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Tesla Motors Is Delivering Cars
jamie found the news that Tesla Motors is delivering roadsters in California. (We've been following developments on the Tesla front for a couple of years now.) According to a letter from the CEO, "9 production Roadsters have arrived in California, another 3 arrive this weekend, and they will keep arriving at the rate of 4 per week... In fact, currently there are 27 Roadsters in various stages of assembly." The early owners must be proud, but there could be complications.
Erm, the title has an error.
America, Home of the Brave.
..until it's ion-propelled, RADAR navigated, coming complete with a charged particle beam and a death ray as standard safety features against enemy vehicles (eg: anyone who dares to race you at the traffic lights).
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
now sergey and larry and elon have some toys to play with
What do you mean? I've seen that guy posting all the way back in 1997.
Despite any flaws, I think they're an absolute breakthrough and a sign of things to come in the next decade.
Not only do they have performance, but they also go the distance and I believe they're also astoundingly cheap. If I had a spare $100,000 laying around and they were shipping to Australia, I'd buy one in a heartbeat!
The price of carbon fibre is declining faster than predicted and battery production is ramping up in line with Toyota's ramp-up of hybrid powertain cars and GM's announcement to mass-produce an electric car so hopefully the price of batteries will come down a lot as well.
Things are definitely looking good. Now we just need to start building a bunch of nuclear power plants so they'll be ready in time for when the plug-in hybrids and pure-electric vehicles hit critical mass.
I'll believe it when they ship... wait this isn't how vaporware is supposed to work.
Next thing you know they'll be telling me that these solar panel thingys are real too.
About those alleged "Complications" ... well yes sure, if you run out of stored power then you're in trouble. However, this isn't exclusive to electric cars, but applies similarly to liquid-fueled vehicles. If you set out on a voyage of 500 miles with only 200 miles of gasoline and you can't find anywhere to refuel, then you're in trouble too. Fortunately, most people understand power and refueling constraints and know how to plan ahead.
Admittedly, electrical recharging infrastructure is almost non-existent at the moment. However, this isn't a total disaster nor an unforseen "Complication". It's thoroughly forseen, so any early adopter who can add and subtract won't be travelling further than the stored energy allows, minus a safety margin since nobody likes getting stuck. In many cases, it'll be a second car anyway, mainly for short hops around the local area and short office commutes.
But let's look at the worst case scenario as well. When the power runs out in between recharge points, will it be a total disaster? Well, it certainly will be a big annoyance, but that's where the recovery services come in. All it takes is a phone call and some waiting in the comfort of your car while you sulk at your arithmetic incompetence, but soon your vehicle will be sitting snugly on the back of the recovery truck, and remedial transport sorted out. This is normal today in the event of breakdowns, and it will be just as normal when cars go electric, both for breakdowns and for recharging mishaps. (The vehicle recovery industry will certainly boom for a few decades, until vehicle recharging infrastructure is widespread.)
So while "Complications" will exist in the short term, they're not exceptional ones. We already have similar issues today, and solutions to them as well. It's just a matter of degree. For the next few years, trips in EVs will have to be a fair bit shorter on average. We can cope with that.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
don't blame them. Blame GM, Ford, VW, BMW, PSA, Toyota. I don't find it surprising that, all of a sudden, various car-makers are developping electric cars and fuel-cell cars, ... why couldn't they do that 10 years ago? I am waiting for those a long time now.
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
It looks like the thing that has largely fixed the EV issue is the laptop computer/mobile phone - which has justified the research effort into lithium batteries.
From a volume point of view in the short term the manufacturer to watch is Mitsubishi: they have a joint venture factory with Yuasa, and last week they delivered a test sample EV to a Japanese police force (they already have them with Tokyo utilities.) The Miev may not be as large and fast as the Tesla, but it is likely actually to be affordable. $100000 will only appeal to the rich who want a status symbol, as the payback compared to (say) a Mercedes Bluemotion clean Diesel will be forever. But a $30000 commuter vehicle may well make economic sense. I could justify one right now if oil reaches $200/barrel.
