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What Does the Future Hold for Low Emission Vehicles?
Bryan Andersen asks: "While searching for information on electric vehicles to make an EV Hot Rod I came across this Op Ed piece at EV World about James Cameron's Dark Angel series for fall. It got me thinking just what would it take to get low or zero emission vehicles common place? What has to change? What do people think is the future of low or zero emission vehicles? And just what is the state of the art in both manufactured and home built ones? What cool technologies are down the pike? Electric vehicles are something that I very much like the concept of. Every year or two I get the crazy idea of building an electric vehicle. Last time it was doing a motorcycle. This time it's a street rod. A few years before that it was for a hybrid/electric drive for an RV."
H2 + O2 -> Fuel Cell -> Electric Power -> Electric Motors
The hydrogen's safer than most other fuels because in case of a leak, it dissipates in the atmosphere VERY quickly (molecular weight of 2 and all :-) ). Remember the Hindenburg blew up because the paint on the skin was made of kerosene...
One possible variation of these vehicles includes something called a reformer, which lets the vehicle 'cook' gasoline to extract hydrogen. All the infrastructure of gasoline, all the energy density/range of gasoline, but none of the emissions and much better efficiency.
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Wide acceptance of low-emissions vehicles is almost completely dependent on the existence of a, for lack of a better word, refueling infrastructure. People don't want to have to drive across town to the one electric recharge station (or hydrogen station, or whatever) when they could drive their combustion car 2 blocks. And they dont' want to run out of whatever fuel they're using out in the middle or nowhere, or in a bad neighborhood, etc.
/constructing/ that infrastructure is basically dependent on wide acceptance of these vehicles.
But naturally, the profit motive for
Soooooo, unless there's a mad rush of early adopters, or some venture capital finds its way to a alternative-fuel-station startup, or some other wildly improbable set of circumstances come into play, we'll simply not see wide use of LEV's.... until the government steps in. Playing to the environmentalists in all of us, the gov't will justify a huge subsidy (and likely a huge tax to go with it) to the large gas station chains to get them to install electric rechargers, hydrogen dispensers, or whatever. Or worse yet, they'd create a new gov't agency for providing these services ("hmm, I don't seem to see 'LEV' in the constitution... but who cares!").
So the short answer is, its highly unlikely that in the near future, natural market forces will bring LEV's to a large number of motorists. But since economic boom has made the environment a viable concern again, we'll likely see the government use a little bit of (or a lot of) force to bring it to the market, "because they say so".
MoNsTeR
Low Emission and electrics seem to be synonymous these days. But a pure electric is entirely depedent on the electricity coming out of the house wire and you've got no say over that. Sure, power plants get tremendous efficiency throught scale. And then they loose a lot in the wires and loose a lot in the vehicule battery. Moveover, it just makes the technology pretty unautonomous. A technology that appeals much more to me is bio-diesel. This is a system for converting new or used vegetable oil into a fuel that can be burned in an ordinary diesel engine of a car, truck or whatever. Thus non-poluting and renewable and do-it-yourself.
Not that one can expect a solar panel to extend range, but it can reduce the cost for use. Most cars sit in the parking lot during the day. Why not let the cars "refill" for free?
Fight Spammers!
1. what if it breaks
2. Do I have to plug it in.
Since right now there is no real way generate electricity without using gasolene, people will never buy purely electric because they are afraid that if there isn't a plug then they will be stranded somewhere. This is why the future is with hybrid cars, at least for the time being.
Basically, a hybrid is a car that runs on a gas engine, and when the engine is turning it also turns an electric generator which charges a special battery. For example, with a normal car, when going downhill the engine is in idle and its still using juice, but nothing is being produced. In this situation, the gas would be off and the battery would charge.
Also, in a normal car when you break the extra energy is dissipated in heat and friction. with this, that energy is harnessed to turn the electric motor. The result is that when the car is going under 25 miles an hour, the gas motor is completely off and its super efficient as well as quiet. Because of this, the emmisions of these cars are two to four percent of a normal car. In other words, one hybrid equals about thirty normal cars.
They are actually pretty cheap too. The one we got is a toyota prius, it just came out and its 19,900 bucks. pretty good. They've been out in japan for a while and sold about 30,000 units, and they are making 10,000 for the U.S. and if they sell out they will make more. The one problem with this is that the batteries are still pretty expensive to make, and they have to come down in price. Still, with the full package for under 20k and you don't have to plug it in, this is going to be a big seller. Also, it looks exactly like a normal four door car.
In general, people want to do what's right for the environment, you just have to make it easy to swallow. That's what hybrids do. The ease of a normal car, but with the preformance near an all electric vehicle.
That's right.
Currently, the only feasible power source other than fossil fuel, that can provide the power we need to run the world as-is, is the fission reactor. And nobody likes that, even though it's far better and cleaner.
Solar power? Forget it. You'd have to cover a large portion of the earth's surface to get the kind of power we get from fossil fuel today.
Wind? Same thing.
Every been in the drive-through line behind a '70 'Cuda? Thos who are old enough will recall that ALL cars used to smell like that. Car emissions have been reduced so radically (albeit gradually) over the last 30 years that we don't notice just how much has changed. The air is vastly cleaner than it was 30 years ago, even though there are twice as many cars on the road. And that trend will continue. We're not headed for a pollution-filled hell, we're emerging from it.
Of course, some folks are so intent on keeping people from enjoying their cars that they continue to push the silly idea that cars produce so much carbon dioxide that the sky will fall. After hearing this nonsense for thirty years, you gotta start asking... when? According to the predictors of doom, we should have been through about three apocalypses by now.
The reality is that the only way to reduce CO output is to reduce the utility of cars in some way, by making them smaller or slower or more dangerous. And while that may seem fine for the Beautiful Person who commutes from one side of Palo Alto to the other, the potential impact on average working folks is somewhat more severe.
I expect that we'll continue to make incremental improvements in efficiency and emissions. And people will continue to insist that unless something drastic is done, civilization as we know it will end. But we needn't do anything drastic; incremental improvements over a period of years have made a very real difference, and they will continue to do so. And people will be able to go on with their lives without disruption.
I am personally getting sick of people who say "we should all move to electrical vehicles." The main problem is the the answer to, 'where does the electricity they use come from?' And the answer surely does not come out of thin air like many "wantabe" environmentalists think it does!
Electric cars use upto 5 times as much fossil fuels than ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles.
How and why? First off, the electricity is produced at a power plant, of which, the nation still relies on 70-80% of fossil fuels to generate. Secondly, the efficiency of first generating the electricity from fossil fuels to drive a motor by electricity, rather than via an ICE is much, much lower. And, finally, there is a lot of transmission loss between the power plant, relay stations to your home (the most likely location where you will charge your vehicle). And there is the fact that the current power generation infrastructure could not meet the power generation needs to support home charging of electrical cars if 1/4th of America was driven them. In addition, I think most Americans would take exception to a $400-500 "electrical bill" even if they did not have to fuel their vehicles elsewhere.
