I could see Government Motors not selling any, but Nissan? I am saddened by this.
GM sells just 281 Chevy Volts in February, Nissan only moves 67 Leafs
by Sebastian Blanco (RSS feed) on Mar 1st 2011 at 7:47PM
Peruse Chevrolet's February sales release, and you'll notice one number that's blatantly missing: the number of Chevy Volts sold. The number – a very modest 281 – is available in the company's detailed data (PDF), but it certainly isn't something that GM wants to highlight, apparently. Keeping the number quiet is a bit understandable, since it's lower than the 321 that Chevy sold in January.
Nissan doesn't have anything to brag about here, either (and it didn't avoiding any mention of the Leaf sales in its press release). Why? Well, back in January, the company sold 87 Leafs. In February? Just 67. Where does that leave us? Well, here's the big scorecard for all sales of these vehicles thus far:
Volt: 928
Leaf: 173
Ouch. The big questions, of course, revolve around one word: "Why?" Is ramping up production and deliveries still a problem? Is demand weak? Are unscrupulous dealers to blame? When will sales start to climb? And what are these numbers doing to plug-in vehicle work at other automakers? We don't know all the answers, but for more on February auto sales, click here.
Hardly surprising really. The electric car market is an absolute joke and its really only because of pressure from the eco-nuts that these things ever made it to market. Under normal circumstances, any right thinking CEO would laugh the idea out of the office.
Its all very well wanting to cut emissions and carbon footprints but where is the sense in swapping petrol emissions for power plant emissions due to having to charge the damn things? And for the pedants, yes obviously the emissions total is reduced but still, its woolly thinking all the same.
Secondly, the tech just doesn't cut it. If I had a daily commute of 60 miles or so, why would I swap my high MPG diesel car for an electric car that I have to stop and charge up halfway for eight hours because it doesn't have the range?
I think the Top Gear team (semi-seriously) worked out that trying to charge an electric car using a small wind turbine in ones' garden would take on the order of 16 days or something crazy...
Although, once we master the technology remote energy transfer (way, way, way, waaaaaaaay in the future), electric cars could become potentially useful. Imagine if your car automatically topped itself off from the nearest satellite. You wouldn't even have to take it to a charging station. Hell, being stuck in traffic would be fine.
'course, the technology is decades, if not centuries in the making. But with the vegetarian diets most hippies are sporting, they may just live long enough anyway.
Mind you if I could afford it I'd also get solar panels on the roof of my house and a stairwell in the backyard leading up to them so I could clean them without having to use a dinky ladder.
Frazzled wrote:Whats the rang eon the things? If the electric grid were powered by unicorns or maybe nuclear I'd proffer it'd be a better deal.
100 miles on the Leaf, 40 miles on the Volt.
It's not a bad concept, but it's only useful on a to-and-from work scale. I don't think I could even make it to the LGS and back on 40 miles.
I'm not willing to spend $30,000 on a vehicle to commute to-and-from work. But like Melissia, if I had money to waste, I'd probably buy one over a Lexus or some other luxury car.
Well, as long as we're talking impossibilities, I'd buy one for the work commute and a Lambourghini to drive around town.
I think the real future in sustainable transport will be from hydrogen fuel cells or something similar - ie. an electric car but one that generates its own power to recharge itself.
filbert wrote:I think the real future in sustainable transport will be from hydrogen fuel cells or something similar - ie. an electric car but one that generates its own power to recharge itself.
I would agree. There are few disadvantages with this technology (other than the oil ecconomy will collapse - hence their resistance to alternate power sources for so long, but they have held the world to ransom long enough anyway) and many advantages.
If I had the money and the fuel stations were available, I would buy one in a second (or convert a petrol car to have a hydrogen based power system).
I think as soon as the ball gets rolling on the infrastructure, it will wipe out oil based fuel car sales almost overnight.
Fafnir wrote:Although, once we master the technology remote energy transfer (way, way, way, waaaaaaaay in the future), electric cars could become potentially useful. Imagine if your car automatically topped itself off from the nearest satellite. You wouldn't even have to take it to a charging station. Hell, being stuck in traffic would be fine.
'course, the technology is decades, if not centuries in the making. But with the vegetarian diets most hippies are sporting, they may just live long enough anyway.
Isn't that how radio was invented?
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SilverMK2 wrote:
filbert wrote:I think the real future in sustainable transport will be from hydrogen fuel cells or something similar - ie. an electric car but one that generates its own power to recharge itself.
I would agree. There are few disadvantages with this technology (other than the oil ecconomy will collapse - hence their resistance to alternate power sources for so long, but they have held the world to ransom long enough anyway) and many advantages.
If I had the money and the fuel stations were available, I would buy one in a second (or convert a petrol car to have a hydrogen based power system).
I think as soon as the ball gets rolling on the infrastructure, it will wipe out oil based fuel car sales almost overnight.
Hydrogen, its the Bomb!!!
(actually I agree. Hydrogen is the future, when tied to that thar miracle sciency power generation).
filbert wrote:I think the Top Gear team (semi-seriously) worked out that trying to charge an electric car using a small wind turbine in ones' garden would take on the order of 16 days or something crazy...
That's because garden turbines are useless gimmicks, bought by MPs and celebs hopint to look 'green'. You'd have to put an enormous one up to be economically viable and the neighbours might complain when a 200 foot propeller is looming over their homes.
n0t_u wrote:Whatever happened to this motor idea? From about 4-5ish years ago.
Maybe the same thing as this?
With something to produce the energy from the movement of the axels or braking to be stored in a battery and back up battery.
The only drawback would probably be the magnetism. Or am I just being naive?
And the fact that their claims are impossible. But I'm sure that's only a small obstacle...
They aren't selling because people are (apparently) smart enough to realize that its not only economical, but its also not good for the environment. The batteries in the volt need to be completely replaced (not recharged, REPLACED) every 5 years or so at a cost of about 16,000 US dollars. The old batteries get tossed in a landfill where they most likely leech corrosive/toxic materials. The alternative is to buy a completely new vehicle, in which case the old one may very well end up in a scrapheap or a landfill depending on its overall condition.
Either way, these electric cars are the same as hybrids and ethanol fuel additives. Half-assed measures that make people feel better about themselves but in reality don't really do anything at all to help the environment (ethanol for instance may actually be WORSE for the environment than gasoline when all things are considered).
I personally cant justify paying that much on a car that would not only be a big ol annoyance with keeping it charged and if I drained it, Im basically stuck at home till its charged. Screw that, I can keep my current car, and by the time the repair bills and such catch up to what those cars cost, the technology for them will be cheap enough and practical enough for me to actually think about doing it
chaos0xomega wrote:(ethanol for instance may actually be WORSE for the environment than gasoline when all things are considered).
I would be pretty interested to hear your sources on this, as for part of one of my chemical process engineering modules we had to look at biofuels and various means of producing them, their overall impact, etc.
Other than replacing (in some cases) land that could be used for crop growing, the environmental impact was, from memory, not very large at all, especially compared to the impact of burning oil products.
Granted I was mostly focused on using GM/selective pressure to get certain algae to produce diesel, so I may be wrong.
What about the market for Environmentally friendly commercial vehicles.
I seem to remember seeing something on the news saying that the take up was quite good and also used to see quite allot of them (upto to say 7 1/2 tonne lorry size) delivering in London where the congestion charge made them even better value?
SilverMK2 wrote:I would be pretty interested to hear your sources on this, as for part of one of my chemical process engineering modules we had to look at biofuels and various means of producing them, their overall impact, etc.
Depends on where they source them from. There's no point in cutting down rainforest to create agricultural land to grow biofuels. Also most biofuels are made from food crops which doesn't make much sense either because that cuts into food supplies. Biofuels are better sourced from plants that can be grown in non-agricultural land, that way they complement rather than compete for space.
chaos0xomega wrote:They aren't selling because people are (apparently) smart enough to realize that its not only economical, but its also not good for the environment. The batteries in the volt need to be completely replaced (not recharged, REPLACED) every 5 years or so at a cost of about 16,000 US dollars. The old batteries get tossed in a landfill where they most likely leech corrosive/toxic materials. The alternative is to buy a completely new vehicle, in which case the old one may very well end up in a scrapheap or a landfill depending on its overall condition.
Either way, these electric cars are the same as hybrids and ethanol fuel additives. Half-assed measures that make people feel better about themselves but in reality don't really do anything at all to help the environment (ethanol for instance may actually be WORSE for the environment than gasoline when all things are considered).
You could recycle the batteries like we do in Europe and Japan.
The reason they aren't selling is because of range. A 40 mile range is fine for commuting somewhere like London, where the average round trip is 20 miles.
Howard A Treesong wrote:Depends on where they source them from. There's no point in cutting down rainforest to create agricultural land to grow biofuels. Also most biofuels are made from food crops which doesn't make much sense either because that cuts into food supplies. Biofuels are better sourced from plants that can be grown in non-agricultural land, that way they complement rather than compete for space.
chaos0xomega wrote:(ethanol for instance may actually be WORSE for the environment than gasoline when all things are considered).
I would be pretty interested to hear your sources on this, as for part of one of my chemical process engineering modules we had to look at biofuels and various means of producing them, their overall impact, etc.
This:
Other than replacing (in some cases) land that could be used for crop growing, the environmental impact was, from memory, not very large at all, especially compared to the impact of burning oil products.
Additionally, corn/sugarcane farming can be pretty damaging to soil and requires a lot of water/irrigation, and then there is the fact that even if every acre of farmland in the US was devoted to ethanol production, we still would not have enough to meet the U.S. energy needs (and then we'd have to import all our food as well...).
Also, the burning of ethanol increases formaldehyde and acetaldehyde emissions.
I'm actually all for algae based biofuels (approximately 1/10 of the land used for corn production could be used to meet the entire US petroleum demand using algal fuels), unfortunately the present government administration does not seem to be serious about pursuing truly effective biofuels and green technologies, instead focusing on less efficient politically expedient methods.
See, when I was looking into it, cellulosic ethanol production was promising to give much higher ethanol yields from the same amount of crop, meaning that although land was still being used to grow non-foodstuffs, you could get a much higher level of fuel from it.
You can also use much less damaging crop types than corn (which would be grown there for food anyway) to produce ethanol as well.
Have to admit that I had forgotten the production of nitrous oxides during the combustion of ethanol, though catalytic converters help to remove some of it. I'm not sure off the top of my head whether such pollution is better or worse than from straight petrol.
You can also use solar ovens to create fuel as well, though they are still very much in their infancy.
chaos0xomega wrote:(ethanol for instance may actually be WORSE for the environment than gasoline when all things are considered).
I would be pretty interested to hear your sources on this, as for part of one of my chemical process engineering modules we had to look at biofuels and various means of producing them, their overall impact, etc.
This:
Other than replacing (in some cases) land that could be used for crop growing, the environmental impact was, from memory, not very large at all, especially compared to the impact of burning oil products.
Additionally, corn/sugarcane farming can be pretty damaging to soil and requires a lot of water/irrigation, and then there is the fact that even if every acre of farmland in the US was devoted to ethanol production, we still would not have enough to meet the U.S. energy needs (and then we'd have to import all our food as well...).
Also, the burning of ethanol increases formaldehyde and acetaldehyde emissions.
