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First Algae Car Attempts To Cross the US On 25 Gallons of Fuel
Mike writes "San Francisco recently saw the unveiling of the world's first algae fuel-powered vehicle, dubbed the Algaeus. The plug-in hybrid car, which is a Prius tricked out with a nickel metal hydride battery and a plug, runs on green crude from Sapphire Energy — no modifications to the gasoline engine necessary. The set-up is so effective, according to FUEL producer Rebecca Harrell, that the Algaeus can cross the US on approximately 25 gallons of fuel — a figure which is currently being tested on a coast-to-coast road trip."
When they factor in or go without the gallons of oil, pounds of coal, cubic feet of natural gas, amount of uranium or other fissile fuel, wind turbine hours, and other electric generation measures, then I'll get excited. Until then the 25 gallons is a bit misleading, sort of like the volt's 240mpg. Either that or I'll forgo the above if you give me a dollar amount in electricity donated, borrowed, bought, or rented along the way.
...if you rtfa..., guess a full algae-driven car isn't feasible yet.
TFA says the car is running on a 5% mix Algae, with the rest being gasoline. What exactly does this prove, apart from being a marketing stunt?
If anyone has better knowledge on what just 5% of this fuel can change to the overall MPG rating, I'd be glad to hear about it, but call me sceptical about the whole claim.
...of whale oil, since it's actually using gasoline, not whale oil, as its fuel. But, hey, whale oil is fuel, and I don't need more than two gallons of it, so my claim is exactly as well-founded as theirs.
Plug-in hybrids are a great idea. But stop already with the stupid and misleading claims about "gas mileage" based on getting most of your energy from the grid.
Back to the MPG debate when dealing with electric/hybrid vehicles. Any time one take electricity from the grid, which this car does through the plug, that energy is not counted in the MPG. This makes MPG rating suspect at best. It also merely shifts the carbon load to the electricity plants rather then the vehicle causing the carbon footprint to be distorted.
I just noticed that the past paragraph states "Algaeus only runs on a 5% blend of algae fuel". Basically only 1.25 gallons of algae fuel will be used. The rest of the energy will come from conventional fossil fuels and the electrical grid. Not much of a big advancement.
750$ dollars of Gas. But I still have to connect to the grid when I stop every time. Haven't found a gravity fed gas dispenser yet.
The Navy Motto "IF it ain't broke Fix It" "A day is wasted if you don't learn something new"
It says no modifications to the gasoline engine necessary.
It could just as easily be an Exxon Mobile car. Or a Chevron car.
I guess the point is to try to draw attention to algae fuel extraction technology, but it's a bit misleading.
One of their distortions depends on having the battery to store most of the energy they will be using to power the vehicle.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
I don't know what they are saying in this article.
:') Or is that 25 gallon just a number? (Just like that previous electric car add about some car driving 1/100)
They speak of 25 gallon to get from coast to coast. Coast to coast is about 3000 miles (google earth tells me).
A regular 25 gallons of diesel would get you to about 750 miles?
So i was thinking: yeah good deal!
Then further on in the article they say that only 5% of the fuel is algae fuel.
Then what do they mean with the 25 gallon thing? Is 25 gallon 5% of the entire fuel used to get from coast to coast? In that case, i guess you're far better off with running regular fuel
What did i miss?
Come on guys! A single look at the website shows that this is a marketing stunt. It seems to me that there are quite a few "green" sites that are completely misleading.
Currently I am very suspicious of over-engineered websites like these. I remember the site of ThinFilm. Brilliant to look at, technically very interesting and technologically completely misleading (oh, the capacity that they could reach!). Now their main applications seem to be kids toys and RFID for which they are planning to use a few hundred bits.
You seem to think that a Prius runs either on the gas motor OR the electric motor (but not both).
If you watch the display on a Prius at highway speed (gas motor running), the electric motor / generator / battery are being used in one way or another almost all the time. If they were just useless weight, a Prius would get mileage similar to a typical gas car. In reality, it gets much better mileage and has rather good highway performance. I drive 100 miles roundtrip to work every day and average about 50 mpg at 65 mph, driving "normally" (no concessions for the sake of mileage). Passing acceleration (50 up to 75-80) is surprisingly good because both the gas and electric are combined.
