Apparently, purely electric vehicles are way more efficient than hydrogen fuelled fuel-cell vehicles. As in something like two to four times as efficient. I have to admit being rather shocked about that. (My Prius hybrid is actually about as efficient as a fuel cell car, or slightly more so, according to Toyota).

Maybe instead of a hydrogen economy, we need to skip right past diesels, hybrids, fuel cells and go straight to off the grid electric power to motiveate purly electric vehicles.

Seriously.

Well, you ask, what about long trips?

When I was a young-un (back when Studebaker still barely existed, but did), my father had a one-wheeled trailer. The thing had two hingepoint connections to the car, and the center wheel swiveled to make backing up a snap. One wheel trailers had been around from the 1920's or 1930's.

Use the basic idea as the basis for a small hydrogen fuel cell electrical generator (or Stirling cycle engine and generator fuelled by CNG, Propane, unleaded, biodiesel - whatever).

In other words, we'd all have 250 mile ranges on our electric cars (something like 90% of vehicle use is commuting local trips) and for the times when we need to take long trips, we could go to our friendly
U-Haul, Enterprise or Hertz, and rent a "one wheel trailer generator" using the fuel of our choice, making the electric vehicle a temporary hybrid.

Well? Anybody want to say "kudos, Glenn, good idea" or maybe "what a stupid idea, think again"?

Or, use your own brain cells and think up something else.

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Glenn:

I think that, and all other ideas that would re-distribute our centralized power economy (like personal wind/solar generation, etc) are good ideas.

My idea is that there could be retrofitted gas tankers that would act as "mobile gas stations" which could refuel out-of-fuel cars on the road. This could also work with ethanol, butanol, hydrogen, anything that can be tanked. Now that electronic payments are ubiquitous, it's time to start thinking about ways to change our systems that weren't possible before.

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I tell you what, all an electric car needs is a 250 to 300 mile range and a price tag under $30k. They will sell like hotcakes as long as the battery life is at least 150,000 miles. I'm sure that a ways off but, this is a great first step and certainly a way for the development costs to be paid out by clients who have the means.

If you really got crazy you could hook your elec car up to a solar charging station and viola(!) free energy. Now, if they just would come up with standardized batteries, you could stop by a fueling station and swap your batterly pack (for about the cost of a tank of gas) in 5 minutes and be on your way.

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Well, what does the super car look like? Any pictures? Or is this the only car without any spy cam shots? Somewhere else I read, that the car will be extremely expensive. Certainly not for the masses.

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yay! More very expensive, limited production, electric supercars. Just add it to the growing heap like the Venturi.

Meh, show me a $20,000 sedan that holds four people, is electric and goes 250 miles, then i'll get all excited.

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"Meh, show me a $20,000 sedan that holds four people, is electric and goes 250 miles, then i'll get all excited."

Why stop at that? What not wait for flying carpets!? It doesn't run on oil, electricity, but pure magic!

If we were all ready to kill every project just because it doesn't do MIRACLES, I guess we should have killed the very first car! At that time, horse carriages were certainly more efficient, faster, cheaper, and goes further than the flimsy automobile.

Certainly, it's hard to get too excited about supercar cars that no one can afford (but I guess for some, petro supercars certainly rank higher than electric supercars). However, if we have to sharply reduce our dependence on oil NOW, EVs are the BEST that money can buy! There is no infrastructure problems, and just about everything can be built off-the-shelves. Range is an issue, but for most Americans who commute less than 40 miles a day, life is not different than now.

Oil-based research have gotten this far simply because our society has spent tremendous amount of resources into it. EV would be on par, if not better, compare to petro cars today, if only we pour in as much effort and money into it.

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"Meh, show me a $20,000 sedan that holds four people, is electric and goes 250 miles, then i'll get all excited."

Why stop at that? What not wait for flying carpets!? It doesn't run on oil, electricity, but pure magic!

If we were all ready to kill every project just because it doesn't do MIRACLES, I guess we should have killed the very first car! At that time, horse carriages were certainly more efficient, faster, cheaper, and goes further than the flimsy automobile.

Certainly, it's hard to get too excited about supercar cars that no one can afford (but I guess for some, petro supercars certainly rank higher than electric supercars). However, if we have to sharply reduce our dependence on oil NOW, EVs are the BEST that money can buy! There is no infrastructure problems, and just about everything can be built off-the-shelves. Range is an issue, but for most Americans who commute less than 40 miles a day, life is not different than now.

Oil-based research have gotten this far simply because our society has spent tremendous amount of resources into it. EV would be on par, if not better, compare to petro cars today, if only we pour in as much effort and money into it.

