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Volkswagen To Build Electric Versions of All 300 Models By 2030 (bloomberg.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Volkswagen AG Chief Executive Officer Matthias Mueller announced sweeping plans to build electric versions of all 300 models in the group's lineup as the world's largest automaker accelerates the shift away from combustion engines and tries to draw a line under the emissions-cheating scandal. Speaking on the eve of the Frankfurt auto show, the CEO laid out the enormity of the task ahead, vowing to spend 20 billion euros ($24 billion) to develop and bring the models to market by 2030 and promising to plow another 50 billion euros into the batteries needed to power the cars. Volkswagen is throwing the fire power of its 12 brands behind the push, aiming to catch up with the likes of Tesla Inc. and transform from a battery-vehicle laggard into a leader. Underscoring the enormity of the shift taking place in the industry, Mueller said VW will need the equivalent of at least four gigafactories for battery cells by 2025 just to meet its own vehicle production. At 50 billion euros, the CEO announced one of the largest tenders in the industry's history for the procurement of batteries. By 2025, VW aims to have 50 purely battery-powered vehicles and 30 hybrid models in its lineup, with a goal of selling as many as 3 million purely battery-powered cars by then. The transformation will pick up speed after that to reach the 2030 goal as economies of scale and better infrastructure help bring down prices and accelerate sales.

168 comments

  1. They're gonna be great... by ckatko · · Score: 2, Funny

    ...but by 2040 we're going to find out those plumes of black smoke coming out of the electric cars weren't actually delicious all-nature chocolate powder.

    1. Re:They're gonna be great... by Racemaniac · · Score: 1

      what we do however already know is that even if all cars in a dense city would be electric, it'd still be too polluting as a significant part of the polluting particles in the air are from the tires of the cars...
      who's going to invent us some clean tires? :)

    2. Re:They're gonna be great... by shilly · · Score: 1

      EVs address two of three significant sources of particulates from automobiles:
      1. Tailpipe -- cut to zero either by displacement to power stations or complete removal through use of renewables
      2. Brakes -- cut substantially due to use of regenerative braking
      3. Tires -- still an issue

      Two out of three is better than none out of three. And yes, we need cleaner tires. But I still look forward to the day when that is the only remaining problem to address

    3. Re:They're gonna be great... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Unfortunately, tyre and road wear for electric ars are substantially higher due to their much higher mass.

    4. Re:They're gonna be great... by shilly · · Score: 1

      Let's break this down, shall we? You've got three assertions in there, two explicit and one implicit:
      1. Electric cars have much higher mass than other cars
      2. That leads to higher tyre and road wear
      3. Tyre and road wear really matters

      1. Ain't necessarily so. A Tesla Model X is 2300kg, a Land Rover Discovery is 3200kg. A Renault Zoe is heavier than a Renault Clio (1500kg vs 990kg), but obviously both are waaaay lighter than any SUV.
      2. Obviously, for any one car, the heavier it is, the more tyre and road wear -- but only if you keep all other factors constant. And you don't -- people drive electric cars differently. Specifically, they drive gently to get decent range. That reduces tyre wear. There may be other important effects too, such as a shift to smaller cars. We don't know yet.
      3. It's an important source of particulates, but I can't find any evidence of exactly how important compared to other sources. Can you?

  2. Okay.... by Ferretman · · Score: 1

    ....honestly my first, second, and third impressions was "what do the HECK do they have *300 models* for?!?!?!?!

    Ferret

    --
    Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
    1. Re:Okay.... by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      [why] the HECK do they have *300 models* for?

      To blame cheating on the other 299.

    2. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I assume it's the same reason some beer companies sell 500 versions of the exact same piss water beer. People are dumb.

    3. Re:Okay.... by AlanObject · · Score: 2

      what do the HECK do they have *300 models* for?

      I had the same question. That does seem like a lot, but I bet most of them are just variants of a base model that are rationalized for different countries.

      But the bigger issue is that it sounds like too grandiose a statement. (Dare I say Trumpish?) I would think they would have had better impact and a better impression of credibility if they committed to making 2-3 models successfully. Do the others once you have proven yourself.

      Another problem -- at least for alert observing engineers -- is that both Musk and Nissan have shown that in order to make a successful EV one of the best practices is to design it as an EV from scratch. VW's announcement makes it sound like they are going to squeeze batteries and electric motors into their existing ICE designs. All 300 of them. Yeah you can make it work somewhat but it doesn't sound like you will get a superior product that way. In effect they have announced that they are going to strive for mediocrity.

    4. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ....honestly my first, second, and third impressions was "what do the HECK do they have *300 models* for?!?!?!?!

      They own quite a few brands. The ones you definitely know are Audi and Porsche.

      For each model in each brand, they produce for various countries with different safety requirements, different preferences by country. (in the U.S., they need a large cup holder. seriously. I'm embarrassed by that one.)

      Moving to electric might mitigate some of the brand variation (you don't need a special engine for California's emissions standards), but they'll still have to do regional preferences/branding.

      That help?

    5. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ....honestly my first, second, and third impressions was "what do the HECK do they have *300 models* for?!?!?!?!

      (in the U.S., they need a large cup holder. seriously. I'm embarrassed by that one.)

      Why does this embarrass you?

    6. Re:Okay.... by wooferhound · · Score: 1

      Will the electric models pass the emissions test ?

      --
      We are Dead Stars looking back Up at the Sky
    7. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > too grandiose a statement. (Dare I say Trumpish?)

      > It's been 30 entire seconds since the last time I reminded the world that I hate Trump and I just can't stand it anymore! I'm sure I can shoehorn it into this thread about german automobile manufacturing somehow.

    8. Re: Okay.... by Jesus+H+Rolle · · Score: 2

      America! Fuck yeah!

    9. Re:Okay.... by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      Your first mistake is to assume they really are electric.

    10. Re:Okay.... by Hadlock · · Score: 5, Interesting

      BMW's been milking the same systems data bus since... at least 1994 when they designed the E39 (5 series). It's been so successful they managed to add on GPS, navigation etc to it when all it was supposed to do was anti lock brakes and 6 CD changers. That system bus (down to the connectors) are present now in modern land rovers, making a 2017 land rover navigation unit compatible with a 1995 BMW 5 series.
       
      When you design something for a ton of passenger cars, usually you want to design common systems to cut down on parts; in the late 90s-mid-2000s VW group cars (VW and Audi in particular) had awful window motors that failed all the time due to shared parts. The pontiac solstice sports car was basically assembled out of random parts from the GM parts bin and was even advertised as such.
       
      I would imagine that if you're going to do EVs big, you will need some sort of modern systems bus that handles navigation, self driving CPU + sensors, battery charging, cooling, voltage etc etc, yes there will be a gas or diesel engine in a lot of these but effectively you're designing a shared platform for the next generation of cars; when you have 300 models (or likely sub-models) the more common parts you can use the better your cost savings.
       
      Sheet metal, cars typically get a total redesign every 5-7 years. The mechanics are somewhat easy to retool for, and already budgeted for, but it's all the self-driving sensors, AI, CPU, charging wiring etc that needs to have a solid foundation so that they can make that big step forward and have many many interchangeable parts.

      --
      moox. for a new generation.
    11. Re:Okay.... by Gussington · · Score: 1

      They probably have about 10 models, compact, mid, large, SUV, Sports, Van, commercial etc, then 30 variants of each. And across the entire range they probably only use about 5 engines with multiple variants of. So effectively they have about 5 models to worry about.

    12. Re:Okay.... by Strider- · · Score: 4, Informative

      "what do the HECK do they have *300 models* for?!?!?!?!

      Volkswagen Auto Group is one of the largest vehicle manufacturing companies on the planet.

      Between VW, Audi, Seat, Skoda, Porsche, Lamborghini, Bentley, Bugatti, Ducati, MAN, and Scania, plus world-wide distribution of different models, 300 seems on the low side.

      --
      ...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
    13. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly. All VW has promised is to _electrify_ their lineup, not to convert it to an electric driveline entirely. In other words, expect to see a lot of 48VDC micro hybrids in the near future. But given the projected price parity by 2025 between electric and fossil, there will not be any combustion engines left by 2030, merely due to market forces.

    14. Re:Okay.... by KozmoStevnNaut · · Score: 1

      Electric cars have great potential for standardization. Build a basic skateboard-type platform with individual motors at the wheels, with options to extend the track and wheelbase. Boom, you've just made a platform for all of your vehicles. Need a small city car? Use the smallest configuration with 2WD, add a hatchback body on top. Need an SUV? Use a larger configuration with motors at all four wheels, add taller suspension, put a roomy SUV body on top. Need a limo with plenty of rear legroom? Use the longest wheelbase configuration, add luxury. The only thing you can't really do is a super low slung sports car, because of the batteries in the floor, but meh. VW isn't about sports cars anyway.

      It's been talked about for years, it's time to actually do something about it.

      --
      Eat the rich.
    15. Re:Okay.... by Rei · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Even the very concept is broken. If you want an electric vehicle to be good (and competitive), you don't "electrify" a vehicle designed for an internal combustion engine. You end up needlessly poor aero drag (having the shape designed around containing an ICE), high center of gravity (batteries are best kept as a base "skateboard" at the bottom of the vehicle) and thus poorer handling/safety, poor packing density (little range and/or awkward shaped / hard to manufacture packs), and a bunch of other issues.

      EVs should be designed from the start as EVs. Battery at the bottom, everything else sitting atop it, and a shape having nothing to do with the constraints of ICEs. Motors located inline with the wheels that they drive - ideally 2 motors if you can afford it for AWD, otherwise FWD or RWD as per consumer preference (generally RWD). Etc. By the way, the reason that you really want two motors (beyond gaining the benefits of AWD without having to add a heavy front-rear linkage) is that you can gear them differently. This lets you "sleep" the motor that's operating outside of its ideal power band during normal operation (instantly waking it when you need more torque or traction), which means greater efficiency, and thus range. It also lets you combine both high acceleration at low speeds and at higher speeds (with a higher top speed) rather than having to pick.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    16. Re:Okay.... by Rei · · Score: 4, Informative

      That's basically how Teslas are built. Model S and X are built on the same skateboard. Model 3 and Y are built on the same skateboard, smaller than the MX/MY one. The two skateboard designs are very similar, although the M3/MY skateboard is updated based on the latest technology and "lessons learned" in the MS/MX line.

      As a random example: M3/MY have no battery pack heater. Tesla has always been great with heat management (shunting heat to/from the drive unit(s), battery pack, cabin, compressor, and radiators so that whatever needs more heat gets it and whatever loses it). With the new design, rather than having a dedicated heater, they deliberately run the motor(s) inefficiently (when at a standstill, with 0% efficiency), wasting all energy as resistive heating in the stator which is captured and shunted to the pack. It costs them nothing extra to do this (since the waveforms created by the IGBTs in the inverter are fully customizeable) but eliminates another part (the pack heater) to manufacture, install, and which could potentially break.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    17. Re:Okay.... by KozmoStevnNaut · · Score: 1

      Maybe that was where I heard the idea, actually.

      Thanks for the info about the pack heating, that's pretty ingenious.

      --
      Eat the rich.
    18. Re:Okay.... by Rei · · Score: 2

      Tesla comes up with the most off-the-wall engineering solutions. Another good example with the Model 3: have you seen their new "leverless" air-vanes (electronic-controlled direction so that it can remember drivers / passengers and how they like their airflow in what conditions)? Most people assumed that there were a bunch of linear actuators in there ducting the flow, and some were complaining that Tesla would complicate the design and add expensive parts and their controllers for something that's not that important. But that's not how they do it. They actually use computer-case-fan style fans to blow the main airflow in different directions (aka, aiming air with air), while simultaneously also contributing to the total air delivered (you need a given amount of fan power regardless!). And you can plug fans like that straight into your motherboard - they're super-cheap in bulk (even high quality ones) and don't need a separate controller.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    19. Re:Okay.... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Volkswagen AG is also known as the Volkswagon Group. They comprise of many "companies" which you may know including: Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, SEAT, koda and of course Volkswagen branded cars themselves.

