Slashdot Mirror
The Lightning Hybrid and the Inizio EV
Mike writes "With auto show season hitting its stride, there's no shortage of incredible prototypes on display. First up is a brand new 100-mpg supercar by Lighting Hybrids. The biodiesel-fueled vehicle has its sights set on the automotive X prize and uses a hydraulic compression system to store energy from regenerative braking. Next, the Liv Inizio, a sleek fully-electric roadster that boasts a scorching top-speed of 150 mph and a 200-mile range, placing it in direct competition with the Tesla roadster."
Just to point out: 'biodiesel' = 'diesel'
i sill dont understand whats so great about biodiesel?
i mean we burn our crops in our cars instead of using the fields to harvest food for people who are starving
You can't grow oil.
And who says we need to be burning food crops?
The guys at this forum have already done many projects similar to this at a fraction of the cost. I guess for a sports car, the cost is about right, but not everyone needs to do 150 mph. Sometimes people just want to the take the family and friends out to dinner, doesn't look like you'll fit more than a few people in most of those. It's still cool though that more are interested in building electric hot rods instead of the ICE counterparts.
Find a lot of the pioneers in the forum below.
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/
(Edit: ICE = Internal Combustion Engine)
How about a cheap, regular electric car I can drive every day instead of overpriced sports models? I am no car fan, I sometimes use a car to drive my ass and my bicycle from point A to point B, and I see no reason whatsoever to spend on a car that can do stuff I don't need.
Get me something moderately fast, reliable, not really ugly and reasonably priced that I can plug ... and drive.
... because distributing your pollution across the environment over 10+ years is much better than having a single contained and recyclable problem after 10+ years are up, right?
Yea, because excess corn in the US finds its way into the mouths of starving Africans.
The food shortage myth is propagated by oil companies so that whenever someone talks about a carbon cycle neutral crop alternative to fossil fuels, they can say "but think of the poor starving people!".If you want to know what big oil thinks about starving people go have a look at Shell's history of dealing with Nigerian villages, or Chevron's dealings with Ecuadorian natives. Big oil's obnoxious effort to feign concern over the welfare of the poverty stricken makes me sick.
The only reason food crops (such as corn, which is horribly inefficient as a fuel crop) are used is due to the insane subsidies that the US government offers them. Of course, the US government would never subsidize proper fuel crops such as rapeseed, flax or linseed because that would step on the toes of big oil.
So cut it out with the "think of the poor starving masses" rubbish please, it's so obviously a load of BS.
I hate printers.
I have a virtual bridge I'd like to sell all their customers.
Also the slashdot article should read future tense ("will use" and "will boast" instead of "uses" and "boasts"), as all we've seen so far are videos of a prototype (with no airbags, carbon fiber body and 6 figure price tag) and some pretty 3d models.
Please wake me, when they start building family cars at affordable prices...
Lots of private companies have tried to build electric and other high mileage cars, most never succeed.
Several years ago I was closely following a company called ZAP(zero auto pollution). They promised MANY nice affordable electric cars. None have made it or been sold in USA, except one called the Zebra. The one I wanted was call an Obvio.Here is an Article about some of the ZAP stuff. http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/03/the-zap-x-and-a.html
I think its great that innovative people are trying, and we should help them somehow without getting scammed. Because the truth is most models will never see the general public.
The only reason food crops (such as corn, which is horribly inefficient as a fuel crop) are used is due to the insane subsidies that the US government offers them. Of course, the US government would never subsidize proper fuel crops such as rapeseed, flax or linseed because that would step on the toes of big oil.
I don't think big oil is the problem. I think it's more about keeping the corn farmers happy.
Is it really that difficult for a corn grower to move some or all of their production from corn to rapeseed/flax/linseed/ whatever crop is best for bio-diesel? IANAF, so serious question how difficult(expensive) would it be?
I am not a farmer either, well, not a professional one anyway. I do have one hell of tomato crop starting this year. Anyway, the areas that are ideal for growing corn may not be ideal for growing rapeseed/flax/linseed. You also have to consider the millions in investments (per farmer!) in equipment that is proprietary to corn farming like harvesters and such, that will become worthless if the farmers start growing switchgrass.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
This argument assumes at least two things:
1) That arable land is used for growing biofuel crops instead of food crops. There are many biofuel crops that will grow on land unsuitable for food crops.
and
2) That all arable land is used for growing food. The US has so much food growing capacity we actually pay farmers to NOT grow anything, since the abundant supply would ruin the value of the crops.
I'm sure there are other glaring holes in your argument but that's what immediately comes to mind.
=Smidge=
Feel free to stop glad-handing yourself anytime. 7000 Calories (That's 2 pounds of pure fat, you pretty much can't digest anything more energy dense than that) is equivalent to (just under) 0.21 gallons of gasoline. That ends up being about 1.3 pounds of the stuff. So using the 10:1, that's 13 pounds (or about 2 gallons) of gasoline that went into feeding you 7000 Calories of fat. If you use a more reasonable number that includes water weight and non-fat foods, you are going to get something less than a gallon of gasoline (a gallon of diesel has more energy than a gallon of gasoline, so it would be even less diesel).
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
What you appear to miss is that the US offshores everything it can and so you end up with Brazilian rainforest cut down to grow crops for US bio-diesel, and existing third world subsistence farmers switching to bio-diesel crops because they are worth more money in exports than local market produce would bring. Meanwhile, YOUR farmers are still getting subsidies on excess corn production because that's the way it is.