# Shoot down my electric car charging solution.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shoot-down-my-electric-car-charging-solution/580152>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [April 29, 2011, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shoot-down-my-electric-car-charging-solution/580152 "2011-04-29T13:09:42Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Lazlo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lazlo/32/9678_2.png) [@Lazlo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lazlo)\
**Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shoot-down-my-electric-car-charging-solution/580152/41 "2011-05-01T04:11:52Z")

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> [@lukeinva](#):
>
> So let me get this straight.
> 
> _I have to drive to work_… and while I’m driving… there is no way to somehow harness the energy created by my wheels? And no way to hook up a windmill to one of those wound-copper generator thingies and create electricity? Enough to recharge my rechargeable batteries? (or whatever)
> 
> Why.

No, because the generator will cause enough resistance that your fuel consumption will go up by more than the amount of energy you generate. For example, if your generators recaptured 10 kWh of electricity, you would expend at least 10 kWh _ **more** _ in fuel than you would have without the generator attached. In the real world, due to losses, it would be more like 2 to 3 times that amount.

In short, you would waste more gasoline (or battery power) than you could ever recapture than if you hadn’t tried recapturing it in the first place. The reason why regenerative breaking is a big deal is because you need to slow down anyhow, so you’re exchanging some of your speed (that you already expended much more energy to get) for a bit of electricity.

I am not terribly good at explaining things, so I hope this made a bit of sense.

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