I'm actually all for algae based biofuels (approximately 1/10 of the land used for corn production could be used to meet the entire US petroleum demand using algal fuels), unfortunately the present government administration does not seem to be serious about pursuing truly effective biofuels and green technologies, instead focusing on less efficient politically expedient methods.
Got to pay the corn farmers those nice subsidies to keep them happy.
Not to mention that our conversion of corn to fuel here in the US is making food prices around the world to skyrocket.
Any alcohol based fuel is very corrosive to the conventional engine. Hence why alcohol dragsters in the NHRA have their engines basically replaced after every run.
As to electric vehicles, does anyone remeber the Geo Metro, look at the MPG's on that little deathtrap.
While there is the range issue (before you switch to petroleum), there are other issues.
1) Price. They are more expensive than their non-electric counterparts. Sure, the government incentive helps, but it will take a while before you break even on gas costs.
2) Logistics. I've love to just plug my car in, but what if I don't own a home? How many apartment complexes have convenient electrical outlets for you to use in the parking area? What if I park on the street?
3) Guinea Pig. These are the first editions of new cars with new technologies. Most people who are interested do not want to be the first group who have to deal with all the kinks.
Same, my daily commute is <5 miles. If I didn't live in the wintry north I would ride my motorcycle every day. With the price of the Volt I can afford to drive my gas hogging 4wd jeep in the winter for the next 20yrs.
The hydrogen issue is the best alternative if you think about it but it depends on if we're talking about fuel cell (far future due to heat issues and others) or internal cumbustion (a variant of engines already using petroleum engines but converted to use hydrogen).
It all just boils down to cost though; fossil engined cars are just so much cheaper to produce now than alternatives. Infrastructure isn't a huge issue because hydrogen could be pumped at any place that already offers CNG; not a ton of these places but, at least in my area, not hard to find.
agnosto wrote:It all just boils down to cost though; fossil engined cars are just so much cheaper to produce now than alternatives. Infrastructure isn't a huge issue because hydrogen could be pumped at any place that already offers CNG; not a ton of these places but, at least in my area, not hard to find.
You also need places that produce hydrogen as well as fuel stations.
agnosto wrote: fuel cell (far future due to heat issues and others)
Solid oxide fuel cell technology looks promising as it operates at a high temp.
I can't remember how hot these things run but I read something about them being too hot to put in a car because it'd melt the plastic. Maybe a Delorean though
agnosto wrote: fuel cell (far future due to heat issues and others)
Solid oxide fuel cell technology looks promising as it operates at a high temp.
I can't remember how hot these things run but I read something about them being too hot to put in a car because it'd melt the plastic. Maybe a Delorean though
They run incredibly hot up to 1000°C but they are small. Right now they just don't last long enough to meet the DOE target for transportation systems.
agnosto wrote:It all just boils down to cost though; fossil engined cars are just so much cheaper to produce now than alternatives. Infrastructure isn't a huge issue because hydrogen could be pumped at any place that already offers CNG; not a ton of these places but, at least in my area, not hard to find.
You also need places that produce hydrogen as well as fuel stations.
Its possible to generate hydrogen in mass quantities more efficiently and economically sound than with the current fossil fuel system, overall, when you consider the cost in human lives and money spent in wars to secure oil sources and wild fluctuations in the price and market due to regional instability, piracy and other factors.
Cities could even use waste to produce it:
"Hydrogen can also be made from urine. Using urine, hydrogen production is 332% more energy efficient than using water.[12][13] The research was conducted by Geraldine Botte from the Ohio University. Recently, Dr. Shanwen Tao of the Heriot-Watt University has invented a Carbamide Power System Fuel Cell that can immediately convert urine into electricity.[14]"
Need power for your car? Pee in the tank.
The problem is initial outlay to develop the means of production that doesn't exist whereas the standing oil-based production is already in use. People don't want to spend money to try something new when they can just spend X dollars to keep using the old, comfortable system; this is why we have cars using technology that is basically over 100 years old (which is the internal combustion engine).
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Vandil wrote:
They run incredibly hot up to 1000°C but they are small. Right now they just don't last long enough to meet the DOE target for transportation systems.
Cook your dinner and drive at the same time! With the optional incinerator attachment, you can burn household waste or the occasional dead animal.
Hydrogen is not the answer. The methods of production for it won't support anything like coversion of the US auto fleet to using it. At best the hydrogen economy is just a lot of misdirected enthusiasm and rose colored thinking. At worst its and intentional distraction to make it look like something is being accomplished while doing nothing substantial.
It's a byproduct from hydrocarbon production but if you want to move to a true hydrogen economy one of the biggest uses of hydrocarbons, fuel, goes away. The waste stream hydrogen from what's left won't be sufficient. Alternately you can get it from natural gas, except that natural gas is already a premium fuel used in home heating and power generation. Again, there's simply not enough natural gas to both fuel our vehicles and our power plants and homes. What hydrogen you could get from that stream would be very expensive and exposed to weekly price swings depending upon power plant load.
Alternately you can electrolysis but now you need a lot of power generation to support it on the scale you need.
So the two major sources of hydrogen (natural gas and electrolysis) both require major expansions of the power industry. For natural gas production of hydrogen you either have to land coal fired or nuclear generation. Since I doubt anyone will go for coal if we're greening things up that leaves nukes. Same issue with electrolysis for hydrogen production. You'll wind up having to radically expand the power generation capacity of the country with nukes.
So now you have to ask, why are we wasting all the time and effort to build all these nukes just to eat the inefficiencies and environmental impact of getting our hands on large quantities of hydrogen. Instead just build electric cars and be done with it. Hell, with electric cars the impact on the grid isn't even as bad as the hydrogen economy because you can mandate off-peak recharging of cars and make use of installed capacity that would otherwise be ramped down to lower loads at night reducing the number of new plants you need to build. Now there are still issues with long distance power transmission and the fractious nature of the existing grid but in any scenario that's not "just keep doing what we're doing," those are issues that have to be dealt with.
Because hydrogen as a fuel source is significantly better in terms of actually being able to get somewhere? Also in terms of resources commited, since it uses pre-existing technology and does not require a massive increase in such areas such as battery manufacturing that electric vehicles would require?
Batteries only have a very short lifespan before they drop below a certain efficiency, meaning you would need to constantly replace them. And the materials that make them are not cheap or pleasant or eco-friendly.
Hopefully if they ever get fusion power working we will have all the electricity we need to run hydrogen production plants.
We can also use algae (that handy little thing) to produce hydrogen with very little energy input required.
Melissia wrote:Ah, bacteria, is there nothing you cannot do if given the proper genetic tampering?
The answer is no.
Very true. I've genetically altered bacteria before. It is not as exciting as in the movies though. Was kind of hoping it would take over the lab and I would have to fend it off with a lab stool, but it just sat there, growing in a petri dish.
Tyyr wrote:
So now you have to ask, why are we wasting all the time and effort to build all these nukes just to eat the inefficiencies and environmental impact of getting our hands on large quantities of hydrogen. Instead just build electric cars and be done with it. Hell, with electric cars the impact on the grid isn't even as bad as the hydrogen economy because you can mandate off-peak recharging of cars and make use of installed capacity that would otherwise be ramped down to lower loads at night reducing the number of new plants you need to build. Now there are still issues with long distance power transmission and the fractious nature of the existing grid but in any scenario that's not "just keep doing what we're doing," those are issues that have to be dealt with.
Because an internal combustion hydrogen engine wouldn't require new plants or retooling as the difference in engine design is miniscule, comparatively. A fuel cell engine would be able to utilize the same plant as those that make electric cars.
Why electric is a bad idea.
I don't know about other countries but the electric infrastructure in the US can't take much more load, on or off peak; evidenced by rolling black-outs on both coasts in recent years.
If you want electric, convince the government that nuclear energy is a good idea and then also convince them to invest a great deal more money in the infrastructure.
Maybe if the electricity was solar powered, they would be good for the environment, but if we get it from coal and oil, then electric vehicles/hybrids just don't work.
Mike Noble wrote:Maybe if the electricity was solar powered, they would be good for the environment, but if we get it from coal and oil, then electric vehicles/hybrids just don't work.
Solar panels are actually quite bad for the environment in terms of their production and so on. Solar furnaces are far better. Kind of like reverse geothermal power
There's simply no use for the current generation of electric cars.
If you live in a rural or suburban areas, you're going to need a lot more range than these cars can provide.
If you live in an urban area, you've got public transit available for your short trips already. And, you are going to have issues charging your car when the nearest parking spot you found is a block away.
I don't understand why people aren't more accepting of solar powered cars. My car is solar powered and I love it! You just need to have a high enough storage density, and you'll be fine.
I use the following process:
Take some light from the sun and mix it with Carbon Dioxide and Water using Chlorophyll to turn it into carbohydrates.
Take the product and bury it underground.
Come back a few million years later, dig it up, and refine it.
You can now burn this substance in a conventional Internal Combustion Engine to provide 100% solar powered transport!
Grakmar wrote:There's simply no use for the current generation of electric cars.
If you live in a rural or suburban areas, you're going to need a lot more range than these cars can provide.
If you live in an urban area, you've got public transit available for your short trips already. And, you are going to have issues charging your car when the nearest parking spot you found is a block away.
I don't understand why people aren't more accepting of solar powered cars. My car is solar powered and I love it! You just need to have a high enough storage density, and you'll be fine.
I use the following process:
Take some light from the sun and mix it with Carbon Dioxide and Water using Chlorophyll to turn it into carbohydrates.
Take the product and bury it underground.
Come back a few million years later, dig it up, and refine it.
You can now burn this substance in a conventional Internal Combustion Engine to provide 100% solar powered transport!
Assuming your city actually HAS public transportation.
Texas, being a republican state, has a tendency to cut funding for public transit faster than they reach for education funds to fund whatever pet projects they have.
SilverMK2 wrote:Because hydrogen as a fuel source is significantly better in terms of actually being able to get somewhere?
And it's still inferior to straight up gasoline. You're going to take a hit no matter what you do.
Also in terms of resources commited, since it uses pre-existing technology and does not require a massive increase in such areas such as battery manufacturing that electric vehicles would require?
Pre-existing technology? You can't just pump hydrogen gas into an internal combustion engine and expect it to work. You're going to have to redesign cars every bit as much as with electric. You're also going to have to install a completely new fuel distribution infrastructure.
And if you're going to start using hydrogen on the proposed scale you're going to be building a massive amount of new infrastructure regardless.
Batteries only have a very short lifespan before they drop below a certain efficiency, meaning you would need to constantly replace them. And the materials that make them are not cheap or pleasant or eco-friendly.
Batteries can be recycled. It's not a perfect pancea but they can. And as for the expense, what's a new fuel cell run you? Hydrogen tank? The cost for a hydrogen powered car is going to be well elevated from a gasoline or diesel powered one as well. Burning hydrocarbons are delightlyfully powerful, cheap, and entrenched. Going in any direction is going to entail expense.
Hopefully if they ever get fusion power working we will have all the electricity we need to run hydrogen production plants.
Yeah... ok that's fantastic but when you're planning out environmental policy for right now, you can't really bet on a technology that may or may not be commercially viable at some indeterminate time in the future. Although the EPA does love to try and do that.
We can also use algae (that handy little thing) to produce hydrogen with very little energy input required.
