General Motor's EV1 Electric Cars Scrapped

jangobongo writes "Yesterday, the last of General Motors EV1 electric cars were transported to their final resting place, the GM Desert Proving Grounds in Arizona, for "final disposition," which for most of them means crushing and recycling. The experimental GM cars were originally leased (starting in 1996) to owners in California and Arizona for three years while GM developed electric battery technology, but the expected breakthrough in battery technology failed to materialize. GM spent more than $1 billion developing and marketing the EV1, but concluded that the electric cars would not be profitable. The EV1 program was ended in 2003. Some of the cars were donated to engineering departments of colleges and universities, while others went to museums, including the Smithsonian Institution. Despite protests and petitions, GM would not sell the last available cars to the public due to the lack of replacement parts for repairs, and because of potential liability claims. It's sad to see this chapter on electric cars close."

Comments

What you don't see can't hurt you?

[daveschroeder]

Yes, it's sad to see a symbolic engineering marvel like the EV1 go, but all this does is shift the pollution elsewhere. Not to mention not being very practical at all.

See here for energy densities of various materials.

Could there be a reason that gasoline is the energy storage mechanism of choice for vehicles?

Why not concentrate on GM's current hybrid timeline, or on vehicles that are actually useful and that normal people might buy, like GM's 2007 GMT-900 platform (Tahoe/Suburban/Yukon/Yukon XL/Escalade) which will have a strong hybrid option, with a standard 5.7L Vortec V8, but with Displacement on Demand, disabling 2 or 4 cylinders as conditions permit, and featuring two 30kW electric motors housed in the standard Hydramatic transmission case that doesn't require major resigns and retooling entire truck production lines for use, but still yielding up to a 40% mileage improvement, instead of making ugly little cars on which it is apparently mandatory to have the rear wheelwells covered like hearses?

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[lachlan76]

Because at some point we WILL run out of oil.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[stupidfoo]

It's very clear that the future of fuel efficient autos are hybrids, not electric only.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[daveschroeder]

Because at some point we WILL run out of oil.

And most of our electricity, of course, doesn't come from fossil fuels.

...

Hey, I'd love to have electric vehicles powered from all-renewable sources. But frankly, nuclear would be the way to go, and no one, except, oh, I don't know, China, seems to want to talk about building new plants that would actually have a hope of satisfying our inevitable, insatiable, and increasing demands for energy.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[mmkkbb]

making ugly little cars on which it is apparently mandatory to have the rear wheelwells covered like hearses?

Honda also makes/made Civic and Accord hybrid, and Toyota's Prius isn't THAT ugly. There is also Toyota's Highlander hybrid which as far as I know looks like a regular Highlander (and may outperform it but that bit was hearsay)

There are hybrid sports cars on the way, too. Looks like Mercedes has hybrid plans. (google it, there are several articles)

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[ArsonSmith]

They need to market Hybrid cars as an added HP bonus, like a turbo or blower, first and as an economy item second.

If car GM put out a ne Corvett with a big 300+HP engine and a 50+HP hybrid electric assist, I think it would show that hybrid tech isn't just some putty little economy item. It'll be later that people notice that the Corvett now gets 25-30MPG rather than 15-20.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[cmowire]

Hey, it'll happen.

Remember, every time you see "hydrogen", it's a code word for "nuclear".

Sure, we may end up switching to hydrogen fuel cells in lots of places. But that's mostly because it's far more efficent than any other storage mechanism for power, even after the losses in electrolysis efficency to convert water to hydrogen and the losses in fuel cell efficency to convert it back to water again.

The thing is, if they said, "We need to research how to create the nuclear economy, for when the oil runs out," they'd get no money. But if they say, "We need to research the hydrogen economy, for when the oil runs out," and then figure that we'll eventually come to terms with there being no good alternatives to nuclear.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[daveschroeder]

Yes, that was just a little jab. My point is that it's time to start making cars that are attractive and appealing to mass markets - especially the highest consuming vehicles - in order to have a real impact, and get people to start changing thinking. Instead of the attitude that many have toward SUVs, why not make SUVs themselves efficient, instead self-righteously passing judgment against them, or making statements along the lines of "well, they don't NEED that vehicle, therefore they shouldn't have it"? Why not note that the new hybrid full size pickup trucks and SUVs are actually MORE powerful and have MORE torque than their gasoline-engine-only counterparts, while STILL saving fuel and polluting less? I mean, shouldn't we try to make things appealing to the largest consumers? People don't buy SUVs because they want to destroy the earth, you know...and I'm not targeting these comments at you, but rather at anyone who might be reading this.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[leonardluen]

it would be far easier to convert 1 power plant to an alternative fuel or source of power than it would be to convert millions of cards.

just because "it only shifts the oil use from the car to the power plant" is not a good arguement against electric cars. because in the future that power plant could be replaced by wind, solar, geothermal power, etc and suddenly overnight millions of cars are running on 100% clean energy.

so you are right, technically electric cars doen't fix the problem, but they potentially make the problem easier to fix.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[wmshub]

Actually, in a way, we won't.

There is tons of oil all over the world. It's just a matter of the cost required to extract it. Right now we're mostly sucking it from big underground pools, where it's cheap to get. But many large rock deposits have oil mixed in, and it is possible to extract the oil - just too expensive. When the cheap oil runs out, we'll still have oil, it will just be at a price that is much higher than we pay today. It may or may not be more expensive than solar or wind power.

In reality, before we totally run out of oil, we will have utterly cooked ourselves to death on global warming. Lucky for the oil companies, ignoring global warming is a lot easier than the problem they would face if we really were running out of oil.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[einTier]

OK, but what are you going to convert it to?

Solar cells take almost as much energy to make as they put out over their lifetime. We've dammed nearly every river that's dammable, and there's considerable ecological cost that comes with that as well. Wind isn't consistent, and the windmills tend to be large, ugly, and kill birds. Hydrogen isn't a fuel source, it's just a fancy battery.

Nuclear fusion isn't viable yet, and as we know, you can't legislate technological advancement. And no environmentalist (who are the ones crying for alternative energy sources) wants to even consider nuclear fission.

So, pray tell, do you plan on generating this "alternate energy"?

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[rainman_bc]

Remember, every time you see "hydrogen", it's a code word for "nuclear". ...being no good alternatives to nuclear.

Truth is, there's many energy sources in this world that are infinite. Solar, Wind, Hydro and Tidal are not going to run out any time soon. True, we can't dam ever river up, and yes, some places aren't conducive to wind or solar energy, and only coastal communities work okay with tidal energy, but truth is, there are alternative electricity sources other than Nuclear, and to suggest otherwise is a straw man.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[La0tsu]

'Instead of the attitude that many have toward SUVs, why not make SUVs themselves efficient, instead self-righteously passing judgment against them, or making statements along the lines of "well, they don't NEED that vehicle, therefore they shouldn't have it"? '

While I agree with what you're saying as a whole, it should be noted that a lot of the dislike people (myself included) have towards SUVs is for reasons other than fuel economy. For example:

1) If you get hit by one, you are much more likely to get seriously hurt or killed than if you are hit by a sedan.

2) They take up a lot more parking space, which leads to frustration of those boxed in.

3) On the road, they are extremely hard to see through, over, or around. This diminishes the safety of those around SUVs.

4) Many drivers of SUVs feel empowered to a point that is not safe, eg speeding during snowy conditions, making unsafe passes, etc. They fail to realize than four-wheel drive doesn't do any good if none of the four wheels has traction.

But overall, I think you make a very good point about marketing environmentalism (something many environmentalists don't get).

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Desert Raven]

Most people do not need a V8. Indeed, such engines should only be permitted to people that have just cause.

Most people do not need gighertz-class computers, indeed, such computers should only be permitted to people that have just cause.

Most people do not need to criticise the government, indeed, such privilege should only be permitted to people the government decides have just cause.

So, who do you want to make that decision then...?

I didn't put my ass on the line both in a war and on the streets just so some "holier-than-though" person could tell me which freedoms I can and cannot have. Yup, people do a lot of things I don't agree with, but that's a price I will willingly pay so I can do things that *they* don't agree with.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[illusioned]

Then maybe what we need to do is stop giving up on everything and finally start innovating so they don't cost so much to produce and put out more electricity. We do it with gas (and just about everything else that doesn't have an "easy fix") don't we?

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[sxmjmae]

In Oil and Coal burning we know the effects on the environment are 100% bad. People get cancers and die from the pollution.

In a nuclear planet it may have a problem and then you might die. The pollution can be controlled.

In one case you KNOW that lots of people will get sick and DIE from the pollution. In the case of nuclear the pollutants can be contained and stored and in an accident you might get sick and die.

The difference is that in one you have near 100% chance of killing people (oil and coal burning) and much lower chance in the other (nuclear power).

You get the point??? If you burn oil and coal you know you are going to kill someone via the cancers caused by the pollution. If you safely use nuclear energy you may never hurt anyone via pollution.

Most importantly with nuclear you can control your own energy and not rely upon another country. What would happen if the country you relied upon committed acts of terrorism or was a cruel to its population? Spend $350 billion to stabilize a foreign government so they can continue selling you their oil?

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[amliebsch]

Fields of panels to create the electricity necessary to split the water. 24/7, all around the world,

As a practical exercise, why don't you go ahead and calculate just how much land that would require, and you might see why this is silly.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Qzukk]

The interesting thing is that there is (kind of) an alternative to nuclear for generating hydrogen from water.

Aluminum + Water + mercury = Aluminum Oxide + Hydrogen + mercury (take a look at the other reactions on there as well. There are some that don't use dangerous stuff like mercury as a catalyst, though you can do it slower without the mercury.)

The best part? Aluminum Oxide can be recycled straight into the middle of the smelting process (aluminum is extracted from bauxite ore as aluminum hydroxide, which is then converted to aluminum oxide, which is then converted to aluminum.

Of course, it might play havoc with the market for used aluminum cans, but I can just drop the soda cans into my engine ;) (ok, not quite ;) And you still need power to convert aluminum oxide to aluminum, however that means you can set up nuclear power plants in a few key distribution centers, and ship aluminum out to everyone else for local energy generation, vehicle propulsion, etc.

Not sure what the energy density and efficiency for this process is though. Could be that you'd need 1 ton of aluminum to generate enough hydrogen to generate enough energy to propel a 1 ton car ;)

Transport solutions like this solve another problem as well: Hydrogen seepage. Hydrogen can't easily be stored for long periods of time as it seeps through cracks just larger than its own atom, and sealing these cracks is very difficult.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Retric]

Solar cells work they produce way more energy over their lifetime than it takes to make them. But there are other methods of generating energy from solar power that are much cheaper. One simple method is to use a solar collector to heat water then either use that water directly to say heat a house or use it to generate electricity. Another is to have a tracking solar collector to magnify the amount of light hitting your solar cell thus giving you 10x the energy from that solar cell over it's life time with the cost of some cheep plastic lenses.

