Smithsonian Removes EV1 Exhibit 420
johnMG writes to mention a Seattle PI article on the Smithsonian's move to remove the EV1 electric sedan from display. From the article: "The upcoming film 'Who Killed the Electric Car?' questions why General Motors created the battery-powered vehicles and then crushed the program a few years later. The film opens June 30th. GM happens to be one of the Smithsonian's biggest contributors. But museum and GM officials say that had nothing to do with the removal of the EV1 from display."
Re:Nothing to see here. (Score:2, Interesting)
I would love to tour that facility - there has to be a TON of amazing stuff there that they simply don't have the room to exhibit. On the other hand, it's probably all boxed up or something, so maybe it wouldn't be that interesting. Still, the sheer size of the place and the organization scheme is probably something to see.
Re:Or saw the pollution to supply the e-cars... (Score:1, Interesting)
Well, if you take the line that they're going to be burned anyway, then it really doesn't matter. Climate change is driven by carbon dioxide emissions, and an inefficient car will contribute the same amount of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere that an "EPA-mandated catalytic converter" car will. So what does it matter?
Since most electricity is still generated by burning fossil fuels, an all-electric car would most likely be worse than one burning the fuel directly. I have never heard of a perfectly efficient method of transmitting electricty from where it was produced to where it was needed (e.g. charge up the car).
That's a bit of a straw man argument there. I've never heard of a perfectly efficient way of getting crude oil transformed into gasoline either. I don't think you can argue a priori that this model:
crude oil -> electric plant -> battery -> car power
is inferior to the current model:
crude oil -> refinery -> engine -> car power
And in any case gasoline absolutely requires crude oil as an input, whereas the electricity for a battery can be charged from other means. Primarily nuclear, which in terms of waste generated and land used is by far the cheapest and cleanest source of energy on the planet.
Conspiracy nuts, rejoice (Score:2, Interesting)
I have heard that the Smithsonian has about four times more material to display than they have room for displaying. Removing this particular item, whose main interest was as a counterexample of how not to build an electric car, isn't some evil plot of our hybrid car-selling overlords.
You can take off your tinfoil hats now.
S.U.V. (Score:2, Interesting)
Who killed the EV....Physics (Score:3, Interesting)
EVs have nice performance and are can be fun cars. But there is a practical side that needs to be factored in. They typical person may have a EV capable commute, but odds are they also make a few trips a year that are outside the range of the car. That alone makes them a no go for most people. Also they tend to be small 2 seat vehicles. Which again are not practical for most people. People want 1 vehicle that does it all.
Furthermore, hybrids are far more practical in the end and much more environmentally friendly from an entire life cycle standpoint. That's why all the car companies killed their EV programs (EV1, S10, Ranger, Epic.. All now dead).
The EV1 was also not that spectacular. I've worked on one. It's a 1980s tech car developed by Aerovironment and sold to GM to put into production. It was a very crude and dated car when it went into production. GM dumped 2 billion into the program, and never even leased 1000 units in the couple years the program ran. They lost money hand over fist on it. It also had technical problems of the charge port catching the car on fire which was the final nail in the coffin.
EVs do have a place. Fleet service they can work out well for. There you have a fixed usage, daily schedules you can use it around. So the limits of an EV are not a problem. And the durability is a plus. But for consumer usage, they just aren't there.
Now if you manage to make a battery pack that fits in a 13 gallon space, and has the same amount of energy as 13 gallons of gasoline, and weights the same. Now you are on to something. But that isn't going to happen tomorrow.
Re:Who killed the electric car? (Score:3, Interesting)
Why, sure they have! The only issue is that, because of the range problems, they're only working on vehicles competing in the "rich-guy's occasionally-driven toy" market (i.e., the market populated by exotics like the Lotus Elise and Enzo Ferrari -- not stuff suitable for daily driving, like the Corvette). Here are some examples:
Fishy (Score:4, Interesting)
The reason this is so fishy is because GM denied renewal of leases (despite begging and protest) and took back cars back to have them destroyed. They seemed intent on obliterating the EV1 to remove it from public memory, much the same way the Egyptians did with Akhenaton [cartage.org.lb] when he tried to change the whole of Egypt to a monotheistic religion. And now, on the eve of the release of a motion picture that brings light to a set of events not many people are aware of, the Smithsonian removes (AFAIK) one of the last places people can see a real-life EV1 (like so much stone from a bas-relief sculpture), making a documentary seem, for all intents and purposes, more like fiction in the public eye. Oh, and GM had nothing to do with it. They were not under pressure to engage in some uber sparagmos-like act of worship to the oil gods at the detriment of all EV1s ever made.
