Electric Cars and Their Discontents 348
A typical comment about the global impact of switching from gasoline to electric cars on a wide scale comes from reader dbIII, who comments:
"Until something replaces Coal power plants as the main method of generating electricity, you're just replacing one evil for the other."
"With better battery storage it doesn't matter much where the electricity comes from and when - the car could be charging up with solar power in the carpark in the day or with wind when it is blowing, or off-peak when the base load stations are running as low as they can but no-one wants to use the electricity."
"Battery power isn't about saving energy anyway, it's often about shifting the pollution to a big facility that can handle it instead of having heavy pollution control equipment to move about. The first hybrid car I saw, back in 1987, embodied this principle and was designed to work at an underground mine. Above ground it ran on fuel, but below ground you wanted to minimize the air pollution as much as possible so it ran on batteries."
The continued existence of the earth as a habitable planet aside, what about the car itself, and in particular its power source?
Jah-Wren Ryel has a quibble with the terminology used the linked article, writing
"This car is not a true Tesla Car. If it were, it would have no batteries at all. Instead it would gets it energy from some kind of wireless source like microwave power transmission or even the Earth's magnetic field."
Many readers worried about exploding batteries; glowworm was "left wondering if this car is involved in an accident if the batteries will vent like the recent Slashdot articles suggest. Exploding Dells, fires on planes, and soon at an intersection near you... cars venting more flame than the Batmobile."
Reader nSinistrad_D provides reason to think such explosions are unlikely:"Looks like the company that is manufacturing the batteries has replaced graphite with a 'Lithium Titanium Oxide' that they've tested and claim doesn't have the smoking, venting, or explosive problems of normal lithium ion batteries. Here is a link to a rather informative article about the battery technology that will be used in the Tesla. ... I mean, based on the stuff I've read about the founders of the company and a lot of the people who have invested in it (i.e. Elon Musk, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, etc.) I feel I'll wait and see before passing any judgement."
Reader artifex2004 is skeptical: "Here in Texas, where I suspect temperatures exceed battery design, I think this idea will bomb spectacularly. Seriously, though, Li-ion? I shudder to think of how those will get disposed of, eventually."
And Reader Moofie has a tongue-in-cheek solution if the batteries ever go critical: "Maybe you could design a clever little nozzle to get a boost from your on-fire battery packs. That'd be AWESOME."
It's not just safety, of course, that matters to drivers, but practicality for other reasons:
Reader iamlucky13 writes: "15 minutes on the charger might get you another 15-20 miles. And 220 volts at 70 amps is a pretty hefty 15 kilowatts, so to have a dozen cars sitting at the local McDonalds charging is going to be draining about 180 kW from their coinpurse. That is a serious amount of juice. Also, I'm skeptical that you'll be getting 250 miles at 70 mph. If I remember right, electric motor efficiency and power typically increase with load, but fall off with speed, which makes them awesome for say, a 0-60 run in 3 seconds, but marginal at best for high speed cruising. That 250 mile range estimate is probably at significantly lower speeds."
"Big rigs generally run around 5 mpg, but it varies quite a bit around that number depending on the truck, the load, and the speed. Few truckers drive at the most efficient speed because it increases the labor costs significantly."
"If you're suggesting running commercial trucks on electricity, forget it for the foreseeable future. It's definitely been considered. Not only is there the conflicting speed issues I mentioned above, but you run up against the energy density limitations of batteries fast. Assuming the numbers from the article are correct (I doubt it...something isn't quite adding up according to my gut) and unrealistically taking the charge/discharge at 100% efficiency, it's storing up 194 MJ. Gasoline holds about 120 MJ/gallon, so the 1000 pounds of batteries (according to the Tesla website) are equivalent to about 1.5 gallons of gas (6.3 pounds/gal). Divide that an efficiency of around 30% and you've got a 32:1 energy density ratio in favor of gasoline. For a truck to haul the equivalent of 150 gallons of fuel (actually diesel, not gas, but close enough), it would need about 30,000 pounds of batteries. But then you have to go farther and take into account that 2/3's of its cargo capacity has been replaced fuel, so you need to make 3 times the number of trips. And you've got a lot of trucks either sitting idle recharging or having their 30,000 pounds of batteries swapped out every few hundred miles."
