If you want to influence the direction of a company, you would want to own as much of its stock as possible, not get rid of it. If you are extremely wealthy, you can just buy all of the company's shares and have total control over its direction.
Bingo. A 'responsible' party owning 10% of Exxon could be the difference between Exxon having executives who are mustache-twirling villains and having a responsible board that has the company investing heavily into renewable technology to position itself for the inevitable decline of oil.
If we're not using it as a fuel, there's plenty of organic sources that can rather easily provide for our lubrication needs. Thermal depolymerization, for example, generates what's effectively an extremely pure light sweet crude. The processes used to make synthetic oils don't need to use fossil oil as a feedstock.
It's a bit like worrying about people getting enough drinking water when they're living in a city in the desert and thus dying of thirst. It's not the people we have to worry about so much - drinking is near the bottom of the list for municipal water. You use more washing hands. Obtaining enough water for people to keep their clothes washed is a much bigger problem in such a case. Drinking water is such a small usage that we could truck it in if we had to.
You want people swear off coal and oil right now when it makes up over 85% of the total power generated in this country? That's basically asking them to go back to living in caves. To having their kids die of preventable diseases. To going hungry if their crops fail or hunting sucks.
We don't have to. Let's say we pass a few reforms. Things like house the homeless($10k annually vs $40k to leave them on the street), reform sentences and prisons(1/2 the prison sentence AND less likely to come back?), and healthcare. The fed.gov already spends 90% of what it would take to provide single-payer UHC if we were paying the median for industrialized nations. The individual states more than pick up the remaining 10%. We currently spend ~$6.7k vs $2.9k. So fixing this ONE problem would enable states to put more money towards other important things without going into debt, help with the federal deficit, AND dump about a grand more into every family's pocket a month.
What does $3k a year, per person, pay for? A hell of a lot of solar panels and other sources of renewable power. We can improve our lives in a lot of other ways.
The tuition is ~$40k. Sure, they give scholarships based on need etc, but Harvard charges tuition because they can.
Unless you're the child of a multi-millionaire you're not going to be paying full rate for Harvard. Due to the continuing endowments and such they don't technically have to charge a cent to anybody. Yale as well.
Matter of fact, I think my state college should at least start on the same. Encourage all the graduates to donate their tuition at some point in their lives. Perhaps in their wills. Once you reach about 20 times the annual tuition costs interest in safe investments alone should keep costs controlled.
Yep, like I said, it's a special case - good mostly for examining to see where we might be in ~15-20 years if solar panels keep getting cheaper.
They still have quite a ways to go to make power cheaper during the day, but I actually think it's a worthy goal. I like the idea of cheaper cleaner power that's distributed enough that, worst case, I'd be able to keep the freezer frozen* even if I have to use flashlights/lanterns at night until they get the power fixed.
*I have a good one, it won't defrost if you keep it closed and give it power for a couple hours a day.
It may be illegal to be off-grid but there's no law against opening the main house breaker.
They'll still make it illegal because, you know, you could always turn the breaker back on.;) They'll remove the meter, and you won't care until city officials show up and condemn your house because solar panels or no, without a grid connection you 'can't sustain a quality of life there'. Never mind that the alternative had her sleeping in her car... I'd take my house unheated over trying to sleep in my truck, even in an Alaskan winter.
I've seen old cites. They ran the rails right up to and into the factories. Outside of the commercial zones most of the trucks shouldn't be loaded as heavily.
When you are on an island with no coal, oil or gas and consumption is so low that you have to use small and inefficeint generators then it doesn't take much of a price drop for solar to be cheaper.
Hawaii does have a coal plant, but they have to ship the coal in, and they are big enough for the generators to be efficient, even though it doesn't leave much slack.
and probably would have imported some geothermal technology from NZ, Iceland or wherever a couple of decades ago.
