Obama Success Story - The Chevy Volt

[Texas Contrarian]

Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn

..The US does not have the grid to support millions of electric cars...

It certainly does if users employ timing devices such that charging takes place between the hours of 1 a.m. and 5 a.m., for instance. The limiting issue is peak demand capacity, not total megawatt-hour consumption.

Another possibility that's been discussed is the incentivization of electric car owners to allow their batteries to be grid-tied so that utilities could draw down on their capacity at critical peak times such as late afternoon/early evening on very hot days. Then the batteries could be recharged in the middle of the night.

The Li-ion battery pack in my car, for instance, can store about 53 kWh. That's quite a bit of juice!

(But the Chevy Volt is only good for about 16 kWh.)

I love electric cars; experiencing the smooth quietness, the torque, and the acceleration is a great pleasure. It's also nice to not fuck up the air quality in our cities any more than necessary. Ever been in Dallas or Houston on an ozone "red alert" day? But, of course, EVs now make little economic sense, mostly because of the very high cost of the battery packs. A technological breakthrough dramatically bringing down the cost of batteries would be a real game-changer.

[Dawgs]

I can here it now. By mandate you may only be able to recharge your vehicle between 1am and 5am. We don't care when you need to use your car.

[Texas Contrarian]

Originally Posted by Dawgs

I can here it now. By mandate you may only be able to recharge your vehicle between 1am and 5am. We don't care when you need to use your car.

Geez, I hope it never comes to something like that! But the way many government bureaucrats view things, such mandates wouldn't shock me.

The idea that's been tossed around by some utility executives is to strongly incentivize users to charge EVs in the middle of the night by offering steeply discounted rates. That way, substantially more total megawatt-hours could be delivered without adding peak capacity.

Increasing peak capacity is what would necessitate substantial additional investment in new power plants.

I'm OK with incentives that might reduce costs for all consumers by giving utilities a chance to produce more output during slack-demand periods. Mandates? Not so much.

Excess capacity in the middle of the night is about as useful to a utility company as unsold seats are to an airline.

[Dawgs]

And we know that building more plants is almost impossible.

[Sidewinder]

Originally Posted by CaptainMidnight

The Li-ion battery pack in my car, for instance, can store about 53 kWh. That's quite a bit of juice!

Not really. Gasoline contains about 36.6 kWh/US gal. So your battery pack is the equivalent of less than two gallons of gasoline.

And, as someone else pointed out, unless your charging point is EXCLUSIVELY supplied from nuclear or hydroelectric sources (which is HIGHLY unlikely), the carbon footprint is still there. It is just happening somewhere else.

[Sidewinder]

My personal opinion: For an electric car to be SUCCESSFUL, it has to have certain attributes.

It has to have a car's payload capacity.

It has to have a car's unrefuelled/unrecharged range.

It has to have refuelling/recharging times measured in minutes rather than hours.

It has to have a car's cruising speed, both highway and city.

And it has to a pricetag commensurate with its automotive ecological niche. (I have yet to see anyone talk about building an electric Corvette, that matches all of the Corvette's specs, as listed above.)

In short, it has to be a CAR, able to do a car's myriad jobs, not a politically-correct toy.

[Texas Contrarian]

Originally Posted by Sidewinder

Not really. Gasoline contains about 36.6 kWh/US gal. So your battery pack is the equivalent of less than two gallons of gasoline.

True, but my point was simply that the battery packs could, under certain circumstances, slightly increase the availability of power to the grid rather than burden it further.

Originally Posted by Sidewinder

And, as someone else pointed out, unless your charging point is EXCLUSIVELY supplied from nuclear or hydroelectric sources (which is HIGHLY unlikely), the carbon footprint is still there. It is just happening somewhere else.

A couple of points:

Yes, the carbon footprint is still there, but I think it would probably be smaller, and at least some of the sources of pollution would be distributed away from large cities with serious air quality problems. Power plants are also enormously more efficient than gasoline engines used in cars and trucks and emit much less bad stuff per kWh of output.

But there's an issue which, at least to me, is far more important than the carbon footprint. Electricity is generated with domestic fuels such as coal and nat gas. (And about 20% of it comes from nuclear plants.) Since we don't have to import the fuel, the consumption doesn't add to our very large negative balance-of-payments number.

In my view, the trade deficit/negative balance-of-payments position is one of the most serious structural issues facing our economy.

Originally Posted by Sidewinder

My personal opinion: For an electric car to be SUCCESSFUL, it has to have certain attributes.

It has to have a car's payload capacity.

It has to have a car's unrefuelled/unrecharged range.

It has to have refuelling/recharging times measured in minutes rather than hours.

It has to have a car's cruising speed, both highway and city.

And it has to a pricetag commensurate with its automotive ecological niche. (I have yet to see anyone talk about building an electric Corvette, that matches all of the Corvette's specs, as listed above.)

In short, it has to be a CAR, able to do a car's myriad jobs, not a politically-correct toy.

In order for an electric car to be a commercial success; yes, I agree with you, it would have to meet those conditions.

In any event, we're simply musing about how things might be in a more perfect world; not how they are in the world we inhabit today!

[blue3122]

Economics killed the electric car. Blame Adam Smith

[Texas Contrarian]

Originally Posted by blue3122

Economics killed the electric car. Blame Adam Smith

Markets have a habit of resisting interference and doing powerful things.

[JONBALLS]

they dont heat up enough to defrost the windows up north

if I decided to stop fucking hookers I could hold my nose and order up a 427 vette

[Sidewinder]

Well, you have to set your priorities.

Personally, I'd buy a used 350 'Vette in good shape and look into finding an SB or two.

[Munchmasterman]

Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn

3 fires out of how many volts? a thousand, two thousand, five thousand? Not a very good record. And don't they run about 130,000 dollars a copy? Of course the owners only pay about 40,000 dollars each and the tax payers kick in the rest.

14600 sold as of Aug 1 2012. Price is @ $40,000 with a $7500 credit dropping price to $33000.

$90 grand a piece in subsities?

No proof of course..

So you didn't know how much they cost and you don't know how many they made. But you know they suck.

Your typical type of post. You know nothing and can prove nothing.

[i'va biggen]

Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn

Sensia in an earlier life I was an electrician. The US does not have the grid to support millions of electric cars. Unlike gasoline which you can store in a tank until you need it and only use what you need, electricity has to be made continuously and so much is "wasted" in heat and noise.

You can get around in your car with a smart parking spot. Just imbed one half of a transformer in the pavement or garage and the other half on a gimbel in the car. Park the car over the transformer and the gimbel will move the secondary side to get maximum EMF transfer within a few cms. You don't hear anyone talking about this because they are not really serious.

A few years ago Greensburg, Ks was literally wiped out by a T5 tornado. They decided to rebuild using green technology only. I lobbied for setting up a as a test platform parking spots for electric cars and getting the car companies to donate vehicles to the town for testing. I figured that this would be a great publicitiy idea...if it worked. They did neither one, they were not interested in proving themselves to the world.

If they sell a bunch of electric cars you will have to quit using your hair dryer during peak charging hours...

[JD Barleycorn]

Damn, too many and I keeping losing the page. One more try; http://hotair.com/archives/2010/08/0...lue-of-a-volt/

http://articles.courant.com/2010-11-...lectric-car-gm

http://articles.businessinsider.com/...ernment-motors

http://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/16192

http://www.newsroomamerica.com/story/202744.html

[JD Barleycorn]

Shutting down the Volt line "temporarily"...will it reopen after the election?

http://content.usatoday.com/communit...r-slow-sales/1