"Obviously these are really rough numbers, but other engineers have already looked at the idea in more detail and rejected it."
"I'm not trash-talking the Tesla. It looks like a lot of fun, but like all sports cars, it's a toy and not a good comparison for commercial trucking. Most of a car's weight is itself, be it gas or electric. Most of a truck's weight is it's cargo."
"For the record, I think electric can work extremely well for short range commuting (5-10 miles on city streets), but if you travel far, you'll realistically be looking at gas."
As to the exact number of batteries in the car, reader wbean provides a good reason why it should be exactly 6831: "The motor is going to need a lot higher voltage than a laptop. This means that the batteries have to be organized in series/parallel banks. 6831 is a plausible number since it is 23 x 11 x 3 x 3 x 3. This gives you a lot of flexibility in arranging the banks. You could have 99 banks of 69 batteries in series, presumably giving you something like 345 volts. That sounds about right for a DC motor."
Of course, battery technology is the real crux of the issue; balancing safety, weight, volume and energy density is a tough problem, and as reader loose electron puts it,
"Whoever comes up with a significant advance in battery technology will . Li-Ion batteries have excellent amp-hour ratings for their size, but like all other batteries are still pretty limited."
"Acceleration/Torque for electric cars is not a problem. High performance capabilities are there if you want them. However, you are playing battery energy against performance against distance, and all electrics, or fuel-electric hybrids have been designed to be 'green' in their approach. (Any Hummer owners want an environmentally aware vehicle?)"
"Right now the weakest link in many electronic systems is the energy source. A good solution there and you can be a very wealthy person."
hotspotbloc suggests " a different type of hybrid," one with:- "enough batteries for ~50 miles.
- a small (100cc) biodiesel engine running at a fixed and preset RPM connected to a small generator. The engine would be set to run at the peak of its power curve.
- a small ~10L fuel tank
- and
- an AC charging circuit"
"This is a really old idea. I saw something like this (on a much larger scale) on an USCG cutter (WLB-389) that was built in 1943. Two diesels -> two generators -> one electric motor. Worked great and it could double as a light ship."
Finally, several readers' comments focused on the merits of the particular electric car, rather than only as the embodiment of its constituent technologies.
fermion was one of a handful who talked about the car as a sportscar per se, writing:
"I would wager that this vehicle is more like a Lotus Elise, or a Corvette, or even a S2000, all of which can be had for under 50K. Any performance benefits over those sports cars can be attributed to the natural advantage of this car, namely that you can go from 0-60 without switching gears, and it is easier to get it perfectly balanced without an engine. Anyway, The true test of a sports cars, as opposed to just a fast car, is the handling, which was not mentioned in review. Without proper handling, it becomes a Mustang at 30K."
"Which is to say we are still in the same world, in which low volumes and other issues cause electric cars to be 50%-100$ higher than traditional cars. All that seems to have happened here is that an electric car has been targeted to the high end market and priced accordingly. It is kind of like taking the hummer, putting a cheap truck base on it, calling it an H2, and pretending that it still has the dubious value of the original."
"Oh well, I suppose if they can build a sedan for 35K I would be impressed. We would also have to look at maintenance cost of the vehicle, which would be dominated the battery replacement. A sports car car easily run 20 cents/mile in maintenance. Knowing that laptop batteries can only handle a couple hundred charge cycles, one can image where the long term maintenance cost could approach three or four time that amount."
"I wish we had electric cars. I think the technology is there, and the pricing could be reasonable. But even companies that could be using the electric car to revive themselves, for instance Mazda and Ford, still seem to be married to the antiquated internal combustion engine."