If it was cheaper I would have expected them to do it just to improve their bottom line. Seems that they have one in Puna. Of course, it also mentions that the largest/most populated island, Oahu, isn't a good candidate for geothermal power. To the point that they're considering stringing a power cable undersea to connect the islands in order to transfer power between them, exploiting Big Island's geothermal plant for Oahu's benefit.
As for Alaska, hell no, save the oil for heating and selling down south. We have coal up here as well, we're currently in the process of trying to restart a coal power plant - it's even a 'clean coal' one that was built with the assistance of federal subsidies for the purpose of research.
Finally, I swear I've had a conversation similar to this before about Hawaii - Sure it's a special case, but that makes it a good candidate to look at for the potential problems the mainland could face if solar installs explode. IE look at where Hawaii is now to see where the southern US could be in 15-20 years.
Personally, I'm hoping 'retired EV batteries' becomes a viable solution. Too worn out to have the range necessary for staying in the vehicle, but retaining 50% or so of the capacity, which in the case of the 85kwh Model S, would be enough to power me for 2 days.
I take it you're talking about a full size fridge, not a cube?
It's not the size of your home that's the kicker, it's the maximum draw you need to size for. I'm not going to call your contractor incompetent, but he was probably sizing the battery bank for you to be able to run your whole service off of it. If you're willing to deal with something like no AC during a power outage, the battery system can be a lot smaller. Did he quote wattage and kwh, or even run time for that bank of batteries? Was it supposed to provide power overnight?
A quick google search showing a 2Kw battery bank, 4 batteries. It'll run your fridge(or a sump pump) and some lights, beyond that it'd need the pictured generator pretty quickly. Pictured here is a battery bank for an off-grid house.
What is the appropriate "level of penetration" for this tech compared to total generation? Half a percent? A whole percent
Personally, I'd go with 20%. We use about 50% more power during the day than we do at night. So if we say night uses 2 units of power, we use 3 during the day, for a total of 5. 1/5th=20%.
Anything over 20% of power from solar means we start getting close to cutting into power production by base load power plants. Much above that and you'd see night power costing more than daytime. If we get much above 30% we'd need some massive storage banks to actually use the power efficiently.
Besides, on average, solar power users produce power during the day, when demand is high and the cost of production is relatively high (because peaker plants are expensive).
That's currently true, but look at Hawaii - they're quickly reaching the point where they'll need their peakers more at night than during the day. They're quickly reaching the point where some of their distribution circuits will occasionally go negative during the day.
Net metering only works when you are indeed on average selling expensive electricity for the same rate you're buying cheap electricity. If more than 20% or so homes and businesses install solar panels the equation flips - now nighttime power is more expensive than daytime.
The trick is that while it's called in inverter, that's only one of the things it does. Not only can it feed solar power to the grid, it can operate your home off of batteries, and if that isn't enough it can signal a generator to turn on(and off) as needs and power supply(solar AND grid) varies.
Its quite disturbing to see complete forfeiture of assets without a trial taking place. I know normally tycoons and other scum like Madhoff and Ken Lay deserve to be tarred and feathered and pilloried for their crimes against society and shareholders, but who exactly was DAMAGED by Silk Road? Did all of the buyers receive their goods? If so, what is the DAMAGE?
1. The assets aren't forfeited(yet). They're being converted to USD with Ulbricht's consent. Doing so locks down the value now, and he might manage to keep some of it. 2. Who was damaged by the Silk Road? Well, allegedly Ulbricht tried to commission 6 murders on it. 3. The goods were illegal, even though I disagree with them being so. Well, except when the 'goods' are contract hits and such.
Jack Ma, being a Chinese Citizen, and Alibaba, a chinese company, would be rather hard to arrest them. Blocking them would be only very slightly easier because it'd become a matter of international treaty. As for being fraud/racket/exchange, I'd ask for citations, because as far as I'm aware it's a more direct source for cheap made in china stuff, with all the usual caveats for cheap stuff from china (buyer beware, probably lower quality than you think).