Makes me wish I had GTA'd one and hidden it somewhere for future generations.
Well, that was a fun conspiracy theory. I'm going to drink some more vodka.
Bullshit! (Score:5, Interesting)
the cars couldn't be sold for the amount of money it took to build them
Change that to "the cars could not be bought for any amount of money". That's right: GM never sold a single EV1, they were all leased with no option to renew the lease or buy the damn car! On top of that, GM made the customers jump through hoops to even get an EV1.
Still some people were persistent and patient enough to get their hands on EV1s. But after the leases had expired, they had no choice but to return the cars to GM. What did GM do with them? They crushed them! Every single one! Crushed them and dumped them in a junk yard! Seems like the prudent business decision would be to *ahem* sell your product rather than trashing it, no?
Here is more information on the whole fiasco: link [wikipedia.org]. My take on it is that GM set EV1 up for failure so that they could point at it and say "see? no one wants electric cars!". But when, despite GM's best efforts, customers actually showed interest in it, GM decided to pull the plug.
Re:NAH! Of course it didn't. (Score:3, Interesting)
That's because some people like that look (like me, for instance -- my family owns a nice wine red one). I'm sure some people liked the look of the EV1 as well (I didn't, but I do like the Insight which is kind of similar).
If you want an example of an ugly car, try the Pontiac Aztek -- don't nobody like that one!
Re:Riiiiiight (Score:3, Interesting)
I skipped a couple steps.... The dot.com years were good, and there's a big trailer that tags along behind the SUV. How much can your Cavalier tow? I managed 22 mpg (sans trailer of course...) on one 2000 mile trip with 6 people in the SUV plus a weeks worth of suitcases and wedding gifts. Your Cavalier would have required 2 trips on that one, and an extra week of vacation. and I'd still be ahead on fuel in the SUV. Sadly I haven't been able to repeat that mileage... Best I've done since was 20.5 mpg... Which still has me ahead on fuel and time vs. your Cavalier, provided I'm hauling enough cargo.
But the point you're missing is.... At the time I could buy pretty much anything I wanted within reason, and they wouldn't sell it to me. I didn't get to that position by taking it in the ass on a stupid lease deal that would have nailed me on mileage charges at the end of the lease and leave me with no equity position at all.
There is a limit to ideological fevor with most rational people. I wanted an EV-1 becuase I thought they were cool, and I like to tinker with electronic gadgets. Not because I give a flying fuck about gas prices, or what happens to your skull when you run a red light in front of me. At one point I wanted an EV-1 and couldn't aquire one under terms acceptable to me. At some other point I wanted a large SUV and I could aquire one. It's not like I walked off the GM lot in a huff and over to a Ford dealer and bought the biggest thing they had out of spite. I just found the irony amusing... You and several others seem to find it infuriating. Sucks to be you...
Re:Not as market-driven as you'd hope (Score:4, Interesting)
Because they already use bicycles.
Seriously, why do you think China would benefit greatly from electric cars? The population centers are very dense - so cars aren't too useful there, outside of the cities, the roads are not like America's and the majority of people who live outside the cities generally could not afford a card of any sort anyway.
Re:S.U.V. (Score:1, Interesting)
If safety is a concern, buy a Mercedes manufactured in the last 7 years or so. Or a good (new) Toyota. A Volvo has the impression of being safe, but it's nowhere as safe as the Mercedes. A used Mercedes C-class isn't that expensive either. It's got good fuel economy, and won't break down easily. (Repair costs will be slightly higher when it does break down though.)
