This guest editor piece was written by Ben Macdonald, CEO of Nodum. You can find out more about Nodum’s charging solutions, here.
I’d happily suggest that the Megane E-Tech is the most underrated car from the last couple of years.
There are not many cars that would make me look at them for any longer than a fleeting glance. The Megane E-Tech is one of them. It may simply be the fact that we don’t often see them on the road (more on that later). However, there is something about the proportions of the car and its stance that always catch my eye when one passes by.
The interior of the car also makes you (especially the driver) feel special. Perhaps this might be a result of the cheeky angle that the central screen tilts towards the driver – a little like some of the BMWs from the 1980s.
It is also the choice of materials that helped make this feel classy. In particular the cloth seats with sensible bolstering were very comfortable and all the important touch points felt well put together. As always, an adjustable lumber support was very much appreciated.
The central screen doesn’t dominate like some modern cars. There is a sensible mix of physical buttons and stalks (four stalks!). Whilst this may have initially been a little overwhelming it soon became second nature – and a lot easier to control the car’s systems from than a giant screen.
The car has plenty of va-va-voom when you need it – as you would expect from an electric car. More importantly, it also nudges you towards driving in a more efficient style. This is particularly so when travelling at low speeds – the sounds of Jean-Michel Jarre are like receiving an aural massage that gently compels you into being delicate with your right foot. This has the added bonus of feeling a lot less stressed in urban traffic. Negotiating Paris and in particular the Periperque on Friday afternoon has never felt so chilled out.
The journey we took this car on was a little longer than you might expect for the average car review. The challenge was to drive to just outside of Toulouse in France over the half term. This journey is a little outside the Megane’s comfort zone – especially during the winter months. In total we travelled 1,520 miles – and were largely dependent on public charging.
Depending on public charging presented a few challenges on the autoroutes. These challenges stemmed from being dependent on a British bank card for charging and the charging curve of the car. Don’t expect this car to be ready after necking a coffee and having a little stroll.
Charging at a fast charger does start promising enough, reaching 120kW after a minute or so. However it soon drops off to a pedestrian 60kW when above 50% SoC. This means that a 10 – 80% charge would typically be closer to 40 minutes. For our journey, A Better Route Planner suggested five charging stops between Calais and Salvagnac, each lasting about 30 minutes. This obviously adds a significant amount of time to the journey.
Now the French do Motorway Service Areas better than we do in the UK so it didn’t feel like being trapped at South Mimms. Yet we felt that we missed out on a number of opportunities to explore some of the pretty little villages of France. Ideally, some of the Villages Étapes would provide the opportunity to charge at a reasonable 50kW allowing for a decent lunch stop and exploration.
We did take the opportunity to stop overnight in Bourges on the way down, and rented a little apartment for the night. Unfortunately we couldn’t find a public charger that we could tap into and wake up with a full battery in the morning. Admittedly, we could really have booked into a hotel that offered charging so that we could wake up in the morning with a full battery and 200 odd miles of range.
We completed the journey home in one go – this sort of distance can be a challenge even in a legacy (diesel) powered car. To do so in a car that doesn’t have the longest legs was even more so. Leaving at six in the morning with a full battery resulted in us reasonably far north – averaging a respectable 3.7 miles per kWh on the Autoroute. This was when we first bumped into a bit of trouble. We tried charging at a fast charging hub at an Intermarche supermarket in Magnac-Bourg – and despite two attempts to get this working with a British bank card it failed. We decided to try another charger given that we were getting hit with multiple pre-authorisation fees.
The next charger recommended by A Better Route Planner needed you to be a member – and only found this out when we arrived. So we drove to the third recommendation. This was asking a lot on the few percent of battery we had remaining – the car said it wouldn’t make it. I channeled my inner Kevin Booker and this combined with the vehicle’s natural efficiency allowed us to get to the Ionity charger with a couple of percent remaining. The fear of running out of charge on an Autoroute understandably did result in some degree of clenching.
For us the biggest frustration of all was the pre-authorisation charges. At one point these charges were totalling £300. Total Energies were particularly irksome. Each time we stopped there they ringfenced 72 euros. At €0.59 per kWh this would cover 122 kWh. I am not aware of any cars on sale in Europe that have a battery this large.
As of writing, we still have about £180 in pre authorisation charges waiting to be released…despite being back on this Isle for a couple of days.
Ideally I would have liked the opportunity to have paid in advance of connecting the car at each charger for how many kWh I needed for each leg – this was generally about 42 kWh to get from 10 – 80%. Multiply this by the tariff and then pay for that amount of electrons to be dispensed (in most cases it would be about 21 Euros). Can anyone explain to me why this is not possible or even desirable?
There have been a lot of lessons learned from this experience – the last time I drove this route was pre-Covid – to see the hardware going in was wonderful. The biggest priority for any future continental excursions will be getting hold of a Charge Card. Many British EV drivers I have subsequently spoken to use the Octopus Electroverse card on the continent. I have also heard some very good things about the Chargemap card which has a €20 joining fee. Renault also have their own Mobilise card which supports plug and charge at some charging stations.