You know, I've never seen a attack ad/article like what you came up with? It's weak.
Sorry for not actually creating a template, but it'd be more along the lines of attacking somebody for having a liberal arts degree - not a science or engineering degree to indicate that you've been trained in how to assess the dangers of mining/drilling in an area. Revealing that they're getting money, or at least have ties with, people that the target audience don't like and don't think should have a say in their business. Example would be Bloomberg's 'donations' to help spread gun control in the USA. It's often counterproductive because, well, the gunnies* hate him so bad. The Koch brothers would be the ones from the opposite side of the fence. They seem to like donating to 'any' conservative republican running against a liberal democrat in a competitive campaign. They don't really care where.
Depending on how bad they are, you could also accuse them of simply being NIMBY or BANANA - Not In My Back Yard, or Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anybody. Fact is, we need resources to power our economy, and if you give the impression that you oppose EVERYTHING(and there are people who do), or your plan amounts to powering the economy on fairy farts, perhaps your efforts to constrict expansion should be restricted.
I say all of this as an anti-coal, pro-nuclear type. I think that the republicans have a point about the EPA - every regulation needs to be examined thoroughly, but consider diesel vehicles. Do you realize that because of the latest round of emission requirements, mileage in new diesels has dropped 20-30%**? We're talking about stuff like new hybrid buses getting worse gas mileage than their older non-hybrid cousins. The city can't afford to run the new buses in long routes because they don't save fuel. They WERE saving fuel until a new EPA approved engine was put in...
Anyways, to get back to the point - a single person 'rolling coal' with a deliberately modified truck in protest of the EPA's rules negates the benefits of the systems they mandated on about a thousand other trucks(and yes, those that do so are assholes). Personally, I think that the EPA needs to place stronger emphasis on retaining gas mileage, because we need to conserve oil. At this point the EPA is increasing fuel consumption and CO2 emissions for reducing other emissions - and I don't think that it's worth it.
*Given his staunch support for gun control and the fact that while Mayor of NYC he attempted to increase gun control on a GLOBAL scale, often donating money to gun control initiatives in individual states across the country I can see why. **At least until you rip out the extra EPA stuff or reprogram the chip. Then you get the gas mileage back Details on modifications necessary depend on vehicle and emission system.
are specifically not intended to return to the whitehouse after their year there.
No, but that's because the 'good ones' are off for seasoning elsewhere in order to increase the diversity of their experience. After interning at the white house, they get a position working in some bureaucracy somewhere, perhaps as an assistant to a representative, even a senator if they're really good. Maybe helping with somebody's campaign.
Then they have the whitehouse experience(and contacts), as well as knowledge in political campaigning and congressional procedures. They're well prepped to eventually run for office.
It does and it's a natural way to "store" hydrogen safely.
I'd argue that carbon is what allows us to 'naturally' store hydrogen safely, not carbon dioxide...;)
Plus, well, once you're producing your hydrogen from a renewable resource it's not really any harder to break up some CO2 while you're at it and make a hydrocarbon that's far easier to store.
As for my thing about using a fuel cell, I've done the figuring using a IC engine and figured out that all you'd need would be a 5-10hp generator to extend a Model S's range to rather more than most people would be willing/able to drive in a day.
No. A fuel cell is a device which turns chemical energy into electrical energy without having to turn it into heat first.
Though they do tend to generate quite a bit of heat as a byproduct.
Honestly, they have fuel cells that work with natural gas all the way up to alcohol. While they don't have the energy by mass that hydrogen does, by the time you add in the mass of the storage systems and account for the necessary volumes(or energy needed to compress it to the point of liquification), fuels with some carbon in them often achieve higher practical densities, and it's not like we can't generate NG and alcohols fairly readily.
