The Electric Car Battery Battle 87 comments
-
Font Size:
-
Print
- TweetThis
The next five years will clearly be a transition period from the petro-car to the electric car. But this transition will feature an interesting horse race between two different battery technologies, a lithium-ion (Li-on) or an upgraded Nickel Metal Hydride [NiMH] powered battery.
Apparently Toyota (TM) and Honda (HMC), the two currently leading makers of transition hybrid cars, do not think the Li-on is ready for prime time yet. They reportedly are going with an upgraded NiMH battery. Carlos Ghosn, on the other hand, is taking Nissan (NIS) directly into what he thinks will be the ultimate answer, a Li-on powered electric car with a short stop in hybrid-land, but still powered with Li-on.
This report offers a preview of Ghosn’s all-electric Li-on powered dream car. It also confirms that Ghosn is a realist who understands that the all-electric vision that he has embraced so fully along with Project Better Place needs a hybrid transition period. To solve that problem he has purchased a power plant from Toyota. But apparently deciding that the transition will last for quite a while, he is also now building his own hybrid, but still one with a Li-on battery.
On “the outside”, as they say in horse racing, is an untested potential game changer, the ultracapacitor powered car by EEStor/Zenn. That has to be considered a very long shot at this point since so little is really known about it. But this will be a long race and there is certainly time for a twist that is not currently anticipated.
The largest stakes in this horse race are not so much which battery is best or whether the electric vehicle [EV] or hybrid electric vehicle [HEV] is ultimately proved better (it might be both). Rather it is whether the global fleet can be taken off petroleum faster than the decline of old oil fields causes the amount of crude available to the market to become truly scarce as predicted by megaprojects analysis.
Honing in on just the battery issue though, this horse race bears on the fortunes of companies that produce lithium, e.g. (SQM), and Rare Earth Elements that are used in the NiMH battery. It is entirely possible that both will be winners. I have re-established a position in SQM now that it has fallen to my target of the mid-30’s.
Related Articles
|
-
The Seeking Alpha 100
See allThe top 100 stock
market authors
selected for publication
Seeking Alpha 100 » -
Fastest Climbers
Authors with the largestSee all
increase in followers
in the last 7 days
Fastest Climbers » -
Top Commenters
Top commenters,See all
as ranked by their peers
Top Commenters » -
Top Instabloggers
The 100 most active
Instabloggers.-
1
David Fry
-
2
TraderMark
-
3
Don Dion
-
4
Cliff Wachtel
-
5
Mike Havrilla
Top Instabloggers » -
1
-
Top StockTalkers
TopSee all
StockTalkers.
Top StockTalkers »
This article has 87 comments:
(awhich will crush the plain hybrids we have today). They will be using li ion like everone else - it's impossible to build a plug-in using NiMH batteries - Toyota has already tried and only managed an 8 mile driving range. NOBODY is using NiMH batteries for either plug-ins or battery-only electrics. I might add that they call a million plug-ins on the road by 2015 optimistic. Regardless, a million plug-ins, even if they use no gasoline whatsoever, will only reduce crude demand by less than 1/4th of 1 percent. And plug-ins use 1/10th the gasoline that plain hubrids use. A dose of reality amongst
the cheerleading fantasies that the media is engaged in. And 1/3rd of the fleet (commercial diesel trucks) won't be going electric for a long, long time.
Cobasys is apparently for sale though (and having $ problems), see: www.courthousenews.com....
Gee, maybe if they supplied BEVs they would be making more money?? Even a 50-mile range in a reduced-price car would be sufficient for a whole lot of people (I know I'd strongly consider buying such a car), but they think they need the full range of a gas car before anybody will buy it for their commuting needs.
Yes, it's a small start. But we simply cannot continue the status quo - we absolutely need to switch to hybrids and BEVs and public transportation or we'll be faced with only being able to afford bikes.
Toyota, on the other hand, willingly sold the last 300 RAV4-EV, using NiMH, and they are almost all on the road still, added to hundreds of fleet-run RAV4-EV.
Ghosn is a jokester and a hypester.
They drive GREAT.
But there's never been a Lithium car that drove over 100,000 miles on the same battery.
"compressed air (an Indian company is just now starting production on a vehicle powered by compressed air)."
Good call. Don't underestimate this. The "Indian company" you mentioned is TATA Motors. The same TATA that just purchased Jaguar/Land Rover from Ford. This company has 23,000 employees worldwide and they want this air engine technology to make low cost cars for developing markets. Hmm... so what about all those nitwits that keep saying "just wait until everybody in India wants a car" regarding oil. Yea so if they are powered by air -- big deal. This is a real and exciting technology created by a former Renault Formula One engine builder and his son who was an engineer on the $1.8mm Bugatti Veyron. Real and credible technology in the hands of a company with the resources to make this happen in a big way. Good stuff...
The advent of mass produced electrics isn't a horse race, as the author suggests, it's a MARATHON that will last well into the NEXT generation of human endeavor.
Chevy will be introducing its Volt in late 2010 they say, IF they can decide on the most viable battery. It is predicted to cost around $50K, including its $15K REPLACEABLE battery pack.
Next!
However, there's a role and market for the pure electric <50 mile range; it will take a hybrid for the market >50 miles. Battery maintenance, life, cost and lifecycle cost will forever be basic issues sans consumer related issues of safety and practicality, etc.
In the meantime, the reduction in transportation energy will evolve as it did during the several 70's oil/gas crisis'.\: REDUCE/REUSE/REPLACE which is the order of increasing cost of change.
So we basically are in the REDUCE mode, except for those that can afford to REPLACE (buy a Prius, etc.). For the general Joe Public that means he/she must lose or yield some FREEDOM:
0) DON'T GO!
1) walk, ride a bike, (NO CONSUMPTION WHATSOEVER).
2) double-up via car-pool, van-pool (ECONOMIZE).
3) use public transportaion (REALLY ECONOMIZE).
All of the above will reduce consumption of fuel. They REALLY work. They have immediate results (at reduced out-of-pocket costs). The cheapest way out of Dodge.
Someone should instigate a NATIONAL REDUCE CONSUMPTION EXPERIMENT for a week or month to see what the effect can really be. The result may be that many of the people actually like it.
Public transportation will love it. So will those that still commute alone at a higher cost.
The next least capital expenseive move would be to put more hiway transport onto the steel-wheeled rail cars; be it people or goods. Like Switzerland does.
Then Warren Buffet should fully electrify those rails and get rid of the diesel consumption (while Bill Gates electrifies the interstate highways/beltways AND Boone et.al. install solar and wind as if the world were coming to an end).
And as many as possible Prius et.al. should be mfg'd to scratch the itch of those that can afford them.
And "someone" should come up with that biofuel-injected no-moving-parts-burner with that waste heat solid-state direct-coversion-to-el... ChorusMotor driven hybrid that uses 100% of the energy in the biofuel, which we grow on the surface of dryland farms currently in CRP programs where farmers get paid to do nothing: as a starting point for ADVANCED REDUCTION/REPLACEMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCE ENERGIES (which is another name for no drill, no drill, no drill and no dig, no dig, no dig, etc.).
Oh yeah.. I live in the foothills of California and about 5 miles from town... I bought my daughter one of those $1000 36volt electric scooters... Charged up well overnight, and could make a 20 mile round trip, but even with 36 volts, it barely made it up hills.... She had to walk it up our driveway . The pedals are useless and more effort than pushing it, so we removed them Worked pretty well in flat areas of town though.
jegan ;-)
The point I wish to make here is that the one single key to getting electric vehicles to work is to eliminate on-board batteries, period. This would seem so obvious that it actually baffles me why everyone is going on about expensive technology when all we need is to work on power supply infrastructure for battery-less cars!
There certainly must be a way to 'tether' a moving car onto an external power supply without too much loss of independent mobiity (a 'dogem cars' style come to mind at most basic), and thereby reduce to a bare minimum the need for batteries on-board which is the sole functional drawback facing electric mobility. Whatever the battery type (Li-ion, PB-acid or even ESSstor) , they will probably continue to have inferior power-to-weight ratio compared to liquid fuel vehicles, and most importantly they all exhibit 'retro-progressive' range inhibition (i.e as the batteries get discharged, they not only lose power but continuously become simply dead-weight on the vehicle, which further reduces the P/W ratio, and so on in a vicious circle of inefficiency).
While all the effort to find the best batteries around is laudible, however the transition to viable electric vehicles could have been much faster and simpler if infrastructure design began seriously to accomodate supplying power to electric vehicles (of course a level of standardisation over all key system parameters -voltages, technology,etc -would be called for). This means Municipal/Federal Authorities starting to look the idea as a national public service development akin to other services like road building, rather than letting private enterprise alone take all the lead on such an essentially public service issue.
Some transit systems do have on-board batteries for maintaining voltage over track/rail breaks, etc., but they are not motive power batteries.
The glitch comes with selfish, individualized personal transport.
For that, I again suggest to you my final last paragraph(s) posted above: whatcha think?:
... a biofuel injected no-moving-part-burner encapsulated by no-moving-part direct-to-electric solid-state waste-heat converters powering a ChorusMotor hybrid, with the only on-board stored energy being the biofuel...... (the technology exists for everything including the waste heat conversion which is already used in space, etc., which is about to go even more advanced as nanotech; much beyond the 1960's Mechanics Illustrated Strontium Motors which were decay-heat electric conversion devices directly powering individual electric motor drive-wheels on moon-buggies). Same stuff only better. Nothing new under the sun.
So these,
1) the fully electric rail transport for cargo and people, including high speed transport between major commute and coastal US cities, which you mention; and
2) the electrified inter/trastate hiways and biways and beltways, including electried ferries for individual (people and hybrids) transport over longer distances than your doggie method; and
3) the biofuel 100% energy-efficient hybrids be they trucks to motorscooters - and with that, ZERO CRUDE.....
....... REAL independence. Let 'er rip; let 'er roll.
Come on Boone, Warren and Bill; do your things.
"A car with "Compressed air power" is not a car powered by air. It is also not powered by "compressed air"."
Why don't you take up your syntax arguments with these guys
Tata Motors, India’s largest automobile company, has signed an agreement with MDI (Moteur Developpment International) of France for the application in India of MDI’s compressed air engines.
www.greencarcongress.c...
And then maybe these guys here
www.growthconsulting.f.../$File/TI%20Alert.htm
And then here.
www.edmunds.com/inside...
As recently as 2005, Ghosn called battery-powered cars “niche products.”
Objectivity is right. Imagine the amount of power needed to compress that air to 4500PSI. When you buy a fillup of that air at 4500PSI, you are paying for the gasoline to run the compressor to compress that air to 4500PSI. Sorry air-car fans, there is no such thing as a free lunch.
Objectivity, I think you should just back off. All energy comes from the sun and everything is just storage, so contribute something useful, thank you.
Single people will want a car that can cover a long range and I don't think it will be all electric (unless it is very small) for a long time. This will keep hybrids or PHEVs viable. There are companies like Cyclone Power CYPW that are bring new combustion engines to market. Another one is Turbine Truck engines TTEG.
Ok ok so what you want me to say is that the air is a storage mechanism. The air doesn't actually power the car but it is part of the conversion to energy.
Fine.
You know what I say to that? It's an air powered car you nitwit! Ha ha ha! While you sit there and try to do your best "Scientific American" peer review on everything, I think that most people will realize that when you take this car for refueling, you connect a pressurized air hose to it and then you drive away on said air, then you have an air powered car. But go ahead and keep coming back with your highly visible presentation of somebody with little social skills. You think that if you repeat something enough, if you add a smart ass tone to it all then you are naturally right. Classic definition of someone socially maladjusted.
You remind me of that one person all of us know. Quite intelligent but trapped in a lower socioeconomic lifestyle because they can't seem to convert their smarts to money. George Soros said it well. I'm paraphrasing "I have been never able to find a correlation between intelligence and the ability to make money"
Ok ok so what you want me to say is that the air is a storage mechanism. The air doesn't actually power the car but it is part of the conversion to energy.
Fine.