In addition, because the elctricity is still generated from fossil fuels 70-80% of the time, the belief that it is "zero emissions" is just untrue. Now on the flip-side I will admit that power generation from fossil fuels at a power plant is less of a polutant than generation from fossil fuels in an ICE -- probably by an order of magnitude. So even if it takes 5 times as much gas to power the electric vehicle and, therefore 5 times as much fossil fuels are used, the total number of pollutants are probably cut in half. I.e. 5 (times as much fuel) x 1/10 (the pollution per unit fuel) = 1/2 (the total pollution).
So, at best, the "zero emissions electric vehicle" is a flight of fantasy, at least until we either develop direct heat to electricity generation (by passing the traditional steam turbine/generator system of today), possibly in combination with commodity fusion power generation (until which, we will be dependent on fossil fuels).
And if you are even thinking of solar power, don't bother. Solar cells would have to be 25 times as efficient as they exist now. Putting solar panels atop of your hood, top and trunk would not even yield enough power to go a few miles after several hours of charge. Wind power is in the same boat, although it it is more efficent than solar.
The reality of reduced fossil fuel dependence comes not from its total elimination. No. The best solutions come in "hybrid" electric vehicles where an ICE is used in combination with electric systems. Everything from alternators to flywheels are used to generate and charge the batteries while the ICE is running. Hybrid vehicles can almost double the MPG (miles per gallon) rating of vehicles over their ICE-only components.
Looking beyond just they ICE-electric hybrid, we can look at one petroleum replacement, and another one electrical source (other than direct battery storage and recharge). CNG (compressed natural gas) is one since it burns much cleaner than petroleum, and is in limited used in largely application-specific commercial vehicles (like various commercial utility trucks, etc...). Hydrogen fuel cells are a promising technology that will make electric cars much more efficient than charged and discharged batteries. But, both CNG and fuel cells have serious safety issues in their on-board storage in that massive explosions can result in rupture of their tanks (much larger than possible with petroleum-based ones because of the pressure and density of CNG, and the volitity of hydrogen in fuel cells).
Lastly, some may remember "gasohol", an ICE fuel replacement for petroleum. Gasohol is a reality, and can be used to power ICE. In fact, the US' total agriculture capability could meet the world's total demand for gasahol at least two times over if petroleum did not exist tomorrow. The reason it does not today is because of the cost of its refining into an end-user product. Not so much in the refining process itself, but in the massive and quite useless by-products and waste as a result of the refining process. As such, until petroleum resources start to dry up and drive costs of a crude barrel at least 5 times more than the cost today, gasohol will remain a relatively untapped technology.
I seriously hope I educated some individuals here. I don't work the petroleum industry nor do I defend them -- I'm actually quite critical, especially in light of the little effort by everyone in the US to push for the development and maturity of economical fusion power generation (which I believe is possible). I'm just an engineer who is sick of reading various comments on "electrical cars" or "renewable energies/fuels." Let's talk reality people or not talk at all!
-- Bryan "TheBS" Smith
-- Bryan "TheBS" Smith
Independent Author, Consultant and Trainer
The government in Germany recently increased fuel taxes to the point that fuel costs 2 DM per liter (slightly less than $4/gal).
The effect is that everyone is complaining about the tremendous fuel prices, while nobody can do anything about it.
Even in many of the bigger cities, there are no facilities to refill alternate fuel-cars.
Public transportation is not an alternative in many locations because it's even more expensive and not even available to a real extent in some of the more rural areas.
People who could afford getting a new car that just uses up less traditional fuel are not the ones hit hardest.
People who are still driving a 15 years-old car that obviously needs more fuel than recent technology simply because they can't afford buying a new car are in real trouble.
A more sane approach, IMO, would be to
Since the demand will obviously grow (because of #2), they'll know they need to do it sooner or later. If they get incentives only if they start in the next 6 months or so, they'll do it sooner.
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The gas prices in Europe are artificially high! Their gas taxes are far higher than ours. This is probably a legacy of their socialist past, when only the very prosperous had cars (true into the 1950's). Also, the tiny size of their countries pretty well ruled out long-distance driving before the EU. After all, if an Austian or Italian goes on what would be a pleasant, all-day jaunt into the next state over here, he winds up in the next country.
The same situation of artificially inflated gas prices holds true in Canada and Taiwan. Probably other countries as well, but these two I know about first hand. Gas taxes are an easy source of revenue in Europe and Taiwan, because gas is really a luxury for most people. Those countries have also fairly comprehensive public transportation systems, not because the people want it, but because it is subsidied by their socialist governments. The public transport is well-used, since the people can't afford anthing better, after the government has robbed them blind and jacked up the price of gas. Their environment is certainly no cleaner than ours, to boot.
See what I've been reading.
We don't need to collect solar energy with photovoltaics. In fact, the two best (most efficient) methods of collecting solar power right now are through farming, and passive solar heat. While growing corn may not be the most efficient plant to farm fuel alcohol, it IS sustainable. If we want to get serious about removing our dependency on a non-sustainable fuel (never mind the foreign policy issues of dependency on foreign oil), HEMP and JUTE are the the most efficient means of doing so. See The North American Industrial Hemp Council and Hemp Lobby.org for an insightful look into what we (as a society) are wasting by preventing farmers from growing industrial hemp for paper, pressboard, fuel alcohol, and fabrics.
You may also be interested in this Eurekalert release Scientists create organic photovoltaic devices to convert light into electricity which discusses the use of ionically self-assembled monolayer process onto a fullerene (bucky tube) surface, which generates a molecule thin organic photovoltaic cell -- without all those nasty solvents used in the traditional process of making the silicon counterpart.
There are real alternatives to implement if we want to get off this crazy dependency on fuel oil. But the real issue is not infrastructure, but politics; as the oil industry has it's hands on our political establishment. Just which of our presidential candidates comes from a family of oil tycoon and has a vice presidential nominee that's a former CEO of a large Texas oil company?
ps - Frankly, Gore's record on the environment is just a bunch of enviro-talk hooey as well. I think they both suck. I'll be voting Nader this time around.
I believe that the pollution problem stems more from accepted lifestyles in our society than anything else. Look at all the SUV's out there today!
I don't think it's so much "lifestyle" as government interference steering people towards vehicles that are inefficient.
A major reason people are driving SUVs is due to government legislation. The CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy, if memory serves) standards added thousands of dollars to the costs of big car - the kind of car a growing family would want to cart themselves around in.
So given a choice between a $18k station wagon or $12k mini-van, the average family doesn't need a slide rule to figure that one out.
We don't have millions of years to press a huge history of plant matter down into a barrel of oil in order to sustain "the wonderful economy" (though I'd argue that the economy can't be altogether too well off over the long haul if it's ignoring issues which involve our very survival while in a feeding frenzy of over consumption and energy utilization -- some day we'll rue how poorly we managed this resource). But we CAN grow alcohol based fuels, and we CAN use these alchohol based fuels in a sustainable manner; the CO2 released from burning alcohol would be absorbed by the next generation of plants being grown.
