging points across the UK in 29,709 charging locations. That was a 43% increase from September 2022. But there were reportedly 850,000 EVs on the road in the UK at that time, working out at around six for every 100 EVs. Of course, it's unlikely all these vehicles will be on the road at the same time and many will be using home chargers or the large number of private and workplace chargers available. But at pinch points like Christmas Eve, and bank holiday weekends, when roads are exceptionally busy, the infrastructure issues will continue to be exposed.

The revolution is coming and the country needs to be ready. There need to be more chargers and investment in the National Grid. Some of the public chargers I have used so far have promised up to 150kW, but I have barely got 50kW out of them. Faster charging means a more rapid flow-through of users and the difference between being sat there for between 15 minutes and 50 minutes. So, my main wish list is:

• Lots more chargers
• Ones that work all the time please
• A National Grid capable of supplying them with power
• A proper queuing system