Oh, also consider the original Honda Insight, which came out at around the same time as the Prius but was much more similar to the EV-1. The Insight WAS a sales flop, with Honda selling about half as many of them as they planned to. If Honda (who could do no wrong in the 90’s) couldn’t pull off an eco-friendly two seater, I doubt GM would have.
No, I think you are missing the point. Purchasers today probably care little where the cost is coming from. They are making a cost benefit decision based on a number of factors, one of which is clearly early adopter. I assume that the Tesla is not as luxurious as other cars at its price point, but that isn’t the issue for its purchasers, clearly.
I find it hard to believe that the battery technology is so mature that cost can’t be driven out of the manufacturing process. And it is not like they do not understand the need to drive the price down for wider acceptance. Now I’m sure the current surge in its stock prices is unsustainable, but on the other hand I don’t think it is totally smoke and mirrors. If they - or Toyota or anyone else - has come up with an advance I’m sure they are not publishing it.
My reason for citing the article is to demonstrate that there is a substantial market for these things in California = substantial in terms of luxury cars, anyway.
In California the availability of car pool stickers for Priuses was a major factor. It would be interesting to recalculate the ROI based not only on gas savings (which were inadequate as you mention) but in time savings.
I don’t know the sales figures, but my impression is that even today the market share of the Prius outside of California is much lower than in, even after the car pool sticker advantage is gone.
Who killed the electric car? Well, naming it the Impact might’ve had something to do with it. People like cars that have names that make them think of things they’d like to be or do, not bad things they are likely to do.
No, the point is that Elon Musk and other advocates of the electric vehicles are pointing at the Tesla S as having demonstrated the viability of the technology of electric vehicles as providing the same capability of liquid fuel internal combustion vehicles when in fact there are some significant deficiencies based upon fundamental limitations of the technology, including limitations on how inexpensively an electric vehicle with a comparable range and capability to a gasoline or diesel powered vehicle can be produced.
The technology of lithium ion batteries is about a decade old. Development of both the basic construction and the manufacturing processes has been heavily subsidized by several governments and has gone through considerable evolution. In the last 12+ months there has not been a significant reduction in cost per kWh of output nor improvement in storage capability which indicates that the technology has approached the maximal economy of scale. This isn’t like microprocessor technology where there are opportunities for geometric improvements in capability; the basic chemical energy density and thermodynamic limitations of electrochemical batteries are fundamental limits, and existing Li-ion batteries are within a few percentage points of the theoretical maximum efficiency.
Cars like the Tesla S may be suitable for the small percentage of drivers who can afford to own multiple vehicles in which one is suitable for moderate range transportation. The technology is not suitable for households in which both drivers may regularly exceed the expected range, in climates which are not optimal, or which cannot afford to purchase a vehicle in which the energy storage system costs more than the average family sedan. As a technology to offer complete and sustainable replacement of petrochemical fueled transportation, electric vehicles fail to fulfill all but a very modest segment of transportation demand.
Stranger
Doesn’t any discussion of the economics of the Tesla, have to also include discussion of the lavish subsidies (touched on by Stranger) including the zero-emission credits that Tesla sells? Is the car actually profitable, if Tesla had to get its operating income strictly from sales/leases, and not from the Federal Government?
I’d suspect there are few electric car advocates who claim that they will replace 100% or nearly 100% of internal combustion engines any time soon, if ever.
That doesn’t mean that there isn’t a significant market for them. Here is data on the average length of a car trip - just over 10 miles, well within electric vehicle range.
We haven’t gotten anywhere near mass production of batteries yet, and my manufacturing experience makes me find it hard to believe that we have optimal processes. As for price, I’m no expert, but here is a chart from Technology Review showing a forecast of falling battery prices over the next ten years. It also predicts a 1.9% market share by 2020. Given how slowly the infrastructure will grow, that could be plausible.
