Electric Vehicles Cost effective

[ekpolk]

Originally Posted By: chevrofreak
Originally Posted By: ZZman
** The Prius has been out since 1997. I wonder how their batteries have held up?


The Prius doesn't fully charge its battery pack, in fact it isn't even close to being fully charged. That allows it to have a long life, at the expense of far less range.


This is getting a little O/T, but true, the Prius (in fact, all Toyota/Lex hybrids), through the control exerted by the ECU, never allows the battery to fully charge or fully discharge. The max SoC (state of charge) is typically around 80% of battery capacity, and the minimum is around 40%. By staying within these boundaries, the life of the battery is extended far far beyond what you'd get if you accessed the total instant capacity of the battery. There's probably a lesson here for the pure electric car designers, especially if they're still using NiMH batteries, as the HSD cars presently do.

Another issue that seems always to lurk beneath the surface in electric car discussions is the cost of the charge. Many of the discussions seem to assume that somehow the juice coming off the grid and into the EV is free. Everyone seems to forget that between the grid and your EV's battery is your ELECTRIC METER! I expect (but I could be wrong) that the cost per mile of grid electricity is cheaper than gasoline, but still, that EV is going add a huge hit to the owner's monthly electric bill. Some food for thought.

 

[ekpolk]

Originally Posted By: ZZman
The only way to get the technology cheaper and prices down is to get them out there and start producing.

But if we do nothing and sit on our butts like we have been we will still be at the mercy of other countries that may be hostile towards us. We will also still be in competition with China, India and soon Africa for a shrinking oil supply. We have to take a different direction.


We will be forced to, one way or another, sooner or later...

 

[brianl703]

Originally Posted By: ekpolk
I expect (but I could be wrong) that the cost per mile of grid electricity is cheaper than gasoline, but still, that EV is going add a huge hit to the owner's monthly electric bill.


In the worst case scenario, the electricity used to charge the EV could be generated by a diesel[1] or natural gas fired peaker plant (which is a plant that generates supplemental electricity during times of peak load--the idea is that it's cheaper for the utility to generate electricity that way than it is to pay the peak rates).

A load management switch could be used to disconnect EVs from the grid when peaker plants are in use.

[1]Yes there are diesel-fired power plants. Manassas City Utilities (which doesn't serve my house) has several of them.

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: XS650
I've had two power outages due to rolling blackouts in the past 10 years, the last one 7 years ago. Both were under an hour.

As long as people plug their cars in at night when there is extra capacity, there won't be much of a problem.


Don't forget that the planned, massive increase in price for electricity must be justified by any means necessary. Cutting people's power off a couple time every few years, every few months, every couple days, randomly at any time, demonstrates the value of having power (Woo-hoo, double entendre!).

I think that anybody who is seriously expecting to charge his EV for nickels in the long run is in for a real surprise. Once you come to depend on something, its value increases.

 

[ZZman]

The Volt plans to stay in the 30%-80% range. The gas engine will kick in to recharge the battery once it drops to 30%.

Recharge rates are currently estimated at about 2-3 cents a mile or about 85 cents to 1 dollar a day to recharge. I think that is pretty good and not nearly as bad as I imagined.

I wonder if you would save more by charging with 220? Isn't that more efficient?

 

[ZZman]

You could also build more coal fired plants as we have an abundance of that.

 

[Max_Wander]

yeah, 4bucks a gallon or 1.20/L is sooo much cheaper than 5 cents a kilowatt hour....

the rest is pretty arbitrary....

 

[Max_Wander]

Originally Posted By: moribundman
Once you come to depend on something, its value increases.