If they can then wonderful, but again, you have to start working and moving towards the goal at some point. You can't do any real work if you're going to base the whole thing off a pie in the sky technology that hasn't been proven viable yet. Algae is all the rage right now but I can't recall seeing anything ready for commercial prime time.
agnosto wrote:Because an internal combustion hydrogen engine wouldn't require new plants or retooling as the difference in engine design is miniscule, comparatively. A fuel cell engine would be able to utilize the same plant as those that make electric cars.
Just like you can use most of those plants to build electric cars. And sorry, but a hydrogen powered car is going to need all new plants and tooling since you're not going to keep building the same thing you always have. Besides, the cost of the automobile plants is nothing comparitively.
Why electric is a bad idea.
I don't know about other countries but the electric infrastructure in the US can't take much more load, on or off peak; evidenced by rolling black-outs on both coasts in recent years.
Rolling blackouts? Where? There have been some actual blackouts but those were not load related blackouts but issues with the way the grid was actually managed. The infrastructure can handle electric vehicles provided they charge during off peak hours when the grid is running at a low point anyways. Provided that the grid can handle it. The peak day load is dramatically higher than that experienced at night.
I'm not suggesting that the grid doesn't need dramatic sweeping improvements but that has to happen no matter what you do going forward unless you want to just keep doing the same thing.
If you want electric, convince the government that nuclear energy is a good idea and then also convince them to invest a great deal more money in the infrastructure.
If you want reliable clean power you need to be convincing the governement to support nuclear because that's about the only way you're going to get it. Hydrogen isn't plug and play, you can't just utilize the existing infrastructure and change out your 4 banger for a fuel cell. If you could we'd have all been driving hydrogen fuel cell powered cars for a decade now. The infrastructure issues for hydrogen are HUGE and pretending they are minimal is just flat wrong. If it were that simple we'd already be in hydrogen powered cars.
Tyyr wrote:And it's still inferior to straight up gasoline. You're going to take a hit no matter what you do.
I am given to understand that a hydrogen powered car has a comperable range to a petrol car, certainly the newer ones.
Pre-existing technology? You can't just pump hydrogen gas into an internal combustion engine and expect it to work. You're going to have to redesign cars every bit as much as with electric. You're also going to have to install a completely new fuel distribution infrastructure.
And if you're going to start using hydrogen on the proposed scale you're going to be building a massive amount of new infrastructure regardless.
Pre-existing technology in terms of electric motors, fuel tanks, etc. In order to get an electric car which has the same refueling time, the same range, etc as a hydrogen powered or petrol powered car, you would need a significant advance in technology.
Batteries can be recycled. It's not a perfect pancea but they can. And as for the expense, what's a new fuel cell run you? Hydrogen tank? The cost for a hydrogen powered car is going to be well elevated from a gasoline or diesel powered one as well. Burning hydrocarbons are delightlyfully powerful, cheap, and entrenched. Going in any direction is going to entail expense.
Sure, in the immediate term they will be far more expensive. But then again, what did your PC cost you back in the day? How much is your original PS3 retailing for now?
Every new technology has a stupid price dag when it comes out. As it becomes more common, or the technology/manufacturing/etc improves the price comes down.
Yeah... ok that's fantastic but when you're planning out environmental policy for right now, you can't really bet on a technology that may or may not be commercially viable at some indeterminate time in the future. Although the EPA does love to try and do that.
Seriously, you are wanting to take speculative thinking and try to say I am basing some kind of concrete planning on them? Read my other posts - I've mentioned that infrastructure needs to be built, methods of hydrogen production need to be found, etc.
If they can then wonderful, but again, you have to start working and moving towards the goal at some point. You can't do any real work if you're going to base the whole thing off a pie in the sky technology that hasn't been proven viable yet. Algae is all the rage right now but I can't recall seeing anything ready for commercial prime time.
*points to line above about reading my other posts and seeming to think that speculation = concrete plan for the future*
Building national infrastructure for hydrogen is estimated to cost less than a billion dollars, that actually is pretty trivial on the scale American government and business tend to spend money.
Hydrogen production could be handled with coal to hydrogen in the US for a couple centuries (we have a lot more coal than oil).
The principle issue holding hydrogen cars back is one of fuel storage. You can't hold much hydrogen in a pressure tank, and it tends to leak, even with a high quality tank. Nobody wants a car that only gets ~40 miles per fuel up and goes dry if you don't drive for a couple weeks. And nobody can afford a car that has the systems necessary for liquid hydrogen storage.
SilverMK2 wrote:I am given to understand that a hydrogen powered car has a comperable range to a petrol car, certainly the newer ones.
Pre-existing technology in terms of electric motors, fuel tanks, etc. In order to get an electric car which has the same refueling time, the same range, etc as a hydrogen powered or petrol powered car, you would need a significant advance in technology.
If range is your only consideration then yeah, existing electric vehicles don't have the range you need for really long trips. I can't argue with that but we have electric cars with ranges that aren't that far off an economical gasoline powered car. However Tesla motors already produces automobiles with ranges over 100 miles, some with 200+ mile ranges. The Leaf can go a bit over a 100 on a charge. So they aren't quite there yet for sure, but they aren't an order of magnitude off. Your average gasoline car can go between 300 and 400 miles on a full tank. With electric cars with ranges of 200+ miles in production it's not really that far off right now.
I need to look into hot charging, if its possible to charge these kind of batteries quickly. If it is then you may see charging stations pop up along highways the way gas stations do right now. Or see places like McDonalds add charging stations so you can charge while you eat.
Even the Volt with its dinky 40 mile range is more than enough for a lot of people's daily commutes. It'd do the job for me.
Sure, in the immediate term they will be far more expensive. But then again, what did your PC cost you back in the day? How much is your original PS3 retailing for now?
Every new technology has a stupid price dag when it comes out. As it becomes more common, or the technology/manufacturing/etc improves the price comes down.
I don't disagree with you. I just disagree with the idea that hydrogen powered vehicles are going to cost the same as existing gasoline powered vehicles but electric cars will never be cheaper than they are right now. Both technologies are going to start off expensive as all hell but get cheaper with time. Both of them.
Seriously, you are wanting to take speculative thinking and try to say I am basing some kind of concrete planning on them? Read my other posts - I've mentioned that infrastructure needs to be built, methods of hydrogen production need to be found, etc.
Ok fine. It's another strike against the hydrogen ecnomoy idea. Electric cars are something you can put on the road now, with the existing infrastructure. The hydrogen economy requires far more infrastructure and technological development and I'm not at all convinced there's any benefit that it has over simply going all electic. To me the hydrogen economy just adds in a middleman that's not needed.
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Requia wrote:Building national infrastructure for hydrogen is estimated to cost less than a billion dollars, that actually is pretty trivial on the scale American government and business tend to spend money.
Who are you getting your numbers from and how much weed do they smoke on a daily basis?
It's the slow speed of charging rather than the range. If you could charge an electric car as fast as you put petrol into a normal one, it would not be a problem. The problem is that faster charging needs a higher voltage, special power supply. Even then, conventional batteries can't be charged in just a few minutes.
I'm not really expecting to recharge the car in the same amount of time I can put gas in my current one. However if you can charge them in between half an hour and an hour it become feasible to put charging stations outside things like malls or restaurants.
Requia wrote:Building national infrastructure for hydrogen is estimated to cost less than a billion dollars, that actually is pretty trivial on the scale American government and business tend to spend money.
Where did you read that?
Also, are we talking about a business gradually developing the infrastructure, or the government building it as a matter of civil infrastructure? If its the latter, there are going to massive political hurdles.
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Tyyr wrote:I'm not really expecting to recharge the car in the same amount of time I can put gas in my current one. However if you can charge them in between half an hour and an hour it become feasible to put charging stations outside things like malls or restaurants.
That's an option even if a full charge can't be maintained.
I've also heard ideas regarding making a certain portion of the batteries in any given car modular so they can be swapped out at certain locations.
Electric Cars are Stoooopid and barely more environmentally friendly than an economical European diesel car ~70Mpg. BTW for any americans 'Diesel' is the stuff they put in trains and Big Rigs, in Europe we have cars that run on it.....
Requia wrote:Building national infrastructure for hydrogen is estimated to cost less than a billion dollars, that actually is pretty trivial on the scale American government and business tend to spend money.
Where did you read that?
Also, are we talking about a business gradually developing the infrastructure, or the government building it as a matter of civil infrastructure? If its the latter, there are going to massive political hurdles.
Scientific American (I believe the number was 700 something million, dunno where I put my back issues). I think i might be talking about things a bit differently than the rest of the thread though. This is for sufficient infrastructure to make it practical to buy a fuel cell car for 90% of Americans (I think the target was a refueling station within 3 and half miles in cities, and one every 70 miles on major highways), but would only support a small number of Americans actually doing so. The idea is that as fuel cell car sales slowly rise, more and more infrastructure would be built because it's profitable to do so at the same level of investment as building a new gas station or new refineries (rather than dropping money on a national scale).
Automatically Appended Next Post: As for political hurdles, there are never really any significant ones to giving money to big business. Just pay the existing gasoline distributors to do it (It's how we got broadband internet).
Requia wrote:
Scientific American (I believe the number was 700 something million, dunno where I put my back issues). I think i might be talking about things a bit differently than the rest of the thread though. This is for sufficient infrastructure to make it practical to buy a fuel cell car for 90% of Americans (I think the target was a refueling station within 3 and half miles in cities, and one every 70 miles on major highways), but would only support a small number of Americans actually doing so. The idea is that as fuel cell car sales slowly rise, more and more infrastructure would be built because it's profitable to do so at the same level of investment as building a new gas station or new refineries (rather than dropping money on a national scale).
Ah, ok, that makes more sense.
Requia wrote:
As for political hurdles, there are never really any significant ones to giving money to big business. Just pay the existing gasoline distributors to do it (It's how we got broadband internet).
There has been a lot of opposition to any financed move away from petroleum, or towards "green" technology; even when its been directed at big businesses.
Melissia wrote:Course there is, big businesses don't like change no matter what kind.
Big business has no problem with change as long as it equates to more profits. What big business (and small business) hates is having to shell out a large amount of capital to establish for no additional profits.
Currently, we all have gasoline cars and there's already a gasoline infrastructure in place. So, profits are easily obtained without having to invest much.
No one is willing to buy a hydrogen car because there's no place to get it filled. There's no place to get it filled, because there's no demand, and no profits to be had from building the infrastructure. Therein lies the problem.
FITZZ wrote: Call me part of the "problem" if you like,but...until I find an "electric eco-friendly" car like this..I'll pass.
Close to what I was thinking. No electric car is gonna give me the pure aural satisfaction of a gas burning Vtwin with unbaffled pipes like my latest ride:
If it ain't fun, it ain't worth riding.
Jake
EDIT: I also doubt any electric vehicle is going to be able to haul a couple hundred hay bales or multiple horses across country like my big diesel F350 can.
Melissia wrote:Course there is, big businesses don't like change no matter what kind.
Big business has no problem with change as long as it equates to more profits. What big business (and small business) hates is having to shell out a large amount of capital to establish for no additional profits.
Currently, we all have gasoline cars and there's already a gasoline infrastructure in place. So, profits are easily obtained without having to invest much.
