Ireland to go down the Electric car route?

gpjordanf1 · 17-07-2009 7:42pm

robtri wrote: »

a normal family car liek the ford focus in the USA cost $15,000, that means the Tesla normal family car is three times the price..... what normal family over here is going to pay around €64,000 for a car????

Not the point, this is the first run family saloon EV cars, three times the price is not meant for the typical Focus buying family. They will be snapped up by wealthier eco loving wanna be seen buyers. Money not an issue.

We're further down the feeding chain, probably 5th production run with maybe a 33% premium, this will be offset by no fuel costs, no servicing costs, low tax band, probable grants tax rebates or scrappage schemes. SO at that rate it will be a runner. And when it comes the norm and more companies are making the EV cars they will be on par with fossil fuel cars. Less than 10 years easy.

robtri wrote: »

not 100% sure about that, surely the electric motor needs new bushes and a regular check up???

Nope modern electric motors have moved on.

robtri wrote: »

and they still are not at acceptable levels... till they are this will always be the achilles heel of the electric motor.

they are wll withing acceptable levels and will only improve, I drive a thirsty car, i usually have to stop to refuel on a return journey. Its not a big deal, to fill up and go in and pay, have a leak and smoke usually take like 10 - 15 minutes, this is well withing the times required for modern battery charging. Were already there. I would swap in the morning!

robtri wrote: »

but a porsche or a ferrai will whip the EV on a circuit... the EV1 corners like a whale...

Again not the point, the EV1 was a first run EV production car and in its short life it could out drag and embarrass the pedigree of fossil fueled sports cars with a centuary of development. Thats serious!

robtri wrote: »

while that is true, and I am one of them, I travel less than 50 miles on 90% of my journeys, but what do I do on the 10% when I want to drive more than the range of the cars batteries????
stop pull in and charge my car over many many hours....

Modern battery charge times are down to minutes now, with specialised charge stations this would take no longer than filling the tank as I said above. Not a big deal anymore.

robtri wrote: »

there is no "what if's" we aren't a green energy producing country.... and thats a fact which makes crap of all the arguments for using green electric cars....

Your right we should no longer accept what ifs, we have this resource at our door steps, surely we should use it? Sad!

robtri wrote: »

While I love the idea of electric cars, I do not think we are ready for mass acceptence of them.
The electric car meets can accomodate most of the people most of the time, but they need to accomodate all of the people all of the time just as good as petrol does to be a viable alternative...

I agree EV cars cant accomodate all of the people all of the time, buts thats not a valid reason not to put them into production straight away for the 90% of the peole that they will suit and in a short time they will be developed for the magic 100%
Well hers hoping the sooner the better!

robtri wrote: »

put it this way , if you where in the market for a new family car.. like a focus....
would you be willing to buy a car that is three times the prices,

Nope I would eait till it was more affordable, see my first point.

robtri wrote: »

once filled up can only cover have the range of the petrol car and then takes a few hours to top up with energy....

Only takes minutes to charge so a few extra stops over the year wont bother me.

robtri wrote: »

this car also claims to be enviromentally freindly, but in the country you live it, it's not..... and lets not even get started on the damage the mining of the material used in batteries has had on the enviroment

These cars are environmentally friendly, cant be argued against. So should we stop mining? haven't heard much about this before? Is it all mining or just anything related to batteries? New to me anyway?

robtri wrote: »

running costs are less, a good deal less.... but no where near good enough to make up for the initial 3 times the price initial cost over a normal petrol car....

Again on a first run its not viable, its the same as when Blue Ray or LCD came out first, I remember when LCD cam out first a 28" TV was in the region of £10,000, not Euro. Same with Blue Ray, they were around the 2k mark, now ya can get them for 3-400, the same will applay to these cars in a very short space of time. Cant wait!

gpjordanf1 · 17-07-2009 7:45pm

Eric Cartman wrote: »

until theres an electric 4x4 thats big, can pull 2.5 tonnes and has the same/better acceleration and torque as a kia sorento/ pajero lwb - then no , but if that ever happens, i might consider electric,

ohh and most importantly, dont make it look like an electric/hybrid car, the thing i really hate about the prius : it looks like its a hybrid/electric-"the george regular" mobile

All EVs have 100% torque from 0mph, its a flat line. No diesel 4x4 can boast the same!

