Motorists encouraged to buy electric

Capt'n Midnight

astrofool wrote: »

Battery technology will keep on evolving, we may end up going the way of supercapacitors, the beauty of the electric car is that any source of electricity can power it, so rolling battery upgrades would be possible (or even fuel cells).

Charging a car via coal power station is much much much less polluting than burning petrol in an ICE. Power plants are much more efficient, and this is without considering renewable sources of power (wind/solar/wave/geothermal).

The battery packs have a cooling system, this keeps their ambient temperature at the correct level, so environmental factors should not have a large effect on charging.

Most urbanites could happily use an electric car 99% of the time without any range issues, this reduces pollution and fossil fuel dependence drastically.
...

I can see most regular service stations installing a number of fast charge points. Charging time will go down as the battery technology improves, allowing them to intake more power/time.

The only problem with electric cars are the batteries. Most land vehicles over 100 tonnes are electrically powered.

While chemistry has improved a lot in the 150 years since the Lead Acid battery was invented you still need 303.26g of lead sulphate per mol of electrons. ( 96485.3399 F /3600 C = 26.8 Ah)
Six cells in a battery so a ~7KG battery of 26.8 Ah battery would have 1.82Kg of Lead Suphate in it. Allowing for the case and electrolyte and conductors you are never going to more that double the capacity of Lead Acid batteries.

Lightest technology is Lithium Air but still a long way off and the price will go up as demand for Lithium increases.

Super capacitors will allow quicker charging but won't ever compete with the better batteries in capacity.


Ye canna break the laws of physics (or chemistry)

Melodeon

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Ye canna break the laws of physics (or chemistry)

That needs a picture:






On Topic:
I think electric cars are most likely the way of the future, and we have to start somewhere I suppose.
As others have said though, until the between-fill range gets up to something similar to current cars or some sort of on-the-move charging technology becomes feasible, they're going to be restricted to commuter/city use.

Sponge Bob

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Lightest technology is Lithium Air but still a long way off and the price will go up as demand for Lithium increases.

You forgot to mention the Chinese control most of the worlds Rare Earth production as well :eek: and much of the Lithium ...along with Chile Boliva and Argentina.

All of which has a lot to do with EV's

Lithium is a bit more diverse than the Rare earths which are used in the motors.

2005 Production (tonnes) Reserves (tonnes) Reserve Base (tonnes)

United States 1,000 (est.) 38,000 410,000
Argentina 2,000 2,000,000 (est.) 2,000,000 (est.)
Australia 4,000 160,000 260,000
Bolivia - - 5,400,000
Brazil 240 190,000 910,000
Canada 700 180,000 360,000
Chile 8,000 3,000,000 3,000,000
China 2,700 640,000 1,100,000
Portugal 320 NA NA
Russia 2,200 NA NA
Zimbabwe 240 23,000 27,000

TOTAL 21,400 6.2M 13.4M

Have a read

http://www.evworld.com/library/lithium_shortage.pdf

Can be charged up on cheap rate electricity overnight

That won't last long! As soon as overnight demand increases to the point that power actually needs to be generated, rather than just keeping power stations operational, then the nightrate will soon dissappear.

The only (im)practical solution to the lack of range of EV's.

Insert a slot in the motorway and run the cars over it!

dowlingm

We could always start planting more sugar beet to power E85 hybrids The Brazilians have a serious ethanol industry off their sugar cane plantations.

KevR

Live Drive wrote: »

The Opel Ampera is an interesting solution to that problem in the short term. A range of 60km on the battery and then the engine kicks in but rather than running the wheels it charges the battery so the fuel consumption is very low. It has a range of 500km on one tank. Out next year.

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Bit like a Prius that LiveD, a Hybrid rather than an EV.

I definitely think the Ampera solution could be the way to go for the transition to full electric vehicles.

It's the right idea but 60km on the battery is a bit measly! I presume that's 60km at a steady cruising speed also (90 or 100kmh perhaps?). For example, if you were crawling across Galway (Barna-Oranmore and back again) in start/stop traffic would you find that the battery gets used up and the petrol starts kicking in despite it only being a 31km round trip? Same goes for long trips across the likes of Dublin City in heavy traffic.

Also, assuming these cars are actually capable of 120kmh, would you be able to get the full 60km out of the battery at 120kmh? I doubt the optimal cruising speed is that high...

Right idea but the battery range needs to be something like 150km before the petrol has to kick in. The vast majority of commutes and short/medium journeys would be covered by the battery and long journeys wouldn't be a problem either (500km on a fuel tank which can be refilled in the 'normal' way and there will be some fast charge points around the place also).

astrofool wrote: »

And the best bit, abandonment of the inefficient clutch and gearing sytem, driving without waggling a stick at random times.

Ineffecient in an electric car maybe but aren't manual cars more fuel effecient than automatic cars in petrol/diesel (presuming people drive them properly of course).

I much prefer manual cars. Adds to the enjoyment of driving in my opinion. Wouldn't even consider buying an automatic now and I'd definitely miss the clutch and gear in an electric car.