No one is willing to buy a hydrogen car because there's no place to get it filled. There's no place to get it filled, because there's no demand, and no profits to be had from building the infrastructure. Therein lies the problem.
More importantly the same companiers making money now would not be the same ones making money under a hydrogen economy. If Exxon had interests in power companies its view would likely be substantially different.
Melissia wrote:Course there is, big businesses don't like change no matter what kind.
Big business has no problem with change as long as it equates to more profits. What big business (and small business) hates is having to shell out a large amount of capital to establish for no additional profits.
Currently, we all have gasoline cars and there's already a gasoline infrastructure in place. So, profits are easily obtained without having to invest much.
No one is willing to buy a hydrogen car because there's no place to get it filled. There's no place to get it filled, because there's no demand, and no profits to be had from building the infrastructure. Therein lies the problem.
More importantly the same companiers making money now would not be the same ones making money under a hydrogen economy. If Exxon had interests in power companies its view would likely be substantially different.
It doesn't? Exxon is a titannic company, I'm sure it owns plenty of power plants somewhere.
The fortunate thing is that the tech roadmap for electric vehicles has a lot on it's side. Battery storage is scaleable and untold billions are going into research on battery energy density given the rush towards totally portable personal electronic systems. Since the battery is the only piece of the puzzle missing for electric (instead of every piece but the road for algae bio or hydrogen) then it's likely that we will solve that puzzle far sooner then with other "competing" (fake) technologies.
FITZZ wrote: Call me part of the "problem" if you like,but...until I find an "electric eco-friendly" car like this..I'll pass.
Close to what I was thinking. No electric car is gonna give me the pure aural satisfaction of a gas burning Vtwin with unbaffled pipes like my latest ride:
If it ain't fun, it ain't worth riding.
Jake
EDIT: I also doubt any electric vehicle is going to be able to haul a couple hundred hay bales or multiple horses across country like my big diesel F350 can.
Exactly. Let the hippies keep their pocket sized eco cars. No electric or bio will ever replace the purr of a big block chevy with 4 barrel Hawley carb with dual exhausts.
Hmm, a shame, but completely understandable - any electric cars put out right now are just a line thrown to get environmentalists off the company's back.
I would like to eventually see a true electric car with respectable range, but it's the catch-22 of no one wanting research the tech if it doesn't sell, and it won't sell because the research isn't far enough along to make it a feasible concept.
FITZZ wrote: Call me part of the "problem" if you like,but...until I find an "electric eco-friendly" car like this..I'll pass.
How about the Tesla Roadster, a high end sports car that goes from a dead stop to sixty miles per hour in under four seconds, gets the equivalent of 120 miles per gallon, and manages a range of more than 200 miles? Sure, I hear they're dead silent (comparatively), but to me that's much better than something that sounds like it's falling apart. Only downside is it costs more than $100,000, with the batteries clocking in at more than a third of the total price...
Really, the only problem facing electric cars are the batteries. The engines are extremely powerful and efficient, but batteries are expensive, low capacity (the Tesla Roadster's total capacity is effectively smaller than what a jerrycan can hold, if I'm reading right), and short lived (although, admittedly, seven years is more than many people keep their cars in the first place, and electric cars have much less wear and tear and so require much less maintenance than internal combustion engines). Hydrogen is even worse on all those fronts, though. Fuel cells are ridiculously expensive, hydrogen is ridiculously expensive to produce compared to what you can get back out of it, and it's physically impossible to store a meaningful amount of hydrogen in a car.
Hydrogen is a pipe dream/smokescreen, combustion is outdated and finally running into the problems of a limited fuel source, while electric cars need only a few small improvements to batteries before they become widely viable, with the added benefit of continuing to function perfectly no matter what you have producing the electricity in the first place.
The Tesla Roadster seems to be similar in size to the Lotus...which for me would be a problem,I've worked on Lotus before and practically have to break my legs just to get inside.
Don't get me wrong,the Roadster appears to be a nice car,but between the diminutive size and rather large price tag...again I'd have to pass.
The fundamental problem with electric cars is that it take time to recharge them. You could get 3000 miles a charge and it wouldn't be enough if you forgot to plug it in and need a refuel right away.
Assuming you actually solve that problem (it's not impossible) you then need massive infrastructure upgrades, (on the order of ripping out the entire electrical grid and putting in a new one), in order to actually deliver that power.
Next up you've got to deal with the fact that huge number of Americans' don't have the luxury of personal garages that they can add an electrical outlet too, so you have to have something for all those people who live in gakky apartments (probably about half the country).
Electric is a luxury item, for those that have the time and money for it, and it won't ever be anything else.
The fundamental problem with electric cars is that it take time to recharge them. You could get 3000 miles a charge and it wouldn't be enough if you forgot to plug it in and need a refuel right away.
Assuming you actually solve that problem (it's not impossible) you then need massive infrastructure upgrades, (on the order of ripping out the entire electrical grid and putting in a new one), in order to actually deliver that power.
Next up you've got to deal with the fact that huge number of Americans' don't have the luxury of personal garages that they can add an electrical outlet too, so you have to have something for all those people who live in gakky apartments (probably about half the country).
Electric is a luxury item, for those that have the time and money for it, and it won't ever be anything else.
I agree with most of your statement with the exception of the very last line.
While electric cars are currently a more "luxury/green" item, I for one won't be surprised to see them on a much broader scale in the future.
The fundamental problem with electric cars is that it take time to recharge them. You could get 3000 miles a charge and it wouldn't be enough if you forgot to plug it in and need a refuel right away.
Assuming you actually solve that problem (it's not impossible) you then need massive infrastructure upgrades, (on the order of ripping out the entire electrical grid and putting in a new one), in order to actually deliver that power.
There are already batteries that can be rapidly charged. They're not ready for commercial production, but they're out there. You're also going to need to increase the capacity of the electrical grid anyways, merely to deal with increased use from other things. It's not outrageous to assume that adding the capacity for ubiquitous charging stations over a decade or so would not be so much as difficult, let alone impossible.
Next up you've got to deal with the fact that huge number of Americans' don't have the luxury of personal garages that they can add an electrical outlet too, so you have to have something for all those people who live in gakky apartments (probably about half the country).
That's nothing compared to the number of Americans that don't have a gas station in their house...
Increase capacity and solve the charge time issue, and there's no problem so long as charging stations end up as ubiquitous as gas stations.
Electric is a luxury item, for those that have the time and money for it, and it won't ever be anything else.
Sure, so long as a bank of batteries that's the equivalent of a two gallon gas tank that takes three hours to fill costs $36,000. Give it a few more years, and it will only get better and cheaper. Like I said, all the problems lie in the batteries, which are almost resolved.
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FITZZ wrote: The Tesla Roadster seems to be similar in size to the Lotus...which for me would be a problem,I've worked on Lotus before and practically have to break my legs just to get inside.
Don't get me wrong,the Roadster appears to be a nice car,but between the diminutive size and rather large price tag...again I'd have to pass.
I've never actually seen one in person, so I don't the size. That would be a problem though. Still, it's an example of a powerful, stylish, electric sports car, thus proving that electrics can be powerful, stylish cars, even in this day and age.
There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
Requia wrote:The fundamental problem with electric cars is that it take time to recharge them. You could get 3000 miles a charge and it wouldn't be enough if you forgot to plug it in and need a refuel right away.
Stormrider wrote:Any alcohol based fuel is very corrosive to the conventional engine. Hence why alcohol dragsters in the NHRA have their engines basically replaced after every run.
I've not heard anything to say alcohol is corrosive - every high performance engine gets rebuilt often, simply because the components are put under so much strain - it's not limited to dragsters. Refer to F1, MotoGP, even Superbikes and Supersport classes. I've got a few friends who race at club level who run supersport levels of tune, and the engines need a full refresh every thousand miles or so. Motox and enduro bikes sometimes need new pistons every couple of races.
FITZZ wrote: The Tesla Roadster seems to be similar in size to the Lotus...which for me would be a problem,I've worked on Lotus before and practically have to break my legs just to get inside.
Don't get me wrong,the Roadster appears to be a nice car,but between the diminutive size and rather large price tag...again I'd have to pass.
It is a Lotus as far as I know, it's an Exige with the IC engine removed. I think you'd have the same problem fitting in that as a real Lotus. Sometimes I like being short
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
That sounds like a great solution, but don't the batteries make up a substantial proportion of the weight of the car? It's going to need a workshop crane to get the thing out.
As technology improves the energy density of batteries increases which will give longer ranges and lighter vehicles; charging technology received a major breakthrough recently in terms of speed and reduced energy loss (no time to find a source at the mo though) so batteries may well become feasible. Manufacture and disposal may still cause as many environmental issues as the batteries claim to solve, but I don't know on that score.
Because they are heavy, the batteries are placed low in the chassis. I envisage that you will drive the car over a pit and get out to go for a pee. While you’re emptying your tank, a robot in the pit takes out the drained batteries from underneath the car and puts in fresh ones.
Obviously this system will need car manufacturers to use a fairly standardised system of batteries, however some flexibility will be possible because each car will transmit its precise configuration to the pit robot. A small car might have two or four battery packs, and a van or lorry would have more, according to size.
Billions of batteries will be needed, so mass production will bring the price right down.
Right, so when the guy that gets pissed at you at work takes a dump on your car he's not just making a statement, he's also decreasing your car's efficiency in gathering power!
I could see Government Motors not selling any, but Nissan? I am saddened by this.
GM sells just 281 Chevy Volts in February, Nissan only moves 67 Leafs
by Sebastian Blanco (RSS feed) on Mar 1st 2011 at 7:47PM
Peruse Chevrolet's February sales release, and you'll notice one number that's blatantly missing: the number of Chevy Volts sold. The number – a very modest 281 – is available in the company's detailed data (PDF), but it certainly isn't something that GM wants to highlight, apparently. Keeping the number quiet is a bit understandable, since it's lower than the 321 that Chevy sold in January.
Nissan doesn't have anything to brag about here, either (and it didn't avoiding any mention of the Leaf sales in its press release). Why? Well, back in January, the company sold 87 Leafs. In February? Just 67. Where does that leave us? Well, here's the big scorecard for all sales of these vehicles thus far:
Volt: 928
Leaf: 173
Ouch. The big questions, of course, revolve around one word: "Why?" Is ramping up production and deliveries still a problem? Is demand weak? Are unscrupulous dealers to blame? When will sales start to climb? And what are these numbers doing to plug-in vehicle work at other automakers? We don't know all the answers, but for more on February auto sales, click here.
Tags: auto sales, breaking, electric vehicle, leaf, leaf sales, plug-in hybrid, volt, volt sales
The Prius sure is selling. 2010 sales topped a 1/4 million by the end of the 3rd quarter of 2010.
Frazzled wrote:Whats the rang eon the things? If the electric grid were powered by unicorns or maybe nuclear I'd proffer it'd be a better deal.
The same range as gasoline engines. A series hybrid an electric car with a purely electric drive train that has a back up electric generator fueled by gasoline or diesel, and they still get good gas millage when the batteries are dead.
Automatically Appended Next Post: The 2 proven technologies that vastly improve MPG without major changes to our infrastructure are diesel and a series hybrid.
