Yael Pipano

The Electric Car Battery Battle

For you guys arguing about whether NiMH is better than Lithium or not:
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 Electric Car Battery Battle

Energy Conversion Devices seems to have all NiMH technology through Cobasys (see below). Can anyone comment on this??
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.

The Electric Car Battery Battle

israelline.wordpress.c... ?

The Electric Car Battery Battle

Ben B - where is your blog? Yael.

The Electric Car Battery Battle

Above confirms existence of Nissan hybrid, not electric car.

The Electric Car Battery Battle

Doug Korthof-- you may be right --Ghosn is a jokester and a hypester. Look at below article:
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.../

The Electric Car Battery Battle

10words.betterplace.co...

The Electric Car Battery Battle

Daimler Sues Cobasys; Mercedes ML Hybrid Delayed or Cancelled

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 »

The Electric Car Battery Battle

Mitsubishi’s Trial EV Indicates Challenge for the Lithium Ion Solution

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.
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The Electric Car Battery Battle

True, Cobasys is in a financial crisis, see below:
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.

The Electric Car Battery Battle

Another matter: Chevron could really break out of the pack if it licensed the patents it purchased from GM for GMs plug in electric car the EV1. Chevron owns all of the patents including the NiMH battery technology. Unlike lithium ion batteries, NiMH batteries do not overheat so there is no chance of fire. It's common knowledge that Toyota can't add a plug to their Prius because of Chevron's patents. Once Chevron licenses these patents to the automakers the sky is the limit as far as the share price is concerned, and the energy crisis and global warming would be averted. Chevron would be a corporate hero. As per Nerfer (top commentator): Also Chevron, via their part ownership of Cobasys, has long blocked the use of NiMH for pure electric vehicles, using their NiMH patents they bought up to block the large-format NiMH batteries needed for that type of application, even for companies like Toyota that get their NiMH batteries elsewhere.
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 [e-mail]

The Electric Car Battery Battle

so agree with naked jaybird!!!
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

Oil: The Inconvenient Truth

Brian you must have info re global warming that no one else has.

Chevron's Share Price Looks Most Compelling

re above comment: As of December 31, 2007, BP had net proved developed and undeveloped reserves of 5,492 million barrels of liquids and 41,130 billion cubic feet of natural gas.

Ten Ways to Invest in Utah

August 30, 2008
Surge in Natural Gas Has Utah Driving Cheaply
By CLIFFORD KRAUSS
SALT LAKE CITY — The best deal on fuel in the country right now might be here in Utah, where people are waiting in lines to pay the equivalent of 87 cents a gallon. Demand is so strong at rush hour that fuel runs low, and some days people can pump only half a tank.

It is not gasoline they are buying for their cars, but natural gas.

By an odd confluence of public policy and private initiative, Utah has become the first state in the country to experience broad consumer interest in the idea of running cars on clean natural gas.

Utahans are hunting the Internet and traveling the country to pick up used natural gas cars at auctions. They are spending thousands of dollars to transform their trucks and sport utility vehicles to run on compressed gas. Some fueling stations that sell it to the public are so busy they frequently run low on pressure, forcing drivers to return before dawn when demand is down.

It all began when unleaded gasoline rose above $3.25 a gallon last year, and has spiraled into a frenzy in the last few months.

Ron Brown, Honda’s salesman here for the Civic GX, the only car powered by natural gas made by a major automaker in the country, has sold one out of every four of the 800 cars Honda has made so far this year, and he has a pile of 330 deposit slips in his office, each designating a customer waiting months for a new car.

“It’s nuts,” Mr. Brown said. “People are buying these cars from me and turning around and selling them as if they were flipping real estate.”

Advocates for these cars see Mr. Brown’s brisk sales as a sign that natural gas could become the transport fuel of the future, replacing much of the oil the nation imports. While that remains a distant dream, big increases recently in the country’s production of natural gas do raise the possibility of making wider use of the fuel.

To a degree, it is already starting to happen in Utah, where the cost savings have gotten the public’s attention. Natural gas is especially cheap here, so that people spend about 87 cents for a quantity of gas sufficient to propel a car approximately the same distance as a $3.95 gallon of gasoline.

The word about natural gas cars has been spreading in news reports and by word of mouth, and so many Utahans are now trying to get their hands on used natural gas vehicles that they are drying up the national supply. Used car lots are stocking up, and beginning to look like county government parking lots with multiple lines of identical white Civic GXs once used in out-of-state fleets.

Gov. Jon M. Huntsman Jr. got into the act last year, spending $12,000 out of his own pocket to convert his state sport utility vehicle to run on natural gas. “We can create a model that others can look to,” Mr. Huntsman said in an interview. “Every state in America can make this a reality.”

