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Because of the glory that is petroleum. Cheap, plentiful, clean. (Should be cheap unless a leftist fucktard impedes it's production) ETA: I love petroleum in all of it's glorious forms. Are you referring to OPEC? I hate them BTW. Have hated them since 1979 & they have only gotten worse since then. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Cost, range, cost and range. Did anyone actually read what I wrote?  I mean, beyon the Subject? Few will do the charging station thing, it's way too expensive in the era of budget cuts killing coffee services. Outside of .gov where statement is more important than cost, it'll be a there and back world for the time being. |
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Heard a great line from one of Hannity's guests yesterday when talking about green energy. "In order for it to be an alternative energy, it first has to be an alternative." Get the price down to about 15K and have a 500 range per charge and people might start looking into them more. |
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Quoted:
Heard a great line from one of Hannity's guests yesterday when talking about green energy. "In order for it to be an alternative energy, it first has to be an alternative." Get the price down to about 15K and have a 500 range per charge and people might start looking into them more. nice 
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IMO, one of the keys to make the electric car "catch on" in America in the short term is to attract commuters by offering tax incentives to businesses for the installation of charging equipment at the business. Park-N-Charge (I'd call it) at work would have the effect of DOUBLING the range of an electric car. In a single stroke, the electric car would be an attractive alternative for SUBURBAN commuters. Most suburbanites like me are beyond the round trip range of the current technology being offered. I think we'd see the emergence of a new market for converting cheap electric cars or for making "home-made" electric cars. Cheap is the other key to making the electric car fly in the short term because it won't replace the real car in the garage, just supplement it in the day-to-day commuting role. Cheap, personal, electric-powered cars solely for commuting to and from work and short trips to get beer etc.. Saves wear and tear on the real car. Reduction of demand for gasoline would accompany the electric car taking off. This idea might even save the coveted suburban lifestyle; might lead to th resurgence of home prices in "bedroom" towns (no jobs in bedroom towns––just houses and walmarts.) I live in a bedroom town and saw the value of our house drop from ~$230,000 to ~$120,000. That value will NEVER return until and unless PERSONAL transportation costs are lowered in the long term. IMHO, Suburban-ism is about to collapse with disasterous results. If I were running the GoP, this idea would be plank in its political platform before the sunset today. Comments, additions and criticisms are eagerly anticipated. Common sense. The batteries are hellishly expensive when they need to be replaced. The car is also expensive and it can barely get out of the driveway before it needs to be charged again. It cannot go fast or carry a reasonable load and the acceleration is miserable. Aside from these minor drawbacks it is a great idea. |
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Quoted: I'm one of the few that would make the leap for what it's worth, so here are my two reasons: 1) Tech isn't there yet, battery technology/weight just can't provide enough range beyond short jaunts. 2) Once "1" is there, it must be affordable to the masses. I would dig having one... Couldn't have said it better myself. Once they have more range and a lower price, I'm in. But you gotta start somewhere, and they are improving. Early adopters and tech super-enthusiasts of today will fund the development of tomorrow's electric vehicles. Being able to have a spare battery at home that you can quickly swap out would also be a nice plus for those times you can't wait for a recharge. Or something like a propane cylinder exchange at fuel stations, but I don't think that's going to work in this case. |
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Cost, range, cost and range. Did anyone actually read what I wrote?