From a photovoltaic standpoint, since surface area is the limiting issue why not cover a segment of the ocean -- say at the equator -- with solar cells converting ocean water into stored (and transported) hydrogen? Transmitting electricity generated by solar may not make much sense, but hydrogen is an excellent transport mechanism.
It might be convienent for the roadside phones, and electric cattle fences. But then why for houses and walkway lights, calculators?
I saw some 100W units for about $650. I remember seeing some things on flexible sheet style.
Maybe it's not practical for cars, yet.
Fight Spammers!
You are assuming that gasoline engines are high efficency. They are not. Most of the energy is wasted as heat, no? Gasoline engines in hybrids are more efficient because they run at a constant velocity, and are tuned for that speed. (True if the engine is simply charging the battery pack).
You cannot get more energy out than you put in, but the fallacy here is that gasoline engines are more efficient users of fossil fuels than power plants, with their attendant transmission losses. I understand that they are *not*.
If we had not succumbed to hysteria and lawyers, we'd have nuclear power plants charging our cars, and the pollution would have been negligible. Now we are trapped in a coal economy. What a victory for saving the earth.
Gasoline powered transportation is undefendable. We are going to fight more than the First Oil War of '91 in the future. Out future and economic well-being is linked to the most psychotic political climate in the world, and we are shipping our wealth to them daily.
The fuel itself is unstable and explosive; if it did not exist as a fuel souce today, and someone proposed it, it never would be approved.
Electric cars are quiet, and non-polluting *in the area they are driven*, a critical fact if you live in Tokyo or Mexico City or L.A. If they can't do pubtrans, they need to go electric. Population growth will make those cities uninhabitable if they get even more cars.
Either compare two engine's emissions, or compare the entire industry consumption related to the manufacture of the fuel the engines need, but do not compare on one hand the energy cost of an internal combustion engine and on the other hand the entire industry cost of electric motor-based engines.
The calculations done that supposedly demonstrate a five-fold decrease of efficiency in electric motors would turn out very differently had both the electric motor and the engine been compared fairly - that is, compare the power plants, transmission etc. of the electric engine against not only the gasoline engine but also the entire industry that supports it. This includes the gargantuan Alaskan pipeline that consumes massive resources to keep it active, it includes the large refineries that work twenty-four hours a day to provide refined fuel, it includes the massive ships that carry the petroleum across the seas, and it includes the ground transportation of this fuel to consumer-usable sites (ie, gas stations). All of the costs in manufacturing this fuel must be included if it is included with the electric alternative. Although I cannot provide numbers, I would suspect that this comparison would be much less impressive, perhaps even impressive the other way, when the comparison is modified to provide a fair view of both sides of the industry, as well as the engine itself.
Those figures would provide a more accurate view of reality.
A nice side-effect of this approach to low-emission hybrid vehicles is that we get a lot of interaction between the model airplane community and the experimental automotive community which could have some surprising results -- like jet backpacks such as those portrayed in the movie "Rocketeer".
Seastead this.
Like organic farming, 'gasohol' will take up much more farmland than is currently in use, effectively wiping out all natural land that can be farmed. Goodbye, nature preserves. Wetlands will be drained, forests razed. It's even worse than windpower, otherwise known as "avian quisinart".
Where have you been? This has already been done in the US. Gasahol would at least provide a welcome addition to the ag market so that the govt could stop price supports and paying farmers to not grow crops. Also, if birds are that fscking stupid to fly into a windmill, so be it.
I completely agree about nuclear power. It's too bad that that the NRC in the US never standardized civilian nuclear plants like the military and the French have. They would be cheaper and safer.
What about hyrdoelectric power? I would think most people would be for that. Take advantage of the potential energy of the millions of gallons of water flowing out to sea. No hazardous waste and they usually create great recreational areas. Sure, they transform one ecosystem into another, but so what! It's not like the original one has been there forever and will change into something else if geologic history is anything to go by.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Your claims are rife with inaccuracies and misleading statements. Look at just a few of the real doozies.
Modern oil-fired and coal-fired plants are getting 35-40% efficiency ratings. This compares wonderfully with the 25% efficiency of petrol engines or 30% efficiency of diesel engines. Even with ridiculously inefficient transmission, storage, and final conversion, electric cars are still more efficient in terms of quantity of fuel used. An ICE also produces far more toxic emissions due to not having the benefits of high-quality scrubbers and catalytic convertors (though you did comment on the reduced quantity of emissions, you didn't mention that the gasses produced by ICE are thousands of times more toxic to plant and animal life than power plant emissions).
This is just an outright lie. Even factoring in ridiculously high transmission losses from plant to car (say 40%), and even given a highly inefficient electric motor (say 75%), an entirely electrically powered car is still going to be more efficient and result in fewer emissions to the air. The quality of air produced by fossil fuel plants is amazingly good compared to an ICE so there's simply no comparison here.
Solar Power Plants don't ever rely on solar photovoltaic cells or panels. Not only are they far too expensive, the cells "wear out" after only 10 years usage. Modern solar plants use the tried and true heliocentric model. Mirrors or chromed surfaces reflect large areas of sunlight into a single point (either a tower with a collection point at the top, or using new trough technology with a copper pipe running down the centre of the reflective trough). These plants are in operation RIGHT NOW in Australia, and are turning 6c/kWh which is very favourable compared to the 4c/kWh of coal (currently the cheapest source of electricity).
I also see no mention of true, realistic, and even commercially viable zero-emission plants. They do exist but your rant seems to imply every person pushing for zero emissions is living in fantasy land and none of this is possible. Let's take a look at some of the zero emission plants in operation right now.
Hot-rock power is a new finding in a joint Australian-American investigation. You send water pipes 2km into the crust then use the temperature difference between surface and bedrock to drive a steam turbine. Estimates are that a single 2km cube of rock in the Australian desert could power the entire of Australia's power needs. Still in the experimental stage.
Wind power, currently the best bet for future zero-emission plants. Currently pushing 5c/kWh which is better value even than nuclear. It's in the running for beating oil/coal plants in the near future. People are concerned about the ugly nature of wind farms, but these same people never seem to complain about open-cut mines or tailings dams or the unsightly fossil fuel power plants.
Dam power, such as found in the hydro-electric power plants in Australia. Uses the natural water cycle (evaporation, condensation, water flow) to produce vast amounts of power. These plants have no emissions, are very cheap to maintain, and the high construction costs are easily offset by the long running lifetime.
This argument is ridiculous. By the same token nobody should ever have built modems, because at one stage there weren't enough ISPs to dial into. Power plants take a while to build (the typical estimate is 10 years per plant) but electric cars won't magically appear overnight. They'll slowly phase in alongside normal cars and power plants can be built to meet demand. The people who build and run the plants already know how to figure in rising demand: they've been doing it for decades.
I agree electric cars aren't a magical panacea but there's no reason to be a cynic just because they aren't 100% perfect. Electric powered vehicles are an incremental evolutionary improvement. Crying "I won't consider anything that isn't 100% emission free and costs nothing to run and has all the infrastructure already in place" is the attitude the oil barons want you to have.