In fact, there are reports that sales of the EVs currently available are very poor, presumably because people who might have bought one as a third car are spending the money on new, efficient vehicles which will show a real cost saving in a sensible payback period.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
I've always wondered (and not really seen stated anywhere) how an electric vehicle's performance varies from the point of being fully charged to fully flat. i.e. does the performance (speed, acceleration, etc.) gradually get worse as the car's charge dwindles or does it suddenly just stop when the batteries are exhausted? A petrol or diesel car performs just as well (if not better due to less weight) when the tank is almost empty. Does a Tesla that has only 5 miles worth of charge left perform like a milk-float?
They did occasionally but as long as petrol was cheap, there was not very much demand. Also, the car industry is a very conservative one which rarely tries something dramatically new. Most of them would rather wait for the competition to take the risk, and then copy the idea if it worked.
The last such attempt was Toyota releasing the Prius, which was a success. Now, various car makes have released hybrids or are working on them (which confirms the wait and copy attitude).
On the positive side, I think introducing hybrid technology is a breakthrough because it allows the industry to make progress in its traditional way of little steps. The "plug-in hybrid" is one of those: ;-)
Make the batteries larger and add a charger - nothing spectacular and risky here
C - the footgun of programming languages
In fact they don't like any form of power generation.
nuclear = [insert glowing green fluffy sheep horror stories]
fossil = [insert global meltdown story]
wind power = [insert migrating insert birds killed by blades sob fest] or [blot on lovely landscape rant]
tidal power = [insert moan about marsh habitat of less spotted wading snot gobler flooded]
Solar power = [insert some fucking rare tortoise issue]
hydro = [insert whinge about flooded valleys/woodlands/displace peasents etc etc]
You just can't win with this brainless hippies.
Because sometimes when they try something new and exciting they get the Edsel
Virginia is for lovers. EVE is for griefers.
One simple solution: Built-in tesla attack coil.
The SUV wouldn't stand a chance.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
Big Oil has been buying and burying patents for 50 years. So the "why haven't we seen cheap, ultra-efficient cars?" question is answered by, "BIG OIL wants it that way."
TANSTAAFL GIGO Acronyms to live by!
The charging plug has been standardized. Its likely one of the reasons why the EV-1 was killed off. GM used an inductive paddle style charger "plug", while the standard that was eventually agreed on uses a more traditional conductive charger. Its a moot point though since the car will have the option to charge on standard household 120V outlets (albeit at slower charging rates).
You could say the same for any roadster.
which is totally what she said
Prove it. Find 5 patents that are owned by "Big Oil". Also, define "Big Oil".
http://www.uspto.gov/patft/index.html
-- Humans, because the hardware IS the software.
So now that we all want to switch to an electric car, I have to ask, how much more efficient is an electric car and also, roughly how much would one reduce my CO2 output?
According to the company website, if you extract a megajoule of natural gas (a major source of electricity) out of the ground, convert it to electricity, transmit it over the grid to your Tesla, you can travel well over 1 km. A VW Diesel rabbit ( a very small, efficient car) can get you a bit less than half a km on a Mj. So, this car is much more efficient if you are talking about moving a single person a km. You can probably squeeze four people into the VW, which would be approximately as efficient per passenger mile as this car with two persons in it. If you're driving anything that gets less than 30mpg, you'll probably need to have five or more people in the car before you can effectively counter the Tesla motor driver's smugness.
With respect to CO2, according to the company web site, California gets over 40% of its electricity from sources with no net CO2 emission. If you are traveling on long trips on uncongested highways, you'll probably get some net CO2 reductions, but not as much as if you take trips that are inefficient for ICE, such as city travel or travel on congested roads. Short of bicycling or taking public transportation (heaven forbid), you'd be hard pressed to cut down your personal CO2 per mile more.