Or, if you can't afford that, get a minivan. Minivans aren't that small, they have a lower center of gravity, and so on so forth. If you're buying an SUV because you think it's safer on the highway, you're buying a whole lot of nothing but a warm fuzzy feeling that will only last until you actually have a collision. And really, people in this mentality, that can't swerve their way out of a traffic accident (and would rather take it head-on in a "safe" car) shouldn't be on the road in the first place. There are some places in the U.S. where traffic is worse than others, but I find it odd that Americans make it sound like their home town has THE WORST DRIVERS ANYWHERE! Get real. I've been (literally) around the world, and seen traffic in places like India, Nepal, Iran, Turkey, Egypt, Italy, Kenya, and I live and drive in Tokyo, Japan. The U.S. isn't that bad at all. Drivers aren't that bad either.
And to be really honest, there aren't as many SUVs on the road as you make it sound.
Now for my personal agenda. If you see an SUV driving irresponsibly, blame the driver, not the car!!!!
An older and (somewhat off-topic) question.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:who stands to lose the most? (Score:1, Interesting)
Notice it is the equivalent of a 111mpg car as far as cost goes. With photovoltaic or wind powered recharger that's zero emissions. And at 80-120 miles on a charge it is pretty respectable for city commuting.
Only available for consumer purchase from 2002 to 2004 at select LA and San Francisco Toyota dealers. Generally demand far outstripped supply despite no advertising.
Re:Bullshit! (Score:3, Interesting)
I know this nice fellow who runs the Duffy Electric Boat Company [duffyboats.com]. He made a great big pile of money from Duffy Electric Boats, and he bought an EV1 to support the idea of electric car technology.
The Duffy Boat story is a pretty interesting one for those who are skeptics about electric propulsion technology. Turns out the Duffy Electric Boat was a truly fabulous idea. You see, the speed limit in Newport Harbor, Newport Beach, California is 5 knots. You can run a launch-style boat, complete with polished teakwood and brass, at five knots for an entire day on a set of Trojan golf cart batteries. It turns out to be a wonderful, relaxing way to spend an afternoon.
And of course Newport Harbor, with boat dock homes starting at an economical US$3,500,000 and zooming rapidly up to $25 million plus, was the perfect place to launch a company selling these great little boats, starting at around $30,000 for the 18 foot model. This is pretty much a rounding error in the finances of the nice folks owning these homes, so the Duffy Boat was an immediate hit. Nowadays you can't throw a stone in Newport Harbor without hitting one or two.
So would a rich tinkerer like Mr Duffy not love to own an EV1? Of course. And I'm sure his engineers could figure out something for the batteries too. If he did, there were a lot of loyal EV1 owners who would buy them. If my memory serves, they were a pretty affluent audience.
It's quite possible that GM underestimated the wealth of its audience and their eagerness to keep the vehicles on the road. I don't think GM should have felt an obligation to support the owners past the lease period, but I think it would have been a nice gesture to sell them for $ 1 on an unsupported basis.
D
Re:Who killed the electric car? (Score:3, Interesting)
I forgot about that CA program... (Score:5, Interesting)
The California regulations required that some percent (5%? 10%?) of the cars sold in California be zero emissions by a certain date. So companies start to make electric cars.
And what does California do? Back away from the regulations. First, they declared that some gas-powered could be qualified as partial zero emissions vehicles (PZEV) and thus qualify for the regulations. I don't have a problem with SULEVs (the less Orwellian name for PZEVs), but anyone who thinks they deserve credit for being zero emissions should have to sleep in a bedroom ventilated by the exhaust of PZEVs for a couple nights and report back how the "zero" emissions are treating them.
So after GM spends a lot on real ZEVs, California allows other companies to spend less than 10% as much and make the grade. then they flat out ditch the program making GM (and Honda's) efforts an almost total waste of money.
No wonder the car companies fight new regulations that seem likely to force them to make vehicles there probably isn't a market for. Once bitten, twice shy.
Interesting Story (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Or saw the pollution to supply the e-cars... (Score:2, Interesting)
The best thing about an electric car though is its ability to brake regeneratively, in theory meaning the net energy consumption of the journey is equal to the losses from bearing friction/electrical resistance in the motors/air resistance of the vehicle etc. The energy dumped into the brakes every time you slow down (1/2 a megajoule for a 1 tonne car stopping from 100km/h) is stored in some form of high power density short term storage (supercapacitors perhaps).