Honestly, I wonder how large a system you'd need to 'extend' an EV's range if you figured on something like this: EV battery range@65mph: 150 miles Total range needed per day: 600 miles (Roughly 10 hours of driving a day) Fuel cell starts operation @50%/75 miles charge for the battery Speed is figured on a 55mph average, with the fuel cell continuing operation even while vehicle is stopped unless it's plugged into an electric source that exceeds that of the fuel cell. How big of a hydrogen storage tank would you need, how much would it weigh(and space taken up), how big of a fuel cell, and what would it weigh. Would this be smaller and lighter than a 600 mile battery?
Standard Oil was already huge when ICE cars started being made. Most of the infrastructure for refining and delivering gas was already in place.
Indeed. Remember back before the IC engine was huge, gas/oil lamps and heating systems were around and popular because electricity wasn't. Browsing wikipedia, 1885-1888 seems to be when the first 'practical' IC engine powered automobiles appeared. The model T, 1908, marked the beginning of automobiles entering the homes of the middle class and lower.
Meanwhile, only 70% of households were electrified by 1930. Homes not yet electrified would typically be using a gas like propane or liquid like kerosene for light.
I assume that Facebook can purchase enough to get all the volume discounts that vendors will offer on 18650s; but I'm genuinely surprised that that's enough, for non-vehicle applications(where weight and bulk are an obvious problem) to beat out the nasty, heavy; but cheap and mature lead acid stuff.
Don't forget that with higher oil prices that shipping costs took a sharp nose up fairly recently. With the latest price drops the lower weight of shipping li-ion vs lead-acid can shift the economics towards liIon.
Slashdot Mirror
If you want to influence the direction of a company, you would want to own as much of its stock as possible, not get rid of it. If you are extremely wealthy, you can just buy all of the company's shares and have total control over its direction.
Bingo. A 'responsible' party owning 10% of Exxon could be the difference between Exxon having executives who are mustache-twirling villains and having a responsible board that has the company investing heavily into renewable technology to position itself for the inevitable decline of oil.
Oil isn't just used for fuel, it's a lubricant.
If we're not using it as a fuel, there's plenty of organic sources that can rather easily provide for our lubrication needs. Thermal depolymerization, for example, generates what's effectively an extremely pure light sweet crude. The processes used to make synthetic oils don't need to use fossil oil as a feedstock.
It's a bit like worrying about people getting enough drinking water when they're living in a city in the desert and thus dying of thirst. It's not the people we have to worry about so much - drinking is near the bottom of the list for municipal water. You use more washing hands. Obtaining enough water for people to keep their clothes washed is a much bigger problem in such a case. Drinking water is such a small usage that we could truck it in if we had to.
You want people swear off coal and oil right now when it makes up over 85% of the total power generated in this country? That's basically asking them to go back to living in caves. To having their kids die of preventable diseases. To going hungry if their crops fail or hunting sucks.
We don't have to. Let's say we pass a few reforms. Things like house the homeless($10k annually vs $40k to leave them on the street), reform sentences and prisons(1/2 the prison sentence AND less likely to come back?), and healthcare. The fed.gov already spends 90% of what it would take to provide single-payer UHC if we were paying the median for industrialized nations. The individual states more than pick up the remaining 10%. We currently spend ~$6.7k vs $2.9k. So fixing this ONE problem would enable states to put more money towards other important things without going into debt, help with the federal deficit, AND dump about a grand more into every family's pocket a month.
What does $3k a year, per person, pay for? A hell of a lot of solar panels and other sources of renewable power. We can improve our lives in a lot of other ways.
The tuition is ~$40k. Sure, they give scholarships based on need etc, but Harvard charges tuition because they can.
Unless you're the child of a multi-millionaire you're not going to be paying full rate for Harvard. Due to the continuing endowments and such they don't technically have to charge a cent to anybody. Yale as well.
Matter of fact, I think my state college should at least start on the same. Encourage all the graduates to donate their tuition at some point in their lives. Perhaps in their wills. Once you reach about 20 times the annual tuition costs interest in safe investments alone should keep costs controlled.