I mean, beyon the Subject? I read what you wrote. Are you a communist? Why should the government subsidize anything? How about let the market decide? Good Lord man, petroleum is cheap, clean to burn, and US territories have metric shit gallons of it. A good plan would be to stop gov regulation and let the fracking begin! Drill in US waters, ANWR, etc.. . Overnight oil prices would plummet and we could get back to an American way of life. How do you think friggin electricity is produced? God's own methane? |
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Quoted:
Heard a great line from one of Hannity's guests yesterday when talking about green energy. "In order for it to be an alternative energy, it first has to be an alternative." Get the price down to about 15K and have a 500 range per charge and people might start looking into them more. What about a 25-30 mile range and about $5,000? 25-30 miles from the house charge and 25-30 miles from the at-work charge. I'm suggestting a near-term way to have the electric car supplement the real car in the garage, not replace it. |
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Because of the glory that is petroleum. Cheap, plentiful, clean. (Should be cheap unless a leftist fucktard impedes it's production) ETA: I love petroleum in all of it's glorious forms. Are you referring to OPEC? I hate them BTW. Have hated them since 1979 & they have only gotten worse since then. No. I am referring to our own massive oil reserves. Offshore, ANWR, etc... . |
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Energy density / lb of curb weight. Period, full stop. The tech is not ready. It may never be. This, but I think it will eventually get there. I've heard of a couple breakthroughs in progress which have the potential to increase the energy density of a lithium ion battery by a factor of x10. A leap like that would bring electric cars to the mainstream if it can be commercialized. I believe it was this article I am thinking of: http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/16/researchers-increase-charging-capacity-speed-of-lithium-ion-bat/ I get that making something work in a lab and work in real life are two entirely different things though. It will never get there in a way that lets these things get to market and compete with internal combustion engines. The issue is energy accumulation and transfer. Fossil fuels have accumulated the energy stored in their molecular forms over millions of years. Once that energy exists, it can be distilled, stored, transferred and pumped into our cars relatively quickly and safely. But the energy "in" a battery is actually created by the electrical grid at the time of charging. It cannot be effectively stockpiled. The grid cannot produce more electrons than are consumed by the things hooked to the grid. Electrons cannot be readily stored as we can with gas stations, they cannot be accumulated, or really safely "pumped" in a quick and efficient fashion. The "battery" model is wrong in and of itself. Its never going to really be able to compete. They'd be better off dumping the subsidies they're playing with in electric cars into internal combustion engine research, particular diesels and high efficiency designs. Or into research on the catalyzed (or bio synthesized) manufacture of hydrocarbons from water and CO2 in the air. THAT is the magic bullet. |
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The common denominator of the comments so far are "poor range and high cost". Both are addressed in the body of what I wrote. It seems no one read it. I read it. You lost me at tax incentives. The government has no business deciding which cars people should use. Your "bedroom community" house dropped in value because it was artificially inflated to begin with. |
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I was listening to a a radio show yesterday that went over the chevy volt costs and stats. Most users were getting 25 miles per charge on a 16 kilowatt. At or around the 25 mile mark it would go to its 9 gallon fuel tank and the car then only got 25-27 MPG. The radio host said that after some math he came up with that it took a little over 70 cents per mile to run a chevy volt (between fuel costs and charging costs) at $45,000 Retail but only cost 10 cents per mile to run a $20,000 economy car.
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Quoted: I live in a bedroom town and saw the value of our house drop from ~$230,000 to ~$120,000. That value will NEVER return until and unless PERSONAL transportation costs are lowered in the long term. IMHO, Suburban-ism is about to collapse with disasterous results. Sorry, but the electric car is not the answer to your problem. Your problem stems from supply and demand. Demand was artificially inflated by people thinking that the price of housing would continue to increase at an unsustainable rate. People purchased homes they could not afford because they expected to sell them in a few years and make money off of them. It appears that $120k is the current actually equilibrium of supply and demand. The only things that are going to change that is a reduction in supply, or increased demand. Where do you think the increased demand is going to come from - what do you think is going to decrease the supply?If you have a 50 mile commute and a decent gas car - your commute is costing less