      There are per country differences between cars as well as country specific models too. I actually thought it may be possible to get to 300 without seeing the list of other brandnames, but this is not surprising at all.

    20. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He comes from a nation whose citizens are so fat that if they go to the beach, Greenpeace come along put damp towels on them and splash them with water, then attempt to roll them into the sea.
      Hence the cup thing.

    21. Re:Okay.... by MightyYar · · Score: 1

      300 doesn't seem like that much considering their size and global reach. They have Volkswagen, Audi, Seat, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Ducati, and Scania. Some of those brands are just rebadged cars and some are trucks or motorcycles - but all can be electrified.

      in order to make a successful EV one of the best practices is to design it as an EV from scratch.

      That is probably true, but then again they have 13 years, which is at least 2 platform changes away for most models. They can probably come up with a platform that shares body and non-drivetrain parts but has dramatically different guts to keep the center of gravity low and the weight balanced front-to-rear.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    22. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you really know nothing about cars, do you think there are any fundamental changes between tesla structure and any other car manufacturer? HOT TIP, NOPE

      they will have to rails the floor with in their uni-bodies, bur the crash structure is similar and the engines are already in the front (usually in line with the axles already)

      Engineering perfection is awesome and all but like most people you fail to take into account the larger picture and the business cases. you know like retooling their entire production line.

    23. Re: Okay.... by that+this+is+not+und · · Score: 1

      Are you one of the illegals, fighting like hell to get into, or stay in the US?

    24. Re:Okay.... by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      Volkswagen is the mother company.
      They have their own brand, VW, but they own: Porsche, Audi, Seat, Bentley, Scoda, Scania AB, Ducatti, Lamburghini and probably a few more I don't recall right now.

      And keep in mind that every "model" comes in various variations, that probably count as "model", too.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    25. Re: Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Are you allowed to have a jelly donut Private Pyle ? And why is that Private Pile ? Because you are a disgusting fat fuck Private Pyle !

    26. Re:Okay.... by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      The Teslas and Nissans are more or less simply ICE designs converted for *one* electric engine.
      If they were true advanced electric vehicles they had a linear engine in each wheel.

      But: then they had no "electronic stabilization", anti blocking brakes etc. p.p.

      To be able to use certified modern mechatronics (and anti blocking breaking systems are mandatory by law since nearly a decade), you basically are either required to buy of the shelf components or build your own ones and get them certificated.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    27. Re:Okay.... by Rei · · Score: 1

      My mistake. Apparently gasoline vehicles are built around a skateboard like this. Silly me for not knowing that!

      My mistake. "The engines are in front" - my dang lying eyes convinced me that they were built into the skateboard between the wheels. Silly me for trusting them! My dang eyes also lied to me about there being a frunk where you'd normally find an engine on an ICE. I better have them checked out.

      Silly, silly me.

      And you're right. It totally makes sense to continue to build highly suboptimal vehicles, with poorer handling, space usage, assembly economics, and shorter range, indefinitely, rather than designing for an entirely different powertrain and using that as the basis for all of your upcoming EVs. Your logic is impeccable: spend a fortune developing and refining the new powertrain, making huge gigafactories, etc, but then jam all your hardware developed at high cost into a vehicle that wasn't designed for it because you can't be bothered to do a design refresh.

      It's so obvious now. I'm such a fool.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    28. Re:Okay.... by AlanObject · · Score: 1

      If they were true advanced electric vehicles they had a linear engine in each wheel.

      Are you talking about a motor in each hub? (Seen that as far back as the '60s in Popular Science)

      That idea has been considered and rejected for multiple reasons as a bad idea. Particularly if you are designing a vehicle for high speed.

      This why not inwheel hub engines thread on Telsa's site hits the major issues.

    29. Re:Okay.... by michelcolman · · Score: 1

      Yeah, there's really no difference between an electrified car and one that was designed specifically as an electric car.

    30. Re:Okay.... by Archimonde · · Score: 1

      It definitely is a lot. That is almost 30 models per brand. I hope it will not bite them in the ass. They could streamline it a bit to be honest.

      --
      Trolls are like broken clocks. They show the truth two times a day. The rest of the day they talk nonsense.
    31. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They do a lot with common platforms. For example, Wikipedia lists 27 models just based in the MQB platform, and I think it's missing a few. They're all based on the same drive train so a lot of the electric redesign would be shared between them.

    32. Re:Okay.... by haruchai · · Score: 1

      in the late 90s-mid-2000s VW group cars (VW and Audi in particular) had awful window motors that failed all the time due to shared parts

      In the mid-90s, I was told by a colleague who'd done systems support for Audi dealerships that a regional manager had ordered that all window motors were to be replaced until further notice. The rumor he'd heard was that it was to clear up a serious overstock of the parts which always seemed dubious to me.

      --
      Pain is merely failure leaving the body
    33. Re:Okay.... by Hadlock · · Score: 1

      Nothing like driving down the road at 15mph and your rear passenger window just falls into the door, shattering in to a million pieces. I'm sure VW has fixed the QC issues but after having that happen twice I'm sort of done with them. Ever since I've shared that story, family members come back to me, they say they're having dinner with a friend and their friend's kid had the window fall in to the door for no reason and they ask them if they had a VW or Audi and the friend is always suprised that they guessed right. I hear this from them about every six months from new people. Good times.

      --
      moox. for a new generation.
    34. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To be fair, many other cars from the same era have been scrapped already due to issues much more serious than a window wounts becoming brittle. You still see 1990s VWs and Audis everywhere. Renaults, Fords, Opels, Toyotas etc. from that era are a rare sight.

    35. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...for each of the twelve brands.

    36. Re:Okay.... by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      That is nonsense,
      It was/is actually a very good idea. And Germany was leading in research about those topics.
      You have 4 wheels drive, slip control, non blocking braking, all for free, without any other hardware.
      Of course for tesla it was difficult, given in the posts above already. They wanted:need to use off the shelf components for slip control and non blocking breaking.

      Bottom line 4 linear engines would be much more efficient.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    37. Re:Okay.... by cthulhu11 · · Score: 1

      Moreover, VW has been notorious for horrid electrical systems for years; the idea of them expanding the role of such in the car is frightening.

    38. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's news to me. Scary stories about electrical problems in other cars (especiall Renault, Ford and Fiat are notorious) are often reasons why people opt for VWs...

  3. Will they also have a secret diesel engine? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Will they also have a secret diesel engine? That will only turn itself on when the regulators aren't watching?

    1. Re:Will they also have a secret diesel engine? by blindseer · · Score: 1

      They'll just have a large "lubrication oil" tank. People will just have to refill it every 300 miles or so.

      --
      I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
  4. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by msauve · · Score: 2

    You say that as if batteries are the only means of energy storage.

    --
    "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
  5. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    Energy storage for an electric grid on an industrial scale is a HARD and environmentally messy thing to do. Doing it efficiently, depending on what efficiency you think is good enough, is not financially viable for much more than just peak load offsetting where the spot prices of power triple or more from base load costs..

    We will be keeping those fossil fueled power generators around for a long time yet, or learning to live in the dark.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  6. Wow! Lead on! by benjonson · · Score: 1
    Or,:

    "In 10 plus years, we are going to have a half-baked approach to what we thought was the future more than 10 years ago and now realize _was_ the future! Dang!!"

    --
    =-+
    1. Re:Wow! Lead on! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It won't be the future until the cars are there. VW have been working on this for some time and will probably be among the first manufacturers delivering significant numbers of fully electric cars.

  7. Re:PC baloney by blindseer · · Score: 1

    If I were a big auto CEO, I'd go all in for synthetic fuel.

    How hard can it be to make an engine compatible with burning ethanol or bio-diesel? I guess it must be more than trivial or else every new car would have it by now. Still, that's got to be easier to do than switch all of your manufacturing to a whole new kind of power plant.

    The way cars are built now are to accommodate an internal combustion engine. Change that and the shape of the vehicle should shift with it. If you bolt an electric drive train to a vehicle built for an ICE then you're making compromises. The compromise will be in costs, efficiency, safety, etc. Having a whole fleet of vehicles available in ICE, electric, and hybrid versions means more compromises. This is a very bad idea.

    --
    I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
  8. What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    This is really quite remarkable, and shows just how much Musk has gotten right and how much the future is falling right into his hands. The cool thing, however, is it's less about the competitiveness and his desire to "win" and beat out Volkswagen as I'm sure Musk is more than happy to have them join the push to electric. The last thing we need is only one car manufacturer going all electric, leading to a monoculture of design and a monopoly on service.

    This really couldn't be more fantastic news for those who want to see a plethora of electric car companies succeed and drive the transition away from fossil fuels, with the rest of the companies who don't being relegated to the dust bin of history as soon as possible, the writing is on the highway.

    1. Re:What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by kzanol · · Score: 1

      I see one huge flaw with this plan: The way to get a successful electric car is NOT to stick a battery+electric motor onto an existing design - that just gets you yet another bunch of compliance cars with sub-par performance and driving characteristics that no one actually wants to use.

      Concentrate on just a few models.

      Design these new models as all electric models from the ground up.

      Distribution of components is radically different than classic internal combustion based cars- you can have multiple small motors, not necessarily located under the hood. You want the battery as an integral part of the chassis right at the bottom. You definitely want to put way more effort into aerodynamics to get best range. Since you just got rid of engine noise, concentrate on wheel noise and wind noise to actually make the most of the low-noise experience possible with electric cars.

      The resulting cars may not look exactly like today's cars because of the changed parameters - but they'll actually work and be fun to drive. I guess it'll be a challenge to get there without creating weirdomobiles (BMW i3 anyone?).

      --
      you have moved your mouse, please reboot to make this change take effect
    2. Re:What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The 300 models are car won't be today's models, though. 10 years is > the product lifecycle of th typical automotive platform.

    3. Re: What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only thing Musk is truly interested in is the share price of Tesla stock. Helping VW on any way is probably not going to increase that, even if he could.

    4. Re:What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      BMW i3 is a good example that designing an electric-only car is no guarantee of success. Haven't driven it, but from the perspective of practicality:
      -very high floor and low ceiling in the rear, thus nowhere to put your legs, feet, and head
      -cannot open rear doors without first opening the front
      -front doors ~10 cm wider than in most cars
      The first two make it a two-person car. The last two make it useless in tight parking spaces. It is so much larger on the outside than even e.g. Smart ForFour or VW e-Up (in which four average-sized adults can sit just fine) that I really don't see a point.

      Look and feel of the i3 interior, on the other hand, is fantastic.

    5. Re:What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by Nidi62 · · Score: 1

      BMW i3 is a good example that designing an electric-only car is no guarantee of success. Haven't driven it, but from the perspective of practicality: -very high floor and low ceiling in the rear, thus nowhere to put your legs, feet, and head -cannot open rear doors without first opening the front -front doors ~10 cm wider than in most cars The first two make it a two-person car. The last two make it useless in tight parking spaces. It is so much larger on the outside than even e.g. Smart ForFour or VW e-Up (in which four average-sized adults can sit just fine) that I really don't see a point.

      Look and feel of the i3 interior, on the other hand, is fantastic.

      You also forgot it's ugly as shit, especially that damn 2-tone exterior. That's why so many people have gushed over Tesla: their cars actually look good.

      --
      The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
    6. Re: What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I also think itâ(TM)s ugly. But itâ(TM)s increasingly popular in Europeâ" here in London, itâ(TM)s now a pretty common sight, with a noticeable uptick in the last couple of years. I think it helps that itâ(TM)s now available in a single colour...

    7. Re:What a breathtakingly awesome announcement! by dunkelfalke · · Score: 1

      Tesla 3 is fugly,

      --
      "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
  9. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No it really is easier to just start over with a clean slate & redesign the chassis around electric.
    .
    Biodiesel & Ethanol are boondoggles-

    Biodiesel is chemically less stable than petro-diesel, and there simply isn't enough feedstock oil available to make it
    viable. And it has the same problems as petroleum, just to a lesser extent. Biodiesel is also irritatingly corrosive to common
    materials. Read up on it.

