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Installation of new electric boat charging bollards


Alan de Enfield

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@MartynG are there many full electric large GRP boats at Farndon or on the Trent that you know? Just wondering what sort of electric engine power/batteries would be needed to get the boats up to planning speed and what range they would have? A bit more power and less range then a Narrowboat I imagine.

Edited by PD1964
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14 hours ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

I've said before that a basis of an inland electric boat charging network could be started in conjunction with the hire fleet owners. Place charging bollards around common cruising rings and routes, part paid for by the hire boat owners. As their fleet of boats turns over, build many of the new ones with electric drive. Have a proportion of hybrid boats still for hirers that are planning to go off-piste on the network to places with no charging points yet. Part fund the bollards through some of the hire companies savings in diesel and engine oil. A differentiator for hirers too. Silent boating and a more green holiday. The bollards are then available for private boaters too. Every one wins.

So far, just the sound of crickets from CaRT on this subject.

 

 

Probably because they've costed it.

 

I can imagine (say) ten charging points near a popular random canal location costing £1m to install. 

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4 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

@MartynG are there many full electric large GRP boats at Farndon or on the Trent that you know? Just wondering what sort of electric engine power/batteries would be needed to get the boats up to planning speed and what range they would have? A bit more power and less range then a Narrowboat I imagine.

None that I know of.

Greenline have made hybrid boats for years but they have never been cheap , they are not fast  and they have limited range .

 

 

 

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49 minutes ago, David Mack said:

Some day we may not be allowed to use diesel engines or generators on our boats. So they will have to be all-electric. And that means chargers all over the system. Someone has got to start installing them sometime, otherwise the transition from diesel to electric won't happen.

 

 

I think there is a lot of truth in this, but my view of the future is far more bleak. I think the banning of diesels on the cut aligns very nicely with CRT's hopes for the future and their antipathy towards boaters. When the banning of diesels eventually arrives, all those pesky narrowboats will fall into disuse, the locks will no longer need fixing, no need for dredging as long as the draft of a duck can be accommodated, water supplies to fill the canals shrink to nearly nothing, what's not to like (for CRT)?

 

Installing electric charging points all over the system opposes this long term goal, which is the main reason CRT is sitting on its hands over the issue, IMV. 

 

 

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3 minutes ago, MartynG said:

None that I know of.

Greenline have made hybrid boats for years but they have never been cheap , they are not fast  and they have limited range .

 

 

 

Thanks, I thought that would be the case, a completely different type of issues and owner requirements then the Narrowboats I’m seeing. 

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I keep my lumpy water boat at this marina in Plymouth and there's a charging point on the end of my pontoon arm. Every time I go down there all the 16a bollards on the entire arm are tripped out. Only started happening recently.

 

Wonder why....

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4 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

I think there is a lot of truth in this, but my view of the future is far more bleak. I think the banning of diesels on the cut aligns very nicely with CRT's hopes for the future and their antipathy towards boaters. When the banning of diesels eventually arrives, all those pesky narrowboats will fall into disuse, the locks will no longer need fixing, no need for dredging as long as the draft of a duck can be accommodated, water supplies to fill the canals shrink to nearly nothing, what's not to like (for CRT)?

 

Installing electric charging points all over the system opposes this long term goal, which is the main reason CRT is sitting on its hands over the issue, IMV. 

 

 

 Was thinking the same with miles of narrowboats in lines half buried in gardens, with gnome’s holding fishing rods where once actual fisherman used to sit🎣

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12 minutes ago, gatekrash said:

I keep my lumpy water boat at this marina in Plymouth and there's a charging point on the end of my pontoon arm. Every time I go down there all the 16a bollards on the entire arm are tripped out. Only started happening recently.

 

Wonder why....

I think there’s a lot more to think about with the infrastructure and power requirements then people realise especially with certain issues like you mention. Maybe too many canal and Narrowboat users live in a Rosie&Jim world and often dream too much, especially now they’re retired and have just bought a £200k+ all electric boat.

Edited by PD1964
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5 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

Thanks, I thought that would be the case, a completely different type of issues and owner requirements then the Narrowboats I’m seeing. 

A GRP displacement  river  boat would be fine with electric propulsion as power demand would be greater but not a lot greater than a narrowboat.

But folks who want a boat that can do sea trips as well as the river like me I don't think electric propulsion is viable. Instead a fuel like HVO which requires no change to the diesel engine, is a possible  solution.

Like most things there is more than one option  to solve the problem.

 

 

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12 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

 Was thinking the same with miles of narrowboats in lines half buried in gardens, with gnome’s holding fishing rods where once actual fisherman used to sit🎣

 

 

To see the future, one only has to walk the Basy towpath at Woodham and look at all the boats on the SCC moorings there. Never move, never expected to move, all residences. 