than $10 a day. That is $200 a month. Even if all that savings went to purchasing a more expensive house - that is worth about 20k in house price. Increasing the price of gas will not make that much better, because it will ultimately increase the cost of everything else as well - cutting demand for houses. I commute more than most, about 500 miles a week. An electric car would not help me much, as none that I know of have a dependable 100 mile one way range (which I need at least 2 times a week). –––– The problem with charging stations is not the cost of the station - where are you going to get the electricity from? If you put 20 of those in a parking garage, you have a major new load on that buildings electrical system. These are also peak hour loads - which screws with the power grid as well, were is the city going to get the extra electricity from. Overnight charging is done at off peak times (so not a city issue) and also off peak for the home the station is in (so not causing an overall higher peak load on the home). Forbid if we work on tech for faster charging and higher peak loads. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Heard a great line from one of Hannity's guests yesterday when talking about green energy. "In order for it to be an alternative energy, it first has to be an alternative." Get the price down to about 15K and have a 500 range per charge and people might start looking into them more. What about a 25-30 mile range and about $5,000? 25-30 miles from the house charge and 25-30 miles from the at-work charge. I'm suggestting a near-term way to have the electric car supplement the real car in the garage, not replace it. A lot of people don't have room for a second vehicle, either physically or financially. Even if the electric car is a stripped-down bare-bones shell, it's got to meet all kinds of safety regs, so it's going to have a significant minimum cost. I don't think it's possible to make any vehicle that anyone would want to drive for $5000. Might not be possible to even got one road-legal. |
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Because of the glory that is petroleum. Cheap, plentiful, clean. (Should be cheap unless a leftist fucktard impedes it's production) ETA: I love petroleum in all of it's glorious forms. Are you referring to OPEC? I hate them BTW. Have hated them since 1979 & they have only gotten worse since then. No. I am referring to our own massive oil reserves. Offshore, ANWR, etc... . Thank you for the clarification rike! 
BTW - I still hate OPEC. |
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The common denominator of the comments so far are "poor range and high cost". Both are addressed in the body of what I wrote. It seems no one read it. Your solution seems to be to spend huge money for a poor vehicle, then the same again for a "real" vehicle for the 75% times when the electric toy can't do the job. Not much of a viable plan. 
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| Yeah I read it. Pie in the sky thinking. A cheap electric car to save wear and tear on the gasoline car. These cars are 40k plus. What's a cheap one? 20k? I own a $1200.00 sidekick that gets 32mpg that will accomplish the same thing. How much wear and tear is there running to the store to get beer? As much as you want it to work, the technology just isn't there yet. In reality, the future is probably better for hydrogen fuel cells than electric cars. |
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Because of the glory that is petroleum. Cheap, plentiful, clean. (Should be cheap unless a leftist fucktard impedes it's production) ETA: I love petroleum in all of it's glorious forms. Are you referring to OPEC? I hate them BTW. Have hated them since 1979 & they have only gotten worse since then. No. I am referring to our own massive oil reserves. Offshore, ANWR, etc... . Thank you for the clarification rike!
BTW - I still hate OPEC. I agree. If we were allowed to harvest oil in our own back yard they would not be needed. |
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Batteries (Chemical storage) are untenable, we are going to need to get Capacitors (Current storage) online before electic anything is worthwhile.
Its too damned expensive weight and volume wise to carry around chemicals that generate minor amounts of electrical energy, its a lot saner to just store the energy directly. |
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Heard a great line from one of Hannity's guests yesterday when talking about green energy. "In order for it to be an alternative energy, it first has to be an alternative." Get the price down to about 15K and have a 500 range per charge and people might start looking into them more. What about a 25-30 mile range and about $5,000? 25-30 miles from the house charge and 25-30 miles from the at-work charge. I'm suggestting a near-term way to have the electric car supplement the real car in the garage, not replace it. Never happen. Your pipe dream has to compete with someone saying this: "Why wouldn't I buy a $2500 used Civic which gets 35+ MPG? Then I take that $2500 that's left from your proposed purchase price, and even at $5 a gallon, that left over $2500 buys me 500 gallons of gas which gets me 17,000 to 20,000 miles of driving –– like two years worth." You add range anxiety and constantly having to worry about the fucking thing running out of charge and NO ONE WILL BUY THEM. There's a reason people don't drive around on their daily errands with only 1 gallon of gas in their car at a time. It gets wearisome to have to constantly worry about fuel and range. |
