Re: EV/Hybrid Survey

[Bill Dube <billdube@killacycle.com>]

>His statement was that EV don't need maintenance, which is bull.  Even a
>commercially built EV requires maintenance, just not a lot of it.
>
>
>>>  Also a lot of
>>>ICEs are being built that don't need maintenance for 100,000 miles,
>>
>> There are no vehicles (aside from spacecraft) that can go this distance
>>without maintenance. They have indeed reduced the maintenance on ICE cars
>>to intervals of 20,000 miles (give or take.) Most of the maintenance items
>>that must be performed at 20,000 miles or 50,000 miles are directly
>>associated with the fact that there is an ICE on board. Eliminate the ICE
>>and it would be quite straightforward to build a car that required
>>maintenance only every 100,000 miles.
>>
>
>
>Sorry late night, I ment 100,000 miles before it's first scheduled tune-up.

	I know of no car that can go this long before a tune-up. We are talking
about maintenance, not tune-ups, however. Belts, air filters, cat
converters, fuel filters, antifreeze, and most of all, oil and filter
changes must occur before 100,000 miles. The "check engine" light on most
cars goes on more than once within 100,000 miles. (It's connected to the
speedometer.) 

>I'm still waiting to see if any commerciall built EV that can go 100,000
>miles before it needs a batttery replacement (which incidently will cost a
>lot more than a tune up).

	Since there are so few OEM EVs, you don't have much to worry about at the
moment. I strongly suspect that the 100,000 mile battery life will be the
norm once there are more OEM EVs on the market and competition takes over.
>
>>>How
>>>many EVs can go that far without replacing the batteries a few times?
>>
>> It depends on the type of battery. I'm quite envious of David Roden's
>>NiCad project. If all goes as planned, David won't have to replace his
>>batteries for 150,000 miles. It also looks like these NiCads will be
>>cheaper in the long run than lead-acid batteries.
>>
>
>I'm quite anxious to see how well this works out for David. I've always
>thought that NiCads are the best battery technology currently available, of
>course it will likely be 10 years or so before we find out how well they
>worked out for him :-)
>I'm also waiting to see how well these NiMH batteries they are putting in
>the new EV1s will work out.

	I don't hold out as much hope for these.
>
>
>>>Also some EVs DO pollute, they just don't do it in the same neiborhood as
>>>they drive in (powerplant smoke stacks).
>>
>> Hard to run your ICE car on wind power or a hydro-electric power plant.
>>Geo-thermal power for an ICE would be a bit difficult to pull off, don't
>>you think?>
>
>True but in most parts of the country it's hard to drive on EV on any of
>those sources of power.  I can't remember what the current figure is, but
>isn't something like 75% of our electricity produced by burning fossile
>fuels?  And that's just for todays demands, if EVs become more popular they
>are going to have to build more power plants, do you really think they are
>going to damn up more rivers?

	If we discovered that burning gasoline was causing brain cancer in our
children, how long would it take to change cars over to some other fuel or
to make modifications to remove this pollutant from the exhaust? I'd guess
at least 10 years, maybe 20. Even after 30 years, there would still be cars
burning gasoline on the road somewhere in the world.

	If we discovered the same thing about burning coal in power plants, we
could fix the problem in three years or less. This is the beauty of EVs.
They have a great diversity of energy sources to choose from. It's very
easy to alter the fuel, regulate the pollution on a 24 hour per day basis,
modify the power plants to reduce pollution and increase efficiency, build
new power plants, and to transport the energy to the EV from nearly
anywhere on the continent. EVs give you a lot of choices that ICEs don't.

	It's easy to monitor and to regulate a few hundred power plants. It is
impossible to effectively regulate millions of ICE cars. 
	
>
>>>> 4)  Do hybrid vehicles stop all pollution eminating from exhaust?
>>>>
>>>>        If they are fuel cell based, or some other non-combustion
>>>>power source then yes.
>>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>FWIW fuel cells emit water.  As I recall there are some combustion type
>>>fuels/engines that also only produce water.
>>
>> Ah, but you are forgetting the CO2. Investigate how hydrogen is produced
>>commercially and you will discover the problem.>
>
>As I read the question it was asking only about the vehicles exhaust.

	You brought up power plants and EVs. If you are going to consider the
entire process for EVs, (and rightly so) you must consider the entire
process for alternatives to EVs. 

>
>>>
>>>P.S.  With the way hybrids are going it looks likely that they will
>produce
>>>LESS total pollution than an EV drawing power from a electric company
>>>burning fossil fuels.
>>
>> This is completely incorrect. This has been proven over and over again.
>
>
>What is complete incorrect?  While I'm aware that EVs powered by fossil
>fuels are about 10% more efficient than a standard ICE, I haven't seen any
>PROOF that Hybrids can't be more efficient than EVs when both run on fossil
>fuels.

	Oh no. EV's are MUCH more efficient than 10% better than a standard ICE. A
large stationary power plant weighing millions of tons and costing god
knows what is many times more fuel efficient than a tiny power plant in a
car. You will cold start a power plant perhaps less than once per year. You
run each unit right at its peak efficiency all the time. It is not unusual
to spend millions of dollars on a power plant to pick up a few extra
percent of efficiency. 