 

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1 hour ago, PD1964 said:

How many years away is that? Do you think that the thousands of diesel boats already on the canal will be forced to change their engines to electric engines and lithium batteries with fast charging electrical systems, costing many thousands of pounds?

 CaRT seam to be struggling keeping the system navigable now with their funding, never mind being able to fill their canal infrastructure with enough fast charging stations in the future.  

Do I think an all-electric canal boat is practical? No. But government has announced that all new cars are to be electric, and so over time the road vehicle fleet will become largely electric. Similarly the burning of fossil fuels to heat houses will end. And relatively niche areas like canal boating will simply not be allowed to ignore the fight against climate change. So sooner or later we will have to change. Probably not in my lifetime, but it will happen eventually. And canal boating will have to either adapt or die. So the first steps towards adapting are surely to be welcomed.

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Just now, MtB said:

 

 

To see the future, one only has to walk the Basy towpath at Woodham and look at all the boats on the SCC moorings there. Never move, never expected to move, all residences. 

 

Would sort the London property problem out and also the continuous mooring problem out,

 just find a section of canal, park the boats up 4x abreast  nose to nose and fill the canal in with soil. Problem solved and everyone has a  place for a herb garden.👍

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10 minutes ago, David Mack said:

Do I think an all-electric canal boat is practical? No. But government has announced that all new cars are to be electric, and so over time the road vehicle fleet will become largely electric. Similarly the burning of fossil fuels to heat houses will end. And relatively niche areas like canal boating will simply not be allowed to ignore the fight against climate change. So sooner or later we will have to change. Probably not in my lifetime, but it will happen eventually. And canal boating will have to either adapt or die. So the first steps towards adapting are surely to be welcomed.

Do you think very large tax paying companies and producers like BP. Shell and Texaco would have nothing to say about this if governments tried to ban Diesel engines? As you say I can’t see diesel being banned any time soon and more of a chance of a cleaner alternative being developed before this.

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20 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

Probably because they've costed it.

 

I can imagine (say) ten charging points near a popular random canal location costing £1m to install. 

Perhaps. Perhaps not. Lets have a go in a rough and ready, order of magnitude way, with a lot of assumptions.

Going with your £1m cost for ten bollards on a popular route. Perhaps the Llangollen, or other route.

Say each diesel boat uses £250 of diesel over a weeks hire. For electric costs, 3kW for 8 hours a day, seven days a week is 168kWhrs. Say at 15p/kWhr is £25.2. An order of magnitude less. Take a boat with a five year life under hire ownership. Guess that an electric one costs say £20k more to make than a diesel one. That is an extra 4k to amortise per year before it is sold, assuming that the value of a second hand electric boat is identical to a diesel one when they sell it on Possibly less value early on, but more in later years as fewer people want to buy an expensive to run diesel boat. After 18 weeks of hires each year, you are saving money on diesel. There are perhaps 30 weeks of hire each year from each electric boat, so another 12 weeks of cost saving of 2.7k. Which with say a fleet of ten boats is going to take 37 years to amortise £1m. Ouch. So it probably isn't going to happen just with private sector hire fleet money. It would need some public decision that investing to use less fossil fuel is a good idea. Perhaps from the not wrecking the environment and civilisation collapsing and almost every one dies point of view. Crazy, or what!

However, the assumption is that each bollard is on average charging one boat from the hire fleet a day. With the bollards in place, building private electric boats becomes more attractive, in a similar same way that people are more likely to cycle to work, school, the shops, if there are segregated routes with reduced risk of getting squashed flat.

As far as hogging bollards goes, we already have a similar situation with water points. There are selfish boaters hogging those and aggressive tutting is needed to persuade them to move on. It is easier with electric boat charging bollards. The bollards are going to need to know which boat they are charging for billing purposes, so disconnecting them when full and not allowing a reconnect within a certain time would help do it.

Feel free to question my numbers and add in more costs/savings.

 

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How much do you think an electric boat costs more then a normal diesel £20k? What I’m seeing it’s way higher then that for an efficient system and out of reach for most people, what I’m seeing it’s averaging £250K

Edited by PD1964
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2 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

How much do you think an electric boat costs more then a normal diesel £20k? What I’m seeing it’s way higher then that for an efficient system and out of reach for most people.

How much more, like for like? Remember, this is just batteries, control system and motor. No £10k worth of diesel generator required for a hire boat on a route with charging bollards.

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10 minutes ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

How much more, like for like? Remember, this is just batteries, control system and motor. No £10k worth of diesel generator required for a hire boat on a route with charging bollards.

It would all depend of efficiency, quality of components and installation as you say. You could always go the cheaper Chinese route, but may compromise reliability, which is not the best thing for a hire fleet, if you have more broken down boats then running craft.