ChronosWS largely agreed with this, writing that "cars like the Porsche Carerra and the Bugatti Veyron (mentioned in a related article) are consummate sports cars -- they exemplify not only speed but styling, handling and quality expected of a car with their price tag. Cars such as the Corvette, especially the most recent incarnation, do so relatively inexpensively. But regardless, 0-60 acceleration is not the most important statistic, and often isn't an important statistic at all except to people who don't know better (I refer the undereducated to the more useful 0-100-0 or 0-150-0 tests, as well as relevant agility tests such as emergency lane change, slalom and skid pad.) Electric cars will be desirable when they meet the following conditions met [by] existing cars:"
- "price (under 30k)
- features (styling, interior, gizmos)
- convenience (fueling in under 5 minutes)"
Thanks to all the readers who took part in the conversation, in particular those quoted above.
Powerful, Long-Running Electric Cars Can Be Made (Score:3, Insightful)
We already have the resources, technology and brains to make practical electric vehicles, we just have to have the willpower, patience and know-how to make them.
Does anyone really believe that a practical electric car or truck is an impossibility?
This just in! (Score:1, Insightful)
Gas has to get much more expensive. (Score:1, Insightful)
Anyway, if the cost of oil goes up, the cost of electricity will also go up because demand for it will go up as people substitute electricity for oil.
Re:wow.. talk about naive (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Backslashes and their discontents (Score:3, Insightful)
Simple. Problem solved.
Coal power (Score:5, Insightful)
Whoever was objecting to using coal power plants to charge electric cars is overlooking several issues. One, would you rather keep sending billions of dollars to Bin Landenland to power our cars, or to places like Wyoming and Kentucky that have more coal? And that assumes we couldn't offset some of the additional demand with solar, wind and ethanol fueled power plants. Lift the 100% tarrif on sugar from Brazil and free up some of that for ethanol production. Take over part of the Sonora Desert and start using to cultivate oil producing algae. There are a million things we could be doing that we're not.
Kind of reminds me of those rich people back east who opposed a wind power farm because it messed up their view. I was aghast at that. Here we are dependent on a thin line of oil tankers that terminates in a crapass part of the world where people hate us and a lot of the money we spend on oil is quietly funneled to people who want to kill us. Our highest national defense priority should be developing and implementing alternative energy sources and those fat asshats are worried about their freaking view! And some of you are worried about electricity from coal? J*** H Tapdancing C**** what's it going to take before people get a clue? Instead of making energy indepedence a priority our government is spending their billions on a dead-end war in Iraq, finding new ways to spy on Americans and making damn sure a handful of gay people can't get married. Un-f'ing-real.
Why do people expect corvette even? (Score:3, Insightful)
People expecting a "sports" car out of it is ridiculous. I currently drive a cavalier, I love my Cavalier, but I don't even expect that much power. The reason you drive a first gen battery power car is to save the planet or avoid expensive gas. Would I? Nah, I'm not into the enviroment (don't bitch at me, I'm honest at least), and I want a sportier car, maybe a Camero, but at the same time I'm hopeful that as the first gen battery cars get older, and the technology gets investigated more each year we might get camero's that rocket along the roads without gas, and then vettes that do it.
The point is people who expect cars like Vettes or Veyrons to be similar to the battery cars have to also take into account that the Vette can do something like 18 miles per gallon in the city. My Cavalier can do around upwards of 25-27 and highway I easily can get 30. If the first gen cars can beat vettes and S2000's great, but no one is going to pay 60K just for a car because it can do that, those of us who want the "sports" car won't adapt as easily as those of us who already are buying Prius Hybrids and such. Their aim should be at making the system work and give decent performance in that range with out costing an arm and a leg in price. Then when the concept is proven thinking about developing a higher end car.
It's the same as any new technology it'll take time for everyone to adapt, but those of us who are looking at a car as more of a power symbol arn't going to be as easy sells to jump on the electric bandwagon.
Simply put those of us who'd buy cars that have lower and lower miles per gallon, will not be as keen on saving the planet as other folks who might have families and sedans, and aiming on making cars that will make the sports car fans happy in the first round of cars will be too expensive and possibly break the technology's finacial back too early and fast.