As to fusion it's really only 30-50 billion$ away from production use. We are just not putting that much money into research. In 2000 there was a plan to create a 1500MW fusion power plant by 2020 but it was scraped to cost's. We could easily make a fusion power plant the only real problem is lack of funding. It would take about 5 billion a year for 20 years, which is really a tiny fraction of our GDP, but hey 20 years is way to long for most people to think about.

PS: There is still some hope on this one look into ITER which is one of those you want one in Japan and you want one if France... I say fine let's build two and stop #^$&ing around.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[truthsearch]

Solar, wind, hydro, and tidal are not viable options for complete replacement of oil. Do the math like they have here. Do you want to see windmills taking up entire states' full of land and killing millions of birds a year? Or how about solar panels on the roof of every building but still nowhere near enough for the whole electric grid. Let's throw in hydro and tidal and devastate more ecology. Why not try everything without knowing the full consequences of our actions?

Extreme environmentalists cry for all this stuff without thinking enough about it. Every "environmental" source such as these actually hurt the environment while not even solving the problem. The only reasons nuclear is frowned upon are political. Nuclear plants can be made extremely safe and far from most civilization. Fix political problems like what to do with spent cells. Don't waste effort on things that won't completely eliminate the need for oil.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[truthsearch]

IIRC the largest oil deposit known on earth is in Canada. Problem is it's basically blended in with sand and it's much more expensive to extract.

And the best part is it's a much easier place for the US to invade. *ducking*

Sarcasm kids, just sarcasm.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[uncqual]

Good? Here in BC we get 90% of our power from Hydro; a clean, infinitely renewable resouce.

Maybe America just needs to catch up

First, one needs geographic and weather patterns to support hydro - my guess that that per capita, BC has more suitable hydro locations than the U.S. does.

Second, one needs to be able to convince people to destroy ecosystems and endangered species to build dams. I don't know much about BC politics but it sounds like there must be less sensitivity to ecosystem and endangered species in BC than in the U.S. Indeed, in the U.S., there are calls to remove dams to restore ecocsystems.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[jnaujok]

Hydro; a clean, infinitely renewable resouce.

Sorry, but hydro is not "infinitely renewable" as it is really just an expression of solar energy. Riverbeds move, climate changes, and reservoirs fill with sediment. Second, we have already dammed something like 50% of all the available waterways for power to produce something like 7% of all the needed energy on the planet. What are we going to do to get to 100%? Additionally, damming rivers is devastating to the downstream environment. 200 years ago the Colorado River drained into the sea of Baja, now it just dries up somewhere in Arizona...

And finally, hydro power is not clean! Several studies have shown that the average hydro plant produces more environmental destruction and greenhouse gasses than a similar (in power production) coal plant. So your "clean" energy source is worse for the environment than a filth-belching coal plant. Congratulations.

Me, I'd rather have a nuke plant...

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[flyingsquid]

SO you are taking energy out of the wind.......and what happens to the winds?

We use the power generated to drive HUMONGOUS fans to blow air and keep the wind going. Problem solved!

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Auckerman]

Judging from your reply, I don't think you fully understand. Today, a known amount of energy from the Sun will arrive at earth. This energy current powers wind, tides, and the weather. You start using that energy on a large scale, there WILL be changes in weather. That simple. Solar is a great idea, , but it's not going to meet the needs of an advanced industrial society without accepting that there will be changes to weather patterns.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[njh]

Why are you maliciously spreading lies, or are you just stupid?

"Studies have shown that, depending on the type of PV technology, the clean energy payback of a PV system ranges from one to four years. With life expectancies of 30 years, 87% to 97% of the energy produced by PV systems will be free of pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. For more information, see the NREL report, "Energy Payback: Clean Energy from PV""

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[dabigpaybackski]

While it is true that the old, rapidly spinning windmills kill a lot of birds, the newer large and slow-moving wind turbines are easily avoided by our avian friends. Costs keep coming down with new technology and larger production runs of specific designs. Wind power is getting considerably cheaper. Nuclear could be, but we need to scrap the antiquated light-water designs were using in favor of simpler ones like the sodium-cooled fast breeders, or the gas-cooled ones the Chinese are building.

I like the Integral Fast Breeder design, which could be the closest we get to safe, unlimited, and abundant energy for a long time. But it needs to be demonstrated in well-publicized tests and aggressively marketed to a public that is ignorant of physics. Then it needs to be mass-produced to make it cheap.

But before any of this happens, it has to get funding. The IFBR got the last of it's funding pulled in 1996, even though there was an example operating in Idaho.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[rainman_bc]

You start using that energy on a large scale, there WILL be changes in weather

As opposed to the change in the weather that isn't caused by fossil fuels?

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[John Courtland]

LS1's are pretty damn efficient and Corvettes are pretty damn light. With a bit of modification you can hit 28+ crusing. Not too shabby for a sports car.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Draveed]

Well it's not entirely true you'll have total control of your own energy. You'll still need to mine uranium for nuclear fuel. Uranium mines aren't present in every country on earth.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[jcochran]

Yes. Let's do a bit of back of the envelope calculations.

According to the CIA World Factbook the United States generated 3.6 trillion kilowatt hours of electricity in 2001 (I will ignore the power in the gasoline that was burned in cars, the oil used to heat homes and businesses, etc. Those items will increase the power requirement. These calculations are just what's required to replace the electric generation capability with solar).

Now at the equator, the solar intensity is about 1 kilowatt per square meter. If I assume that the 3.6 trillion kilowatt hours is evenly consumed over the year, this means that every day. 10 billion kilowatt hours is consumed. Assuming that the collectors work for an average of 12 hours per day (I'm being generious) That means that each square meter of collection area captures 12 kilowatt hours of power per day. This requires 833 million square meters of collection area. Oh did I mention that this 833 million square meters is with an assumed efficiency of 100%? What? You don't have a 100% efficient method of collecting solar power? No problem, just use more area. The most efficient solar cell that I can find runs at about 17% Most likely, you'll find something in the 6% to 10% range. But I'll use the 17% cells. That means that I need 5 billion square meters of collection area. Mind you, this is assuming an average of 12 hours per day every day. (Clouds not permitted). And assuming that the collection area is near the equator. There is NO excess capacity to deal with peak loads and NO storage capacity to deal with cloudy days. Now how big is 5 billion square meters? That would be 5000 square kilometers. How big is 5000 square kilometers? For reference, Delaware is about 5160 square kilometers in size. Just about right for the minimum required area.

But wait, there's more!

You need to add in a factor to deal with peak loads and cloudy/rainy days. A factor of 4 is typical industry standard, so you just have to pave over an area slightly greater than New Jersey (try filling out the environmental impact statement for that!).

Also, remember that the above calculations are just for replacing the electric generation capacity for the power used in the United States for the year 2001. If you intend on also replacing the power used in the form of gasoline and heating oil as well as the power used in the rest of the world, please multiply the required area by the appropiate factors.

Have a good day.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[amliebsch]

Well, let's see. 2002 fossil fuel energy consumption appears to be 56.915 quadrillion BTU's.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb0102.html

That's about 6.00485039 × 10^19 Joules. Let's be generous and assume a very high 5 kw-Hr/m^2 solar intensity over our land mass, and a very generous collection/Hydrogen conversion efficiency of 20%, in effect yielding 1 kw-Hr/m^2 in hydrogen. 1 kilowatt hour = 3 600 000 Joules, and we need to produce 6.00485039 × 10^19 Joules, so that works out to be 1.668014 × 10^13 kilowatt hours that we need to produce in a year. A production rate of 1 kw-hr/day = 365.25 kw-hr/year, so we need 4.56990137 × 10^10 m^2 to generate the same number of kw-hrs in the same year, or 17,644.4878 square miles. Delaware is 2,489 square miles. Now, Arizona is the sixth largest state, so it looks like this facility could still rest entirely in its borders. But I think you can see why this is not an even remotely cost-effective solution.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[d34thm0nk3y]

And finally, hydro power is not clean! Several studies have shown that the average hydro plant produces more environmental destruction and greenhouse gasses than a similar (in power production) coal plant.

Except that when burning fossil fuels it is releasing carbon that has been buried in the ground for millenia whereas rotting plants are releasing carbon that was already up here.

So your "clean" energy source is worse for the environment than a filth-belching coal plant. Congratulations.

Except without the radiation and other fun stuff in coal smoke

Of course, hydro needs to be planned to minimize impact like everything else.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Damvan]

So, because these technologies (solar and wind), implemented on a extrememely large scale, might have impacts on weather patterns, we should ignore them completely, or not implement them on a smaller scale?

And you can't tell me that the fact that my roof is covered in solar panels (it is) will have a bigger impact on the weather / environment than the asphalt shingle roof the panels cover?

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Peter777]

I watched a documentary about the damming of a river in the amazon. No tree felling, animal rescue or anything. There were just a bunch of environmentalists going around in boats to save what primates and other assorted creatures they could from the above-water treetops. It was a long time ago, and late at night, so the details are a bit fuzzy.

The commentator was going on about how the trees would rot, acidify the water, release methane and corrode the turbines, thus shortening the lifespan of the dam. There was also a bit about how the siltation rate was 10X or so what had been anticipated, which was going to render the reservoir useless in 20-50 years IIRC. Sorry for being vague.

Here in Scotland, there's generally negligable siltation, no trees, no large animal life that can't get out of the way itself and the temperature keeps methane production low (thus why all our peat bogs don't decompose faster than they form).

Despite all the advantages to hydro in this country, it still only makes about 10% of our electricity, and I doubt if there's much room for expansion on that. Still, criticising any energy source for not delivering 100% of our needs isn't going to get us anywhere. We have the best wind resource in Europe (40% of European wind potential is in the UK), and are deploying off-shore wind farms to minimise environmental disturbance (we don't want to scare away the tourists).

http://www.iesd.dmu.ac.uk/wind_energy/sustainable_ dev/wcwind.html

Most of our current production comes from nuclear, though the plants are gradually being decomissioned. We haven't had very good experiences here with the first generation reactors, and they've proved far more costly than expected.

http://www.bopcris.ac.uk/bopall/ref20494.html

Hopefully, the new reactor designs will prove to be better value for money. The rest of Europe lacks our renewable resources, so nuclear power will be essential for making up the difference.

Re:What you don't see can't hurt you?

[Master Bait]

To produce enough nuclear power to equal the power we currently get from fossil fuels, you would have to build 10,000 of the largest possible nuclear power plants.

NPR

[blackmonday]

Search NPR.org for an interesting article. According to GM, there where only 50 people committed to buying an EV1. That didn't stop environmentalists from chaining themselves to the last enclave of EV1s in Burbank, CA.

My neighbor drives a very nice Honda Insight (Hybrid). Seems like a lot less hassle than an electric-only vehicle, until hydrogen (or the next big thing) comes along.

Re:NPR

[silentbozo]

pushing through legislation mandating that manufacturers sell electric cars.