The "sweeping emissions under the carpet" argument is correct in stating that electric car emissions aren't zero, but it's wishful (???) thinking that electric vehicles emit more net pollution than ICE cars -- even extremely efficient ICE cars. Unfortunately (???) the $100,000 grapes are not sour in this case.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Didn't Boeing say they won't be testing carbon fiber wings to the point of failure because they'd need to call in the hazmat team? Is this the same type of problem we'll see when carbon fiber vehicles crash? I'm just asking.
This can easily be proven, since one of the companies has even gone so far as to name themselves Shell.
This guy's the limit!
Patents are public informsation...
Find 5 patents that would have led to ultra efficient cars and aren't being used.
If "Big Oil" has been buying up patents for 50 years than we have at least 30 years of inventions no longer under patent protection...where are those inventions?
The reality is that while Oil companies probably have tried to squash some tech, the basic laws of thermodynamics suggest that internal combustion engines are about as efficient as they are going to get.
Battery tech is also progressing very quickly (Microsoft, IBM etc are pushing for better batteries and can compete with oil companies) however most of the really efficient and high power batteries are due to nano-type materials, ultra pure processing and extremely fine manufacturing controls. Until very recently these techniques were impossible to test and those that were testable were prohibitively expensive to produce.
If you want to claim a conspiracy, you must offer some proof.
"If "everybody knows" such-and-such, then it ain't so, by at least ten thousand to one."
Robert Heinlein.
Now, care to exercise your brain and provide a few facts, or will you continue being a conspiracy theory slacker? Does Big Oil control China and India? Do you really feel (notice I didn't write "think") that those nations would hold off deploying superior technologies if it gave them a competitive edge?
"I improvise. It's my greatest talent. I prefer situations to plans..." --Wintermute, William Gibson's "Neuromancer"
You must be new here? On /. there are three rules about postings.
1. You do NOT have to RTFA to know what it says.
2. It's all GWBs fault.
3. There is always a conspiracy to screw us out of something if the topic involves BigOi, the U.S. Government or the Military.
That solves the range problem now until batteries get better, especially for any theoretical cheaper all electrics. They need to get the 50 mile range much cheaper commuter cars out there now, then the generator trailer option for trips-plus handy to have said generator around the house. And the generator could be run on home made biodiesel for that matter.
If the batteries in these cars last as long as my laptop batteries have, the owners are in for some serious disappointment.
The problem with your laptop batteries is due to the fact that they haven't been looked after properly. In order to get serious lifetime out of li-ions, you need to keep them cool. The battery pack in a Tesla is air-conditioned. The battery pack in your laptop is slung right next to a ridiculously hot CPU and hard drive, and has almost zero airflow.
BS... just last week I was reading an analysis on new tech being developed by Nissan along with Ford and a few others, a Variable Compression Ratio (VCR) system.
This tech would would dramatically improve the performance of turbo charged engines not just in terms of power output but also in terms of fuel effective, and it would make the engine run much much smoother.
I guess I don't understand how combustion engines are supposedly tapped out. Keep in mind that most of the engine's performance characteristics are still very much mechanical and are basically "hard coded" for a good median of power output and fuel economy since they don't have the technology to dynamically change the characteristics when one is needed over the other.
Even Variable Valve Timing is in it's infancy and the current methods for that are crude at best, there are alternative methods under development that could theoretically give you a Corvette when you stuff your foot into it and a Prius when you're just cruising on the highway or around town.
Even the engineering techniques are just starting to get interesting... engines developed completely new in the last decade mark the first engines completely prototyped in a virtual environment as opposed to the old method of just building something similar to what's been done before and making slight improvements through real world testing. Chevy's LS series motor (found in the late 90s Camaro, Firebird, and Corvettes) marks one of the first of such motors and with a 6-speed sees an impressive 31MPG with 330HP. And even over the last decade they've been able to make small tweaks to that power plant in terms of both power output and fuel economy. And there's still a world of possibilities that can be done to improve things still.