You know what I say to that? It's an air powered car you nitwit! Ha ha ha! While you sit there and try to do your best "Scientific American" peer review on everything, I think that most people will realize that when you take this car for refueling, you connect a pressurized air hose to it and then you drive away on said air, then you have an air powered car. But go ahead and keep coming back with your highly visible presentation of somebody with little social skills. You think that if you repeat something enough, if you add a smart ass tone to it all then you are naturally right. Classic definition of someone socially maladjusted.
You remind me of that one person all of us know. Quite intelligent but trapped in a lower socioeconomic lifestyle because they can't seem to convert their smarts to money. George Soros said it well. I'm paraphrasing "I have been never able to find a correlation between intelligence and the ability to make money"
The vessels are special carbon fiber storage tanks to supposedly mitigate your concerns. But it is a valid point. But as you mentioned their is no free lunch as in the combustibility of gasoline or the inherent dangers of Hydrogen. OK let's here it from "the professor" AKA Objectivity (which is criminally ironic coming from someone that doesn't even understand what the term objective means) about hydrogen not being dangerous -- Hindenburg -- Nazis -- Rocket fuel silver paint blah blah blah...
You are right, he used the wrong words to describe how air is technically involved in "driving a car".
You are right, YOU ARE RIGHT. YOU ARE RIGHT. YOU ARE RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!...
EVERYONE, PLEASE STOP WHATEVER YOU ARE DOING RIGHT NOW AND ACKNOWLEDGE THAT OBJECTIVITY WAS RIGHT.
Dear god, he was right, he is right, he will always be right.
For the love of all that is holy, you are RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!
Now please, Please PLEASE....use your brains for something constructive and stop giving English lessons and messing with everyone else on here.
You're obviously smart, and I'm serious about that. So please do something constructive and give us something interesting to read here.
What is the potential range of cost per mile using compressed air?
have algae based gasoline for $2/gallon as one company is suggesting is achievable.
Should this happen, probably all the electric technologies will go by
the wayside, except for possibly uses where carbonless operation
is really important.
Here's some objectivity on the subject of autos, fuels, fuel economy, pneumatic storage, and design of the same subjects ... and before you get too excited, this is something a even a 2008 first year engineering student should be able to comprehend...
The problem with any particular motive system isn't whether it is feasible, but whether it is sensible, overall, in the context of it's production and use. Design analysis provides the answer...
Start with this... Good Design is a function of intelligent compromise. Good engineers and designers understand this.
Try also this... in the system we live in (earth) there are clearly limitations in our ability to overly satisfy all of our whims and wants, and sometimes even our needs. Efficiency is the key factor, in many cases, in deciding between success and failure.
Transportation needs (transporting goods, economically necessary travel, etc.) and wants (trips by car to WallyWorld) are both possible when good designs results in efficiencies that enable TOTAL (the integral of the function) Transportation Demand to be met.
When we downsized cars and doubled fuel economy in the 70's, it was a fairly easy exercise. How do I know? Because I was there, and doing it. Why did it happen? BECAUSE we could not, as a nation, meet our fuel demand with the inefficient fleet of 13 mpg autos.
Congress (the People) mandated higher mileage, and The Big Three ordered weight taken from components, and we re-designed and re-tooled to make it happen.
If you had been there at the time, you would have heard plenty of people smart enough to argue why we really needed the bean-counters out of top management then... as they only responded because it was mandated. We were plenty pissed off that once we reached the 27 mpg targets for CAFE, it would all stop, and be effectively rolled back.
Unfortunately, 30 years have effectively rolled by, and we are in far worse a predicament now than we were then.
Crude oil derived gasoline and diesel are "fuels". They exist, are energy rich (high specific btu) can be extracted at extremely high EROEI, are relatively safe, cheap enough (at least in the past) that burning it at 30% efficiency was still fairly economical, etc...
Unfortunately, cheap oil is over.
What REPLACES cheap oil, and how we do it (for transportation need) is the critical problem we face today.
We should have all been driving cars like Audi A2 turbodiesels at 75 mpg long ago. But the beancounters wanted really big profits, and our women wanted SUV's. And the bulk of the human brain-mass of the USA wasn't quite smart enough to see that $1 a gallon gas wasn't a God given right. The bean counters blew the profits, the SUV's sit in garages, but the brain mass that went along with it all seems not to have learned a thing, but to bitch in all the wrong directions.
Idiots who do not understand any of this are all around. Smart loses to stupid in a democracy every time, however, if smart fails to educate stupid first. If you doubt any of this, at this point it's obvious where you stand.
Back to intelligent design... so what is the real problem?
THE PROBLEM IS LACK OF SUFFICIENT, and CHEAP ENOUGH... fuels.
And... their efficient use.
Not alternate energy transfers, or methods... I said FUELS.
Hydrogen isn't a fuel. Why? Because it's an energy SINK, not a SOURCE. If you don't grasp this then go learn, come back, and start again. We will all wait.
Compressed air is also not a fuel. It is like a spring, a pneumatic one. The losses from compressing the air means also, that it is subject to all the iron rules of efficiency that bind us to this struggle. TANSFTAAFL. No perpetual motion machines either. simple right?
Electricity also isn't a fuel. Unless you can harness lightning, that is.
Wind? Actually, yes, in the context of us humans... it's a fuel. But a transient one. WASTED if not captured. Sunlight? Same thing. The issue for both is the capital cost and EROEI of capture, including all inputs and infrastructure. Again... efficiency. Makes sense if it's efficient, but there we go again, design decides. Not idiots with opinions.
Why does any of this matter here?
Because... The PROBLEM is, idiotic nonsense like ... "we can all just have solar powered cars! I saw it on TV!" or "wouldn't it be great if cars could run on water! They can, I heard all about it!" or "chicken waste will be our next oil, I read it in Pop-Mech!" ... abounds whenever those unfit-to-design attempt to force a "solution" onto a problem they cannot even fathom.
Just like bean-counters running car companies.
So... those that understand better start helping the rest learn this quick, otherwise it will be a repeat, and add in more resource wars to boot.
And we don't have time to blow this chance, like we did the last thirty years.
www.hybrid-car-show.co...
Now that was a helpful post. I'll ignore the few jabs you took at everyone in the crowd because a lot of it is true....just try to be nice to the great, unwashed masses as you educate them. A good deal of them are the politicians and bosses who are making the decisions that affect us all so try and explain why they are wrong rather than tell them why they are stupid...please.
What you said above is what you should have been telling A247 all along. The problem is that a lot of these ideas just don't make practical sense. Using electricity or gas or whatever, to compress air and then use that stored energy to drive a vehicle just doesn't make sense. Too much loss to compress it and then reuse it.... unless you can prove that storing compressed air is somehow a more efficient way to store energy than in a battery or some other medium.
Too many steps and I've never seen a mechanical system that was very efficient at storing and then burping back up it's energy.
You are right that too many people who don't understand the impractical side of the "next great thing" they read about somewhere on the internet or hear about on the evening news are making decisions that affect all of us.
I feel so sorry for them sometimes. About once a month, a local tv station gets this great story about some guy in his garage who can produce hydrogen from water!!! And then it gets picked up by someone like CNN or even worse it ends up on Youtube and suddenly everyone is waiting for their car that's going to run on water. And this poor guy in his garage who has "discovered" electrolysis has no idea that he's doing something we've been able to do for centuries or that it uses more energy than it can ever produce. But what can you do. People are looking for solutions and trying to help.
All you can really do is be patient and try to explain to them why it's not practical and not turn them off so they stop listening when someone really does come up with a good solution.
Anyhow, I'd go for a whole lot of REDUCE fuel (real FOSSIL energy) first and significantly, while we work on the REUSE (waste energy RECOVERY via solid state thermalelectric devices and REUSE in electric drive hybrids) and then ultimately REPLACE the limited real energy source in TRANSPORTATION, oil with biofuels, and burn them in a no-moving-part injected burner encapsulated with such TE devices (get rid of that IC engine/transmission/ex... etc).
Do all this while we implement all the ALTERNATIVES to REPLACE coal and nat gas POWER GENERATION with unlimited solar PV and wind (and even more homegrown biofuels w/whr and some actual storage as solar thermal and pumped hydro).
The comparative cost of capital and operation to capture any effeciency which is gain from solar and wind into electricity should not overlook all the capital and operating costs involved in exploration, drilling, extraction, shipping, processing, transportation, conversion, remediation, enviornmental, regulation, legal, etc..for oil, coal and nat gas from which we throw away 70% of it's energy.
Any applied KWH from solar and wind that REPLACES any applied KWH from the burning of any coal, oil, nat gas is an immediate 70% reduction in hydrocarbons; in other words, we need to extract only 30% of the energy from wind and solar to equal the useful energy from burning hydrocarbons, the way we do it today. What a way to go.
ok. I gathered 2 thoughts whilst reading
:
1) There probably is alot of energy used to transport the single or few commuters. And I think alot of the requirements for batteries are high because of the weight they need to propel. Recreating commuting vehicles for single person (or 2 or so) might reduce the necessary power requirements, in that they can be lighter weight.
2) I think harvesting lightning is doable. That is one thing I would like to see with a viable ultracapicitor. Since they can take and store a BIG charge at once, they can become a mechanism to harvest that power.
...I can be more informed on any science with regards this if someone has some insight.
YT ~M
If you'd seen all of the alpha24-7 posts (I can't say dialogue, that woud imply more from his side than existed), not just here, but other pages, you would have understood.
As for suffering fools, been there, done that, and if they are just misguided souls, it still happens. Freakingly obtuse moronic donkeys with bad attitudes, like alph here... now that's a horse of a different color.
To "schmicknick"... there's a better chance that Ghostbuster's equipment is a plausible scenario than solving harnessed lightning. Or... in the immortal words of Winston Zedimore... "That's a big twinkie!"
Conservation and efficiency go hand in hand.
Back in '89, I was driving another engineer to a meeting. I drove a VW 5 speed, and though gas wasn't very expensive, I coasted down hills on the highway... he asked me why. I told him that in hilly regions like where we were it increased my FE by about 5 mpg.
When he commented that why bother, as it must only save me all the cost of a lunch once a month, I had to reply... "I'm not really saving anything for myself. I'm trying to save oil for our kid's generation..." He thought about it for a minute, then told me he'd be doing the same from then on... if only he drove a stick.
And before some clown starts on about clutch wear or the societal cost of using up a car prematurely or something, I drove that Scirocco nearly 300,000 miles before giving it away to charity... and it still ran good.
However, regarding uncaptured solar and wind energy as WASTE is not correct. Solar and wind have low conversion effeciencies, but everything captured is PURE GAIN. They do not have any conversion inefficiences, which would be WASTE (except for in wind generation we have the inefficicies of the turning gears, moving parts etc., which result in some inefficiency; but solar is basically all gain with low conversion effeciencies.
Contrasted with burning hydrocarbons where conversion effeciencies are 30%, and 70% is truly waste since the supply of the hydrocarbons is not FREE AND READILY AVAILABLE AS IS THE SOLAR AND WIND ENERGY -- those days are long gone (the closest we got was oil gurgling in surface pools as gas bubbled up thru it, and when coal was picked up off the ground). And that decline in availability will never happen with solar and wind (except on a daily basis as it does now, depending upon location).
Aug 10 11:04 AM
GALEWHITAKER - I invite you to take a look at the dip in oil consumption during 1973 and 1978-9. You can say it was a supply problem, but I guarantee you, folks doubled-up and tripled-up in personal car commutting, and ten-uped in van pooling, and twentied to fourtied-up in bus and public transportation.
We could do the same thing today without a supply problem and lower our oil consumption IMMEDIATELY. I guarantee you it would be effective AND PERMANENT as long as the folks wanted to pool etc. That would free up a lot of oil. We'd flood the market - more than China and India could soak up.
If we use 20 million gallons/day and consumed 10-15% less, our reduciton would match all of China or Indias current consumption.
So do the numbers: 2 in a car instead of 1 as 100% reduction; now multiply that by 50 million commuters as twosies, threesies, 10ies and 40ies, etc. Pretty soon ya got a pretty good reduction. WE OUGHT TO RUN THE EXPERIMENT FOR A MONTH (OR UNTIL IT BECOMES A HABIT - THEN WE'VE REALLY DONE SOMETHING).
Then we can start of putting more cargo and people on trains; electrified trains.
And "Turn Me Loose" Pickens.
