THE Electric Vehicle (EV) Thread pt 3 (merged)

[vfr]

http://www.quantya.us/

cost $10,000; Street model to come out mid '08. Price? ???

[WisJim]

Here's another one, more of a street bike. Read an interesting review of it in a motorcycle magazine, that included a road ride. Sounded interesting, but I think it was closer to $14k or $15k.

http://www.enertiabike.com/

[Starvid]

This one is the closest to market, it might even be there.

http://www.vectrix.com

[cephalotus]

German car start-up Loremo made a big splash back in 2006 with the unveiling of their ultra-efficient 157MPG Diesel powered car called Loremo.

[cephalotus]

http://gas2.org/2008/11/28/germany-want ... d-by-2020/

http://www.elektromobilitaet2008.de/konferenz (German)

[Plantagenet]

From the link above:---"Germany’s stated goals are to become a leader in electric car technology, become an energy independent nation, and provide all of the electricity needed for charging the vehicles from “renewable sources.”"


That's great!

President-elect Obama has said he will make the US energy independent in 10 years and now Germany is now promising to be energy independent in 11 years.

Yes we can!!!!

The doomers are wrong......We're saved!!!!

[jamest]

I love it when politicians mandate the mass implementation of technology that doesn't exist.

I keep waiting for somebody to propose improving school lunches by mandating the inclusion of kryptonite supplements in all meals.

[Revi]

Electric cars exist. I drove mine around this week.

I think it's possible. A million electric cars isn't that many.

The US produced 2 million gas cars in 1920.

Can we produce a million electric cars by 2010?

Yes we can!

[cipi604]

Yeah sure thing, but remember for 1 new electric car , we build 70 based on diesel/gas/gasoline. So it's just a drop in the ocean, too late. Listen to Hirsch and just let it go.

Quebec has a lot of hidro-energy available, here it could work IF we have a technology for batteries that is cheap and that doesn't pollute. We don't have that, lithium is not enough on this planet, titanium the same, and so on...

You'll have to think further than having a car... think at the idea that nobody cares about cars if they starve to death.

[supersonic]

That sounds cool a pollution free world.

[cephalotus]

I love it when politicians mandate the mass implementation of technology that doesn't exist...

The "political will" is the first step and it is a very important step.

Some years ago German politics desided that in 2010 12,5% of our electricity has to come from renewable sources.

Even Merkel with her phd in p hysics (at that time environmental minister) stated that 4% share in renewable electricity is all that Germany will -ever- have, because that is the potential for our water power plants.

In 2007 the share on renewable energy in the electricity sector rose to 14,2%, we built a huge wind power industrie (in 2007 85% export rate) and currently we build a huge photovoltaics industrie.

In 2010 we will have a share of ~17-19% in renewable energy in the electricity sector and the next (political) goal aims at 30% in 2020.

I'm very sure, that the US can do the same, maybe even better and faster, because the antural resources (area for biomass, solar radiation, wind, geothermal and water power potential) are much better than in Germany.
But of course the politics must play the right cards.

You got men to the moon within a few years, it seems unbelievable that you couldn't make the transition to a nation, mostly independent on fossil fueals and low on CO2 emissions within -let's say- 20 to30 years.

The most important thing that is lacking in the moment is not the technology, but the political will to do it.

[Dezakin]

Yeah sure thing, but remember for 1 new electric car , we build 70 based on diesel/gas/gasoline. So it's just a drop in the ocean, too late. Listen to Hirsch and just let it go.

Quebec has a lot of hidro-energy available, here it could work IF we have a technology for batteries that is cheap and that doesn't pollute. We don't have that, lithium is not enough on this planet, titanium the same, and so on...

Lithium is widely distributed in the crust at about 20-70ppm by weight, far more common than lead and yet there hasn't been a problem with the scalability of lead-acid batteries. Titanium is one of the most common elements in the crust, and is going to get much cheaper with the development of the FFC Cambridge process replacing the Kroll process.

You'll have to think further than having a car... think at the idea that nobody cares about cars if they starve to death.

True, and entirely irrelevant for 2020.

[jamest]

The central problem is not the ability to produce the electricity, nor is it the ability to produce the sufficient number of electric vehicles. These are problems, but not the central problem.