Yep, like I said, it's a special case - good mostly for examining to see where we might be in ~15-20 years if solar panels keep getting cheaper.
They still have quite a ways to go to make power cheaper during the day, but I actually think it's a worthy goal. I like the idea of cheaper cleaner power that's distributed enough that, worst case, I'd be able to keep the freezer frozen* even if I have to use flashlights/lanterns at night until they get the power fixed.
*I have a good one, it won't defrost if you keep it closed and give it power for a couple hours a day.
It may be illegal to be off-grid but there's no law against opening the main house breaker.
They'll still make it illegal because, you know, you could always turn the breaker back on. ;) They'll remove the meter, and you won't care until city officials show up and condemn your house because solar panels or no, without a grid connection you 'can't sustain a quality of life there'. Never mind that the alternative had her sleeping in her car... I'd take my house unheated over trying to sleep in my truck, even in an Alaskan winter.
of the streetcar tracks that are still under the pavement in many cities.
Which is actually too bad; a lot of cities could use those today, better fuel economy then buses and higher passenger loads than cars.
I've seen old cites. They ran the rails right up to and into the factories. Outside of the commercial zones most of the trucks shouldn't be loaded as heavily.
When you are on an island with no coal, oil or gas and consumption is so low that you have to use small and inefficeint generators then it doesn't take much of a price drop for solar to be cheaper.
Hawaii does have a coal plant, but they have to ship the coal in, and they are big enough for the generators to be efficient, even though it doesn't leave much slack.
and probably would have imported some geothermal technology from NZ, Iceland or wherever a couple of decades ago.
If it was cheaper I would have expected them to do it just to improve their bottom line. Seems that they have one in Puna. Of course, it also mentions that the largest/most populated island, Oahu, isn't a good candidate for geothermal power. To the point that they're considering stringing a power cable undersea to connect the islands in order to transfer power between them, exploiting Big Island's geothermal plant for Oahu's benefit.
As for Alaska, hell no, save the oil for heating and selling down south. We have coal up here as well, we're currently in the process of trying to restart a coal power plant - it's even a 'clean coal' one that was built with the assistance of federal subsidies for the purpose of research.
Finally, I swear I've had a conversation similar to this before about Hawaii - Sure it's a special case, but that makes it a good candidate to look at for the potential problems the mainland could face if solar installs explode. IE look at where Hawaii is now to see where the southern US could be in 15-20 years.
Personally, I'm hoping 'retired EV batteries' becomes a viable solution. Too worn out to have the range necessary for staying in the vehicle, but retaining 50% or so of the capacity, which in the case of the 85kwh Model S, would be enough to power me for 2 days.
I take it you're talking about a full size fridge, not a cube?
It's not the size of your home that's the kicker, it's the maximum draw you need to size for. I'm not going to call your contractor incompetent, but he was probably sizing the battery bank for you to be able to run your whole service off of it. If you're willing to deal with something like no AC during a power outage, the battery system can be a lot smaller. Did he quote wattage and kwh, or even run time for that bank of batteries? Was it supposed to provide power overnight?
A quick google search showing a 2Kw battery bank, 4 batteries. It'll run your fridge(or a sump pump) and some lights, beyond that it'd need the pictured generator pretty quickly. Pictured here is a battery bank for an off-grid house.
What is the appropriate "level of penetration" for this tech compared to total generation? Half a percent? A whole percent
Personally, I'd go with 20%. We use about 50% more power during the day than we do at night. So if we say night uses 2 units of power, we use 3 during the day, for a total of 5. 1/5th=20%.
Anything over 20% of power from solar means we start getting close to cutting into power production by base load power plants. Much above that and you'd see night power costing more than daytime. If we get much above 30% we'd need some massive storage banks to actually use the power efficiently.
Besides, on average, solar power users produce power during the day, when demand is high and the cost of production is relatively high (because peaker plants are expensive).
