Had a Tesla model S (the high performance version) out 4 a drive today. 0-100 km in 4.4 seconds 460 km range with a one hour recharge time (stop for lunch and u can drive it across the country) and a 50 cm central touch screen. It was an amazing car. dead silent and very fast. Some guy in a V8 mustang tried to pass me on the on ramp. (he didn't succeed). The only thing saving the gasoline engine now is the price of the batteries which are steadily dropping. Give it another 5 years and the gas engine will be an anachronism in a regular passenger car. As I was driving kept wondering how easy it would be to put this drive train in a Fiero. SInce a Fiero with the Tesla drive train would be about 1100 lbs light I am guessing the performance would be "spirited"
I really don't doubt I'll see gasoline internal combustion engines be replaced by something better in main stream transportation in my life time. I don't think it'll be as soon as 5 years, as it will be more of a transition period over possibly decades. This may be affected for the better/worse by the greedy gas companies wanting more billions of dollars in revenue.
The only thing saving the gasoline engine now is the price of the batteries which are steadily dropping. Give it another 5 years and the gas engine will be an anachronism in a regular passenger car. As I was driving kept wondering how easy it would be to put this drive train in a Fiero. SInce a Fiero with the Tesla drive train would be about 1100 lbs light I am guessing the performance would be "spirited"
And the only thing preventing us from having unlimited power is the invention of Mr. Fusion.
I admire your optimism, but research has been working on a better battery for 100 years and there has been little progress. I don't expect any major breakthroughs in the laws of physics in 5 years, but there's always a slim chance.
Until such time the chemical battery is only going to have a fraction of the energy of gasoline (A Chevy Volt stores less than the equivalent of a gallon of gas' worth of energy) and nothing short of a miracle is going to change that.
A person's optimism or pessimism on this subject seems to be directly connected to their vested interests. I live in a town that has one of those government sponsored battery plants. Now we are going to get a research center too, courtesy of you-know-who. The local free enterprise people (and there are many) are in a quandary trying to figure out what they think of the whole thing. I am sure if I were in Texas I would have no trouble denouncing the effort.
From Teslas own web page: 62 miles of range per hour of charge
That is using the 240V charging. So the 'stop for lunch' isn't going to charge enough to make that trip across the country. I also don't know very many diners that have 240V outlets that they will let you use. Will we have power stations across the US like we now have gas stations? Again, doubtful. My reasoning is that we are already straining the grid as it is. We have to make power somehow and most of those options are pretty much tapped out. You can dam only so many rivers. You can only build so many coal/gas/oil/methane/(some other fuel type) plants. Look at the government regulations covering the building of these and you'll understand more. Then there is distribution of the generated power. Another problem to over come. I can see the near future electric car as a commuter/grocery getter, not a long distance vehicle. Not until a whole bunch of obstacles are over come. And they aren't on Teslas back to fix them. Would I buy one? Yes, I would. If I had the money to do so. But I would not be able to use it for more than what I've already mentioned: local commute and grocery getting.
Tesla company is building a whole network of charging stations... 30 mins... For 180 miles... I forget when they will complete it... The biggest thing is price... The Tesla S is over a 100k right? I gotta check...
...This may be affected for the better/worse by the greedy gas companies ....
I have this argument with a buddy, who'd love to get an electric car so he "can tell the oil companies to shove it". Of course, right now electric cars are overpriced, they don't have the range he needs etc. - a bunch of reasons he hasn't bought one.
And are these people naive enough to think the cost of electricity will remain low as it is now? Cheap electricity is not a "right" any more than cheap gas. You think electric companies aren't "greedy"? "Supply and demand" will be the reason your electric bill had tripled.
From Teslas own web page: 62 miles of range per hour of charge
That is using the 240V charging. So the 'stop for lunch' isn't going to charge enough to make that trip across the country. I also don't know very many diners that have 240V outlets that they will let you use. Will we have power stations across the US like we now have gas stations? Again, doubtful. My reasoning is that we are already straining the grid as it is. We have to make power somehow and most of those options are pretty much tapped out. You can dam only so many rivers. You can only build so many coal/gas/oil/methane/(some other fuel type) plants. Look at the government regulations covering the building of these and you'll understand more. Then there is distribution of the generated power. Another problem to over come. I can see the near future electric car as a commuter/grocery getter, not a long distance vehicle. Not until a whole bunch of obstacles are over come. And they aren't on Teslas back to fix them. Would I buy one? Yes, I would. If I had the money to do so. But I would not be able to use it for more than what I've already mentioned: local commute and grocery getting.
