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Are You Clamoring for an Electric Car?
(With my apologies to Gary McVey, prepare for one of my incendiary posts.)
Is a Tesla or a Chevy Bolt, or a Nissan Leaf on your Christmas list this year? Can you hardly wait to ditch that gas-guzzler in the driveway and replace it with a vehicle that you can “fill up” from an installation in your garage, at a lot less than a tank of Regular?
Well, if that’s what you see in your future, so do most of the world’s car manufacturers. There probably isn’t a car manufacturer who isn’t working on designing and building an electric car, either purpose-designed or just replacing the internal-combustion engine in a model they already build with a big battery. General Motors has already announced their coming “All-electric future.” The European Union is mandating more and more strict emissions rules for vehicles sold there, and their carmakers like BMW, Renault, Daimler, Fiat, and Volvo are all touting their electric vehicles.
But you might wish to wait a moment before you go all-in on electric, especially if you live in the United States outside of a central large city. First, let’s check out the price of that electric car versus its gas-powered brother. The Nissan Leaf retails for about $30,000. Its near twin, the Nissan Versa, costs about $19,000. An electric Chevy Bolt will set you back about $36,000. Its similar brother, the Cruze, is about $17,000. See a pattern developing here? In the past, you could rely on a nice Federal tax credit for your electric car, to help mitigate that huge price differential, but not anymore. Most carmakers have sold enough cars that they don’t earn any tax credit now. So, it looks like GM’s All-Electric Future will be a lot more expensive than its Internal Combustion Present.
That nice home charger in the garage will set you back another $700 or so. However, unlike the five-minute fill-up of your gas-powered ride, it will take you up to 3-4 hours to recharge that electric car. And the “range” of an electric car is a lot smaller than the range of miles you can get from a tank of gas. So, you’ll probably want to forget those long road-trips in your new electric car. And if you get caught in an unexpected traffic jam, that electric car’s range might just shrink. If you get caught with your battery down in the middle of a busy street or freeway, it might be pretty embarrassing to have AAA send a truck to hoist it up and carry it to the nearest charging station. And there’s no guarantee that there will even be a nearby charging station! They are still pretty few around the country today.
Also, what about that wildfire in your area, when the police or highway patrol comes to your house and tells you to evacuate? What? Your electric car is out of charge? It won’t get you very far when you need to evacuate? Too bad, it becomes a hunk of junk when the fire reaches your house, and you really can’t carry much on your back. Then, what about that power failure in the next thunderstorm? Your car needs a charge? Impossible with no power! That’s especially worrying when you are a rural resident, where you are already far from most services.
Now, I’ll bet that new electric car might not seem like such a good investment. And electric cars are so new, there’s really not much of a market for used ones. And big Li-ion batteries don’t last forever, and eventually need to be replaced, at a cost far above that of an internal-combustion engine. So your electric car might not be worth very much when its battery wears out, and you might be out one-third the price of the car for a new one. Oh, and batteries don’t perform very well in the cold, so if you live in a northern state like Minnesota, your car will need to be kept indoors so its battery doesn’t freeze or get drained by the cold weather. And beware of the company parking lot while you’re at work — your car might not run when you come out to go home at the end of the day.
My own viewpoint is that I will never, ever, buy or drive an electric car. I appreciate being able to get in my gas-powered car, and go wherever I want, whenever I want, with no “range anxiety.” I like long car trips, without the worry of how long I have left before my car dies. Gas stations are everywhere, and if you keep a full or close to full tank, you can even drive around during a power outage. And when you are forced to evacuate, you can fill up the trunk with your goods and just drive away. I’m betting that most Americans aren’t clamoring for an electric car, and that GM’s future might not be so prosperous if it expects most Americans to want one.
An electric car will not be in my future.
Published in Economics
They all ready have Arahant:
Disco could make a comeback at the same time!
Hydrogen actually has a higher lower explosive limit than gasoline. The main issue is that it has a crazy high upper explosive limit. Fortunately, hydrogen is super-light, so it is much less likely to accumulate.
Gasoline flammable range: 1.2% – 7%
Hydrogen flammable range 4% – 75%
Realistically, hydrogen is a bad idea for fuel cells outside of space travel. It’s too light to store in quantity outside of hydride reservoirs, and hydrogen attacks metals. High temperature hydrogen attack has caused massive oil refinery fires / explosions.
Manny, I’ve bought gallon bottles of distilled or drinking water. It’s way cheaper than gasoline. That’s aside from drinking fountains that give water for free. You’ll never see gasoline given out for free.
Unfortunately neither Car & Driver nor Consumer Reports have been able to establish accurate panty-dropping metrics for electric vehicles.
A real one, G.
How very ignoble.
Gary
It’s the anal engineer in me that cannot let some of this go.
