Electric cars are a pipe dream

Hey, I did the same!! I pointed out that the Rav-4 EV of '98 was as good as the Leaf, so no improvement in the last 12 years!!

We are really trying to look at the thechnological advancements, but they are slow and rather insignifficant.

And anybody who brings up the Tesla is an outright idiot...

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

I thought EVs want to REPLACE gascars. Cars of today do go 80 mph, just so you know. If we just want a little commuting toy, we might as well just buy a moped or bicycle. >> No charging, no oil on the driveway, small parking space,etc...

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Yes. That they can go farer with bigger loads, without increasing the size of the batteries...

You know, for 12.5K the government could distribute a cheap ICE car for free. Or mopeds and there would be leftover money for Christmas...

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

The point is that let's not count on government subsidies, because that money still has to come from somewhere....

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Than they would not be supporting the creation of new infrastructure and energy independence of the nation, might as well just throw money directly to Saudi Arabia.

That "point" does not derive from it premise.

 

Nevertheless it is still VALID.

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

Sure.

One by one.

Why YES they can.
In fact mass transportation during morning/evening commutes will be their strong suit. They get charged over night, they drive a known distance that their batteries can handle, they get charged again while the person is at work and they get them home, with enough spare power to stop by the grocery store for a gallon on milk.
This in fact is their sweet spot, and they will probably be used by the millions for this very use within a few decades. Will they totally replace ICs? No, but what will likely replace the majority of ICEs and hybrids will be more on the line of the Chevy Volt, an Extended Range Electric Vehicle with an onboard charger. BUT, it is expected that 80% or so of the miles a typical driver puts on a Volt type auto will be battery powered. So it is also a huge shift to EVs (and it is not a hybrid since the IC does not interact with the drivetrain)

You could restate that in a more reasonable way: EVs can fill a large niche defined by their range and time to recharge. Their range has indeed improved dramatically per pound of battery storage in the last 100 years. There are battery swap technologies that could be used for fleet vehicles (and even commuters) that could drop the recharge time down to minutes. Their price is expensive only in relation to relatively cheap gas. As the price of gas goes up, they become relatively cheaper to operate. Everyone expects their cost of maintainence to be quite a bit lower than an IC car (No ignition system, no fuel injection, no fuel tank/pump, no transmission, no exhaust system, no cooling system etc).

Right, no one said long haul trucks are a good candidate for battery power, though there are quite a bit of battery operated machinery already in use (fork lifts are very often battery powered for instance). As to source of Electricity, today ~50% of electricity comes from coal, but one can also generate large quantities of electricity from Nuclear, Wind, Solar and Hydro, so the future does not have to be the same as the past.

In any case, the govt is set on seeing if this techology is viable and they are footing the bill for a LOT of charging infrastructure to run the first large scale trial using the Leaf.

We shall see.

Arthur

 

Yes, but it requires using 480 V DC 125 amps. What brainiac is going to put that anywhere near a regular petrol pump?

Nobody. Which means to make use of that, totally separate infrastructure needs to be built, away from the petrol pumps. That's going to cost money.

Your comparison between TV sets doesn't apply to EVs and petrol cars btw. Here's an example of why not: in 1903 the Wright Bros could fly 61metres, less than 50 years later, the Comet could fly 5,190 km, meaning by now, Commercial jets should be able to fly 441,575,409km. That's nearly a round trip to the Moon. Such arithmetic progressions of progress do not hold, do they?

 

Exactly,... the majority of car journeys in the UK are under 4 miles, so one of these:

http://www.fun2ride.co.uk/v2/tricycle.html

Would be perfect for most people. Cheap, no license requirements, fairly practical as it can take two passengers, and shopping, ...

... so how many have I seen on the roads?

None. Because people can pick up an old 2nd hand petrol car for the same money, and use it on Motorways too.

Technology is supposed to bring us advancements. Limited range, increased fuelling time, and lower top speed are not improvements. Why do the EV proponents here not see that?

 

Why not?
The connection can easily be designed so no spark is ever produced, which is in fact possible today from just static electricity in normal cars (that's why they say don't get back in your car till you have finished pumping the gas).

Of course the infrastructure for charging is going to cost money, but so what, the cost of the infrastructure will be part of the cost of the elecricity one charges up with, and in fact you will pay more per watt the faster you get recharged.

So?

Arthur

 

Sorry arthur, but there have been EVs capable of taking care of the daily commute for some time, and people just aren't buying them.