Hypercars don't solve the basic problems of too many miles driven by too many people in too many cars. Indeed, they may-without good accompanying public policy-worsen these problems by making driving even cheaper and more attractive.
Many of the social costs of driving have less to do with fuel use than with congestion, road-building, lost time, accidents, urban and suburban sprawl, and other side effects of auto dependence. Of those social costs, a sum estimated to be approaching $1 trillion a year-perhaps a seventh of U.S. GNP-is borne by everyone but not reflected in drivers' direct costs. Hypercars would cut those costs perhaps in half, but half of such a big number is still far too big.
It's hardly surprising that doubled U.S. new-car efficiency over the past two decades has been offset by more cars and driving, which also dilute the benefits of cleaner and safer cars. Global car registrations are growing more than twice as fast as population; Hypercars would do nothing about that alarming trend except slightly accelerate it.
Solving transportation problems without creating new ones requires not only having great cars but also being able to leave them at home most of the time. That in turn requires real competition between all modes of access, including public transportation and alternatives to physical mobility (such as telecommunications). And of course the best form of access is already being where you want to be-achievable only through sensible land use.
And if you are even thinking of solar power, don't bother. Solar cells would have to be 25 times as efficient as they exist now.
Why is it that when some says Solar, they are cut off with 'but solar cells..."
Solar cells are simply one way to harness solar power. As far as that goes, I agree, they're not there yet, and probably won't be for a good while.
What's wrong solar powered steam turbines? That approach has the advantage that only the boiler changes, and with clever engineering, can be a dual system with solar by day fossil by night setup. The nice thing is, that the solar part is working during peak demand times.
Solar steam is a nice low-tech solution to power generation. We know how to produce enectricity from steam, and we know how to use sunlight to boil water.
There is a real audio interview with Ed Begley, Jr. over on EVworld and he brings up some things I found to be very interesting.
First, EV is a lot like the early VCRs, CD players etc. Everyone worried "are they going to stick around?" EV is in that stage right now. He pointed out that things like ebike.com are going to help turn consumers onto the idea of plugging in your vehicle when you get it home.
I am preparing to build an electric bike (note this is not going to be electric-assist). There is a cool one here.
Another place to check out is Esarati. They look pretty damn cool.
Feh. Internal combustion engines are much less efficient than power plants, and transmission losses are neglagible.
I agree with many of your comments about battery technology, though, especially wrt cold weather.
Yah like anyone is really stupid enough to return to an 1800's lifestyle. Jeez,
My history book must have been defective. I never read anywhere about people in the 1800's going online to milk the cow or bale hay. The book also failed to mention commuter trains and executives bicycling to work.
In other words, different does not mean regressing to the stone age.
Unless your electric source is from hydroelectric, wind power or solar power (and not that much of the US's electric power does), then an electric car may cause more pollution than a gasoline powered car. Why? If you are burning coal or natural gas to produce electricity, and then you have to transmit that power a long distance (which has a lot of loss), and then you have to store that electricity in batteries (which are inefficient, and cause pollution to make and dispose of), then your net pollution might be higher than just burning gasoline. Nuclear power is cleaner than coal or natural gas (although it still has waste disposal problems), but it is highly unpopular with the type of mindless eco-nuts who are likely to buy an electric vehicle.
I think too many people think that if there isn't smoke coming out of a tailpipe something is clean, and they don't stop to connect smoke coming out of a smokestack at a power plant miles away with the electric vehicle. Its at best just moving the problem somewhere else.
Folks,
If you're talking about very low emission vehicles, they are here NOW.
Ever heard of the Honda Insight and Toyota Prius? They achieve their extremely low emissions because it uses a very small gasoline motor (with closely-coupled emission control system) plus battery power to get the car going. The result is extremely low emissions, qualifying for the California Air Resources Board's standard called Super Low Emissions Vehicle (SULEV).
Nissan has also achieved this with a special version of the current Nissan Sentra, which uses a very tightly-controlled emissions control system to keep emissions to the level defined by the SULEV standard. We do know that Honda and Toyota plan to introduce soon new variants of Civic and Corolla models that also achieve SULEV compliance.
Anyway, a slightly less stringent standard, ULEV, is already achieved by many 2001 model-year automobiles. I believe that the entire 2001 Honda Civic model lineup will be ULEV compliant, and the next-generation Mercedes-Benz C-Class sedans (C240 and C320) will also be ULEV compliant, to show only a few examples.
Besides, it should be noted that the CARB SULEV standard is the basis for the Japanese Stage III and European Euro2004 emissions standards. By 2004, the average automobile rolling off the assembly line in the USA/Canada/Mexico, Europe and Japan will have over 98% less carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, and unburned hydrocarbons than 1970 model-year cars. These three pollutants are the major source of smog from automobiles.
I'm sure you're going to mention the issue of diesel engines, too. But even here, major improvements are on the way. The development of cleaner diesel fuels, improved engine combustion thanks to common-rail fuel systems and direct-injection fuel delivery, and a new generation of particulate traps will dramatically reduce the soot and other emissions that is a big problem with diesel engines.
In short, the technology is essentially available to reduce emissions from gasoline and diesel internal combustion engines by an astonishing 96% or more compared to 1970 levels.
And the improvements already in place today has drastically reduced pollution problems. Los Angeles in 2000 has much less smog alerts than even 10-15 years ago.
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
It is political suicide in today's climate to call for increased taxes on anything, and we've seen the uproar that happens when the price of energy goes up dramatically (gasoline in the midwest and electricty in San Diego). People go nuts. They think the right to drive gas guzzling vehicles is written into the Constitution. Those that drive the gas guzzlers have to accept the fact that our fossil fuel supply is finite, and since we live in a capitalist economy (in the USA) that the price will go up as the supply goes down.
I admit- I have a truck with a gas guzzling V8. I'm willing to pay that premium so that I can use it to haul things far too bulky to put into the sedan. I can afford it right now, someday, I may not be able to. When that day happens, I'll accept the consequences.
Increase taxing!? Support public transportation!? Point the consumers into any direction by governmental incentives!? Shh! Man, be quiet. That's called communism - they don't like it in the US.
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OTTERS RULE.
+1 informative, anyone?
Soccer moms and yuppies are the ones driving the suvs. I find it disgusting that they never go off-road.
.... virtually all of the 'SUV' class these days aren't capable of going offroad. The Range Rover and the Isuzu Trooper are the only two of the class you can claim with a straight face are a good offroad truck. At least, the Trooper is once you toss the pansy bouncy shocks it comes with and put in some Rancho 5000s and ditch it's pussy car tires for something in a steel belted 33". Then you can really tell you're driving a truck!
:)
Ummmm
Of course, I drive up stream beds looking for new launch sites, so my definition of 'capable' is a pretty restrictive one
Why do we have an environmental problem in the first place? Because capitalism requires companies to continuously grow or else die,
*scratches head*
And just how do you reconcile this statement with the real world facts that the worst environmental disaster areas are found in the formerly Communist nations?
Is it me, or is the whole 2-party system just a big "good-cop/bad-cop" scam? :^P
Well, it's not you.