Energy density for Kerosene/Diesel/Avgas (yes they are essential the same with different additives) is greater than AvGas (7lb/gallon vs 6.5lb/gallon) the “heavier” fuels are composed of longer hydrocarbon molecules, and are less volatile, which is why the Otto cycle ICE uses “gasoline”. Diesel cycle engines require a direct injection of the fuel into cylinders with ~22 to 1 compression ratios, Otto cycle top out at 11 to 1 (hence why you need a slow burning high octane fuel to prevent pre combustion). Jets engine until recently hovered in the 20’s to 1. Newer versions are climbing into the middle 30’s to 1
Your thermodynamics of turbines vs piston needs adjusting. Any engine’s efficiency is directly related to it’s compression ratio. Piston have better sealing than turbo machinery, and thus have better thermodynamic efficiency (ie heat management), but that alone does not determine what is a better power plant for a mission cycle.
Jets do not use their fuel as efficiently as piston engines (.6lbs of fuel/hp/hour vs .39lbs of fuel/hp/hr are the nominal specific fuel values for what’s on the market today) however they produce prodigious amounts of thrust for fairly light weight power plants. To get the range since they are crappy users of fuel require a quick trip up to thin air and pull back to idle thrust (which is still has poor economy compared to a piston, but can jets operate better at the high altitudes, pistons need some sort of compressors (turbo and super chargers) to get much past 20K feet). The range of a turbo fan jet diminishes greatly if they cannot bounce up pass 30K feet.
Also a jet engine cost more because the materials (exhaust turbines have to live in a hellishly hot environment) and the precision of the spinning parts machining, and assembly rigor used for the long duty cycles between servicing for a unit reliability rating that is acceptable for commercial operations. A piston engine is good for 2000 hours between over hauls (TBO) and producing ~300 hp will run you ~$60K. Some of the smaller turbines (attached to a reduction gear box for a prop) producing between 300 to 800 hp start at $250K up to $750K, however they only need their first hot box “inspection” (and probably not replacement) at 250K hours of operation. So they compensate for the higher initial price and higher fuel consumption by having a much, much, longer but pricey TBO’s. Turbo prop aircraft operations typically have lower service ceilings for their sweet spot of efficiency (25 to 30K feet). You need to have a lot of operational cycles to make this cost effective, not something typical with a lot of small GA operations.
The newest jet engines from GE and RR have more compressor stages, more bypass air and are approaching compression ratios of the reciprocating engines and thus more efficiency. Getting them onto the wings of the commercial aircraft fleet might give one some insight as to why Boeing was so eager to get the 737 MAX out the door with it’s larger and more efficient engines, which caused some airframe flight dynamics issues resulting in the need for the MCAS “pilot assist” system/software.
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Given the unreliability of electric power in N California, how popular are electric cars further from the city (SF, Sacramento et al)? Can you just imagine having to resort to charging the car off of a diesel generator once the power goes out?
When we drove from Seattle to Big Fork MT for the meetup in 2017, the first leg took us to the Hampton Inn at Walla Walla. That distance probably couldn’t be made without a pitstop by an electric car. I noticed when we arrived, there were two EV charging spaces, one was occupied and the other was out of commission.
I’ve been through earthquakes. When the power goes out, gas stations close, because they have no way to pump the gas, unless you live near a quaint 1919 gas station with a manual pump (and probably a glass column with a float level indicator).
If there’s a regional emergency, it’s true that everybody will have to make do with the range they’ve got, electric or gas. If 400,000 cars evacuate your mid-sized city, it’s true that nobody will be able to recharge until then can reach somewhere with 110 volt regular AC current. It’s also true that the first 50,000 cars on the way out of town will likely wipe out the supplies of every gas station en route. At this point, someone will say, “But whatabout a farm with a 200 gallon gas storage tank?” How many people reading this have one of those? Stocked and ready to go? Probably just about the same number with a generator…a low number.
I heard San Francisco has bio fuel lying around for the taking.
Yep, it can happen, but most EV users have phone apps indicating where working and unoccupied charge stations are nearby. Roadside recharging tends to be co-located with diners and restaurants. A DC charge, which most non-hybrids can accept, takes somewhere around 20 minutes to bring the car to 80%. Also, every EV I know of can trickle charge on ordinary 110 volts, the kind that every motel and every home has. Sure, in that case an empty to full charge could be an overnight deal. But there are more AC outlets than gas stations. It’s rarely a problem.
You are bringing this to the real issue, which is batteries. They are why electric cars did not take off initially, and still dog electrics to this day. Batteries are going to need to be massively less expensive and less rare material intensive for a given power density before the pure electric car becomes practical. Liquid fuels are the best for energy density, and already have a nationwide distribution network for them. They can also be stored much easier in large quantity. Something like a flow battery or reversible fuel cell could get around this.