EV charging stations are all ready starting to become more common place. I think every Cracker Barrel in the country has at least one, so you could stop for lunch and make it pretty far. According to the Alternative Fuels Data Center there is already 5,059 of these ev charging stations. So they are/will be as common as gas stations.
I think the gas in the vehicles is getting stale. It's been 9 months and there's no new gas. There should be problems with keeping them running soon. Electric vehicles have been dead for months, no way to recharge them unless you have a generator sitting somewhere and then all you are doing is staying within the range of the batteries. Fiero related: was there a Fiero in Woodbury?
Could the country put charging stations in every rest stop and gas station in the US? yes Will that be done anytime soon? no Will putting a charging station in every rest stop and gas station in the US put even more strain on an already straining electric grid? yes Will the electric companies or the government step up and improve the grid any time soon? I think you can answer that yourself. But NO. Will the US have to generate more electric power to accommodate the adding of all these power stations? yes Will the government make it easier to build more power stations? no, look at EPA regulations governing power generation stations and the environment
I really do like the idea that we are moving to electric/flex fuel/hybrid vehicles. It's been a long time coming and the environment really needs it. Do I foresee the infrastructure of the US being able to accommodate purely electric vehicles for long distance travel in the near future? Not even close. We, as a nation, just don't have the infrastructure in place and, in my opinion, it won't happen any time soon. As was mentioned there are a lot of electric charging stations already in the US. Over 5,000 as mentioned in a previous post. The vast majority of those stations are in CA. Then up the coast into OR and WA. After that TX and then up the East Coast from FL (then you have to skip a few states) into the New England states. There is a dearth of stations in the middle. Are there some? Yes but not many. Could/will that number grow? Yes. But how fast? I try to look beyond just adding a charging station into what it will take to do so on a large scale. It won't be easy. And I don't think it will be any time soon. Just my opinion and everyone else is entitled to theirs. I'm done hijacking this thread about Tesla Model S. Great car and I hope that they do well.
[This message has been edited by n7vrz (edited 12-01-2012).]
I have this argument with a buddy, who'd love to get an electric car so he "can tell the oil companies to shove it". Of course, right now electric cars are overpriced, they don't have the range he needs etc. - a bunch of reasons he hasn't bought one.
And are these people naive enough to think the cost of electricity will remain low as it is now? Cheap electricity is not a "right" any more than cheap gas. You think electric companies aren't "greedy"? "Supply and demand" will be the reason your electric bill had tripled.
I think the gas in the vehicles is getting stale. It's been 9 months and there's no new gas. There should be problems with keeping them running soon. Electric vehicles have been dead for months, no way to recharge them unless you have a generator sitting somewhere and then all you are doing is staying within the range of the batteries. Fiero related: was there a Fiero in Woodbury?
That's more like it. Take the engine out, decklid off, stuff a buncha armless zombies in the engine bay and they can "chase" the back of your head. Sure, you'll only go 3 mph, but it's free power...the tree-hugging zombies will love ya for it.
Or put the zombies on a treadmill and they can generate electricity. Everyone alive has a turn sitting on a chair just out of reach of the zombies so they can chase them.
First of all, "making a better battery" is dead research. Any real research for improved power in the future is looking toward alternate ways to provide power, not alternate ways to store it.
Battery powered cars will be gone by the time gasoline engines are gone.
People on this forum generally just don't give a damn. They are mostly old timers stuck in the ways of "I'm American and I'll do what I want, I don't care about the environment, and the Socialism of the Democratic party can't tell me what to do with my catalytic converter!" The people with this attitude will feel the hurt the most when we run out of oil. Trying to convince people who won't even accept all the evidence around them that gasoline is going away or that their removal of emissions equipment has an effect on the entire world and not only the air over their household, is futile.
In relating to electric cars and the hi-way they travel on, where are the funds going to come from to build and maintain said roads? the majority of the funding comes from the tax placed on a GALLON (not dollar amount) of fuel by both state and federal entities. If there are more vehicles on the road that are not using gasoline or diesel as a fuel, where are we going to get the funds? Some states are looking at an $-per-mile tax, which should get interesting. Tolls and higher registration fees are also a couple ideas being looked at if not already in place.