However, it's more along the lines of Pepsi and Coke competing with each other only secondarily to their more important goal of keeping any third parties out of their common market than it is the conspiracy theory that you imply.
Republicans and Democrats don't have to be controlled by the same people for them to all come to the conclusion that switching power between themselves every few years is much better than having to compete against genuine alternatives...
First off, I was trying to make a point that we should not be looking into 100% electric vehicles until both the technology and infrastructure exist! I am NOT saying we should not be looking into them period, just that people should get off the ignorance game.
Secondly, I stand by my "5 times" statement on electric power that is generated by fossil fuel power plants for 100% electric vehicles. Until the majority of America's power either comes from non-fossil fuel sources, or the vehicles themselves are not just stored electric vehicles (i.e. fuel cells instead of batteries), it holds true! It's one of those "trees make smog" type of deals that people like to play "politically correct" on where the base problem is humanity and you can't do anything to stop (besides getting rid of humanity ;-).
100% electric is a pipe dream until we can come up with an infructure that at least:
Some of it will come from the "'PC' Renewable Energies", but figure less than 25% total, period. I guess it is my bias, but I believe fusion power plants are the best chance and could be a reality in 25-50 years *IF* proper funding is re-implanted into the various research programs. It is too bad the world has been turned off of nuclear fusion, largely from the irresponsibility of various members of our science community (on both sides of the cold fusion argument -- never seen so many closed minds on both sides). While cold fusion may or may not be a reality -- in fact, I think it will not be, at least in my lifetime -- but I think traditional, high-temperature nuclear fusion *IS*!
For now, hybrid (petroleum and electrical return) and, soon, alternate fossil (CNG) and electric (hydrogen) fuels and fuel cells are our best chance. I sick of people blindly stating electric cars and zero emissions without knowing jack!
As far as solar, it's a mixed bag. Solar is expensive, period, and does not produce much. Some new solar technology is on the horizon, but it is rediculously expensive and the actual results are not concrete yet. It holds promise, but don't invent a reality that does not exist yet, let alone we don't know if it will be cost-effective (time will tell).
Wind is looking better and better. I have no problem with eyesores and someone brought up that point (I cannot believe people would argue against them because they are eyesores!). But that's an infrastructure that is a whole new bag.
Water is not an option to power the entire nation. There just aren't enough rivers and damns that can be built to power even 1/10th of the US. It is also questionable how long it takes to get a return on the initial investment which is extremely large in the case of hydropower.
Again, I'm just an engineer. That means I'm a scientist and a businessman. I'm not going to say things that are PC, just reality today. I hope for the best in the future but clinging to alternate realities or lying to yourself as you see fit are NOT 2 ways to get there!
-- Bryan "TheBS" Smith
-- Bryan "TheBS" Smith
Independent Author, Consultant and Trainer
However, I still don't believe that electric vehicles are likely to take off, and there are far easier ways to reduce greenhouse emissions.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Electric motors 90% efficient?
I can't speak for the power plants, but as an electronics designer for an industrial motor controller company, I can tell you with absolute certainty that your standard "squirrel-cage" induction motor is at least 90% efficient, and those are the OLD designs.
These days people (Weg in particular) are pushing what they call "Premium efficiency" motors, which are between 96% and 99% efficient. They're great because they're so efficient, but they also draw 18-26 times their nameplate current during the first half cycle starting up across the line, which tends to piss off the breakers, fusing and switchgear. i.e. if you've got a 500HP motor, that's roughly 500A full load (at 575V here in Canada), but if you throw the switch on it you will see a 9000 to 13000A spike in the first half-cycle due to the highly efficient design.
I'm starting to get offtopic here but I just wanted to point out that that efficiency figure for the electric motors (at least refering to squirrel-cage AC induction motors, which is what you'd want in an electric vehicle) is low if anything.
Unfortunately, for me, it is not quite zero emmissions, what with the beans and broccoli in the diet.
Of course, the occasional 'wind-assist' helps.
MrCreosote Meow!Thump!Meow!Thump!Meow!Thump! "You're right! There isn't enough room to swing a cat in here!"
One big problem with Hydro seems to have been overlooked here. It is *extremely* finite. It requires a fairly large volume of water with a very significant drop to produce power effectively. Why do you think the lower Mississippi has never been dammed? While the volume is there, getting a 30+ foot drop in the river would require backing it up into a lake 50 miles or more, flooding untold millions of acres of land (arable land in most cases, too).
The truth is - most rivers that would work for Hydro are already being used. The figures have doubtless changed with newer technologies, but I read ~10-15 years ago that Hydro was effectively 100% saturated in the U.S.
With that said, I think time will take care of the power-generation problem. Solar is making steps toward viability, as is wind (but keep in mind both are geographically sensitive - Quebec is a bad choice for solar) And there are other things on the horizon that might work out (Farnsworth Fusor is interesting).
We have made huge advances in the last 10 years in reducing the damage we're doing - another 20 and I think we'll have a reversal in progress...
Sure, carbon dioxide isn't good for the environment. Nitrogen oxide isn't good. Hydrocarbons aren't good. But none of those is anywhere as bad as the lead and other heavy metals used in batteries. If you have a car filled with batteries, there is going to be leakage, and the batteries have to be created and recycled often, and these processes aren't great for the environment either. The emissions from electric cars are small, but particularly potent.
Electrical power has great potential, but not with conventional batteries. And I haven't heard anything at all hopeful in the way of nonconventional batteries -- perhaps, in an indirect way, hydrogen power could qualify (hydrogen being created with electricity, then being used to power vehicles).
My own preference, though, is Personal Rapid Transit -- i.e, small, automated, elevated rail cars, powered off the rail.
I think a lot of the emphasis on electrical cars is because the auto industry doesn't want things to change much. Electric cars are unlikely to be economical or effective anytime soon -- all current examples are heavily subsidized -- and even if they do, the basic economics are largely like current cars. Innovative public transit is a much better solution. Buses suck, will always suck, and are no solution at all. Subways have potential in some areas, but most development has been car-based so they won't work everywhere.
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Your figures for electric motors (90%) and combustion engines (19%) are 100% in agreement with the textbook I've got here. But the 70-80% power plant efficiency seems way off.
Old style oil fired plants never exceeded 40% efficiency. This textbook talks about a modern (fairly revolutionary) design by Siemens that gets 65% efficiency.
Power plants are still 2 to 3 times better than small "personal" engines, but they're not 4 to 5 times better as you're suggesting here.
I agree that hybrid engines seem to be the next best evolutionary step. They require very little change to the infrastructure (you can still "fill it up") while almost doubling efficiency and halving the emissions. The fully electric car seems to have captured the public's attention though.
Nuclear power is unfortunately expensive. It looks damn cheap on paper (1c/kWh vs coal at 4c/kWh) and this encourages people to develop nuclear plants. Also the waste products from nuclear, though extremely toxic, are in such small quantities that it's like 0% emmissions when compared to coal or oil.