In short... If you're just looking at the explosion in the chamber and the resulting torque then yes, combustion engines are already "pretty good" in terms of effency. However that neglects the fact that conditions change mili-second to mili-second in terms of air-pressure, air-temperature, load on the engine, and numerous other things. Engines aren't dynamic enough to work as good as they could in every possible scenario so they're built for a best average across the board.
Collector's Edition
Guess what? I knew someone that bought an electric car back in I think 72!
Don't blame the car makers blame physics and customers.
The reason that liquid hydrocarbon fuels have been so popular for cars is because they are a great solution for powering cars.
Build an electric car that can take four people and luggage 300 miles on charge. Oh and the recharge time has to be five minutes, battery life has to be 150,000 miles and the cost? Under $20,000. That is what it would take to be a better car then a Mazda 3.
The real problem has nothing to do with the auto companies. It has everything to do with us.
People bought giant SUVs and Pickups just for style and the fact they felt safer. Everybody thought I was nuts because I actually like smaller cars. I don't have kids yet and I think smaller cars are more fun to drive.
Companies work on the premise that you should give the customer what they want. We wanted big SUVs and trucks and not small cars and minivans.
Now customers want more fuel efficient vehicles. It takes a while to make the change.
Now what I find funny is that back in 84 a car that went 0-60 under 10 seconds was quick.
Now that is considered slow.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
You have a good suggestion, but I think it would pose complications too. For example, say a vehicle has a worn out or defective battery that barely holds a charge? A less than honest driver could "unload" the bad battery, getting a free upgrade to a good one, just by dropping by the "charging station".
Conversely, the recipient of the dud battery would be inconvenienced, angered, and might even go as far as filing a suit against the charging station - claiming they owe him/her a new battery.
(Granted, your proposal of having microprocessors on the batteries would *theoretically* offer a solution to this dilemma. A station could refuse to swap a battery that was "out of spec" without paying a fee. But how long do you think it'd be before someone programs false values into the chip to cheat the system? We do it now with ink cartridge refills for printers as a matter of course!
If you can cruise at 2hp you're driving a moped, and an efficient one at that. For an American car with a "normal" drag coefficient, cruising at 65mph requires around 20–30kw (~25–40hp). And the reason an elevator can use such a small motor is because it has a counterweight balancing the load.
The Tesla is very lightweight, and has a low drag coefficient, so I'd expect it to use as little as 10kw (~12–15hp) cruising at 65mph. Which is still very good, on par with a small riding mower or dirt bike, but you sure won't find a 10KW generator the size of a house cat.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
But if you wanted to actually build such a device, you'd still have to license the patent that your patent improved on.
*sigh* back to work...
Who killed the electric car?
simple, fast homepage with your links: http://www.ngumbi.com/
The battery makers...While people who didn't have to buy them LOVED them, anyone who was forced to pay for them balked (with a very low percentage of exceptions).
The batteries were to expensive and gas was too cheap. Plus the range was still low.
Now things are much different...batteries are MUCH cheaper, gas is Much more expensive and the range is getting comparable.
While I do believe that there is some truth to this. I think a lot of it has to do with how inexpensive gasoline has been in the past. Even now, at near $5 a gallon, Hybrids don't really save you money. So a Hybrid, when gasoline was $1 a gallon would have not been economically viable to the consumer.
Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
Prove it. Find 5 patents that are owned by "Big Oil". Also, define "Big Oil".
Okay, Big Oil should be pretty easy. From this wikipedia page, you'll get ExxonMobile, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and Total S.A. And they don't register these patents under their own names- they use subsidiaries. For example, Chevron owns Cobasys, a NiMH battery maker.
5 Patents? Hell, I can find you at least 40.
Do I get a cookie?