Certainly the U.S. has the ability to have three million electric vehicles on the road by 2020, which would be equivalent to Germany's proposal to have one million on the road. It could put ten million on the road for that matter.

The central problem is that the battery technology does not exist to produce an electric vehicle that is practical for anything other than niche use. No amount of government mandates will change that. Only innovation will change that, and mandates discourage innovation.

The typical rebuttal to this point is that government will mandate improved batteries, and that this will solve the problem. This argument is, or course, absurd.

Given the huge economic incentives, does anybody believe that there are not already countless institutions, both public and private, working on this all over the world? Does anybody believe that progress on solving this problem is impeded by the lack of a government mandate?

The effect of a government mandate to put electric vehicles on the road before satisfactory battery technology is developed would be to impede technological development, not enhance it, because it would make it artificially profitable to produce an impractical product. This would destroy any incentive to improve the product.

This is what happened with biofuels development in the U.S. Government established a system of subsidies and consumption mandates for corn ethanol, and we lost twenty years of biofuels development. This was because too many people could make too much money by producing an environmentally devastating, expensive, impractical product that no consumer would buy if given the choice and if it were not heavily subsidized, and that nobody would produce if the production were not heavily subsidized.

If government mandates the production of electric vehicles and highly subsidizes their use (which is the only way that people would buy them), then we will lose decades more of innovation.

Hybrid vehicles weren't the result of a government mandate. Personal computers weren't the result of a government mandate. Fiber optics weren't the result of a government mandate. Airplanes weren't the result of a government mandate. The transistor wasn't the result of a government mandate. Semiconductors weren't the result of a government mandate. The internet wasn't the result of a government mandate (Al Gore notwithstanding). The telephone wasn't the result of a government mandate.

Do you see a trend here?

Finally, let's do some arithmetic, something of which most politicians seem to be incapable:

Suppose the U.S. were to put 3 million electric vehicles on the road, and that they average about 10,000 miles per year (remember, they are primarily urban commuter vehicles), and that this usage displaces the use of hybrid vehicles over the same number of miles at a gasoline consumption rate of 30 miles per gallon (this is a very conservative value). This means that using the electric vehicles would have displaced the consumption of 10 billion gallons of gasoline per year - a whopping 7% of current gasoline consumption, or the energy equivalent of about 0.2% of the current oil consumption by the U.S. And this does not take into account deducting the energy that was used to charge and recycle the batteries.

This isn't an energy policy. It's a gimmick.

The point is that electric vehicles won't make a significant dent in oil or gas consumption unless they are used on a truly mass scale and for long distance travel. That won't happen without tremendous improvements in battery technology, and history shows that government mandates of the commercialization of impractical technology do not enhance innovation. They impede it.

If politicians want to make it look like they're doing something, they can always increase funding for battery development. This probably won't help much, but it won't do much harm.

[cephalotus]

I do not agree.

Maybe the typical driving situation is different between central Europe and the US.

20kWh batteries do already exist and in a small 4 seat vehicel the will be good for 100-150km.

Typical commuter distances in Europa are much shorter than that.

And if you need to drive longer distances there are several options:

- Use your 2nd (1st) car with a gasoline engine
- don't buy a 100% EV, put a plug in hybrid (even a 10kWh battery for 50km electric distance would be good enough for many people in such a car)
- use car sharing
- use the train
A 20kWh battery in current technology (ie NaNiCl or LiFePO4) will weight around 200kg. That's not perfect but good enough imho.

The main "problem" is the prize for such systems. (In Europa with our high gasoline taxes they can already be profitable for those that travel a lot, but for broad use they have to become cheaper by factor 2 at least.

1 million EV (in Germany) are not enough to get "independent from oil" of course, but you have to start somehow. With 1 million vehicles there are enough of them to buiold a charging infrastructur and maybe interesting tarif systems for electricity (cheaper if there is lots of wind available for example).

And let's assume that we have to pay 250$/barrel in 2020 people will have the option to buy an electric vehicle, an option that does not really exist yet (except from very few "prototypes").

How long did it take from the first 1 million mobile phones until almost every one in the 1st and 2nd world had one? 5 years? 10 years?