But the cost of disposal, due mostly to govt regulations and whining greenies, drives the actual cost of nuclear power up to 7c/kWh, or depending on the country even higher. So it's nearly double the cost of coal power, and it receives so much negative public attention that nuclear fission power is simply not feasible anyway. Nobody wants a nuclear power plant in Australia at all, despite the vast amounts of barren useless land Australia has to offer.
I'm personally peeved at greenies for being anti-nuclear. Sure, they can be catastrophic, so when they do pollute they do it in a big way. But compared to the destruction of the environment due to oil/coal, nuclear is nothing. Millions of acres of land are destroyed for coal mines alone but nuke out a few thousand acres of land in the middle of the poverty stricken former USSR and suddenly nuclear power is off limits. It seems to me sometimes people can't see the alternatives to nuclear power are far worse. It's not like anyone builds those dangerous carbon core style reactors anymore. The modern nuclear reactor is far safer.
But even given that, nuclear is not cheap. You're better off with wind power. There's nothing wrong with fois de gras anyway.
I don't know about you, but I'd take a Hybrid-Electric HMMWV. Both designs even perform much better than their diesel only powered originals.
"The Hybrid Electric Powered High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV) developed by PEI Electronics, Inc. (PEI), Power Management Division is making the cross-country endurance trip as part of extensive testing of this vehicle?s new advanced hybrid-electric power train.
The utility model being used for the cross-country tour is a modified version of the more powerful tactical HMMWV developed for the military, which is also powered by a Unique Mobility hybrid electric propulsion system. The utility model utilizes a small 1.9-liter diesel-fueled engine and Unique Mobility?s permanent magnet generator to produce 55 kilowatts of electrical power to maintain the long-term operation of the vehicle. Two 100 kilowatt (125 horsepower) permanent magnet motors developed by Unique Mobility, one for each axle, power the vehicle. The vehicle with its 3,000-pound payload accelerates from 0 m.p.h. to 50 m.p.h. in only 10 seconds - nearly one-half that of a standard HMMWV. An operating range of up to 375 miles is possible with a smaller than normal tank of diesel fuel. The vehicle?s increased fuel economy of up to 16 miles per gallon is twice that of the standard HMMWV."
If they can make a Hummer perform better on less fuel, I bet they can also do it to the average car.
At this point I'm seeing the potential to take a 550 Spyder kit car and make it Hybrid-Electic while still having a great performer.
Carbon ends up in any of the 1000+ organic compounds that come out the tailpipe. It is mostly the ones that kill us directly or indirectly that people worry about.
A diesel engine emits less CO2 than an equivalent powered spark engine because it has a higher thermal efficiency and thus uses less fuel to do the same work. Quite simply, if less carbon goes in, less carbon comes out.
A diesel engine produces substantially less CO because it such an engine always runs lean. For a rough comparison, a gasoline car without a catalyst emits about 30 times the CO as a diesel engine, and a gasoline engine with a three-way catalyst emits about twice as much CO. (From a 1993 report by the UK Department of the Environment titled "Diesel Vehicle Emissions and Urban Air Quality".) And remember, for the first 3 or 5 miles of driving, the catalyst in a gas car is largely ineffective! For those short trips to the store, a diesel engine is much cleaner than a gas engine.The emissions challenges for diesel engines are particulates and NOx. While a diesel naturally has lower NOx emissions than a gasoline engine, the catalysts used to reduce NOx on the gasoline engine do not work with the makeup of diesel exhaust so NOx emissions often end up higher than a catalyst equipped gas engine.
A fair amount of carbon ends up as particulate emissions--soot. This is suspected to be carcinogenic in sufficient doses but the jury is still out on how much is a problem. One study estimated the health impact of one cigarette to be roughly equivalent to six to ten years of inhaling typical concentrations of diesel particulate matter. (Apologies for not having the citation handy, but I can dig it up if anyone is interested.) Also, particulats are heavy and don't accumulate in the atmosphere like the smog producing emissions do.
But even if the health effects are small, the soot is still dirty which is an aesthetic problematic in urban environments. Aside from more careful control of the combustion process, efforts to minimize particulat emissions revolve around particulate trap oxidizers. In the early days, these didn't work very well and got a bad rap but in recent years the technology has improved substantially.
If you do the numbers, you will find that the power plant emissions attributable to each mile of EV driving are about 3% of those of conventional internal combustion engine cars. The actual percentages depend on the pollutant in question. See the detailed analysis of this exact issue on my website.
You then proceed to list all the conversion steps in the electric vehicle fuel cycle, claiming that because there are more steps, EVs are necessarily less efficient. You should know that it's not the number of steps, but the product of the efficiencies at each step.
If you do the numbers, you'll find that current production EVs are typically at least twice as efficient, in primary energy consumed per mile, as conventional ICE cars. Modern combined-cycle gas turbine generating plants can exceed 50% efficiency, vs perhaps 20% peak for an ICE. The power grid is typically 95% efficient (that's the figure for SDG&E). The charger & battery are typically 70-80% efficient, though this depends on the technology. The inverter and motor are usually well over 90% efficient.
To be more specific, the measured AC consumption for the PbA version of the 1997 EV1 is 248 Wh/mile. It's 373 Wh/mile for the 1999 NiMH version, mainly because of the battery pack cooling required in warm weather. There is definite room for improvement here, btw.
Then there's the fact that EVs are the only practical way to use certain primary energy sources, such as hydro, solar, wind, geothermal and nuclear -- all sources that pollute far less than fossil fuels.
Southern California Edison has calculated that California could easily support several million EVs with existing plants and transmission lines -- despite our well-publicized shortages -- as long as they're charged at night. Right now, as my EV1 is charging in my garage shortly past midnight PDT, the load on the California ISO-controlled grid is 23067 MW. The load at which they start to have trouble is around 40000MW. That's a lot of slack for nighttime EV charging.
No production EV I know of uses NiCd batteries. They all use lead-acid, nickel metal-hydride or lithium ion. There's a well-established recycling infrastructure for lead-acid batteries, and nickel is also far too valuable to just throw away.
Several people I know regularly drive their EV1s on cross-country trips. The first went from LA to Troy, Michigan. Another went from LA to Florida. Yes, it takes them a lot longer than in an ordinary car. They do it for fun. They spent some time arranging for 240V outlets to be available, but it was possible.
That said, no one really argues that EVs can now replace every ICE vehicle application. But they don't have to! The vast majority of daily commuting is well within the range capability of existing EVs, so if we reserved ICE vehicles for when they were really needed we could cut total vehicle emissions enormously.
My EV1 is my only car. Most of my trips out of town are by air, and my EV1 gets me to the airport quite easily. On the very rare occasion I/we need to take a road trip that exceeds its capabilities, I either take my fiancee's car, or we rent an ICE. This happens very, very rarely. Maybe once or twice a year.
My EV1 does 0 to 60 in less than 8 seconds. Does that count as "barely move themselves"? That said, see the previous paragraph about it not being necessary to replace every ICE, only most of them. If I ever need to tow a boat, I'll rent a SUV with a big engine -- something I hardly need to commute to work every day.
