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Electric cars- are they the way forward? I have my doubts about the hydrogen miracle which is supposedly just around the corner, and hybrids seem a bit pointless. Why spend a fortune on a Prius when you get the same fuel economy out of a nissan micra 1.0 ?

 

Bio-fuels seem to me to be too limited, so that leaves electric. Lately I have been seeing loads of these around, mostly driven by OAP's (it's a start I guess). The Indian company which produces them is also working on a GTI type model which looks a bit sexier. This one has a top-speed of 120km and a range of 200km.

 

Have a look at the Tango as well. Apparently george Clooney drives one !

 

Does anyone here drive an electric car? If so can they share their thoughts, experiences and ideas ?

 

Will the technology improve quickly enough to allow us all to experience petrol-free motoring sometime in the foreseeable future ?

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I don't have any figures for this, but to me electric cars, if taken up seriously, will just move energy demand elsewhere. We won't need to refine petrol, but all this electric power needs to come from somewhere, whether it's oil, coal, gas, nuclear or renewables producing the juice.

 

I can see economies of scale, and less energy expended in the petrol refinement process and transport of petrol to service stations, but it's also possible that the increased demand for electricity would need increased infrastructure for the national grid, unless sufficient power could be produced locally.

 

TLM

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Sure, juice would have to come from somewhere.

 

How about PV on your roof powering your electric car ? Or a wind turbine ?

 

I found this link regarding the RAV EV and im wondering why they dont make them anymore ? It seems a damn shame as all the owner's forums i have visited praise them highly, and at a top speed of 78mph it sure out-does the g-whizz

 

I would definetly be in the market for one if they were produced again

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PROBLEMS

 

1/

You need to power them up.

So what do you do in London: run an electric cord from your apartment doiwn the street to where you managed to find a parking space? They are quite impractical unless you have a garage or parking space near to your home.

 

2/

Limited range.

25-30 miles is the limit for some. So what do you do when you want to take a longer trip

 

3/

Cost: they are expensive, and so is the recharge

 

4/

Size: they are small, are they safe?

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Electric Cars are for the shy and grungies who are happy to overpay for their transport,

just to win brownie points with their shy and grungy friends.

 

If you study the matter you will see that by the time you use the electricity, it is more expensive than

oil, and plenty of carbon emissions have been created to generate it, and to transport it.

 

I am happier in a decent modern car, which gives much-improved mileage to many of the old bangers

that the fashionable-but-grungy set drives

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PROBLEMS

 

1/

You need to power them up.

So what do you do in London: run an electric cord from your apartment doiwn the street to where you managed to find a parking space? They are quite impractical unless you have a garage or parking space near to your home.

Good point. They seem to only be city cars when on the move. When parked, they become a problem.
2/

Limited range.

25-30 miles is the limit for some. So what do you do when you want to take a longer trip

I disagree on this one. 25-30 miles is a lot in a city.
3/

Cost: they are expensive, and so is the recharge

This is the clincher really. Youre just moving your fuel bill from oil to electricity in the short term and therefore not actually doing anything for the environment.
4/

Size: they are small, are they safe?

They dont need to be, as such. They are not classed as cars.

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If you study the matter you will see that by the time you use the electricity, it is more expensive than

oil, and plenty of carbon emissions have been created to generate it, and to transport it.

Whats wrong with a PV system or wind turbines ? electricity can be generated by renewable means, whereas oil cannot. you can generate electricity pretty much anywhere, oil and gas is concentrated in the hands of a few pariah states (the UK included)

 

I am happier in a decent modern car, which gives much-improved mileage to many of the old bangers that the fashionable-but-grungy set drives

 

agree that automobile technology still has a way to go and that modern ICE's will improve further and give greater fuel economy - but as the price rises this might be negated in the long-term

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(Popular Mechanics looked into this):

 

Case For: Vehicles that operate only on electricity require no warmup, run almost silently and have excellent performance up to the limit of their range. Also, electric cars are cheap to "refuel." At the average price of 10 cents per kwh, it costs around 2 cents per mile. Electric cars can be recharged at night, when generating plants are under-utilized. Vehicles that run on electricity only part of the time and on internal-combustion power at other times--hybrids--have even greater promise. As hybrids gain in popularity, there is a growing interest in plug-in hybrids that allow owners to fully recharge the vehicle's batteries overnight.

 

A strong appeal of the electric car--and of a hybrid when it's running on electricity--is that it produces no tailpipe emissions. Even when emissions created by power plants are factored in, electric vehicles emit less than 10 percent of the pollution of an internal-combustion car.

 

Case Against: Pure electric cars still have limited range, typically no more than 100 to 120 miles. In addition, electrics suffer from slow charging, which, in effect, reduces their usability. When connected to a dedicated, high-capacity recharger, some can be recharged in as little as an hour, but otherwise such cars are essentially not driveable while they sit overnight for charging.

 

Outlook: Mixed. While interest in plug-in hybrids grows, the long-term future of pure electrics depends on breakthroughs in longer-lasting, cheaper batteries and drastically lower production costs for the vehicles themselves. And then there's the environmental cost. Only 2.3 percent of the nation's electricity comes from renewable resources; about half is generated in coal-burning plants.

 

@: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/ea...html?page=6&c=y

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Popular Mechanics - do they still have credibility after 'proving' that WTC could not have collapsed from fire alone? Don't mention 'em on HPC, you'll get the 'HPC is the only conspiracy I believe in' brigade down on you like a ton bricks.

 

I would have thought they still have credibility.

 

From the Popular Mechanics website.

 

9/11: Debunking The Myths

 

"Melted" Steel

 

CLAIM: "We have been lied to," announces the Web site AttackOnAmerica.net. "The first lie was that the load of fuel from the aircraft was the cause of structural failure. No kerosene fire can burn hot enough to melt steel." The posting is entitled "Proof Of Controlled Demolition At The WTC."