[jamest]

Cephalotus,

I appreciate your enthusiasm, but can you show me an error in my arithmetic, estimating that putting 3 million ev's with current battery technology on the road would reduce the U.S. oil consumption by only 0.2%?

As you said, if one wishes to go further than 100-150km., an ev is not suitable. Therein lies the problem.

As you said, a lot of this has to do with differences in driving between the U.S. and Europe. The population density in the U.S. is far lower, and the distances are far greater.

It is difficult for me to believe that an ev would be driven much more than about 10,000 miles (about 15,000 km) per year, given current battery technology and that is the key parameter. Even if one were to assume that the average ev were driven 20,000 miles per year and that there were 3 million of them on the road, that would reduce U.S. oil consumption by only about 0.4%.

I'm all for ev's, and I would love to own one, but at the current state of technology they are simply not practical for the great majority of applications, particularly in North America.

The basic problem is that ev's are only suitable for driving short distances with current batter technology, and this limits both their practicality the impact that they can have on fossil fuel consumption. That's why the hybrid will have a greater impact, until battery technology improves significantly. This is particularly true for North America.

Technological developments may change this, but government mandates won't.

[cephalotus]

Cephalotus,

I appreciate your enthusiasm, but can you show me an error in my arithmetic, estimating that putting 3 million ev's with current battery technology on the road would reduce the U.S. oil consumption by only 0.2%?

hmmm, I'm not so familiar with the US energy consumption.

here are some details for Germany:

http://ag-energiebilanzen.de/cms/verwal ... cation/pdf

we did use 4701 PetaJoule mineral oil in 2007.

2378 PJ on oil products have been used in the transportation sector.

An electric vehicle that drives 15.000km a year will need ~2500kWh for that distance and will replace around 7500kWh on mineral oil products (electric motors are about 3 times more efficient)

1kWh = 3,6MJ, so 1 vehicle will replace around 27GJ on oil products.

1.000.000 vehicles will replace 27PJ.

That's around 0,6% on overall oil consumption or 1,1% of oil consumption in the transport sector.

I assume that your numbers are correct.

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As you said, if one wishes to go further than 100-150km., an ev is not suitable.  Therein lies the problem.

so don't use the EV for that and use it "only" for the smaller distances.

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As you said, a lot of this has to do with differences in driving between the U.S. and Europe.  The population density in the U.S. is far lower, and the distances are far greater.

maybe that's the main difference. Would be an advantage for EV in Europa, it seems.

I'm all for ev's, and I would love to own one, but at the current state of technology they are simply not practical for the great majority of applications, particularly in North America.

I assume that when EV become the standard they could be good enough for 50% of all driving situations. That wouldn't be so bad. Imho this is much more likely than replacing 50% of the oil with coal to liquid or biofuels.
And 50% sounds lot more preferable than doom, at least to me.

There still will be oil in 2050 for certain applications, e.g. long distance individual driving or airplanes. I doubt that it will be cheap.

[jamest]

An interesting article on lithium availability:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7707847.stm

[Ayame]

Even if they manage to make/import the 1 million electric cars since europe is in a recession that is expected to last until 2010 nobody will be buying them.

[VMarcHart]

Nice thread.

I'm all for ev's, and I would love to own one, but at the current state of technology they are simply not practical for the great majority of applications, particularly in North America.

Same here.

I found this article about the Mini E. US$850/month, 2-3 times the average monthly car note! In this economy, J6P is saying thanks but no thanks.

(Revi, you own an EV, could I please ask how much is your monthly note? Thanks.)

1M EVs in 10 years is achievable, but then it's 299M to go, and I doubt that at $850/month it will have much success. The annual record sale of passenger vehicles in the US was some 9.7M units sold in 1999. 300M / ~10M = 30 years of consecutive sale records.

And wait, how about the infrastructure to charge all these EVs, which I'm sure we'd like it to be renewable-based, right?

[mos6507]

Electric cars exist. I drove mine around this week.

The problem is, the way gas prices are today, you'd have to hold a gun to somebody's head to make them drive a NEV. BTW, wasn't it a little chilly in your NEV up in Maine this time of year? Does it have a heater?