Sigs are for losers
Hmm,
I'm surprised folks are missing one important point about this car. Let's say you're rich and you want to buy a supercar. Most gas powered supercars use huge amounts of gas. After all they're not designed to save fuel. They're designed to go fast. This thing is an electric and generally very efficient so right away you've helped the environment there by not burning huge amounts of gas. At $100,000 the price is cheaper than most high end sports cars and being rare that will look good too. Sure it doesn't have much range but how often do you take your car on cross-country trips. Hell if you're rich, how often would you seriously want to spend hours driving across country versus taking a plane? It's range is great for most normal commutes in the city. It's also very likely highly reliable too being that it has very few parts. So yes, this isn't your common man's car but for the rich or enthusiast this seems like a good idea.
I can give you 125 examples.
According to Wikipedia, Cobasys and ECD Ovonics hold 125 patents for battery technology, particularly NiMH battery technology. They produced the batteries that powered the ill fated EV1. In 2001, Texaco (now Chevron) bought Cobasys. Since then, they have refused to sell automotive batteries or license the technology to smaller players. Since the big players were not interested in electric cars (perhaps because of influence from Big Oil), this effectively killed electric cars.
They have also actively used their patents to prevent others from selling NiMH batteries for automotive purposes in the US. In 2001, same year as they were bought by Texaco, they sued Panasonic EV Energy for patent infringement. The results were that Panasonic is restricted from selling commercial quantities of some batteries in the North American market until 2010.
A lot of the comments here resemble the same kind of skeptical remarks that were made when the first automobiles came out. They were outrageously expensive. They got flat tires constantly. You almost needed to keep a team of horses on retainer to drag the thing home after one of the innumerable breakdowns. Et cetera. Et cetera.
No new technology leaps full-blown into existence without glitches, screw-ups and mistakes (yes, I know about the 100-year-old electrics, but a lot has changed). They're part of the territory, especially where a complete changeover in something as basic as personal transportation is concerned. What's needed is the vision and will to change, and the guts to persevere through inevitable problems to something that works. That's what seems to be missing these days.
I wonder what the smog situation would look like in a city where most two-car families included an electric for local jaunts and basic running around, and a regular car for longer trips? I recall seeing many parking lots with electrical outlets available at each space for block heaters, back when cold weather presented a starting problem for regular cars. Perhaps they might appear again to serve next-generation electrics. I have no idea what shape the actual solutions will take, but I'm quite confident that solutions would be found, once a decision is made to move away from gasoline-powered vehicles.
I'm certain of one thing: as long as those with a vested interest in the status quo are allowed to present every mistake as a disaster, every bump in the road as an insurmountable mountain, nothing will be accomplished.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
From wikipedia, on the toyota EV (based on the rav4) that was scrapped somewhere in 2003. Would need to validate the sources.
Whether or not Toyota wanted to continue production, it was unlikely to be able to do so, because the EV-95 battery was no longer available. Chevron had inherited control of the worldwide patent rights for the NiMH EV-95 battery when it merged with Texaco, which had purchased them from General Motors. Chevron's unit won a $30,000,000 settlement from Toyota and Panasonic, and the production line for the large NiMH batteries was closed down and dismantled. Only smaller NiMH batteries, incapable of powering an electric vehicle or plugging in, are currently allowed by Chevron-Texaco.
I cant name 5 patents but I CAN name one very important one. Try making and selling Nickel Metal Hydride batteries suitable for electric cars and see how far you get. You will likely be sued by a company you haven't heard of called Cobasys for violation of their patent on NiMH battery tech. What the lawyers probably WONT tell you is that Cobasys (and the NiMH battery patent) is actually controlled by Chevron (not the largest oil company but big enough).