Actually, it was that 3% of the fleet be Zero Emissions, which effectively required automakers to turn to electric cars, as that was the only technology available at the time that could meet the zero-emissions requirement.

The only manufacturer who actually sold cars to the general public, that I know of, was Toyota. Their RAV4EV cost upwards of 40k, list price, and very few were available, as they were all conversions done under contract by a 3rd party. All the other manufacturers leased their vehicles to commercial and governmental fleets. As part of the negotiations to get the carmakers to put EVs on the roads, the State of California financed a network of EV recharge stations throughout the state. Unfortunately, the car manufacturers couldn't agree on what kind of charging standard there should be - GM advocated using the inductive paddle system (Magnacharge), Honda and Toyota and Ford produced cars using a conductive charging system (someone correct me if I'm getting my facts wrong.)

This is why when you see an electric charging spot in California, there are usually two chargers - one Magnacharge paddle, one conductive charge jack. As a consequence, mucho dinero was spent by taxpayers to establish a charging infrastructure for vehicles which have largely disappeared from the landscape.

From the very beginning auto manufacturers argued that the battery technology just wasn't there yet to make a decent all-electric vehicle.

"It can't be done", or "it's going to cost us a lot of money." I think this has been their running argument for a lot of things - against seatbelts, airbags, lower emissions, etc. Sure, batteries are not going to deliver the same energy density as gasoline. You're not going to be driving a Suburban very far on batteries. However, as a second car, especially an in-town commuter car, electricity is IDEAL. The market for NEVs is fairly decent, and these are nothing more than glorified golf carts. Hobbyists have built very capable electric commuter cars for decades. And Chrysler, Honda, and Toyota, came up with very effective electric cars, which have served for years as part of commercial and governmental fleets. Then of course, you have the EV-1.

Keep in mind, the automakers didn't HAVE to comply with the CARB mandate. Hell, they spent millions of dollars over a number of years lobbying and suing to ease the compliance schedule, and in the case of ZEVs, discard that requirement completely. But California is a big market for them, big enough such that being forced to stop selling other autos was reason enough to subsidize the ultra-low volumes needed to meet the minimum requirements of the ZEV legislation. Even with the subsidies, due to the limited production runs, the EVs ended up costing a bundle, as opposed to their gasoline cousins, whose engines and drivetrains are built in volume and shared across platforms.

Of course, that was the same problem with the electric/gas hybrid, which looked even more impractical to build and sell, because the engineering costs were higher, at least initially. Toyota had the guts to actually build one and sell it to the public (again, because of the same mandated low-emissions schedule that the ZEV legislation was part of), and now they can't keep the damn things in stock.

Hybrids replaced electric cars

[acomj]

The gas electric hybrid is ingenious. You get great range and great gas mileage.

Electric only cars are in some ways a waste, because of lossed in electricity transmition and pollution at the plant, they might end up causing more pollution per mile than a gas car. Just its pollution somewhere else.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[n1ywb]

You get BETTER range and BETTER milage in CITY conditions. They electric system is only beneficial during acceleration, so it's great in stop and go traffic. Cruising on the highway it provides no benefit, in fact the extra weight reduces your mileage slightly. People don't understand that and that's why some people have been whining that their hybrids don't get the mileage they expected. If you do mostly highway cruising you really are better off with a normal, fuel efficient gasoline vehicle.

Of course on the highways here in the NYC area, and in most metro areas, stop and go is the rule.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[FencingGerbil]

OK. Cars convert gasoline to energy in the neighborhood of 17% efficiency after all things like wind, friction, heat loss, and whatnot are taken into effect.

Power plants are 50-70% efficient in converting dinosaur bits into energy. Much is lost over the wire, being stored in batteries, and being transmitted back out. It's probably a wash for efficiency.

Cars, however, have MANY fewer restrictions on what they can belch out per watt of work generated. Cars pollute everywhere they go. Changing pollution levels on cars involves hundreds of millions of source points for pollution. SUVs get around most of those restrictions by being classified as trucks or other categories (6000lb plus vehicles like the Escalade get around a lot of pollution laws).

Centrally generated electricity is cleaner (not clean but cleaner) by orders of magnitude than burning it at the point where it's going to be used. Not only that but central power plants can be placed in poor neighborhoods where most of us never have to see the pollution and those that do don't vote.

Hybrids are better than nothing but it's just plain lazy to sit and say that it's all we need to research/do.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[huge colin]

The gas-electric hybrid sounds good, until one realizes that they're heavier, more complex, and therefore substantially more expensive than an equivalent gasoline-engined car.

If you want great gas mileage, diesels are unbeaten. Driving normally, [British motoring journalist] Jeremy Clarkson got 75mpg out of a Volkswagen Lupo diesel.

The hybrid-engine cars of today are a silly fad.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[arootbeer]

And if you're better off with a normal, fuel efficient gasoline vehicle, you'd be even better off with a normal, even more fuel efficient diesel vehicle.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[poot_rootbeer]

Driving normally, [British motoring journalist] Jeremy Clarkson got 75mpg out of a Volkswagen Lupo diesel.

See, already, it's lost relevance to driving conditions in the US. The Lupo is a subcompact car. For several reasons, both cultural and practical, such cars are not feasible in the United States. We drive bigger cars, and bigger means heavier and heavier means lesser gas mileage.

The hybrid-engine cars of today are a silly fad.

And the motor-coach will never exceed a speed of 10 miles per hour! What with the trouble of having to crank-start the engine, and frequent tyre re-vulcanizations, you might as well stick with your horses or your steam-powered locomotive. The internal-combustion-engine auto cars of today are a silly fad!

Hybrid automotives are still in their young stages. The technology will evolve and improve over time.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[nathanh]

If you want great gas mileage, diesels are unbeaten. Driving normally, [British motoring journalist] Jeremy Clarkson got 75mpg out of a Volkswagen Lupo diesel.

Diesel has a significantly higher energy density than petrol. So it's a mistake to compare the "mileage" in "miles per gallon" between petrol-hybrid and diesel. They're different fuels. You might as well compare vodka to rocket fuel.

The Lupo is also a tiny compact. Hybrids like the Prius are decent sized family cars. Once again, you can't compare "miles per gallon" when the physical mass is completely different.

Yet despite the Prius being larger, heavier, and using a less dense fuel, it still gets 50mpg for normal driving and the record is 85mpg. That beats the Lupo's once-off record of 75mpg.

And you say diesel is unbeaten? I think you're wrong.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[NuShrike]

How is it more complex and heavier?

In the Prius: no alternator, no timing belt, no-multigear transmission and linkage.

Just a single-gear direct drive small (less weight!) gas-engine that only runs at certain RPMs, and electric motors.

An equivalent HP gas car of the same class and internal room weights more, currently.

And MPG is not the only part of the game - emissions is also, and there isn't a diesel engine (by itself) using USA diesel that puts out less emissions than a gas-hybrid.

Now, if you're talking about a diesel-hybrid using low-sulfur diesel, or a hydrogen-hybrid then WOOO!

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[FecesFlingingRhesus]

Just to get started, the vegetable oil costs 2.50$ a gallon. In bulk

That depends on what oil you are using pure vegetable and peanut oil are very expensive and are not the best choice for bio-diesel. Soy and rapeseed are far better choices and are cheaper that 2.50 in bulk. It averages in the $1 per gallon area in futures trading.

Add the costs of processing to turn it into bio-deisel and you've got a very expensive solution.

Methanol and lye are both very cheap and used in small amounts in the process as well most of the methanol is recovered to use again. Blending is a fairly automated process for the manufactures just pour in all the ingredients and out comes bio-diesel pretty much. Refining Diesel is as much if not more labor intensive.

And that's not taking into account of the skyrocketing price when large numbers of people start buying up the oil.

No actually there may be a small spike at first but what will happen is that farmers that are now sitting on crops that they cannot move will start to migrate to producing oil out of them not to mention that many farmers would love to have a new cash crop to grow. Right now the ability to produce far outweighs the demand for the product in fact as production ramps up you may actually see a decrease in the price as it does not require the farmers to grow a special crop for low demand. If the roles where reversed and bio-diesel where the main fuel source diesel would be very expensive as there would have to be special refineries to produce diesel for what would amount to a limited demand hence the refineries would have to charge a premium to cover the increased cost to produce a fuel with limited demand. Right now that is bio-diesel and that is the only reason that bio-diesel is expensive but with the current skyrocketing diesel prices there is now no reason to by diesel fuel. I currently purchase B100 at a local supplier for $2.10 a gallon well under the $2.30 a gallon that they are charging for diesel. The bio-diesel they are selling is soy and rapeseed derived and all virgin so they are not sucking out the local McDonalds vat to reduce their costs. The alternative fuel tax breaks have made it competitive with regular diesel.

Take a look at this it has some good info on cost to produce bio-diesel.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[huge colin]

Diesel has a significantly higher energy density than petrol. So it's a mistake to compare the "mileage" in "miles per gallon" between petrol-hybrid and diesel.

That's correct about the difference in energy density -- but diesel and gasoline are very similar in cost and availability, so it's in a person's best interest to take advantage of the greater energy density of diesel if they're concerned about covering miles in the cheapest way possible. Because diesel is not volatile like gasoline, diesel engines can use higher compression and operate with much greater efficiency.

Once again, you can't compare "miles per gallon" when the physical mass is completely different.

But you can compare miles-per-gallon when performance is completely different? Doesn't sound fair to me. It's possible to design a 150mpg car, but it's 0-60 time would be even longer than that of a Prius (if that's possible).

You can buy a car today that'll do over 40mpg (highway) with a 0-60 time less than 5 seconds, which is twice as fast as any hybrid. Hmm.

That beats the Lupo's once-off record of 75mpg.

The 75mpg from a Lupo isn't a "record", it's normal operation.

Re:Hybrids replaced electric cars

[huge colin]

No, what I have done is shown that you can't decide "diesel vs hybrid" on the basis of a flawed comparison between a compact Lupo and a family-sized petrol-hybrid.

Here's an unflawed comparison: You can get a well-built, reliable, four-dour sedan in the form of the VW Jetta GL TDI (0-60: 7.7s, 36/47 mpg, ~$21,000) for almost $10,000 less than the Honda Accord Hybrid (0-60: 7.5s, 29/37 mpg, ~$30,000). The VW is much cheaper, practically just as fast, and features significantly better fuel economy. There's no doubt some critical flaw in this comparison, so go ahead and tell me what it is.

Why yes, that's exactly what you said. Don't try and change the subject when you're wrong.

Ok: I was completely incorrect about a 4.9s 0-60 time being more than twice as fast as any hybrid, as evidenced by the 7.5s 0-60 time of the Honda Accord Hybrid.

I'll ignore the fact that, in terms of car performance, 7.5 seconds is nowhere near 4.9 seconds. I'll also ignore the fact that the fuel economy, which is the single most important selling point of hybrids, is worse on the Honda Accord Hybrid than some gasoline-engined cars that actually perform better than the Accord.

