At $400 kwh battery it’s still a $9,600 gas tank attached to a car that has an electric motor in addition to an ice motor.
So how much progress has been made about eliminating that awful diesel stink? If you don’t get rid of that, a diesel won’t ever be in my garage no matter how cheap it is to run.
I need to correct this statement.
And for kicks some details on V2G and how the it would pay for the utilities to pay a premium to borrow some electricity from car batteries for a few minutes at a time during short demand spikes and pay a nice premium for the privilege. (It’s a lot cheaper than turning on the peakers and straining the transmission wires as much.) One model:
I can see Project Better place working with that model - charging stacks of batteries at night and fewer during the day to have on hand for exchanges and while sitting around waiting to be swapped in available in racks to help buffer the grid (both to give power and to absorb excess) - for a fee that more than offsets any potential degradation to their lifetimes.
Magiver, we are repeating ourselves now. Look to past posts to get responses to that concern.
There will be plenty of ideas on how to make it easier to drive an electric car. They will find ways to make charging or switching batteries more friendly and cheaper. It will work out fine after a while. If they sell enough and the users find they are practically using no gas, it will catch on.
There will be plenty of ideas on how to make it easier to drive [del]an electric[/del] a diesel car. They will find ways to make [del]charging or switching batteries[/del] bio diesel more friendly and cheaper. It will work out fine after a while. If they sell enough and the users find they are practically using no gasoline, it will catch on.
There will never be an electrical replacement for diesel trucks, trains, or jet fuel. Bio diesel solves a bigger problem more economically.
Never is a long time. I don’t know if that is true. If you said, you don’t see it soon. I could agree. But the alternatives should be explored while a clean transportation system evolves. I think it will. But you are an old stick in the mud, mired in the past and afraid of the future. I embrace it.
Most of the trains in Japan are already electric. The United States could do it, but it would takes decades. I’m a lukewarmer, so I’m fine with that.
It would also be possible to run vehicles, even jet planes using ammonia for fuel. You couldn’t use ammonia for long haul routes, but most of the domestic traffic could run on ammonia as fuel. Ammonia will only produce nitrogen and water as combustion produces. It can be produced using only water, air and electricity.
Japan is a small country with a dense population and 35% of it’s power comes from nuclear plants. The United States is a vast expanse of land where electrical rail is economically unfeasible and trains exist almost exclusively for freight.
To start with, anything is “possible” but it would be financially unfeasible to switch to another fuel for jet aircraft. Beyond that, water vapor is the number one greenhouse gas.
BTW, the exact same claim was made for hydrogen peroxide in the 80’s right down to the cost of the fuel.
Water vapor has an obscure negative feedback loop that ensures that not too much of it stays in the atmosphere at any one time. Not many know about it. It’s called “rain”.
Carbon dioxide has a feed back loop. It’s called photosynthesis. It produces oxygen.
I have no information on this particular alternative fuel but did you know that every molecule of octane completely burned in gasoline produces eight molecules of CO2 and NINE molecules of water?
I think few would argue that diesel serves some functions in America very well right now, much better than electric could in any near to moderate term. City and suburban commuting, defined commercial routes around central hubs (be it garbage pick-up, or bus routes, or delivery routes) are not among them.
And “never” replace jet fuels may be a bit of an overstatement.
Sounds like a wise investment opportunity. Go for it.
I forgot to add that I was excited about the hydrogen peroxide claim to salvation when it was made as well as a truckload of other promising technologies.
Most of the long haul lines in Russia are electric. The whole Trans-Siberian Railroad is electric. The last time I looked, Russia was bigger than the United States.
I’m talking about 50 years in the future. All our rolling stock and all our jets will be replaced and most of our electricity will come from nuclear power. My goal is to have 80% of our electricity produced by nuclear by 2060 as France already does. If we can’t develop a practical battery technology, then we go with ammonia. I expect to be in the process of converting to Thorium and Uranium breeder reactors. The Uranium Breeders will run from the spent fuel from our current reactors and from our U-238 stockpile. We may end up buying the technology from the Chinese or the Indians.
Your hydrogen peroxide comment caused me to flash back on a Dilbert character called “Dan the illogical scientist”, who told Dilbert his idea wouldn’t work because he (Dan) has seen other ideas that wouldn’t work.
I suspect that a lot of impractical ideas will become practical when diesel fuel goes over $10 a gallon.
bio-diesel is already below $10.
And hydrogen peroxide is going to be cheaper to make then liquid hydrogen.
Then I assume that bio-diesel will be very popular someday.
What does liquid hydrogen have do with anything? The whole point of ammonia is that it has more hydrogen per gallon than liquid hydrogen and it doesn’t require cryogenic temperatures.
I expect algae to be more important in the future producing food than fuel. Since Algae can grow fine in saltwater or even sewage, it could be a major crop that would be insensitive to rainfall. We could make Baja into a major food producing region. It grows so fast compared to conventional crops, it could be harvested every few weeks.
American agriculture is very energy intensive, so it would also save a lot of diesel used for agriculture.
Ford exec on CSPAN today, saying they have 5 alternative vehicles on the boards including a 100 percent electric. They also have Volt types on the line. They see the future is not in ICEs.
The best way to prolong the future of the ICE is to get some fraction of the public driving EVs as that delays demand for gas outstripping supply (especially as more drivers in Cina and India join the demand pool). If you are a company that makes ICEs you want those vehicles to keep selling for a good long time. Yes, you also want to be part of the emerging technologies, both to not be dealt out of the longer term future, and to have those vehicles count towards your fleet averages for CAFE standardsli, but your profits are going to be in selling the ICEs for a while yet.[/li]
I don’t think they see that their future is not in ICEs, at least not in any reasonable term; I think they see that EVs are part of making their ICE future succeed in the medium term.
How does 1 electric car become the future?