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Glenn, I saw the Wrightspeed EV prototype on Sand Hill road the other day and it blew me away. Looks very interesting (check their website). I couldn't believe the acceleration I saw when the driver (I think it was the owner/inventor/etc) punched it into a left hand turn at the intersection.

However, that got me thinking -- with farily efficient electric motors and increasingly efficient batters, at what point does it become more efficient to turn the hybrid system on its head and just have an onboard gasoline engine optimized to get, say, 100mpg (think a 4 cycle Honda generator or 500ccs or so), just come on to power the battery pack when necessary. In other words, a hybrid where the gasoline motor is helping out the electrical system, not the other way around.

I like your thoughts but I think the trailer would be a turnoff for a lot of people (although for most it would be more efficient). I think just finding a way of building an efficient, lightweight generator into the car itself would probably only add a hundred pounds or so, and could extend the range significantly.

However, IANA electrical engineer, so maybe there are some good reasons for this solution not appearing quite yet.

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Dolan, the Wrightspeed is pretty cool. But, as ruggels writes, show me a $20,000 family car and then I'll get excited.

Well, I recently bought a book which shows the entire worlds auto production (from Poland - the book is in English, thankfully) and in the China section, it had an article about a little known auto maker called BYD.

In the write-up, BYD is said to be working on a purely electric F3 automobile (which is actually a "cloned" - unauthorized copy - of a current Toyota Corolla). However, BYD are developing a self-designed F5 car, working on fuel cell cars and hybrid cars as well.

See for yourself (the translated Chinese is pretty rough) - this being from http://www.bydauto.com.cn/

"A Global Leading IT Components Producer
The first private company acquiring a state-owned auto plant
Top 100 in Chinese Electronic Industry
Among Top 100 Chinese High-tech Companies
Among Top 100 private listed companies
BYD AUTO is a subsidiary of BYD Company Ltd., which is a listed company in Hong Kong Stock Exchange.BYD Company Ltd. made its debut from less than 30 people in 1995 and became the second largest rechargeable battery producer in the world in 2003.In the same year, BYD Company Ltd. started to set foot in the automotive industry by purchasing the Tsinchuan Automobile Company £¬ which is the basis of BYD AUTO Company (Ltd).Now, BYD Company Ltd. owns more than 40,000 staff members all over the world with its market value over HKD 15 Billion. BYD AUTO has adhered to the international development road and devoted itself to researching, developing and manufacturing the Fuel vehicle-vehicle and Hybrids-vehicle. Aiming to meet costumers' increasing demand and relying on BYD's unparalleled strength in both technology and capital and bringing Chinese abundant manufacturing elements into full play, BYD AUTO made an entire integration of the chains of the automotive industry. Besides, based on the constant technology innovation, BYD AUTO has absorbed and been absorbing many international advanced non-patent rights to reduce the cost tremendously and upgrade its quality significantly. Inheriting the car manufacturing elite from the former Tsinchuan Auto Co., LTD, which had a history of several decades, and melting the first-class technology of BYD IT and electronic equipments manufacturing, BYD AUTO has become a world-class auto manufacturing company. The BYD Auto people devote themselves entirely in the auto industry and get ready for any difficulty and aim to create a world renowned auto brand. Our BYD AUTO people will strive forward unswervingly along a zigzag but also bright course."

See also http://www.globalautoindex.com/news.plt?no=863

So, you just never know. BYD may surprise everyone and introduce a purely electric family car at an affordable price AND export it. As it stands, BYD are one of the largest Li-Ion battery manufacturers in China, and we all know that China is becoming a major manufacturing force (whether we like it, or not).

Now, sell it with a solar cell power generator, and you've got my biz...

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"There is no infrastructure problems, and just about everything can be built off-the-shelves."

Actually, infrastructure is a fairly large problem with EVs. The primary concern is the number of EVs that the current power grid can support...I've seen numbers from 20 to 50 million, but that's assuming that the load is evenly distributed and all the EVs are only being charged at night (off-peak hours). We'll have to add additional power generation & distribution capacity if EVs ever become remotely as popular as 'conventional' vehicles.

Also, there's the local problem of actually charging the vehicles - there are a lot of folks in urban areas that don't park next to an electrical outlet, and since this would probably be the initial market it's something that will have to be addressed. And, even if you do have an outlet handy, most of the systems I've seen use 220 - and while I happen to have a 220 outlet in my garage, many people don't.

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Good points, LK. But, of course, you're working on the mistaken impression that one "fuel" type is going to replace gasoline.