This is the mantra we should be hearing from Kudlow, DC, and all campaigners, including Bush who doesn't need to be elected and sits at the bully pulpit: CAR AND VAN POOL, FOLKS: REDUCE THAT CONSUMPTION AND SAVE IN MANY WAYS. INSTEAD, IT'S DRILL, DRILL, DRILL.
REALLY SAD!!!!!!
LEADERSHIP SUCKS!!!!!!!
So now that you've vetted the entire "air power" scientific debate to your liking. Can we focus on what is important? How about actually doing something.
As I mentioned, the engineers that created this technology come from the Renault Formula One Team. The investors ($30mm at this point) are from TATA Motors with 23,000 employees and the recent acquirer of Jaguar/Land Rover are going to make this happen while people like nobjectivity engage in asinine arguments whether or not it is an air powered car! I'm guessing that a particular CV would be relevant to make sure the principals above don't make some dumb mistake and actually attempt doing this. I'm guessing a letter writing campaign and guest appearance as a consulting engineer is probably in order here...
It goes like this.
I say it's an air powered car. The companies and engineers say it is an air powered car. The buying public say they want to buy an air powered car. The manufacturers decide to sell 1mm air powered cars to the buying public.
Meanwhile...back at the ranch, the Monday morning armchair genius society is still arguing with everyone that it isn't an air powered car!
Who cares! This is and was my point EXACTLY. This type of message board behavior is ALWAYS telling of people that never make money. There will never be a perfect mathematical or statistical explanation for things, so while you guys try and figure everything out, the rest of us go out and make money by actually doing something.
It's a repeating pattern that we have all seen on message boards. There is always that one guy(s) that knows everything, corrects everybody with arcane logic while worshiping at the alter of statistics. I've hired (and mostly fired) this type before. Very intelligent but not smart. They become an impediment to a larger team because they are condescending and argumentative. They don't understand that when they explain something to someone that is actually inconsequential to the goal, the person seems non interested or indifferent. This is usually when the lack of social skills creeps into the equation and people start getting summoned to the office for a "chat".
I'll leave you with this quote from Paul Tudor Jones II. $18bn AUM returning annualized 23% since 1986.
Alpha Magazine Page 64 June 2008.
On why new managers fail or are succesful.
"These days, there are many more deep intellectuals in the business, (hedge fund) and that, coupled with the explosion of information on the Internet, creates the illusion that there is an exploration for everything and that the primary task is to find the explanation for everything."
Just look at the power tool industry and radio controlled plane and helicoptor hobbies for a glimpse into the future. MHD batteries went the way of the buggy whip; replaced by Lithium/Ion because of superior performance and reduction of size and weight.
Look for companies developing methods of mass production as target investments.
GM's slimy claim that Lithium is needed for the VOLT ignores the only proven EV batteries, NiMH and lead-acid. NiMH is the longest-lasting and the most reliable at a low life-cycle cost, and lead-acid is the very lowest life-cycle cost but doesn't last quite as long.
So why go to Lithium? So far, no Lithium EV has gone more than 50K miles without significant battery degradation.
And stupid GM, their 16 kWh of Lithium from A123, costing perhaps $32,000, only yields 8 kWh of energy for 400 lbs. of battery.
400 lbs. of NiMH contains 12 kWh of accessible energy at a cost of perhaps $5,000 (even in small quantities). So NiMH is superior in lighter weight, longer life, lower cost and higher reliability.
But stupid GM talks about Lithium, like it talks about fuel cells -- all hogwash.
The reality is, we are still driving Toyota RAV4-EV, over 100 miles range on a charge, last sold in Nov., 2002, on the same battery pack -- Chevron won't sell us replacement batteries, they bought control of GM-Ovonics, which controls the patents, and sued Toyota, which now is afraid to supply replacement batteries.
1. Superior power (at least 50,000W, or 50 kW, 68 hp to take off from a stop). Many batteries, for example ZnO, can't supply this; and for Lithium, it seems to degrade them.
2. Deep cycle, at least 25 kWh for 100 miles range. Non-volatile Lithium has a problem with this: for example the VOLT has to BUY 16 kWh to use 8 of them.
3. Long cycle-life, at least 1,000, preferrably 2,000, for a life of 100K to 200K miles for the pack.
ONLY NIMH HAS BEEN PROVEN TO DO ALL THREE.
So obviously, Toyota (and Honda) are sticking with what works. If Lithium ever works in an EV (for example, if the Tesla battery pack goes over 100K miles), then they will use it; but to rely on it before it's proven is not prudent.
The supposed VOLT uses the same basic configuration; it works and has been proven successful, with or without batteries. Large earthmoving machinery, also, is serial-hybrid.
The problem is, GM has no intention of honestly making the VOLT, they are planning to sabotage it, just as they sabotaged the EV1.
(PS, diesel-electric locomotives use electric braking, but since diesel has been so cheap, they don't yet store the recaptured energy of motion in a battery; they dissipate it via heat exchangers. Electrified rail is great, but diesel-electrics with batteries work too. The thing is, it's always more efficient to generate the electric in a central plant, not on the fly! You're right about that)
Hydrogen is a HOAX.
You can run H2 cars, at a cost of $10/mile, just for show; but if anyone tries to SELL a fuel cell car for $50,000, buy it, you can dismantle it and sell the parts to easily double your money! Sure, it works, in space, where cost doesn't matter and they carry technical-grade O2 as well as technical-grade H2; but YOU CAIN'T DO THAT on the roads here!! NONE of the FCX carry their own technical-grade Oxygen, which is why they only last 3 years.
As for EEStor, we all hope for the best, but there's no reason to believe anything they say, to this point. The term "vaporware" springs to mind. Similar to GM's lies about resuming EV production, or last night's beer-bust conversation, EEStore's promises seem to evaporate in the light of day.
What I'm asking is whether or not it's practical. Renault and Tata can support and try to see if it works and that's a good thing. We need to know and we won't know until they try it.
Other major manufacturers are trying Flywheels (KERS) and batteries and supercaps and many different ideas.
What you can't tell is whether or not that makes it a good idea. In a previous life, I watched Tata throw away $25million in some silly software program that they didn't even follow through on to see if it worked after they spent all the money. Just decided there were other things they wanted to do and dropped it. You have to understand the kind of money these guys throw at problems and then lose interest in if there is a change in mgt or govt policy or whatever. A big company with Billions and Billions of dollars, spending money on a project is not proof that it produces anything constructive. What's a few million dollars to them?
Kleiner-Perkins through $3million at EESTOR when they had nothing but a neat theory about Barium Titanate with many well known engineering problems to overcome even if the BT could be produced.
Just a lotto ticket for them and what do they care...it doesn't hurt them and if it pays off it's worth Billions.
I'm glad Tata/Renault are doing it so we can find out rather than speculate as to whether or not it works. I trust they'll follow through on this one since it's such an important issue.
We're betting over $20 million on something else. But we have the ability to cut over and use the air car concept if it proves to be more effective. We'll lose time to market and a good chunk of change, but I'm betting we won't because I don't think the mechanical conversion of energy back and forth can be that efficient. If I'm wrong, then it will cost my company, and me, a lot of money. But at least I'm willing to place the bet. It will be fun to find out :-)
I'm sorry, but your parameter comparison of NiMH and Li-on are not accurate except for cost and for the moment, reliability. Given the maturity gap of the two, It is difficult to make comparisons. I believe Li-on will surpass NiMH in these issues in the near future.
Again, look at the power tool industry which changed over to Li-on within two years of introduction.
Fossil fuels are effectively sunlight concentrated and stored for millions of years which we burn up (very, very inefficiently) to release energy.
Sunlight and wind are that same energy and if they are captured by whatever means and then stored in a battery it's equivalent in motive terms to oil since it can move a mass.
Hydrogen likewise is simply stored electricity and whether it's derived from sunshine, wind or burning coal it doesn't matter, you can get the energy back out again.
What it comes down to folks in the end is this:
We are burning up 20 million barrels of oil a day in order to get about 3 million barrels of oil per day's worth of work. That's because gasoline and diesel engines are only 15% or so efficient when you take into account all the energy costs that go into getting that gasoline into your tank from the oil field up through the oil well, refine it etc. In that sense oil itself is only an energy carrier.
Hydrogen is a little bit better in that the overall efficiency of getting the energy into the hydrogen fuel cell and back out again as electicty to power electric motors which make the car go is about 40%. So we'd need about the equivalent of 8 million barrels to power the same number of vehicles if they were all hydrogen fuel cells. A pretty good gain. But hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are expensive (10X the price of a regular car) and the infrastructure to get the hydrogen to the fuel celss doesn't currently exist.
This is where battery powered vehicles really come into their own.
Battery powered vehicles are close to 80% efficient (some studies put them at 90%+). So in order to power our current fleet on battery powered vehicles we'd only need around 4 million barrels per day of energy equivalent.
That's much, much easier than what we are dealing with today.
As for those who say we need to take the batteries out?
Well, give it a little thought. That'd work for point to point or fixed route transport systems like trains and streetcars, but it wouldn't work for a vehicle driving from the suburbs into the city or out to the lake or something else.
Personally I think the near future will bring a big recession with a lot of people simply not driving due to the cost of gas. These folks will by and large take the bus (myself included). There will be massive consolidation among auto manufacturers as the mass market vaporises. At some point over the next decade, those surviving auto manufacturers (kept afloat by the upper middle class or those with money) will start to roll out electric vehicles to the masses.
Hopefully, however, I'm wrong, and we can see mass manufacture of electric vehicles real soon now.
The purpose of a patent is to ensure that one is able to be rewarded for the hard work they have done inventing a new technology by being able to develop a new product and sell it.
The purpose of a patent is NOT to make sure that an OLD technology can continue to make money by "preventing" a new product from being developed which may replace it someday.
The development of new technology to replace old technology is called "progress". You should not be able to prevent progress by simply buying up the patent for the new technology
Chevron has single handedly pushed electric car technology back 10 years by preventing the NiMH large format battery from being used.
Without Chevron's intervention, we would be able to drive electric cars "today".
Instead we to have to wait for new battery technology and then "hope" Chevron doesn't buy the patent for that technology.
Just to get a certain perspective right -I'd otherwise rather prefer to speak in ordinary terms and language - I am a qualified Petroleum Engineer (MSc.) and have broad background in most sectors of energy (oil and gas/hybrid alternatives, etc) by way of academic and occupational experience. I would then reliably say, the days of Oil and Gas as the first choice energy source for road vehicles ( other uses not necessarily) are truly numbered, in several ways but principally through the following: firstly (obviously) because it is a non-renewable dwindling resource which more importantly, unbenowst to many is becoming increasingly difficult (read insanely expensive) to produce/extract out there in overworked reservoirs (we now talk routinely of so-called secondary/enhanced recovery) and in newer previously unacessible environmnents (i.e deeper ocean depth, HTHP,etc) :- only technological breakthroughs continue to provide a sustaining cushioning effect, and so called portfolio diversity enables Oil companies to offset costs, otherwise the reality is that Oil/Gas is not going to get any cheaper/easier to produce soon, probably not ever. Secondly, new unfavourable market/environmental factors such as the explosion in demand rising out of the new global economies of Asia (asociated population growth and affluence), the speculative trade in oil as a commodity, and finally increasing legislation globally against use of oil particularly as vehicle fuel (environment protection issues or otherwise), all conspiring to inflate its value, it's a matter of a few years more before this cheap source will hit such cost as to render it untenable.
Another thing we may not often relate is that Oil is INDEED a global item and so used: First, second and third world if you like. However, the variation in affordability is as extreme as the difference in the socio-economic well-being of the various demographies, indeed it can be zero affordable to the lowest earners of the lot. If the first/western world is currently groaning under the burden of inflated Oil prices, what can be said of the rest?. To cut a long story short, whether we like it or not, an alternative fuel (to oil) will be forced onto the world by the factors and circumstances above.
However (and this where one returns to Hangerglider's points), given the dire economic downturn most everywhere today, it's a given that the best-chanced alternative to oil will be the one that comes with the least financial costs, least technological challenges and greatest ease of adaptation to any existing infrastructure if at all possible, on a global scale. From even a simple analysis of all the technologies discussed here, in light of the just-mentioned prerequisite, the logical way most people would tend is towards traditional to medium level technologies (say PB-acid, use of rail or overhead power supply to battery-less vehicles,etc) because they offer an immediate universally adaptable solution at least in the short term. The simpler the better is the golden rule; not everyone will be concerned that much about 90% efficiency if it works at 40% at a fraction of the cost.