The truth is battery research is in high gear and they are looking at many ways to store power and to recharge faster. I even saw how they are looking to the mud under the sea floor to store power. The fact is the chase to find a better powe storage device is nearly as strong as the cure for many health issues. The guy who solves this will stand to make more than Power Ball will ever pay out. Imagine a cell phone that needs charged once a month or pace maker battheries that last for the life of the person they are in. Etc. Batteries that could be charged in min not hours.
It has been stated by many including many eviromentalist that the internal combustion engine will not vanish anytime soon. It is clear it will become smaller and more efficent and in some way change in how it may function. But at the end of the day as long as oil is available it will be in play.
Add to that too that there is still a hell of a lot of oil available and will be for sometime. While it may not always be cheap it will be here.
One thing many forget on why oil prices are up is when the Fed Reserve prints more money it devalues the dollar and when that happens it takes more money to buy oil. Oil has been see a commoditiy since the early 70's and is treated like a currency anymore. Supply and demand also play into this.
The truth is this is a very complex issue and not just a simple one to cover in a few lines of a post.
The bottom line is the Automakers will continue to make electric cars for those who can live with them and as they do more money will be invested in their system to make them better. No electric car market no investment as this is that simple. The auto makers need as many takers of the electric cars they can so they can continue selling the more popular models that most people want. Same goes for smaller cars like the Chevy Spark.
Also while we did need to clean things up we also have to keep in mind that many have turned this geen agenda into a money making venture and power grabbing system. While many have good intentions there are many other that have made a lot of money and power grabs to change who calls the shots around the world.
I recomend people to read up on people like Maurice Strong and learn more on the power players as their intents are not always honest. Also read up on carbon trading as too few people know the whole truth on everything going on.
Oh and if you see a Zombie either shoot it in the head or hit it in the head. Never anywhere else. LOL!
[This message has been edited by hyperv6 (edited 12-01-2012).]
The truth is battery research is in high gear and they are looking at many ways to store power and to recharge faster. I even saw how they are looking to the mud under the sea floor to store power. The fact is the chase to find a better powe storage device is nearly as strong as the cure for many health issues. The guy who solves this will stand to make more than Power Ball will ever pay out. Imagine a cell phone that needs charged once a month or pace maker battheries that last for the life of the person they are in. Etc. Batteries that could be charged in min not hours. ...
I agree.
I am pessimistic not because I live in Texas, but because of physics. Batteries have made very little progress in 100 years not for lack of trying. But there is only so much energy that can be stored in chemical reactions. Can it get better? Absolutely, but how much better is debatable.
I am pessimistic not because I live in Texas, but because of physics. Batteries have made very little progress in 100 years not for lack of trying. But there is only so much energy that can be stored in chemical reactions. Can it get better? Absolutely, but how much better is debatable.
The fact is there is mroe work and investment into batteries now than ever thanks to lap tops and cell phones. Now that there is a great investment in electric cars there will be even more investment. While this is a tough nut to crack the odds of a breakthrough are better with more investment and more people working on it.
The one thing that has really hurt is the fact NASA is being killed slowly. Much of our advancements we have made in the last 50 years were all due to NASA and their contractors building and designing systems for space. Many think the act of landing on the moon was out goal but the truth was the the act of getting to the moon was the goal to advance out technology from the top down.
The Glenn NASA center here in Cleveland was making good progress with many power systems till the Obama admin cut the budget. Our area lost a lot of money for this program and all we got back were some programs to pave roads and to put a fence on a bridge to keep people from jumping. As nice as the though of the fence was the idiots never accounted for people standing on the roofs of their cars and still jumping to their deaths. $10 mill down the drain..
While the Obama admin has invested in green engergy programs there has been even greater waste than ever on many with so little oversite or goals. At least with NASA there was some oversite and when goals were missed it was front page news. That is the advantage of very public programs as it keeps goverment more honest in a day and age they like to hide so much.
While progress has been slow work goes on and someone somewhere will kick the door in on this. The auto makers by having electric car programs have not just made advancement with the batteries but also with better electric and efficent motors. The Gains GM has made with the EV1, Hydrogen cell program and the Volt have been the greatest but they still have a lot to do and make it clear this is only the start.
