GM's 230 mpg Chevy Volt aka Toyota Prius killer

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted By: Shannow
There's a (somewhat) easier way of comparing what it supposed to be a car to protect the environment.

CO2 per passenger mile (or tonne mile for trucks).


The CO2 - fact or myth argument aside (if producing fuel there ARE LOTS of other things that can be released in the are which ARE nasty), is a decent metric. However, here in the US, gross tonnage is not a metric. That is why a 50 MPG jetta diesel is a gross polluter, and a 12MPG ford excursion can be considered a partial zero emissions vehicle. Stupid.

That said, one can directly calculate CO2 from an IC engine... but what about the powerplant? Are the stoichiometries the same for coal vs oil vs NG? How do we come with a nuke equivalent? wind equivalent?

At some point the energy just needs to be equated to a quantity of fuel at some conversion efficiency. This can be in a CO2 basis or just on fuel volumetric basis. Still a tough thing to do... Lots of room to add fluff.

 

[badtlc]

Originally Posted By: Steve S
I wouldn't consider a G.M car. what B.S. What happens when the electric rates go sky high ?


Everyone thanks Obama?

 

[PT1]

Originally Posted By: Steve S
I wouldn't consider a G.M car. what B.S. What happens when the electric rates go sky high ?


Exactly...when cap & trade comes along the cost of charging a Volt will double...as will your home electric bill as the Volt throws your electric peak load numbers into the Stratosphere.

You will see them stacking up on Toyota used car lots.

 

[PT1]

Originally Posted By: oilyriser
A 20 mile hwy commute in a Camry sized car takes about 0.625 gallons of gas, which makes about 12700 BTU of mechanical energy to move the car. An electric car will need about 16,000 BTU of electric energy to charge its batteries for a similar trip.


If you are going to insist on clouding this thread with real scientific facts & data...you are going to ruin the whole debate.

 

[ekpolk]

Originally Posted By: PT1
Originally Posted By: oilyriser
A 20 mile hwy commute in a Camry sized car takes about 0.625 gallons of gas, which makes about 12700 BTU of mechanical energy to move the car. An electric car will need about 16,000 BTU of electric energy to charge its batteries for a similar trip.


If you are going to insist on clouding this thread with real scientific facts & data...you are going to ruin the whole debate.

Hey, hey, hey, we can't have that happening now. . . I'll be driving my TCH until about the 2015 MY, when I expect Toyota to introduce their perpetual motion hybrid system car.

 

[tonycarguy]

Originally Posted By: labman
Originally Posted By: tonycarguy
Ultimately, what 95% of hybrid buyers care about is cost of ownership. The greeness factor is overrated; buyers didn't give a [censored] about the greeness of hybrids when gas was $1.75/gallon.



You may be partly right. The hybrid owner I know best is may daughter. Shortly after graduating in 2001 with a degree in environmental engineering, They bought an Insight for her 60 mile each way commute. Within a few years, they traded it on a Civic Hybrid and she had found a job much closer to where they were living. They are no tree huggers, but are environmentally aware. They are also engineers. Perhaps more image conscious than I am, but not affluent enough to waste thousands on a car to support it.


I'm cynical of human nature. I believe the overwhelming majority of people make decisions based first on economics, and then (a distant second) on other factors like environmental or geo-political concerns.

I'm sure people like Leonardo Dicaprio will buy a Volt even if it cost $100k, just to make a political statement. But he probably has that much money in his seat cushions. The typical Joe does not, hence they will make their decision on practical economics. They will crunch the numbers for fuel savings, just like the hybrid owners I know did when they bought their car.

 

[DeeAgeaux]

Originally Posted By: tonycarguy
Originally Posted By: labman
Originally Posted By: tonycarguy
Ultimately, what 95% of hybrid buyers care about is cost of ownership. The greeness factor is overrated; buyers didn't give a [censored] about the greeness of hybrids when gas was $1.75/gallon.



You may be partly right. The hybrid owner I know best is may daughter. Shortly after graduating in 2001 with a degree in environmental engineering, They bought an Insight for her 60 mile each way commute. Within a few years, they traded it on a Civic Hybrid and she had found a job much closer to where they were living. They are no tree huggers, but are environmentally aware. They are also engineers. Perhaps more image conscious than I am, but not affluent enough to waste thousands on a car to support it.


I'm cynical of human nature. I believe the overwhelming majority of people make decisions based first on economics, and then (a distant second) on other factors like environmental or geo-political concerns.

I'm sure people like Leonardo Dicaprio will buy a Volt even if it cost $100k, just to make a political statement. But he probably has that much money in his seat cushions. The typical Joe does not, hence they will make their decision on practical economics. They will crunch the numbers for fuel savings, just like the hybrid owners I know did when they bought their car.