It's not several orders of magnitude, but it's a start... It makes it easier to switch to other methods of energy generation such as nuclear as they are deemed appropriate (I'd take nuclear over coal any time).
Re:who stands to lose the most? (Score:3, Interesting)
Perhaps *you* should do some more research on it. And there are *thousands* of people all over the planet who have conversions and DIY models, and don't seem to suffer a whole lot. Hey, how about the millions of golfers, we don't seem to hear of them magically exploding or whatever from battery driven vehicles. It is old tech man, there were electric rides a hundred years ago, electric motors and batteries are just not that exotic, it is classed as "normal" human technology, just we are just starting to see more interest from the pollution angle and from the cost angle now.
I can remember getting gasoline at a scosh over 12 cents, that's my cheap record I recall, so I have a little historical perspective here. Of course there wasn't a lot of interest back then and up to now, it was incredibly cheap to drive, and most cars then were paid off in 12 months, that was a common loan then. Times change, stuff is expensive now, so people are looking at the electrics and the net is making a lot of shared knowledge and research possible. It's coming, ready or not, along with a ton of other neat stuff.
GM intentionally crippled their car (BTW, I used to *work* for GM and was in the UAW) and made it overly complicated and overly expensive on purpose, then never offered to sell them, just so they *wouldn't* have to keep making them., because electric vehicles are a considerable threat to the gas vehicle status quo. Like I said, disruptive technology, the main part of the article at the top-who killed the electric car and why. You can keep on trying to debunk it, I heard the same or similar about hybrids a few years ago, I heard it about solar a long time ago, and now that they are getting common, they are the hottest styled new type of car out there. And plugin hybrids are coming, because it makes sense and people want them. And solar PV is in extremely hot demand, new factories going in all over. We have neat new battery tech coming out now, and...just an exciting time now, stuff is coming together.
I'm not saying they are perfect, far from it, and so are gas buggies, I should know, been wrenching on them since they were mostly all flatheads. But for the target market, commuter cars, one guy driving, the tech we have now is more than adequate. My normal flooded lead acid storage batteries for my solar rig are 8 years old and still working fine. Why is that? I have had all sorts of internet "experts" tell me that "your batteries won't last". Well, they do and have, and they are cheap ones too. Sorry, but I have heard fud after fud after fud about alternative energy stuff over the years, and that is what most of it is, fud. Some is real, a lot is just fud.
The stuff works, and it is a clear and present danger and serious threat to various multi-billion dollar industries, that is the primary reason it has taken so long to reach good market penetratrion, but now it has. You *will* be seeing more pure electrics, plug in hybrids, a lot more solar installs, wind chargers-you name it, whether you think it "works" or not, because just way too many other people actually are doing it and it *does* work and can be made affordable.
Sorry,. I just have no truck with entrenched luddism on this subject, it has been an interest and hobby of mine for over three decades now. I have worked on superinsulated homes that practically needed zero additional heating in the winter other than the lights burning and cooking. That is possible with just normal tech we have had for year
Re:Or saw the pollution to supply the e-cars... (Score:3, Interesting)
STILL missing point! (Score:2, Interesting)
This reminds me of feeble arguments a few years ago that we had temporarily (and quite by accident) balanced the pollutants in our atmosphere so that one effect held off the other.
And actually, no, it's not just as likely.
If we were holding off an ice age, we would be seeing increasing CO2 having little or no effect, quite contrary to our expectations. But what we're really seeing now is very much in line with the expectations that were set twenty-five or thirty years ago.
Anyhow, the answer to your question who will be burning [Fossil Fuels] is this: who ever can get at them for an energy source cheaper than any alternative.
Again, missing the point. We burn fossil fuels as a means of improving our quality of life. At the same time, we're destroying the quality of life of the future. Don't give me some free-market bullshit as a justification for crashing our society.
Let's say there is some "day after tomorrow" or "an inconvenient truth" scenario in our future... and humans are whacked back to Ice-Age times, or "worse"... Do you think the raco-sapiens will give a whit about burning cheap hydrocarbons vs "the environment"?