Mr Benevolent · 17-07-2009 8:46pm

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

All EVs have 100% torque from 0mph, its a flat line. No diesel 4x4 can boast the same!

To be accurate, it's not a flat line, it's a linear torque 'curve'.

gpjordanf1 · 17-07-2009 9:19pm

Confab wrote: »

To be accurate, it's not a flat line, it's a linear torque 'curve'.

A linear Curve..........O..........K.................!

robtri · 21-07-2009 8:50am

kodi wrote: »

Lightning GT with extended battery pack that uses 4 PML Flightlink electric engines (currently Printed Motor Works). It's a sport car and costs arm and leg at this moment, but from what I saw in this car - it's the design I would vote for.

Can you link to this, I can only find resources saying up to 250 mile range and thats being optimistic I hear.....
I won't say anything about the cost nearly €300,000......

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Not the point, this is the first run family saloon EV cars, three times the price is not meant for the typical Focus buying family. They will be snapped up by wealthier eco loving wanna be seen buyers. Money not an issue.

Sorry it is the point, would your average consumer buy it NOW, then the answer is NO...

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

We're further down the feeding chain, probably 5th production run with maybe a 33% premium, this will be offset by no fuel costs, no servicing costs, low tax band, probable grants tax rebates or scrappage schemes. SO at that rate it will be a runner. And when it comes the norm and more companies are making the EV cars they will be on par with fossil fuel cars. Less than 10 years easy.

I absolutely agree, but the points I was making where in reference to NOW, not 10 years away..

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Nope modern electric motors have moved on.

as I said wasn't sure on this one...any good links would be interested in reading more up on the motors?
so why is it that the TESLA ev car, needs a $1,000 a year maint and service interval????

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

they are wll withing acceptable levels and will only improve, I drive a thirsty car, i usually have to stop to refuel on a return journey. Its not a big deal, to fill up and go in and pay, have a leak and smoke usually take like 10 - 15 minutes, this is well withing the times required for modern battery charging. Were already there. I would swap in the morning!

I high light the issue here.... in your own words, we are not there...

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Again not the point, the EV1 was a first run EV production car and in its short life it could out drag and embarrass the pedigree of fossil fueled sports cars with a centuary of development. Thats serious!

EHHH yes it is the point, I was responding to the fact that an EV1 was better than a ferrai in a straight line... I was just saying it was crap going around corners, i.e a track...

anyway the offical 0-60 time for an EV1 is 9 secs....
not blisterring quick either...

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Modern battery charge times are down to minutes now, with specialised charge stations this would take no longer than filling the tank as I said above. Not a big deal anymore.

can you show me a ev car with this system of a full charge in mins???

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Your right we should no longer accept what ifs, we have this resource at our door steps, surely we should use it? Sad!

it is sad very sad...

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

I agree EV cars cant accomodate all of the people all of the time, buts thats not a valid reason not to put them into production straight away for the 90% of the peole that they will suit and in a short time they will be developed for the magic 100%
Well hers hoping the sooner the better!

I am not suggesting not putting them into production... bring them on.. I look forward to the day when they are the norm...
my point was because they currently don't meet joe soaps current needs, and joe soaps percieved needs, then they won't sell......

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Nope I would eait till it was more affordable, see my first point.

same here, I do agree, but my response where to a question, why wouldn't I buy one NOW...

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Only takes minutes to charge so a few extra stops over the year wont bother me.

again show me a car that takes minutes to fully charge

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

These cars are environmentally friendly, cant be argued against. So should we stop mining? haven't heard much about this before? Is it all mining or just anything related to batteries? New to me anyway?

yes it can be argued against... the cars are only enviromentaly friendly if used correctly....

look at this comparison
how green is an electric car?????????

ok lets look at the REVA here,
say you do 10,000km a year in it...
at 9.66KWh of energy for 70Km thats is 1380KW per year...
at eleccy grid co2 emmissions( I had to use the UK numbers didn't have irish) that equates to 0.741t of Co2 a year....
not very green is it......