I loved the Hydrogen cell Equinox GM built a couple years ago. I was able to drive one and loved it. Too bad there is no where to fuel it and no way to do it faat on a large scale. Honda also has one ready but again filling is an issue.
Originally posted by hyperv6: The fact is there is mroe work and investment into batteries now than ever thanks to lap tops and cell phones.
Most of the improvements in battery powered devices over the last 20 years have not been in batteries, but in reduced energy consumption in the devices they are used in; which inevitably allows smaller batteries to be used to power them. The future of batteries (as we use them) isn't in storing energy in chemical compounds or across leaflets of carbon nanotubes. It is that those "batteries" will actually be generators. Miniature reactors which safely produce energy from the decay of an element, or crystalline nanostructures which convert heat into electricity.
Some of these are already in use by NASA, or by other research facilities, and some will probably even be feasible for consumer application in the next few years.
..."batteries" will actually be generators. Miniature reactors which safely produce energy from the decay of an element, or crystalline nanostructures which convert heat into electricity. Some of these are already in use by NASA, or by other research facilities, and some will probably even be feasible for consumer application in the next few years.
Just gotta find some di-lithium crystals and get working with those.
(fun fact - in early episodes of Star Trek, they called them lithium crystals)
[This message has been edited by fierosound (edited 12-02-2012).]
Unless you get your electricity from a hydroelectric power plant, any electric car you plug in is still running on coal, oil or natural gas. We lost power on Long Island for 4 days and gas was rationed, you could still get gas though. Imagine not being able to drive because you could not plug your car in. If plug in cars increase in popularity, they will put a strain on electric demand, especially in warmer months. Does anyone think for a minute that an electric company will not raise rates? The "evil" gas companies are always attacked for this, what do you think a monopoly like an electric company will do?
Gas engines aren't going anywere for several more years regardless of what the EPA's Nazi laws attempt to do until the electric motors are perfected its just not happening.
Gas engines aren't going anywere for several more years regardless of what the EPA's Nazi laws attempt to do until the electric motors are perfected its just not happening.
I don't think the EPA regulates the murdering of specific ethnic groups. A bit out of their jurisdiction really.
No dilithium needed. Though Helium-3, deuterium, and thorium are more practically available and applicable to larger scale of power plants and homes, than the Nickel-63 used in this robotic insect.
Or nuclear fission, or wind, or solar, or geothermal, or biofuel, liquid fuel thorium reactors.
Sorry, I left off nuclear which I wish we had more of but wind and solar are not economically viable sources of power right now, they only work when it's sunny or windy, respectively and wind has it's own issues with killing birds and causing health issues with people who live near windmills, not to mention they're ugly. Biofuel, if you mean fuels like corn ethanol, costs more to produce than gasoline (it takes alot of energy to process all that corn and that mostly comes from coal and oil generated electricity) and removes food products from the food supply. The price of feed goes up because of the demand for corn for ethanol production, not to mention that the US taxpayer subsidizes the farmers. I'm not even going to go into the fact that we have more oil in the ground in the US than possibly anywhere else in the world.
Most of the improvements in battery powered devices over the last 20 years have not been in batteries, but in reduced energy consumption in the devices they are used in; which inevitably allows smaller batteries to be used to power them. The future of batteries (as we use them) isn't in storing energy in chemical compounds or across leaflets of carbon nanotubes. It is that those "batteries" will actually be generators. Miniature reactors which safely produce energy from the decay of an element, or crystalline nanostructures which convert heat into electricity.
Some of these are already in use by NASA, or by other research facilities, and some will probably even be feasible for consumer application in the next few years.
I agree as I pointed out the better motors etc that have come from programs like the Volt etc. When there is a market companies will invest.
At this point all the cards are on the table. I have even seen where there was even work to store energy in the mud at the bottom of the ocean. It was working to a small degree but nothing marketable as such yet. This is just an example of how far reaching this is.
If goverement budget cuts do not kill it the are working heavily with drones. Not the kind we are used too but the drones that are very small and in large numbers. Think mechanical Bugs. These are what they are looking at in relation to the battle fields of the future. Also larger drones are still being worked out. Air and Space Smithonian in the recent issuse address some on the more simple projects. I have read some on the black programs and just the hints of them would have to employ new power systems and sources.