There most definitely is such a scenario in our future. All we need do is nothing and allow the short-sighted sociopaths who run our businesses to exploit conditions to their maximum extreme and it will happen.
And I give a shit. Short-sighted nihilism disturbs me and as a rule I have this advice for nihilists: destroy yourselves, but leave the rest of us alone.
you really care about saving the planet - it is a lost cause. If you want to save human kind, then you should push for high-tech and space programs and spread people all over, off this doomed rock.
Oddly enough, investing in more efficient energy sources is about the only way that can be done. But there are few current realistic alternatives to the Earth as a place to live. Trust me, I've thought about the topic some. Follow the link in my .sig . . .
Re:Who killed the electric car? (Score:1, Interesting)
http://www.rsportscars.com/eng/cars/venturi_fetis
(needs to be modded up)
Re:Open Source GNU-Car (Score:2, Interesting)
Screw this "why aren't they building electric cars for meeee!" whining. Share knowledge and let's do things ourselves.
GM took its "closed source" vehicle off the road. Open Source designs for drivetrains and retrofit kits would mean that the EV hobbyist/early adopter would be less vulnerable to big companies AND individuals who would hoard knowledge.
Re:GM loves corn (Score:2, Interesting)
Ok,
10% Ethanol / 90% gas: 76,000 x 10% + 115,000 x 90% = 111,100 btu/gallon
10% MTBE / 90% gas: 93,500 x 10% + 115,000 x 90% = 112,850 btu/gallon
So using gas mixed with ethanol would give you about 1.5% fewer MPG then using gas mixed with MTBE. Also the lower energy/volume of ethanol comes from ethanol having a lower density than gas, so using ethanol instead of gas would not significantly increase air pollution. According to wikipedia [wikipedia.org] the oxygenate requirement was dropped from federal law in 2005, however some states still have laws requiring it.
Re:who stands to lose the most? (Score:3, Interesting)
I still stand by my statement, electric cars are disruptive technologies to the established car companies, a big fnancial threat long term, a threat to governments from loss of road tax, and a definite threat to the oil companies and by allusion to the established electric grid monopoly suppliers because it is one step away going from an electric car to contemplating being your own power producer with solar or wind, etc. This is big time folding month *threats* to those wealthy and powerful folks, of course they are gonna FUD it out and deny and delay. It's only logical from their POV.
And that is the primary reason you don't see them out there on the dealers lots. And that is why the government is pushing hydrogen, it keeps control and the money directly where it already goes now-eventually. The big companies and big governments make no profit in you becoming independent of them. The car companies are not going to bork their long term sales and repair business by releasing vehicles with just a few moving parts that function well.
I have worked in some factories that have big electric motors running heavy machines for FIFTY YEARS or more and they hadn't broken down. One factory in particular I remember had some in the 70's when I was working there that were installed in the *teens* IIRC. They had oiler reservoirs for the bearings, big huge honking motors that drove belts all across the floors and simultaneously ran a lot of older but still quite functional woodworking machinery. three shifts a day when I worked there, those electric motors ran just about constantly, day in day out, months and years on end-and didn't break. The factory also burnt their own wood scrap (mostly lathe hearts, what we called them and what was left over after sections got run through what is called a peeler lathe-I ran one, that was my job there), anyway, burning that wood fed the boilers,which went to a GE steam turbine,and generated all their own electricity-everything- and they still sold off 10 grand a rough monthly into the grid, which more than paid the two firemen and some incidental repairs or the GE plant.
Electric motors *don't break* very easily. If the bearings stay good, that's it, blow them out and clean them with compressed air once in awhile or put some new brushes in if they are required.
Eventually you'll see them, but only after a lot of startups start selling them en masse, then you'll see the big car companies reluctantly jump in, just like they did with hybrids once toyota showed them how popular they were. There's already any number of smaller companies out there selling electric cars or offering conversions or kits. It is in roughly the same situation personal computers were in the early 70's, but, it has the potential to really take off. I expect some chinese companies to release them first actually, but that is a pure SWAG on my part, based on them now pumping out a lot of scooters and golf carts and atvs and tractors and now regular engine cars that will be hitting north american and european markets next year-cheap, as in under 10 grand new cheap.