That's currently true, but look at Hawaii - they're quickly reaching the point where they'll need their peakers more at night than during the day. They're quickly reaching the point where some of their distribution circuits will occasionally go negative during the day.
Net metering only works when you are indeed on average selling expensive electricity for the same rate you're buying cheap electricity. If more than 20% or so homes and businesses install solar panels the equation flips - now nighttime power is more expensive than daytime.
Charging a battery off of AC? Surely you mean RECTIFIER.
Nope, he said inverter, he was talking about a intelligent hybrid inverter like this Outback one.
The trick is that while it's called in inverter, that's only one of the things it does. Not only can it feed solar power to the grid, it can operate your home off of batteries, and if that isn't enough it can signal a generator to turn on(and off) as needs and power supply(solar AND grid) varies.
$125k to shill for an oil company? Sign me up.
$1M simply to look for dirt on somebody? That should be sufficient money to make a good start on a smear campaign.
Actually fairly unlikely. Give it a few more transactions.
Its quite disturbing to see complete forfeiture of assets without a trial taking place. I know normally tycoons and other scum like Madhoff and Ken Lay deserve to be tarred and feathered and pilloried for their crimes against society and shareholders, but who exactly was DAMAGED by Silk Road? Did all of the buyers receive their goods? If so, what is the DAMAGE?
1. The assets aren't forfeited(yet). They're being converted to USD with Ulbricht's consent. Doing so locks down the value now, and he might manage to keep some of it.
2. Who was damaged by the Silk Road? Well, allegedly Ulbricht tried to commission 6 murders on it.
3. The goods were illegal, even though I disagree with them being so. Well, except when the 'goods' are contract hits and such.
Jack Ma, being a Chinese Citizen, and Alibaba, a chinese company, would be rather hard to arrest them. Blocking them would be only very slightly easier because it'd become a matter of international treaty. As for being fraud/racket/exchange, I'd ask for citations, because as far as I'm aware it's a more direct source for cheap made in china stuff, with all the usual caveats for cheap stuff from china (buyer beware, probably lower quality than you think).
Dread Pirate Roberts has a sense of decency.
I'd have a lot more sympathy for him if he'd stuck to drugs rather than attempting to hire hits(contract murders) through his own site.
You know, I've never seen a attack ad/article like what you came up with? It's weak.
Sorry for not actually creating a template, but it'd be more along the lines of attacking somebody for having a liberal arts degree - not a science or engineering degree to indicate that you've been trained in how to assess the dangers of mining/drilling in an area. Revealing that they're getting money, or at least have ties with, people that the target audience don't like and don't think should have a say in their business. Example would be Bloomberg's 'donations' to help spread gun control in the USA. It's often counterproductive because, well, the gunnies* hate him so bad. The Koch brothers would be the ones from the opposite side of the fence. They seem to like donating to 'any' conservative republican running against a liberal democrat in a competitive campaign. They don't really care where.
Depending on how bad they are, you could also accuse them of simply being NIMBY or BANANA - Not In My Back Yard, or Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anybody. Fact is, we need resources to power our economy, and if you give the impression that you oppose EVERYTHING(and there are people who do), or your plan amounts to powering the economy on fairy farts, perhaps your efforts to constrict expansion should be restricted.
I say all of this as an anti-coal, pro-nuclear type. I think that the republicans have a point about the EPA - every regulation needs to be examined thoroughly, but consider diesel vehicles. Do you realize that because of the latest round of emission requirements, mileage in new diesels has dropped 20-30%**? We're talking about stuff like new hybrid buses getting worse gas mileage than their older non-hybrid cousins. The city can't afford to run the new buses in long routes because they don't save fuel. They WERE saving fuel until a new EPA approved engine was put in...