    De-watering ethanol is so energy intensive it makes the whole process energy negative- you put in more than you get out. Also has the same feedstock problems as biodiesel. Where does all that sugar to make ethanol come from?

    A few years back liquid fuels had their shot. Before fracking when oil prices were going nuts. Everyone figured out pretty quick that all current liquid fuels were non-starters, which leaves us with walking, horses or electric vehicles.

  10. Re:PC baloney by GuB-42 · · Score: 1

    Ethanol and bio-diesel are essentially trivial.
    For ethanol, you just need a bit of programming and compatible rubber parts. For bio-diesel, that's essentially nothing. Older diesel engines can burn almost anything, from rocket fuel to vegetable oil and used motor oil. Newer engines may be more picky, especially about impurities, but for the rest, that's just a matter of programming again.
    In France, there is already ethanol mixed with gasoline (usually 10%). I don't know about diesel but some people illegally put vegetable oil in their car with little ill effect.
    The problem is that biofuels are expensive and compete with crops for food. And 3rd generation fuels based on micro-algae, not competing with food crops are not commercially available yet.

  11. Re: PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If I were a big auto CEO, I'd go all in for synthetic fuel. So that I'd only be promising to invent a not-quite-pie-in-the-sky technology instead of a totally-pie-in-the-sky technology.

    You'd be laughed off the board. The only people putting money into that are in the military (which has its own needs) and the petrocorps with billions in mineral leases they need to demarginalize.

    It's like a home builder pouring thousands into a stately old Victorian, the smarter option would be bulldozing.

    Even Toyota, chasing the Hydrogen dream is smarter than you.

    You're just pretending a mud pie is anything other than a wet turd.

  12. It's not all *that* difficult by haruchai · · Score: 1

    Make a lot of Chevy Volt-type cars, minimum all-electric range of 50 miles EPA & a turbocharged 2-liter engine engine.
    BMW gets 230 HP out of a B38 3-cyl 1.5 L.
    Use the electric motor to power the rear wheels; should make for a car that's fun to drive at legal speeds.

    --
    Pain is merely failure leaving the body
  13. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by msauve · · Score: 1

    No, that's not true. And, it's so wrong, you can only be making things up.

    --
    "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
  14. Re:PC baloney by blindseer · · Score: 1

    Biodiesel & Ethanol are boondoggles

    I know that. You know that. Lots of people know that. You know who doesn't know that? Or, more likely, know it but would rather not admit it publicly? Legislators. They'll let this slide so long as voters will cast a vote for them over it.

    Same for electric vehicles, they are a boondoggle too. Volkswagen will go for it so long as it makes people feel better and covers up past sins.

    which leaves us with walking, horses or electric vehicles.

    I believe electric vehicles will fall out of favor soon. We'll see some sort of synthetic fuel replace it. It might be hydrocarbons, or ammonia, or something else. It's not like we need a new energy source, electricity is already an energy sink when produced, not a net gain like petroleum. Electric vehicles make sense now because it uses cheap coal, nuclear, and natural gas, fuels that don't pour into a tank easily like gasoline. Find a way to convert the cheap energy into a liquid fuel and electric cars look real inconvenient, and no more "green" than anything else.

    --
    I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
  15. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Same for electric vehicles, they are a boondoggle too" - not here in New Zealand, we get pretty much all our vehicles second hand from Japan. They are moving to electric, and thus, so are we.

    We have the infrastructure to do so as well. Most of our power comes from Geothermal, Wind and Hydro. The Hydro IS our big infrastructural scale batteries. We have some peaker plants, to handle rapid changes in power usage, but, that is a small amount of overall energy usage here.

    Where you live, isn't the entire world.

  16. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yeah, those 300 mile range electric cars just don't exist. /s
    Get stuck in a traffic jam of all electric cars and then get stuck in a traffic jam of petrol cars. End of story.

  17. Re:PC baloney by haruchai · · Score: 1

    Vinod Khosla, who's famously referred to EVs & fuel cells as "just toys", has been touting biobutanol for some time

    "Advantages/Disadvantages

    Due to its low vapor pressure it can be easily blended with gasoline
    It contains nearly as much energy as gasoline (ethanol only contains 66% as much.
    Because it separates less easily in the presence of water it is better adapted to be used in the present distribution system than ethanol
    Because it is less corrosive, it is also expected to be more suitable for use in existing oil pipelines.1
    It can be used in existing vehicles in higher blends than ethanol."

    --
    Pain is merely failure leaving the body
  18. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by Hadlock · · Score: 0

    California has nearly 100MW of grid scale storage with more on the way, from Tesla and another grid scale storage vendor, Hawaii has ~40MW grid scale storage, Australia has ~20MW of grid scale storage and is adding another 100MW of grid scale storage. That's just battery tech. Japan has a mothballed 80MW seawater hydroelectric gridscale storage, there's an active rail gravity storage system already built in California and Nevada wants to build a 20MW version. California is looking at adding at least another 100MW of gridscale storage over the next 20 years, and that's just what's already approved. As solar ramps up in California they'll have to start adding gridscale storage 2:1 for solar added.

    --
    moox. for a new generation.
  19. Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by jonwil · · Score: 1

    Bugatti holds various records for the fastest cars on the road. I cant wait to see how bonkers fast the Bugatti EV (whatever they come up with) ends up being.

    1. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Rei · · Score: 2

      Tesla is in a close battle with Bugatti on accelerations. The Bugatti Veyron did 0-60 in 2,4 seconds. The Tesla P100D does it in 2,27 seconds. The Chiron now does it in 2,0 seconds. Etc. I can't see how electric isn't ultimately going to win this battle. The Teslas also cost 1 1/2 orders of magnitude less, and while they lose out on high-end acceleration, they clobber anything on the road off the line.

      One thing Teslas don't do yet is that they're not track cars; they don't have the cooling level needed for sustained track duty. I expect the Roadster 3.0 to be their first track-duty car.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    2. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      Considering the Italian location, I would call it: Bugatti Electra.
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      (Yes, I know the difference between Greek and Latin :D )
      However the name giver would be this Electra: http://www.theoi.com/Nymphe/Ny...

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    3. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The Tesla is not even remotely close to the Bugatti on acceleration. It is close to the Bugatti very, very briefly off the line, but that's it.
      0-60 times are related to power, but they are really limited by traction. It's what happens after launch that's telling.

      The fastest Tesla in Ludicrous mode does the standing quarter mile in an impressive 10.7 seconds at 120mph. The Veyron does the quarter mile in 9.7 seconds at 151 mph.

      The 0-120 mph time for the Veyron is 6.3 seconds, getting to 120mph more than 4 seconds faster than the Tesla. 60-120mph takes more than twice as long for the Tesla, 3.9 seconds for the Veyron and 8.5 for the Tesla. The Tesla is only close to the Bugatti for 2 seconds when acceleration is traction limited, then gets absolutely annihilated as soon as the tires are hooked up.

      By the time the Tesla hits 120, the Veyron is going 160. The Tesla's top speed is 130mph. They Veyron will more than double that at 267 mph. Although the Tesla is limited electronically, the electric motor has a physical limit which is not going to be even close to 200mph.

      So, no, the Tesla is not in the same performance league as the Veyron in acceleration, it's not even close.

    4. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Rei · · Score: 1

      The Tesla is not even remotely close to the Bugatti on acceleration. It is close to the Bugatti very, very briefly off the line, but that's it.

      In driving that you'll actually regularly experience as an owner, 0-60 is the most meaningful factor, and the fraction of that which matters the most is 0-30. The P100D beats the Veyron in the former, and clobbers it in the latter. The fact that the Veyron continues accelerating once you start hitting double the speed limit? Wow, what a totally meaningful trick for your everyday driving.

      All of this comes with the fact that - need I even bother to mention it - that the P100D is a large 5-seat sedan.... and the Model X has nearly as good acceleration, as a bloody crossover.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    5. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      All races I've ever seen last more than 2 seconds. All races I've ever heard of last more than 2 seconds. You claimed "Tesla is in a close battle with Bugatti on accelerations", this is just not true. Trying to redefine "acceleration" to an incredibly narrow slice doesn't make it any more true.

      You need to make up your mind about what you are arguing. You claim it's faster in a race, then limit the race to everyday driving, which would not include a race. This is quite idiotic.

      The Tesla does not "clobber" the Veyron from 0-30, 0.2 seconds is not a "clobbering", that's a reaction time difference. The Veyron accelerates much, much, much, much, much faster than the Tesla at every speed once the tires are hooked up. Tesla is not, by any definition, by any metric, in any sane or rational way, in a close battle with Bugatti on acceleration.

    6. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Rei · · Score: 1

      All races I've ever seen last more than 2 seconds.

      Why do you keep talking about "races", as if we're talking about the track? This thread is about performance on the road. On the road, it's meaningless how fast you can go from, say, 100 to 150. How fast it peels off the line or when you want to pass someone is the future that matters.

      The Tesla does not "clobber" the Veyron from 0-30, 0.2 seconds is not a "clobbering"

      Yeah, try again. The P100D does 0-30 in 0.87, while the Veyron does it in 1.32. That's "clobbering". That's like racing a Porsche Cayenne against a Yaris.

      that's a reaction time difference.

      It's not a "reaction time difference", it's the nature of the propulsion systems. ICEs put out minimal torque at low RPMs. EVs put out maximum torque virtually instantly. No turbos to spin up. No need to even rev up the engine to get some rotating kinetic energy - just instant max torque that doesn't begin to drop until you get to around halfway to your max RPM. The response is so fast that it can almost feel like the car is reading your mind.

      The Veyron accelerates much, much, much, much, much faster than the Tesla at every speed once the tires are hooked up.

      Haha, wow, it must be sad to watch your era end, isn't it? Sorry, but Veyron acceleration figures are - for all acceleration figures - with warm tires.

      Teslas are not "track cars". If you're talking about a high speed track race, of course the Veyron wins; Teslas were never designed like that. They're sedans and crossovers for the road (the topic of this thread). Yet they happen to be so high performance that even a bloody crossover (the Model X) will clobber a Veyron off the line. And I know it hurts you to hear that, so let me write it again: a bloody crossover that costs 1 1/2 orders of magnitude less will clobber a Veyron off the line. 1.32 seconds? Hahahaha, slowpoke! I wouldn't be surprised if the performance package for the Model 3 makes it competitive with a Veyron. I'm going to laugh my bloody arse off if a sub-$50k car can match or beat a Veyron 0-30 ;)

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    7. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Rei · · Score: 1

      ** is the figure that matters.

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    8. Re:Can't wait to see what Bugatti comes up with by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Again, you made the claim that the "Tesla is in a close battle with Bugatti on accelerations". This is what I'm refuting. You keep trying to limit it to a narrower and narrower definition of "acceleration" until it's completely meaningless. There is no "battle". You're just plain wrong here.

      Performance on the road will not include full throttle, launch controlled starts. If it does, then it's a street race, and those typically last more than 2 seconds. You don't seem to get this. Your examples are completely, totally, and incredibly irrelevant.

      When you want to pass someone, the Bugatti will crush, destroy, and absolutely annihilate the Tesla. There isn't wheelspin to deal with once you're moving. The Bugatti is immensely more powerful, and is in a different performance league from the Tesla. In every passing scenario, the Tesla loses very, very badly. Using the numbers you provided for 0-30 and 0-60 times, we get that the Tesla takes 1.4 seconds to go from 30-60, and the Veyron takes 1.08 seconds. It gets much worse for the Tesla at every speed above this.

      0.2 seconds is a reaction time difference between drivers. This is what reaction time commonly refers to, I have no idea what the hell you thought it meant.