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

Again on a first run its not viable, its the same as when Blue Ray or LCD came out first, I remember when LCD cam out first a 28" TV was in the region of £10,000, not Euro. Same with Blue Ray, they were around the 2k mark, now ya can get them for 3-400, the same will applay to these cars in a very short space of time. Cant wait!

again, I was responding to the question of NOW.... and you have just re-enforced that, now is not the time to buy an EV car..

cianof · 21-07-2009 9:20am

Hey robtri,

How did you calculate the amount of CO2 per KWH? It's different for every person, surely. If I buy my electricity from airtricity, the amount of CO2 generated will be different than if I buy it from the ESB.

robtri · 21-07-2009 9:39am

cianof wrote: »

Hey robtri,

How did you calculate the amount of CO2 per KWH? It's different for every person, surely. If I buy my electricity from airtricity, the amount of CO2 generated will be different than if I buy it from the ESB.

actually your CO2 will be no different no matter who you buy it off....

Your actual electricity comes from the national grid, which eirtricity feed into, so you are not getting any more green energy than your next door neighbor who pays the ESb and not airtricity. the CO2 per KWH is an average for the grid.

cianof · 21-07-2009 9:58am

Sure, electricity comes from the national grid.

But if you chose to buy your electricity from airtricity would you agree that the money from your bill would go towards funding renewable sources of power generation rather than non-renewable sources?

robtri · 21-07-2009 10:12am

cianof wrote: »

Sure, electricity comes from the national grid.

But if you chose to buy your electricity from airtricity would you agree that the money from your bill would go towards funding renewable sources of power generation rather than non-renewable sources?

Absolutely agree, and I do it myself at home and at work, we as a country need to move towards more renewables and ditch coal and oil....

but no matter who you fund, if you pull your electricity off the grid, you are in effect using electricity that causes CO2.

peasant · 21-07-2009 10:18am

This

is out for test drives now and will be available to buy in 2011
(depending on price, it could very well imagine this as my next peasant-mobile)

Here is Renaults press release on electric vehicles
http://www.renault.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/Communiqué%20de%20presse/en-EN/Pieces%20jointes/20356_CP_Essai_KangoobebopZE__290609_GB_E5CDC2D7.pdf

robtri · 21-07-2009 10:48am

peasant wrote: »

This

is out for test drives now and will be available to buy in 2011
(depending on price, it could very well imagine this as my next peasant-mobile)

Here is Renaults press release on electric vehicles
http://www.renault.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/Communiqué%20de%20presse/en-EN/Pieces%20jointes/20356_CP_Essai_KangoobebopZE__290609_GB_E5CDC2D7.pdf

Not a bad EV looking car...

Still the issue of 100KM range will be a massive issue for people... seriously thats only 60 mile range.... but they hope to extend that to a real world 160KM by production ... thats just under 100 miles...

charging via a normal 220v socket at home takes between 6 and 8 HOURS... not ideal

using a fast charge 400v charge station, takes 30mins, which is good, BUT you only get 80% battery charge... which means your range till next charge drops from 100 miles to a maximum of 80 miles....

don't get me wrong depending on the price.... I would still be very interested.....
BUT it cannot compete with the versatility of a petrol or diesel car at the moment.

Heroditas · 21-07-2009 10:56am

cianof wrote: »

Hey robtri,

How did you calculate the amount of CO2 per KWH? It's different for every person, surely. If I buy my electricity from airtricity, the amount of CO2 generated will be different than if I buy it from the ESB.

The average Irish value is 538g/kWh. That is the current "standard" figure and should be up for review soon.

cianof · 21-07-2009 11:00am

Driving an electric cars gives you a choice which fossil fuel cars don't.

You can drive your electric car, pay your electricity bill to airtricity and in doing so support renewable power generation.

With a fossil fuel powered car you have no choice but to give your money to oil company.