Obviously prices have to drop to increase demand. But most families own at least two cars, and few families have both members driving long distances frequently. (If they do they move.) See data on average trip length. The increase in car sharing services is from the realization that cars in general are very inefficiently used, in that they have small duty cycles, used perhaps two hours per day tops. That is an excellent model for an electric car with reasonably rapid charging. Not for everyone - using one on a cross country trip is going to be difficult for quite some time, but enough so that this shouldn’t be nearly as much of a barrier as cost to increased sales.
I think the biggest challenge is going to be increasingly effective hybrids, good enough so the fuel economy differential is very small.
Subsidies like that are ways of kick starting the market, like the effective subsidy of car pool stickers for the Prius I already mentioned, or subsidies for solar panels. They will help a good technology ramp, but is not going to turn a technology that is not inherently cost effective profitable.
What “killed” the electric car? The invisible hand of the rational market. Very simple-they cannot compete on range, price, or capabilities (yet). Why is that concept so hard to understand? The total costs of an electric car are many times that for a gasoline car-and get worse if you consider a used car. Funny how whenever we doubt the invisible hand, we get burned…like when the US Gov gave $471 million of the taxpayer’s money to Fiskars (to develop the “Karma” electric car).
The money was wasted.:smack:
I don’t see how that’s any different than the loans given to Tesla, which have been paid back and appear to have had the desired effect of jump-starting a viable new company. If the loans to Fisker were defying the almighty invisible hand, why didn’t Tesla didn’t get smacked too? The loans to Fisker turned out to be a pretty bad investment, but that’s because Fisker didn’t really have their act together, not because they were in violation of some fundamental law of economics.
(Also, Fiskars is the Finnish manufacturer of high-quality scissors, unrelated to the soon-to-be defunct car company)
Are you talking about a lack of EVs from European brands, or about no EVs in Europe? Hybrids and EVs are becoming quite popular, with more and more cities making sure that all public garages have EV spots. I looked at half a dozen brands (Korean, Japanese, French, Italian) before choosing my Citroën and every brand had at least hybrids. EVs are generally poised for the second-car market, hybrids as primary vehicles.
I presume what Deeg is saying here is that despite high fuel prices, there haven’t been any spectacularly high-selling EV’s in Europe, therefore discounting the idea that the record-low fuel prices at the time of the EV-1 trial had something to do with it’s discontinuation. It sounds like EV’s are indeed selling better in Europe now, but they’re still a niche product. The EV niche is also growing in the US, but it appears to be the result of the technology maturing and prices coming down as opposed to anything to do with fuel prices.
Hybrids are a whole other issue. They had trouble selling in Europe during the last decade because the first wave of hybrids couldn’t compete on price (or even mileage in some cases) with the many small efficient diesel cars on the road there, which we don’t have in the states. The hybrid technology has also matured, and so they are starting to be competitive.
A gasoline pump moves chemical energy at 20 MW. It takes a small power plant to wiggle electrons that fast.
<SINGS>Who controls the British crown?
Who keeps the metric system down?
We do, we do
Who keeps Atlantis off the maps?
Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
We do, we do
Who holds back the elctric car?
Who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?
We do, we do
Who robs gamefish of their site?
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We do, we do</SINGS>
Do you have something a little more recent? One of the sources mentions a 5-year project to try to come up with a solution and the end of that 5 years is soon. Is it possible that the hydrogen stations is the culmination of the project?
Quote:
“not because they were in violation of some fundamental law of economics”.
Selling a product for which there is no market?
Selling a product that costs more, does less, and has an uncertain service life?
OK, I guess that is not violating marketing, just common sense.:smack:
Metal hydride fuel cells are being researched. They have the advantage of being able to store the hydrogen fuel within the cell itself and can be recharged either physically or electrically. Unfortunately, their volumetric storage capacity is rather low.
But, in the end, hydrogen is not and energy source, it is a transfer medium, and not a particularly good one at that, it would seem.