There are some definite advantages to the electric drivetrain. I’d imagine the engine braking on an EV or hybrid is absolutely obscene, with the full torque of the engine applied to each wheel. With independent motors, I’d imagine traction control is impressive.
There is nothing on the horizon showing this sort of leap is about to happen.
Hybrids I can understand
What about battery materials? Lithium is a rare element. And demand for it is already increasing with the ubiquity of computers.
Would the resource demand be sustainable if electric vehicles were standard for a billion drivers worldwide? Would battery disposal at that scale cause problems?
I don’t mind electric vehicles as an option. But I’m not sure the eco-fascist dreams of electric vehicles only would play out as they hope. If auto-manufacturers were not fearful of idiotic governments or beholden to hippies, I wouldn’t worry.
Huh? The whole reason why governments are pushing (and in some cases outright edicting) electric cars is the assertion that they are “zero emission”. This is of course only true if the source of the electricity is zero emission.
I like the idea of compressed air vehicles although the limits on speed and distance needs improvement.
The fear really is the same as the overreach on same-sex marriage, in that the angry activists on the pro gay marriage side of that issue didn’t want simple acceptance by government of the change, they wanted to force people who disagreed with them into bowing to their beliefs, which was what the Masterpiece Bakery kerfuffle in Colorado was all about.
With EVs, you get the feeling the environmental activists aren’t going to be content with electric cars having their place as short-distance and light-duty vehicles alongside longer distance and more work-oriented gas and diesel powered vehicles — they’re going to try and use the force of law to mandate everyone has to have EVs, even if the technology is nowhere near in place to make them equally capable of doing the jobs that fossil fuel cars, SUVs and trucks now perform. The left doesn’t believe in their ‘co-exist’ bumper stickers when it comes to things they want done that call for a single solution, and where they have the power to enforce their ideological demands.
Where’s the beef? Or is she a vegetarian too?
I am so glad not to have an HOA . . .
How much of the price of gasoline is a tax? How much of the price of an electric car is subsidized. Do we know what it actually costs to run and charge an electric car, for x number of years, replace batteries, etc. if the energy is generated by oil, gas, hydro. There must be some studies somewhere done by honest people.
I’ve posted some thought-starters about the future of the auto industry, and some worthwhile links, here: What Future for the Global Auto Industry?
I especially recommend the Vitaliy Katsenslson piece, although I think his case for electric cars is overstated.
I work with electric motors and drivetrains every day.
Electric Cars are simpler. No, they are not. Mechanical engines are complex in terms of moving parts, but electric motors and the very expensive power electronics that drive them are extremely complex as well. So are batteries, which are incredibly complex structures.
Energy Storage is narrowing. It is not. It has not for many years. There are no breakthroughs on the horizon. Gasoline still has 1-2 orders of magnitude higher energy density than does a battery. Pure electric cars are at a huge disadvantage. Hybrids save some gas, but still at a higher sticker price.
Electric cars are cost-competititive. Not in terms of utility, they are not. In terms of other goals (style/virtue/etc.) they do fine.
Without tax breaks and with people buying utility, electric cars are uncompetitive. But if people want to buy electric cars the same way they buy watches or organic tomatoes, then the cars will do OK.
This
If you want to be that way about it, the complexity of a mule-drawn cart or pedicab beats that of a electric car or an internal combustion engine car.
Not analogous. I am speaking about the degree of technological manipulation and investment required to make a thing.
OK, but some of the people you’re contradicting are talking about the complexity of interacting parts that wear out and need maintenance. That’s not analogous, either.
The power electronics that govern the motors also wear out/fail unexpectedly. Very complex and very sensitive to complications of overheating.
{ Technical summary: power transistors’ internal resistance climbs as their natural high operating temperatures cause dopant diffusion in their junctions. That increasing internal resistance produces even higher operating temperatures exacerbating their own aging. And inducing similar issues with the adjacent computing cores. }
That said, while an electric-only vehicle is not in my future, for all of the reason @omegapaladin pointed out, I would like a viable plug-in hybrid. One that has a tiny (~25hp or so) genset plus generous fuel tank for range extension and emergency charging. That architecture has all of the advantages of the pure electric: low-rpm torque, simple gear train (if any at all), regenerative braking, and cheap recharging for short range duties. But they also have the range, flexibility, and fueling convenience of high-energy-density liquid fuels. These designs are also practical with cheaper and easy-to-recycle lead-based batteries. (Strange it may sound, but lead-acid batteries are far more environmentally friendly than anything based on lithium.)
FWIW, a typical sedan’s power requirements at steady highway speeds is in the vicinity of 25hp (based research w/ the Ford Taurus years ago).
Of course.