Sure, electric cars won't be suitable for everyone. But I think the point is not to have all electric cars but to increased number of these cars.

robtri · 21-07-2009 11:01am

Heroditas wrote: »

The average Irish value is 538g/kWh. That is the current "standard" figure and should be up for review soon.

thats close to the figure I used to determine the CO2 value for the REVA electric car... using that figure it still responsible for 0.742 tonnes of CO2 for the year.. based on a figure of 10,000km a year

cianof · 21-07-2009 11:23am

That's 74.22g per km

Are there any fossel fuel cars that can achieve that?

robtri · 21-07-2009 11:59am

cianof wrote: »

That's 74.22g per km

Are there any fossel fuel cars that can achieve that?

its good alright... very good...
fossil fuel cars.... can't beat it but they do get so close,

Smart Cabrio - 88g/km
Seat Ibiza and VW polo offical figures of 99g/km

it is a saving of CO2, albeit small...

cianof · 21-07-2009 12:04pm

So for the Reva, it would require 1380kwh to travel 10000 km

On urban night saver that would be

€0.0769 per kwh * 1380 = €106.22

How much do you reckon you'd have to spend on petrol/diesel to travel the same distance?

€106.22 for 10,000kms seems cheap to me.

gpjordanf1 · 22-07-2009 2:07pm

cianof wrote: »

So for the Reva, it would require 1380kwh to travel 10000 km

On urban night saver that would be

0.0769 per kwh * 1380 = 106.22

How much do you reckon you'd have to spend on petrol/diesel to travel the same distance?

106.22 for 10,000kms seems cheap to me.

well that's a big seller surely, bye bye petrol and diesel. Well not really but figures like that cant be argued against. 106 yo yo's for 10k kms!

robtri · 22-07-2009 2:34pm

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

well that's a big seller surely, bye bye petrol and diesel. Well not really but figures like that cant be argued against. 106 yo yo's for 10k kms!

That price is dependant on only charging your car at night,
remember it has a range of only 80Km and takes 4-6 hours to charge...
so add to that 106e the cost of trains or car rental per year needed to go anywhere over 40Km from your house :eek::eek:

a proper efficeint disel like polo bluemotion does 62mpg.... so over 10,000km thats €420.00 in fuel...

so for that small saving of €300 a year( excluding trains, buses car rentals when the reva doesn't work practically) you have the privillage of driving this lovely looking car... the REVA

personally I would spend the extra €300 a year on fuel and drive a polo

sparklepants · 22-07-2009 2:42pm

cianof wrote: »

So for the Reva, it would require 1380kwh to travel 10000 km

On urban night saver that would be

€0.0769 per kwh * 1380 = €106.22

How much do you reckon you'd have to spend on petrol/diesel to travel the same distance?

€106.22 for 10,000kms seems cheap to me.

It is cheap! An efficient diesel doing 5l/100km will cost you over €500 for the same distance. You may have left out VAT etc in your calculations but the difference is still huge.

When/if carbon tax comes in the next budget the difference will be even greater. The tax will apply to directly consumed fossil fuels, but not to fuels used in the production of electricity, as electricity generation is already covered by an existing carbon trading system.

spank_inferno · 22-07-2009 2:59pm

My rough calculation for an underpowerd 1.4ltr petrol car. it would cost me about €635 to do 10,000 kms

quite a difference for sure.

But If I just keep my existing car, I save many thousands from not purchasing a battery operated car in the first place.

And the world saves on the considerable amount of energy, carbon, steel, oil/plastic, lithium that would go into making the new battery operated car and disposing of my old car.

so, fine for some, but not for me.

Oh and a unit of energy is actualy 14.55 cent not 7 cent as mentioned above.
1380 kw/hours actualy costs €227 incl vat @ 13.5% if your on the standard.
I dont have the nightsaver and I reckon most people done either.

gpjordanf1 · 22-07-2009 3:52pm

We aren't too far away from electric cars going mainstream, all it will take is a major manufacturer, making a nice design at an affordable price. Now alot of people say this will be impossible but i think it can be done.

1) electricity is everywhere.

2)charging can be done in half hour or under to suit most drivers at specialised stations.

3)CO2 emissions are greatly reduced

4)most people drive to work so can charge their cars if needed, even using longer charge times, same with going doing the shopping or going to town. Coin operated stations like parking stations could be easily installed. Simple.

5)the range of electric cars will need to be in the 300km+ range to satisfy most people, they are not far off that now.

6) oil is going to get more expensive, end of argument, in a couple of years we'll be paying 2 euro a litre and more going forward. Can you afford that? I cant!

cianof · 22-07-2009 4:07pm

There's also the service costs to consider.