No, I went to the DoE and NREL websites and looked for the most recent studies on the use of hydrogen as a transportation fuel. Since both agencies are mandated to advance and advocate the use of hydrogen fuels and the associated technology it would be reasonable to assume that if the various issues involved in handling and transporting hydrogen had been resolved that there would be further reports to that effect and projecting a rapid adoption of hydrogen as a practicable fuel for vehicles. Nor am I particularly interested in investing more time in attempting to disprove a point that no one has yet made any real effort to factually demonstrate in the first place, to wit that the technical issues and hazards involved in handling and transporting hydrogen have all been suitably addressed to the point that it would make a practical substitute for gasoline and diesel by the average commuter.
I have repeatedly stated the known issues and hazards involved in the use of hydrogen, which is drawn from my experience in an industry where large amounts of liquid and gaseous hydrogen are regularly used (upper stage rocket propulsion). Nor am I just pulling these issues out of my ass or handwaving them into existence. The core reference for aerospace applications of hydrogen as a propellant or fuel are AIAA G-095-2004 Guide to Safety of Hydrogen and Hydrogen Systems. G-095-2004 is an over 200 page standard which 75 pages of the primary document are devoted to the special materials, handling and detection systems, transportation hazards, quantity-distance explosive allowables, training, and operating procedures are required to safely handle and use hydrogen. Another appendix (Annex C) details scaling laws and blast effect calculations. Yet another (Annex D) concerns the interpretation of NFPA 50, 29 and 49 CFR, various OSHA, DoD 6055.9, and other regulations and standards with respect to the special hazards and handling issues of hydrogen. The sum total is that handling, transporting, and using large quantities of hydrogen is significantly more challenging and hazardous than other petrochemical and hydrocarbon fuels, and any systems to distribute and use such fuels will be substantially more complex and expensive than the existing transportation fuel infrastructure. Just saying, “Well, some car company is working on a hydrogen fuel vehicle, so they must have resolved all of the issues somehow,” does not begin to address these issues or the practicality of replacing liquid fuels which can be stored at room temperature under ambient or low pressure with hydrogen.
Stranger
GM’s EV1 came out at a bad time. Gasoline was well under 1 dollar a gallon and under 10 bucks a barrel at one point. Who is going to buy a car with limited range and that costs so much money when oil was so inexpensive?
There were also issues with it catching fire, etc.
Also, I believe automotive companies have to keep spare parts around for X number of years to service them, so if the car was a loss leader, why would they keep it around?
Think about it in modern times…imagine if there was a huge oil discovery that yielded 900 billion barrels of sweet light crude and there was a huge oil glut. Suddenly, oil drops to 15 a barrel and gasoline is 99 cents a gallon. Are you going to go buy an electric vehicle? If so, are you going to pay such a premium for it? The reason why so many EV1 users were celebrities was because they can afford to have a fleet of gas powered vehicles at their disposal and for them it was just a novelty. A working man or woman who has children and has to commute far for work is not going to want to spend a bunch of money upfront to have a car that limits their usefulness.
I really like GM’s Volt. It’s a neat idea, although I wish it had a longer electric range and it looks like it’d be hard to parallel park. But I really enjoy the idea of having a back-up gasoline engine.
What we have today is electric vehicles right now are only for people who are quite affluent and showboating about it. I couldn’t afford a Tesla or a Volt, and the fuel savings of the Prius are long down the road to offset the cost of gasoline on a car that gets less in the way of MPGs.
Now obviously being green is good so we should all have electric vehicles right? But right now, being green is a luxury for the affluent. Do you think a working-class family can go out and buy a brand new electric vehicle, a charging station at home, and all that? No, they’d likely have an older car and try and maintain it well enough not to have any expensive repair bills.
I hope we come to a time where buying a very efficient or electric car with a long range is affordable; besides brakes and tires and some other things, they seem much less maintenance intensive. But GM’s EV1 was a neat toy for the rich celebrities and not really a feasible car when you considered the price of gasoline at the time.
Except that the success of Tesla shows that there obviously is a market for high-end electric cars. What Tesla is doing is not substantively different than what Fisker was trying to do.