Posted on 11/28/2010 5:18:31 PM PST by Jet Jaguar
Edited on 11/28/2010 6:07:20 PM PST by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
Getting your home ready to charge an electric car will either require little time or money ---- or a couple of months and thousands of dollars. It depends on what kind of electric car you buy, the wiring in your home and how quickly you want to juice your ride.
(Excerpt) Read more at nctimes.com ...
Well, the title of the article implies that there are actually instructions on how to wire for the electric car. I didn’t find any significant details in the article.
Tell me what kind of circuit capacity I need and I can wire one up with ease.
Yeah, should be great here in the mountains. Can't wait to try driving 44 miles to work, uphill, climbing over 4,000 feet in elevation in a foot of snow on mountain grades and passes in an electric car when it is 5 degrees out.
Thanks, that makes sense.
Biodiesel generator would be a better way to go.
Your typical coal fired power plant has a thermodynamic efficiency of about 80%. Your typical gasoline powered car has a thermodynamic efficiency of about 30%.
Of course, the electric car has to deal with transmission losses and charging resistance. So overall thermodynamic efficiency winds up being, more or less, a wash.
The real question is, what costs less. At $3.00 a gallon, an efficient car has a fuel cost of 10 cents a mile. A modern electric costs about 5 cents a mile for electricity. Of course, fuel cost is only one consideration.
There are a few FReepers who haven't figured this out yet. ;)
Most people would keep their gas car for out of town trips and have the electric car for tooling around the city limits. Its more likely to be more of an errands vehicle than a commuter one.
Well, there are fewer moving parts but there are definately moving parts. Tie rod ends, brake pads, rotors, ball joints, all the stuff that wears out in 80,000 - 100,000 miles is still there. And since most electric cars, or at least the ones with a useful range, have a gasoline engine to accompany the electric motor, they still have all the same wear issues as well.
That said, it is rare that gasoline engines wear to the point that parts need replacement these days. 100,000-200,000 miles is common these days.
“If you keep a zero balance on your credit cards there is NO downside.
And if you use cash for everything you will never have a good credit rating. That can mean very real $$$ when you try to finance a car or a mortgage. “
It’s also about the same power as a central air conditioner. If people get home, plug their car in, and start to cool their house...and a lot of people do it, you better believe that a utility will notice. A typical house averages 1000 Watts without AC...then it operates at 6000 Watts with AC on, and now we add another 5000 Watts, to get that house up to 11 kW (after work). That is some serious power if lots of people buy the cars, a lot of areas won’t stand a chance. The utilities are able to predict very closely as to what their load will be - start doubling it all over the place, and they will be hit.
Just stationary parts like a $15,000 battery?
Actually, to say there are no moving parts on an electric car is slightly silly. There are the bearings in the electric motor that can go out, not to mention the Rotors. Then we have the drive train, air conditioners, wheel bearings etc. Plenty of parts to wear out, and on a hybrid, such as the new chevy POS, you have the gas engine and related parts to worry about.
Hardly.
The Volt uses 10KWH to drive 40 miles. Even at Summer peak rates in socal, that is $3.50 per day to drive 40 miles. That’s $100/mo, not $5000. Roughly the same cost as gas or diesel if you have a 40mpg vehicle.
...and I could go on. Here in Texas one day about 3 years ago I picked up the newspaper to find that something like 12 proposed coal power plants were canceled. Just plain canceled, due to their effect on global warming. Not replaced with something else, just canceled.
Well, I figure that they were proposed for a reason - such as an exploding population, modernization, etc. But they were simply canceled. No problem that day, no problem today, but a few years from now, when we were COUNTING ON THEM, they simply will not be there. Can we “absorb” that loss? Maybe (it would certainly help to get the illegals out, but that’s another thread). But those plants were proposed for a reason - and I don’t think it was for electric cars, as they never said anything to that effect when they canceled them.
So we lose capacity that was DEFINITELY needed, at least here in Texas, and we now start adding what look almost like new houses (in addition to our real new houses) every time someone buys one of these POS’s. We lose.
3300 watts X 8 hours is 26400 watts , 26.4 KWH, considering EVERY HOME IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA hits Premium Electricity rates by Mid-Month, It will Be in the THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS.
Gasoline.
No, it doesn't. According to DOE, typical efficiency of the average coal-fired power plant is around 32%, with the average of the top 10% of plants reaching 37% efficiency.
I love those old steam engines, but OMG, there were probably a dozen ways to get your shirt or arm caught in those gears or the big belt it used to drive whatever it drove. Loss of arm = practically a given.
Because it would mean that there are no tires, no bearings, no motors, no transmissions, no axles, etc. All you could do is just sit there and wish you were someplace else.
Hey, it works on TV.
“If a battery is developed that can be recharged in 30 minutes, the power load on transformers should be cut substantially.”
How so ? Because people will frequent such retail fast-charging stations like gas stations that are part of a more industrial grid and not rely on the residential grid ? Because the faster the charge, the higher the power demand, and that makes it more likely to pop a residential neighborhood transformer. The power load would actually be lower if everyone used a slow charger over 8 - 12 hours. I think the electric companies are just going to replace the neighborhood transformers with higher capacity models as the charging demand grows. Nothing wrong with that. They’ll be making a lot of money off additional power sold during periods when they’d otherwise lose money with idle equipment. Replacing transformers is a bargain price to gain additional revenue compared to the infrastructure costs required to get additional customers.
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