Most folks would take a highway, where the electric motor and battery do not get used at all-- they're just useless weight.
Not how it works at all. The electric motor in my Prius works at all speeds. It contributes to the drive chain when it makes sense to do so regardless of the speed. If I take my foot off the gas at 65mph the car coasts and the motor runs in reverse as a generator and charges the batteries. If I lightly rest my foot on the gas the gasoline motor stays off and the electric has enough torque to maintain speed. Until I hit an incline or need to accelerate, then the gas will pop on. Under most conditions if you watch the Energy display screen, you can see both the gas motor and the electric drive contributing at the same time.
The whole system is pretty dynamic. It's not like there is a kill switch on the motors at 30mph.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
I ran a car with about 5% piss in the gas tank. Long story, but yeah 5% is nothing to brag about when it comes to fuel additives. When they can use a 15% blend and beat ethanol in efficiency (meaning MPG/KPH) then we will talk. Until then the algae has a long way to go.
Everyone with all these wonderful plans to get the "Happy Motoring" era happy again with 100+ MPG vehicles is conveniently forgetting that it will take a HUGE amount of money to convert the VAST fleet of current BFACs (big f'ing American cars) to anything resembling a 100+ MPG fleet of vehicles.
This is money that we don't have. We have (you may recall) pissed away 3 trillion dollars on the PEW (permanent endles worthless war) so far and it's still at PEW status. We have bankrupted the middle-class on a bogus housing bubble to the point where half the houses built and sold in the past ten years are 'underwater'. We have maxed out our credit cards and destroyed the major banks to the point where they required two seperate 760 billion dollar 'bailouts' in a single year. We have no realistic health care system at a point where a 100 million people born between 1945 and 1970 are nearing retirement. Our totally corporately-owned corrupt government runs up a trillion dollars of deficit every fucking year. And the rest of the world is talking behind our backs about not continuing to buy our Ponzi Federal Reserve bonds.
Not only are we out of money, we are out of money with 100 million stupid and obese self-entitled citizens. And all this is happening when we face Peak Oil and global warming environmental transformation. And when the number of $1 a day people in the 'never-to-be-developing' world are increasing their population from 4 to 8 billion in 30 years.
There isn't going to be any great new 'Apollo' or 'Manhattan' project to deal with these problems. No one seems to realize this, ESPECIALLY here at Slashdot, but there is no more fucking money . Over the next ten years, critical systems for economic growth are continute to shut down, one by one. It's not going to be easy, or pretty, or fair. And as a member of the technological elite, it's going to really piss you off because you know that we could be doing so much, if only...
Start thinking like this and stop thinking about giant government projects and Mars Landing and all that other 20th century fantasy and you will be around to play with your grandchildren. And please don't mod me down to -1 because my rational discussions bum you out. If I bother you, reply here as to exactly why I'm wrong. Believe me, I do want to be wrong about all this. But I have this bad feeling...
The truly exciting thing here is that it's yet another 'green' innovation brought to you by the private free market. Just like the Prius itself, this was the result of a business listening to its customers and responding to a demand. It was not brought about by government mandate or fiat. People roll their eyes when you talk about the wonder of the free market, unaware of its massive and beneficial daily impact on their lives. This is why you have to fight to keep it.
>>>We have no realistic health care system at a point where a 100 million people born between 1945 and 1970 are nearing retirement.
What are you talking about? We have Medicare and Medicaid for these retirees so they will be covered by the government. We also have SCHIP for the children. In total there are only 8 million citizens without either private or government health insurancee. (Note I said citizens.) I wish people would stop exaggerating the health problem. It needs tweaking but it's not that bad overall.
>>>the rest of the world is talking behind our backs about not continuing to buy our Ponzi Federal Reserve bonds.
Now THIS is a serious problem. I've actually considered investing my wealth in Chinese stock since they have a manufacturing industry, and carry no debt. I'm thinking my wealth is safer in Chinese Index Fund rather than an S&P500 fund.
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