I strongly suspect that this will not be the case, if for not other reason than the fact that humanity are not rational - we're more emotional and impulsive, but generally, certainly not rational.

I suspect there will be flex-fuel vehicles, perhaps Butanol and/or Ethanol (E85) replacing some gasoline, E10 type gasoline mixtures, gasoline, natural gas, hydrogen fuel cell cars (Honda are bringin them out by about 2009 but they apparently just amount to a stupid variation on the natural gas fuelled vehicle instead of a means of getting us off the hydrocarbon crack-habit). Hopefully there will be electric cars, hybrid cars, bio-diesels - where suitable. Oil made from garbage, sewage, offal (www.changingworldtech.com) which is recycling carbon, not pulling it out of the ground ("oil" not necessarily therefore being such a dirty word, as long as we aren't pulling it all out of the ground).

I don't think we'll ever see a scenario where one "fuel" system is so dominant as gasoline has been over the last 90 years or so.

BUT, perhaps that is for the best? I mean, let's look at this rationally (against our natural instincts) - how dumb was it really for our world to put all of our eggs in the oil basket, anyway? Especially when crazies control most of the (remaining) oil.

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If only we could get the oil distributors (chevron, shell, the rest of the bastards) to use a fraction of their wealth to change the current infrastructure to accomodate EVs. If they worked closely with the major EV manufacturers and maybe used that swappable-battery idea at the gas stations, since they already have the supply and transportation infrastructure I don't see it being such a dramatic leap from our current tank-hopping mode of road tripping.

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"Actually, infrastructure is a fairly large problem with EVs."

Well, it's all relative.

As oppose to Bush's plan to build a hydrogen infrastructure, the issues with EV is tiny in comparison. Ethanol and biodiesel has problems with geographical and transportation of the fuel; in other words, if there isn't a refinery plant around, people can't get access to the fuel.

In the end, any alt. fuels will require some kind of an upgrade to the infrastructure, and electricity is probably the cheapest way to go.

BTW, there was a story in EV World about how a northern CA couple bought a RAV-4EV from Southern CA. They planned their trip accordingly, and traveled along a route where they can get access to charging stations at hotels and camping sites. There were some minor issues with the RAV-4 itself, but otherwise, they never really got stranded due to lack of electricity.

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"I think just finding a way of building an efficient, lightweight generator into the car itself would probably only add a hundred pounds or so, and could extend the range significantly."

Well once you put the engine back in, you would be better off with a hybrid again, or a plug in hybrid.

Personally I initially loved the idea of only using the engine as a generator, but there are significant disadvantages to doing that.

1: You need a separate generator for the gas engine. You still need the main electric motor-generator to power the vehicle and do regen braking.

2: The gas engine no longer helps by adding motive force.

3: Because of 2, you need a much larger electric drive motor.

So now you have a larger electric motor and second electric generator, so the whole system is heavier.

If you are going to have both systems on board, then the parallel plug in hybrid is probably the best overall system.

The real solution is shrinking the gas engine and beefing up the electrics more. Apparently the Toyota Aygo gas engine only weighs 150 lbs. It is a 1 liter 3cyl. As is this thing gets something like 60MPG. Mix that with parallel hybrid and you get better performance/mileage...

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"how dumb was it really for our world to put all of our eggs in the oil basket, anyway?"

It's just natural that the world gravitates to the cheapest fuel at the time. During the oil crisis, all kinds of alt. fuel vehicles were made, but in the end, cheap gas killed them all.

Personally, I have no problem with an economy base on the cheapest source of energy. My beef is with US dependence on importation of energy. Importing fuel can actually be a good thing; it helps stabilize prices in case of shortages. But once our economy starts getting affected by situations outside our borders, then it's time that we look at changing our infrastructure.

I think people wouldn't even need to debate about alt-fuels if we just ban all gas-guzzlers right now. When farmers were hurting decades ago, we should be looking into converting surplus biomass as fuel back then, not now. I'm not saying that my plan would have been perfect, but we are in this situation today, because we rely too much on cheap oil.

If people can recall, our gov't and auto manufacturers have funded lots of projects on "future car" and ways to advance our cars. But in the end, businesses only want to do the minimal and watch the bottomline. People only want to buy the "cool" and impractical cars and trucks. And our gov't got no backbone to steer us from the on-coming train that we, well, *I*, certainly know it's coming.