      If you insist on a street non-race acceleration contest (this is what you are talking about, and it makes absolutely no sense), you do realize the Tesla takes about 10 minutes for Ludicrous mode to cool the electric motors down and warm the batteries up before you can accelerate like this? And that you need to wait 10 minutes after doing this before doing it again? That kind of kills any possibility of the spontaneous sort of non-racing race you are talking about. Tires take seconds to warm up.

      from http://www.motortrend.com/cars/tesla/model-s/2017/2017-tesla-model-s-p100d-first-test-review/ :
      "So how can you lay down a run like this in your very own P100D? First, find a safe closed course where the local constabulary won’t write you up for reckless driving. Then ensure your car is running the latest firmware (v8.0 release 2.52.22), and select the Settings menu. Under Acceleration, press and hold the Ludicrous button for five seconds. As with the P90D, this prompts a warp screen of flashing lights followed by a screen that asks, “Are you sure you want to push the limits? This will cause accelerated wear of the motor, gearbox and battery.” The two buttons below are marked, “No, I want my Mommy,” and “Yes, bring it on!” Selecting the latter initiates a process of battery and motor conditioning, wherein the battery temperature is raised slightly and the motors are cooled using the air-conditioning system. It usually takes just a few minutes, longer in extreme ambient temperatures or after repeated runs. You should expect to wait a minimum of 10 minutes in between runs. "

      So, 10 minutes after the Tesla driver sees the Veyron, if they set the car in Ludicrous mode and wait, they might be able to squeak out to a whole car length ahead in the first second, before being passed about one second later and be hopelessly crushed at anything after that. Once. Because every other time the Tesla tries it in the previous or next 10 minutes, the Veyron won't be behind at any point, because you can't use Ludicrous mode any more often. The time the Tesla would be leading is 300 times less than the time it needs to prepare. If the Tesla driver has slower reactions that the Bugatti driver, they won't ever be ahead.

      So, no, "Tesla is not in a close battle with Bugatti in accelerations". It's not a battle, Bugatti is not even remotely concerned about Tesla. At no point did anyone at Bugatti ever think "that luxury sedan that has half the top speed and is in a completely different market segment is a problem." And the acceleration is not close beyond your ridiculously restricted example that requires a bizarre set of circumstances and simultaneous breaking of laws on launch but strict adherence to the speed limit.

      I like Teslas. They are cool

  20. Re:PC baloney by blindseer · · Score: 1

    Your post negates nothing I've said. As soon as someone figures out how to turn a cheap and green energy source, like hydro, into a valuable liquid fuel then electric vehicles aren't any more green than any thing else. They also start to look real expensive and inconvenient.

    Turning wind and solar energy into a liquid fuel also solves the problem of storage. You might have hydro but not everyone else does. What people do have, almost by definition, is land to build a fuel synthesis plant. I say by definition since the land that a fuel synthesis plant would take is "free" since it can be put under solar panels or windmills. Even New Zealand has a use for synthetic liquid fuels.

    --
    I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
  21. Powered by Andrei Rossi's E-cat by goombah99 · · Score: 1

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    they hint they might also have a cold fusion convertible model. Zero emissions.

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
    1. Re: Powered by Andrei Rossi's E-cat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When you put them on a dynamometer, they turn off the combustion engine and run off the battery.

  22. Re: PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How hard can it be to make an engine compatible with burning ethanol or bio-diesel?

    Not hard. Anybody with a steam engine could do it. Trivial effort.

    Or you could get a turbine car. The A-831 ran on diesel, gasoline(unleaded), vegetable oil and tequila. I believe Honeywell might sell the AGT1500.

    All this exists. Yet nobody is pursuing it. Maybe you should think about the why. Maybe they are all fools, or they know something you don't.

    Like the problem being emissions and supply. Can't wave a magic wand and solve those.

  23. All their cars? Seriously? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    An electric Bugatti? All Lamborghinis will have electric versions? Ducatis, too?

    I don't think these will happen. I know there's hybrid systems in some of the hypercars, but he's promising full electrics.

    Good sense and responsibility are the exact opposite of everything Lamborghini represents.

      And I really don't think Ducati's will be ready for the battery packs, the faster ones are only around 350-400 lbs dry weight.

  24. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by slack_justyb · · Score: 2

    We will be keeping those fossil fueled power generators around for a long time yet

    There's usually an eye roll that goes along with these kinds of pedantic statements, because people who actually understand how things work (and I am not saying you are not one of them, you more than likely are just really simplifying the whole topic, and I understand and respect that) know we're not bringing fossil fuels to 0% anytime soon. The simplicity of your comment might as well have been, "ending usage of fossil fuels won't end hurricanes." That statement isn't incorrect, but it is a really simplified response full of snark to a really general way of thinking of a problem we now face. Which I get, it's bad for people to blame global warming for hurricanes that are happening now because it is not a 100% accurate way of talking about global warming. But I digress before we go down that rabbit hole any further.

    Now one day, and that day is long after everyone here reading this comment is dead, we will have ended the usage of fossil fuels for the majority of industrial and metro power generating. It will have more to do with the increasing difficulty of extracting fossil fuels and less to do with some holy war of clean vs dirty power. That doesn't mean the latter will have nothing to do with it, just in case you get the wrong idea here. I'm not standing on a economically reasonable only platform, its a light mixture of the two ideas I just stated, plus a whole lot of global politics mixed in there that I'm going to not be bringing up. But all of that I just stated plus a bit more ultimately will be guiding the world as to what we move to next. But to keep it simple, as it stands, coal is the first causality of this ever increasing difficulty of "access to." Will we ever use 0% coal? More than likely not, but as time goes on we will be less inclined to burn it for lighting someone's light bulb or cooking their Hot Pocket, we will all think that's just stupid considering it has a way better use in something like steel production. That's not today, but I would wager that it is sooner rather than later. So when I say causality, I don't mean death of coal absolute. I and many others mean it in these terms of being more conservative with the resource than we previously have been.

    Eventually, all fossil fuels will come to this point. It will seem really silly for us to use natural gas to heat someone's water, or for us to use oil to lubricate someone's car when both of those will be better used for heating a hospital or lubricating a wind farm or whatever. It's about the same state of mind that Slashdot seems to get into when we think about using Helium in balloons. It is a really silly usage of a resource that is limited that can be better used elsewhere. Now don't get me wrong here, I'm not attributing to humanity the notion of always picking the "better" for whatever terms that might mean, method of using a resource. However, the economics of things being an awfully powerful force for changing people's minds.

    So that said, I just want to touch real lightly on coal for a second, since it is the first one on the chopping block that we rely on for a majority of our current power production. Again, by chopping block, I mean that in terms of having to rethink its usage, not it's absolute demise. About 53% of the coal that we know about is still left for us to extract and is slightly economical to pull out of the ground. The remaining 47% of the coal that we do know about is just not feasible to extract economically and maybe that will change with some sort of technological leap. Even still, the coal we do know about is but only 30% of all the coal that is thought to exist on the planet. So that 53% roughly represents about ~15% of all the coal we think is out there. At some point as we get close to the bottom of that 53%, with out any clear change to getting at that 47%, we're all going to really be rethinking if we should be burning the stuff for powering homes ver

  25. Re:PC baloney by Nemyst · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And yet you're missing the biggest actual reason all of these manufacturers are eyeing electric. Hint: it's not global warming. They want to get in on power sources which specifically do not release pollutants because pollution from exhaust pipes is becoming a major issue in just about every large European and Asian city. Synthetic fuels would change fuck all to that, so nobody's investing in it. If you're not going electric, your only other real option is hydrogen, but that's got even more problems.

    As a general rule, if you, average Slashdotter, think you've figured out something nobody in the entire world has, you're probably just missing something.

  26. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by careysub · · Score: 1

    The U.S. has 20,000 MW of pumped storage on the grid right now (2% of U.S. grid capacity) and another 5% have been granted permits for construction.

    Add 800 KV DC long distance transmission lines and electricity can be moved coast-to-coast with losses of only a few percent. Pumped storage can store electricity from anywhere in North America, and then supply it to anywhere in North America.

    In fact, with 800 KV DC lines much of the need for storage disappears entirely. Grid supply can be balanced simply by moving electricity from where the sun is shining/wind is blowing to where demand is currently high.

    Yeah, you can throw some batteries on to the grid, and may be attractive in certain specialized situations, but they aren't really needed with an revamped North American grid.

    --
    Starships were meant to fly, Hands up and touch the sky - Nicky Minaj
  27. Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & relia by Brannon · · Score: 1

    Are you claiming that the Tesla model S is a hoax?

  28. Precambrian automotive industry by aglider · · Score: 1

    These long term plans make me laugh out loud!
    It looks like "someone else's problem/project".
    Or just investors' bait.
    Tesla will bury them all.

    --
    Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
    1. Re: Precambrian automotive industry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tesla will be bankrupt long before EVs are a significant portion of the car market.

    2. Re: Precambrian automotive industry by Rei · · Score: 1

      Is that you, TTAC "Tesla Deathwatch"? ;)

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
    3. Re:Precambrian automotive industry by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      Considering that Germany once was the top notch researchers in electric cars (and Daimler is still dreaming about hydrogen powered fuel cell EV cars), it is a shame how the car industry here developed.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    4. Re:Precambrian automotive industry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Considering that Germany once was the top notch researchers in electric cars

      It still is. They just don't hype it as much as the Americans and the Chinese.

  29. /. Interface by Trogre · · Score: 1

    An interesting article, to be sure, but WHAT THE HELL just happened to Slashdot? I just refreshed this page and Slashdot disappeared, and I instead got some mobile version of Beta on steroids. On a desktop.

    --
    "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
  30. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by RightwingNutjob · · Score: 0, Troll

    No. It's quite real. I've seen them with my own eyes. What's a hoax is the claim that it's better than my ten year old Chevy that fills up in two minutes, can be filled up out of a man-portable container of gasoline in an emergency, goes at least 400 miles between fill-ups, has roughly the same range regardless of whether it's hot or bone-chilling cold, and would cost new about a quarter of what a Tesla costs sans federal and/or state bailouts and subsidies.

  31. Re:PC baloney by RightwingNutjob · · Score: 0

    I'd say the same about each and every bean counter who floats his way up to the C-suite unless and until he gets hard results instead of just making pleasant-sounding noises and lofty promises. As a general statement...I'm still waiting. Elon Musk is only 2/4 on his ventures. I don't know who this VW joker is, but he probably didn't work his way up from the engineering shop.

  32. Re: PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    As soon as some new technology that's far better then anything that currently exists gets invented, everything will change?

    This is a stupid non-statement. Please lurk more.

  33. Re: Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & r by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Electric cars can be all of those things, but the Tesla Model S is none of them. That's not due to some intrinsic limitation, but due to Tesla's incompetence and their sophomoric arrogance. They think they can do everything better than companies with actual experience, technology and facilities and then they fail with lots of things that are essentially solved problems in the car industry.

  34. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The processes are already fairly well know and depending which you choose can actually produce gas or diesel fuel that could be mixed with standard stock or used completely on it's own in normal vehicles without modification. The problem is both are highly energy intensive and green energy is not abundant enough or cheap enough yet to make them viable for a pure green synthetic fuel starting from water and atmospheric carbon dioxide.

    The reality is also that this process is also highly inefficient with a lot of inefficient steps in the chemical reactions to produce the fuels and then a highly inefficient combustion engine. An EV is a much more effective use of the electric power and gives much greater range per kWh of power generated and I don't see any way of changing that. Combustion engines just aren't efficient enough and there are too many conversion steps that can't be 100% efficient.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer%E2%80%93Tropsch_process

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabatier_reaction

  35. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That is actually not true. The pollution levels in most of European cities fell significantly over last few decades. They did not fall as fast as the regulations which is a problem if you do not want to break the law. I do not know about US of course. I just checked the data for the cities that environmentalists claims are so dirty that dirt kills their people. Well guess what - it ain't true. I am not saying we should not pursue clean policies because this is exactly what got us less pollution so do by all means enforce reasonable standards. Whether they are reasonable now is questionable. The nitrogen oxides are a problem but their levels in cities is low much lower than it used to be. The particulates that are allegedly produced by diesel engines- well think again about few other sources. If you replace all diesel with all electric you will still have dust from your brakes or from heating machinery in the houses (unless all comes from electric but that will not be true for very long time). Bottom line - diesel has an impact but not as big as said. We may get rid of it but we will be in tight spot for pollution anyway. Whether all electric fleet is a solution - we will see. Or rather we will see the problems that it will bring with itself. We will most likely not see whether it is better or worse.

