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More on GM's New Fuel Cell Cars
Whispers_in_the_dark writes "Scientific American has an article about GM's approach to fuel cell based vehicles of the future. It appears that GM wants to build a common fuel cell based drive-by-wire chassis that it will mount the body panels, control systems, and passenger compartments. This would provide a great deal of flexibility and upgradability to the cars of the future. GM has even more details."
This fuel-cell powered car could be part of a distributed power generation network. People drive the car for a commute, then plug in a work or at home, powering the gird. The 'small farm' reference is probably a nod to the need for electricity 'off grid' This vehicle could be part of that solution.
All this assumes that a fuel, Hydrogen or otherwise, is available and , very importantly, inexpensive enough.
But still, it would be cool to have my car keep my house powered during a blackout.
The plan calls for a small variety of frames to be built. Most of the articles have bandied about a small/compact, midsize, and large chassis, on which various body designs can be bolted on. So you'll be able to get a nice big road-hog to pimp around in if you need it, or you can opt for the smaller model.
What I want to know, is how are the chop-shops gonna streeeeetch these things for limos?
Link to GE fuel cells
Don't be so sure. "An electric car can have anywhere from 96V to over 300V of batteries. During cruising, the car will draw up to 200 amps, and up to 400-500 amps for acceleration." Note that in the US power to the home is about 115 VAC and 100-200 Amps. It takes a tremendous amount of power to accellerate and decelerate a car. Granted, a lot of power can be recaptured regeneratively, but cruising and starting power has to come from somewhere. That's an average car. If you design a chassis for small bus/tractor/hay wagon use, you could easily power 8 first-world homes off of it. You could probably power most of a small third-world town with it.
I hear this conspiracy theory alot, but in the real world, how could they prevent a better technology? Do you actually see a law being written that forces you into a gas combustion engine?
Simple. It's called our modern, unfair patent system. Go look at how many alternative energy related patents the oil and big-3 auto companies own.
There are plenty of other transportation technologies where hybrid fuel cells just don't apply, and wont for a long long time (planes, trains, ships, semis, buses). Electric wheels just dont turn as hard as gas-driven ones. (torque)
Buzzzz.. wrong. Electric motors have far more low-end torque than IC engines. That's why hybrids available today use electric for initial acceleration. And ever hear of the diesel-electric locomotive? (the most popular design today) Yep, electric motors. Busses? Already been done. Ships and subs? Yep, also using diesel-electric. (and done so for a very long time.. think WW2). Planes? Currently being researched. So the next step is logically to replace the diesel generators with fuel cells.