As I briefly hinted in the first article, the crucial bit that is required for even the simplest electric vehicle to function competitvely viz liquid fuel is making it battery-free (i.e no on-board packs). Make an effective system capable of supplying power to the (independently moving) vehicle and the type of the power source/battery used becomes only relatively, not overridingly crucial.
The implementation of such a system, unlike it's design, is a function that can only be best realised at a regional scale (read national grid network at standardised voltage) rather than local (indivdual person) level. In comes hopefully sensible 'public good' minded federal/central government infrastructure building, regulation and maintenance as is done for other public works. As for the other 'emerging' technologies (nanotech, EEstor and the like) there certainly would be a role but presumably at the extended rather than primary mode of functionality, essentially as a more premium grade/option avaialble on the basic infrastructure.
What about the oil comanies? While they may still have such tenacious influence via other uses of oil, however as a phenomenon borne out of overriding popular need one can assume that not even they (Oil companies) would have sufficient clout to block such a system - especially if adopted on a global scale. Unless, as is entirely possible, they are re-invented as new energy utlilties or through the usual buy-ups and multinational mergers (woe to us all) of new electric/hybrid technology companies (akin to Chevron buys Cobasys).
Hope I made some sense.
"As for those who say we need to take the batteries out....Well, give it a little thought. That'd work for point to point or fixed route transport systems like trains and streetcars, but it wouldn't work for a vehicle driving from the suburbs into the city or out to the lake or something else. " end quote.
As a proponent for battery-less vehicles myself, I believe these are only challenges, not impossibilities. Giving it 'a little thought', the basic solution in my opinion would be : start from the fact that the vehicles (unless speciality terrain types) need roads ANYWAY wherever they go, including the lake; then the first challenge will be how to convert the road system to support electric cars (nomal wheeled ones, not rails). It might mean certainly establishing a whole set of new grid supply extensions in cases, but it can be done ACTUALLY without any new grid, by grafting the car network over existing infrastructure (utility/domestic power lines for instance). This must fundamentally be a public service legislated function for reasons discussed previously, and by this fact makes the whole idea subject to the will and resolve of the authorities concerned to make it work, alas. The second challenge then remains how to get the vehicles themselves to access the road-side networks - assume apart from the fact that they run on electricity, these are essentially operationally ordinary wheeled vehicles . This is again only a design challenge, with all manner of possibilities and at which anyone individual or corporate can have a go. I personally as you can guess are actively putting together a potential design.
For the last challenge, namely instances where the above set-up does not work, certainly some on-board back must be provided on the vehicle. My own take on this is - turn the whole concept of a hybrid around : let it be literally a Hybrid Fuel Vehicle (H'F'V) in the exact way we currently characterise Hybrid Electric Vehicles (H'E'V) , by subtituting the electric drive with a small 'hybrid' liquid fuel engine for supplementary power purposes. The fueled engine (note it may be gas, petrol, biofuels ,etc) functions far more efficiently in this regard because it is lighter (P/W or E/W ratios), fully self-contained, and actually the technology is much more stable if you want a back up.
This is all potentially far-fetched hot air, i certainly you know, but what do you think?
--- Only one reference to Phoenix Motorcars ( phoenixmotorcars.com )
--- Not a single references to Altair Nanotechnologies ( altairnano.com ).
The Phoenix Motorcars SUTs (Sports Utility Trucks) are 4-door all-electric EV trucks that can haul 4 people and a piano 100 MPH down the highway and go 130 miles on one 10-minute ($3) charge!
That is thanks to the NanoSafe battery from Altair Nanotechnologies.
The NanoSafe generates virtually no heat while charging (allowing the quick 10-minute charge when you have a 480v triple-phase power supply).
These batteries have a base similar to lithium-ion, but they use nano-structured lithium-titanate instead of the graphite used in lithium-ion batteries (on the cathode? ... I forget).
This eliminates the heat & breakdown problems common to lithium-ion and tests indicate that you'd have to drive that EV about a million miles worth of charges/discharges before those NanoSafe batteries would lose a lousy 4% of their charging capacity!
Unlike just about all other batteries, they have a full 100% range depth of charge.
What does that mean?
You can fully charge and fully discharge them without hurting them in the least.
It doesn't matter how much they're charged at any time ... even when you store them for a long time.
With most batteries, there's a narrow middle-range you must keep them charged within .. or they break down.
With the NanoSafe, you can fully charge them and/or discharge them... unlike others.
No "memory" effects, either (like with NiCad, etc.).
Because of the safe, fast charge/discharge rates, the NanoSafe have extremely high efficiency in handling regenerative braking, whereas other batteries are on the opposite (low percentage).
If you're driving a Phoenix EV in stop-and-go city traffic, you'll get even better mileage than on the highway due to the regenerative braking (and it'll also save your brakes in the meantime).
I think the regenerative braking for the Phoenix is up in the 90% range of efficiency whereas it's down around the 20% range for most other batteries.
(Since the others can't charge that fast, they therefore have to throw away most of the energy produced from the regenerative braking.)
Phoenix Motorcars hopes to deliver their first products to their first fleet-order customer, PG&E (Pacific Gas & Electric), around late September or early October (less than a couple months away).
All of Phoenix's first customers will be California fleet customers initially (for about a year).
That way they can work with those customers and fine-tune things during that period ... like a "dress rehearsal" ... before they let them loose to the general consumer public.
PG&E is working on setting up an electric grid for charging these in that northern California area ... but you can still charge them at home for about $3 for a full 130-mile charge. (It's just a slower charge at home, since you don't have much power there.)
I got to drive one at a Dallas unveiling last year.
I was invited as one of the Phoenix's few private investors (for about 7 years now).
(Was already doing business with it's founders before they started it.)
Phoenix Motorcars is not publicly traded, but Altair Nanotechnologies is (ALTI).
Phoenix is the only one (so far) in the States that uses the NanoSafe.
The Lightning GT, recently unveiled in Great Britain, is the only other vehicle in the world (so far) that also uses the NanoSafe.
Those can go from 0 to 60 in less than 4 seconds.
-- Jim Dale
(not to be confused with Jim Kingsdale, the author of the article)
www.forbes.com/technol...
you may find the reference to the key issues affecting practical use of these batteries revealing, particularly inability to have a 10-minute system domestically due to (present) limits on power supply, and how a solution lies ultimately in large-scale infrastructural developments (mega-batteries via charging stations/grids). That said, however, it is quite brilliant work and one wishes altairnano all the best.
again: 0) DON'T GO!
1) walk, ride a bike, (NO CONSUMPTION WHATSOEVER).
2) double-up via car-pool, van-pool (ECONOMIZE).
3) use public transportaion (REALLY ECONOMIZE).
Also read below for backup:
September 02, 2008 (article taken from Sierra Club)
EVs vs. Gas-Powered Cars: No Ride to Utopia
Hey Mr. Green,
Is an electric car really more efficient than a hybrid getting 50-plus miles per gallon running on gas? How efficient (and green) can it be to charge an electric car with natural gas or coal-based electricity, when we lose roughly 66 percent of the original energy in generation and transmission? –Keith in Boston
Hey Keith,
Once a gas-powered car gets around 45 to 50 miles per gallon, the energy it consumes decreases to about the same amount of energy needed to propel an electric vehicle, or EV, of the same size. But as you indicate, that’s no reason to get all cheerful and start believing that EVs or super-efficient gas cars will save the world. They won’t. Alas, they might even hasten our ruin by promoting the illusion that more-efficient cars are “good for the environment.” I don’t care how many times T. Boone Pickens comes on TV to peddle this fantasy—he’s wrong. The best you can say about the most efficient car is that it is less of an environmental menace than a gas-guzzler.
Now if you must have a car, an EV is the best choice. But this does not absolve EVs from the terrible environmental damage that will continue as long as cars remain our primary mode of transportation, instead of what they should be: neat toys for special excursions, racing, and antique shows and sites for torrid romantic encounters. If you want to find out why, read on.
EVs are more efficient than most of today’s gas-powered cars. An internal combustion engine loses a lot of its energy in gasoline to heat and friction. Since electric motors are highly efficient, up to 95 percent of the electrical energy put into them can be converted to torque. But as you note, making that electricity in the first place is a different proposition. You get much less energy out of an electric dynamo than you put into it: Only about 35 percent of the fossil-fuel energy burned to run a typical generator emerges as electrical energy. An additional 7 percent of the electrical energy itself can be lost in transmission , and another 10 to 20 percent is lost in charging an EV’s batteries. (Some new "combined cycle" dynamos do recapture heat that is lost in a conventional generator, so their efficiency is as high as 50 to 60 percent. )
EVs would be an even better choice if their power came from clean renewable sources like wind or solar. But it will be a long time before we have cars running exclusively on renewables, and we don’t yet understand the full environmental impact of building enough non-fossil-fuel sources of energy to power a few hundred million EVs.
There are several other advantages to EVs. First, it’s easier for authorities to curb emissions at the smokestacks of a couple thousand power plants than at the tailpipes of a massive fleet of automobiles. Second, electric cars need a lot less lubrication than gasoline engines, which all living creatures should appreciate because more than 340 million gallons of used motor oil get dumped into the environment every year--a hellacious source of pollution and damage to wildlife. A lot of toxic oil simply seeps out of cars, creating the greasy pools and splotches seen in many parking lots.
Now to the specifics of your question: How efficient are EVs when you account for energy lost from power plant to motor? A 3,000-pound electric vehicle like Toyota’s RAV4 uses about 0.2 kilowatt-hours per mile. That's equivalent to 682 British thermal units, or Btu, a common energy measurement that lets us compare different fuels. If you get that energy from a fossil-fuel-fired power plant, only 34 percent of the original input becomes electrical energy—the other 66 percent is lost in the generation process. So it takes about 2,000 Btu to get 0.2 kilowatt-hours. But because transmission and charging the battery can eat up 15 to 20 percent of the original electricity, you'll need at least another 300 Btu to generate enough electricity to make up for the loss. That means moving the RAV4 one mile requires a total fossil-fuel input of about 2,300 Btu.
How do gas-powered cars stack up? A gallon of gas is equivalent to 124,290 Btu—so a 25-mpg car uses 4,970 Btu per mile, nearly twice the energy required by its electric counterpart. However, as you imply, if we improve the mileage, the gas-powered car or hybrid comes closer and closer to the EV in terms of energy use. At 40 mpg, it's down to 3,110 Btu. Bump it up to a Prius-like 50 mpg, and, voila, it's about 2,490 Btu per mile—close to the RAV4.
Cost-wise, however, there’s also no comparison. EVs win handily for the simple reason that energy sources used to make electricity are presently a lot cheaper than gasoline, which now costs about six times as much per unit of energy as coal. EV enthusiasts like to boast about how little it costs them to get around, and they’ve got good reason. At $4 a gallon for gas, even a 50-mpg car costs eight cents a mile for fuel. With electricity at 10 to 15 cents per kilowatt-hour, the EV can go that same distance for a piddling 2 to 3 cents a mile.
Sounds fabulous, almost magical, but I find it downright terrifying. We know from bitter, prairie-defiling, forest-ravaging, suburb-expanding, war-begetting experience that when fuel is cheap, people will drive more cars more miles, while developers create more residential enclaves farther from where people work, begetting even more driving.
We know because it has already happened. During the oil crisis of the mid-’70s, we responded by doubling the fuel economy of cars. It was a great technological achievement. However, because of this leap in efficiency, more petroleum was available, which helped keep gas prices down, which in turn pushed up the demand for fuel. This is one reason we now have nearly 115 million more cars and SUVs on the road than in 1975, we drive them 2,400 miles farther each year, and we burn 40 billion more gallons of fuel in them. If we continue in this direction, we will pave more land and sacrifice even more wildlife habitat and farmland to development and more precious urban space to the automobile. It doesn’t matter what power the vehicles use, they are still going to create environmental and social havoc while remaining a public-health menace because of the millions of people injured in car wrecks and the 40,000-plus people killed in highway accidents each year.