 

FACT: Jet fuel burns at 800° to 1500°F, not hot enough to melt steel (2750°F). However, experts agree that for the towers to collapse, their steel frames didn't need to melt, they just had to lose some of their structural strength--and that required exposure to much less heat. "I have never seen melted steel in a building fire," says retired New York deputy fire chief Vincent Dunn, author of The Collapse Of Burning Buildings: A Guide To Fireground Safety. "But I've seen a lot of twisted, warped, bent and sagging steel. What happens is that the steel tries to expand at both ends, but when it can no longer expand, it sags and the surrounding concrete cracks."

 

"Steel loses about 50 percent of its strength at 1100°F," notes senior engineer Farid Alfawak-hiri of the American Institute of Steel Construction. "And at 1800° it is probably at less than 10 percent." NIST also believes that a great deal of the spray-on fireproofing insulation was likely knocked off the steel beams that were in the path of the crashing jets, leaving the metal more vulnerable to the heat.

 

But jet fuel wasn't the only thing burning, notes Forman Williams, a professor of engineering at the University of California, San Diego, and one of seven structural engineers and fire experts that PM consulted. He says that while the jet fuel was the catalyst for the WTC fires, the resulting inferno was intensified by the combustible material inside the buildings, including rugs, curtains, furniture and paper. NIST reports that pockets of fire hit 1832°F.

 

"The jet fuel was the ignition source," Williams tells PM. "It burned for maybe 10 minutes, and [the towers] were still standing in 10 minutes. It was the rest of the stuff burning afterward that was responsible for the heat transfer that eventually brought them down."

 

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/de...html?page=4&c=y

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Peering through the smog: Can cars be clean?

By Li Jian (Shanghai Star) : 2004-10-17 09:45

 

As a bicycle kingdom gearing-up to become an automobile society, China, the world's third largest car manufacturing base, is facing a serious problem of automobile-related pollution and soaring levels of petrol consumption.

 

xin_01100114010426208941.jpg

An electric-powered Aspire car from China's Wuhan University of Technology rolls at the start of the Challenge Bibendum Rally, a clean vehicle event, in Shanghai October 13, 2004. The event promotes progress in the development of environmentally friendly vehicles and is an increasingly popular platform for car manufacturers to demonstrate state-of-the-art technologies in this field. [Reuters]

 

 

China produced 4.45 million cars in 2003 and the total number of cars nationwide is expected to reach 24 million by the end of this year, according to the Ministry of Science and Technology. China already ranks third among the world's automobile manufacturing countries, with a voracious domestic demand that has sucked all major automobile manufacturers into the market. China's vehicle output is expected to grow an average of 10 to 15 per cent annually over the next 20 years, said Zhang Xiaoyu, chairman of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. Statistics from the State Environmental Protection Administration show that China will have 33 million automobiles by 2005 and over 131 million by 2020.

 

Polluted cities

 

As the market explodes, so are serious pollution problems. Vehicles have become the biggest carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide emitters in big cities like Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou. In China's 14 largest cities, air pollution kills 50,000 newborn babies and causes 400,000 cases of respiratory illness every year, according to the Ministry of Science and Technology. In Guangzhou, automobile exhaust emissions contribute 20 per cent of the city's air pollution. The proportion reaches 70 per cent in Shenzhen, a coastal city opposite Hong Kong which produces over 200,000 tons of vehicle exhaust annually.

 

Things are even worse in Hangzhou, a city of legendary beauty and picturesque scenery, renowned all over the country for its West Lake. Every morning on clear days, the city sky is blurred into a dismal grey by exhaust fumes.

 

In 2000, vehicular carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide emissions in China reached 30 million tons and 3.8 million tons respectively. Authorities warn that this will double by 2010.

 

. . .

China's Dongfeng Automobile Company has developed electric buses and cars, and according to Deng, "The European II standard will be implemented nationally next year." "Our next step is to use hydrogen to replace oil in automobiles."

 

China will launch a policy to encourage natural gas-fuelled automobile in the near future. This should also be an important step towards an improved oil economy in the country.

 

"Our aim is to develop fuel cells and battery technology," said Deng.

 

Public awareness may be the biggest challenge.

 

"Once I was chatting with some taxi drivers in Beijing, they had no idea what hybrid autos were. Even those drivers who earn a living on the road know little about the future development of new or clean energy. The general public is even more ignorant," said Li Xinmin.

 

 

@: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2...tent_383042.htm

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  • 1 month later...

China will probably forge the next generation of automotive technology. They are constrained by dense cities and lack of oil, so we may expect these frustrations to prompt invention.

 

In the C19th, the US had a severe shortage of skilled labour to work in factories. In response, machine tool designers devised ways for one operator to increase their production. This is why US productivity was already leading the world by the First World War, with the path being laid to the mass-production revolution of Ford. It is lack that leads to revolution, not plenty.

 

It would not surprise me if the Chinese emerged as the automotive pace makers in the years to come, playing the role of the Japanese in cameras, computers and motorbikes. Keep an eye on their work.

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It would not surprise me if the Chinese emerged as the automotive pace makers in the years to come, playing the role of the Japanese in cameras, computers and motorbikes. Keep an eye on their work.

 

I have no doubt that China will move in leaps and bounds, but my money is on India - they already produce the world's best-selling electric car (here in Cyprus I see more and more G-Whizz'es on the streets, last night I counted four within an hour of walking along the promenade) they have a good head start and might make excellent headway if the NXG version goes into mass production.

 

Rest of the electric car market seems very fragmented - or am I missing something ?

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