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The technology is there for a 10 minute recharge - or at least about an 90% recharge in 10 minutes. What is not there is the infrastructure to handle the charger side. I would love to see the power cables to a filling station that was trying to do that to 8 vehicles at a time. It would look like a transformer station. ––- Just for fun, GE WattStation can charge in 4-8 hrs with a 220v 30amp load. Assuming the worse, 5hr of 30amp - that is 150amp hours, if you want that in 10 minutes the rate would be a hair under 1000amps for 10 minutes. I am sure the wiring to that station would be close to 10k amps. Not bad considering most houses are .15k amps services. Under peak that station would use as much electricity as almost 70 homes at peak ––- The "brick" issue is real, but a joke as well. It is fairly easily avoided with a simple circuit that cuts the battery off after it gets below a certain threshold. Those batteries discharge at a very low rate, you would have the better part of a year to get it onto a charger before damage is done. A problem for a car in a collection, but not for a driver. A cheep maintainer and you would never have a problem |
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Cost and technology mainly....As Keith mentioned, when you have an EV that gets 200-300 miles range and only take 5-10mins to charge safely, (swipe at the Volt there,) then you'll have a viable option. If the Volt could go for 300 miles on a safe 5 min charge for 40K, GM literately couldn't make enough of them quick enough. In fact I'll go so far that GM would have to halt production on all gas cars and start making Volts to keep up with demand. The Volt HAS an unlimited range, you need to do your homework. It just does not have unlimited BATTERY range, once the battery reaches a specified discharge level, the engine comes on and provides charging power to the battery for as long as you need to drive the car. It gets about 35mpg with the engine charging the battery. Its biggest problem is that at its price, it has no real advantages over a Chevy Cruize getting almost 40mpg on the highway for 2/3 of the price. The only way this car works is if the person lives 10 miles from work and the gas engine never comes on. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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Quoted: I was listening to a a radio show yesterday that went over the chevy volt costs and stats. Most users were getting 25 miles per charge on a 16 kilowatt. At or around the 25 mile mark it would go to its 9 gallon fuel tank and the car then only got 25-27 MPG. The radio host said that after some math he came up with that it took a little over 70 cents per mile to run a chevy volt (between fuel costs and charging costs) at $45,000 Retail but only cost 10 cents per mile to run a $20,000 economy car. 25 miles is actually quite good. The Volt is still effectively a short-medium range car, but at least it doesn't leave you dead when the battery is out like a dedicated electric. Comparing it to a standard car over hundreds of highway miles is going to kill its stats. Same as if you loaded a Prius to its capacity with concrete bags and drove everywhere at WOT and wondered why you weren't getting over 25mpg. I would dig having a volt even though I'd kill the battery upon every commute. I'm just not going to pay what they are asking. |
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http://hotair.com/archives/2011/12/21/govt-subsidies-for-chevy-volt-up-to-250000-per-car/ The only reason they are "affordable" (if you can call 32,500 for a economy car affordable) is because we the taxpayer are footing the bill if it wasnt for the subsidy they wouldnt sell a single one of these damn things
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You do realize that the majority of components in an electric car are still dependent on OIL products - right? Gas is just one aspect of oil. Plastics is another huge aspect of OIL consumption.
Quoted:
You mean "Catch on fire?" (sorry, could not resist). I agree though: MOST car trips/commutes are very very short. Electric cars would work very well for this. Before someone calls me a hippy/environmentalist (I am neither), I simply believe it is stupid for Americans to spend a single penny in oil profits to OPEC. Hugo Chavez? Iran? WHY buy ANYTHING from people who hate us? Oil is a commodity and even if most of it comes from U.S./Canadian/Mexican sources, we are still benefitting OPEC by buying it. When it comes to energy, the BEST energy to buy is energy that is 100% made in the USA. Right now, that ain't oil. Screw OPEC. Buy anything EXCEPT oil/petroleum. |
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Because of the glory that is petroleum. Cheap, plentiful, clean. (Should be cheap unless a leftist fucktard impedes it's production) ETA: I love petroleum in all of it's glorious forms. Are you referring to OPEC? I hate them BTW. Have hated them since 1979 & they have only gotten worse since then. No. I am referring to our own massive oil reserves. Offshore, ANWR, etc... . Thank you for the clarification rike!