  36. Re:PC baloney by Rei · · Score: 2

    PC baloney

    You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

    While electrons are easier to transport over distances, molecules are much easier to stockpile and transfer without loss.

    Merely even refining transportation fuels is a much less efficient process than charging li-ions.

    Carrying your own oxidizer with you is stupid when the air is 20% oxygen, not to mention that riding on a ton of fuel and oxidizer packed in close proximity is silly

    Li-ions don't work by oxidation processes, they work by intercalation processes. On one side you have graphite and/or silicon, and on the other you have nickel/cobalt/aluminum oxides. One or both of them are infiltrated with lithium ions in the interstitial space; the charge state is defined by which side the lithium is on.

    You seem to be under the mistaken concept that energy density corresponds to safety. Tell me, which is more of a hazard, 100kg of aluminum or 100kg of nitroglycerine? Now tell me, which is more energy dense?

    Here's the reality of fire safety in Tesla battery packs. They're so non-flammable that you can generally burn the rest of the car to the ground without burning the pack. Try that with a gasoline car. Gasoline fires in cars are extremely common. 152k gasoline cars catch fire in the US alone every year. Tesla rates of fires are far less than those in gasoline cars.

    What boggles the mind *to me* is that gasoline vehicles are allowed to store such huge quantities of a highly flammable fuel in just a big tank. No compartmentalization / isolation system, just pour it in, and there you go!

    And lastly: IC engines have consumables yes, but they are field-serviceable and don't require complete remanufacturing to maintain their efficiency.

    Simply not true. ICE efficiencies decline over time, and the level of cost required to keep them running at as-of-manufactured efficiency makes it impractical to do for most consumers. Older ICE vehicles are generally much less efficient than new ones. Which also, BTW, reduces range. Proper li-ion packs, like Tesla's, do lose range with time, but only slowly. Click on "charts". Typical degradation is about 4% in the first year, but much slower thereafter. A typical 5-year old car has only about 6-7% total degradation. It's hard to know at this point whether you can continue extrapolating such a slow decline slope over time, but it's at the very least extremely promising. Typical results from Tesla taxis with hundreds of thousands of miles on them are less than 10% degradation.

    We're talking "Now, not in a hundred years."

    BTW, it also sounds like you're under the impression that EVs remain unusually heavy. Check out the curb weights of the Model 3 variants. SR is 3549lbs (1609kg) and LR is 3814 lbs (1730kg). Its ICE class competitors (BMW 3-series, Audi A4, Mercedes C300, etc) come in a wide variety of configurations:

    BMW 3-Series: 1475-1770kg
    Audi A4: 1410-1695kg
    Mercedes C300: 1630-1715+kg

    There's nothing unusual about the Model 3's weight versus its ICE competitors. The LR is a bit on the heavy side, but the SR slots right in the middle.

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  37. They ALREADY have. by DrYak · · Score: 1

    I would think they would have had better impact and a better impression of credibility if they committed to making 2-3 models successfully. Do the others once you have proven yourself.

    The already have, both... :
    - ultra small and low cost VW UP!
    - the iconic VW Golf
    are available as electric variant as VW-eUP! and VW e-Golf.

    But you probably haven't heard much about them because VW only taugh about putting marketing money and massively advertising them in the wake of the diesel scandal.

    Another problem -- at least for alert observing engineers -- is that both Musk and Nissan have shown that in order to make a successful EV one of the best practices is to design it as an EV from scratch. VW's announcement makes it sound like they are going to squeeze batteries and electric motors into their existing ICE designs.

    (And you can add Renault to the list, they share their EV R&D with Nissan - they developped the "Zéro émission" platform together).

    Yup, the current 2 above mentionned vehicles seem to me a little bit like "EV motor slapped on classical ICE cars" experiment quickly done to probe the market to see if there's interest.
    (Which then were subsequently re-advertised as serious EV business goals after the scandal)
    But I have to admit that I haven't much experience driving these.

    Citroën C-zero also seems in my own driving experience like this - with a battery bank stuck in the trunk of an otherwise re-purposed ICE car.
    (Which is weird, given that Citroën has nearly 4 decades of successful electric utility vehicle used among other by the french post on their delivery routes).

    This as opposed to Renault Zoé which are modern Twingo design bolted onto the specially designed "Zéro émission" platform that they designed together with Nissan for this special purpose.

    Smart is another European brand that reuses part of Tesla's battery platform for their electric variant. (Haven't driven one though - only seen them around).

    (Both these last have batteries under the car like other "from the ground up" EV designs. Not batteries occupying whatever space happened to be free in the converted ICE such as the trunk as in the former).

    Yeah you can make it work somewhat but it doesn't sound like you will get a superior product that way. In effect they have announced that they are going to strive for mediocrity.

    ...or that they want to be the quickest to market.

    See how long it took Nissan and Renault for their "Zéro émission" platform.

    See how long it is still taking as of today for Tesla who are still in the process of extending their platforms range to cover Model 3.

    Designing from the gound up take time. A lot. And costs. Again a lot. During which time you'll still have to sell the old cars.

    VW's old cars got a horrid reputation after the scandal (in practice they're not the worst. There are other offenders cheating even more. VW just happen to be the one who didn't pay enough brib... huh.. sorry "who happened to get caugh by chance").

    They need to move fast and cheap.
    (They've always have been about producing cheap cars fast, all the way back to the first beetles and minivan)
    Repurposing ICE cars is a quick cheap solution that can work RIGHT NOW.

    Then they can take time to specially built new platforms at a later time (as the upcoming 2018 electric rebirth of the VW minivan - which seem to be built on a newer platform)

    That also explains clearly the Citroën C-zero : cheap, fast to produce entry-level car now.

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
    1. Re:They ALREADY have. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      VW's old cars got a horrid reputation after the scandal

      [citation needed]

      They've always have been about producing cheap cars fast

      They may have been in the past, but Volkswagens haven't been cheap since the 1980s.

  38. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    Really? So when you discover that you need gas on your way home, you arrive home only 2 minutes later than you would have otherwise? I'm going to call BS on that one.

    Do you know how long it takes to fill up an EV? 20 seconds. Ten to connect the cable and ten to disconnect. The fact that the charging at home happens while you sleep doesn't affect you one bit. And that's the vast majority of a person's usage. For the minority - long trips? Supercharging happens while you eat lunch and on bathroom breaks. During those stops that you're supposed to take (and which EU commercial drivers can lose their license if they don't take). But to reiterate: that's a solid minority of travel for most people. In your everyday life, charging an EV takes 20 seconds.

    goes at least 400 miles between fill-ups

    Which affects your everyday life how? Oh, that's right, it's to help you avoid those periodic inconveniences of having to detour on the way home to a gas station.

    Not that Tesla ranges are short. The cheapest Model 3 has an EPA range of 220mi (same 5-cycle or equivalency as gasoline cars), while the long range version is 310mi.

    has roughly the same range regardless of whether it's hot or bone-chilling cold,

    1) That's not true. ICEs also lose range in the winter, and to a lesser extent when running the AC in hot weather.
    2) Teslas lose about 20% range in the winter. See the extensive driving data gathered by Björn Nyland's work as a courier in Norway. Other EVs with less efficient heat recapture may lose more, but Teslas do not.
    3) ICEs lose a lot of range idling in traffic; EVs lose nearly an order of magnitude less. ICEs lose significant range driving at low speeds due to congestion; EVs gain significant range in such conditions.

    and would cost new about a quarter of what a Tesla costs sans federal and/or state bailouts and subsidies.

    Ahem.

    Lastly: I'm going to take a wiiiiild guess that you've never gotten behind the wheel of a Tesla. ;) Try it some time. Seriously, just call up a Tesla store and ask if you can.

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  39. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    I don't know who this VW joker is, but he probably didn't work his way up from the engineering shop.

    Matthias Müller started out as an apprentice tool and die maker at Audi and then studied engineering at Munich University of Applied Sciences. After that, he got a job in the product planning at Audi and gradually worked his way up to become the manager in charge of product planning. After that, he subsequently became coordinator of sports brands for the VW Group, CEO of Porsche and, after the resignation of prof. dr. Martin Winterkorn in 2015, CEO of the VW Group.

    However, please don't get readily available facts get in the way of your presumptions.

  40. Don't get too excited by coofercat · · Score: 1

    They're giving themselves plenty of time on diesel and petrol, although I guess we'll see more 'stop the engine at the lights' in the near future.

    From TFA, "By 2025, VW aims to have 50 purely battery-powered vehicles and 30 hybrid models in its lineup, with a goal of selling as many as 3 million all-electric cars by then."

    'hybrid' can mean 'stop the engine at the lights', or it can mean something more like a Prius. There are a lot of years between then and now, so there's plenty of time for Nissan to beef up the Leaf, or Tesla to find an Italian to style their cars. Hell, we might even see another new start company jump in - some googling suggests Tesla started in 2003 and showed the Roadster in 2008 (so 5 years from nothing to demo). By 2025 there's be exponentially more places to charge an EV than today, access will be more aggregated than today, and so owning an EV by then will be much easier than today - selling 3 million by then doesn't sound too hard (wikipedia says 250,000 Leafs have been sold to December 2016). VM group has far better 'reach' than Nissan, so should be able to do this comfortably.

    1. Re:Don't get too excited by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      'hybrid' can mean 'stop the engine at the lights'
      That is not what hybrid means.
      And for your interest: all modern cars automatically stop the engine when you stop.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    2. Re:Don't get too excited by coofercat · · Score: 1

      The UK government recently stated that the sale of all non-hybrid cars would be stopped after 2040. During the ensuing news round-up and debate, it transpired that using a bit of battery to save the fuel while idling (ie. 'stop at the lights, but restart the engine to pull away') could be considered 'hybrid' in so much as it's not 100% hydrocarbon and using electrical power to fill the 'gaps'. It turns out that the industry calls this "micro hybrid", and indeed there are numerous varieties of implementation with a range of electrical involvement (http://www.hybridcars.com/stop-start-primer-not-all-systems-are-created-equal/).

      So yes, hybrid does mean what I think it does.

    3. Re:Don't get too excited by fnj · · Score: 1

      'hybrid' can mean 'stop the engine at the lights'

      No it can't. That's not a hybrid, idiot. That's a simple start-stop engine. Sheesh.

    4. Re:Don't get too excited by coofercat · · Score: 1

      Yes, start-stop is 'hybrid' - https://www.carsdirect.com/gre...

      So, it seems you're the idiot because you can't use the Internet.

    5. Re:Don't get too excited by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      If it has no electric engine to drive the car, it is not a hybrid.

      Obviously you found the name "micro hybrid" yourself. However I would hope people would slap the car manufactures on their wrist to coin such misnomers.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    6. Re:Don't get too excited by andydouble07 · · Score: 1

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... commonly referred to as a micro hybrid. The car needs to use electric power for certain things which would normally run via serpentine belt while the engine is off. So it is using electricity instead of gasoline, just not for propulsion.

  41. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by Rei · · Score: 2

    One thing batteries are really nice for is voltage maintenance on long feeder lines. Things like the old Castle Valley battery on the Rattlesnake #22 line. When you have one long line serving a sparse population of customers, having a battery buffer halfway along its length lets you use a smaller, cheaper line (the buffer charges at night and then discharges during the day).

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  42. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    For your somewhat less common requirement it may not be better, but for most people it is. Charging at home is so much more convenient than having to go and pump smelly liquid at a dirty petrol station (not to mention the cost), and it's better for everyone's health too.