GM can make 60k Volts per year at regular full time capacity.

About 100k per year if max overtime is used, including cancelling their typical 2 week plant summer shutdown.

The first genration Volt will probably be sold for five model years.

GM hopes to sell 300k first Generation Volts.

They don't need alot of average Joes. None really.

They don't hope to sell 200k per year like Toyota does TODAY with the Prius.

Like the first years of the Prius, average Joes were not willing to risk their hard earned money on a racically new technology.

First generation will be sold mostly to the well to do and the super politically movtivated.

There will be 300k of those over the next five years.

 

[BuickGN]

The parents have been running solar cells on the house for two summers now. Even running the AC full time at 72 degrees won't make the bill budge. They're in the market for a new car, this one may make sense for the short trip around town car.

 

[Shannow]

Originally Posted By: JHZR2
That said, one can directly calculate CO2 from an IC engine... but what about the powerplant? Are the stoichiometries the same for coal vs oil vs NG? How do we come with a nuke equivalent? wind equivalent?

At some point the energy just needs to be equated to a quantity of fuel at some conversion efficiency. This can be in a CO2 basis or just on fuel volumetric basis. Still a tough thing to do... Lots of room to add fluff.


I think that you would have to evaluate the cars on the "fleet average" emissions of the grid as a whole.

They are drawing out of the "pool" of electricity.

Silly things like people down here claiming that their house is "100% renewable powered" (because they are paying a green premium) are silly, because the total fleet average remains unchanged.

 

[DeeAgeaux]

Originally Posted By: Shannow
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
That said, one can directly calculate CO2 from an IC engine... but what about the powerplant? Are the stoichiometries the same for coal vs oil vs NG? How do we come with a nuke equivalent? wind equivalent?

At some point the energy just needs to be equated to a quantity of fuel at some conversion efficiency. This can be in a CO2 basis or just on fuel volumetric basis. Still a tough thing to do... Lots of room to add fluff.


I think that you would have to evaluate the cars on the "fleet average" emissions of the grid as a whole.

They are drawing out of the "pool" of electricity.

Silly things like people down here claiming that their house is "100% renewable powered" (because they are paying a green premium) are silly, because the total fleet average remains unchanged.


Asking a Liberal/Green to make sense is pointless because they don't.

If you want to be efficient/rational you would buy a Honda Fit/Nissan Versa, a smiliar sub-compact or a new generation diesel.

Both are better options than Prius or Volt.

But premium/luxury/sports/green cars are about emotion,want,desire not about logic.

 

[robbobster]

Originally Posted By: tonycarguy

I'm cynical of human nature. I believe the overwhelming majority of people make decisions based first on economics, and then (a distant second) on other factors like environmental or geo-political concerns.

I'm sure people like Leonardo Dicaprio will buy a Volt even if it cost $100k, just to make a political statement. But he probably has that much money in his seat cushions. The typical Joe does not, hence they will make their decision on practical economics. They will crunch the numbers for fuel savings, just like the hybrid owners I know did when they bought their car.



I've got an opposing view:
Most people are easily swayed to make irrational, emotional decisions. Even to the point of contradicting what they logically should do.

 

[cousincletus]

I've seen a lot of badmouthing GM here, but I think the Volt is a good idea. Better and simpler (supposedly) than the Prius. The price will come down when changes in manufacturing technology improve. The batteries are still very expensive to make. For my wife's commute, she wouldn't burn any gas at all. You can charge at night during off-peak power demand, so the grid can handle mass electric cars right now. We're seeing the long term effects of manufacturing jobs leaving the USA, so let's all hope and pray this car is a success.

 

[Shannow]

Look up "peak lithium"

 

[oilyriser]

Originally Posted By: unDummy
I great way to get rid of nuclear waste is to mix it into the paint of all these electric vehicles.


Hey...

...like the old radium watch dials. The cars will glow in the dark, with a bit of phosphor added to the paint. Much safer... "for the children".


A 120 amp-hr 12V lead/acid battery here at Wal Mart sells for $113. It stores 1.44 kilowatt-hours of energy. If you can get 500 cycles out of it, that's a cost per kw-hr of 15.7 cents for the batteries and 20 cents for the grid power, accounting for charging loss, for a total cost of 35.7 cents per kw-hr.

A car engine will make about 1.8 kw-hr per L of gasoline, for a cost of 56 cents per. Electric *is* currently a cheaper energy source, though your car ends up completely loaded down with batteries, if you use Pb. Though you can be sure as the laws of economics that competition will equalize end use prices across all energy sources.