With the fossil fuel car you have to factor in the cost (both time & money) of oil, filters, timing belts... etc....+ the labor cost to do those jobs.

I did say urban nightsaver in my previous post because I reckon those who will chose to drive electric cars will also charge their cars at night, because it will make financial sense given their energy requirements.

I forgot to include the 13.5% vat, so figure for the Reva should be €120.56 per 10,000km not €106.22.

robtri · 22-07-2009 4:12pm

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

We aren't too far away from electric cars going mainstream, all it will take is a major manufacturer, making a nice design at an affordable price. Now alot of people say this will be impossible but i think it can be done.

Yes it can be done, but it is still a few years away......

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

1) electricity is everywhere.

so is petrol and diesel....

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

2)charging can be done in half hour or under to suit most drivers at specialised stations.

not on any currently available , reasonably affordable electric car....

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

3)CO2 emissions are greatly reduced

they are reduced but I wouldn't say greatly considering where the electricity in this country is generated from.

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

4)most people drive to work so can charge their cars if needed, even using longer charge times, same with going doing the shopping or going to town. Coin operated stations like parking stations could be easily installed. Simple.

Simple.... are you serious, nothing further from the truth, there is nothing simple about setting up a whole new infrastructure around the country to support this..
this is a very impractical and expensive solution, and the cost of this would be passed to the consumer.

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

5)the range of electric cars will need to be in the 300km+ range to satisfy most people, they are not far off that now.

they aren't and some very expensive ones exceed that greatly...
but they here yet at an affordable solution price.
Renault.... big car company.... in 2 years are looking to bring out the berlingo EV... see posts previously.... in two years they estimate the realistic driving range will only be 160KM.....
I am open to correction on this but there is no currently available sub €30,000 ev car now in will be ready in the next two years that will have a realistic range of over 300KM....

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

6) oil is going to get more expensive, end of argument, in a couple of years we'll be paying 2 euro a litre and more going forward. Can you afford that? I cant!

nope I can't, but considering our electricity here is generated mainly by fossil fuel, any rise in the fossil fuel commodity market will see a sharp rise in the price of electricity as well.....

I want to see electric cars, I want one myself... but till there is a practical overall solution in place, people will continue to drive normal fossil fuel engined cars

robtri · 22-07-2009 4:16pm

cianof wrote: »

There's also the service costs to consider.

With the fossil fuel car you have to factor in the cost (both time & money) of oil, filters, timing belts... etc....+ the labor cost to do those jobs.

I did say urban nightsaver in my previous post because I reckon those who will chose to drive electric cars will also charge their cars at night, because it will make financial sense given their energy requirements.

I forgot to include the 13.5% vat, so figure for the Reva should be €120.56 per 10,000km not €106.22.

And the Tesla ev car has a $1000.00 a year service cost..... my petrol engined car is cheaper than that to service.....

and as I said previously, what about the associated costs of long journeys where the REVA is not prctical, i.e weekend trip to cork, going for a game of Golf in killarney, bring visitors on a trip around the ring of kerry, all the other things people do with there cars besides go to work and home....
please add that cost into the running of it...

ohhh and how long do you think you would get Urban nightsaver for, if everybody was using electricity at night to charge cars...
not long, so I would say double that re-charge cost...

gpjordanf1 · 22-07-2009 4:23pm

robtri wrote: »

And the Tesla ev car has a $1000.00 a year service cost..... my petrol engined car is cheaper than that to service.....

and as I said previously, what about the associated costs of long journeys where the REVA is not prctical, i.e weekend trip to cork, going for a game of Golf in killarney, bring visitors on a trip around the ring of kerry, all the other things people do with there cars besides go to work and home....
please add that cost into the running of it...

ohhh and how long do you think you would get Urban nightsaver for, if everybody was using electricity at night to charge cars...
not long, so I would say double that re-charge cost...

the tesla is a high end sports car, what's the servicing costs of a lambo or ferrari in comparison? The servicing costs of the GM EV1 was practically zero, just tires really. Thats the difference, why dont you check out tesla's family car coming out next year, big difference, ya could even go to kerry if ya wanted and play golf!

robtri · 22-07-2009 4:35pm

gpjordanf1 wrote: »

the tesla is a high end sports car, what's the servicing costs of a lambo or ferrari in comparison? The servicing costs of the GM EV1 was practically zero, just tires really. Thats the difference, why dont you check out tesla's family car coming out next year, big difference, ya could even go to kerry if ya wanted and play golf!