    There will always be some uses where ICE is more suitable I imagine, the question is not if EVs are "better" it's what percentage of people they are better for.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  43. Re: Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean basel by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Spectacularly good reply

  44. Re: PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Emitting particulates is going to be a problem for any ICE, no matter what liquid fuel it runs on

  45. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I just bought a Leaf, so I know a little bit about this. For most people a Leaf would be a bad choice as an only car. However, if you have a place to park and charge it overnight, it's a great second car. Seriously, it's nice to just start the day with a "full tank", and the electric powertrain makes a ton of sense - fewer moving parts, smooth and quiet. I have a 3 series convertible and it just feels primitive after driving the Leaf, and the Leaf is basically a crappy econobox! That said, it's not "better" than your 10 year old Chevy. In a few years, however, when the range is 200+ miles and the cost of the batteries is lower, they will be a no brainer for almost everyone with access to a plug and normal driving patterns.

    I have found that, even with my ~110 mile range, trips of 150 miles or so are easy, with a 20 minute quick charge. This assumes that a quick charger is conveniently placed, which for me is true. I think there's no way that they aren't the future unless all progress on battery tech grinds to an instant halt; given the billions being poured into battery R & D, I don't see that happening.

    TL;DR - Yes, today an EV is not for everyone. Soon they will be, though.

  46. Re: PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What a load of drivel. For example, EVs produce dramatically less brake dust than ICE cars due to regen.

  47. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by shilly · · Score: 1

    >fills up in two minutes
    but can't be filled up at home, can't be filled up overnight, can't be filled up on a delay switch when fuel is particularly cheap, can't be ready with a full tank every morning, etc etc

    >can be filled up out of a man-portable container of gasoline in an emergency
    but can't be filled up from a plug point in an emergency

    >goes at least 400 miles between fill-ups
    about 90miles more than a Tesla, 160 more than a Bolt, and about twice the range of a Renault Zoe, so a genuine advantage but not as big as you think

    >has roughly the same range regardless of whether it's hot or bone-chilling cold
    true

    would cost new about a quarter of what a Tesla costs sans federal and/or state bailouts and subsidies.
    >cheaper electric cars are available. It's new tech. The price will drop much further

    Oh and look, you forgot to list the advantages of EVs compared to your car:
    - no tailpipe emissions
    - instant torque
    - pre-warmed and de-iced before you get in on those bone-chilling cold mornings you mentioned
    - no engine noise or vibrations
    - full range every morning
    - low fuelling costs
    - possibility of generating your own fuel at home
    - potential to run power tools off your battery if you're out doing manly things in the woods (you strike me as the kind of guy who prides himself on his manliness) -- see http://bollingermotors.com/
    - new car configurations possible thanks to the absence of the engine and transmission, e.g. a hole from front to back of your truck to carry 24 2X4s -- see http://bollingermotors.com/ again
    - ability to be part of a closed-loop home power / transport storage-and-use system
    etc etc

  48. Re: PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's a problem even for battery electrics, since the tyres generate most of the particulates even in an ICE car.

  49. Re:PC baloney by fnj · · Score: 1

    How hard can it be to make an engine compatible with burning ethanol or bio-diesel?

    Not hard at all, but there are tradeoffs. And what are you trying to accomplish? It certainly wouldn't eliminate exhaust emissions. And ethanol gives absolutely terrible fuel efficiency, and sky-high cost. Biodiesel is a much, much better choice, except that it is a problem with the insanely high-tech, high-strung injection systems that have replaced the dead-simple diesel injection of yore.

  50. Re:PC baloney by fnj · · Score: 1

    Biodiesel & Ethanol are boondoggles

    I know that. You know that. Lots of people know that. You know who doesn't know that? Or, more likely, know it but would rather not admit it publicly? Legislators.

    Legislators know a lot of things, but DON'T GIVE A SHIT.

  51. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    If you have enough EV cars, you have a huge pool of grid storage ...
    Cars connected to the grid.

    Same for PV house owners that chose to also have a big battery. You can join them in a virtual power plant, use them as balancing power pool.

    And before you yell your uninformed idiotic counters: we do that in Germany and other parts of Europe since nearly a decade. Every new battery bank house owners buy gets put into a virtual power plant. Unless of course he wants to life isolate, but for that a battery is still to expensive to make sense. You would better have your own Nat Gas fuel cell then.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  52. Disasters by stabiesoft · · Score: 1

    I am not sure I would want an EV if I was in FL at the moment. Given the grid is toast, exactly where does one fillup? Its not like you could truck in spare batteries to change out. And those long lines to fillup. Given it take a few minutes to fill a tank vs an hour or more to charge an EV, can you imagine the lines at the charge stations before the hurricane hit? ICE engines/tech has been around for a very long time and we know how to handle problem times, extreme cold, extreme heat conditions. How long before we learn how to do the same with EV's. What happens to a EV battery when it is flooded for example. Gas cars yes, its bad, gas & oil leak out but I don't get fried or they don't explode b/c they are shorted. What does an EV do?

    1. Re:Disasters by Rei · · Score: 1

      After Harvey, only one Supercharger station was noticed to have gone out, and only for a brief timeperiod. Superchargers survived serious damage to the buildings they were attached to - for example, one had a gaping hole in the hotel it was attached to, while another's adjacent building had the floor flooded with water.

      Irma was different - probably the single greatest power loss incident in US history. Ten million customers were left without power, and in certain parts of the state, virtually everyone. This took down about 80% of the supercharger network. That said, a day layer, about 75% of it is now up. The Marathon and Naples superchargers may have gone underwater, we'll have to wait and see what happened to them; there's a couple more that will probably go online shortly.

      How do superchargers keep the power on when it's going out for others, and get restored so quickly? Simple: they're on very high power feeds. Adding a supercharger to a suburban neighborhood is, power-wise, like building a large office building or small skyscraper. The Sarasota Supercharger, for example, running at full tilt would consume 1,5MW; unless they're located downtown or next to some huge industry, they're easily the largest power consumer around. This means that if the lines supplying them are out, then everyone is probably out as well. And in order to bring the lights back on to others, the supercharger is going to go online first.

      The other issue is that, like gas stations, charging infrastructure is spread out. But unlike gas stations, where delivery issues or the like may leave a whole region in short supply, power outages are spotty. So even if 80% of the chargers went out in an area, you still have 20%. But that's not the really important part; the important part is that 20% of outlets, period still have power. What it works out to in practice (and I know some people in this situation right now) is, the power goes out at your place, and if you don't have a backup generator, while everyone else is miserable in the heat, you use your car as a lifeboat; it can maintain the climate control for days, with no "idling", no worries about carbon buildup or carbon monoxide or the like. It leaves you mobile (getting great range at the low speeds you have to go when roads are covered in debris), and you simply need to find one place with power and you can charge. Which you almost invariably can. Doesn't matter if even the national guard can't get to you, let alone gas trucks, let alone whether gas stations have backup generators, whether or not their tanks were flooded, etc, etc - you can charge on any power outlet, anywhere - you just need to ask for permission.

      Of course, if you have a backup generator (say, natural gas), it's a moot point; you have unlimited driving at any point in time.

      ICE engines/tech has been around for a very long time and we know how to handle problem times, extreme cold, extreme heat conditions. How long before we learn how to do the same with EV's.

      The answer to your question is "already". Good EVs (like Teslas, for example) have pack heating and cooling, and can survive (and operate in) temperatures that gasoline cars could not.

      What happens to a EV battery when it is flooded for example

      In theory or in practice? In theory, there are two possibilities: the waterproofing holds up, or the waterproofing does not hold up. It's designed for the latter, but that's only guaranteed for a fixed period of time, they're not designed for long-term submersion. Depending on how the water sloshes in and how stable the vehicle remains, sometimes you can even use them as a boat (google "Tesla swimming") ;) But not always. Even a vehicle that goes into a shutdown mode will often just reboot after it's out of the water and be driven off (you can find videos of this too).

      As for "in practice", however? In general your insurance will take a look at the ca

      --
      "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  53. What about cheap electric bikes? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    When are they going to become available? By cheap, I mean less than £200 more than the bicycle on its own would cost, whatever quality/make it is.
    And what about electric bikes with a decent range, like 30 miles at least?

  54. Re:PC baloney by fnj · · Score: 1

    Biodiesel is NOT "vegetable oil". It is synthesized from vegetable oil and other bio sources by a complex chemical process of esterification. Idiots who burn SVO (straight vegetable oil) or WVO (waste vegetable oil) or any kind of "grease" in their diesels end up with a disgusting gooey mess in their expensive fuel injection system.

    Even true biodiesel has its drawbacks. The viscosity isn't the same as the proper diesel fuel the engine was designed for. That matters when you're dealing with the 1000-bar-plus (15,000 psi-plus) fuel pump of a modern common-rail diesel fuel injection system. It gels and stops flowing at a much higher temperature, and the gelling is harder to deal with than normal diesel fuel gelling. The shelf life is shorter. It is harder on the fuel system seals. Completely unlike normal diesel fuel it is hygroscopic. Once it becomes contaminated with water, bacteria grow and rot filters. Most or all modern diesel engine designs are not rated for any more than 2%, maybe 5% at the most, of biodiesel mixed with regular diesel. The old 1980s-and-before designs were fine with 20%, 80%, or even 100% biodiesel, but those days are gone.

  55. Re:PC baloney by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Every new car can run on Bio Diesel. Since 20 years or so.
    There are some cars that have problems with the hoses transporting the fuel.

    Conversion to Ethanol is simple, too. Basically all old cars that use "normal gasoline" instead of "super", burn ethanol out of the box.

    However: in the long run both biodiesel and ethanol production use to much land and produce to much CO2 in the whole processing chain to make it feasible for nations or the planet to got there.

    Not far from my house is a gas station that sells bio diesel. It is about 10cents cheaper than diesle made from oil.

    If the diesel engine is big enough, e.g. a truck or cough cough, a tank: it burns everything anyway.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  56. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    Pumped storage is indeed the most usable solution, however, there are two things you simply must have to set up a system.

    1. Hills or mountains. You have to pump the water up hill and the higher up you can go the better. This means you need some natural topography that has significant elevation changes where you can build some kind of storage pool up the hill. Usually they take a hill, flatten the top to build a pool. You won't be doing this in the plains, which are nearly table top flat and cover a significant percentage of the country.

    2. Water source to pump from. Not only do you need hilly land, you need a ready source of surface water to pump up that hill. Again, this is not a given in the areas of mountainous terrain in the USA. Certainly the southwest doesn't work, it's hilly but there is no water.

    So you cannot just build these things anyplace as you indicated. In fact, there are really limited areas that have both things you need for this. Most of the Atlantic seaboard states from Georgia to Maine with the Smokey Mountains could work along with the states just to their west. There is a bit of Missouri (the Ozarks) that could work (actually already do this) and possibly the North West states of OR and Washington but after that, forget it.

    Then there is the HUGE environmental impact these things have and the dangers they create for the local area. You don't just take the top off a mountain and pump water up there w/o making lasting changes to the local environment. Plus you need a lower pool to keep the water when it's at the bottom of the hill, which has another huge impact. There is also a risk of failure and accidental uncontrolled release of all that water and the damage that could cause. And yes, that has happened with these things in the past. So, for safety, you cannot build these things upstream from where people are living, or risk killing people should an accident happen. This last requirement puts a HUGE limit on where you can put these things.

    Finally, there is the efficiency of pumped storage. By most standards it is abysmal. You get at best 87% efficiency and often no more than 75%. This means that you loose 13-25% of your energy input. Remember this is the BEST we can do and there is HUGE environmental impacts with this. Where I am a great proponent of pumped storage coupled with nuclear base load generation as a cost effective solution, I still do not think fossil fuels are going away anytime soon. However, as a peak shifting tool, buying power at night from base generation capacity then selling it at double to triple the price during peak, they might work out financially. But the start up costs are really high, and the energy storage capacity pretty low for the costs, so the break even point would be 10+ years away. So far, it doesn't seem they are very profitable.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  57. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    Do you have *any* idea how inefficient battery storage is? The BEST way to store electricity on an industrial scale is about 87% (pumped storage), batteries are barely over half that.... Chemical battery storage has *really* bad efficency ...