2008 Ford Fiesta Diesel version gets 65 MPG
Yep 65 MPG and it's not even a hybrid. It's also not available to sale in the USA because US environmental laws say it pollutes more than a Hummer H1 because we measure pollution by the amount of exhaust emitted per gallon of fuel burned instead of by the amount of exhaust emitted per mile traveled.
A series hybrid is basically an all electric vehicle with a fossil fuel electric generator added onto the vehicle. IMO it's the best of both worlds. Also as a technical fact diesel makes a much more efficient fuel for a fossil fuel powered electric generator than gasoline, but a few douchebag environmentalists won't ever let hat happen when it comes to a series hybrid.
Well seeing as how most US electricity is generated by coal thanks to environmentalists killing the construction of nuclear power plants those articles do have a point.
I will freely admit I'm what SUV drivers would call "a MPG nazi", but it's not for environmental reasons. We (Americans that is) import 2/3 of our oil, and our entire economy is completely dependent on it. We should get off foreign oil as much as possible, but we absolutely must get completely middle east oil. The main reason our DoD budged needs to stay so bloated is so we can protect our oil interests, especially in the middle east.
@Ulver AFAIK methanol is pretty corrosive to metal parts compared to any other fuel. Obviously it aint gonna be like sulphuric acid or something but is certainly acidic enough. Oh and again AFAIK, part of the 'Formula' of F1 is that the cars run on regular petrol.
Unfortunately Killkrazy though your 'Clarksonesque' idea is a good one standardisation in something as incredibly incrementaly progressive as battery tech is just never going to happen, unless we all get those 'ZPM' crystal things from Stargate. Compare an iphone 4 to one that is bought 3 months down the line chances are it's got a different kind of battery.
The batteries on hybrids and electric cars will pretty much always be recycled. Many of our nation's homeless earn their beer money by picking up aluminum cans for their recycling value. The battery for an electric car battery is easily worth hundreds of dollars if not a 4 digit figure. They are worth so much money no junkyard in the world will fail to recycle them. On undeniable fact about hybrid car batteries is that they make junk yard owners happy when a hybrid comes into the junkyard.
Perkustin wrote:@Ulver AFAIK methanol is pretty corrosive to metal parts compared to any other fuel. Obviously it aint gonna be like sulphuric acid or something but is certainly acidic enough. Oh and again AFAIK, part of the 'Formula' of F1 is that the cars run on regular petrol.
Unfortunately Killkrazy though your 'Clarksonesque' idea is a good one standardisation in something as incredibly incrementaly progressive as battery tech is just never going to happen, unless we all get those 'ZPM' crystal things from Stargate. Compare an iphone 4 to one that is bought 3 months down the line chances are it's got a different kind of battery.
We've managed to standardise a lot of car parts, for example, practically all spark plugs are the same fitting, as are the hoses and pumps for fuel of different types, there are only a few types of tyres and wheels for the great majority of vehicles. That's because a lot of those kind of items are made by second tier suppliers, such as Bosch, and it is beneficial to everyone for that type of component to be standardised.
I think standardisation within a range of adapters is possible for hi-tech batteries.
The advantage of battery power is that the electricity can be produced from any source, and the batteries can be recycled when they die.
Hate to burst your bubble, but batteries can only be recharged so many times before the metal (usually lithium) is permanently spent. Recycling the metal is fruitless at that point since its been changed molecularly, thus making a very useful paperweight.
Not to mention the mining involved with finding lithium, nickel, cadmium etc...
I would also like to know how electric vehicles heat the interior of the car without being a huge drain on the battery. Heating elements are monstrous power drains.
Stormrider wrote:
I would also like to know how electric vehicles heat the interior of the car without being a huge drain on the battery. Heating elements are monstrous power drains.
Electric motors produce plenty of waste heat. There are variety of ways this could be stored for periods when they aren't running.
The advantage of battery power is that the electricity can be produced from any source, and the batteries can be recycled when they die.
Hate to burst your bubble, but batteries can only be recharged so many times before the metal (usually lithium) is permanently spent. Recycling the metal is fruitless at that point since its been changed molecularly, thus making a very useful paperweight.
Hmmm... The examples you chose for standardisation are not very relavant to the battery dilema. Infact most the parts you chose are replaceable, moderately easily, by the car owner themselves and by an independant garage, the standardistion of these parts is to ensure a measure of autonomy in the product, it is not profitable to constantly recall cars or make bespoke spares. There is no profit for the car company in fostering a bad reputatation for delivering spares. Plus the profit comes from the tyre not the mounting, the carbon vanadium triple phallus weave tyres etc, not the lug nutz.
They have ALOT of electro chemical cell ideas to try out, it will take a WHILE to develop it. Plus Petrol never had the goal of being an infinite resource hence why unleaded is as far as the development went but rechargable batteries cells do, there is ALOT of development still to go before we can think about standardisation. And who knows, if they can find a non -energy deficit way of storing hydrogen we will be driving hydro cars.
The advantage of battery power is that the electricity can be produced from any source, and the batteries can be recycled when they die.
Hate to burst your bubble, but batteries can only be recharged so many times before the metal (usually lithium) is permanently spent. Recycling the metal is fruitless at that point since its been changed molecularly, thus making a very useful paperweight.
Thats not how batteries work, the lithium metal is inherent to the process of electron transfer (very simplistically), it's destruction is not where the energy comes from. Thats the chemicals. The metal is highly reactive, but it's reusable if you can separate it from the... crap. That they put in LiOns.
So long as the the batteries were consistent shapes and voltages, I don't think there'd be a problem with new designs leaving them incompatible with existing cars.
The problem I see is if the batteries are made by different companies, there's going to be a quality difference, or one of cost, so someone could drive in with cheap, cruddy batteries in the car, only to have them replaced by top end, brand new ones, or vice versa, meaning either a lot of economic confusion, monopolies on who gets to manufacture them, or else a sort of "you don't own the batteries, you're just (effectively) renting them" sort of situation.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
The price would certainly have to come down for it to be viable, but I suppose it's sound in theory, if we don't get faster charging batteries/a workaround to the slow charge time sorted out before then.
Well, even if you get the price down to around 2000$ (about where I would consider the idea to be practical , on the grounds that its what I payed for my car), its still a major theft problem.
You'd have to get the things cheap enough that either the stations can afford insurance that will replace them, or the temptation to steal them is low enough that you don't need 4 well payed armed security guards to watch the station.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
They don't even cost that much now except maybe the tesla roadster, but that car is two hundred grand anyway. The leafs battery doesn't make up 120% of it's total cost.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
They don't even cost that much now except maybe the tesla roadster, but that car is two hundred grand anyway. The leafs battery doesn't make up 120% of it's total cost.
The Roadster is just over $100K, and doesn't the Leaf also have something like a fifth of the range?
Or we just ignore the hippies and their quest for green cars and keep driving our 60's and 70's muscle cars that don't give a rats ass about fuel economy and just sound and look good?
Make me a car that looks and sounds as good as a '65 Mustang GTO and is "green" and I'll consider buying it.
Fateweaver wrote:Or we just ignore the hippies and their quest for green cars and keep driving our 60's and 70's muscle cars that don't give a rats ass about fuel economy and just sound and look good?
Make me a car that looks and sounds as good as a '65 Mustang GTO and is "green" and I'll consider buying it.
filbert wrote:Hardly surprising really. The electric car market is an absolute joke and its really only because of pressure from the eco-nuts that these things ever made it to market. Under normal circumstances, any right thinking CEO would laugh the idea out of the office.
Its all very well wanting to cut emissions and carbon footprints but where is the sense in swapping petrol emissions for power plant emissions due to having to charge the damn things? And for the pedants, yes obviously the emissions total is reduced but still, its woolly thinking all the same.
Secondly, the tech just doesn't cut it. If I had a daily commute of 60 miles or so, why would I swap my high MPG diesel car for an electric car that I have to stop and charge up halfway for eight hours because it doesn't have the range?
An unfair assassment it is only significantly less green if you have fossil fuel based power stations. Electric cars would give a genuine environmental dividend in places with green and near free energy like Switzerland with so many opportunities for hydroelectric power.
The second thing to consider are the tax breaks for electric vehicles.
Third the technology is becoming less and less of a joke, it just hasn't caught on with the public yet. Storage and capacity has increased, costs have dropped and efficiency is going up. Give it time. This tech hasn't matured yet.
Last and most practically in the short term you ought to look at hybrids. Hybrids help enormously by being able to shunt to lectric power in heavy or slow moving traffic for a great increase in efficiency, IC engines are horribly inefficient in a stop-start role, as increasing congestion and it is anything but 'woolly thinking' to look at the environmental practicalities of a hybrid in urban traffic. Sure with fossil fuel based power stations and hybrds/electric cars you get pollution either way, but its a matter of where it is distributed, in a remote power station or on suburban streets.
Legislators look favourably at hybrids for a number of well sounded reasons, power on the open road with genuine sensible practicality in urban traffic. Got a hybrid, get a tax break, in London hybrids and electric cars are exempt from congestion charge. Other similar scheme also encourage electric cars.
I would definitely get a hybrid if I could afford one, most are kit cars though. Electric, I am not so sure, Nice idea but not practical for long distances, it would have to be a second car. But by no means is either a joke.
I don't think electric will catch on very soon, as internal combustion engines just get better and better:
To prove a point, John and Helen Taylor have just completed an around Australia road trip and averaged a record breaking 3.13L/100km or 90.75mpg. This figure gives the Peugeot 308 HDi a theoretical range of approximately 2000km! These figures also accounted for real world driving and were not conducted in a controlled laboratory environment.
Fateweaver wrote:Or we just ignore the hippies and their quest for green cars and keep driving our 60's and 70's muscle cars that don't give a rats ass about fuel economy and just sound and look good?
Make me a car that looks and sounds as good as a '65 Mustang GTO and is "green" and I'll consider buying it.
Can you even afford a '65 Mustang GTO?
Not me personally but given the choice between a '65 GTO or a 2011 Hybrid I'll take the GTO.
Fateweaver wrote:Or we just ignore the hippies and their quest for green cars and keep driving our 60's and 70's muscle cars that don't give a rats ass about fuel economy and just sound and look good?
Make me a car that looks and sounds as good as a '65 Mustang GTO and is "green" and I'll consider buying it.
Can you even afford a '65 Mustang GTO?
Not me personally but given the choice between a '65 GTO or a 2011 Hybrid I'll take the GTO.
I'm happy with my Nova SS.
So this isn't a choice you actually get to make, and yet you're basing your opinion of other peoples tastes and the general direction of research on a hypothetical comparison between several cars that you can not have on the premise that high value gas guzzling 'merican classic cars are inherently going to be better then electrics because you say so. Would it help if they just dropped the engine out of a Charger and put an electric motor in there? It's got the truck space for the batteries and the motors themselves are actually quite small for the amount of performance they put out. It would still steer like a boat though.
Is there a specific reason you hate the idea of electric cars (vehicles with theoretically much higher weight performance, vastly superior torque, far less maintenance needed, and much longer lasting)? Is it just because it's a "hippy thing"? I mean, cars can look like whatever the designers want, it's not like a battery pack doesn't fit in a muscle car frame.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
So? Why is that a challenge?
Because they're extremely expensive portable things that can be stolen. It's a security thing.
Kilkrazy wrote:So what? The point of changing batteries is to be able to exceed the range without stopping to charge.