I recharge every night in my garage. Takes me 10 seconds to plug in the paddle, and it's full by morning. Second nature, I have yet to forget.
My EV1 actually has a pretty good heat pump, augmented with an electric heating element. Works great in both heating and cooling modes, but then again I do live in San Diego.
NiMH batteries actually work pretty well in cold weather.
This is, in my opinion, the one valid concern about the present generation of EVs. The standard 6kW charger for the EV1 gives you about 25-30 miles of range for every hour of charge. On days when my total driving is less than a full charge (which is almost always true), charging occurs at night when I sleep, so as long as it's done by morning it doesn't matter how long it takes.
That said, I do believe we need high power public charging stations for those occasions when you need to drive more than a single charge will take you in a single day, and you don't have the time to spend at one of the public 6kW charging stations. GM is supposedly testing a 50kW charger now on a fleet of electric S-10 pickups. I'd very much like to see it publicly available.
Any car made by hand in batches of 500 (like the EV1) is bound to be expensive. They'd get much cheaper in volume production, but even if they remain more expensive than comparable ICE cars you have to trade that off against significantly lower operating and energy costs.
See my EV web page for another side to the story.
There's no question that we'll all be driving EVs some day. The only question is when -- before or after the oil runs dry, or before people are born and live their whole lives in LA without ever having seen the mountains.
Phil Karn
OK, so storing one thousand barrels of nuclear waste in your backyard is bad. I agree.
The alternative is to store millions of barrels of sulfuric acid enriched waste from coal and oil plants. That combined with millions of tonnes of ash belched into the air. And the lakes used for cooling heated up by 10s of kelvin, causing environmental damage by killing algae and fish and plant life.
Nuclear waste is bad. No dispute. But people don't realise how bad the fossil fuel pollutants are. I think people should go see a tailings dam, see the dead stunted trees as far as the eye can see, smell the terrible stench of sulfur, and see the dying sick animals that have unluckily wandered into the area.
And even given how bad the power plants are, they are positively sparkling clean when compared to the pollutants produced by your SUV or sports car. Not an individual effort of course, but as combined across the entire country. The power plant is incredibly clean when compared to the millions upon millions of cars, each belching their own toxic mix of monoxides, lead laden gasses, and various nth-ene pollutants. These chemicals are already known to be linked to brain damage in newborns, cancer in adults, and respiratory or lung damage for everyone.
Oil and coal are disgusting fuel sources. Any of the alternatives, even nuclear power, would be preferable.
One reason why the rest of the USA can't really get to SULEV is the fact that in most of the USA, gasoline and diesel fuel have a very high level of sulfur compounds (usually 800 parts per billion or more).
The CARB standard for these fuels are 80 parts per billion; if the entire USA were to go to this standard (and the EPA does plan to do this within the next 24 months), this opens up new possibilities for cars sold in the USA.
For one thing, direct-injection gasoline engines will become viable for the US market for the first time. Instead of injecting fuel into each cylinder's intake manifold pipe just before the air fuel mixture enters the combustion chamber, direct-injection engine inject the fuel right into the combustion chamber itself. The problem is that high levels of sulfur compounds common in US gasoline stocks will corrode such a fuel injector; that's why direct-injection engines are only sold in Japan and some countries in Europe, where sulfur compounds in gasoline is under 300 parts per billion. The same situation applies for diesel fuel, also.
Once the US goes to the 80 parts/billion standard for sulfur compounds, most cars should be able to meet at least ULEV standards; many cars will meet or exceed the SULEV standard with no problems.
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
lobos,
The reason why we can't get the BMW 330d or the new 2001 Mercedes-Benz C270 is the fact that diesel fuel sold in the USA has way too much sulfur compounds in the fuel (somewhere between 800-1200 parts per billion). Unfortunately, the high level of sulfur compounds can corrode the fuel delivery system on modern diesel engines sold in Europe.
However, this is changing. The EPA will soon require that diesel fuel have sulfur compounds no more than 80 parts per billion, which will allow these high-tech diesel engines to show up in the US market. I think the BMW 330d will be particularly popular, since when driven at normal freeway speeds (e.g. 55-75 mph) fuel mileage of 35-40 miles per US gallon is the norm. But the BMW 330d has such a fat torque curve down low that the car has a top speed of 143 mph (!) and accelerates just as fast as the 330i with its gasoline-fuelled engine.
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
I keep reading this type of comment about the toxins that are created in making solar panels. This is true - like creating anything you are going to have crap left over that you don't want. This is the same thing that the gasoline companies are using to combat the rise of the EV.
But it is one hell of a lot easier to control the pollution at one source than it is to control the pollution at millions of sources.
I really wish people would quit falling for the crap the oil companies are spouting. We can all see through the MS fud with no problem, why can't we see through other fud?
True. And when he's elected, we know the next 4 to 8 years of the USA's transportation will be heavy on petroleum. That's what happens when TWO Texas oilmen move into the White House (and the little gray house down the street, technically).
A bit of history: when Jimmy Carter was elected, he walked from the Capitol to the White House rather than take a limo. Shortly after moving in, he installed solar panels on the roof. He was THE Environmental President (and sucked at most other parts of the job). When Reagan moved in 4 years later, he tore the solar panels down, both symbolically and literally. Clinton was too much of a waffle wimp to try putting them back.
What does the future hold for alternative power (along with Microsoft, spotted owls, the obscenely wealthy, gays, and various others)? We'll find out in November.Why store it? All that nuclear waste is recycleable, with a by product of more energy then was gain from the initial fusion. (I don't know where the end of the line is on recycling, but nearly all the waste they want to store is easially recyclable)
Too bad the greenies are even more against recycling the waste then they are against nuclear power. (Okay, there is the problem that an insecure plant could allow a terriorist to create a bomb, but just mandate enough redundant security measures and then check them. Physical security is hard, but we understand it)
Unfortunately one of the failings of slashdot (and the government) is that simplicity is moderated down. I think the question that most people are answering here is something like:
What big-government, over-engineered, deadly, polluting, land-wasting, oversubsidized mess can a bunch of technology-obsessed gadget freaks create to soak up tax money for the next 50 years?
Look up the "electric vehicle tax credit" to get an idea. ZEV's only count if they're not bicycles.
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
You eco-whackos must really hate guys like me. I drive an SUV with a V6 engine and a sports car with a V8. If I nail the gas pedal I can almost watch the the needle fall on the fuel guage.
At what point do you deem that the "greater good" outweighs the rights of the individual person? Will you support a tax on fatty foods in order to bring down health care insurance costs?
How about we force people to wear body armor, helmets, and knee pads to leave their house, accidental injuries and deaths would drop substantially.
How far is too far?
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
"I don't want to ruin the environment, but if it comes down to choosing between the environment and impressing chicks, I gotta go with the chicks.
How about the fact that some of us happen to weigh 200 pounds or more. I weigh 210 pounds or so, if I'm in a car with a friend who happens to be in the same weight class as me, I want to be able to get off of the entrance ramp and ONTO the freeway before that 18 wheeler turns us into pudding.