The servicing costs for the GM EV1 are not available as the services where covered in the lease agreement, but they still did need a service.....

Tesla new family car is fantastic....

Few issues:

1. Cost is out of reach of most families ... $50,000 so any savings on fuel tax ect are lost in the cost over a normal family car here....

2. Range is 275km... brilliant.. I love it

3. Charge time is 4 hours.... or 45mins for a quick charge...quick cahrge reduces range hugely.... not practical for the trips to cork or killarney
for my golf outing

4. and it is still over two years away before it will be made available to buy anywhere... end of quater 4 is planned launch date for California...

Not very practical for NOW is it

cianof · 22-07-2009 4:42pm

Do you reckon that's a fair comparison....comparing the service costs of a €100,000 electric sports car costs with your petrol car?

I reckon almost any car costing €100,000 will have a fairly expensive service cost.

Sure battery electric cars don't/won't suite everyone. If they suite your driving pattern they can make a lot of sense.

robtri, would you consider driving a hybrid.... or a plug in hybrid when they come out?

Blitzkrieger · 22-07-2009 6:10pm

sparklepants wrote: »

Even using electricity from fossil fuels electric cars are more efficient and better for the environment than IC engines. You can produce electricity at around 55% efficiency using gas, compared to an efficiency of maybe 20% for a petrol engine.

You must be joking - what about the enviornmental impact of all those batteries?

Hydrogen fuel cell ftw.....

cianof · 22-07-2009 6:24pm

Blitzkrieger,

You do know that batteries can be recycled?

Hydrogen fuel cell cars have batteries too remember. They are in fact a type of battery electric vehicle.

The fuel cell uses the hydrogen to make the electricity, to charge the battery, which provides the juice to run the motor.

The problem is, as yet, there's no efficient method to generate hydrogen. It required far more energy to make than it delivers.

cianof · 22-07-2009 6:32pm

There was a new more efficient method of producing hydrogen announced recently, but I'm not sure it will catch on....

http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/News/2009/July/02070902.asp

cianof · 22-07-2009 6:58pm

The survey and title on this thread are misleading.

TITLE
Ireland to go down the Electric car route?
Most people would probably agree that some electric cars are a good idea.

That's what the gov are proposing. The Government wants 250,000 cars and vans - or 10% of the national fleet - to be electric within a decade.

Given current developments. That seems fair enough.

SURVEY
"An all Electric car Ireland?"
That's daft.....no one has actually suggested that.

towel401 · 22-07-2009 9:23pm

cianof wrote: »

Blitzkrieger,

You do know that batteries can be recycled?

Hydrogen fuel cell cars have batteries too remember. They are in fact a type of battery electric vehicle.

The fuel cell uses the hydrogen to make the electricity, to charge the battery, which provides the juice to run the motor.

The problem is, as yet, there's no efficient method to generate hydrogen. It required far more energy to make than it delivers.

BMW Hydrogen7

burn the hydrogen directly

Johnny Utah · 22-07-2009 9:33pm

robtri wrote: »

And the Tesla ev car has a $1000.00 a year service cost..... my petrol engined car is cheaper than that to service.....

and as I said previously, what about the associated costs of long journeys where the REVA is not prctical, i.e weekend trip to cork, going for a game of Golf in killarney, bring visitors on a trip around the ring of kerry, all the other things people do with there cars besides go to work and home....
please add that cost into the running of it...

ohhh and how long do you think you would get Urban nightsaver for, if everybody was using electricity at night to charge cars...
not long, so I would say double that re-charge cost...

Oh God, you would have to re-charge the car in every town & village you passed along the way. It would turn into an epic 3-day journey, and you would end up staying the night in "Moll's Gap" while the car re-charged for the final leg!

cianof · 22-07-2009 9:49pm

BMW Hydrogen7 burn the hydrogen directly

BMW Hydrogen 7

What a joke!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Hydrogen_7

60 L/100 km

60L of compressed hydrogen per 100km traveled. Seriously, that's never going to happen.