Bummer

[bitswapper]

Too bad. Seems odd, though, that GM sites lack of parts and liability as reasons. After all, if they were really worried about liability, why would they have allowed them to be purchased in the first place.

Here a link to pics of the remains.

:-(

Re:Bummer

[WoodstockJeff]

Um, they didn't allow them to be purchased. They were leased, so that GM maintained control over them and their eventual disposal.

While it is sad to see them go

[winkydink]

it really speaks well for how well Toyota has done with their hybrid engine. While there's lots of talk about hydrogen (here in California they say it will be possible to drive from end to end using hydrogen-powered autos in a couple years), their problem remains setting up a vast distribution network that rivals that of gasoline. That's not cheap. I think that they hybrid will be the predominant player for the immediate future.

in other news today...

[circletimessquare]

gas prices are up 50% for the last 12 months

Passing blame to the laywers.

[Kainaw]

GM would not sell the last available cars to the public due to ... potential liability claims.

I wonder if this is a red herring or not. Sure, lawyers have turned the U.S. into a lawsuit-happy country where people are visited in the hospital right after surgery with promises of grand malpractice suits (I work in a hospital, so that's the only example that comes to my mind right away). But, it is possible that GM made some damn good electric cars. Maybe they don't want people using them so they can force-feed a few more SUVs to the nation. Either way, I'm of the opinion that we should drastically increase our fossil fuel usage. The sooner we use it up, the sooner we will stop using it.

Muted Protests?

[14erCleaner]

The protests would have been better-attended, but many of the protesters were hospitalized for heat exhaustion while trying to bicycle to the desert site.

I drove one.

[MrLogic17]

The feel of it is really just a 2 seater Geo Metro running on batteries. Granted, there was a lot of cool ideas (no key, just a password to get in, and a "run" push button on the dash), but EV1's are *not* ready for prime time.

I took one for a spin at a GM proving grounds, and floored it from every stop sign. After about 10 minutes, a fully changed car was almost dead. A kick to drive, but I'd never buy one.

There's a reason GM didn't sell them, and chose to only lease them. GM knew they were just a big experiment, and had no intention of supporting pre-first generation EV parts for the Federally mandiated period of time (5 years?).

-MrLogic

Re:I drove one.

[rilister]

Yeah, me too.

They rocked. Really. The low end torque was fabulous and they *walked* anything else off the lights. Even better, nearly silently.

Range was a problem, but not as bad as you say: I drove it the full range (40 miles round trip on 101 between SF and Palo Alto), and since that was my main commute, it was sufficient range. Just.

Sad to see them go...

I wish

[WormholeFiend]

I wish people would focus on real problems, like installing an artificial engine noise maker on a silent fuel-cell motorcycle.

Eradication Fascination

[Shadow Wrought]

I have always pondered human's fascination with things either going extinct or being completely destroyed. Has anyone here really given a thought about the EV-1 in the last few years? Would you have even noticed their dissappearance without a /. story? Yet, because now we know that they are on the verge of compelte destruction, they somehow have a higher value than they did when they were sitting around- but not about to be destroyed.

I wonder if they just made them inoperable (to avoid liability concerns) and sold them as collectable on ebay if they wouldn't make the program profitable after all.

One question about electric/hybrid cars

[Anita Coney]

I've read that it costs $8000 (of course in US dollars, you godless heathen!) to replace the batteries for electric and hybrid cars. And furthermore, they need to be replaced every three years.

If that is true, (please tell me it's not true) how in the heck are you ever supposed to sell them in a used market?! They would essentially all become scrap, sort of like a two year old iPod. How is that environmentally sound?!

Re:One question about electric/hybrid cars

[Locke2005]

Hybrid and Electric are completely different. Since they are not powered solely by batteries, hybrids use much smaller batteries which should last from 8 to 10 years and cost 1 to 2 thousand dollars to replace. I can't speak for electric, but it stands to reason they would have much more expensive batteries with a shorter life; obviously the figures you cite ONLY apply to electric vehicles.

Re:One question about electric/hybrid cars

[Mendenhall]

Warning! Hybrid battery cycles are nothing like EV battery cycles. In an EV, the battery is repeatedly drained from 100% to (typically) a very low charge, resulting in a short life between replacements. On the other hand, a hybrid batery, which is just used for short-term energy buffering, can be pampered by the control electronics.

In the Toyota Prius, the battery is tightly controlled for state-of-charge (SOC) between about 50% and about 90%, and not allowed to deep discharge or overcharge. The battery temperature is also controlled. This results in the battery not being overworked. In accelerated lifetime tests published a couple years ago by Toyota, it appeared that the internal resistance of the batteries in a 1st generation Prius would be expected to decrease (effectively making the batteries better) for the first 80,000 miles (or so) and to return to the as-delivered resistance at about 150,000 miles. After that, the resistance is rising, and one could really say the pack will be wearing out between then and 200,000+ miles. Also, the $8,000 battery cost is nonsense. Even a new Hybrid battery direct from Toyota was only about $5000 in the early Priuses. If a replacement market has to develop, one can bet that off-brand packs will be available for a lot less than that once competition cuts in. Of course, if the packs outlive the cars anyway, thuis may not happen.

The oldest (that I know of) Prius was a taxi in Vancouver, BC which was retired with its original battery pack at 200,000 miles. There is no evidence that hybrid battery packs will not, in general, live as long as the rest of the vehicle. IIRC, the car was then bought back by Toyota for engineering analysis, to what really does start to wear out.

Note: I am an extremely happy Prius driver... I am also an advocate for green technology that really works. Nothing makes me happier than technology which is not only cleaner than its predecessors, but nicer to use. This is the case with the Prius. It is peppy, extremely quiet, and smooth to drive. Since it has no transmission as you normally think of one, and even the term continuously-variable transmission doesn't really describe the power splitting transaxle, one can drive up and down hills, and accelerate briskly, with no bump from a transmission upshifting & downshifting. It's really nice!

Re:One question about electric/hybrid cars

[mfarver]

I didn't think the power plant emissions were relevant, but a bunch of posts have given the "moving the pollution" argument so I'll address it.

1. Moving the pollution is actually a bit of a good thing. Pollution is bad anywhere, but cities have more people getting lung cancer. Most power plants are spread out and away from population centers.

2. The control issue... its a lot harder to clean up 100,000 tailpipes than one power plant. Bigger scrubbers aren't cheap but still cheaper than the pollution controls on the car. CO2 sequestering really isn't even possible at the car level, but might soon be at the plant level.

The problem gets worse when you look at how little maintainence the emissions controls get on most cars. Approx 15% of cars in the US are driving with the "Check Engine" light on, indicating some reduction in power and emissions. Add in the the people actively subverting the emissions controls for increased in performance. Search google for "drilling out the cat" for some fun stories. Getting high horsepower in an EV doesn't require increasing pollution when the car is being driven normally.

3. Pollution and cost improvements by using electric cars to avoid expensive and often inefficient peaking power. Electric cars can charge at night using cheap base load electricity, and help balance the day/night usage swings. Some tests have even had the EVs putting power back into the grid from their batteries during daytime emergency brownout situations.

3. An extension to the control issue is that while an large fleet of electric cards would be only be about 25% -50% less polluting with todays electric grid (which relies on a lot of dirty coal) is that the cars now have a choice of fuels. We can keep generating power from dirty but plentiful US coal (avoid Mideast oil). Or we can add clean renewable sources, or nuclear, etc. If something better comes along: fusion, solar energy sats whatever it can be quickly integrated, without waiting 10 years for the cars to be taken off the road. 90% of the current air pollution is cuased by less than 10% of cars on the road (mostly 70's and 80's cars still in use and built with minimal pollution controls.)

And the other arguement is "just wait for fuel cell cars":

Fuel cells are not a replacement for electric cars. They _are_ electric cars, just with a different battery tech. All of the research investment in electric cars applies. Right now the auto industry is using fuel cells as a stalling action. By saying that fuel cells are still immature, and electric cars impractical they avoid retooling their production for 10 years or more.

Seemed inevitable

[VolciMaster]

Electric cars have that nasty feature of needing to be recharged constantly also. I'm far moer interested in hybrids and fuel-cell vehicles, personally. THe technology exists now, is fairly cheap to manufacture, and (like another poster pointed out) the vehicles don't have to look like futuristic dwarf hearses.

Several manufacturers (Ford, Toyota, Honda, GM) all have hybrids in production, or near production. They get better mileage, accelerate faster, brake quicker, and (at least the recent entries) look like the normal vehicles on which they're based.

Re:No surprise, this.

[lpangelrob2]

No it's not. They made the electric cars. No one was interested in something that plugs in... which apparently has such a negative connotation that Toyota specifically advertised on their Super Bowl commercial for the Prius that you don't have to "plug in" their car into the wall. (In spite of the fact that other Prius owners are modifying their batteries so that they can plug it in, which to me seems pointless and a waste of resources.)

So GM scrapped them. That was probably unfortunate for the company, as people no longer are buying GM's trucks and SUVs, which they made the highest profits off of... and people aren't buying them thanks to Big Oil's Big Prices.

It's okay... I look forward to the next innovations from Honda and Toyota... and I never considered buying American automobiles anyway. The world hasn't really changed.

Re:No surprise, this.

[tomzyk]

No, it isn't part of "the Big Oil conspiracy".

If you actually read a little bit about the vehicle, you would realize that they were dumping their money into a lost cause too. The car was battery powered and could only go 55-95 (or 75-130, depending on the type of battery) miles per charge and took up to 8 hours to recharge. There is no possible way that they could make a profit off of a vehicle that performed that poorly. (I know I wouldn't buy a car that I would have to refill almost every night and wouldn't even be able to go too far out of the city on a roadtrip.)

Instead, I'm sure they will just be redirecting their funds into research for their hybrid and hydrogen-powered vehicles.

What you choose to ignore can hurt you...

[podperson]

Hydrides currently achieve volumetric energy densities 50% better than liquid hydrogen (and safer than gasoline). There's no mention of this on the page you've linked -- but then the writer clearly has a pro-gasoline axe to grind.

There's no question that gasoline is the most convenient vehicle fuel available right now, but it's stupid not to look for alternatives -- including more fuel-efficient gasoline-powered vehicles, hybrids, and electric cars (of various kinds).

To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[La0tsu]

Let's get on with diesel. Why?

1) Better efficiency than gasoline

2) Longer engine life

3) Diesel fuel can be produced from non-fossil sources such as soy and corn (even hogfat!)

But aren't diesel engines dirty, you might ask? Not inherently. The problem is the quality of the fuel, specifically the level of sulfur. Here in the States, in less than a year the standard will reduce that nasty impurity by huge amount.

A whole lot of goodness, no? Plus, it is a way for our struggling farmers to increase demand for their products.