Anyways, to get back to the point - a single person 'rolling coal' with a deliberately modified truck in protest of the EPA's rules negates the benefits of the systems they mandated on about a thousand other trucks(and yes, those that do so are assholes). Personally, I think that the EPA needs to place stronger emphasis on retaining gas mileage, because we need to conserve oil. At this point the EPA is increasing fuel consumption and CO2 emissions for reducing other emissions - and I don't think that it's worth it.
*Given his staunch support for gun control and the fact that while Mayor of NYC he attempted to increase gun control on a GLOBAL scale, often donating money to gun control initiatives in individual states across the country I can see why.
**At least until you rip out the extra EPA stuff or reprogram the chip. Then you get the gas mileage back Details on modifications necessary depend on vehicle and emission system.
are specifically not intended to return to the whitehouse after their year there.
No, but that's because the 'good ones' are off for seasoning elsewhere in order to increase the diversity of their experience. After interning at the white house, they get a position working in some bureaucracy somewhere, perhaps as an assistant to a representative, even a senator if they're really good. Maybe helping with somebody's campaign.
Then they have the whitehouse experience(and contacts), as well as knowledge in political campaigning and congressional procedures. They're well prepped to eventually run for office.
It does and it's a natural way to "store" hydrogen safely.
I'd argue that carbon is what allows us to 'naturally' store hydrogen safely, not carbon dioxide... ;)
Plus, well, once you're producing your hydrogen from a renewable resource it's not really any harder to break up some CO2 while you're at it and make a hydrocarbon that's far easier to store.
As for my thing about using a fuel cell, I've done the figuring using a IC engine and figured out that all you'd need would be a 5-10hp generator to extend a Model S's range to rather more than most people would be willing/able to drive in a day.
In the Dutch system you also do not have CEOs of medical companies having to pay for trophy mistresses, reducing costs even further.
I'd say that the mistresses are cheaper than the advertising costs, but whatever. ;)
No. A fuel cell is a device which turns chemical energy into electrical energy without having to turn it into heat first.
Though they do tend to generate quite a bit of heat as a byproduct.
Honestly, they have fuel cells that work with natural gas all the way up to alcohol. While they don't have the energy by mass that hydrogen does, by the time you add in the mass of the storage systems and account for the necessary volumes(or energy needed to compress it to the point of liquification), fuels with some carbon in them often achieve higher practical densities, and it's not like we can't generate NG and alcohols fairly readily.
Honestly, I wonder how large a system you'd need to 'extend' an EV's range if you figured on something like this:
EV battery range@65mph: 150 miles
Total range needed per day: 600 miles (Roughly 10 hours of driving a day)
Fuel cell starts operation @50%/75 miles charge for the battery
Speed is figured on a 55mph average, with the fuel cell continuing operation even while vehicle is stopped unless it's plugged into an electric source that exceeds that of the fuel cell.
How big of a hydrogen storage tank would you need, how much would it weigh(and space taken up), how big of a fuel cell, and what would it weigh. Would this be smaller and lighter than a 600 mile battery?
Standard Oil was already huge when ICE cars started being made. Most of the infrastructure for refining and delivering gas was already in place.
Indeed. Remember back before the IC engine was huge, gas/oil lamps and heating systems were around and popular because electricity wasn't.
Browsing wikipedia, 1885-1888 seems to be when the first 'practical' IC engine powered automobiles appeared. The model T, 1908, marked the beginning of automobiles entering the homes of the middle class and lower.
Meanwhile, only 70% of households were electrified by 1930. Homes not yet electrified would typically be using a gas like propane or liquid like kerosene for light.
I assume that Facebook can purchase enough to get all the volume discounts that vendors will offer on 18650s; but I'm genuinely surprised that that's enough, for non-vehicle applications(where weight and bulk are an obvious problem) to beat out the nasty, heavy; but cheap and mature lead acid stuff.
Don't forget that with higher oil prices that shipping costs took a sharp nose up fairly recently. With the latest price drops the lower weight of shipping li-ion vs lead-acid can shift the economics towards liIon.