If you think the BMW Hydrogen 7 is a break through, check this out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qM325S_3TI

towel401 · 23-07-2009 12:54am

cianof wrote: »

BMW Hydrogen 7

What a joke!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Hydrogen_7

60 L/100 km

60L of compressed hydrogen per 100km traveled. Seriously, that's never going to happen.

If you think the BMW Hydrogen 7 is a break through, check this out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qM325S_3TI

I don't care, i'll still buy one if i had the cash

and its 50L not 60. compressed hydrogen has far less energy in it than petrol. so be it

JHMEG · 23-07-2009 12:59am

cianof wrote: »

BMW Hydrogen 7

What a joke!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Hydrogen_7

60 L/100 km

60L of compressed hydrogen per 100km traveled. Seriously, that's never going to happen.

I noticed that too... 4.7 miles per gallon! Versus 81 mpg for the fuel cell powered FCX.

Fortunately BMW only made 100 of the damn things!

robtri · 23-07-2009 8:50am

cianof wrote: »

Do you reckon that's a fair comparison....comparing the service costs of a €100,000 electric sports car costs with your petrol car?

No I don't think its fair, BUT it is the only service cost of an EV I could find... ea lot of people here are under the belief that EV are service free, they aren't.. just point this out...
Also the Tesla roadster is a LOTUS ELISE, its only a €100K because of the costly batteries and charging devices, so its not too far off being a reasonable comparison....

cianof wrote: »

I reckon almost any car costing €100,000 will have a fairly expensive service cost.

as above.....

cianof wrote: »

Sure battery electric cars don't/won't suite everyone. If they suite your driving pattern they can make a lot of sense.

absolutely agree, but the way I see it, currently hte vast majority of people with petrol/diesel cars takes them on drives over the range of current EV cars at least once a year....
so until EV cars can get over this hump, the re-charge time hump, then IMHO they will never succeed...

cianof wrote: »

robtri, would you consider driving a hybrid.... or a plug in hybrid when they come out?

A hybrid .... NO, waste of money and not ECO friendly.. at all, rummor has it that the Hummer, is more enviromentaly friendly over the course of its life than some current hybrids....

a Plug in Hybrid, yes I would consider one.....

And I will take your questions further....

An EV car...... when certain criteria are met.... Hell yes....
I am actually trying to persuade work to buy an EV car/van for travelling between buildings and moving equipment between buildings

Johnny Utah wrote: »

Oh God, you would have to re-charge the car in every town & village you passed along the way. It would turn into an epic 3-day journey, and you would end up staying the night in "Moll's Gap" while the car re-charged for the final leg!

THANK YOU!! at last some on on this thread who see's the shortcomings of the EV motor as it stands today

Mr Benevolent · 23-07-2009 9:56am

THANK YOU!! at last some on on this thread who see's the shortcomings of the EV motor as it stands today

Most of you are missing one obvious point. People who drive long distances every week/month will not buy an electric car. EV's aren't going to be mandatory, folks! They're really for city driving only and they'll stay that way for maybe 10 years. So there's no need to worry about range.

From a government standpoint, the EV would be a revenue disaster. How are they going to levy car tax and VRT? VRT especially would be a flat rate - no more sliding scale. What about VAT receipts from garage that deal with them? Less maintenance, less money paid, less VAT. VAT receipts on fuel would suffer horribly as well. Increasing the price of electricity won't be any option because everyone uses it and besides, electricity is far cheaper than petrol per km anyway. What it is a government realistically going to care more about? CO2 emissions or income streams? Again it's obvious.

Let's be honest here. The government hasn't seriously thought this through. Look what happened to VRT once they went to CO2 emissions. It was so obvious that individual car emissions would go down, bringing VRT receipts down with it. The idiots must've thought they were running Dubai or something.

I'm all in favour of the electric car, but the Irish government is stupid and will crush this movement as soon as they figure out the consequences. Then again, they didn't figure out the VRT thing in time...

spank_inferno · 23-07-2009 10:01am

But with the Eco-Nazis in power who is to say that it wouldnt be compulsory?