Most people in the public sector have little idea how far some ideas have gone. They still think the F-117 is leading edge stuff.
Either way with the need for more efficent things and the need for better power storage the increase in spending will only keep going up. The inclusion of the auto industry will only increase the pace of things even more. Lets face it the Tesla is pretty much just based on modified lap top type batteries where the GM system has taken it a step farther and introduced liquid cooling to maintain the batteries in all conditions. Systems like this will help even more with life and limited if you can control the enviroment. Today the leaf is lacking such and has limited cold life and the batteries have been failing in AZ due to the heat. Many forget heat is as bad or worse on a battery life vs cold.
It will be interesting to see what comes from all of this. Other issues like the shortage of power plants with the killing of coal and the building of Nuke plants will also be a factor. Solar panels and wind are not enough to take their palce but yet the EPA is banning things before we have a ready replacment.
Having been in a Volt I love the little car. It would suit me fine to drive to work daily and if the needs comes where I have to travel I still could. The only issue is price as if and when GM can lower cost to $25K and up they will sell even more. With volume and more sales the cost to build will come down some and better pricing from vendors who will be making more and more parts. GM already has the Gen 2 nearly ready to come out and has been already working on Gen 3 and 4 models of this car. Inprovments in all areas of these cars will come into play and they will only improve and cut cost in them. Also more different versions will come. The new Cadillac ELR will offer new things at a little higher price that will filter down to the other cars they build.
I am not a fan of E assist. To be it is a pain in the butt and really adds little to the cars gains for the amount of space you lose and the increase cost as the car gets older in repair and replacment parts. Many have not considerd this yet. I would rather lease a Volt before I too a E assist GM car.
The fact is there is mroe work and investment into batteries now than ever thanks to lap tops and cell phones. Now that there is a great investment in electric cars there will be even more investment. While this is a tough nut to crack the odds of a breakthrough are better with more investment and more people working on it.
The one thing that has really hurt is the fact NASA is being killed slowly. Much of our advancements we have made in the last 50 years were all due to NASA and their contractors building and designing systems for space. Many think the act of landing on the moon was out goal but the truth was the the act of getting to the moon was the goal to advance out technology from the top down.
The Glenn NASA center here in Cleveland was making good progress with many power systems till the Obama admin cut the budget. Our area lost a lot of money for this program and all we got back were some programs to pave roads and to put a fence on a bridge to keep people from jumping. As nice as the though of the fence was the idiots never accounted for people standing on the roofs of their cars and still jumping to their deaths. $10 mill down the drain..
While the Obama admin has invested in green engergy programs there has been even greater waste than ever on many with so little oversite or goals. At least with NASA there was some oversite and when goals were missed it was front page news. That is the advantage of very public programs as it keeps goverment more honest in a day and age they like to hide so much.
This is something I happen to have first hand experience with... I worked on two failed battery projects for NASA. The problem is that budgets so tight everyone is risk adverse. We tried to develop a custom lithium ion battery with the best energy density the world has ever seen. And at the first sign of failure the money dried up. We ended up buying cells form some overseas manufacturer and repackaging them into our box.
That's not technology development at all. The overseas cell manufacturers are not interested in major breakthroughs... all they care about are selling cells to whoever will buy them, and sell them by the millions. What really pushes the state of the art is when a big organization like GM or NASA comes to them and has them build something they never built before, like the Volt battery. Before the Shuttle was cancelled we were working on an electric APU that would have used battery power to drive the hydraulics. It would have had one of the most powerful batteries ever developed, but alas it never happened.
I won't live to see it, but in 100 years I'm sure electric will be used in propulsion of automobiles. Maybe they will be powered by improved batteries, maybe fuel cells, maybe cold fusion, I don't know exactly, but whatever it is, it will eventually be better than gasoline. But unless there is a genius out there that surprises me, I don't see it happening in 5 years.