Worse yet, if it comes to pass that EVs are propelled by cheap power produced by fossil fuels or nuclear fission or any material--from your discarded plastic furniture to your very own corpse--they could become the vehicle of choice for our continuing ride to oblivion. If new technology allows them to go farther between charges and gives us the accelerative kick we crave, the demand for EVs could skyrocket. And they would derive powerful moral torque from environmental spin: They would be touted as the green solution to pollution, the thinking person’s car, earth-friendly transportation. You can see the ads already: leaf-fringed cars, vehicles driven by smiling endangered species, or illustrations of cars with feet advancing on ever smaller ecological footprints.
The point is that if EVs really boom, there will obviously be a tremendous need for new electric power sources. If this power comes from conventional systems, a lot of new power plants will have to be built, and a massive amount of fossil or nuclear fuel will have to be produced to run them. The environmental impacts that could result from building and supplying these power plants are staggering. Therefore, unless clean sources of alternative power can be developed cheaply and rapidly enough to power EVs, the so-called miracle car could be just another overhyped technological fix that failed to live up to our glorious expectations. (Like ethanol, or nuclear power that was going to be “too cheap to meter.”)
But even if all these clean-power sources could be developed, we have to seriously consider their possible unintended consequences. How many windmills and in whose backyard? How many thousands of square miles of solar panels and in whose favorite retreats? In our blissful fantasies of technological utopia, we ignore such questions and conveniently forget basic laws of physics and economics.
I’m all for electric cars. Bring ’em on. But for godsake let’s get real: Unless we also drive a whole lot less, and create a whole lot more efficient mass transit, EVs might very well compound the huge environmental and human damage we’re already doing with our automobiles.
Posted at 04:44 PM in Energy, Transportation | Permalink
Technorati Tags: cars, electric vehicles, ev, gas prices, rav4, t. boone pickens, toyota
Cobasys is apparently for sale though (and having $ problems), see: courthousenews.com....
Gee, maybe if they supplied BEVs they would be making more money?? Even a 50-mile range in a reduced-price car would be sufficient for a whole lot of people (I know I'd strongly consider buying such a car), but they think they need the full range of a gas car before anybody will buy it for their commuting needs.
What else are you thinking Nerfer? Why isn't Nissan or Mitsubishi mentioning any of this patents owned by Chevron to the public?
recent article (8/25/08 WSJ):
online.wsj.com/article...
Mitsubishi Looks to Russia for Growth
Masuko Also Plans
Electric Vehicles
In Japan Next Year
By JOHN MURPHY
August 25, 2008; Page B1
Mitsubishi also wants to be a leader in ecofriendly cars. It is looking to be the first Japanese car maker to mass-produce a pure electric vehicle with the launch of the i-MiEV electric car in Japan in 2009, a year ahead of rival Nissan's own electric vehicle.
Excerpts from an interview with Mr. Masuko:
Mitsubishi Motors
Mitsubishi looks to launch the i-MiEV electric car in Japan in 2009, a year ahead of rival Nissan's electric vehicle.
WSJ: What are your sales plans for Mitsubishi's electric vehicle, the i-MiEV?
Mr. Masuko: We are planning to sell them in Japan next summer. This fall, we are going to test-run those electric cars in Europe. In America, we have made agreements with two California-based electric companies to make test runs. As we do test runs in America, we are trying to judge the applicability and also whether the infrastructure is ready.
WSJ: So how soon might consumers be able to buy one in the U.S.?
Mr. Masuko: By 2010, we are looking to make the left-hand drive cars but we haven't decided exactly when we are going to sell them in America.
WSJ: What is the driving range and cost of your electric car?
Mr. Masuko: On one charge, the range is 160 kilometers (99.2 miles). The cost is hard to tell. With government subsidies we are looking to sell the electric cars for 3 million yen (about $27,600). After mass production, we will reduce costs and sell it for 2 million to 2.5 million yen.
WSJ: What are your production plans for the electric vehicle?
Mr. Masuko: In 2009, 2,000 units. In 2010, our plan is to make 4,000 units and in 2011, 8,000 to 10,000.
WSJ: Does Mitsubishi have plans to make a hybrid car?
Mr. Masuko: Right now, we are focusing on electric vehicles but not hybrids. We know that the time for electric vehicles will come and in the future we have the plug-in hybrids in our minds.
WSJ: Given the difficulties in the global auto industry including soaring gasoline prices, rising raw material costs and the economic slowdown in the U.S., do you think you'll be able to meet your new management plan to double profit?
Mr. Masuko: It is undeniable that the conditions are very difficult. We definitely want to accomplish our business plan and for now we're not thinking about changing the business plan.
Write to John Murphy at john.murphy@wsj.com
Thursday, July 31, 2008Last Update: 11:26:26 AM
Mercedes-Benz Sues Hybrid Battery Supplier
By ANNIE CLEMENS
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (CN) - Mercedes-Benz U.S. International paid Cobasys $6 million to develop a battery pack for a hybrid vehicle under production, but claims the supplier ran into a funding crisis and is unable to deliver the product, putting the pressure on Mercedes to meet its June 2009 production deadline, the car company claims in Federal Court.
Cobasys is one of the few suppliers to produce nickel metal hydride (NiMH) battery packs for use in hybrids. It submitted the winning bid for the Mercedes hybrid project and, in doing so, agreed to develop, produce and deliver the product on time, the lawsuit claims.
Cobasys allegedly assured the Daimler AG affiliate that had all the requisite staff, funds and equipment to complete the job.
After Cobasys and Daimler hammered out the production costs and pricing of the battery pack, Mercedes issued a purchase order. It claims Cobasys confirmed that it could meet the expected launch date, but did not sign a confirmation of the purchase order. The plaintiff says it found out later that Cobasys refused to sign the order because its owners, Chevron and Energy Conversion Devices, had cut off funding, leaving the supplier with "no plans or ability to fund its day-to-day operations past that point, much less make the capital investments required to meet its production volume commitments to (Mercedes) and other manufacturers."
To make matters worse, Mercedes claims Cobasys' owners are actively searching for a buyer. They allegedly hid this information from Daimler and Mercedes, leading them to believe that Cobasys was "ready, willing and able to produce the necessary parts, while knowing this is not the case, and while avoiding signing (the plaintiffs') purchase order."
Mercedes claims that Cobasys has since found a buyer, and the sale is imminent. But even if the buyer assumes the contract, Mercedes claims it has become "entirely dependent" on Cobasys' delivering the NiMH battery pack in time. "No other supplier can produce a battery meeting the specifications jointly developed by Cobasys and Daimler," the lawsuit claims.
However, when Mercedes solicited written reassurance from Cobasys, the company allegedly denied having any contract to produce the battery pack. Cobasys told Mercedes that it would continue the development work, but would not be involved with production. The plaintiff also remains suspicious of what will happen to the property rights, as Cobasys "has yet to provide any written concrete assurances that it will not sell or transfer any assets or intellectual property rights required to carry out its obligations."
The car manufacturer seeks a declaration of Cobasys' obligations under contract. Chevron Technology Ventures and Ovonic Battery Company, primarily owned by Energy Conversion Devices, have also been named as defendants.
Mercedes' attorneys are Howard Walthall Jr., Joseph Letzer, Ellen Mathews and S. Greg Burge of Burr & Forman.
According to the report below from the L.A. Times the electric version of Mitsubishi’s small vehicle, using a lithium-ion battery, apparently costs more than twice its gasoline-powered equivalent, takes up to 7 hours to re-charge and has a range of only 75 miles.
A hybrid version with an NiMH battery might be $20,000 cheaper based on existing hybrid prices. A lithium-ion hybrid might be $10,000 cheaper since it would use a much smaller battery than the EV, with the battery cost savings being partly offset by its need to have a standard gas engine as well. Of course the hybrids do not have range restrictions or the need for virtually daily recharging.
So the Mitsubishi indicates the challenge for the li-on battery and demonstrates the essential trade off between an all electric city car and a hybrid. With the EV you get infinite miles per gallon of gas compared with maybe 50 or 70 on a next generation hybrid. But it is only for short trips.
There seems to be two conclusions to be drawn. First, the lithium ion battery is currently an expensive technology compared with the NiMH. It probably needs to be decosted before it can compete with the NiMH battery as was discussed here.
Secondly, a city car may not have a vast consumer market until the gasoline savings are in the range of $4,000 a year to justify an additional $20,000 cost. At 15,000 miles/yr and, say, 50 mpg for a hybrid, the cost of gas would need to be north of $13 a gallon. Or else the battery cost needs to come down a lot.
Mitsubishi electric car to get U.S. market test by PG & E, Edison
A handful of i-MiEV cars will be sent to the utilities, which will evaluate whether there’s a mass market for them here.
By Ken Bensinger
August 8, 2008
Mitsubishi Motors Corp. will bring electric cars to the U.S. starting this fall in test programs announced today with Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and Southern California Edison.
The Japanese automaker will deliver fewer than a dozen of its tiny i-MiEV electric cars to the utilities, but the company said it plans to use the programs to determine whether the U.S. is a viable mass market for such vehicles. We want to evaluate if electric cars are feasible as a commercial technology,” said David Patterson, Mitsubishi’s senior manager for regulatory affairs and certification.
Currently, only one company sells highway-legal electric cars in the U.S., San Carlos, Calif.-based Tesla, which began delivering its $100,000 Roadster in April. Electric cars made by General Motors, Toyota and other major carmakers were available on limited lease terms in California in the late 1990s, but most of those cars were recalled and the lease programs were discontinued.
Now, with gasoline prices roughly triple their 1990s prices, interest in electric cars has risen significantly and a number of automakers are considering the technology, including Nissan and General Motors, which plans to release its electric Volt in late 2010.
Mitsubishi will begin selling the i-MiEV in Japan starting in August 2009 for between $45,000 and $50,000, not including government incentives of more than $15,000. A non-electric version of the car retails in Japan for around $20,000.
The largest component in the price, said Patterson, is the car’s advanced lithium ion battery, produced by Lithium Energy Japan. Battery technology is considered the main obstacle to widespread adoption of electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles.
The battery, which can be charged in five to seven hours using 220-volt current, gives the i-MiEV a 75-mile range and a top speed of 81 mph. It can hold three passengers and the driver.
Tags: peak oil energy investments
This entry was posted on Friday, August 8th, 2008 at 9:43 am and is filed under batteries, electric vehicles, hybrid vehicles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Print This Post Print This Post
By Edward Niedermeyer
August 6, 2008 - 1,078 views
Who wants to do some business?Information Week reports that Cobasys can't make shipments of NiMh batteries to Daimler. The battery firm, a joint venture between Chevron and Energy Conversion Devices (ECD), lost $76m in 2007. The owners mixed like oil and water. Both "partners" are keen to foist the money-loser on someone else. Daimler's filing a lawsuit (or two) against Cobasys accusing Chevron, ECD and Cobasys of conspiring to keep the plan to bail a secret from Mercedes officials– so that the automaker wouldn't pull the battery deal. Daimler also alleges that Cobasys hadn't begun production on its $6m NiMh contract "in case new owners don't want the contract." And so… "Without a reliable source for this critical part, (we) will be unable to produce the hybrid vehicle in accordance with its scheduled launch date, and will likely be forced to either cancel the vehicle entirely, or delay the launch for an extended period in order to identify and develop a substitute battery, and to redesign other portions of the vehicle to accommodate it." Ouch. Meanwhile, we are still anxiously waiting to hear if rumors of a Cobasys sale to GM were correct or not. After this debacle, with GM's cash flow issues, we can only hope the answer is not.
Information Week »
Nissan shows models of electric car, hybrid
A battery developed that delivers more power than type common today
The Associated Press
updated 11:23 a.m. ET, Wed., Aug. 6, 2008
YOKOSUKA, Japan - Nissan showed on Wednesday a spiffy electric car packed with a battery developed by the Japanese automaker to deliver more power than the type common in today’s hybrids.
The electric vehicle, set for sale in 2010, carried a 300 kilogram (660 pounds) lithium-ion battery and still zipped around a Nissan Motor Co. test course, accelerating more quickly than comparable gas-engine cars.