I've no problem with going electric, so long as its my choice.

cianof · 23-07-2009 10:04am

Right now there's %0 VRT on electric vehicles. That will be in place until end of 2010 at least.

I'm not sure how they will balance the books. Perhaps they plan to offset against carbon credits.

cianof · 23-07-2009 10:54am

This 1/10 electric car plan is all related to the governments plans for energy independence.

Eddie Hobbs made some goods point on the issue back in May.

http://www.eddiehobbs.com/_bpost_1462/Energy_independence

Oil is 64.44 dollars a barrel today, and that's in the middle of a recession. Just imagine what the price will be when things start picking up again.

nicksinthemix · 14-08-2009 11:41am

The issues surrounding VRT and fuel taxes need a bit of outside the box thinking. It's actually not like the Russian empire a hundred years ago that generated a third of its tax from duty on vodka. In the middle of a war (before WWI I think) they went into prohibition and ruined themselves.

Transport electrification is a lot more complicated. Think about our current energy cycle:

import fuel --> combust fuel --> emit gasses into atmosphere

This is liniar and it doesn't involve much activity from an Irish economic perspective. As a result, the government tacks on taxes to each stage of the chain. And this makes complete sense because the national economic role is to buy and burn. If there were no taxes on this process, then money would just be leaving the country.

Now, a heavily electrified transport network looks different. Assuming that the drive towards renewables and domestic power genberation gets enhanced, then this becomes more of a closed loop:

generate power --> charge -->discharge or feed back into grid

The vehicles that use the power will still be imported, but the energy to propel them comes from a national effort and as such, taxing it as a source of revenue doesn't make sense. You'd just be moving funds from one sector of the economy to another and in many cases, from one government office to another.

Of course, much of this depends on not having to import fuel for the power stations. Then you close the loop completely but the ESB is aiming for this by 2035. At this point, there'll be less reason to get a kind of economic rub-off from a given activity (i.e. driving) because it doesn't just funnel money out of the country.

That's what I mean by looking at this one 'out of the box'.

kleefarr · 18-02-2010 9:47pm

230,000 Electric cars by 2020.

http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/ireland/esb-230000-vehicles-to-be-electric-by-2020-446789.html

Will our renewable electricity sources be able to cope?

I doubt it.

cianof · 18-02-2010 11:06pm

That's great news.

Why so doubtful?

230,000 won't all be charging at the same time.

Maybe once every 4 nights (100miles per charge).
20 kwh hours per car. ( €1.80 on nightsaver)

Check out the Robert Llewellyn Mitsubishi iMiev videos.
http://green.autoblog.com/2010/02/17/video-robert-llewellyn-launching-gearless-new-ev-centric-serie/

Looking forward to being able to buy one of those.

Cionád · 18-02-2010 11:12pm

Build a nuclear plant and we'll be sorted with plentiful clean energy

... just put the waste in the Irish Sea, can't get much worse

Heroditas · 19-02-2010 12:08am

kleefarr wrote: »

230,000 Electric cars by 2020.

http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/ireland/esb-230000-vehicles-to-be-electric-by-2020-446789.html

Will our renewable electricity sources be able to cope?

I doubt it.

More to the point, electric vehicle production worldwide will have to ramp up markedly if we're going to see 230,000 electric vehicles on the road here within ten years.

galwaytt · 19-02-2010 12:22am

kleefarr wrote: »

230,000 Electric cars by 2020.

http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/ireland/esb-230000-vehicles-to-be-electric-by-2020-446789.html

Will our renewable electricity sources be able to cope?

I doubt it.

Never going to happen. Either part of your statement.......

cianof · 19-02-2010 12:39am

Businesses can claim back 100% of the purchase cost of EVs via the accelerated capital allowance scheme.

http://www.sei.ie/Your_Business/Accelerated_Capital_Allowance/

There's 0% VRT on electric cars.

Most of the major car companies are developing electric cars.

http://www.audi.com/com/brand/en/experience/audi_e-tron.html

10 Years is a long time.

Looking forward to see what happens

Atlantic Dawn · 19-02-2010 1:14am

To my knowledge there's not currently 1 recharge point in the whole of Dublin, the Greens will also be decimated at the next elections, the dominance of the electric car is a long long way away in this country

Ireland to go down the Electric car route?

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