Stopping to refuel every 40 miles? Seems somewhat impractical.
Because they're extremely expensive portable things that can be stolen. It's a security thing.
So's a car. People still rent those. Presumably it would function off of some sort of credit or ID based system with inbuilt securities and liabilities. That said it's an unrealistic concept that would require massive infrastructural investment on the order of total battery standardization, regulation, and the development and deployment of tens of thousands of charge stations all over the country (hundreds of thousands for the world). Its much more realistic to just plan for the development of fast charging batteries, something that many companies are working on as I write this. Building an infrastructure around a battery formats not the best idea in the first place, they tend to change too often for it to be practical. The battery will become practical before ownership of the car does, infrastructural development will follow proven technologies, not be created short term to deal with their inefficiencies. The investment simply wouldn't be there to implement a flawed technology nationally when easier alternatives exist.
Stopping to refuel every 40 miles? Seems somewhat impractical.
Given that battery storage has been on an accelerating upward curve for the last decade it's unlikely that will be the case for long. Hell, it's not even the case now.
Try to utilize more hyperbole, it will mask your lack of interface with the fields you're discussing.
Orlanth wrote:Got a hybrid, get a tax break, in London hybrids and electric cars are exempt from congestion charge. Other similar scheme also encourage electric cars.
The only problem with that is that as soon as most people have switched over, tax breaks stop and everyone goes back to paying again...
Orlanth wrote: An unfair assassment it is only significantly less green if you have fossil fuel based power stations. Electric cars would give a genuine environmental dividend in places with green and near free energy like Switzerland with so many opportunities for hydroelectric power.
The second thing to consider are the tax breaks for electric vehicles.
Third the technology is becoming less and less of a joke, it just hasn't caught on with the public yet. Storage and capacity has increased, costs have dropped and efficiency is going up. Give it time. This tech hasn't matured yet.
Last and most practically in the short term you ought to look at hybrids. Hybrids help enormously by being able to shunt to lectric power in heavy or slow moving traffic for a great increase in efficiency, IC engines are horribly inefficient in a stop-start role, as increasing congestion and it is anything but 'woolly thinking' to look at the environmental practicalities of a hybrid in urban traffic. Sure with fossil fuel based power stations and hybrds/electric cars you get pollution either way, but its a matter of where it is distributed, in a remote power station or on suburban streets.
Legislators look favourably at hybrids for a number of well sounded reasons, power on the open road with genuine sensible practicality in urban traffic. Got a hybrid, get a tax break, in London hybrids and electric cars are exempt from congestion charge. Other similar scheme also encourage electric cars.
I would definitely get a hybrid if I could afford one, most are kit cars though. Electric, I am not so sure, Nice idea but not practical for long distances, it would have to be a second car. But by no means is either a joke.
Actually, there is quite a heated debate over the Prius' green credentials. For example, a recent What Car? study found that a VW blue motion Polo diesel produces less carbon dioxide per kilometre than a Prius. Not only that, but there are serious environmental concerns and impacts from the mining that needs to take place to produce the nickel needed for the batteries. Another study claims that the average Prius owner needs to drive ~30,000 miles just to break even with the eco impact of producing the thing. So I wouldn't be touting its green credentials just yet. Like a lot of these things, its just a sop for people to think they are doing something positive and feel a little better about themselves when really its doing bugger all. If one were really concerned about saving the environment, one would bike everywhere, simple as that.
Its all well and good saying that electric cars are great when power is free but how many countries are at that state or anywhere near that situation yet? How many countries are heavily reliant and invested in solar and hydroelectric power? I know the UK government has given the green light to mass wind farms but that won't take shape for a decade or more and will still only be a drop in the ocean to fulfilling the UKs power demands. The bald facts are that very few countries are in a position to withdraw dependency on coal, gas and nuclear power.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
There would be few change stations methinks, and the cost would be high.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
So? Why is that a challenge?
The average gas station sells ~600 gallons per day. At an average of 25 miles per gallon, that's 15,000 miles the gas station is 'selling' every day. If we assume 8 hour charge cycle and a regular rollover, at 40 miles/charge, that means the average gas station would have to have 125 batteries in stock all the time, just to keep up with demand.
At $30,000 per part, that's $3.75 million in inventory sitting around every day, which is an incredible startup cost for what is essentially a small business.
Of course, that's assuming the gas station turns over it's inventory every 8 hours, and that they see an average amount of business daily. More likely, they'll have to (at least) double their inventory to account for low sales at night and on the weekdays. But taking into account the economy of scale, each service station would still have to have $3-4 million in inventory sitting around on a daily basis. From what I've been able to find, the average gas tank at a station is no more than 10,000 gallons ($40,000 in inventory).
This doesn't even take into account battery life, which would be a significant issue at these 'gas' stations.
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a simple solution to the battery problem.
Don't charge the battery, change the battery.
When you pull into the equivalent of a petrol station, there'll be a machine to replace the battery with a fresh one, and put the old one on charge. You'll pay for the difference in charge.
You'll be able to "fill up" just as fast as with a petrol pump.
There's the slight issue that you're changing out a $30000 (or more) part at said change station.
So? Why is that a challenge?
The average gas station sells ~600 gallons per day. At an average of 25 miles per gallon, that's 15,000 miles the gas station is 'selling' every day. If we assume 8 hour charge cycle and a regular rollover, at 40 miles/charge, that means the average gas station would have to have 125 batteries in stock all the time, just to keep up with demand.
At $30,000 per part, that's $3.75 million in inventory sitting around every day, which is an incredible startup cost for what is essentially a small business.
Of course, that's assuming the gas station turns over it's inventory every 8 hours, and that they see an average amount of business daily. More likely, they'll have to (at least) double their inventory to account for low sales at night and on the weekdays. But taking into account the economy of scale, each service station would still have to have $3-4 million in inventory sitting around on a daily basis. From what I've been able to find, the average gas tank at a station is no more than 10,000 gallons ($40,000 in inventory).
This doesn't even take into account battery life, which would be a significant issue at these 'gas' stations.
Battery swaps are a strawman arguement, don't get suckered into it, don't get suckered into trying to figure out a way for it to work, because battery swaps are a complete non option due to the is a huge difference in value between batteries depending onits conditions. There are however 2 very viable options.
Option #1 extended range electric vehicles aka series hybrid aka electric car with a fossel fuel powered electric generator.
Option #2 live with the range of an electric vehicle. As a 2nd car in a 2 car household being used to drive to and from work and around town the range of an electric vehicle is no problem. If option #2 isn't an option for your lifestyle option #1 still is an option.
I don't think battery swaps are a straw man and I disagree with some of biccat's assumptions.
1. The majority of car journeys are short range within a city, and can be done within the range of a current electric car. Most drivers therefore will be able to charge overnight at home. They will only need to go to a battery change station when making a long distance journey.
(This is your point 2, basically.)
Also, charging points could be built into parking meters, so you charge as you park, and pay for both at the same time.
2. The average gas station sells X per day partly because petrol cars keep burning fuel all the time while braking or in traffic jams. Electric cars consume no current in a jam (except lights, etc.)
Because of 1 and 2, you wouldn't need as many battery changing stations in cities as you need petrol stations, and your stock of batteries would be lower.
3. You assume a cost per battery of $30,000. That is a more than the current Leaf batteries cost, without having gone into volume production. It is not unreasonable to assume that the cost of batteries will fall considerably as the technology improves.
4. Petrol stations not only have to pay for fuel, (three or four different types) they have to pay for the storage, pumps, and the tankers which bring refills. A lot of these costs would be reduced by electric
5. I don't know about the US, but in the UK, practically all petrol stations are owned by major oil companies who would be very capable of repurposing existing stations to electric, especially if they can sell off a significant amount of their current land holdings which will no longer be required.
Of course, I am making a number of assumptions here which could be incorrect. Only time will tell.
Kilkrazy wrote:I don't think battery swaps are a straw man and I disagree with some of biccat's assumptions.
IMO battery swaps could work, but not with : a) current battery technology; b) current car design; and c) current range.
Kilkrazy wrote:1. The majority of car journeys are short range within a city, and can be done within the range of a current electric car. Most drivers therefore will be able to charge overnight at home. They will only need to go to a battery change station when making a long distance journey.
(This is your point 2, basically.)
Also, charging points could be built into parking meters, so you charge as you park, and pay for both at the same time.
Not really feasable at 8 hours per charge (I doubt most people park at a meter for 8 hours). But even if you assume charge while you work/sleep, there's still a large number of people who drive more than 40 miles to work or use service stations continuously.
Kilkrazy wrote:2. The average gas station sells X per day partly because petrol cars keep burning fuel all the time while braking or in traffic jams. Electric cars consume no current in a jam (except lights, etc.)
True, but petrol cars also ramp down significantly when in traffic, which significantly reduces fuel consumption.
Kilkrazy wrote:Because of 1 and 2, you wouldn't need as many battery changing stations in cities as you need petrol stations, and your stock of batteries would be lower.
Not sure how to quantify this. But lets say half. That still leaves $2 million in "inventory" sitting around.
Kilkrazy wrote:3. You assume a cost per battery of $30,000. That is a more than the current Leaf batteries cost, without having gone into volume production. It is not unreasonable to assume that the cost of batteries will fall considerably as the technology improves.
I think the balance of # of batteries required vs. cost/battery would offset one another. Battery price might go down, but you also need more than exactly the number of batteries to service the average number of customers.
Breakdowns, surges in demand, and inventory rollover will require more batteries.
Kilkrazy wrote:4. Petrol stations not only have to pay for fuel, (three or four different types) they have to pay for the storage, pumps, and the tankers which bring refills. A lot of these costs would be reduced by electric
I doubt they'll be reduced by electric by very much. You still have the problem of disposal, cost of electricity, adding new electrical transmission lines, replacement parts, storage, and whatever it costs for a machine to replace the batteries.
Kilkrazy wrote:5. I don't know about the US, but in the UK, practically all petrol stations are owned by major oil companies who would be very capable of repurposing existing stations to electric, especially if they can sell off a significant amount of their current land holdings which will no longer be required.
In the US, most petrol/gas stations aren't actually owned by major oil companies, but instead by small independent operators who are franchisees of the major oil companies. I assume this is the case elsewhere, and when you see a "BP" sign, it's not really owned by BP.
Not sure what you're talking about "land holdings." I can't see stations decreasing in size very much (still need convenience centers and room to service 4-8 cars at a time). If you're talking about harvesting operations, fossil fuels are going to be used for a long time, so I can't see the major oil companies changing their positions drastically.
Kilkrazy wrote:Of course, I am making a number of assumptions here which could be incorrect. Only time will tell.
One issue that wasn't even addressed is: how do you make a battery easily replaceable? I assume the limitation of 40-100 miles isn't because the designers wanted a small compact battery, but rather because that's all the battery they could cram into the car at an affordable price. So how hard will it be for an automated machine to remove and replace the battery?
When I refill my car, I figure it adds ~15 minutes to my trip, and required every 300 miles. Will it take 2 minutes to replace a battery?
Since we disagree about a number of basic assumptions I will only respond to your final point.
I am assuming that electric cars will be designed so that the battery pack can be extracted and replaced fairly quickly. Ideally it should be done as simply as driving your car over the pit, waiting a couple of minutes, then driving off. Modern engineering can come up with something to make that possible.