Chevron makes a lot of noise about how they aren't just an oil company any more, they are an "energy company" but all the work they are doing is just replacing one fuel source (crude oil) with another fuel source (hydrogen, tar sands, oil shale, coal liquefaction/gasification, gas-to-liquids etc)
Big Oil doesn't care if its gasoline, diesel, LPG, natural gas, corn ethanol, biodiesel, hydrogen, liquid coal or whatever else. They just care that the worlds cars continue to run on fuel of some kind (fuel that they can continue to sell from their station forecourts). Plug-in vehicles threaten that monopoly as the provider of the source of energy for our cars.
That $55K is NOT in addition to the $109K, It's a deposit.
Every other electric or hybrid till now is just plain fugly....Prius for example, I rest my case.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Am I the only one here who realizes that NiMH batteries suck? Lithium Ion and Lithium Polymer have a MUCH better density and cycle life, not to mention being lighter. When was the last time you saw a NiMH battery in a cellular phone or laptop? 1999? I don't even run them in my radio control cars anymore, LiPo has 4 times the run time and 2x the "punch". NiMH sucks, you know, scientifically speaking.
Just another ignorant American.
People bought giant SUVs and Pickups just for style and the fact they felt safer.
Actually, I have a pickup truck to haul things that won't fit in the trunk or on top of a car, or if they do would damage the paint job. (Try putting a load of 2X4s or a cubic yard of topsoil in your car). Also, my wife drives it when we get standing water in the streets during bad rain storms (her minivan has a tendency to stall in wet conditions).
I take the bus to work - but I won't give up my truck because it has come in handy over the years for various projects. (it is 6 years old)
It mostly sits in the driveway - but what I save riding the bus more than pays to keep the tank full for when we do need it.
If they made a cost effective electric or hydrogen powered pickup truck that could do all that - then I would buy it. Right now the exotic fuel vehicles are pointed toward a) commuters, b) high end sports car collectors. When they make a truck that I can afford - give me a call.
Most generalizations are not a complete representation of reality.
Lodragan Draoidh
The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
Debunked.
cant name 5 patents but I CAN name one very important one. Try making and selling Nickel Metal Hydride batteries suitable for electric cars and see how far you get.
You mean like the large-format NiMHs in the Vectrix scooters?
You will likely be sued by a company you haven't heard of called Cobasys for violation of their patent on NiMH battery tech.
Cobasys has repeatedly made it clear that they will deal in large orders for large format NiMH, but not small orders. There haven't exactly been people lining up around the block wanting large orders of large-format NiMHs, however. It's old tech, inferior in about a dozen different ways to the modern automotive li-ions.
FYI, Cobasys only holds the patent rights on said large format NiMHs in the US, not internationally. Oh, and they've cross-licensed their patent portfolios with PEVE (who they initially sued for making NiMHs for sale in the US without paying them); PEVE now has the right to make large format NiMHs for sale in the US. The fact that they haven't should speak volumes for the demand of said batteries.
NiMH was top of the line tech back during the original CARB ZEV mandate. It no longer is.
No, she's fine. My associate is vomiting for a totally unrelated reason.
that your reply was perfect in demonstrating the OPs case don't you.
That point is, you can't make all people happy but we are nearly stuck simply because with the current court system we might actually have to.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I own an LS based engine. Let me tell you, I stuff my foot in it daily. The cars got 120,000 mi of this kind of driving. The engine performs almost as perfect as day 1. The only maintenance it gets is synthetic oil changes. 5-30 all the time. (in fact, I slid through a roundabout destroying a Mustang GT convertable of the same year this AM)
Lets not forget too though, that we blow a metric shitload of energy out the tailpipe in the form of heat. Making that heat useful by turning some sort of thermal powered device. A steam alternator + electric waterpump & AC could give us back over 20 hp + better fuel economy, less drag on the engine, and lower idling speed.
Lets also not forget about the story of the six stroke engine. The one that uses water in the 5th stroke to cool the cylinder about doubled the power & economy of a standard 4 stroke engine. And it was carbeurated.