For more info:
http://www.biodiesel.org/

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[StressGuy]

Yea, biodiesel has me intrigued as well. It is also my understanding that diesel engines themselves have been undergoing considerable improvement in recent years.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[djbentle]

What I don't understand is why not hybrid diesels? If you can get 50 mpg out of a hybrid now, imagine what it would be like if you could use a diesel engine that already gets 45 mpg to replace the gas engine. Diesels and hybrids are not mutually exclusive. Plus you can still use your alternate sources of diesel.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[QuantumRiff]

They have these, they are called Locomotives. Check out Howstuffworks.com's article on locomotives. The big (okay HUGE) diesel engine goes between 300-900 rpm, all it does is power a generator, that runs an electric motor on each axle. Instant tourqe, lots of power, regenerative braking, and no big, heavy, nasty to work on transmission.. (the article talks about a transmission strong enough for a locomotive to get up to over a 100Mph would require a 32 speed transmission that would weigh twice as much as the locomotive)

Why can the train companies develop these huge, fuel efficient engines decades ago, but we can't seem to learn any lessons from these and apply them to cars.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[fred fleenblat]

You are right, they are not mutually exclusive at all. However, there are some minor technical issues that meant that gas-electric hybrids got developed first.

The main reason is that the torque curves for gas and electric motors are complementary. Electric motors produce maximum torque at (or near) 0 RPM. Gas motors produce maximum torque far higher. It depends on the engine, but a typical four banger that gets used in a hybrid may have max torque up around 4000RPM. Diesels produce their highest torque lower, around 1500RPM. So what happens in a hybrid is that you step on the gas and get a rush from the electric motor, then the diesel gives its max torque soon after, then...nothing, they both peter out and you have to shift early and often to compensate.

Another issue is that in a couple of cases, hybrid vehicles were developed with a CVT (continuously variable transmission). Again, the torque presents a problem. CVT's of a given size can only handle so much torque at once. If the electric motor and the diesel are both producing a lot of torque at the same time, you'd have to provide a larger, heavier CVT to accomodate.

Finally, hybrids gained a lot of popularity for environmental reasons. This made them popular in "green" places like California. Unfortunately, CA has strict emissions standards and currently very few diesel passenger car engines meet these standards. A hybrid vehicle that cannot be sold in CA would limit its success drastically. As low-sulfur fuel is phased in, this might change.

None of these are reasons that diesel-electric hybrids could not be brought to market, but together they added up to a "not yet" decision pm the part of automakers.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[njh]

Diesel Electric locos can't do regenerative braking because they have no where to put the energy. Instead the electric braking energy is shunted into some very large resistors. The reasons for doing it is to save on brake blocks more than anything.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[CodeBuster]

Because train locomotives have a lot fewer limitations with respect to size and weight than cars.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[AnalogDiehard]

Why can the train companies develop these huge, fuel efficient engines decades ago, but we can't seem to learn any lessons from these and apply them to cars.

Especially since one of the largest builders, EMD Locomotives, is owned by General Motors.

Re:To heck with hybrid/electric ...

[DerekLyons]

Why can the train companies develop these huge, fuel efficient engines decades ago, but we can't seem to learn any lessons from these and apply them to cars.

Mostly because diesel engines don't scale very well. It took a long time (and a lot of work) to get them down to a size where they were useable in cars. It will take more time (and work (money)) to get them down to the size where they can share space with the hybrid end of the equation.

That's setting aside the problem of diesels not liking cold greatly, cooling problems, etc... diesels are in many way better than gasoline IC, but they are not without additional problems and difficulties.

A Better Ad campaign

[Mostly Monkey]

Manufacturers would probably have better luck if they stop treating electric cars as replacements and sell them as "second" cars. Many people already have 2 cars so why not advertise it as a supplement to their existing car instead of a replacement? By owning two, people can use the advantages of both without the pros and cons of only one.... City/errend driving (majority of miles for most users) in the EL car and longer trips in the gas one?

I rode in one and loved it

[Dr. Transparent]

I got to ride in one of these a few times and I loved it. The coolest part was just how darn quiet the car was. And it didn't hurt that the dashboard made you feel like you were on the bridge of the enterprise.

Also, the fun of the high torque electric engine made 0-60 pretty darn quick. Of course that took about half your battery life right there. =)

That said the car was wicked small and hardly practical for much beyond putting to a very close office and maybe the grocery store. (at least here in Phoenix where density isn't very high). I was really hoping they could get the density up so that range could get to the 200-250 mile range. That would have made it much more practical. Of course it still means long trips would have been broken up, but at least you could drive around on the freeway all day without worrying about your car running out of battery.

Sad to see it go... it was a fun car. But I doubt we've seen the end of electric car experiments.

Got to get over the hump

[Doc Ruby]

Our vast investment in petrofuel technology poses something of a chicken/egg problem for switching. Can't use electric (or other power) cars, because there's no fueling stations. Can build alternative fueling stations, because there's no cars to consume their fuels. By switching cars to electric, which can be fueled at home while fueling stations are gradually retooled, we jumpstart the process. The upstream infrastructure can be powered by any fuel, as long as it delivers electricity to the existing grid. Which is a much smaller hurdle than the alternatives. Even from a purely energy-efficiency analysis, reusing more of our existing infrastructure for the evolution of vehicle fuels will save energy in demolition and construction. Electric is the cross-platform way to make the transition smooth enough that it could actually happen without huge, possibly unsupportable, losses.

Re:Got to get over the hump

[johnjaydk]

I looked into the issue a few years back and in my country (at the time) the energy loss from the electrical distribution grad was around 1-2%. Eliminating that loss is a noble idea but it won't change much.

Now the part about not driving around like crazy makes a lot more sense.

Sounds like the Chrysler Turbine Cars

[MajorDick]

MOPAR Did the same thing with the Chrysler Turbine Cars, they expected to use them as a mobile test platform while they deveoped the means to make it work

In the end nearly all but 3 or 4 went to the factory to be cut up into teeny tiny bits....sad but it happens....

Photos of the carnage (pun intended)

[JonTurner]

>>Won't somebody think of the CARS!!!
I can understand some of GMs thinking, especially the part about litigation, but it seems a waste to crush so many perfectly usable automobiles.

Before and after photos of at least 60 EV1s being crushed: http://ev1-club.power.net/

Re:Photos of the carnage (pun intended)

[iamhassi]

"I can understand some of GMs thinking, especially the part about litigation, but it seems a waste to crush so many perfectly usable automobiles."

Not only that but they couldn't possibly get insurance on a vehicle who's brakes can not be replaced due to the part not being available.

They're right, they had to crush them, either that or give them salvage titles and unlicensable, which means uninsurable and not legal to be driven on the roads. They could still be used off-road and on private property, perhaps as a high-tech golf carts or for security guards of private property? Honestly I think if they ebay'd them they could have sold all the vehicles and not been held liable, but they took the safe road and I applaud them for that.

Re:No surprise, this.

[einTier]

Car and Driver had an excellent article about these cars a few years back.

Basically, people were paying $525 a month to lease a car that cost nearly 1.5 million each to build. Small wonder they liked them, and small wonder that GM scrapped them.

Re:No surprise, this.

[Nefarious Wheel]

GM's first foray into commercial electric cars was named the "Impact". Does that sound like they wanted them to succeed, rather than a sop to the green movement? Heck of a thump to the subconscious. And they do know their subconscious marketing cues.

Let the anti-bush and anti-oil love fest begin....

[Ghostx13]

Seriously, this post has less than 20 comments in it and 3 are already blaming Bush or Big Oil.

The eviromentalists need to realize something: people like driving big gas guzzeling cars. Despite them being bad for the enviroment people will continue to drive gas powered cars. Realize that the public you're trying to convert is the public that stuffs itself with McDonalds. If the public won't take care of their own bodies what makes you think they give a hoot about the enviroment? The people (for the most part) won't buy them, hence the car manufactures won't make them.

Also, people keep hawking on hybrid/electric cars. What about trucks/suv? They hold the market share. Those puny hybrid/electrics won't haul a boat, or a trailer, or a load of 2x4s. Yes I know Ford has 1 hybrid SUV out. Big deal, what's its market share?

Further, the handeling/performance of electric vehicles suck. Yes, I know about the amazing electric sports car that can do 0-60 quicker than a porshe, but guess what, it also costs as much as a porshe. You want the American public to embrace electric cars? Make an electric Mustang that has the exact performance specs as it's gas powered brother, and at the same price. Until some R&D department can do this the majority of the public won't convert to electric.

I'm not saying it's right, but enviromentalists need to wake up and realize their fighting this battle all wrong. You'd think they'd take a queue from the food industry. A majority of the public is under the impression that "fat-free" foods taste like crap. Never mind they might be better for you. Never mind your HCL is through the roof, Americans want a fat-free meal that tastes EXACTLY like a full-fat meal, if it doesn't, fuck it we'll die fat and happy.

Re:AAAaaah

[WormholeFiend]

I bought an Echo for half the price of a Prius, and I only get (officially) 3 less miles per gallon than I would if I was driving a Prius.

I have yet to see the numbers on how much comparative environmental damage is produced in making both cars, though.

What's wrong with hybrid/electric?

[2nd Post!]

Nothing is stopping hybrid DIESEL.

1) Better efficiency than pure diesel
2) Longer engine life than pure diesel
3) Diesel fule can be produced from non-fossil sources

4) Extra 10 to 40 percent efficiency due to regenerative braking + running the engine at peak efficiency

Re:What's wrong with hybrid/electric?

[La0tsu]

True. My point was not so much that we shouldn't seek out improvements to technology, but that we don't need to reinvent the wheel. Everybody gets so focused on electric or hydrogen, when the truth is we already have viable technology that doesn't require a complete change of platform, as those do.

And when VW is making prototypes of hybrid diesel vehicles aiming at 90 mpg which actually get closer to 135 mpg, it becomes clear real quick that that is the way to go.

Re:What's wrong with hybrid/electric?

[huge colin]

...and I believe you forgot "higher initial cost than pure diesel".

I wouldn't mind that hybrid Honda Accord

[IronChefMorimoto]

Both Autoweek http://www.autoweek.com/ and Car & Driver http://www.caranddriver.com/ have had some excellent reviews about Honda's new top-o-the-line Honda Accord Hybrid V-6. Both magazines noted that, for buyers who want to get more MPG for their money without something as unconventional looking as an EV1 or a Prius, the Accord may fit the bill.

Not to mention the fact that the new hybrid Accord sits at the TOP of the Accord lineup for Honda. Friggin' $30K for a hybrid V-6, but you DO get 255HP and a nice car.

I wonder, though, if this prices what could be a very nice, standard hybrid sedan out of the reach of the consumers that Honda hopes to reach -- those that want something "normal" instead of a stylized Prius. Certainly, the Civic hybrid is an excellent, cheaper alternative, but it's not nearly as roomy, and for long trips, it's gonna be cramped/inadequate, say, for a family of 4.

The Ford Escape Hybrid has also gotten lots of good press from these magazines. And the hybrid Lexus RX400 (2006? yes? no?) is supposed to be a marvel of hybrid innovation and luxury technology.