BTW - I still hate OPEC. I agree. If we were allowed to harvest oil in our own back yard they would not be needed. Good point. I also think T. Boone Pickens was onto something; natural gas can be part of the solution - especially with ever-improving hydraulic fracturing technology. And I see no reason not to open new nuclear power plants either. Go USA!! |
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Quoted: Quoted: Cost and technology mainly....As Keith mentioned, when you have an EV that gets 200-300 miles range and only take 5-10mins to charge safely, (swipe at the Volt there,) then you'll have a viable option. If the Volt could go for 300 miles on a safe 5 min charge for 40K, GM literately couldn't make enough of them quick enough. In fact I'll go so far that GM would have to halt production on all gas cars and start making Volts to keep up with demand. The Volt HAS an unlimited range, you need to do your homework. It just does not have unlimited BATTERY range, once the battery reaches a specified discharge level, the engine comes on and provides charging power to the battery for as long as you need to drive the car. It gets about 40mpg with the engine charging the battery. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile Technically, the Volt still has the ability to drive the wheels directly with the gas engine, it is not strictly gas-electric in the locomotive sense. A physical connection is available. While this ability is indeed a broken promise from the original specs, it is actually a good thing, as it's the most efficient way to put power to the wheels. As far as I know, if traveling at highway speeds where consistent high power is needed, the gas engine is doing most of the work even if the battery is not expired. |
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You do realize that the majority of components in an electric car are still dependent on OIL products - right? Gas is just one aspect of oil. Plastics is another huge aspect of OIL consumption. Quoted:
You mean "Catch on fire?" (sorry, could not resist). I agree though: MOST car trips/commutes are very very short. Electric cars would work very well for this. Before someone calls me a hippy/environmentalist (I am neither), I simply believe it is stupid for Americans to spend a single penny in oil profits to OPEC. Hugo Chavez? Iran? WHY buy ANYTHING from people who hate us? Oil is a commodity and even if most of it comes from U.S./Canadian/Mexican sources, we are still benefitting OPEC by buying it. When it comes to energy, the BEST energy to buy is energy that is 100% made in the USA. Right now, that ain't oil. Screw OPEC. Buy anything EXCEPT oil/petroleum. We can't eliminate use of petroleum - everyone knows that. But current rate of use of it for gasoline is benefitting OPEC. Screw OPEC; eliminate as much of their oil profits as possible; drive them into financial ruin. |
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There are already tax incentives. They make very little difference. There already are a few "home-brew" electric car makers out there. Here are the problems: Charging takes between 5 and 10 hours. Fast charging is hard on the batteries. Further travel distances (40-80 miles +) require a hybrid anyway Winter travel, range greatly decreased. As the battery's age, their capacity is lowered. Expensive to build, and people besides the diehards, are not willing to spend $20K+ for a car that goes 40 miles. Gas is cheap...comparatively. More pollution is made building the batteries than a normal car will produce it's entire life (allegedly) Our power grid could never handle the extra load of a great deal of electric cars. Thoughts?  This is the one that is never thought of, we're already having rolling blackouts in summertime...now add an electric car to each home. |
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You do realize that the majority of components in an electric car are still dependent on OIL products - right? Gas is just one aspect of oil. Plastics is another huge aspect of OIL consumption. Quoted:
You mean "Catch on fire?" (sorry, could not resist). I agree though: MOST car trips/commutes are very very short. Electric cars would work very well for this. Before someone calls me a hippy/environmentalist (I am neither), I simply believe it is stupid for Americans to spend a single penny in oil profits to OPEC. Hugo Chavez? Iran? WHY buy ANYTHING from people who hate us? Oil is a commodity and even if most of it comes from U.S./Canadian/Mexican sources, we are still benefitting OPEC by buying it. When it comes to energy, the BEST energy to buy is energy that is 100% made in the USA. Right now, that ain't oil. Screw OPEC. Buy anything EXCEPT oil/petroleum. We can't eliminate use of petroleum - everyone knows that. But current rate of use of it for gasoline is benefitting OPEC. Screw OPEC; eliminate as much of their oil profits as possible; drive them into financial ruin. I strongly suspect the West––especially the US––is currently sustaining a coordinated economic attack; oil cost is the weapon. |