Kilkrazy wrote:I don't think battery swaps are a straw man and I disagree with some of biccat's assumptions.
1. The majority of car journeys are short range within a city, and can be done within the range of a current electric car. Most drivers therefore will be able to charge overnight at home. They will only need to go to a battery change station when making a long distance journey.
(This is your point 2, basically.)
Also, charging points could be built into parking meters, so you charge as you park, and pay for both at the same time.
2. The average gas station sells X per day partly because petrol cars keep burning fuel all the time while braking or in traffic jams. Electric cars consume no current in a jam (except lights, etc.)
Because of 1 and 2, you wouldn't need as many battery changing stations in cities as you need petrol stations, and your stock of batteries would be lower.
3. You assume a cost per battery of $30,000. That is a more than the current Leaf batteries cost, without having gone into volume production. It is not unreasonable to assume that the cost of batteries will fall considerably as the technology improves.
4. Petrol stations not only have to pay for fuel, (three or four different types) they have to pay for the storage, pumps, and the tankers which bring refills. A lot of these costs would be reduced by electric
5. I don't know about the US, but in the UK, practically all petrol stations are owned by major oil companies who would be very capable of repurposing existing stations to electric, especially if they can sell off a significant amount of their current land holdings which will no longer be required.
Of course, I am making a number of assumptions here which could be incorrect. Only time will tell.
Battery swaps is a strawman argument because massed battery swaps would have more serious logistic problems than just about any other solution, and it is used as a tactic to distract people from more viable options. The most serious problem with battery swaps is how much more valuable a less used battery is than a heavily used one. Because batteries vary so much in value a serious diagnostic test would need to be performed on any batteries that are going to be swapped, and at that point the diagnostic is going to take so long that the car owner may as well just charge his car.
It would also make more sense to attach a small rental trailer that contains an electric generator to an electric car if you're going to move cross country with it. As an added bonus it would have a bit more cargo room for a move.
On #3) The $30,000 price tag on the Leaf's battery was completely pulled out of somebody's butt. The leaf costs about 32k in Japan, which should spread some serious doubt about a 30k price tag on the battery.
On #4) The higher costs of running gasoline stations over electric is no big deal to the oil companies because they just pass the added costs onto the consumer. All of those problems you listed are the store owner's problems, not the oil companies. Also note I'm not sure how things work in the UK but in the USA owners of gas stations make crap money on fuel, perhaps 10 cents or so a gallon of net profit after the oil company, credit card companies, and banks (for debit cards) take their share of the pie. They actually make more money on booze, cigarettes, drinks, and junk food than they do fuel.
On #5 In the US most gas stations are owned by small business owners that only get a small piece of the pie. Neither US nor UK oil companies have any desire to retool their plants to sell the electric companies energy when they make a gakload of money drilling and refining oil. Oil companies are in the business of doing 1 thing: Selling oil. Anything that reduces oil sales is bad for their bottom line, and the only logical thing for them to do is fight against anything that would reduce oil sales.
Kilkrazy wrote:Since we disagree about a number of basic assumptions I will only respond to your final point.
I am assuming that electric cars will be designed so that the battery pack can be extracted and replaced fairly quickly. Ideally it should be done as simply as driving your car over the pit, waiting a couple of minutes, then driving off. Modern engineering can come up with something to make that possible.
I don't think we disagree, more that we agree that there's no idea how to measure this type of thing.
I think that the start-up cost of this type of station would be more expensive, mainly because oil is cheap and current battery technology is less efficient (on a charge per mile basis). Early gas stations were probably pretty expensive too.
I also think that the operation cost of such a station would be about the same. You don't have to pay for tanker trucks, but you also have to have someone to change out batteries, and have a lot more power delivered to your gas station.
Sure, doesn't have to be any more time consuming than getting gas. The problem is the 1 gallon tank (equivalent) that the economy electrics like the leaf have.
As batteries get better the economy cars could get a better range and solve that problem, but then you have to keep the current issue that the batteries (even the economy batteries) cost more than a used car.
The leaf actually averages slightly over 70 miles on a charge with a worse case scenario being about 47 miles with most of the loss being from the AC.
If people can charge their car at work the limited range should be absolutely no problem for the vast majority of drivers. The vast majority of all driving is on very small trips.
The real problem with pure electric vehicles is it's hard for them to compete against an extended range electric vehicle (EREV). As previously stated the vast majority of driving is on very small trips. With EREV small trips are made entirely on the battery without the gasoline engine kicking in, once the battery is nearly drained a gas power electric generator starts making the juice. If 90% of an owners driving is on very small trips, 10% are long trips with the engine on, and the car gets 50 MPG with the engine on then the car only needs 1 gallon of gas to go 500 miles as 450 of those miles were small trips powered by electric.
Kilkrazy wrote:Since we disagree about a number of basic assumptions I will only respond to your final point.
I am assuming that electric cars will be designed so that the battery pack can be extracted and replaced fairly quickly. Ideally it should be done as simply as driving your car over the pit, waiting a couple of minutes, then driving off. Modern engineering can come up with something to make that possible.
I don't think we disagree, more that we agree that there's no idea how to measure this type of thing.
I think that the start-up cost of this type of station would be more expensive, mainly because oil is cheap and current battery technology is less efficient (on a charge per mile basis). Early gas stations were probably pretty expensive too.
I also think that the operation cost of such a station would be about the same. You don't have to pay for tanker trucks, but you also have to have someone to change out batteries, and have a lot more power delivered to your gas station.
I think that oil is likely to become more expensive in the future, while battery technology will improve.
I think these sorts of factors can be measured. That is what management accounting is for. Unfortunately, we don't have the figures needed to build a convincing case either way.
schadenfreude wrote:The vast majority of all driving around here is on very small trips.
Fixed that for you.
I have to drive my daughter to her bus stop each morning and pick her up each afternoon at 14 miles each way for almost 60 miles a day just for that. Her school is another 30 miles away but the bus handles taht. Work is over 40 miles each way. The closest Walmart is over 20 miles away. When my wife is not deployed she has to drive from Ft Bragg to Ft Stewart and then back each weekend to come 'home'. (over 500 miles for the weekend on that vehicle).
When my wife was stationed at Ft McPherson (Atlanta) she lived about 45 miles from the office and drove 'home' to Ft Gordon on weekends to be with the family.
When we were in El Paso it was a 50 mile drive from the house to Macgregor range (where I passed 1 gas station) where I worked and a 20+ mile drive from the house to Biggs army airfield where my wife worked.
America has many rural areas where distances are even further.
Kilkrazy wrote:I think that oil is likely to become more expensive in the future, while battery technology will improve.
Certainly. Oil is not an unlimited resource, and will eventually run out. How far in the future is the question. There's also the issue that as oil gets more expensive, certain methods of obtaining oil (shale) become more economically feasable, thereby increasing the supply.
Technology will increase, and when oil becomes more expensive than an electric vehicle, the electric will win out. Whether the government intervenes (including tax breaks), we're eventually going to move away from gasoline-based transport.
Kilkrazy wrote:I think these sorts of factors can be measured. That is what management accounting is for. Unfortunately, we don't have the figures needed to build a convincing case either way.
Agreed. But like you said, oil is going to get more expensive while batteries will get cheaper. It doesn't make economic sense now, but once it does (hopefully without government assistance) you'll see "electric filling stations" popping up everywhere.
Unless solar cars or something else comes along first.
schadenfreude wrote:The vast majority of all driving around here is on very small trips.
Fixed that for you.
I have to drive my daughter to her bus stop each morning and pick her up each afternoon at 14 miles each way for almost 60 miles a day just for that. Her school is another 30 miles away but the bus handles taht. Work is over 40 miles each way. The closest Walmart is over 20 miles away. When my wife is not deployed she has to drive from Ft Bragg to Ft Stewart and then back each weekend to come 'home'. (over 500 miles for the weekend on that vehicle).
When my wife was stationed at Ft McPherson (Atlanta) she lived about 45 miles from the office and drove 'home' to Ft Gordon on weekends to be with the family.
When we were in El Paso it was a 50 mile drive from the house to Macgregor range (where I passed 1 gas station) where I worked and a 20+ mile drive from the house to Biggs army airfield where my wife worked.
America has many rural areas where distances are even further.
That's the problem with America. My brother and his wife both have cars because there is no public transport in the town where they live (Eugene, Oregon) and it is large enough that they could not walk to work. They could do it all with electric cars, though.
Perhaps the rest of the world will change to electric cars and leave the oil for rural Americans.
schadenfreude wrote:The vast majority of all driving around here is on very small trips.
Fixed that for you.
I have to drive my daughter to her bus stop each morning and pick her up each afternoon at 14 miles each way for almost 60 miles a day just for that. Her school is another 30 miles away but the bus handles taht. Work is over 40 miles each way. The closest Walmart is over 20 miles away. When my wife is not deployed she has to drive from Ft Bragg to Ft Stewart and then back each weekend to come 'home'. (over 500 miles for the weekend on that vehicle).
When my wife was stationed at Ft McPherson (Atlanta) she lived about 45 miles from the office and drove 'home' to Ft Gordon on weekends to be with the family.
When we were in El Paso it was a 50 mile drive from the house to Macgregor range (where I passed 1 gas station) where I worked and a 20+ mile drive from the house to Biggs army airfield where my wife worked.
America has many rural areas where distances are even further.
The vast majority of driving is on very small trips, I fixed it back for you because I was correct the first time. City slickers outnumber country bumpkins. You're in the minority, so for every person like you there are far more people like me. I drive less than 10 miles to work and almost all of my driving tends to be very short trips. If people like me vastly outnumber people like you then the vast majority of people drive on very small trips, and thus the vast majority of driving is on very small trips.
80 mile round trips to work are still good for an EREV. I had about the same drive between 2006 and 2007 when I lived in BFE so I know what you are talking about. The next generation plug in Prius has 15 miles worth of juice in it's battery, so if you can plug it in at work that knocks an 80 mile commute down to a 50 miles commute on gas +30 miles on electric. The current Prius gets 50mpg which means you could get down to1 gallon of gas per day for your commute. The technology can work for you.
schadenfreude wrote:The vast majority of all driving around here is on very small trips.
Fixed that for you.
I have to drive my daughter to her bus stop each morning and pick her up each afternoon at 14 miles each way for almost 60 miles a day just for that. Her school is another 30 miles away but the bus handles taht. Work is over 40 miles each way. The closest Walmart is over 20 miles away. When my wife is not deployed she has to drive from Ft Bragg to Ft Stewart and then back each weekend to come 'home'. (over 500 miles for the weekend on that vehicle).
When my wife was stationed at Ft McPherson (Atlanta) she lived about 45 miles from the office and drove 'home' to Ft Gordon on weekends to be with the family.
When we were in El Paso it was a 50 mile drive from the house to Macgregor range (where I passed 1 gas station) where I worked and a 20+ mile drive from the house to Biggs army airfield where my wife worked.
America has many rural areas where distances are even further.
The vast majority of driving is on very small trips, I fixed it back for you because I was correct the first time. City slickers outnumber country bumpkins. You're in the minority, so for every person like you there are far more people like me. I drive less than 10 miles to work and almost all of my driving tends to be very short trips. If people like me vastly outnumber people like you then the vast majority of people drive on very small trips, and thus the vast majority of driving is on very small trips.