I guess we'll have to see how the hybrid phenomenon goes forward. I thought this morning, as I sat behind a Civic Hybrid on my morning commute, about how soon hybrids are going to NOT BE ENOUGH to help with an emerging energy crisis. This while I'm listening to an NPR report on the US Senate vote on drilling in ANWAR for oil. It's going to be an interesting next few years, I'm afraid. Hope my rather inefficient Subaru Forester doesn't become a MPG killing liability.

IronChefMorimoto

Re:Another idea for disposal

[R2.0]

2 words: Attractive Nuisance.

It is the same legal principle that allows one to be sued for a drowning of a stranger in their swimming pool, when the stranger was trespassing to begin with.

Re:No I can..

[Stormwatch]

I'm guessing 3 is "time travel, back to 1955"...

That old wive's tale AGAIN?

[Engineer-Poet]

Solar cells take almost as much energy to make as they put out over their lifetime.

Try some payback figures from last year

• Multicrystalline: 3.7 years
• Thin film: 3.0 years
• Multicrystalline, anticipated: 2.1 years
• Thin film, anticipated: 1.1 years

Warranty on today's PV panels is typically 25 years, and panels can be expected to go on producing well beyond the warranty period.

Re:That old wive's tale AGAIN?

[Damvan]

Wow, you guys will go to whatever level is necessary to try and "prove" that solar isn't feasible. Work for Exxon or something? Well, since the effective lifetime of my panels is about 50 years, in 2052 I will worry about disposing of them. In the mean time, they have eliminated who knows how many pounds or tons of other, known harmful, pollutants from being sent into the atmosphere.

Re:AAAaaah

[timeOday]

I bought an Echo for half the price of a Prius, and I only get (officially) 3 less miles per gallon than I would if I was driving a Prius.

Huh? For city driving, the score is 60 to 35. 60 MPG in the city!! Out on the highway, it's closer at 51 to 42. That's still a difference of 9 MPG.

And, better yet (IMHO) are cars that trade off some of the increased efficiency for increased performance. The 2005 Accord Hybrid has both more power and better fuel economy than its prececessors.

Stupidity can be painful, too.

[abb3w]

and then figure that we'll eventually come to terms with there being no good alternatives to nuclear.

This strikes me as wildly optimistic, given that after almost a century and a half, Gallup polls show only a little more than a third of the US has "come to terms" with the Theory of Evolution. A good business plan will assume they will continue this way. "No one in this world, so far as I know, has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people."

yes and no

[phyruxus]

>>we will NEVER run out of oil.

In the sense that there will always be residual oil somewhere on the earth, you are right. However your statement is misleading in terms of using oil as a fuel; someday, the cost of getting the oil will exceed the value (in terms of heating a house, fueling a car, oiling a machine, what have you).

>>Oil in the ground is not like a gas tank where you pump it out and Boom! it's gone one day. It just gets more and more expensive to pump it.

Yes, but not only will it get more expensive per unit, it will simultaneously become *rarer*. So not only will prices rise, but production will fall. It's not like everone just has to get used to higher prices - most of us will eventually HAVE to do without, because even if we CAN afford to buy a $20 gallon of gasoline, it's not available, Period, unless you're a member of an ever smaller group of "haves". Oh, and while oil gets more expensive, and more rare, demand will rise. We're not just talking about peak production; there IS a limited amount of oil, and even if we never do extract the last drop, it's going to "run out" in the sense that *you* and *I* can't get it. And, our approach to that point is faster as time passes.

>>What will happen is that fossil fules will get progressively more expensive until cheaper alternatives become less expensive than they are, and certain uses will gradually switch over.

Not to split hairs (okay, to split hairs) actually what will happen is that fossil fuels will get progressively more expensive until they are impractical, and then asymtotically approaching impossible to use due to availability/cost/yourmetrichere. Now, if we collectively had some smarts, we would realize that the cost of (not so) blue sky research on alternative energy *now* will save us buttloads of money on fuel because we will have to do it anyway, and if we do it before oil is a $500 / barrel, we'll save all the extra money of switching before we have to instead of only when we're forced to. (grumble grumble big oil grumble)

>>There's not going to be some magic day where Boom! THE OIL IS GONE OMG WE'RE DOOMED WHAAAA.

If I were to infer that you lean right politically, would I be barking up the wrong tree?

>>Everything will "just work out", as it always does in matters of economics.

Well, if by "work out" you mean that a new level will be sought in terms of price, production, availability and alternatives, you're stating a tautology in terms of economics. If you mean that there's no chance of serious economic hardship for the whole world, including real fiscal pain in the first world and possible life-death issues in the third world, I'm sorry but I have to contradict you there (if that's what you meant). The richest of the rich will continue to live in comfort, as they always have and always will. It's the other 99.999999% of us (or our grandkids) who will face real difficulty.

The Post-Oil period won't be the end of the world, but there are serious - as in, failure is possible - challenges to overcome if we expect to continue to live anywhere near as conveniently as we do. Cheap oil moves goods from cheap producers to the markets, cheap oil keeps us mobile, etc. We're racing toward a huge question mark. To say that it isn't an issue is foolhardy at best. There's no need to play it off like the concern is only felt by CrAzY lOoNiE fReAkIeS!!1! It is an issue. The sky is not falling; it's just rain. Lots and lots of rain... no need to insult the ark-planners. You'll be glad they were working on it someday.

Re:yes and no

[beakburke]

"It's not like everone just has to get used to higher prices - most of us will eventually HAVE to do without, because even if we CAN afford to buy a $20 gallon of gasoline, it's not available, "

That doesn't make any sense, absent some kind of government price rationing. If there isn't enough gas at 20/gal. then the price is going to rise until the amount of gas available is equal to the amount being demanded. I'd also dispute that it's just going to sneak up on us. Thats what speculators prevent. Why do you think oil is at $50 right now?

Re:GM should have made everyone happy

[silentbozo]

You won't get any argument from me about what assholes GM has been over the EV-1. These are the same guys who went out in front of the public and told everyone that the EV-1 wasn't selling well, in order to justify scrapping the program (and just as they were about to begin replacing the lead-acid batteries with NiMH batteries.) Of course, they didn't actually lie - not one EV-1 was sold during the entire lifespan of the vehicle, because the EV-1 was only LEASED and NEVER SOLD.

This was no tragedy

[VAXcat]

Because these cars were not so good...now, when Chrysler did the same thing (produced a bunch of cars, distributed them on a trial basis, decided not to produce them, and then scrapped all but one or two of them) with the Turbine cars in the late 60s, there was a tragedy...those were great cars...good looking, fast, and would run on anything from diesel fuel to cheap vodka...those were the cars of the future...and don't get me going on how the US government had all of the Flying Wings scrapped...

Re:AAAaaah

[MightyMartian]

Costs are still a bit up there. As well, the Toyota dealer area in which I live couldn't sell them when I was looking because the Fire Department hadn't take the course. I gather that on electrics, using the Jaws of Life in the wrong spot can introduce a rescuer to the gripping Maw of Death awfully quick-like.

Parts liabilitt

[husker_man]

These cards didn't need to be destroyed.

Actually, yes they did. The problem that GM has is that, if a car is on the road, they are required to provide spare parts (either by manufacturing them or providing diagrams for third-party manufacturers) for those cars for 10 years past the date of building that particular vehicle. In other words, GM would have to come up with suppliers (or themselves) for parts for these cars until at least 2009, and with the problem of the suppliers not being willing to make those parts, it puts GM into a bad situation.

GM was fortunate in that, with these cars only being leased to customers, they could pull them off the roads and thus limit their liability. I would love to own one of these vehicles myself, but I can understand GM's position.

Disclosure: I used to work for GM, and work for one of their automotive suppliers now, so I do know a little about what goes into these types of decisions.

Re:Parts liabilitt

[bStrom]

I dunno - they came out with a truck hybrid recently, so I would say they're still looking at viable alternatives that will actually become MAINSTREAM. That's the problem - the EV1 would never be mainstream until there is a breakthrough in battery technology.

The wheel of politics

[Syncdata]

Living in California, I have a first hand view of why renewable energy is not happening, at least out here. On the one hand, you have groups of environmentalists who want to have things like Wind power, hydro electric power, and solar power,.

On the other hand, you have groups of environmentalists who don't want these things because Birds get caught in the turbines/propellers, or because hydroelectric plants require damming rivers, thus altering habitats. Tidal will mess with sea habitats, and while solar might be acceptable, but it's too inneficient for large scale generation.

And the dominant politicians in California are beholdant to the environmentalist groups, and since the disparate factions can't seem to make up their minds, the politicians just blame everything on the greedy oil industry, or on fear of the "China syndrome".

This is not a troll. This is fact, and it's the case out on the eastern seaboard as well from what I understand. It's a damn shame that in the name of environmentally sound energy generation, we are sticking primarily with coal and oil.

Re:The wheel of politics

[dgatwood]

The problem is that solar panels have a limited lifespan and save only a tiny amount of money relative to their cost. It is really hard to convince someone starting a company that they should spend $20k on solar panels that will pay for themselves within 10-15 years if they're still working.

Re:Another idea for disposal

[Frank T. Lofaro Jr.]

Since our current legal system is so far gone from any sense of sanity or morality, I guess all we can hope for is that it gets more byzantine until it collapses and is no longer viable.

Hopefully that day will come sooner rather than later.

Civil courts create as much injustice as they stop, or perhaps even more.

Lawyers DO kill industries

[FreeUser]

I wonder if this is a red herring or not. Sure, lawyers have turned the U.S. into a lawsuit-happy country where people are visited in the hospital right after surgery with promises of grand malpractice suits (I work in a hospital, so that's the only example that comes to my mind right away).

Until congress passed a limitation on the liability of aircraft manufacturers under Clinton in the 1990s the production of private, single engine aircraft had fallen to zero. Why? Because some boneheaded pilot could decide he could fly IFR (instrument conditions, bad weather) despite not having the rating ("what does the damn gubmint know that I don't"), crash the plane killing himself (and maybe some others who had the misfortune to trust him/her and climb aboard), and the aircraft manufacturer would not only be sued, but often lose and have idiot juries award tens of millions to the relatives of the idiot pilot! I kid you not. It happened enough times that virtually every manufacturer of small aircraft ceased production. They simply could not clear a profit once liability costs were factered in.

It wasn't until congress limited this liability to a mere 19 years after manufactur that the industry rebounded, and one can buy new personal aircraft once again.

Look to software patents as another example where, in the not too distant future, patent attorneys and bad governance will converge to kill another innovative industry: ours.

While I believe there are real technical issues vis-a-vis the energy storage density of batteries that probably killed the EV1, liability was probably a non-negligable factor in decreasing the overall profitability beneath the threashhold required for the car to survive.

Innovation is far riskier than doing the staid, "tried and true" thing. That is one of the reasons why most aircraft engine designs are decades old (the design of mine dates back to the 1930s), and manufacturers are loathe to modernize them despite the plethora of good ideas out there. Patents are another reason, but compared to litigation risks, probably secondary in this instance.