We are on the cusp of a revolution w/ engine tech. We are unfortunately also on the cusp of peak oil. How will we know when we hit peak oil? The day we drill ANWR & American coasts we'll have hit peak. We're about 8 years out though I think.
8 years is not that long, but of course, I am pulling a number from where usually only 2's come from.
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
Exactly. GM was busily working to undermine and kill off the CARB mandate as fast as they could. The fact that they sold off their battery rights should speak volumes to how much they actually wanted to be in the business of building EVs. They had already shut down the lines at that point.
GM never wanted to be building EVs, and was all to happy to ditch the program and shuttle it down into the memory hole, only bringing it up in passing to spin it as a "failure" so that they wouldn't be pushed into doing it again. Their timing was impeccable... impeccably bad. Whether it's fears of global warming, fears of "running out of oil", high gas prices, a distaste for shipping oil overseas, a strengthening green movement, rapidly advancing battery tech, or just outright trends, virtually everything has been moving in the direction of EVs and PHEVs. And with hybrids reaching US shores from Japanese automakers, GM ensured that they had the worst image possible as they steadily lost market share from falling SUV sales.
Such horrible management.
No, she's fine. My associate is vomiting for a totally unrelated reason.
10 years ago, car manufacturers didn't have access to cheap Lithium Ion batteries
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The most used Lithium Ion chemistry uses LiCoO2 cathodes. Disadvantages:
- Price (Cobalt is relatively rare and expensive). Acceptable for a notebook, not so good for a car that needs 500 times the capacity.
- Aging (will lose capacity even if unused, so you might have to buy new batteries halfway through the life of your car).
- can blow up when overheating or due to faults in manufacturing, see Sony laptop batteries...
Now there are some very interesting new developments in Lithium Ion technology, see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_ion#Improvements_to_Lithium_Ion_Battery_Technology
I guess one or more of those will end up making large Lithium Ion batteries a lot more attractive than NiMH. Right now some companies use these for battery tools and scooters (Segway), but the big breakthrough is yet to come.
C - the footgun of programming languages
I just did, and I did not find 2-3 months. I found this:
Honda Civic Hybrid, 4.8 years, $2,803 premium over Civic LX;
Mercury Mariner Hybrid, 6.4 years, $4,904 premium over standard Mariner;
Lexus' V-6 powered RX 400h hybrid SUV, 6.4 years, $4,407 premium over conventional V-6
powered RX350;
Saturn Vue Greenline, 7.1 years, $4,770 over Vue XE;
Ford Escape Hybrid, 7.3 years, $4,161 over Escape XLT;
V-6 Lexus GS450h, 7.7 years, $2,722 over V-8 powered GS460
http://blogs.edmunds.com/greencaradvisor/2008/05/soaring-gas-prices-shrink-hybrid-payback-period-boost-small-car-sales-and-sink-big-trucks.html
,br> Maybe you could do me a favor and point to a source that says 2 to 3 months?
Granted, I did not take into account the Tax Credits,
Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"If you can burn oil to produce electricity to load a battery to turn an axle with a given efficiency then you can burn oil to turn an axle more efficiently. That's a simple fact."
Not true and/or true but irrelevant. Power plants and car engines are totally different, and, not surprisingly, power plants are much more efficient than your car engine. Power plants use efficient multi-stage steam turbines or which operate at near ideal conditions most of the time. Your car engine on the other hand needs to warm up to operating temperature when you first start it, accelerate, decelerate, idle at stop lights etc. An automobile engine has a theoretical maximum efficiency of 37%, and in the real world average about 20%. A thermal power plant can be as high as 60% efficient, and average is usually near maximum. Electric cars don't consume energy when stopped at a light, and with regen braking, can gain back some of the energy use to accelerate when they have to decelerate.
Bottom line, when you take into account all factors, including distribution losses and battery/charger losses, the electric car still produces about 1/2 the pollution of a gasoline powered car.
None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.