Posted on 11/29/2009 2:52:11 AM PST by Halfmanhalfamazing
In brief: This new coalition of members of the electric vehicle community, infrastructure, and more proclaim that the U.S. needs to have 75% of its light-duty vehicle miles go electric by 2040.
They officially released their report titled Electrification Roadmap, which outlines a vision for the deployment of EVs and infrastructure on a national scale.
Members of the coalition include GridPoint, INc., Coda Automotive, Nissan Motor Company, Johnson Controls, FedEx, and A123 Systems. Everyone in the coalition produces vehicles, infrastructure, or components for the EV industry.
That 75% goal would mean 200 million cars being replaced by electrics in only 30 years.
So the Coalition calls upon federal initiatives to mandate and fund this massive altering of the infrastructure and highway usage.
The self-interest of the coalition is obvious, but there is a question that should also be asked:
Why is government always the answer?
(Excerpt) Read more at futurecars.com ...
I’m not sure I know of a light duty vehicle usage scenario where an internal combustion engine is superior to an electric motor.
Disagree! Unlimited mileage as long as fuel is available in the tank, and nothing else breaks.
With electric, one must always be concerned with fuel. The first time you forget, you will realize the superiority of the other in short order.
I think I’ve been around here long enough to understand those sort of things.
Agreed!
At present, hydrocarbons do have superior power density
and nothing else breaks.
By virtue of it's simplicity a pure electric vehicle has far fewer things can break.
With electric, one must always be concerned with fuel. The first time you forget, you will realize the superiority of the other in short order.
For sure no one wants to run out of fuel of any type, especially on some desolate stretch of road. For this reason, plug-in hybrids may be the mainstay of the emerging EV market for many years until high capacity, low weight electric storage technology comparable in power density to hydrocarbons is widely available.
1) Every home will have its own solar panel array on the roof, backed up by a powerful battery pack somewhere in the house. This will provide the power source to charge automotive batteries on a home charger.
2) Automotive battery technology will be either high-density ultracapacitors made with carbon nanotubes or using a high-ion density liquid between the battery elements. As such, by 2040 the average automobile could go as far as 1,000 km (621 miles) between charges--and the battery back will be recharged in a few hours at home or under 15 minutes at a commercial charging station.
Not aware of any breakthroughs. If you have new information could you outline some of it? Last I read nano-tube and capacitor storage tech was imminent. As I recall some of the capacitor storage companies had applied for patents. Since then crickets.
And a humongously beefed up electric transmission grid.
You can't replace 75% of the petroleum products usage with electricity without a grid that will stand up under the load.
Of course, they have no idea what that means. And when I point out that you need a grid in the first place to be "smart" with, they usually mumble something about "wind" and "solar", and call me some kind of foul-mouthed name. Then again, these are people like the one who told me he didn't nee a second electric car to use while the first was being recharged. He'd put solar panels on his garage roof and recharge his one electric car overnight, and that's he he'd be "grid-free".
I don’t think my Chevy could pull all the wood I’d need to drive from Florida to Maine. :)
Yet somehow, things worked out.
To start out with, you didn't have to hitch old Dobbin to the buckboard in the cold and rain. So score one for the horseless carriage.
On the other hand, you risked getting an arm broken every time you cranked a Model T. And if you travelling more than 10 miles, you were almost certain to have a flat tire. A tire pump and patches were necessities.
In spite of a little adversity, spark ignition and compression ignition engines found their true place in society. And there hasn't been much out there to rival the internal combustion engine over the past century, at least.
I frankly doubt that the IC engine will be displaced this century.
As these technologies improve thanks to using better quality materials, we could see electric cars go as far as 600 km (372 miles) on a single charge by 2014-2015 time frame. At that range, it starts to become a real, viable replacement for gasoline engines. By 2040, ranges in the 1,000 km (621 miles) range on a battery pack the size of today's automotive gasoline fuel tanks may be the norm.
Boy, I can wait to see one of those “ultracapacitors” short out, say, in traffic accident.
Hopefully, from several hundred yards away...
Sure they will. Sure they will.
I want my own mini nuke so I can be grid free as well
And of course, these mo-mos have not given one second’s thought to where they will get the electricity to power the electric cars.
When the cost of such an array is around US$4,000 (compared to US$30,000 now), home builders and companies that refurbish homes will put them up on a large scale in no time flat, because being able to not be so dependent on the electric grid makes a lot of economic sense. And that US$4,000 array is very close to reality with new, low-cost solar panels made with nanotechnology in thin sheets.
That's one problem preventing a major shift towards EV's or even plug-in hybrids. However, this problem can be eliminated in short order by rolling back regulations and legislation limiting the ability of utilities to expand capacity and fuel source.
I don't see how the nation could sustain the level of demand necessary for the number of EV’s they are talking about. I don't see any means, with the realms of reality, that this could be feasible.
Two points here:
For an equal power output, breeders consume less than 3% of the uranium required by a conventional light water reactor and generate far less waste. Breeders can also be designed to utilize thorium, which is more abundant than uranium.
I'm not a nuclear engineer and may not be aware of other nuclear technologies that may be superior to breeders that out government prevents us from developing and using.
That depends on how you do it. The grid is structured to meet peak demand, and off peak has plenty of transmission capacity. If this happened, the power companies have two choices. First is increase peak capacity, which will be expensive. The other method is to establish an incentive to charge the vehicles during off - peak hours. This is simply a timer attached to a charger, and lots of power companies already add an extra charge to peak demand usage.
Faced with the need to increase capacity or shift demand, the power companies might even find it worthwhile to provide the timing system. They would have to spend money on something, and they will get revenue from the off - peak sale of power. If it costs less than increasing capacity, it’s worthwhile.
Of course, they still have to burn fuel to generate the power, but I don’t want to bust anybody’s green bubble. :)
AGW “scientists” please take note...this is the way science really works.
Seriously? Good Grief.
You would need to beef up the power grid tremendously to handle that overload from all those electric cars. My wild guess would be we would have to double what we have now and new power plants too are in order
Unless part of this eco-wacko scheme is a huge reduction in usage of all personal vehicales.... Personal transportation conflicts with their socialist utopianism. We should all be on trains and busses like in YOU-ROPE
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