But, the power grid can't handle electric cars on a large scale. Heck, in some places - CA comes to mind immediately - it's held together with spit and bailing wire as it is.
Never mind how to get an EV charged in a reasonable amount of time.
EV's aren't a total writeoff, but the technology isn't even close to being here yet. Maybe in a couple of generations.
In such a scenario, I’d rather go for fuel cells rather than batteries.
“Interesting. I could see where households might use an electric car for local driving and a gas-powered car for long-range driving, at least for the foreseeable future. That might make sense for some households.”
We have a lot of them in our cul de sac neighborhood. They are known as golf carts.
“I could see where households might use an electric car for local driving and a gas-powered car for long-range driving That might make sense for some households. “
how many U.S. households can afford an extra $40,000 for a local-errand-mobile + home charging station in addition to a REAL car?
I live in Germany, and this topic has been up on the board for five or six years. They were predicting that by this point, we’d have a million electrical cars on the road in Germany. Well, this year, it’ll cross the 100,000 point.
If you go and hype electrical cars....Germans ask questions and things haven’t gone well. There are at least five different charging cables in the mix...not one a standard type.
It’s pointed out that if you run AC (especially in a hot July period), your mileage drops in a significant way. In Germany....90 degrees F is considered hot. Go imagine 103 degrees in Texas.
Recharging period? The best is around 60-to-75 minutes. The E-Go car being introduced next year in Germany will require five hours of charging for the small battery version and seven hours of charging for the bigger battery version.
Timing of recharge? It’s viewed with the bulk of cars being plugged in around 5 PM to 6 PM. It’ll be a massive draw on the grid system.
Extended trips? You’d have to plan on hitting recharging stations along the way, reserving your time-slot, and figuring at least two hours of sitting around for that re-charge. All of this said and done....most people think hybrid is the way to go, and would provide more options, less stress, and not require all these recharging stations.
Looking the other day at the octane of gas at the station, and the higher the octane, the lower amount of ethanol is in it. Has to tell you something about the quality of ethanol.