    Don't miss my point here. Sure, you can have local systems, you can have a battery in your house, use the one in your EV to shift peak loads, but they literally suck power out of the system and waste it, a lot of it. Consuming MORE power is not the best answer here... In fact, I'd wager that we could concentrate on consuming LESS power and make a bigger impact on things though conservation, and not local storage. Changing to LED bulbs, more efficient HVAC and other devices that consume large amounts of power will do more. (Drying clothes, Heating Water, Cooking..)

    Look at small scale storage as a local "backup power" solution if you like, just don't think it is a viable solution to peak shifting/load balancing for things like solar or wind supply issues. It's really horribly inefficient for that kind of thing.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  58. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Whew, that was close! I saw you repeating back the exact same thought that you were quoting, and for a second there I was worried that you were going to add something to it. But thankfully, you stopped as soon as you were done parroting what the GP already said. Good job!

  59. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    A couple of points...

    1. Fossil fuels will be used until they are too expensive, on this we agree. However, if history is any indicator, fossil fuels are going to be available for a long time to come. All it takes is a small increase in the market price for fossil fuel and you end up getting large increases in "proven reserves" (those resources which are economically recoverable). The available proven reserves of fossil fuels has generally been rising up though this very day. This tells me we are far from being anywhere near running out. Sure, the price has been slowly rising, but so far, this has only increased available supplies. I don't see this changing in my life time.

    2. Nuclear power has been given a really bad rap, again we agree. However, the problem with nuclear power today is actually cost. It's too expensive compared to a Natural Gas powered generation plant, because the cost of CNG is so low and doesn't seem to be going up anytime soon. I think Nuclear power could be cheaper, but it's stuck with 1960's technology for various regulatory, public policy and public relations reasons, which has stopped development. However, CNG is a sure thing, low risk solution.

    And... Just in case you are interested.... I AM an Electrical Engineer (College Degreed) by training so I do have better than average knowledge of power distribution systems. It's been 20 years, but the basics of how electric motors, transformers, transmission lines work has not changed since Westinghouse took on Edison. The controlling technology HAS evolved and I don't consider myself "up to date" on that part, but I understand how power gets from source to destination and what factors effect the efficiency of the systems involved. I also have nuclear engineering training (as a minor) and have personally toured multiple reactor sites, including trips inside containment structures as part of my learning experiences. So... Where I don't claim to be an expert in any of this stuff, I'm not just blindly speculating or claiming that "I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express" level of expertise.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  60. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    100MW is not a measure of storage... I'll assume you mean 100MW/hour...

    I'll point out one thing... I think your numbers are wrong, or the amount of storage nearly pointless... The state of Texas, today, had a base load of 30,000 MW and a projected peak of nearly 55,000 MWh. That's JUST Texas on a 90 degree day. 100 MWh is spitting into the wind, 10X that would be required to have any meaningful amount of storage for one state and 20x that would still be spitting in the wind. Scale that up to nation wide and this is meaningless...

    Perhaps your numbers are wrong?

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  61. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by shilly · · Score: 1

    As the OP is German, I'm sure he'd agree with you on the importance of reducing energy usage first. This is the country that developed Passivhaus, after all.

  62. Re: PC baloney by shilly · · Score: 1

    Do you have a source for that? Because I was looking and can't find an easy source for the relative importance of tailpipe, brakes and tires. And much as I'd like to take your word for it, you're just an AC on Slashdot...

  63. 300 models? VW has more problems than diesel by swschrad · · Score: 1

    that's about 200 models too many. 200 brand managers and staffs, 200 ad hierarchies, 200 sets of designers and dealerships and headaches too many. use those 12 brands to differentiate types of vehicles, put birds of a feather on the same lot. I bet the savings would just about pay the fines for those illegal stinkpots they pushed the past 8 years.

    --
    if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
  64. Electric VW by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Where will they hide the diesel emissions?

  65. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    ... and the Leaf is basically a crappy econobox! That said, it's not "better" than your 10 year old Chevy. In a few years, however, when the range is 200+ miles and the cost of the batteries is lower, they will be a no brainer for almost everyone with access to a plug and normal driving patterns. I have found that, even with my ~110 mile range, trips of 150 miles or so are easy, with a 20 minute quick charge. This assumes that a quick charger is conveniently placed, which for me is true.

    So, you're saying that a roughly Leaf-priced car with 200+ miles of range that offers a great driving experience, nice interior and standard features, and a broad network of reliable, super-fast charging stations would be a no brainer?

    *cough* Tesla Model 3 *cough* ;)

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  66. RIP VW by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Haha. What makes them think VW will exist in 2030?

    1. Re:RIP VW by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why wouldn't they?

  67. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Battery storage is about 95% efficient.
    Significantly above pumped storage.

    Go back into your cave, troll!

    just don't think it is a viable solution to peak shifting/load balancing for things like solar or wind supply issues.
    Actually it is, as Germany and other countries demonstrade since decades, stuoid troll.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  68. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    Battery storage is about 95% efficient. Significantly above pumped storage.

    Go back into your cave, troll!

    just don't think it is a viable solution to peak shifting/load balancing for things like solar or wind supply issues. Actually it is, as Germany and other countries demonstrade since decades, stuoid troll.

    LOL... Unless they have changed the laws of physics and chemistry in the last decade, 95% is but a figment of your imagination. Chemical based batteries really suck efficiency wise. Lithium Ion batteries (Which are nearly the best rechargeable batteries out there for efficiency) max out at about 90% (dc in dc out), but that's just the battery. If you add in the AC-DC and DC-AC conversion losses and a few percent for I*R unavoidable losses you are well under 80% and likely under 70% for any kind of realistic system (Say the size of what could power a single home.) Industrial sized systems would likely be much worse than this, just because it wouldn't be economical to build systems as efficient as a moderately sized home unit could be.

    Heck, the power supply for your PC is 90% efficient at best (AC-DC) and that's pretty much the best efficiency you can find for AC-DC conversion (and is pretty darned expensive being 1KW for about $250. So assume 90% AC-DC conversion, 90% storage efficiency and another 90% going back to AC when you need it and you are looking at (100W - 10W (AC-DC) = 90 W to battery - 9 W (loss in battery) = 81 W (out of battery) - 8.1W (DC-AC) = 73.9 W) making a really GOOD system running about 74% efficient (And that's making some HUGE assumptions like unity power factor loads).... You are claiming 95%?

    So have you broken the laws of physics lately? Maybe a thermodynamic law or two? Because there is no way you are getting 95% efficiency (Input power to output power) from a buildable and practical battery storage system that I know of.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  69. Re:PC baloney by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I believe electric vehicles will fall out of favor soon.

    You'll be wrong.

    We'll see some sort of synthetic fuel replace it. It might be hydrocarbons, or ammonia, or something else.

    Nope.

    It's not like we need a new energy source, electricity is already an energy sink when produced, not a net gain like petroleum.

    Electric motors actually waste less energy than burning ICE in engines already, and making biofuels costs lots more. We wouldn't do it, except a lot of dinosaurs died for our sins.

    Electric vehicles make sense now because it uses cheap coal, nuclear, and natural gas, fuels that don't pour into a tank easily like gasoline. Find a way to convert the cheap energy into a liquid fuel and electric cars look real inconvenient, and no more "green" than anything else.

    Nope, they're greener, simply based on motor efficiency alone. You'd have to posit a miracle fuel, and let's just say...that's a fool's dream.

  70. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    nice interior

    Tesla Model 3

    ...does not compute.

  71. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    When were you last in a Model 3? Right, you weren't. So all you have to go on are reviews. Very well, start reading them.

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  72. Re:PC baloney by blindseer · · Score: 1

    And what are you trying to accomplish?

    Being "green".

    If the goal is to "greenwash" your line of vehicles then you can do that with bio-fuels. The choice between electric and bio-fuel vehicles is not mutually exclusive so they could do both. As they intend to produce some models as hybrids then they could have bio-fuel compatible ICEs in those hybrids.

    They want to make up for past sins of being polluters so they came up with the idea of electric vehicles. They could do that also with bio-fuels. I'm just curious why they aren't doing that. Jumping into electric vehicles with both feet like this seems risky to me.

    --
    I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
  73. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A picture is enough to show that it will have a horrid interior. Besides, what possible logic would Tesla employ to give their budget model a nice interior when the inside of their expensive model appears as though it was lifted from a 1990s Hyundai?

  74. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    A picture is enough to show that it will have a horrid interior

    1) "will" -> "does". The car already exists.
    2) Not according to every review from everyone who's actually been in the car.

    Furthermore, I'm going to bet that you've never even been in an S or X (hint: there's two expensive models, and that's if you don't count the Roadster).

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  75. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    1) "will" -> "does". The car already exists.

    Cool! Where can I buy one today?

    2) Not according to every review from everyone who's actually been in the car.

    Great, but I have trouble trusting reviews of the most overhyped car in decades. I'd like to see it for myself first before I will share their enthousiasm. The pictures show a terrible ergonomic design, with all instruments at a very distracting place in the middle of the dashboard and essentially every control implemented in a way that offers no tactile feedback, thus requiring visual attention.

    Furthermore, I'm going to bet that you've never even been in an S or X

    I've been in a Model S multiple times and the interior was appalling. Everything looked and felt cheap. Such an interior wouldn't cut it for an Opel or a Kia, much less something that aims to compete with Mercedes, Audi and BMW. I haven't been in a Model X, but I would be surprised if that were much better.

  76. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    Cool! Where can I buy one today?

    Get in line behind me. Those at the head of the line are already getting theirs. Which is nice because it means more and more sightings, videos, pics, etc every day.

    I've been in a Model S multiple times and the interior was appalling.

    Pre- or post refresh, and what interior option? Funny that they've captured a third of the US luxury sedan market, almost 50% more than the next closest competitor, with a "Kia-like" interior, huh?

    And FYI, I'll take professional reviewers opinions (who have been in Model 3s) about M3 quality over yours, thanks.

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  77. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Get in line behind me. [tesla.com] Those at the head of the line are already getting theirs. Which is nice because it means more and more sightings, videos, pics, etc every day.

    So I can't buy one now. How many have they actually delivered to customers?

    Pre- or post refresh, and what interior option?

    I have no idea. It were taxis.

    Funny that they've captured a third of the US luxury sedan market, almost 50% more than the next closest competitor, with a "Kia-like" interior, huh?

    Only by redefining luxury in such a way that the Tesla Model S fits in it. Moreover, have you ever been to the US? A lot of cars in the US are downright awful, especially the US brands, but even European, Japanese and Korean cars often get a special, cheapened interior using locally sourced parts for the North American market. I would imagine a Tesla Model S is probably a lot less crappy to people used to US cars.

    And FYI, I'll take professional reviewers opinions (who have been in Model 3s) about M3 quality over yours, thanks.

    Of course you would. That is, until you encounter a reviewer who hasn't drunk the Tesla Kool-Aid, of course. Then their opinion suddenly doesn't matter anymore.

  78. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    So I can't buy one now.

    Seriously? Because you can't put your hands on it a second after you say "yes" that means it's not for sale? Is "any product that has a waiting list isn't really for sale" actually your argument here?

    How many have they actually delivered to customers?

    Around a hundred, as per the production ramp.

    I have no idea. It were taxis.

    Taxis? Right. So probably pre-facelift / first generation base interior / no PUP.

    Only by redefining luxury in such a way that the Tesla Model S fits in it.

    No, the segment is defined by the form factor and price class. It's not defined by "How AC On Slashdot Wants To Group Things".

    Moreover, have you ever been to the US?

    Amusing ;)

    Of course you would.

    What sort of idiot would take the word of someone who's never seen the car over the word of literally a dozen professional reviewers who have?

    That is, until you encounter a reviewer who hasn't drunk the Tesla Kool-Aid, of course.

    Right, got it. Every major auto reviewer is secretly on Tesla's dole.

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  79. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    OK, you can argue the Model 3 exists, but not in the sense that it is a product someone can actually buy. That more or less removes the 'no-brainer' part of your original claim.