 

Edited by PD1964
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2 hours ago, PD1964 said:

I think there’s a lot more to think about with the infrastructure and power requirements then people realise especially with certain issues like you mention. Maybe too many canal and Narrowboat users live in a Rosie&Jim world and often dream too much, especially now they’re retired and have just bought a £200k+ all electric boat.

 

1 hour ago, PD1964 said:

How much do you think an electric boat costs more then a normal diesel £20k? What I’m seeing it’s way higher then that for an efficient system and out of reach for most people, what I’m seeing it’s averaging £250K

 

2 hours ago, PD1964 said:

Thanks, I thought that would be the case, a completely different type of issues and owner requirements then the Narrowboats I’m seeing. 

 

I wonder - is the a key on your keyboard not working?

 

 

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3 hours ago, David Mack said:

Do I think an all-electric canal boat is practical? No. But government has announced that all new cars are to be electric, and so over time the road vehicle fleet will become largely electric.

 

The Government has also said (in their maritime plan 2050) that by 2030 NO NEW VESSELS can be built that are not zero emission & by 2050 NO vessels that are not zero emission will be allowed on the inland waterways, or the UK coastal waters.

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3 hours ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

Say each diesel boat uses £250 of diesel over a weeks hire.

 

 

 

Whilst the principal is great, I think your base number is a little pessimistic.

 

There are 168 hours in a week, assuming that a hire boat will only be doing a maximum of 10 hours per day, that is only 70 hours.

At 1.5 litres per hour that is 105 litres. At £1.50 per litre that equates to ~£150. Even if we get to £2 per litre that is still 'only' £200 per week.

 

If hirers are only doing 5 hours per day then the figures are even lower.

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3 hours ago, PD1964 said:

I think there’s a lot more to think about with the infrastructure and power requirements then people realise especially with certain issues like you mention. Maybe too many canal and Narrowboat users live in a Rosie&Jim world and often dream too much, especially now they’re retired and have just bought a £200k+ all electric boat.

Just look around, there are more and more. Also a lot of fat ones. The canal world is changing.

7 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

 

 

Whilst the principal is great, I think your base number is a little pessimistic.

 

There are 168 hours in a week, assuming that a hire boat will only be doing a maximum of 10 hours per day, that is only 70 hours.

At 1.5 litres per hour that is 105 litres. At £1.50 per litre that equates to ~£150. Even if we get to £2 per litre that is still 'only' £200 per week.

 

If hirers are only doing 5 hours per day then the figures are even lower.

That is domestic rate, now go 60/40.

1 hour ago, George and Dragon said:

 

 

 

I wonder - is the a key on your keyboard not working?

 

 

Pee's me right off when the clever ones pick others up on spelling

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4 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

That is domestic rate, now go 60/40.

 

But don't forget that the hire companies can reclaim the 20% tax on the cost of their diesel, so even if it is £2 litre, they actually only pay £1.65 per litre nett.

 

They will also be buying at 'volume pricing' not the piddling 50 litres that is purchased by NBers, and, which also has the retailers margin added.

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5 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

But don't forget that the hire companies can reclaim the 20% tax on the cost of their diesel, so even if it is £2 litre, they actually only pay £1.65 per litre nett.

 

They will also be buying at 'volume pricing' not the piddling 50 litres that is purchased by NBers, and, which also has the retailers margin added.

So that makes it at about £1 to £1-10 domestic at the moment

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1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

 

 

Whilst the principal is great, I think your base number is a little pessimistic.

 

There are 168 hours in a week, assuming that a hire boat will only be doing a maximum of 10 hours per day, that is only 70 hours.

At 1.5 litres per hour that is 105 litres. At £1.50 per litre that equates to ~£150. Even if we get to £2 per litre that is still 'only' £200 per week.

 

If hirers are only doing 5 hours per day then the figures are even lower.

These are more likely fuel consumption. I did an electric consumption, for the electric boat, based on 3kW for 8  hours a day over 7 days, but grossly over estimated diesel. With these, an electric hire fleet still probably comes out slightly ahead, or even compared with a diesel boat, assuming a five year hire life, several tens of kilopounds extra build cost and similar resale values, but doesn't leave anything much to contribute to the cost of the electric bollards needed to recharge them around the cruising route. That would still need to be funded by other means some how. So back to the same problem. If it is built, then they would use it, but it isn't going to be built under what is currently politically thinkable.

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1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

The Government has also said (in their maritime plan 2050) that by 2030 NO NEW VESSELS can be built that are not zero emission & by 2050 NO vessels that are not zero emission will be allowed on the inland waterways, or the UK coastal waters.

 

Well that should en6asure that the price of secondhand diesel boats continues to rise, as most new bosters won't be able to afford a new electric boat.

 

Same thing is happening with the price of secondhand cars now.

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