Originally posted by TONY_C: Sorry, I left off nuclear which I wish we had more of but wind and solar are not economically viable sources of power right now, they only work when it's sunny or windy, respectively and wind has it's own issues with killing birds and causing health issues with people who live near windmills, not to mention they're ugly. Biofuel, if you mean fuels like corn ethanol, costs more to produce than gasoline (it takes alot of energy to process all that corn and that mostly comes from coal and oil generated electricity) and removes food products from the food supply. The price of feed goes up because of the demand for corn for ethanol production, not to mention that the US taxpayer subsidizes the farmers. I'm not even going to go into the fact that we have more oil in the ground in the US than possibly anywhere else in the world.
Yeah, go tell all of Europe how dangerous and ugly their windmills are. Make sure you tell the Dutch really sternly too. I'm sorry, but you just don't understand wind power generation that well (or solar either, as panels are getting better every day, and solar does make up quite a large part of power generation, even in the US). And by biofuel I mean biodiesel and/or biomass as fuels. Ethanol for power generation would be silly. But large diesel generators could run on biodiesel pretty easily.
The world's infrastructure has collapsed. Nobody is maintaining the electrical grid - so it is OFF - no matter what the source.
Sure they can use generators, but liquid fuels are getting old and scavenged fuel will be useless at some point. Propane and natural gas - you need a source and then compress it and transport it. Again - how without power?
Making biodiesel is easier said than done. Of course, we can always look it up on the Internet (NOW - but not then). How many here have that knowledge in their head? But again, some welding may be necessary - where's that power coming from?
I'd say you have to use the power sources you'd have - BEFORE they're depleted - to build your new sources like a bio-diesel digester.
Sure - there's ways to "adapt" but I expect it would still be rougher going than depicted in a TV show.
[This message has been edited by fierosound (edited 12-02-2012).]
Originally posted by formulaWA: SInce a Fiero with the Tesla drive train would be about 1100 lbs light I am guessing the performance would be "spirited"
A Fiero with the Tesla drive train wouldn't be 1100 lbs. It'd still be about 2500 lbs at least. You'd need to build a whole new chassis to get a Fiero down to 1100 lbs.
This is something I happen to have first hand experience with... I worked on two failed battery projects for NASA. The problem is that budgets so tight everyone is risk adverse. We tried to develop a custom lithium ion battery with the best energy density the world has ever seen. And at the first sign of failure the money dried up. We ended up buying cells form some overseas manufacturer and repackaging them into our box.
That's not technology development at all. The overseas cell manufacturers are not interested in major breakthroughs... all they care about are selling cells to whoever will buy them, and sell them by the millions. What really pushes the state of the art is when a big organization like GM or NASA comes to them and has them build something they never built before, like the Volt battery. Before the Shuttle was cancelled we were working on an electric APU that would have used battery power to drive the hydraulics. It would have had one of the most powerful batteries ever developed, but alas it never happened.
I won't live to see it, but in 100 years I'm sure electric will be used in propulsion of automobiles. Maybe they will be powered by improved batteries, maybe fuel cells, maybe cold fusion, I don't know exactly, but whatever it is, it will eventually be better than gasoline. But unless there is a genius out there that surprises me, I don't see it happening in 5 years.
It is sad and hard to estimate how far the cuts at NASA have set us back. While other countries like China have watched and learned and are now advancing we are shutting the best arm for new technologies will ever have.
While I agee we may never see electric replace all gas powered vehicles we will see a small and growing segment where they will be. There are enough people out there now to support a small segment and as the performance of these vehicles come closer to a gas vehicle in range and real life useability we will see more growth with dropping cost. It is just going to take more time and more development. GM pretty well let it be known that the Volt was more or less a proof of concept and was not expected to be any kind of profit center for the company right off. They know this is a marathon and not a sprint race and they along with most other large automakers plan on long term investment.
Originally posted by Zoll: EV charging stations are all ready starting to become more common place. I think every Cracker Barrel in the country has at least one, so you could stop for lunch and make it pretty far. According to the Alternative Fuels Data Center there is already 5,059 of these ev charging stations. So they are/will be as common as gas stations.
yup. I am starting to see them too.
I agree that battery tech wont be improving enough in 5 years. yes, the Lithium Ion is a great battery - but - nothing beats Hydrogen as energy storage. but, Hydrogen suffers even more than less dense energy storage, like the hydrocarbon Gasoline, in that storage & delivery are sloppy & hazardous, and not something you want the "average WalMart consumer" doing on their own. It took 50 years to idiot proof our current system of gasoline delivery - and people STILL manage to frack it up.