It was extremely quiet, absent of engine noise — a trademark of electric vehicles. Details such as cruising range are yet to be determined, Nissan officials said.
Having fallen behind Japanese rivals Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. in hybrids, Nissan has made the electric vehicle the pillar of its green strategy.
Automakers around the world are trying to develop ecological products amid growing concerns about soaring gas prices and global warming. Electric vehicles are zero-emission.
Last month, Tokyo-based Nissan, with French partner Renault SA, announced a partnership with the Portuguese government to sell electric vehicles there in 2011. Separately, Nissan has announced deals with Project Better Place, based in Palo Alto, California, to mass market electric vehicles in Israel and Denmark in 2011.
Nissan’s electric vehicle, shown Wednesday, is being promised to go on sale in Japan and the U.S. in 2010 and globally by 2012.
But Nissan faces competition from other automakers, including General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. of the U.S., which have developed electric vehicles.
Also Wednesday, Japanese rival Mitsubishi Motors Corp., working with Japanese battery maker GS Yuasa Corp., said it was building a plant in Japan to mass-produce lithium-ion batteries for its electric vehicle, planned for rental next year and sale the following year.
Nissan also offered test-drives of its hybrid. Hybrids deliver better mileage than comparable gas-engine vehicles by switching between an engine and an electric motor.
Nissan now purchases its hybrid system from Toyota for the Altima hybrid sold in the U.S. but is promising vehicles with its own system by 2010.
Nissan’s hybrid system still has some bugs to work out. Shown on an Infiniti luxury model, it seemed to lurch a little when the gas engine kicked in as speed picked up.
Nissan engineer Mikio Nozaki said the system delivers the mileage of a compact car, although he refused to give numbers.
The hybrid comes with Nissan’s lithium-ion battery, although they are much smaller than the version in the electric car.
Hybrids such as the popular Toyota Prius has a nickel metal hydride battery, which is less powerful than lithium-ion. Automakers are competing to develop lithium-ion batteries for green cars.
Nissan also showed a side-collision prevention feature that uses sensors to recognize approaching vehicles, even in blind spots, and warns drivers when they are switching lanes.
The warning feels like a tug, delivered through very slight braking, either on the left wheels or the right, Nissan Senior Manager Junichi Kobayashi said. When that will become available on commercial models is still undecided.
Safety features that maintain a safe distance with the car in front and prevent dangerous lane departures are already available.
© 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: www.msnbc.msn.com/id/2.../
Gene Marcial's Stock Picks September 3, 2008, 12:01AM EST text size: TT
Marcial: A New Spark in Energy Conversion Devices
A restructuring under new CEO Morelli is fueling a turnaround at the alternative energy company, driven by fat profits at its solar products unit
by Gene Marcial
The brightening story at Energy Conversion Devices (ENER), an alternative energy enterprise that makes solar products, rechargeable batteries, and digital storage technology, is attracting investors thanks to the restructuring efforts of CEO and President Mark Morelli, who took over a year ago when the company was in the red. Until the two recent fiscal quarters, Energy Conversion had for many years reported losses. The company's stock, which soared to 71.30 on Sept. 2 from a 52-week low of 20.47 on Jan. 22, hit a 52-week high of 83.33 on June 23.
Some pros see even more spark in Energy Conversion's shares. Brion Tanous, managing director at investment boutique Merriman Curhan Ford, rates the stock a buy and figures it's worth 110 based on projected earnings and the worth of its three major assets, which are all involved in clean energy technology. "The collective value of Energy Conversion's United Solar Ovonics, Cobasys, and Ovonyx businesses is significantly higher than the current stock price," says Tanous.
Although the alternative energy field is getting crowded, Tanous says Energy Conversion is one of the major "pure plays" in high-growth thin-film solar products. Using a film of silicon on a sheet of stainless steel, these products can be more easily installed on rooftops than conventional solar cells, which are produced on a base of polysilicon crystalline covered in glass.
Fat Margins on Solar Sales
The United Solar Ovonics unit, which contributes about 90% of revenues, uses proprietary technology to make thin-film solar photovoltaic modules that convert sunlight into energy. The modules are mainly used for rooftops. Its Cobasys unit, a joint venture with Chevron (CVX), licenses its proprietary nickel-metal hydride (NiMH) battery technology to hybrid vehicle makers and other manufacturers. Energy's third unit is 30%-owned Ovonyx, which has developed a high-speed memory technology for a variety of applications, including cell phones, digital cameras, and PCs. Several tech companies, including Intel (INTC), have entered into licensing pacts with Energy for the technology.
Tanous figures Energy Conversion's solar business alone is worth 90 a share and Ovonyx about 20. He expects the company to sell its Cobasys operations to a major automaker by yearend, primarily because the unit has been losing money and requires more funding. He values the operations at about $150 million.
For the fiscal fourth quarter ended June 30, Energy Conversion posted record revenues and higher net income driven by greater-than-expected gross margins of 33.5% on solar polyvoltaic sales, Tanous notes. Based on the company's higher guidance for 2008 and 2009, he raised his earnings-per-share forecast for fiscal 2009 ending June 30 to $1.61 on revenues of $459.7 million, and to $3.28 for fiscal 2010 on $757.3 million in sales. In fiscal 2008, the company earned a meager 9¢ a share on sales of $255.9 million. The analyst attributes the jump in sales and earnings to a turnaround spurred by Morelli, who cut costs, sold some assets, and focused on commercializing products.
Still a Bargain?
Deutsche Bank (DB) analyst Steve O'Rourke, who is also bullish on the company, says that with the company's continued improvement in operations and rising demand for solar photovoltaic products, he is maintaining his buy rating on the stock. "We view strong solar PV backlog growth as indicative of a substantial turnaround in Energy Conversion's sales distribution channels," and a sign of its competitiveness, says O'Rourke. (Deutsche Bank has done banking for Energy Conversion and owns shares.)
Analysts agree there is strong demand for solar products. Energy Conversion's thin-film solar technology is "superior to and differentiated from the more established and commodity-like polysilicon-based solar technology," says Angelo Zino, an analyst at Standard & Poor's Equity Research (S&P, like BusinessWeek, is owned by The McGraw-Hill Companies (MHP). He notes the company has filled its entire fiscal 2009 available capacity and is getting significant purchase orders for its fiscal 2010 planned capacity. However, Zino has a hold opinion on the stock because of its already sharp climb. He's also cautious about the lower barriers to entry into the thin-film solar market.
Nonetheless, some investors and analysts believe Energy Conversion is well-positioned for strong growth for the long haul. That's because demand for alternatives to fossil-fuel generated power "should only increase, given environmental, cost, and geopolitical concerns," says Nils C. Van Liew of independent research firm Value Line. Energy Conversion, says Van Liew, has a good shot at grabbing a bigger share of the solar PV market because its product is lightweight, flexible, and easily integrated into building materials, making it well suited for rooftop installations.
Indeed, as it reshapes its corporate structure and sees healthy global demand for its solar products, Energy Conversion has found a profitable green niche.
Marcial writes the Inside Wall Street column for BusinessWeek. In 2008, FT Press published the book Gene Marcial's 7 Commandments of Stock Investing.
Hybrids such as the popular Toyota Prius has a nickel metal hydride battery, which is less powerful than lithium-ion. Automakers are competing to develop lithium-ion batteries for green cars.
The point is that if EVs really boom, there will obviously be a tremendous need for new electric power sources. If this power comes from conventional systems, a lot of new power plants will have to be built, and a massive amount of fossil or nuclear fuel will have to be produced to run them. The environmental impacts that could result from building and supplying these power plants are staggering. Therefore, unless clean sources of alternative power can be developed cheaply and rapidly enough to power EVs, the so-called miracle car could be just another overhyped technological fix that failed to live up to our glorious expectations. (Like ethanol, or nuclear power that was going to be “too cheap to meter.”)
But even if all these clean-power sources could be developed, we have to seriously consider their possible unintended consequences. How many windmills and in whose backyard? How many thousands of square miles of solar panels and in whose favorite retreats? In our blissful fantasies of technological utopia, we ignore such questions and conveniently forget basic laws of physics and economics.
oil embargo, and California passed an aggressive clean-air mandate, it looked like electric vehicles might get a new lease
on life. But the air cleared and gas prices fell, the mandate was revoked and electric cars all but disappeared.
But now that the polar ice caps are melting and gasoline is taking on the aura of a Cheval Blanc ’53, the electric car
is beginning to look a whole lot more attractive. All of the major domestic and foreign automakers have announced
plans to begin to market some sort of electric vehicle and the only question is when they’ll actually ramp up production. The implications are enormous for the world’s environment, for the auto and petroleum industries, for consumers and, of course, for the electric utility industry.
Sooner or later — and with gas prices what they are, probably sooner — we’ll begin to see meaningful penetration of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles and pure electric vehicles, certainly within the next five years. When we do, a key concern is what effect it will have on the grid. Last year, a U.S. Department of Energy study concluded the system has enough excess capacity to recharge 75 percent of the light cars and trucks on the road today if they were electric. EPRI computer models conclude much the same. Based on likely economic and population growth between 2006 and 2030, incremental demand for electricity should grow by a little under 2,000 million megawatt-hours; of that, about 340 million megawatt-hours, or less than one-fifth, would be attributed to PHEVs and EVs. In other words, if capacity must increase approximately 50 percent over the next 25 years, the addition of electric cars won’t matter one way or the other.
In fact, the introduction of the electric car is not much different from the introduction of any new electric appliance.
Rick Tempchin, director of retail distribution policy at the Edison Electric Institute, likens it to the introduction
of plasma televisions. It represents additional demand, but it’s not as though people will rush out to buy them for the
holiday season one year and plug in 40 million new electric cars to charge on Christmas morning. “Once we launch the
technology,” says Tempchin, “we’ll know what to expect and we’ll have time to deal with anything we need to do. That’s
our business. The first vehicle to come to market will be a simple appliance and it will evolve from there.” Nancy Gioia,
director, sustainable mobility, transportation and hybrid programs at Ford, thinks ramp-up to reasonable commercial
production will take a minimum of five years and perhaps a little longer, and while some companies are predicting a
shorter timeline, virtually no realistic scenario presents a threat to the grid.
While a new appliance presents no serious threat to the grid, neither does it represent a sudden windfall for utilities. The
greatest immediate benefit to the utility industry will come in the form of increased efficiency, assuming the new generation
of cars plug in during off-peak hours. And that’s the most likely scenario. Virtually all of the car companies are aiming for an
all-electric range between 20 and 40 miles, whether from a hybrid or a pure electric. Because the average commute falls within that range, cars could conceivably go back and forth to work without using any gas and without needing to recharge during the day. Although most utilities operate in a regulated environment and don’t necessarily realize increased profit from the sale of additional electrons, more efficient operation of installed capacity will benefit the bottom line, and increased use of off-peak capacity will dramatically increase overall efficiency. Furthermore, increased off-peak usage will facilitate the shift to renewable energy. Energy
from wind, for instance, tends to peak during the evening hours, so charging electric vehicles at night would be a perfect opportunity to boost the percentage of electricity generated by wind and, in the process, help utilities meet their renewable mandates. A tangential benefit to plug-in vehicles is that they could eventually function as a distributed energy storage facility for the grid. Their high-density batteries could serve as a widely distributed source of emergency power during periods of excessive peak demand. But this vehicle-to-grid function is at least 20 years down the road — pun intended — which raises the issue again of just what obstacles still need to be overcome before we begin to realize the benefits of the electrification of the transportation system.
The most obvious issue to be addressed is the battery. As of this writing, no battery capable of reliably powering anything larger than a mini-sized Think-type car is in commercial production. Lithium-ion batteries powering test vehicles produced by Ford, GM and Chrysler are built virtually by hand. The lithium-ion battery isn’t the only option. A sodium metal halide battery used in small European electric cars has great promise for certain types of vehicles, such as the hybrid electric locomotive that GE is developing, but for various technical reasons, the consensus is that some form of lithium-ion battery will power cars in this country.