So don't kid yourself, lawyers can and do kill entire industries, dead. The lucky ones rebound, the unlucky ones disappear for good, or for decades at a time.

Re:GM's Shortsightedness and Paranoia

[silentbozo]

The analogy here is that if Paramount decided not only it would cancel the sci-fi TV show "Enterprise", but also destroy all the films!

You do know that in the past (and possibly even now), a lot of source material has been destroyed because the company that owned the rights didn't think that the property they owned justified the cost of warehousing and preserving that material. They either let it rot, or they actively shredded it, to keep someone else from profiting from it.

Of course, this mindset is EXACTLY why compulsory copying SHOULD be allowed, and why enforcement of depositing of works with the LOC (Library of Congress), and the cost of maintaining/restoring works once deposited, should be included as part of the cost of getting copyright.

In GM's case, I think part of compacting the cars was to keep people from realizing how close they were to actually being able to release a viable production electric car. The drivetrains and controllers alone were very advanced AC propulsion units that could have fetched thousands of dollars on the open market RIGHT NOW, and as another poster pointed out, the bodies alone could have been sold for a variety of purposes, aside from being just scrap.

GM wanted to make sure that you wouldn't be able to put a zero emission EV-1 side-by-side against one of their 14 MPG fake hybrid SUVs (wow, a whole 2 extra miles of efficiency from an oversized 48vdc starter motor!) Besides, the EV-1 has served its propaganda use. The new vaporware of the day, to ward off complaints about GM's fight against higher fuel standards, is the Hydrogen Car, which like the electric car 10 years ago, is just "5 to 6 years away from being introduced to the general public."

But why did THAT surprise you?

[Engineer-Poet]

(In spite of the fact that other Prius owners are modifying their batteries so that they can plug it in, which to me seems pointless and a waste of resources.)

And this lets them tool around town without having to burn gasoline, and potentially lets them generate their "motor fuel" with a solar panel, wind turbine or a generator running off fermenting cow flop. Their energy supply is potentially 100% renewable. All I can say is more power to them!

Re:Another idea for disposal

[dabigpaybackski]

Here's an idea for disposal:

Auction them off to collectors, and make the buyers sign an "as is" contract. No proviso for spares, servicing, or liability from the manufacturer. They'll sell every one. Some will be driven, others tinkered on, and some will become museum pieces.

I wish GM would reconsider. There's no shame in failure, especially a failure as innovative as the EV1. Keeping the remaining specimens out in public will help spark interest in more advanced technology, as well as GM's brand name.

Ummm

[way2trivial]

First of all, we don't all live near enough motive water to do so--some people live in deserts.

further
http://www.bchydro.bc.ca/environment/
says
More than 90 per cent of BC Hydro's electricity is generated by water powering turbines at 30 hydroelectric facilities on 27 watersheds around British Columbia?
but- that's mitigated by the fact
http://www.bctc.com/about/faqs.shtml that the bctc states
(clipped to get to what I consider relevant) What is the relationship between BC Hydro and BCTC?
BC Hydro will be a major customer of BCTC, as will other electricity producers and wholesale customers. BCTC will contract with BC Hydro for certain services, such as engineering and field services.


The fact is, more than 90% of BC hydro's power comes from water- (which isn't practical for the world at large) but bc hydro's product is not 100% of the electricy going thru your lines.

Just a a thought...

Best product we ever owned

[EV1 Driver]

My wife drove an EV1 for five years and it always amazed me how much attention was focused on the environmental/efficiency aspect and how little was paid to the general product advantages. In the end, it felt like IBM was taking our laptops away and giving us back typewriters. Three years later, my wife still hasn't bought a gas car. - In the last three years, the car had zero maintenance. No tune ups, oil changes, trips to the gas station, nothing. - It was remarkably clean - no drips, no exhaust, so smells - we could have parked it in the house. - It was really cheap to charge. - My gas car sat idle most of the time because the EV1 was always our car of choice when we went out. - It got a tremendous amount of positive attention on the road. - And lastly, she never lost a race from the stoplight in five years. When you consider all the reasons, practical or not, people buy cars, I'd say the EV1 was the best consumer product we've ever owned (leased). It was proof that U.S. ingenuity and industry can lead the world. Despite all GM's excuses, the car was an excellent choice for many US drivers and those of us who got to drive one know it.

I Heard This Story on NPR

[Greyfox]

A lot of people sure were getting worked up about it. Wonder if any of those people ever thought about just walking or taking a bike. But that'd be downright Unamerican, wouldn't it?\

Oh well. Their grandchildren won't have a choice in the matter.

Re:AAAaaah

[NaruVonWilkins]

Treehugger just had a great article on Prius versus Echo. It's very close - Echo uses less energy to produce, but Prius gets better gas mileage. If you drive about 7,000 miles with your Prius, you break even with the Echo. Also, less gas overall costs you less. http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/03/_less_is_m ore_p_1.php

The EV1 was over 10 years old! It's 2005 now!

[aquarian]

One thing most people seem to forget about the EV1 is that by now it's over 10 years old. It was developed in the early 90s when cars in general were much cruder than they are now. More importantly, the NiMH battery technology was still in its infancy. In fact the first EV1 had crude lead-acids. Since then, battery capacity and longevity have tripled, and cost is a fraction of what it was then. Furthemore, the EV1 was the first electric car even talked about for decades, so it was completely alien to the public. So at that time the market was a lot smaller than it would be now, simply because the public has been exposed and the idea has had time to sink in.

So before you write off battery powered cars, quit thinking like it's 1995 instead of 2005.

Getting rid of oil?

[ezweave]

I heard the story on NPR. How are electric cars going to get rid of oil, again? Or does everyone forget that plastic, nylon, polyester, (synthetic rubber), vaseline, etc, etc all come from oil?

In other words, even if we don't put it in the gas tank, the rest of the car still needs it... ahhh ignorance is both fun and filling.

I'll never buy another GM car

[Phil Karn]

From 1998 until 2003 I was the very satisfied driver of two GM EV1s: a 1997 lead-acid model and then a 1999 NiMH model. I lost my first car in the 2000 recall, and the second when my lease ended in August 2003. When I turned my car back in, I felt as though I had just euthanized a young and perfectly healthy family pet at the vet.

I've never had a car that was as much fun to drive as the EV1. They were outstanding vehicles, with excellent handling and performance. Everyone who ever rode in my car got out with a broad smile. The EV1 handily demolished the myth of the electric car as slow and impractical. Its 100-125 mile range was more than enough for my needs. I never had to go to a gas station except occasionally to top off the tires.

I even believed, for a time, that GM wanted the EV1 to succeed. But it became increasingly obvious that, despite the slick brochures and the marketing propaganda, their hearts were never in it. They'd been under pressure for years to put EVs on the road, so the EV1 became their cynical "Final Solution" to that annoying California EV mandate.

GM was taken aback by the strong response to this vehicle. They had expected and planned for a flop. They only made a few hundred in each model year, claiming that they could always make more if demand warranted. But even after the existing EV1s quickly sold out and long waiting lists formed, no more EV1s were forthcoming. Instead, they repeatedly told the California Air Resources Board (CARB), with straight faces, that there was simply no public demand for electric vehicles. Each time they said this, they were greeted with laughter and guffaws by the hundreds of EV1 enthusiasts who drove to Sacramento just for the hearings.

But GM still won. Dangling the far-off promise of fuel cells as bait, they quickly closed down the EV1 program and took cars away from hundreds of satisfied customers who would have gladly bought them. Have you noticed that we haven't heard much about fuel cells lately? That's because, as far as GM and the other automakers were concerned, fuel cells have already served their purpose -- getting rid of the ZEV mandate.

GM's action in pulling the EV1 off the market is utterly inexcusable. I will never again buy or lease a GM vehicle. This isn't much of a sacrifice on my part, as no other GM car has ever excited me very much.

some CO2 numbers

[roesti]

Here are some figures from the Australian government's Green Vehicle Guide. These are the results of a standard test and are shown on a sticker on the windscreen on new cars in Australia.

The Toyota Prius HSD uses 4.4 litres per 100 kilometres travelled, which translates to 53.46 miles per gallon, and expels 106 grams of CO2 per kilometre travelled.

Toyota Echo models with manual transmission consume about 5.8L/100km, or 40.55MPG, and expel CO2 at a rate of 138g/km. Automatic models consume about 6.5L/100km, or 36.17MPG, and expel CO2 at a rate of 156g/km. (I listed both, since you didn't specify whether your car was a manual or an auto; in general, autos use more fuel than manuals.)

By those figures, your Echo is using up between 31% and 48% more fuel than a Prius, and spitting out 30%-48% more CO2.

However, most Prius owners don't attain the fuel consumption level on the sticker. Courtesy of http://www.greenhybrid.com/, it's more realistic to say that the Prius gets about 4.9L/100km, or 48MPG. Furthermore, the CO2 emissions scale steadily with the amount of fuel used up, so it's probably emitting closer to 120g/km of CO2. This makes the comparison a bit better for the Echo, but it still uses 18%-33% more fuel and emits 15%-30% more CO2 - and it's a much smaller car than the Prius.

Though people don't achieve the standard measurement of fuel consumption on average, a conservative driver can beat the fuel consumption measurement on the sticker in just about any car. I have a Nissan Pulsar that was listed at 7.4L/100km (just under 32MPG), but I consistently get around 6.7L/100km (just over 35MPG) - about 10% better than the sticker.

Petrol-electric hybrids aren't a bust, as such, and the technology is improving. Daihatsu have a hybrid in the works that goes 60-70km on a litre of petrol - up to 1.4L/100km, or 170MPG. For the moment, hybrid cars are still superficial: they make a statement about the environment and about the future, but they're hideously expensive and they don't pay for themselves. You'd be better off buying a small car with decent fuel economy, and joining a tree-planting campaign.

Consider this, though: it is estimated that the construction of a typical car consumes 25-50 barrels of oil and pollutes 120,000 gallons (450,000 litres) of water. If you were really concerned about the environment, you probably wouldn't have a car at all.

Re:Baloney.

[boodaman]

Ford doesn't sell Model T cars or parts any longer, thus, no liability. However, the company making the parts used by people to restore old Model Ts has potential liability.

Ditto GM with the EV1. Even if the buyer were to sign a release exempting GM from liability for any problems or harm, that isn't the point. It is everyone else that GM has to worry about.

Example: say I buy an EV1. I sign a release exempting GM from liability. Time goes by, I replace a critical part in my EV1 with something I diddled together in my garage. I promptly drive it, but the part I made gives out and I end up killing someone as I crash. In this scenario GM doesn't have to worry about me...they have to worry about the family and estate of the person I killed.

I'm not saying GM would lose such a case, that's up to a jury. My point is, why bother? Why risk it? Why incur the cost? GM has enough cost problems as it is without risking more just to please 100 people.