As for Ford and Mazda, if you think they haven't done any R&D on this then you're misguided, but at the same time to develop an entirely new engine themselves will put them in an even more precarious position then they are now.
Re:Backslashes and their discontents (Score:3, Insightful)
That way I could avoid em in the rss feed.
Re:efficiency (Score:5, Insightful)
And those are the very worst kinds of "environmentalists". Not only can they not see the forrest for the trees, but the small issues they whine about aren't even legitimate problems. I guess they'd rather see whales dying from heat exhaustion than getting "confused".
As some are starting to understand, to truly fix the environmental issues, we have to think "in the large". Like choosing nuclear power over fossil fuels. Nuclear technology has advanced quite a bit in the past 30 years. And with environmentalists pushing for even more safety, it would help solve our energy problems (pollution, foreign dependence, prices) tremendously, without causing significant impact to the environment. The push for only using "perfectly safe" technologies (solar, tidal, geothermal, perhaps wind and hydro) is just helping to maintain the status quo.
Re:I'd like to see more of these (Score:3, Insightful)
The V-6 engine in a Camry has a displacement of 3.3 liters, which amounts to .55 liters per cylinder. The RX-8 rotary has the rough equivalent of .65 liters per cylinder. The Corvette V-8 is 6.0 liters, which is .75 liters per cylinder.
Now, I am not an automotive engineer, but two of the factors that affect fuel economy lie in the engine, namely its overall displacement, and the displacement per combustion chamber. Large engines use more fuel than small ones, and engines with larger combustion chambers use more fule than engines with smaller combustion chambers, so long as the number of cylinders is the same. While the Corvette engine is huge, at highway speeds, it runs almost at idle. This leads to great efficiency for size at highway speeds. The Camry engine runs faster at highway speeds than the Corvette engine does, but its smaller size makes for less fuel use. The Wankel engine runs faster than either of these two engines, and its combustion chamber equivalent size is larger than the Camry engine, therefore, more fuel is used. Finally, the RX-8 transmission is built to maximize the car's acceleration ability while the Camry transmission is built to maximize the car's fuel efficiency.
While it is true that there is no efficiency advangtage to the Wankel engine, its simplicity and scalability and power for size (real, not equivalent) are tremendous advantages over traditional piston engines. Micro internal combustion engines are almost universally Wankel design for these reasons. So is the flexibility on fuel usage. If the fuel is cheap and infinitely renewable, efficiency matters almost not at all. On the other hand, there will always be people that want the most efficient engine possible, no matter how it's constructed, and that will drive piston, Wankel, and all other forms of propulsion to be better capable with less fuel used than they are today. Whether you drive for pleasure or for necessity, that is good news.
Re:Bad link (Score:3, Insightful)
Look at the daily electrical load patterns for a large state like California (www.caiso.com). There's almost a 2:1 variation between daily peak and minimum. Today, for example, CAISO is predicting a 49 GW peak at 4pm. Today's minimum was 27 GW at 4 am. The difference is 22 GW, enough to simultaneously charge 1.3 million Tesla cars at 16.8 kW each.
(Caveat: the California ISO area excludes Los Angeles DWP and a few other municipal utilities, so these numbers actully understate total state consumption.)
That said, we do need to move electric generation off fossil fuels ASAP. Nuclear is the best short-term large scale option. Hopefully wind and solar will soon follow. Distributed generation, especially with rooftop solar, can greatly alleviate congestion on the electric grid by producing power close to where it is consumed.
Anything but coal -- yet even if you assume that EVs are charged only coal-fired plants, you're still in much better shape than you are burning gasoline in cars.
Modular electric car (Score:2, Insightful)
Basicly, make an electric car with a 50-100 mile range, something the size of a civic or a prius, then have a hookup on the back where you can attach a small diesel generator on wheels. Just like the small trailers you see for moving, but this would generate the power needed to 'hybridize' the vehicle, but you don't need to have it hooked up the vast majority of running around town you do. Also, one generator could serve a whole group of vehicles, or maybe even make them rentable for trips.