	I did the complete calculation for my Wabbit at one time. Some small power
plants burn Diesel fuel. If the Wabbit got its power from one of these
plants, it would get about 70 miles per gallon. This includes transmission
losses, charging efficiency, charger efficiency, the whole ball of wax.
Keep in mind that I could pick up an extra 20% efficiency if the Wabbit had
regen.

	Even with the abysmal aerodynamics of the Wabbit and the lack of regen,
hybrids have a tough time matching this number.

	John Bryan's Ghia gets much lower watt-hrs / mile than my Wabbit. If you
do the same calculation on his car (without regen) he is getting about 140
miles per gallon of Diesel. Hybrids can't even come close.
  
>
>Think about it, the power company's generators are about 40% efficient at
>converting fuel to electricity.  There is no real reason why the generator
>in an hybrid can't run close to that figure.

	Unlikely in a lightweight mobile power plant. As you attempt to increase
efficiency, the weight of the power plant grows quickly. As you add weight
(and efficiency) the car gets heavier and less energy efficient. It's tough
to get around this. Also, you are talking about peak efficiency. Cold
starts put this figure in the dirt. A hybrid makes a bunch of cold starts
every trip. Also, you are talking about internal combustion. Central power
plants are not typically internal combustion and thus are much more
efficient. The additional weight is not a penalty in a large stationary
power plant so external combustion is a viable option and results in
greatly increased efficiency and lower pollution.

  A standard ICE doesn't
>because it almost never runs at it's maximum efficiency, a good hybrid can
>be designed to always run at max efficiency.

	It has to cold start at least once every trip (typically many times each
trip.) This puts out gobs of pollution and tears up overall efficiency. 
>
>With a Hybrid you eliminate the transmission losses (7%?), 

	There is still a gear train.

charger losses
>(10-30%),

	No, you are constantly charging the batteries and discharging them. The
charger losses are not nearly this high, by the way.

 battery storage losses (10-30%), 

	You obviously aren't thinking this through. A hybrid works by continuously
moving energy in and out of it's battery pack. The battery losses are still
present. Actually, they tend to be greater because you are quick charging
as opposed to slow charging. The round-trip losses in a high-quality
battery pack are about 20%.

and the complete loss of all
>energy used for battery equalization. 

	You can't really skip this part in a hybrid. They try and then they toast
packs. It is a major problem at this time. 

You also reduce the mass of the
>vehicle since it needs a much smaller battery pack (less weight = less
>energy to move).

	Here is where you are really in trouble. For a commuter EV, you really
don't have to carry much battery weight. A pure EV set up for a 20 mile
commute can weigh about the same as a hybrid set up for the same commute.
 
>I haven't seen any study that shows how far an EV goes on 1 gallon of fuel
>burned at the power plant (soembody have this handy?) but hybrids are
>already getting over 65 mpg (in a rather large car) and they are talking 80
>to 100 miles soon.

	See above. Just ask someone that has run a large Diesel power plant how
many kW/hrs you get from a gallon of Diesel fuel. (In the Air Force, the
power plants I worked in would get about 20 to 25 kW-hrs from each gallon
of Diesel. Small plants get less, big plants get more.) Steam turbine
plants are MUCH MUCH more efficient than ICE Diesel plants. Also, it's
tough to burn coal in a car.
>
>
>>Also, EV's are not at all dependant on fossil fuels. There is a great
>>variety of way to make electricity.  Hybrids (of today) are completely
>>dependant on fossil fuels.
>>
>
>
>But EVs ARE currently dependant on fossile fuels; if you don't happen to
>live on the east or west coast.  The only river near where I live is the
>San Pedro and that's barely a creek (you can jump acrost it in places).
>I'm not aware of any geothermal power generators around here, the wind
>isn't constant enought to be any value and solar power costs two much.
>When I plug in my EV here it IS running on fossil fuels.
>Granted it doesn't have to run on fossil fuels, I could quit the military
>and move, but around here it does run on fossil fuels.
>
>Hybrids are not completely dependant on fossil fuels, they can run on
>renewable fuels: methane, alcohol and used vegitable oil to name just a
>few.

	Good try, but no cigar. If you buy a specific hybrid, it won't run on all
these different fuels. If you buy any EV, it will run on anything you can
use to make electricity. Also, in many parts of the country, you can
specify where you want your electricity to come from. If 20% of the folks
specify wind power, the utility buys 20% of its power from a wind
generation source. You can indeed, pick. You can also change your mind in a
wink.

>
>I'll stick to my statement: hybrids will soon be more efficient and less
>polutting EVs that run on fossil fuel power plants.
>
	It is a physical impossibility. You can't make power in a lightweight,
inexpensive, compact, mobile, intermittently-running power plant as
efficiently as you can in a central power production plant. You will also
make more pollution.

>Granted some people in the US are lucky enough to get electricity from
>clean renewable energy sources, however; most of the country doesn't.  So
>that fact that their EV COULD run on renewable power is (for them) moot.

	Not really. A specific hybrid can NEVER run on renewable and non-polluting
energy sources. All EVs have the instant option. This is the key. 

	To me, hybrids are a way to get auto manufacturers up to speed on EV
technology. They are a transition. They are a lot like a computer that will
run more than one operating system. If your family has two cars, one should
be an EV. Then you have a "hybrid" that makes sense.

Bill Dube'  billdube@killacycle.com
check my website at:
http://www.killacycle.com