The fact is that all EV1s were leased. This means they were always the property of GM no matter who was driving them. As such, GM can do whatever they want with them, and that's that.

Re:Another idea for disposal

[arminw]

...legal system is so far gone from any sense of sanity or morality...

A small change would fix a lot of it: Prevent the pay of a lawyer being in any way related to the outcome of the case or the amount of money at stake. Pay lawyers ONLY for their time actually worked, using a time clock, like millions of ordinary workers. It would cut down on frivolous litigation, but if someone with little or no money had a good case, their lawyer and the defendants lawyers would get their wages from the loser like any ordinary worker does for the documented time spent. No lawyer would pocket a huge percentage of the amount settled for or decreed by the courts.

Also, lawyers should be allowed to or even compelled to advertise their rates and compete with each other like other businesses. Of course since many, if not most legislators are in some way connected to the legal profession, legal reform will never take place as long as these polititians have anything to say about it. What the people may want is totally unimportant to those incumbents. A revolution at the ballot box may change the legal system. As long as we the people vote for these same, often bought and paid for elected politicians again and again, there will definitely be no reform.

My family had one of these in GA

[unlisted15]

Interesting, interesting car. I was only 10 or 12 at the time, I don't recall the details of the arrangement with GM, but we certainly weren't paying the lease price. Or any price, for that matter.

A few things stand out in my mind. The inductive charging system in particular was pretty cool. They installed a futuristic charging unit some five feet high in our garage attached to a wire and plastic paddle. Shove the paddle in a slot where the engine would traditionally be, and in a few hours we'd have a 75% charge. Impossible to electrocute yourself.

I don't agree with the poster above comparing it with a Geo. The EV1 has the second lowest drag coefficient of all time of any vehicle, and the lowest of anything mass produced. If GM removed the speed limiter (80 MPH, I think), it'd top out north of 170 MPH. There was no wind noise at any speed, nor motor noise. Slight tire noise was the sum of it.. given the craptastic rubber the Ev1 was shod in, it's no surprise that was the only sound apparent. Absolutely eerie compared to our old GMC Suburban and any car at the time, luxury of otherwise.

The dashboard was another trick feature. It was a thin digital panel that wrapped around the plastic just below the windshield. Range and battery meters, obviously, standard equipment. I could never get enough of it, I wish they'd put something similar in a traditional car.

Range on our EV1 blew. It was quick, definitely.. 0-60 in the 8s, which was nice, but regular driving wouldn't push us far beyond 45 miles. Max range would have been 75 miles or so, if we'd driven like a grandmother and were actually willing to run it to empty.. but you don't do that when there's no good way to charge away from the house. Given how badly lead-acid batteries respond to a full discharge, it wouldn't have been in the interests of the car to try it anyway.

Surprisingly however, there were a number of places with driving distance of our place that had EV1 charging stations. I question if they still exist. Doubtful.

Anyway, the EV1 was as much an engineering project for GM as anything else. In that, it was a success. When a key component of the business plan was 'incorporate awesome yet-to-be-invented technology', they couldn't have been seriously banking on it as a mass-produced alternative.

-u15

Re:No surprise, this.

[lgw]

Well, that is how you work the figures. The design cost is spead across however many vehicles you sell. If you don't sell many, it's very hard to make a profit. GM didn't come off quite so badly as these numbers would suggest, however, as the Cali government pais a massive subsidy for each one.

Car and Driver also wrote about that. For the cost of the subsidy, Car could have done several times more to improve air quality by having police officers look for the worst pollution offenders, sieze and crush those cars, and replace them with free new cars to avoid complaint.

The difference in pollution between an old beater and a new ULEV car is 10-100 times as much as the difference between a ULEV car and an electric car. Not an efficient approach to increasing air quality, but hey, it's Cali.

Re:No surprise, this.

[lgw]

The other huge problem with electric cars being widely adopted that no one seems to consider is that it would roughly double our need to geenrate and distribute power. We use a *lot* of power in vehicle engines. Getting that much additional power online and available in the home is at least a 20 year project, and would have huge transition costs.

This is one reason why hydrogen fuel cells would be an awesome technology - the existing infrastructure would be pretty close. However, practical high energy density hydrogen storage remains as elusive as practical high energy density batteries.

Cheap fusion

[DaChesserCat]

Cheap fusion already exists, and the fuel supply is expected to last millenia.

It just happens to be 93 million miles away.

Photovoltaics aren't sufficiently efficient yet to remove significant amounts of demand from the electrical grid, but PV isn't the only type of solar energy. Personally, I'd like to see a scaled-down version of Solar Two. I mean, think about a couple 3-meter heliostats (the same size as the older analog satellite TV dishes) sitting on top of your garage (or on top of a shed in the back yard; as long as it gets plenty of sunlight), focusing on some small collector on the top of the house.

A 3 meter diameter dish has about about 7 square meters of aperature. If your heliostats are about 85% efficient (you can get reflective films which do this), and the main collector/generator is 33% efficient, that's about 2 kW for each heliostat (7 sq meters * 1 kW solar energy / sq meter * 0.85 * 0.33). That's about 28% efficiency, from the surface of the heliostat to the final output. Considering the fact that most PV's (and all consumer-priced PV) are <20% efficient, that's not too bad. If your generator consists of a steam engine (Rankine or Kalina cycle) or Stirling engine, these typically product AC to begin with, so you don't have to worry about an inverter (which you will probably need with your PV, since they only produce DC).

If you use the molten salts Solar Two used, you could still get power after the sun sets (their research showed this was >95% efficient in terms of energy in vs. energy out). Alternately, you could just do net metering and knock your electric bill down.

Also, if you use the waste heat from the system to provide household heat or hot water, you get an even higher total efficiency. That aspect of it could reduce the amount of electricity you need, as well (if you have electric heat or an electric hot water heater).

That's a BS argument

[IdahoEv]

Not only that but they couldn't possibly get insurance on a vehicle who's brakes can not be replaced due to the part not being available.

Ford doesn't make replacement brakes for model T's, either. Yet people still collect, own, and yes even in some circumstances drive them.

Because there are collectors, there is a market, and *someone* makes replacement parts, even if it's a machinist down the block making them custom.

The EV1 would have made a fantastic collectible, even if it wasn't licensable as a primary driving vehicle. No court in this country would have listened to a collector trying to sue GM after his unlicensed EV1's brakes failed. GM could easily have sold them off to collectors at the very least.

Someone would have been willing to make custom replacement parts (even computerized ones) for collector's EV1's, because their existence would have made a market for it.

GM's argument is a red herring - they explicitly wanted the cars to disappear, and they aren't saying why.

Re:Toyota Prius Fuel Economy

[NuShrike]

Goto some Prius enthusiast sites, or this specific page and you'll find there something called warp stealth.

If the battery is topped off, you're coasting, and you're not going uphill, the gas engine will just spin without being fed gasoline.

Plus, technology like regenerative braking, regenerative motion (charges battery when coasting), the fact that the gas engine's output is ALWAYS split 70% (drive wheels) / 30% feed electric motor/generator, this higher efficiency setup gives you the better mileage.

You're not using extra energy to charge the batteries. You're just using the excess gas engine energy to charge when driving at a constant speed. How much HP do you need to beat down wind-resistance?

I drive ~75mph and I routinely get 47mph on the highway - and I'm just breaking it in! In high traffic situations (stop & go) which resemble city driving, I've gotten 51mpg so far; so traffic is a GOOD thing. :)

EPA's posted numbers are not realworld numbers, but EPA is inaccurate for EVERY car out there. Consider that.

AND, don't forget emissions - even if Echo gets comparable mpg, it's not a AT-PZEV vehicle where the air coming out is basically cleaner than the dirty city air going in. This is vastly more important than mpg if you care about your health longterm.

You're killing me here!

[Dolio]

What the hell are you trying to do? Kill me?

As if I weren't already awair that they just carted off the last of
the EV1's, Now I have to go over to slashdot of all places and read
all of this crazy Bull Shit. On /. God help us. we're smegin doomed.

(A Friend of mine) wrote:
> http://science.slashdot.org/science/05/03/16/19921 7.shtml?tid=126&tid=14

What the hell am I supposed to do:

- "My Echo gets 3mpg less than a Prius" (sic)
Sure it does, if you drive half the speed.

- "couldn't possibly get insurance on a vehicle who's brakes can
- "not be replaced due to the part not being available" (sic)
There's nothing wrong with the brakes, I quote "electronic brakes" ie
regen brakes via the Motor, it surely still has a duel-zone Hydralic
system and standard brake rotors and pads! ( required by law )

- "but all this does is shift the pollution elsewhere."
Tell me, Have you ever tried to drill & process oil from your back yard?
Well, It's entirely feasable to collect your own "solar" (wind, hydro,
pv) energy via the roof of your house and drive this car with ZERO oil.

- "See here [xtronics.com] for energy densities of various materials."
Yes, but an ICE only yields 20% of that energy, BEV's yield 80-90%!
BTW. Did you include to discovery, drilling, processing, and calaratal
damage (I mean cost) of the gassoline that you pump into your car?

- "According to GM, there where only 50 people committed to buying"
SIC SIC SIC That's total nonesense, even today there were at least
78 individules willing to buy them as salvaged vehicles, and GM finally
admitted that there were several thousand people on waiting lists.
They even refused to sell ONE EV1 to Jay Leno for a cool Million.
BTW. There's a 1 in 25 chance that you happen to live in a state where
these cars were "Available". I don't call that trying to sell them.

- "After about 10 minutes, a fully changed car was almost dead."
SIC SIC SIC SIC TOTAL NASTY SMELLY RUNNY GREEN BULL SHIT !
You would have to be burning off the energy at a rate near 120kW.
CONTINUOUSLY! That means you ran it up to a brick wall and then
spun the tires, HELL even that wouldn't work, you'de have to.....
I rented and drove a GEN 1 Lead-Acis version 110 miles in LA!
I also had it SOLD! in less than 3 hours! GM LIES, and the LIES MORE.

- "I wonder if they just made them inoperable (to avoid liability
- "concerns) and sold them as collectable on ebay "
Funny you should ask, all the ones that went to musiems and universities
were "severly disabled", ie:no run, prior to the donation. Empty Shells.

ONE thing is certin, GM sure as hell wants to make sure that noone who
hasn't already driven one of these cars will EVER get the chance.

L8r
Ryan

That's just silly

[Lihtan]

Sooner or later someone from out of town is going to drive through your area in a Prius. Even if the vehicles aren't sold there, it's a good idea for the fire department to familiarize themselves with the specifics of a hybrid power systems, and associated rescue procedures. This especially a good idea, as we'll be seeing more of this technology in the future.

Toyota makes publicly available, a guide detailing the operation and technical data of their hybrid power system:
http://www.toyota.com/web/vehicles/prius/safety/pr ius_erg_1.pdf,
as well as another guide specifically on emergency procedures: http://www.toyota.com/web/vehicles/prius/safety/pr ius_erg_2.pdf