    Taxis? Right. So probably pre-facelift / first generation base interior / no PUP.

    Again, I have no idea. If Tesla have improved the interior of newer Model Ses, good for them, but again, they had a long way to go compared to the competition in the luxury segment, or even the budget segment.

    No, the segment is defined by the form factor and price class. It's not defined by "How AC On Slashdot Wants To Group Things".

    Making something expensive does not make it luxurious. The Tesla Model S may be comparable in price to luxury cars, it is not in terms of luxury -- the defining feature of the luxury segment. Moreover, the official segment classification of the Model S is 'S' -- sports cars, not luxury.

    What sort of idiot would take the word of someone who's never seen the car over the word of literally a dozen professional reviewers who have?

    You don't have to take anyones word. Just look at the pictures. You have to have been fed and swallowed quite a lot of Tesla propaganda to be enthousiastic about that.

    Right, got it. Every major auto reviewer is secretly on Tesla's dole.

    Most major auto reviewers haven't been any closer to a Tesla Model 3 than you and I.

  80. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Rei · · Score: 1

    OK, you can argue the Model 3 exists, but not in the sense that it is a product someone can actually buy.

    Except for the fact that you can actually buy it, and people are at present taking deliveries.

    Making something expensive does not make it luxurious

    Luxury sedans are a vehicle class. You don't get to make up a new definition for it; it already has one. Model S is in the luxury sedan segment (there's some debate over whether it belongs in the "large luxury sedan" segment or "midsize luxury sedan" segment). Model X is in the luxury crossover segment. Model 3 is in the midrange compact sedan segment. Model Y will be in the midrange crossover segment.

    Your opinions of the quality of the seats on the old taxi you rode in have no bearing on what class a vehicle is slotted into.

    You don't have to take anyones word. Just look at the pictures.

    I have, and I think it looks awesome. But pictures don't capture even the sight like being in a vehicle in person, and they don't capture the feel at all.

    Most major auto reviewers haven't been any closer to a Tesla Model 3 than you and I.

    There have been around a dozen different reviewers from different major sources who have. Every last one of them raved about it. Find me a single review from anyone who has actually been in the vehicle who said that it felt like a cheap econobox.

    --
    "Casual hello, it's me, Zoidberg, act naturally."
  81. Re:Then why are EVs more efficient, safe, & re by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Except for the fact that you can actually buy it, and people are at present taking deliveries.

    I cannot. I can order it and hope that the company offering the product is still around by the time my order is in front of the queue, which may be years from now, when there are many more high-range electric cars to choose from.

    Luxury sedans are a vehicle class. You don't get to make up a new definition for it; it already has one. Model S is in the luxury sedan segment

    Not according to the European Commission, who define the segments.

    Model 3 is in the midrange compact sedan segment.

    It's a 4.69m D segment car, also officially known as a 'large car'. Nothing 'compact' about it.

    But pictures don't capture even the sight like being in a vehicle in person, and they don't capture the feel at all.

    While that is true, I would be extremely impressed with Tesla's accomplishments if the tacked-on tablet were only visible in pictures and the sensible, tactile feedback providing controls are not.

    There have been around a dozen different reviewers from different major sources who have. Every last one of them raved about it. Find me a single review from anyone who has actually been in the vehicle who said that it felt like a cheap econobox.

    Tesla have indeed been very selective about to whom they provided review Model 3s. But then, Tesla can't seem to do anything wrong in the press anyway, however shoddily they build their cars, however reckless their rollout of beta software on public roads and however misleading their press statements. When Peugeot used touchscreen controls for too many things, every reviewer complained. Now Tesla is doing it for everything, it's suddenly 'revolutionary' and 'the future'.

  82. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Lithium ion batteries and charging systems top out at 97% efficiency.
    Sorry to slap it into your face. You are just a stupid american dumb idiot.
    What the fuck would have the laws of thermodynamics to do with batteries? Hu?
    Before you try to seek for an answer: nothing at all.

    All your numbers are completely made up, you are even to dumb to google.
    So assume 90% AC-DC conversion,
    Yeah, and why do you assume that instead of for funk sake googeling the efficiency? Hae?

    Idiot.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  83. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    Citation please....

    My Li Ion numbers came from Wikipedia, which isn't the paragon of factual information but in this case looks correct. The AC-DC/DC-AC conversion numbers come from my knowledge as an electrical engineer. NOTHING is 100% efficient in converting energy from one form to another... And 97% just isn't possible in this case, given my understandings of Thermodynamics.. So where are you getting your information because I think they are wrong?

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  84. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Wow, still bullshit posts like this?
    Still not able to google 'efficiency of lithium ion batteries'?

    Wow, go back into your cave, troll.

    NOTHING is 100% efficient in converting energy from one form to another
    Wow, that is probably the stupids thing I ever heard.

    First law of physics ... you might like to google for that too.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  85. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    First and second laws of thermodynamics back to you.... How the Newton's first law of motion has anything to do with a battery is a mystery to me. Perhaps you mean the first law of thermodynamics? (Energy is not created or destroyed)...I assume that's what you mean, because if not, what you are calling me applies more to you.

    Now that we have that straight...

    Lithium Ion battery charge discharge efficiency is 80-90%. Put 10 Watt hours in, get 8 or 9 out. This is straight from the Wikipedia article I found with a Goggle search. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    Stop and learn something about this by thinking. There is a reversible chemical process going on in a battery, always is. This means when you charge the thing, there is entropy gain, as you convert energy from one form to another, in this case electrical power to potential energy stored in chemical bonds. Entropy gain is unavoidable and represents that part of the energy that doesn't get converted into the desired potential energy, but is lost to some other form like heat. The same is true for the process of changing chemical potential energy back into electrical power. Again entropy is increased, energy is lost to things other than electrical power. My point, and what you should learn, is that entropy increases represent losses in the system, energy that is not returned back to you when you discharge the battery, but is lost to other kinds of energy (heat and such).

    So.... Do you have anything to cite here that says my numbers are wrong?

    BY THE WAY... Just incase you are confused with "coulomb efficiency" numbers being bandied about which are 99%, this is NOT ENERGY efficiency, but a measure of current efficiency.. You put X amp hours in, you get X amp hours out (less 1%), however the VOLTAGE is not the same. To charge a Lithium Ion cell you have to apply a higher voltage than when it's discharging, amazingly there is about a 10% difference in those voltages... ;) Imagine that...

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  86. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
    Neither the first nor second law has anything to do with electricity (none of them has)
    The laws of thermodynamics are about stream engines (I simplified it a bit for you), or in other words: idealized gases under heat an pressure.

    Or if you need more:
    https://courses.lumenlearning....
    The Wikipedia article unfortunately regularly gets rewritten in an incomprehensible state and then fixed again :D

    http://batteryuniversity.com/l...
    Efficiency of lithium ion batteries is about 99%.
    Probably some idiot edited the your wikipedia article?
    On the other hand some other idiot could have edited the thermodynamics article to my favour :P

    Your pick ....

    This means when you charge the thing, there is entropy gain, as you convert energy from one form to another
    Wow, another stupid argument.
    There is no entropy gain when you charge a battery. You reduce entropy.
    Uncharged battery: everything is chaotic distributed.
    Charged battery: everything is fine sorted, all charged particles on one side.

    Imagine a class of water, drop a sugar cube into it. Low entropy: everything sorted. The cube is in one corner. The rest is clean water. When the cube is gone: high entropy. It is distributed all over the place. With a "gradient" of sugar concentration which is high at the spot the cube was, and the lowest at the most far away spots in the glass. Recharging the cube to its old position: removing the entropy.

    Good luck with your half knowledge of Physics (and physics is probably the most simple natural science, until you hit Quantum Mechanics, Relativity Theory and/or String Theory)

    I hope for you, that you are never in a life threatening situation were some basic understanding of physics would save your life, and you fail.

    Regarding that wikipedia article, it seems that specific battery they used as an example has 80% - 90% efficiency. However that sounds not plausible to me.
    The Li-ion batteries in a car have close to 99% efficience. With charging equipment etc. that drops to 95% - 957% ... google is your friend.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  87. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... Neither the first nor second law has anything to do with electricity (none of them has)

    Anybody who's taking a course in thermodynamics sees the folly in that statement. Thermodynamics has application in ALL cases where energy is transferred or transformed, this means heat, electricity, chemical reactions, and/or potential and kinetic energy even. Just because they teach thermodynamics using heat engines does not mean it only applies to heat engines. The rules are general and discuss energy in all forms, not just a form of energy known as heat. You are gravely mistaken.

    You are wrong on your FIRST point... I rest my case because the foundation of your argument is patently incorrect, and thus your conclusions are too.

    Next you are going to tell me perpetual motion machines exist.... Because you found some snake oil sales man on Google that says so..

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  88. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Thermodynamics has application in ALL cases where energy is transferred or transformed
    No it has not. Reads the damn wiki article.

    A photon hits an electron, the electron changes "orbit". No energy "lost", no thermodynamics involved. The electron jumps back to its old orbit, it emits an identical photon, with same wavelength and energy: nothing lost, no thermodynamics involved.

    Last time some school kid with no physics in school wrote such nonsense, I gave two dozens of examples. Perhaps you find my old post.

    Thermodynamics has two single laws that have a general purpose application: the sum of the energy in a closed system is constant. Entropy is over time increasing.

    The rest of the laws are about ideal gases under heat and pressure. Should be clearly written in the wiki article, which you obviously did not read or someone rewrote it in bad/misleading english again?

    The core of the laws of Thermodynamics is a simple realization: if you convert energy to heat then it is hard/impossible to convert everything back into a "useful" energy.

    The law of Thermodynamics says absolutely nothing about converting magnetic energy into electric energy into electric fields into kinetic energy etc. p.p. Hint: get a damn clue what the greek introduction syllable Thermo means, aka as in Thermometer.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  89. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    Thermodynamics has application in ALL cases where energy is transferred or transformed No it has not. Reads the damn wiki article.

    Thermodynamics applies to all transfers of energy, which includes electrical power, batteries and heat just to name a few. Until we agree on that, I'm not going further with you because these concepts are fundamental.

    Thermodynamic laws you must understand the implications of are:

    Energy can not be created or destroyed (Conservation of energy).

    Transferring energy from one place to another and/or one form to another (i.e. doing work) increases Entropy.

    I go no further with you until we can agree on these fundamental laws of physics.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  90. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Thermodynamics applies to all transfers of energy, which includes electrical power
    It does not ...
    But if you believe otherwise that is your problem not mine.

    After all you are not working in electric engineering :D

    No, we can not agree on those laws. The first one is not a law, it is an axiom. One of our basic assumptions like conversation of momentum. I believe we only have those two :D
    The second one is already wrong. Transfer of energy does not increase Entropy. Why would it?

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  91. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by bobbied · · Score: 1

    No, I'm not currently working as an Electrical Engineer... But I have used my Bachelors of Science in Electrical Engineering as a electronics engineer in the past.

    We are at a impasse.. You won't agree to a common view of thermodynamics that I feel is fundamental and beyond debate, so we have no common ground to debate with. In my view you have already disqualified yourself as knowing anything about the topic being discussed, yet you make confident assertions of same which are simply wrong.

    So, as it says in Proverbs.. "Answer not a fool according to his folly"

    I'm done. Hope it works out for you. Full Stop

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  92. Re:Nuclear Power is the way to go for clean baselo by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    You won't agree to a common view of thermodynamics
    Your "ideas" regarding Thermodynamics is not a common view.
    At least not amoung scientists/physisicst. No idea what you learn in american schools, though.

    Basically every time on /. someone takes refugee to the laws of Thermodynamics, the explainations and references he uses: are wrong

    In my view you have already disqualified yourself as knowing anything about the topic being discussed, yet you make confident assertions of same which are simply wrong.
    If you think so :D

    Funny that you think the physical laws about steam engines have any relevant application in electricity etc. except for running a steam engine to create electricity .... rofl.

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  93. Oh! Look what I found for you! by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1
    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.