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300 mile range and 5 minute charges. Plus a dry interior environment with heat and air conditioning. They'll never be widely accepted if they are primitive niche vehicles. An otherwise excellent vehicle can probably dispense with the back seats while retaining some volume for errands and or two weekend size bags, but the elbow room has to be about 6 inches wider than a smart for two, and the picture in the rear view mirror has to be light years better than the smart car's. I would ease the charge time a little, however. Not much, maybe 10 minutes. Quoted:
Lack of a gasoline engine. Lack of a liquid fuel engine. |
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There are already tax incentives. They make very little difference. There already are a few "home-brew" electric car makers out there. Here are the problems: Charging takes between 5 and 10 hours. Fast charging is hard on the batteries. Further travel distances (40-80 miles +) require a hybrid anyway Winter travel, range greatly decreased. As the battery's age, their capacity is lowered. Expensive to build, and people besides the diehards, are not willing to spend $20K+ for a car that goes 40 miles. Gas is cheap...comparatively. More pollution is made building the batteries than a normal car will produce it's entire life (allegedly) Our power grid could never handle the extra load of a great deal of electric cars. Thoughts? This is the one that is never thought of, we're already having rolling blackouts in summertime...now add an electric car to each home. Good point, of course. But, I wonder what vitriol Ford sustained by those citing the absence of gasoline infrastructure? |
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My TDI will do at least 550 miles at 80 MPH with two bikes on top and AC blowing.
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300 mile range and 5 minute charges. 300 REAL miles. With the AC on full blast, driving into a head wind, average speed of 80 mph, 3 passengers + luggage. TDIs are awesome; the REAL question is why haven't the newer generation of TDIs caught on yet? My dream car would be a BMW M5 TDI. As good as BMW is, I'm sure the extra weight up front due to the diesel engine is a challenge for them and I'm willing to bet the gasser M5 will always out handle it for that reason. |
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The common denominator of the comments so far are "poor range and high cost". Both are addressed in the body of what I wrote. It seems no one read it. No, they really were not addressed. You simply shifted the cost, and put a band-aid on the range problem. |
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I was listening to a a radio show yesterday that went over the chevy volt costs and stats. Most users were getting 25 miles per charge on a 16 kilowatt. At or around the 25 mile mark it would go to its 9 gallon fuel tank and the car then only got 25-27 MPG. The radio host said that after some math he came up with that it took a little over 70 cents per mile to run a chevy volt (between fuel costs and charging costs) at $45,000 Retail but only cost 10 cents per mile to run a $20,000 economy car. At $3.00 a gallon for gas and 40 mpg fuel is .075 cents per mile. I generally agree with where you're going, but I think he's being generous with his figures. Quoted:
............ This is the one that is never thought of, we're already having rolling blackouts in summertime...now add an electric car to each home. I'd predict one every morning when thousands of workers get to work at about the same time and plug in. 
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My TDI will do at least 550 miles at 80 MPH with two bikes on top and AC blowing.
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300 mile range and 5 minute charges. 300 REAL miles. With the AC on full blast, driving into a head wind, average speed of 80 mph, 3 passengers + luggage. And there you go. You're not getting that with an electric car... not unless they make some monster advances in battery technology. |
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The fundamental issues are range and charge time.
Personally, the only solution I see, barring some Magical Magic Battery Breakthrough, is hot-swappable batteries. Instead of charging your onboard battery, you should be able to pull up to a charging station and swap out for a fresh battery. The entire process should take less than 2 minutes. The battery swap station would recharge your old battery and re-swap it to another customer. There are a lot of problems with this stagegy, primarily: stupid people, the cost of maintaining an inventory of charged batteries, the amount of power a charging station would use and standardizing batteries across manufacturers to keep the number of different batteries to a minimum. A very big investment, but it would solve a lot of the range and charge time problems. |
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