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it takes a hours to refuel a battery powered car. this means that they cannot be used in trips over 50 miles one way and unless you have chargers at your destination, you severly limited for even short trips. they are only usefull as commuter cars and even then not for everyone. they are about 85% efficient.

think of hydrogen as liquid electricty that you can pour in a tank to refill and be on your way making HFCs a very significant step forward form batterys. the efficiency is about 60% and the range is greatly improved over batterys.

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"Good points, LK. But, of course, you're working on the mistaken impression that one "fuel" type is going to replace gasoline."

Well, I was actually just responding to what Charles S said - I really don't see EVs becoming all that popular (at least, not in the 20+ million range).

The main problem with EVs is that they're inconvenient - and Americans generally don't like to be inconvenienced. Sure, a few folks who really care will go out of their way to modify their home's wiring so they can charge their car, and arrange trips so that they have a place to plug their car in at night...but the average person simply isn't going to do that. The average person will want to wait until the infrastructure is already in place, so that having an EV is no less convenient than having a conventional vehicle...and that creates a problem.

With most alternative fuels, the initial cost is in modifying the fuel distribution network - basically, changing the local fuel station to provide the new fuel (E85, bio-diesel, whatever). However, with EVs that cost falls on the consumer - whether it's rewiring their house, or using their tax dollars to provide charging stations in urban areas (probably something similar to parking meters, but providing an electrical outlet). Parking garages for apartment buildings and condos would also have to be re-wired, and most property management companies won't want to do this without some sort of guarantee of a return on their investment.

While you and I might realize that the consumers will end up footing the bill one way or the other (and that the initial investment is worth it), the average guy will look at the money & inconvenience...and then write off EVs as being "not worth the trouble". If alternative fuels are ever going to become popular they'll need to have a system worked out to make them just as easy to use as current gasoline-powered vehicles.

Plus, people tend to be afraid of things they don't understand...and the average person doesn't understand all that much. And, the people who understand the least seem to complain the loudest - look at all the rumors/myths about the Prius (people who don't think the batteries can be recycled, or people that think they'll get electrocuted if they crash, and so on). Can you imagine if hydrogen fuel-cell cars ever become popular? The news will probably show pictures of the Hindenburg, and you'll have the public thinking that they'll explode into a ball of flames if they bump a curb. "Oh, the humanity!"

I think this is one of the reasons that we'll see ethanol and bio-diesel catch on faster than most of the other alternative fuels - corn and cooking oil don't sound very dangerous to the average consumer, and if they can fill up their car with it at the corner gas station they'll probably consider it. Plus, those vehicles can be filled up with regular gasoline or diesel...so the "convenience factor" is high. While I personally think ethanol is a complete & utter waste of time and money, I suppose if it gets folks used to the idea of alternative fuels it will at least serve some useful purpose. Bio-diesel is at least somewhat useful...it's something the average vehicle owner can do today, but considering how little diesel fuel private citizens use compared to large OTR trucking companies it probably won't have a huge impact.

There are a lot of folks in this country who claim to care about the environment, but when it comes down to spending their own time or money they aren't willing to do it. From what I understand, this is one of the reasons the Prius didn't come with a plug-in option...because Toyota was concerned that the average consumer would be scared away by it. They'd hear about plugging it in, assume that they *had* to plug it in, and then decide it wasn't worth the trouble. I think the fact that the Prius is as convenient as it is explains its popularity - especially compared to vehicles like the Insight. People want to conserve energy, but they don't want to be inconvenienced doing it.

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All this talk of electric cars is fine, but the pipe dreams about an "electric economy" are highly ignorant.
If your motivation for alternative power is environmental, then electric cars are worse than diesel.
If you've ever sat and watched the hundreds and hundreds of rail cars that go every day to electric power plants in the US, then you'll know why electric vehicles are essentially no improvement to the environment.
An electric car isn't an electric car. It's a coal powered car. Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't a coal powered car a step backward.
Before electric powered anything is worth talking about we need two things.
1) a useful advancement in battery technology. Power density is way too low.
2) America needs to get over it's pride and paranoia and design safe, simple, standardized nuclear power plants. Why can Canada do this but not the US?

Meanwhile, E85 is a pork barrel of little use to anyone, hybrids are not ready for prime time, and diesel is here now. http://www.autoblog.com/2006/01/08/detroit-auto-show-mercedes-benz-launches-clean-diesels-for-the/
What's annoying is that the power and torque curves of diesel are perfectly complementary to how Americans drive. Grunt off the line, great for hauling big vehicles and loads, and fuel efficient.

However, that all said,this is a great step forward in electric technology. Research should continue, advancements need to be made. Sometime in the future, electric vehicles will have a place.

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