How about when I need to pickup or deliver 4-8 computers as a part of my job? Vehicles with ROOM inside of them are nice.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Needless to say, it didn't work. I was saying so ten years ago, and now I get to say "I told ya so."
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Does it say anything about the efficiency of natural-gas power plants? I was under the impression that it is fairly simple to extract every bit of usable heat energy out of large amounts of natural gas, at high efficiencies. And the US has quite abundant sources of natural gas (at least for the forseeable future.)
If you could get people to wait five minutes after getting into their car before they could drive away, then practical low-emmision vehicles would probably already be here.
You are absolutely correct on all of your points - but on the above one, I wonder if you had in mind a Stirling Cycle engine (in addition to electric motors)?
Basically, an SC engine is a pure heat engine - it derives its power from the potential heat difference of two sources (ie, such an engine could run on the temperature difference between room-temperature air and a flame, as easily as between room-temperature air and an ice cube). In the past, SC engines haven't been very powerful or cheap to manufacture.
However, in recent times, they have - for use in quiet electric generators, for the most part. One of the other interesting things about an SC engine is the fact that if you turn it, the one side will get hot, and the other cool (think of this thing as a mechanical peltier device). In fact, they can get damn cold - for use as in refrigeration applications.
IIRC, one of the big three managed to make a drivable vehicle back in 50's or 60's that ran great, got excellent "gas" milage, acheived freeway speed - however, one had to wait 5-10 minutes for the engine to begin working after the key was turned "on".
SC engines are amazing devices that have been around for a long time. They are also extremely easy to build (generally the working fluid is helium, but it is possible to build one that uses ordinary air as the working medium)...
I support the EFF - do you?
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
Not anymore, to be sure...
Yesterday I was behind a Peterbuilt tractor (no trailer), and I was suprised by it's "get-up-and-go". Maybe the driver was an expert at the gears or something, but normally it sucks to be behind a rig. After this guy got to about fourth or fifth gear (hard to tell - I couldn't go by exaust - nothing was coming out of the stacks! - all I could tell by was the "lifting" of the frame from the axles), he was cruising!
I support the EFF - do you?
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
I'm afraid that the "zapped city" idea is a hoax, and you bought it.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
[2] That's politics, not engineering. The greenies have as one of their express goals the closure of all nuclear powerplants. They have tried to force this by preventing plants from sending their spent fuel to the US Government for disposal, even though the USG is mandated by law and by contract to take it. Since the USG has welshed on their agreement (prompted by the greenies), the plants have moved some of their cooler fuel from ponds to dry-cask storage. This has really pissed off the greenies: they couldn't shut down the plants directly, they failed to shut them down indirectly, and now they'll have to either come up with a new idea (difficult for brains trained to dogma) or give up.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Your belief is founded on the "miracle carburetor" hoax. That belief is false. When you consider the engine technology of the time (which often included side-valve "L-head" engines, with their huge surface areas and large thermal losses) it is patently obvious that no possible carburetor could have improved the efficiency of the engine to the point where the vehicle could achieve 50 MPG at highway cruising speeds. Carburetors have long been eclipsed by modern fuel injection systems, and those don't break 50 MPG by much even in a Geo Metro.
A carburetor is just a gadget for generating a more or less consistent fuel/air mixture. Unless you are grossly away from stoichiometric or running a really bad imbalance between cylinders, you are not going to lose more than perhaps 10% to 20% from having a bad carburetor versus the best. 20% is nothing to sneeze at, but it won't take a 20 MPG car and make it a 50 MPG car either.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
But you've fallen prey to a hoax:
Energy is conserved. If you are going to convert 60 Hz electricity to RF, you will have losses. If you radiate it around the garage, some of it will leak. Not only will you be paying for more power just to get the same amount to your car, you will be radiating RF around the neighborhood (which may be illegal without the proper transmitting licenses) and subjecting yourself, your family and your neighbors to EMF's much higher than you'd otherwise have (with unknown effects). Plus, it'll probably screw up a fair fraction of the electronic stuff in your house.99% of the Tesla-related stuff on the Net is total bunk. Just remember TANSTAAFL.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
The main advantage of the Stirling engine is that it can operate from anything which can supply heat at the required temperature. This can be a flame, a solar concentrator, or a nuclear reactor. It can also be very smoothly balanced and has no pulsating intake or exhaust, making it very quiet. This makes it great for some applications, but if it was going to beat the Otto or Diesel engine in any major respect you'd be seeing lots of them out there. You don't, which ought to tell you something.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Steam turbines are inefficient in small units and low temperatures.
I'm not talking about small units. I'm talking about full scale power plants. Changes in temperature can be managed with thermal mass and/or by combination of solar and fossil fuel burners. 50% solar beats not solar at all!
In any case, effeciency is not as important for solar power as it is for fossil. After all, requiring twice as much free fuel is still free. In practice, one must consider the costs to maintain and build the plant which is why it is merely less important.
Worst case reliability for a plant that combines solar and fossil fuel is slightly better than for fossil fuel alone.
It seems like a real shame to not utilize the largest working fusion reactor in the solar system.
An SE is an external combustion engine, like a steam engine - however, it works on temperature differentials, not just on heat (ie, put a block of dry ice on the cool side, and leave the hot side at room temperature, and it would still run). Normally, heat is used in such engines, because cold is hard to come by (though I would tend to think such engines would work a bit better on a cold winter day in Maine, heating the hot side with a propane burner or similar).
Also it should be noted that typically (in a well designed SE), the working fluid is sealed in the unit, and never needs replacing. Helium is typically used for efficiency, as well as the fact that it is an inert (and thus, non-corrosive) gas.
You are also correct in stating that the efficiency is limited to how high a differential can be made, and the limits (and cost) for materials to make the engine to acheive this efficiency.
The only other comment I can make is that the quietness of the engine is a good thing in that the quieter it gets, the more efficient it is (because noise = energy waste). I am not saying that diesels or other engines shouldn't be used or investigated, or improved upon - it was just that the original poster's comment prompted me to think of a Stirling cycle engine...
I support the EFF - do you?
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
Strangely enough the text doesn't talk about cost-efficiency ratings for gas powered plants. It has some details on how they work in the technical section, but the cost analysis section concentrates mostly on renewable sources as opposed to nuclear/coal/oil (the most common power plants). The textbook has a very definite bias towards encouraging renewable sources, though it does a fair job of pointing out the flaws in many of the existing renewable sources.
The textbook is also very much an overview rather than a detailed study of the market forces and technical reasons behind real life deployment of power plants. This means the arguments it makes could possibly be flawed because of their simplicity. Coal power plants have one amazing benefit over every other form of power plant: people know how to build them and companies are tooled to produce the necessary parts. One of the highest costs in setting up renewable energy source power plants is the cost of tooling. The book only briefly mentions this but I think it's a very strong argument explaining why dirty coal and oil plants are still so common.
And what makes you think you know what I think, even if I haven't said anything closely resembling what you imply I think?
I assume when you say something, it's along the lines of what you think, and not for the sheer pleasure of flapping your lips.
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.