Pull Plug On High Gas Prices

cbs ^ | 7/18/06

[LouAvul]

If you're fed up with paying high gas prices, Hybrid Technologies says it has a solution for you.

The company is out with an "electric smart car" that runs on a lithium battery.

The company's co-founder, Richard Griffiths, pointed out to The Early Show co-anchor Rene Syler Tuesday that that's the same type of battery you'll find in cell phones, PDAs, computers, "pretty much anything we use now that's a portable electronic device."

Griffiths showed Syler how you simply plug the car in, literally, to a conventional 110 volt outlet.

"If you completely drain the battery," Griffiths said to Syler, "it's like your cell phone, if you drain the battery, a full charge is five to six hours. Normally, people won't drain the entire battery, so maybe one to two hours at night. Basically, it's like, 'Honey, did you take out the garbage and plug in the car?' It's kind of a new way of thinking. It's a plug-in hybrid. It uses absolutely no gas.

"On a single charge, you can go up to 120 miles and, depending how you drive, 150 miles."

"It's very, very small, though," Syler observed. "I am thinking safety. How does it crash test?"

"It has a three-star crash test rating," Griffiths responded, "and it has air bag systems, five air bags, three in the front. It's like a walnut. It's actually a very safe car. This is a city commuter car, so it's not a car that you'll necessarily be driving on the highway every day. So we're not looking at high speeds, necessarily."

[eraser2005]

"LISA! In this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics!"

[ichabod1]

It's interesting, they're not really storing water, they're storing electricity -- the electricity they used to pump it up, until they convert it back to electricity to sell for more. I never knew about this, I don't think. Probably something that's gotten more profitable as the water supply out west has gotten squeezed.

[ichabod1]

I am ALWAYS prepared for it. So far, knock on wood.

[OSHA]

What they may be doing is using the mine shafts for peak demand periods to supplement conventional generating and then using the excess capacity of the conventional power station (at night) to pump the water back out. Thus excess power can be stored.

[ichabod1]

So, since obviously energy is wasted when we eat between what we eat, and what we can produce, there is no reason for us at all. We should all starve.

[ichabod1]

But, but, but what about the salmon and other fish

I read a piece a while back about the Snake River, IIRC, out west where they TRUCK the fish up above the dams.

[Zman]

Don't you know how his theory works? Just pray to the Energy Fairy, click your solenoid and think of cruise control.

[capt. norm]

Why am I getting an image of Lee Ermey's character, Sgt. Hartman, from Full Metal Jacket?

I'm getting the same idea. He shouts "JUMP!"

..and we're supposed to yell: "HOW HIGH?"

[ichabod1]

Desktop Fusion: Been there, done that.

[ichabod1]

SOmeday, someone will find a way! :)

[Puppage]

Not for commuting. Especially for trips to the park-and-ride, or the local grocery store

So, you'd pay 15 or 20k for trips to the store?

Any way...it's just MY opinion...I'm not saying it's eveyones

[ichabod1]

I hate a b@stard that cracks you up and then yells at you even more for laughing. That's low down.

[Sax]

Wipe that disgusting grin off your face.

[OSHA]

I am moving toward the crotchety stage and want to do it with excellence.......

My life's goal.... Curmudgeonry!

[RobRoy]

>>So, you'd pay 15 or 20k for trips to the store?<<

Nope.

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Yeah, but where does the energy comes from at the power station?

Advocates of electric cars fail to realize this. Of course they probably think there's a farm full of hamsters continuously running on wheels that supply power.

[thackney]

Now I'm no engineer (but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night), but it seems to me that if a car is cruising down the road at 60 MPH, that it could somehow generate the power to charge the batteries that run the thing.

You suggest an electric powered car could pull energy from the battery to turn the motor to turn the wheels to propel the vehicle and at the same time turn a generator to generate voltage and current at a rate equal to what is being drawn from the same battery?

It would be like a spring that winds itself back up while moving the car. You don't magically create energy from nothing.

[norwaypinesavage]

"They line the shafts with smaller turbines and then run water down the sides generating power from top to bottom using gravity. They then use some of the electricity they create to pump the water back up continuing the process."

They have a name for this. It's called Perpetual Motion Machine. I can obtain shares in the company. Please send money.

[thackney]

Believe what you'd like, it's NOT happening

You should call your friend and explain what you claim here. If he is really in the business, he will enjoy the laugh.

[norwaypinesavage]

"Where do you get those efficient machines you describe?"

Only in the minds of the liberal media, never in the garages of real people. Your friend with 220v X 30Amps X 6 hours consumes 135,000 BTU, about the same as a gallon of gas (and about $5 bucks worth of electricity per night). The one described in the article (110v X 15 Amps X 1 hour) is only a tiny fraction of a gallon of gasoline in equivalent energy. It exists only in a liberals dreams.