In terms of the infrastructure in France – there were some brilliant examples. There is a huge amount of hardware going in in France. Most MSAs have a shiny new bank of EV chargers. Unfortunately they seem to have many of the payment issues that the UK was suffering from a few years ago. There was no standard method of payment and some very odd decisions were made about having payment terminals sited away from the charging bays as opposed to individual payment terminals on each charger.
There was also very little thought given to those with accessibility needs. Bays were often rather narrow and there were plenty of obstacles to negotiate for someone in a wheelchair or dependent on a cane. This would be even more challenging if a person needed to navigate from the charger to the payment terminal and then back to the charger.
On the flip side – being able to fast charge for circa. €0.50 per kWh changed the equation for cross-continent journeying substantially. Had we been paying the sort of fees per kWh for fast charging in the UK the costs would have been significantly more biting.
Ultimately this journey was as much about the car as the frustrations of negotiating the charging infrastructure. It is a really pretty car – I was struck by the number of times when stopped at a MSA halfway down the country in France where many people seemed to think that it was a new model – or even a concept car.
The car has a real presence – despite it only being about the size of a VW ID.3. If I was given the choice to walk away with the Renault 4, the Renault 5 or the Megane I would definitely choose the Megane.
The quintessential French hatchback
One of the beautiful things in France is the relative lack of ridiculously large cars taking up space on the roads – the vast majority of larger SUVs on the autoroutes seemed to be from the UK – especially in northern France.
This is a result of choices taken by national and local governments. France has some very punitive taxation rules on cars over a certain weight. This weight tax along with others, would mean that a Porsche Cayenne or BMW X6 M would result in a tax of €70,000.
| Between 1,600kg and 1,799kg | 10 Euros per kilo |
| Between 1,800kg and 1,899kg | 15 Euros per kilo |
| Between 1,900kg and 1,999kg | 20 Euros per kilo |
| Between 2,000kg and 2,099kg | 25 Euros per kilo |
| Anything over 2,100kg | 30 Euros per kilo |
Alongside these measures there are also some significant actions being taken at a local level. In Paris the cost to park an SUV is thrice that of a “sensibly” sized car. Combined, these incentives and disincentives are expected to result in less than 10% of cars sold in 2024 weighing more than 1,800kg.
Graeme Cooper – the consummate planner.
In the various roles he has had he needs to have this skillset. He was previously the Head of Future Markets at the National Grid. I spoke with him briefly about his experience of journeying on the continent expecting some magic – it really was not that special (sorry Graeme!):
“It was so simple and easy to drive 1,600 miles to the south of France”.
For Graeme, the secret to easy travel on the continent was using the Octopus Electroverse card (other RFID charge cards are available).
Importantly, Graeme saved about 4 tonnes of carbon taking his EV compared with flying with his family – and had the benefit of his dogs’ company for the trip.
Lessons for France and the UK
There is an awful lot that France seems to be getting right – but also some significant errors. I would suggest that there are some great opportunities for the UK and France to learn from each other’s respective experiences.
Accessibility
A number of the fast charging hubs along the Autoroutes seemed to ascribe to the “squeeze them in” philosophy. This meant that there were some stations where if I had a vehicle much bigger than the Megane I’d be worried about being able to get in and out of the bay without scraping a door or losing a bit of bodywork on the high sided kerbs. Perhaps this is all part of the cunning plan to reduce vehicle sizes in France!
Of a far greater concern is the limited access for disabled drivers who might need a bit of extra space and no kerbs or bump stops. For me this was very effectively illustrated when I pulled into one particular bay and started charging – only noting halfway through that it was a disabled bay. I still struggle to understand what the difference was compared to the other bays – perhaps because it was nearer the payment terminal?
The PAS 1899 standards published by the BSI in conjunction with the Motability Foundation are world leading. There are a huge number of elements in this document that could easily be enacted across French MSAs that would make a real difference to many drivers.
Signage
Every MSA that we stopped had signs directing the driver to the charge hub. This was great when you arrived at the services. The problem with these signs is the design is rather insipid and not easy to see. I think that perhaps they had a competition that allowed entries from school children rather than an actual road sign designer to produce this.
This was a particular irritation when driving along on the autoroute. Each sign for an ‘aire de service’ would have a bold petrol pump on it and then a little +GPL or a cable in the shape of a car just below. These are challenging to see when travelling at 120kph+.
Cost
€0.50 per kWh for fast charging. Don’t need to say too much more – half the price of charging in the United Kingdom at a Motorway Service Area. This goes some way to showing what clear and consistent industrial policy can achieve.
The right chargers in the right place.
Certainly it was great to see a lot of very fast chargers being installed – and a lot of the builds have clearly been future-proofed with bays ready with the cables clearly entrenched ready for the next delivery
What I would have liked to have seen is a few more 50kW chargers in some carparks in pretty French villages – particularly the Villages Etape. These villages have to be within 5 kilometres of a National Highway or a free Motorway and have a population of less than 5,000. Most of them are quite pretty and have all the essential services needed for the wary traveller.
Finally – more slow chargers in public carparks. I would have had an opportunity to sleep in a little longer on the second day had we been able to charge up overnight. There was one charger that we did find – but negotiating the communes website proved a bit too challenging for me.