Nissan insists the battery issue will not prevent ramp up of retail production of the company’s planned all-electric
car by 2011. Similarly, GM’s Tony Posawatz, line director for the Chevy Volt, is “very confident” that the automaker’s
partnerships with A123 Systems and Compact Power, a subsidiary of LG Chem of Korea, will yield batteries in
sufficient numbers to assure the launch of the Chevy Volt within the intended 2011 timeframe. But Nancy Gioia of
Ford is more cautious. “It’s going to take a little bit of time and a chunk of change to go from the science lab to the pilot
production phase to mass production of an efficient battery cell line of 10 million units a year.” Among the issues she
believes must be settled before commercial production of the batteries becomes feasible are battery life, reliability and
the ability to operate under broad temperature ranges. More significant from the perspective of utility companies,
plug-in cars will need to communicate intelligently with the grid, and that means smart meters. Plug-in cars can
be charged from any outlet, whether 110 volts or 220 volts, although the higher voltage cuts recharging time in half.
Smart meters will allow utilities to control demand and shape the load and charge customers incentive rates for charging
off-peak. California is ahead of the curve in installing smart meters, according to Efrain Ornelas, environmental technical
supervisor for Pacific Gas and Electric’s clean air transportation department. With a goal of equipping all 5.4 million
customers by 2012, Southern California Edison also intends to fully deploy smart meters to its five million customers by
2012, and utilities across the country are following suit. “We’re working closely with the Society of Automotive Engineers to
develop codes and standards for how vehicles will communicate with the grid,” says PG&E’s Ornelas. “Customers will
be able to program when to charge and to look for specific pricing signals with the option of giving us direct control as
part of a broad demand-response program.” Ultimately, the combination of smart chargers built into the cars and smart meters will permit a roaming capability, which will allow cars to recharge away from their home base, with electricity billed to the car’s owner. But that’s complicated, with transaction costs easily exceeding actual energy costs. With thousands of separate utility entities, it could make the phone industry’s disastrous experience with roaming look mild by comparison. The issue of developing codes and standards that both automakers and utilities can use efficiently points to what is perhaps the most fundamental unresolved issue on which the success of plug-in hybrids and all electric vehicles rests: a shared business model. Ed Kjaer is the
director of electric transportation at Southern California Edison, and before that he held key positions with major
auto manufacturers. He calls the electrification of the automobile a fundamental paradigm shift. “This is not
about the automakers launching the next car model. It’s about how do we integrate transportation into the energy
system,” says Kjaer. “It’s an absolute win-win for two titan industries. If you think of this as part of an energy
system, as opposed to a car, you start to explore some of the values on the utility side of the equation than can be
monetized and returned to the customer in terms of value. For instance, if we connect the wheels to the grid at night,
we’re spreading fixed costs over more energy use and that potentially puts downward pressure on rates.”
The new business model will go far toward defining the future of automakers, utilities, and the economy as a whole. But the challenges are significant. “We announced a partnership with Ford a few months ago, and it took us literally the first
month of talking to each other before we mastered each other’s vernacular,” Kjaer recounts. “The business models
are completely different. Throw out all the old ones. Start with a blank sheet of paper and a whole lot of imagination, and at the end of the day you come up with a shared vision where transportation connects to the grid. Our industries are being driven by the same forces: energy efficiency and environmental impact.”
The environmental impact of electrifying transportation through plug-in hybrids and all-electric vehicles is clear and incontrovertible. No matter which of nine models is used, regardless of the generation carbon mix, a major study undertaken by EPRI and the National Resource Defense Council concludes that the environmental impact, both in terms of air quality and greenhouse gas emissions will be dramatic, with greenhouse gas emissions reduced by as much as 10.3 billion metric tons by 2050. With inevitable carbon constraints on both the utility and the auto industries, both stand to benefit enormously from the increased efficiency this new technology represents.
On Sep 05 05:23 AM swimjames wrote:What about the Chinese BYD car coming soon for 5-7,000 dollars;it is lithium iron phosphate battery powered???
diego
> anyone, any thoughts on this:
> The point is that if EVs really boom, there will obviously be a tremendous
> need for new electric power sources. If this power comes from conventional
> systems, a lot of new power plants will have to be built, and a massive
> amount of fossil or nuclear fuel will have to be produced to run
> them. The environmental impacts that could result from building and
> supplying these power plants are staggering. Therefore, unless clean
> sources of alternative power can be developed cheaply and rapidly
> enough to power EVs, the so-called miracle car could be just another
> overhyped technological fix that failed to live up to our glorious
> expectations. (Like ethanol, or nuclear power that was going to be
> “too cheap to meter.”)
>
> But even if all these clean-power sources could be developed, we
> have to seriously consider their possible unintended consequences.
> How many windmills and in whose backyard? How many thousands of square
> miles of solar panels and in whose favorite retreats? In our blissful
> fantasies of technological utopia, we ignore such questions and conveniently
> forget basic laws of physics and economics.
>
Allow me first a few points, a slighlty different view:
1. Why is it being assumed that we have to rely on the (existing) utility power and companies for powering electric vehicles or a grid?
2. Why is it being assumed the present auto makers (and hence present vehicle design) are ideally the ones/the best to spearhead electric cars development?
I do differ because of the following reasons (comments much welcome please), respectivley-
1- The Existing Utililties:
- Moral sense: the huge utlilites today hold a stranglehold on our lives by controlling our domestic energy supplies, I dread to have my transportatuion as well handed to them on a siover plate this way!
- Economic/Logistical sense; the present grid system as configured(see below) CANNOT take an additonal load of- for instance- a full city's worth of electric vehicles, unless massively and completely upgraded (and then realistically one would rather build a new system entirely!). Add onto this the organisational requirements and costs in managing these unrelated functions at such a sheer size, the utilities would simply be overwhelmed to full blown chaos on the roads (imagine a power-cut on the road-supply grid) . Also are we sure the present 'mains' grid congifuration (AC, 110-415v, overhead wires, etc) is the best for electric vehicles operations all aspects considered, and that we need the grid to be centralised and so controlled as opposed to a more decentralised/localise... mode of operation? How about independent renewable energies like solar and wind which may not be efficiently adaptable to a pre-existing fixed system, yet are quite important and viable alternative power sources? We are much better off with the utility giants staying off transport then, because it makes the best scenario all around. The alternative/solution? - I believe it's basically a highly decentralised or localised (but standardised, public- owned) grid which can be 'supplied' by several players all preferably under the control of a Public authority (Municipal council/Department of transport, say), a situation which can only be good news for consumers since it will foster healthy competition.
2- The Automakers:
-Electric vehicles will need to be radically new - purpose designed from ground up rather than the present ICE vehicle conversion 'hybird' trend - in order to best utilise their inherent and potential advantages and crucially to fit onto a custom grid. A lot of this will involve new, fresh and open ways of thinking: in body design, materials, assembly, etc - akin to a total rethink of autodesign , indeed a 'paradigm shift' as highlighted above by Swimjames. In such an open environment, It may thus not suprise us if some presently insignificant but highly innovative up-starters (see especially MDI, THINK, even kit-car types) do come up with the most effective solutions as applies specifically to electric vehicles. Of course existing manufacturers will have a head start/edge once viable 'best practice' solutions are established, but it may not be so.
Returning to the question by Swimjames, the gist of the above points is really to highlight the wide range of possiblities that may actually exist towards making electric vehicles viable, without causing anymore than current levels of environmental undesirables. This is because the total energy resource is effectively still there - for instance at the worst, the same oil (fuel) as drives current ICE cars may be used but more efficiently through conversion to electricity at centralised power stations (rather than in each individual car's engine), supplying to a road-side grid. Same thing for all the rest of available energy sources-solar,wind or nuclear. It is only the grid (or whichever system of powering electric vehicles we may eventually adopt) that needs getting right. Certainly without doubt it will be a major headache properly setting up and providing the power to drive such a fully electric transport system - bearing in mind all the challenges of a fully independent mobile car viz a stationary grid- however this to me is the only major problem. Indeed the key atributes (e.g higher overall efficiency,energy interconversion) that come with an electric vehicle system may more than outweigh any undesirable side effects in the long run.
We are now taking $1000 deposits for the Hymotion™ L5 Plug-in Conversion Modules for the Toyota Prius. The L5 is priced at $9995 + all applicable taxes + $400 destination fee. Installation and a standard 3 year warranty are included. Place a deposit now to reserve your L5 and choose the A123 Green Certified Hymotion Installer Partner (CHIP) dealer location of your choice.
Consumer orders placed at this time are expected to ship from our factory in January 2009.
Actual installation date will be scheduled through your local Green CHIP dealer.
After placing your $1000 deposit you will receive a confirmation email that will include a deposit confirmation code and further details on the installation process. Additionally, we will contact you within 5 business days of placing your deposit with your specific target installation timeframe. Deposits are fully refundable for a $75 processing fee up to 30 days prior to your installation date.
Hymotion L5 Plug-in Conversion Module for the Toyota Prius
Purchase Price $9995 including installation and standard 3 year warranty
$400 destination fee plus all applicable taxes
Place your $1000 deposit and select your Green CHIP dealer location
Receive deposit confirmation
Receive target install date within 5 business days
Green CHIP dealer will contact you to arrange your installation appointment
Bring your vehicle in, purchase your L5 from your Green CHIP dealer by paying remaining balance including all applicable taxes
Billing Address
First Name
Last Name
Address
City
State or Province
Zip Code
Country United States Canada
Phone Number
Email Address
Verify Email Match!No Match!
Do you currently own or plan to purchase a Toyota Prius model years 2004 – 2008?
Our first product, the L5 Plug-in Conversion Module, is only available for the Toyota Prius model years 2004 - 2008. If you would like to join our mailing list to receive product updates, click here.
Do you live in the United States or Canada?
www.a123systems.com/hy...
www.a123systems.com/hy...
Amazing!
You can now get a kit (including installation) valued at $12,000 with a lithium A123 battery pack installed in your Toyota prius with its own warranty (not negating your present warranty with Toyota) that can give you 140 miles/gallon. All you need is a 110 Volt outlet. If you run out of gas, no worry, you can fill up gas as usual if no outlet around, wow! Bad news: long wait, abt. 200 people on list to get them.. You can get on waiting list on website above if you really want to go green.
about us
contact us
faqs
Buy yours now!
Place a deposit online
Plug-in calculator Compare different car types
Join the community
Be a part of the gallery!
A123Systems Hymotion™
Products
P: 877-2GO-PHEV (877-246-7438)
Hours: 10 am to 6 pm EST
Hymotion Certified
Installers
Hymotion Mailing List
Not ready to buy but want
to stay in the know? Join
our mailing list for product
announcements and updates.
A123Systems
The Arsenal on the Charles
321 Arsenal Street
Watertown, MA 02472
P: 617-778-5700
a123systems.com
Email
General Information:
info@hymotion.com
Career Opportunities:
a123systems.com
Fleet Owners:
fleets@hymotion.com
Press Inquiries:
press@a123systems.com
Legal | Privacy Policy | Contact
2009 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid
Click image to enlarge
Mouse over thumbnails to view images
This is a 2009 Prius package 6 touring edition, loaded with every feature. We are the Hymotion Green Chip dealer and have professionally installed the Lithium Battery pack which allows the Prius to travel up to 40 miles on pure electricity. You should achieve fuel economy of 100-150 mpg depending on your driving pattern. The car is still under factory warranty and NO this kit does NOT void the factory warranty. The Hymotion kit also comes with a 3 year warranty as well.
Vehicle Information
Stock No:
831549
2009 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid
L4, 1.5L
5 Dr Hatchback
jtdkb20u997831549 Trans:
Drivetrain:
Ext Color:
Int Color:
Automatic
FWD
Light Blue
Gray
Customer Resources
Contact
Green Car Company
Eco-Experts
425-820-4549
345 106TH AVE NE
BELLEVUE, WA 98004
Vehicle Options
----------------------...
Price listed for this vehicle does not include charges such as: License, Title, Registration Fees, State or Local Taxes, Finance Charges, Optional Credit or Liability Insurance, Delivery Fees, and State Documentary Service Fees. I/O COM, Inc. and the Dealership make no representations, expressed or implied, to any actual or prospective purchaser or owner of this vehicle as to the existence, ownership, accuracy, description or condition of this vehicle's listed equipment, accessories, price or any warranties. I/O COM, Inc and the Dealership are not responsible for typographical errors in price or equipment listed. Any and all differences must be addressed prior to the sale of this vehicle.
www.vehiclemart.com/en...