Must we always factor in corporate greed into these idealistic situations? Why should we base our lives and plan products around it? Doing so just enables it (and it's time we stopped that) and makes people feel hopeless about porgess. No one wants to admit it, but we're a good solid 50yrs behind in technology, why? Greed. Case in point, this oil dependancy had no good reason to have ever happened, let alone be enabled to sustain itself, but here we are... stone-age technology and the bloated ancillary infrastructure to support it. It's pathetic! ANY commodity can be inflated to [censored], and most of the time it is never justified, but people tend to just accept what they're told by who gains to get away with it. What about the blackout a few years back, us POOR SAPS were told that all kinds of [censored] about it; first it was US sucking too much power for our AC units, then it became 'untrimmed trees' touching powerlines. And we just swallow that load like a cheap hooker. No one knows or cares about the HAARP ionospheric experiments that were occuring at that same time, starting at about 5pm EST or the effects of the sun's energy on the earth and the transmission grid while theyre screwing around with the ionosphere (which protects the earth from such things). They just saw a great excuse to try and blame us for it, just like the weather manipulation and deliberate arctic melting to open up a new shipping channel.. oops did I just say that? Meh what does it matter anyway, no one cares.

 

[Max_Wander]

... i still can't believe nuclear energy for electricity generation is ONLY used to simply HEAT WATER to pump turbines!! WOW man, are we backwards!!

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: Max_Wander
... i still can't believe nuclear energy for electricity generation is ONLY used to simply HEAT WATER to pump turbines!! WOW man, are we backwards!!


If we want to replace the whole amount of oil the US consumes with nuclear energy at the current rate, we have to build and get online 700 or so additional nuclear power plants.

 

[Tosh]

Charging will need to be done at night, when there is capacity on the CA grid (correct me if I'm wrong).
Think of the charge costing the gasoline equivalent of $1/gallon.

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: Max_Wander
Originally Posted By: moribundman
Once you come to depend on something, its value increases.


Must we always factor in corporate greed into these idealistic situations? Why should we base our lives and plan products around it?


We shouldn't have to, alas we do live in a world of greed. So there you got your reason why everything has its price. Just ignoring this fact won't keep the price down, just like pointing it out won't increase the price. We are not talking about a self-fulfilling propehcy here.

 

[Max_Wander]

Originally Posted By: moribundman
Originally Posted By: Max_Wander
... i still can't believe nuclear energy for electricity generation is ONLY used to simply HEAT WATER to pump turbines!! WOW man, are we backwards!!


If we want to replace the whole amount of oil the US consumes with nuclear energy at the current rate, we have to build and get online 700 or so additional nuclear power plants.


That's the thing though. Our current use of nuclear fission in our electricity generating plants is beyond shameful, and you're right about how many additional plants we'd need to build using that solution. I'm just furious about the fact that it does not have to be like this. Does anyone think that all space stations are solar powered? What about the nuclear power in space, does anyone really think they use nuclear fission to boil water and spin stupid steam turbines on a space station!?! And thats just about nuclear. We're all getting the shaft here, and it's just so big oil can survive! Thats why I can't stand it when people want to marginalize the obvious feasability of alternate propulsion vehicles. The EV-1 tragedy in itself really grinds my gears.

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: Max_Wander
I can't stand it when people want to marginalize the obvious feasability of alternate propulsion vehicles.


I'm all for alternative this, that and the other. I just feel the need to point out that the great motivator in getting people to sign up for it all is the false promise of the alternatives, once established, being less expensive.

 

[PandaBear]

Originally Posted By: moribundman
If we want to replace the whole amount of oil the US consumes with nuclear energy at the current rate, we have to build and get online 700 or so additional nuclear power plants.


I was under the impression that it is the peak usage that limits us. We have a lot of idling at off peak that could be used to power EV.

 

[ffracer]

Originally Posted By: Max_Wander
Originally Posted By: moribundman
Originally Posted By: Max_Wander
... i still can't believe nuclear energy for electricity generation is ONLY used to simply HEAT WATER to pump turbines!! WOW man, are we backwards!!


If we want to replace the whole amount of oil the US consumes with nuclear energy at the current rate, we have to build and get online 700 or so additional nuclear power plants.


That's the thing though. Our current use of nuclear fission in our electricity generating plants is beyond shameful, and you're right about how many additional plants we'd need to build using that solution. I'm just furious about the fact that it does not have to be like this. Does anyone think that all space stations are solar powered? What about the nuclear power in space, does anyone really think they use nuclear fission to boil water and spin stupid steam turbines on a space station!?! And thats just about nuclear. We're all getting the shaft here, and it's just so big oil can survive! Thats why I can't stand it when people want to marginalize the obvious feasability of alternate propulsion vehicles. The EV-1 tragedy in itself really grinds my gears.

