Wednesday, August 09, 2006
Just a Question
Why in the hell don't we have commercially viable cars powered entirely by electricity yet? I'm serious; this isn't a rant about gas prices or reliance on fossil fuels - - I just want to know the logistics behind this. We power damn near everything in the world by electricity; we've spent the past century and beyond advancing and perfecting this technology. We've also spent the past century designing and advancing our automobiles. Is there honestly no way to make this happen?
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3 comments:
That is definitely a reason development was retarded. But the real problem is that developing sufficient advances in a flawed technology like batteries is difficult.
For instance, the Chicago elevated trains run on tracks with a third rail along them supplying 600 volts of electricity. They can zip along no problem.
Electricity on the open road requires batteries, which have always been heavy and inefficient. Sure development of better batteries was quashed by big oil. But fossil fuels were a great advance in technology for early cars, sparing weight and increasing potential power. The first oil crisis in the 70s should have led to innovations and technology to free us from a growing dependence on foreign oil.
Developments for phones, laptops and other portable electricity hogs has helped get battery advances back on track for what it's worth. Which is probably not too much.
Hybrids smartly gather energy from braking to increase efficiency during city driving. However lugging the extra battery weight leads to a negative impact at steady speeds. Watch out for the next wave of hybrid SUVs that still can't break 20 mpg highway.
Another interesting but ultimately doomed idea would be electric lines above the roads that cars contact by dragging along with an arm on the roof. There are busses in SF that run this way. Longer ugly arms on cars will not fly.
I think fuel cells are the way to go. They are lighter and more efficient than other forms of electricity generation or transfer. The only barrier is cost, which keeps going down. Yet moving around as individual 4000 pound units is such a waste. Really we need to travel in packs to cut down on the weight each of us requires. Like wolves.
NO NO NO. Didn't anyone learn anything from the Simpsons? The STONECUTTERS held back the electric car. (And made Steve Guttenberg a star)
I will give the Stonecutters credit for keeping Atlantis off the map (and keeping the Martians under wraps), but not for holding back the eCar.
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