Home • GCC University • Contact Us • Products • Current Inventory • Site Map • Admin Login • Admin Logout
GCC Privacy Policy
first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius Hybrids
In early November, the Green Car Company of Bellevue, WA will auction on eBAY the first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius Hybrids while supporting Plug In America. Unlike other conversions, these Priuses will come with a factory warranty because the Green Car Company is a dealer using A123 Hymotion batteries. Green Car Co. will jump start this offering by donating the profits of the initial sale to PIA. So many PIA members ask us, "where can I get an electric car?" Well now, instead of replying, "they're coming!" we can say, "they're arriving!"
From: Linda Nicholes [mailto:linda@pluginam...
Sent: Monday, October 20, 2008 11:12 AM
To: pipano65@hotmail.com
Subject: Plug In America October Newsletter
In this edition:
Hail to the Bailout-Plug Ins Included
Funding for banks has been getting a lot of attention lately, but the historic Congressional bailout package also..
2009 Plug In Prius Auction to Benefit Plug In America
In early November, the Green Car Company of Bellevue, WA will auction on eBAY the first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius..
We are now taking $1000 deposits for the Hymotion™ L5 Plug-in Conversion Modules for the Toyota Prius. The L5 is priced at $9995 + all applicable taxes + $400 destination fee. Installation and a standard 3 year warranty are included. Place a deposit now to reserve your L5 and choose the A123 Green Certified Hymotion Installer Partner (CHIP) dealer location of your choice.
Consumer orders placed at this time are expected to ship from our factory in January 2009.
Actual installation date will be scheduled through your local Green CHIP dealer.
After placing your $1000 deposit you will receive a confirmation email that will include a deposit confirmation code and further details on the installation process. Additionally, we will contact you within 5 business days of placing your deposit with your specific target installation timeframe. Deposits are fully refundable for a $75 processing fee up to 30 days prior to your installation date.
Hymotion L5 Plug-in Conversion Module for the Toyota Prius
Purchase Price $9995 including installation and standard 3 year warranty
$400 destination fee plus all applicable taxes
Place your $1000 deposit and select your Green CHIP dealer location
Receive deposit confirmation
Receive target install date within 5 business days
Green CHIP dealer will contact you to arrange your installation appointment
Bring your vehicle in, purchase your L5 from your Green CHIP dealer by paying remaining balance including all applicable taxes
Billing Address
First Name
Last Name
Address
City
State or Province
Zip Code
Country United States Canada
Phone Number
Email Address
Verify Email Match!No Match!
Do you currently own or plan to purchase a Toyota Prius model years 2004 – 2008?
Our first product, the L5 Plug-in Conversion Module, is only available for the Toyota Prius model years 2004 - 2008. If you would like to join our mailing list to receive product updates, click here.
Do you live in the United States or Canada?
----------------------...
www.a123systems.com/hy...
www.a123systems.com/hy...
Amazing!
You can now get a kit (including installation) valued at $12,000 with a lithium A123 battery pack installed in your Toyota prius with its own warranty (not negating your present warranty with Toyota) that can give you 140 miles/gallon. All you need is a 110 Volt outlet. If you run out of gas, no worry, you can fill up gas as usual if no outlet around, wow! Bad news: long wait, abt. 200 people on list to get them.. You can get on waiting list on website above if you really want to go green.
about us
contact us
faqs
Buy yours now!
Place a deposit online
Plug-in calculator Compare different car types
Join the community
Be a part of the gallery!
A123Systems Hymotion™
Products
P: 877-2GO-PHEV (877-246-7438)
Hours: 10 am to 6 pm EST
Hymotion Certified
Installers
Hymotion Mailing List
Not ready to buy but want
to stay in the know? Join
our mailing list for product
announcements and updates.
A123Systems
The Arsenal on the Charles
321 Arsenal Street
Watertown, MA 02472
P: 617-778-5700
a123systems.com
Email
General Information:
info@hymotion.com
Career Opportunities:
a123systems.com
Fleet Owners:
fleets@hymotion.com
Press Inquiries:
press@a123systems.com
Legal | Privacy Policy | Contact
2009 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid
Click image to enlarge
Mouse over thumbnails to view images
This is a 2009 Prius package 6 touring edition, loaded with every feature. We are the Hymotion Green Chip dealer and have professionally installed the Lithium Battery pack which allows the Prius to travel up to 40 miles on pure electricity. You should achieve fuel economy of 100-150 mpg depending on your driving pattern. The car is still under factory warranty and NO this kit does NOT void the factory warranty. The Hymotion kit also comes with a 3 year warranty as well.
Vehicle Information
Stock No:
831549
2009 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid
L4, 1.5L
5 Dr Hatchback
jtdkb20u997831549 Trans:
Drivetrain:
Ext Color:
Int Color:
Automatic
FWD
Light Blue
Gray
Customer Resources
Contact
Green Car Company
Eco-Experts
425-820-4549
345 106TH AVE NE
BELLEVUE, WA 98004
Vehicle Options
----------------------...
Price listed for this vehicle does not include charges such as: License, Title, Registration Fees, State or Local Taxes, Finance Charges, Optional Credit or Liability Insurance, Delivery Fees, and State Documentary Service Fees. I/O COM, Inc. and the Dealership make no representations, expressed or implied, to any actual or prospective purchaser or owner of this vehicle as to the existence, ownership, accuracy, description or condition of this vehicle's listed equipment, accessories, price or any warranties. I/O COM, Inc and the Dealership are not responsible for typographical errors in price or equipment listed. Any and all differences must be addressed prior to the sale of this vehicle.
www.vehiclemart.com/en...
Home • GCC University • Contact Us • Products • Current Inventory • Site Map • Admin Login • Admin Logout
GCC Privacy Policy
first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius Hybrids
In early November, the Green Car Company of Bellevue, WA will auction on eBAY the first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius Hybrids while supporting Plug In America. Unlike other conversions, these Priuses will come with a factory warranty because the Green Car Company is a dealer using A123 Hymotion batteries. Green Car Co. will jump start this offering by donating the profits of the initial sale to PIA. So many PIA members ask us, "where can I get an electric car?" Well now, instead of replying, "they're coming!" we can say, "they're arriving!"
In this edition:
Hail to the Bailout-Plug Ins Included
Funding for banks has been getting a lot of attention lately, but the historic Congressional bailout package also..
2009 Plug In Prius Auction to Benefit Plug In America
In early November, the Green Car Company of Bellevue, WA will auction on eBAY the first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius..
We are now taking $1000 deposits for the Hymotion™ L5 Plug-in Conversion Modules for the Toyota Prius. The L5 is priced at $9995 + all applicable taxes + $400 destination fee. Installation and a standard 3 year warranty are included. Place a deposit now to reserve your L5 and choose the A123 Green Certified Hymotion Installer Partner (CHIP) dealer location of your choice.
Consumer orders placed at this time are expected to ship from our factory in January 2009.
Actual installation date will be scheduled through your local Green CHIP dealer.
After placing your $1000 deposit you will receive a confirmation email that will include a deposit confirmation code and further details on the installation process. Additionally, we will contact you within 5 business days of placing your deposit with your specific target installation timeframe. Deposits are fully refundable for a $75 processing fee up to 30 days prior to your installation date.
Hymotion L5 Plug-in Conversion Module for the Toyota Prius
Purchase Price $9995 including installation and standard 3 year warranty
$400 destination fee plus all applicable taxes
Place your $1000 deposit and select your Green CHIP dealer location
Receive deposit confirmation
Receive target install date within 5 business days
Green CHIP dealer will contact you to arrange your installation appointment
Bring your vehicle in, purchase your L5 from your Green CHIP dealer by paying remaining balance including all applicable taxes
Billing Address
First Name
Last Name
Address
City
State or Province
Zip Code
Country United States Canada
Phone Number
Email Address
Verify Email Match!No Match!
Do you currently own or plan to purchase a Toyota Prius model years 2004 – 2008?
Our first product, the L5 Plug-in Conversion Module, is only available for the Toyota Prius model years 2004 - 2008. If you would like to join our mailing list to receive product updates, click here.
Do you live in the United States or Canada?
www.a123systems.com/hy...
www.a123systems.com/hy...
Amazing!
You can now get a kit (including installation) valued at $12,000 with a lithium A123 battery pack installed in your Toyota prius with its own warranty (not negating your present warranty with Toyota) that can give you 140 miles/gallon. All you need is a 110 Volt outlet. If you run out of gas, no worry, you can fill up gas as usual if no outlet around, wow! Bad news: long wait, abt. 200 people on list to get them.. You can get on waiting list on website above if you really want to go green.
about us
contact us
faqs
Buy yours now!
Place a deposit online
Plug-in calculator Compare different car types
Join the community
Be a part of the gallery!
A123Systems Hymotion™
Products
P: 877-2GO-PHEV (877-246-7438)
Hours: 10 am to 6 pm EST
Hymotion Certified
Installers
Hymotion Mailing List
Not ready to buy but want
to stay in the know? Join
our mailing list for product
announcements and updates.
A123Systems
The Arsenal on the Charles
321 Arsenal Street
Watertown, MA 02472
P: 617-778-5700
a123systems.com
Email
General Information:
info@hymotion.com
Career Opportunities:
a123systems.com
Fleet Owners:
fleets@hymotion.com
Press Inquiries:
press@a123systems.com
Legal | Privacy Policy | Contact
2009 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid
Click image to enlarge
Mouse over thumbnails to view images
This is a 2009 Prius package 6 touring edition, loaded with every feature. We are the Hymotion Green Chip dealer and have professionally installed the Lithium Battery pack which allows the Prius to travel up to 40 miles on pure electricity. You should achieve fuel economy of 100-150 mpg depending on your driving pattern. The car is still under factory warranty and NO this kit does NOT void the factory warranty. The Hymotion kit also comes with a 3 year warranty as well.
Vehicle Information
Stock No:
831549
2009 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid
L4, 1.5L
5 Dr Hatchback
jtdkb20u997831549 Trans:
Drivetrain:
Ext Color:
Int Color:
Automatic
FWD
Light Blue
Gray
Customer Resources
Contact
Green Car Company
Eco-Experts
425-820-4549
345 106TH AVE NE
BELLEVUE, WA 98004
Vehicle Options
----------------------...
Price listed for this vehicle does not include charges such as: License, Title, Registration Fees, State or Local Taxes, Finance Charges, Optional Credit or Liability Insurance, Delivery Fees, and State Documentary Service Fees. I/O COM, Inc. and the Dealership make no representations, expressed or implied, to any actual or prospective purchaser or owner of this vehicle as to the existence, ownership, accuracy, description or condition of this vehicle's listed equipment, accessories, price or any warranties. I/O COM, Inc and the Dealership are not responsible for typographical errors in price or equipment listed. Any and all differences must be addressed prior to the sale of this vehicle.
www.vehiclemart.com/en...
Home • GCC University • Contact Us • Products • Current Inventory • Site Map • Admin Login • Admin Logout
GCC Privacy Policy
first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius Hybrids
In early November, the Green Car Company of Bellevue, WA will auction on eBAY the first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius Hybrids while supporting Plug In America. Unlike other conversions, these Priuses will come with a factory warranty because the Green Car Company is a dealer using A123 Hymotion batteries. Green Car Co. will jump start this offering by donating the profits of the initial sale to PIA. So many PIA members ask us, "where can I get an electric car?" Well now, instead of replying, "they're coming!" we can say, "they're arriving!"
In this edition:
Hail to the Bailout-Plug Ins Included
Funding for banks has been getting a lot of attention lately, but the historic Congressional bailout package also..
2009 Plug In Prius Auction to Benefit Plug In America
In early November, the Green Car Company of Bellevue, WA will auction on eBAY the first in a series of 2009 Plug In Prius..
I was in the Bahamas about a month ago, when I was a news report on CNN regarding a new battery for the electric car. What was interesting about the battery wasthat it was about the size of "D" dry cell batteries. The video showed that a pack of about 30 was used to power an electric car. Therefore the amount of space under the hood was reduced by 80%. I have been able to find the report on the internet. Has anyone else seen this report? if so please let me know.
Thanks,
Ford