Ok, what's the solution????

The EV-1 is NOT a tragedy. It was an experiment. Nothing more. it was NOT feasible, but it was succsessful. Only Hollywood gullible ("Who Killed the Electric Car" is so full of inaccuracies, it set back the electric car for years) types will believe that. you want to pay $200K for a car back then? Buy a Ferrari it did more and was more fun.

I have studied battery technology ad nauseum. There are significant challeneges to make cars work for the long term and for the masses. I want them to work. Energy vs. power is the biggest problem.

There's no consipracy for "Big Oil". There are many companies chasing the HUGE amount of money to solve the problem. Most of them are NOT oil companies.

Batteries are simple.

There are major attributes:

1-Power to accelerate
2-Energy (duration) for run time or miles
3-Calendar life
4-Cycle life - how much usage kills the battery
5-Cost

Show me how these all can be met today?

 

[oilyriser]

Lithium batteries can do all except #5.

 

[bob_ninja]

Originally Posted By: brianl703
Originally Posted By: ekpolk
I expect (but I could be wrong) that the cost per mile of grid electricity is cheaper than gasoline, but still, that EV is going add a huge hit to the owner's monthly electric bill.


In the worst case scenario, the electricity used to charge the EV could be generated by a diesel[1] or natural gas fired peaker plant (which is a plant that generates supplemental electricity during times of peak load--the idea is that it's cheaper for the utility to generate electricity that way than it is to pay the peak rates).

A load management switch could be used to disconnect EVs from the grid when peaker plants are in use.

[1]Yes there are diesel-fired power plants. Manassas City Utilities (which doesn't serve my house) has several of them.


Actually no high tech devices are necessary to decrease peak period demand. A much simpler/effective method is price. Where I live they are already installing digital meters and variable rates. Don't know exact costs yet, but the day time peak periods should cost about 5x to 10x more than night time low demand periods. So consumers themselves will be *VERY* motivated to avoid charging EV cars during highest price periods - peak demand periods.

Indeed, the future grid cannot under any scenario supply all the demand at all the times. Building so many nukes or coal plants is just not feasible. It is clear that local generation will become necessary. He is a rough outline:

You install X number of solar panels. (you could also use wind turbines) The peak demand periods are during day time, mostly afternoons. This also happens to be the peak production period for your own solar panels. A controller device at your home would simply get more power from local solar panels thus pulling less power from the grid. So you could be charging your EV at home in the garage even during day time but using more power from your own sources.

During night you panel output is nil, but now you are paying much lower price for grid power. Now controller simply pulls all the needed power from grid at cheap rates.

So you could be using a lot of electricity all day long and still pay much less than for gasoline. As a bonus, sometimes your panels will generate surplus energy that you'll send back into the grid which pays you high rates for it (during peak demand).

This way grid's demand will be more even as houses themselves kick in with extra generation during day time peak demand, while pulling more power during night time low demand.

Still this requires an investment for each house, since panels and turbines are not cheap. However, at a higher global level, installing solar panels and wind turbines is *MUCH* cheaper than building a bunch of nukes and coal plants, then desperately chasing fuel for them. At some point governments will have to step up with high subsidies, tax credits, etc. for panels and turbines. Right now incentives are all over the place and generally low.

 

[bob_ninja]

Forgot to mention, another benefit of local generation (panels and turbines) is that the electricity travels a *MUCH* shorter distance (meters) as opposed grid electricity can travel hundred of kilometers. Thus the transmission losses are much lower!!!!

Grid electricity is stepped up and down (Voltage) at least once, likely several times, and sent long distances. Your local power voltage is only stepped up (V) once.

 

[ZZman]

Imagine if all new Housing Mandated installing some solar panels. Since it is built into the price of the houses it is barely noticed and since every house has to have one no one can really complain. Soon you would be generating some good power and bringing prices down on the technology.