80 mile round trips to work are still good for an EREV. I had about the same drive between 2006 and 2007 when I lived in BFE so I know what you are talking about. The next generation plug in Prius has 15 miles worth of juice in it's battery, so if you can plug it in at work that knocks an 80 mile commute down to a 50 miles commute on gas +30 miles on electric. The current Prius gets 50mpg which means you could get down to1 gallon of gas per day for your commute. The technology can work for you.
50MPG? My bike (2011 Rocker-C) gets about 55 and is all gas. Heck, the wife's 'vette gets about 30 on the highway and 20 + city. Hightech gas engines will be getting 50 MPG or better way before the infrastructure is in place to support all electric even in cities. Many new non-hybrid cars are easily getting high 20s to mid 30s MPG city and highway today. And they are currently cheaper to run by far than a hybrid when lifecycle costs are figured in.
And my point in an earlier post about hauling still holds. Show me any electric vehicle in the next 15 years that can replace the F350 we use to haul horses and hay (and other stuff). Crossing the rockies with a full four horse trailer is gonna be a nice trick for an electric vehicle. Hell, pulling a fenceline tight across a muddy pasture would be a trick with an electric vehicle.
Next, what happens to the electric car that runs out of juice (stuck in a traffic jam on a cold day)? You can't just dump a gallon of gas in it to get to the next gas station. Yeah, eventually tech may solve that issue, but not soon.
Now, how many big urban areas have power grid issues now? Brownouts and such. Think their infrastructure is going to support going electric for their transportation?
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/planning/census/cps2k.htm According to the 2000 census, only about 60% of Americans lived in cities with over 200K population. I'll grant you that is more than half, but there are still a LOT of folks in small towns, suburban areas outside cities, and rural communities that have commutes that are going to make going all electric a pain.
schadenfreude wrote:The vast majority of all driving around here is on very small trips.
Fixed that for you.
I have to drive my daughter to her bus stop each morning and pick her up each afternoon at 14 miles each way for almost 60 miles a day just for that. Her school is another 30 miles away but the bus handles taht. Work is over 40 miles each way. The closest Walmart is over 20 miles away. When my wife is not deployed she has to drive from Ft Bragg to Ft Stewart and then back each weekend to come 'home'. (over 500 miles for the weekend on that vehicle).
When my wife was stationed at Ft McPherson (Atlanta) she lived about 45 miles from the office and drove 'home' to Ft Gordon on weekends to be with the family.
When we were in El Paso it was a 50 mile drive from the house to Macgregor range (where I passed 1 gas station) where I worked and a 20+ mile drive from the house to Biggs army airfield where my wife worked.
America has many rural areas where distances are even further.
The vast majority of driving is on very small trips, I fixed it back for you because I was correct the first time. City slickers outnumber country bumpkins. You're in the minority, so for every person like you there are far more people like me. I drive less than 10 miles to work and almost all of my driving tends to be very short trips. If people like me vastly outnumber people like you then the vast majority of people drive on very small trips, and thus the vast majority of driving is on very small trips.
80 mile round trips to work are still good for an EREV. I had about the same drive between 2006 and 2007 when I lived in BFE so I know what you are talking about. The next generation plug in Prius has 15 miles worth of juice in it's battery, so if you can plug it in at work that knocks an 80 mile commute down to a 50 miles commute on gas +30 miles on electric. The current Prius gets 50mpg which means you could get down to1 gallon of gas per day for your commute. The technology can work for you.
50MPG? My bike (2011 Rocker-C) gets about 55 and is all gas. Heck, the wife's 'vette gets about 30 on the highway and 20 + city. Hightech gas engines will be getting 50 MPG or better way before the infrastructure is in place to support all electric even in cities. Many new non-hybrid cars are easily getting high 20s to mid 30s MPG city and highway today. And they are currently cheaper to run by far than a hybrid when lifecycle costs are figured in.
And my point in an earlier post about hauling still holds. Show me any electric vehicle in the next 15 years that can replace the F350 we use to haul horses and hay (and other stuff). Crossing the rockies with a full four horse trailer is gonna be a nice trick for an electric vehicle. Hell, pulling a fenceline tight across a muddy pasture would be a trick with an electric vehicle.
Next, what happens to the electric car that runs out of juice (stuck in a traffic jam on a cold day)? You can't just dump a gallon of gas in it to get to the next gas station. Yeah, eventually tech may solve that issue, but not soon.
Now, how many big urban areas have power grid issues now? Brownouts and such. Think their infrastructure is going to support going electric for their transportation?
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/planning/census/cps2k.htm According to the 2000 census, only about 60% of Americans lived in cities with over 200K population. I'll grant you that is more than half, but there are still a LOT of folks in small towns, suburban areas outside cities, and rural communities that have commutes that are going to make going all electric a pain.
Jake
Your bike gets better MPG than a prius because it's smaller. 3 wheel EREV cars that classify as bikes like the Aptera get over 100 MPG and are larger than your bike.
The suburbs is part of a city, it's not rural at all. School and a Wal Mart are always within spitting distance in the burbs. 80% of the country lives in urban or suburban areas, and only 20% is rural.
The F350 can't be replaced by electric, but the vast majority of F350 sales goes to suburbainites who use it to commute to and from work, never haul anything with it, and maintain a pristine truck bed that doesn't have a scratch. Very few F350 trucks actually work for a living, and in southern California girls in a thong bikini riding on the back of a bike down the freeway is a more common sight than F350's actually hauling something. Trucks that actually work for a living within city limits tend to be very light ones like a ford ranger or beat up old toyota, and as previously established most Americans live in cities or suburbs. For the most part people in urban/suburban areas who buy trucks like a F350 or Tundra so they can go around tailgaiting smaller vehicles at 75MPH and still see over the other car because the higher visibility makes them "A better driver" Once again sometimes people in a rural area actually put a F350 to work potentially scratching it's bed, but like I said we city slickers outnumber you 4 to 1.
What happens when EREV run out of juice in the battery? The internal combustion engine turns on and generates electricity using gasoline or diesel. Nobody is stuck out in the middle of nowhere.
As far as the power grid goes there are some simple answers that don't involve replacing our entire power grid with a fictional all green power grid that runs entirely on solar, wind, and unicorn farts.
#1) Raise the cost of electricity and let the free market settle. Curly Q light bulbs and other energy savers become more attractive once electric rates go up.
As far as the power grid goes there are some simple answers that don't involve replacing our entire power grid with a fictional all green power grid that runs entirely on solar, wind, and unicorn farts.
At this point many people consider nuclear to be a green alternative. So it would be solar, wind, and nuclear. Nuclear being the actual functional workhorse, something thats been better then coal in almost every respect for decades. The bans already been partially overturned. Also, as an aside, most economists would tell you that artificially raising the price of energy is one of the most destructive things you can do to a recovering economy.
CptJake wrote:50MPG? My bike (2011 Rocker-C) gets about 55 and is all gas. Heck, the wife's 'vette gets about 30 on the highway and 20 + city. Hightech gas engines will be getting 50 MPG or better way before the infrastructure is in place to support all electric even in cities. Many new non-hybrid cars are easily getting high 20s to mid 30s MPG city and highway today. And they are currently cheaper to run by far than a hybrid when lifecycle costs are figured in.
I've never heard of a Harley getting 50 mpg - even modern V-twins suffer from poor fuel consumption, and the antiquated air-cooled designs that HD use are nowhere near efficient. Something about the size of the cylinder and speed of the burn means that fuel at the edges of the cylinder don't get ignited (or ignites too late); that is why some vehicle manufacturers use twinspark designs or various injection setups to atomise the fuel better. I've also heard (from a dyno operator at a HD/chopper garage) that HD purposely put the ignition or valve timing out (can't remember which) to give it its distinctive sound, at the expensive of engine performance.
There are diesel engines already getting 75MPG (claimed, Ford Fiesta with low rolling resistance tyres); my diesel Civic is averaging nearly 52MPG (although I drive like a judge at the moment). It's only America I'm aware of that has a fascination with large inefficient engines. 'High 20s to mid 30s MPG' is abysmal (OK, depends a lot on the city).
With regards pulling horses and fencelines, it's all down to torque and gearing - I've heard of a 2-wheel drive 125cc bike that could pull several tonnes because it produced so much torque and was low-geared. It all depends on the motor and the vehicle - there's plenty of electric trains around the world.
CptJake wrote:50MPG? My bike (2011 Rocker-C) gets about 55 and is all gas.
Comparing a bike to a four door car is simultaneously silly and also possibly a big step towards significantly reducing fuel usage.
It's very wasteful for people to keep driving family cars to and from work each day, carrying just themselves. People complain about SUVs because they're obnoxious fuel wasters, and fair enough, but is a family sedan carrying just one person really that much better?
Perhaps more people need to start using bikes or small one man vehicles to commute?
Then of course there's the idea of more people using public transport to get to work.
And my point in an earlier post about hauling still holds. Show me any electric vehicle in the next 15 years that can replace the F350 we use to haul horses and hay (and other stuff).
There's no reason electric vehicles would need to replace any and all vehicles. Hell, we could still have muscle cars and the like burning up what's left of our precious petrol. What matters is that the bulk of dirving gets done with a lot less petrol, because the cost of that stuff is only going to go up and up.
Ulver wrote:
I've never heard of a Harley getting 50 mpg - even modern V-twins suffer from poor fuel consumption, and the antiquated air-cooled designs that HD use are nowhere near efficient. Something about the size of the cylinder and speed of the burn means that fuel at the edges of the cylinder don't get ignited (or ignites too late); that is why some vehicle manufacturers use twinspark designs or various injection setups to atomise the fuel better. I've also heard (from a dyno operator at a HD/chopper garage) that HD purposely put the ignition or valve timing out (can't remember which) to give it its distinctive sound, at the expensive of engine performance.
The specs say 54 MPG highway. And by the way, that is a 96ci engine. Computer controlled fuel injection does a lot for it. Mine is tuned to the custom pipes and the Screaming Eagle Aircleaner and actually does better than spec as a result. I also submit the dyno operator you talked to is wrong. One of my buddies owns/runs a custom shop around here and I am buddies with the mechs at the Harley shop and they would strongly dispute that statement. My last bike was a custom with a 96ci S&S engine (one in my profile pic), and it was even more 'Harley' sounding than any Harley out there by the way.
tl;dr. Sorry if this was already posted but there are fundimental differences between the Leaf and Volt.
The leaf is a complete electric car, plug it in and charge it up; When it runs out of juice you're stuck.
Volt is a series hybrid (as opposed to the prius, a parallel hybrid). You charge it up and get 40 miles, zero gas. If you drive less than 20 miles one way you will never, ever use gas. If you need to drive more than 40 miles between charges the ICE (internal combustion engine) kicks in and recharges the batteries, giving you as much range as a normal car, as you can just stop at the next exit and get more gas.
So, the volt is the best of both worlds. You could in theory never put gas in it assuming you charge it regularly. Or you could drive it across country if you went on the occasional vacation.
Worms
P.S. I want to mention the Prius doesn't get plugged in, but it always uses gas (Well unless the batteries are sufficiently charged, and you're going low enough speeds... even then you may only get a mile or 3 before you start using gas).
Second, I think you could well be right 