Because they are SHIT. Take this:

http://www.goingreen.co.uk/store/product_list/68

Ten grand for that? With the same budget there are a plethora of small petrol engined cars that are cheap to run, AND can do long motorway journeys.

Here's an interesting read about EV's, ... depreciation rates, something else to factor into ownership and cost recovery figures.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring...ctric-car-buyers-theyll-plummet-in-value.html

 

You'll never get the Health and Safety committees to agree Electrical charging next to petrol fumes, period.

Hell, you aren't even allowed to use a mobile phone by petrol pumps, and they emit 700mw max, and have batteries that supply just a few volts, so a 60Kw line ain't gonna happen.

 

Well you seem to be dealing with an All or Nothing way of looking at it.

EVs don't have to replace ALL cars to have a HUGE impact.

I don't think anyone expects them to replace all cars.

But there are more cars on the road in the US than there are drivers.

So clearly there is room for an EV with an ACCEPTABLE range and and ACCEPTABLE top speed and an ACCEPTABLE cost per mile to make a significant contribution to our transportation needs.

So, will people who have to rely on just one car per household get an EV?
Probably not.
But, once a household gets to two cars the option becomes much more viable does it not?
What about for a three car household, where one of the cars is for the teenage driver?

See what I mean.

Finally people seem to be leaving out of the discussion the Chevy Volt type technology, this is very much an EV with onboard recharging capability and it has no range limitations (in fact is typically greater than an ICE alone) has no inherent top speed limitations and yet in typical use would produce the majority of it's vehicle miles using grid based electricity.

http://www.chevrolet.com/pages/open/default/future/volt.do

Arthur

 

They don't have to be right next to it, to be at the same facility.
Look at your typical gas station, there is usually plenty of room to separate the gas pumps from the electrical stations by 30 or more feet.

Sure there will be proximity restrictions but they will also be reasonable and based on actual physics.

Arthur

 

Sucks to be you then.

Very interesting, so everyone in UK is disobeying speed limit laws? Considering the national speed limit in the UK is 70 mph?

Way ahead of you. I don't own a car, just a bike.

Sure, when they make SUV and Truck PHEV.

Never said they would.

Then your city should start putting up charging stations.

What, you want a Smart Car? Sure I was going at 15k, but you can recalculate for 10k, just drop both values by 1/3 and subtract.

This is a early adoption issue, considering the electric cars make grid storage possible, plug in station will become ubiquitous as the only way to utilize the increased intermittent renewable energy sources like wind, solar and wave. Cities will build charging station and actually pay you for use of your battery as a gird storage utility.

Then you don't need a car do you? Oh you need it for luxury, as the world energy crisis hits us you honestly think you will retain the luxury go out to the beach with kids and tow a camper, I think you will be working hard enough just to keep the house warm in winter!

Tell that to a train, there is a reason why cargo trains are all diesel electric hybrids. The diesel engine lacks the torque to move a train from dead stop, but the electric motor can do so easy without switching gears. So the diesel engine spins a generator which then powers the electric motors so the train can move from dead stop to what ever speed. Add in batteries and you only need the diesel to be able to power the vechile while its in motion, not to accelerate, the engine can be much smaller and its parasitic loses reduced dramatically, that the concept of a serial electric hybrid, like The Chevy Volt.

No that electronically limited top speed. Again you need to understand the nature of electric motors, and stop thinking in terms of a ICE. Its not the the electric motor won't have any power at that speed, its that the bearings won't be able to withstand faster rpms, there no shifter remember, that car going from 0-87 mph without shifting gears. So I doubt the car would have any trouble moving at 80 mph with a full load.

Oh I'm all for that, but if you get a PHEV you can have both bio-fuels and electrics, then your bets are well hedged. In the short term biofuels could take a small percentage out of oil usage invisibly mix with petroleum based fuels, in the long term it can only replace a percentage of our energy usage, not unless we get algae farming going. Both ways your stuck with infrastructure change.

With electrics all the infrastructure change is at the user end, the power grid and power plants could supply the energy with minimal change as long as there is smart charging, but charging stations and EV will need to be purchased by end users. With biofuels energy crops will need to be grown, harvested, converted into fuels and distributed to fueling stations but the cars them selves can remain relatively unchanged. Energy crop needs though will be staggering! For the USA, just to make up the estimated 2.6x10^10 GJ energy usage increase from 2000 to 2020 would require 43-76% of the US total bioenergy reserves, we would need 50%-60% more cropland growing energy crops just to supply the increase in energy demand, we would need 4 times as much to replace all our energy demand! The UK as much lower energy consumption but also has far less cropland and of poor climate, without the potential of high yield crops like sugar cane.

