Comments on: Charging ahead with electric cars

By: Hubberts Peak

Hubberts Peak — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 02:57:36 +0000

I believe that peak oil is true and that we are now past the point of peak oil. I understand many of the current events have to do with this understanding and it won’t be long before the main stream media and population wake up and understand what is going on. For me and my family, we are preparing for the next generation.

By: ben

ben — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 19:20:08 +0000

Thought you might like this link:

Swapping Peak Oil for Peak Lithium?

http://www.hybridcars.com/hybrid-batteries/swapping-peak-oil-peak-lithium-25219.html

By: Milan

Milan — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 22:42:44 +0000

today’s hybrids (which recharge their batteries from the braking power of the car)

Not exclusively. Some hybrids use gasoline engines to drive generators, in addition to employing regenerative braking. Some hybrid designs never use the gasoline motor to drive the wheels directly; rather, they rely on the hydrocarbon-fuelled engine to produce electricity for batteries and electric motors.

By: Ben

Ben — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 15:27:23 +0000

You are right as well. I don’t think cars will ever be gone but I do believe that we could probably cut out at least 80% of current car/vehicle use without any ill effects, as long as the right type of public transport was in place. Not to mention that in a lot of cases, people could just stop being lazy and ride a bike (trips less than 5 miles). I saw this in action when I lived in Portland, Oregon. It is possible, cheap, convenient, and a pleasure to ride TriMet.

Yes, there will always be people who live out in the country (I will soon be one of them), but most people live within 20 miles of a major metropolitan area. This is easily serviced by rail with bus interconnects. For the times when people “need” their freedom and mobility (such as a trip to the mountains or whatever), the answer is car co-ops or rentals.

My worry is what will happen in the meantime. Next year, two years from now, whenever, when gas is $5-10 per gallon, electric cars are not here yet (or if they are, nobody can afford them), and there is no decent public transportation outside of the 10 largest cities. What will we do when it costs people more to drive to work than they make during the day?

Rail systems take a considerable amount of time to implement. I’m afraid that we’re too little, too late, especially given how poor the US is these days.

By: Marc

Marc — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 14:53:57 +0000

Ben, you are asking the right questions. I think there are about 900 million cars on the road, globally, about 15 million a year are sold in the U.S., so replacing gasoline engines with electric motors will take a lot of time. I believe that lithium, a key ingredient in the batteries, is plentiful although some people are worried about its price increasing.
I wish I agreed with you that public transport is the answer. The problem is that we are so scattered as Americans. And that freedom and mobility are so important to people. I strongly support public transportation as well as car taxes, but I think we will need to develop and produce cleaner cars as well.

By: Ben

Ben — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 14:42:00 +0000

While I would love an all-electric car in theory, I think many people who are pushing these things need a reality check. Look at how many cars are on the road today — how many millions is it? Can we really replace all of those with battery powered cars? Don’t these batteries contain significant amounts of precious metals? Is it really feasible from a standpoint of dwindling resources to do this, or will we “run out” (ie. become prohibitively expensive) of some essential component first? What about our roads, which are made from asphalt (an oil product) ? I don’t know the answers, I’m just asking.

I think it would be better to invest in public transport again. 80 years ago we had electrified light rail and trolleys everywhere. People were fully able to travel from any town to any town, and the suburbs, without a car. Why don’t we do that again? Then you only have to build a relatively finite amount of infrastructure (rails, which last much longer than roads) and a somewhat finite number of transport vehicles that are purposed to carry tens of millions of people over tens of millions of miles throughout their lifetime (as opposed to a car, which may get 200,000 miles and carry a few dozen different people over its lifetime). We should be doing this NOW, before oil really becomes scarce — we’ll need it to run the heavy machinery required to build railroads.

By: Bob Wallace

Bob Wallace — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:47:07 +0000

Abraham-

Other places people are actively discussing how to provide green energy both to replace current dirty sources and to power future electric cars.

Wind would seem to be an ideal source. It’s currently the cheapest way to produce new green energy. It provides both day and night. That means that wind energy can be used to provide more peak hour power on hot afternoons when it’s most needed and then can be used for charging vehicle batteries at night when grid demand is low.

By: The Understory » Breakthrough coming for Electric Cars?

The Understory » Breakthrough coming for Electric Cars? — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 18:16:13 +0000

[...] posted by Jennifer Krill in Freedom from Oil, Global Finance, RAN General on November 17th, 2008 Check out yesterday’s blog post from Marc Gunther: [...]

By: Abraham

Abraham — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 14:23:53 +0000

the idea of plug-in electric is all well and good, but what generally seems to escape the conversation in the electricity infrastructure that would have to be developed to provide the energy to power the cars. In a pill, this means more power plants – many of them conceivably coal-fired – scattered across the landscape.