In fact, some unique factors apply in Utah. Natural gas prices at the pump here are controlled and are the cheapest in the country, while the price of conventional gasoline is one of the highest. Questar Gas, the public utility, has compressed-gas pumps around the state open to the public, a fueling infrastructure that few states can match.

Special factors or not, the sudden popularity of natural gas vehicles here demonstrates their potential, according to advocates like T. Boone Pickens, the Texas oil billionaire who is financing a national campaign promoting wind power and natural gas to replace imported oil. “Utah shows that the technology is here and the fuel works and the fuel is better than foreign oil,” Mr. Pickens said.

Natural gas cars produce at least 20 percent less greenhouse gas per mile than regular cars, according to a California study.

No official figures are available on how many natural gas vehicles Utah has, in part because so many people go to garages that install conversion kits that are not certified by the Environmental Protection Agency and are therefore illegal.

(Governor Huntsman has expressed concern, and some in the installation business have requested that the E.P.A. close down the unauthorized operations; the agency says it does not comment on possible investigations.)

But Questar estimates the number at 6,000 and growing by several hundred a month. That is small compared with the 2.7 million vehicles registered in the state, but natural gas executives and state government officials say it makes Utah the fastest-growing market in the country for such cars.

Cars fueled by compressed natural gas have been available intermittently in the United States for decades, and have found wide use in fleets, but have never attracted much consumer interest. The situation is markedly different abroad. Of the eight million natural gas vehicles operating worldwide, only about 116,000 were in the United States, mostly as fleet vans, buses and cars, according to a 2006 Energy Department estimate.

Congress mandated the use of fleets capable of using alternative fuel cars for governments and some energy companies in the early 1990s, but public interest petered out as gasoline prices plummeted. Over the years, all the major car companies except Honda dropped their production in the United States.

The cars have two major disadvantages — a shortage of fueling stations and limited range. (A typical natural gas car goes half as far on a full tank as a gasoline car.) Utah is one of the few states where a driver can travel across the state without being out of range of a station.

The situation is a Catch-22: Carmakers do not want to make natural gas cars when few filling stations are set up for them, and few stations want to install expensive equipment to compress gas with so few cars on the road.

Hundreds of stations supply compressed gas in a few states like California, New York and Arizona, but most are either closed to the public or charge only modestly less than regular gasoline prices.

Retail natural gas prices in some states are triple the price in Utah. The only state that comes close to Utah’s low gas prices is Oklahoma, and a surge of natural gas car buying is going on there, too.

The natural gas industry and some politicians are pushing to open up the market to gas-powered vehicles across the country. Even in states without fueling stations, a few drivers have switched by spending several thousand dollars to install a home gas compressor.

A proposal on the ballot in California this fall would allow the state to sell $5 billion in bonds to finance rebates of $2,000 and more to buyers of natural gas vehicles. Legislation has been introduced in Congress to offer more tax credits to producers and consumers and mandate the installation of gas pumps in certain service stations, with the goal of making natural gas cars 10 percent of the nation’s vehicle fleet over the next decade.

“If the incentives are right and the fuel and cars are available, natural gas can work,” said Gordon Larsen, supervisor for natural gas vehicle operations at Questar Gas. But he said that any drop in gasoline prices douses enthusiasm among drivers considering the switch.

With gasoline hovering just below $4 a gallon for unleaded regular here, interest in the Salt Lake City area is strong.

Questar reports that the volume of natural gas pumped at its 21 filling stations is up 240 percent this year from last, after a 50 percent rise in 2007. Demand has grown so fast that the compressors at many of Questar’s stations run low during the day, forcing drivers to settle for half a tank or fill up during off-peak hours.

The natural gas car surge in Utah is because of several factors. Questar has had filling pumps around the state to fuel its own fleet of service vehicles since the 1980s, and because it had excess capacity, it opened those stations to the public. Natural gas prices are cheap because under Utah regulations, the utility is obliged to offer about half of the gas that it sells to its retail customers at the cost of production.

The state and a few municipalities are preparing to open more filling stations. If the trend continues, it could eventually lower the environmental impact of driving in Utah.

For now, demand for compressed-gas cars is outstripping supply.

“People get into a frenzy and they just have to buy,” said Rick Oliver, owner of a company that converts vehicles. He said that in a recent online auction, a Utah buyer paid $19,000 for a 2001 Civic GX with 50,000 miles — the price a buyer of a new GX would pay after state and federal tax credits.

Gary Frederickson, a 48-year-old computer technician, has bought six natural gas vehicles on Craigslist over the last year, flying as far as Portland and Oakland to pick up the cars. One 1998 Ford Contour he bought for $3,000 in effect cost him nothing because he will receive a $3,000 state tax credit for buying an alternative fuel car.

“It’s crazy to be in Utah and have access to 85-cent-a-gallon fuel and not take advantage of it,” he said before a recent 2-cent increase.