Part of the problem is gross inefficiency, an ICE does on average 25% efficiency, so 75% is just wasted energy blown off the radiator and tail pipe as hot air. Consider 80% efficiency in converting crude oil to gasoline, minor loss in transportation and 25% in the car, thats a total of 20% efficiency. The worse power plants (coal burning steam cycle), generally do 35% efficiency, consider 5-10% loss in transport, 10-15% loss in charging a Li-ion battery, thats 28% efficiency to run an EV. Off of natural gas the initial efficiency is as high as 60%, so 48% by the time the EV is driving. With Nuclear and renewable, power plant efficiency can be dropped (same reason I did not count the efficiency of plants converting sunlight to biomass: ~0.5%, up to 7% in algae in high CO2 atmospheres) and it all comes down to $/w. With printable solar panels we are now below $1/w, but solar is so intermittent where could we store the power to use it consistently? Perhaps a battery, but that would be expensive, unless the battery could do something else as well like driving people around... just killed the intermittent problem of renewable energy and the transportation problem with one solution.

 

Curious, where are you getting your physics from? A Lithium-Air battery has a theoretical energy density of 11140 Wh/kg, diesel fuel is at ~11000 Wh/kg. That not include only 45% tops could be used by the diesel engine and that the weight of the engine and sub-systems are not added, just the weight in liquid fuel of diesel, verse the Lithium Anode weight.

Even the most efficient pure ICE car could only manage ~25% improvements, there you have physical limits: thermodynamics! That being physical inefficiencies of heat engine, mind you a non-ideal heat engine at that! Batteries and Fuel Cells are not limited by the physical inefficiencies of a heat cycle, while a ICE could never dream of 60% efficiency, let alone be able to make such an efficient engine viable for a car, Li-ion battery manage charge/discharge efficiencies of 95% today, electric motor easily do beyond 90% efficiency. Even a Zinc-air flow cell would managed beyond 60%, would be far cheaper then lithium and have 2-3 times the energy density of Li-ion and could be refueled in minutes by pumping in fresh zinc paste.

When there won't be enough petroleum fuel to go around internal combustion engines won't be practical. There is a reason China is hording their rare earth minerals (for electric motors) and investing billions and hundred of thousand of people into battery research. There people all want cars but they know there no fucking way they could fuel a billion drivers!

 

Well, for $3,500.00 brand new, my brother got a zap electric pickup truck, 2 seater. For an extra $600 or so he installed an extra battery. It's pretty much all he drives. No it won't go freeway speeds. But it goes to home depot and comes back with 2x4's and sheet-rock. It goes to the grocery store and comes back with groceries. It goes back and forth to work, out to parties, to the post office, keeps you warm when it's cold outside and cold when it's warm outside, carries a passenger (the sedan model carries 3 passengers) and doesn't use a single drop of gas. He bought it on close out so they are normally ~ 9 or 10k but still, in terms of costs, the idea that commuter cars are a toy is simply ignorant of city life. Sorry to say.

 

Sorry, your 'China conspiracy' theory is silly.

I've been to Shandong and anyone who thinks there is some master Chinese plan for 'battery power' is nuts.

I saw capitalism gone into a frenzied craziness that is controlled by nobody...certainly not the government, banks, etc. There will be more internal combustion engine vehicles in China in 15 years than all of the USA. when it comes to actually controlling anything other than propaganda, the government in China is impotent. Money rules in China more than it ever ruled in the USA.

 

Its only potential valid if the argument were restructure, If my conclusion is "42", it may be valid if the argument were something like "12+40=..." not if I say "Ducks get alot of grass" the premise and conclusion are disjointed they do not follow, please learn how to make a valid argument. If you going to argue that the government subsidies don't count because the "money comes from somewhere" you have to state where the money is coming from and how its apparently not going to be made up. A subside very well may save money by preventing a bigger loss somewhere else, like say massive import losses from having to buy oil from the saudis, or saving in increasing the electric grid's efficiency by dumping all the wasted off-peak energy somewhere useful, etc.

 

it not a conspiracy, china quite open about its technological development plans.

And where will they get the fuel to power all these cars?

 

I'm not saying those things won't work for everyone, but when they appeared in Portland, some people bought them, and I used to see them stranded on the side of the road, out of power. EVs still aren't there yet, but they may be in 10 years. I think the most serious problem with them is that they still encourage car dependency and a development pattern that is not sustainable.