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What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

nytimes.com

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Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#411

Post by ecpottinger »

greedo wrote: post #287
fergie wrote: post #66

> "But the automakers’ existing expertise — building internal combustion engines — will no longer give them a competitive edge." Interesting- this would mean that the real innovation in cars comes _after_ electric drivetrains have become the standard, when any moderately capitalised company without substantial experience of internal-combustion motors can create their own take on a car with any kind of new features th…

Thinking that the ICE is a competitive advantage/disadvantage is what has led to Tesla struggling with building the Model 3. The competitive advantage held by the existing automakers is based around building cars cheaply; in quantity; and in quality. They also have established brands that inspire tremendous loyalty, and they have dealerships that offload a lot of the support issues. When electric drivetrains become t…

Right, by that logic Tesla should not have any sales.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#412

Post by UMadBreaux »

brownbat wrote: post #189

> car companies will have to radically streamline their dealership networks Electrification won't kill inefficient dealerships. They're too entrenched in politics. https://www.inc.com/magazine/201411/paul-keegan/collision-co...

I find Japan's car buying culture very interesting. Dealership services in Japan are much more of a concierge service, where the dealer brings the car you are interested in right to your house, and buyers generally have an ongoing relationship with the sales staff and others at the dealership.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#413

Post by dawnerd »

GiorgioG wrote: post #390

The issue of energy portability is not an insignificant one IMO. I can carry 5 gallons (or 100-150 miles worth of range) of fuel fairly easily. Not so much with an electric vehicle. What happens when I run out of juice on the side of the road? I don't care how many times the car warns me; that it shouldn't happen, etc. People still manage to run out of gas today. With an electric vehicle already hampered by half the…

>hampered by half the range of an I.C.E.

Not always the case. There's plenty of petrol powered cars that have horrible range. Thing with electric cars is they'd be plugged in when parked (ie overnight). ~300 miles on electric might not sound like much, but do normal people drive 300 miles every day? nope. If their car is fully charged every morning they should never run out of battery power. Long trips, yeah it's a problem that'll need to be fixed but really not all that different from being stranded in the middle of no where miles from the nearest station. Likely roadside assistance will have portable chargers or just simply tow you to the nearest charger.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#414

Post by ecpottinger »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #171
ransom1538 wrote: post #164

"About 65% of this electricity generation was from fossil fuels" These EV cars should be renamed "Coal Cars" so people understand the true harsh carbon footprint. Because you plug the car into a wall doesn't mean the energy is clean. https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3

How does the emissions of a coal plant (plus the loss from transfering over the power line, battery, into motors) compare to the emissions of a regular petrol or diesel car?

Don't forget to carbon footprint needed to process/make that petrol/diesel .. that oil from the ground needs to be processed and transported too.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#415

Post by Florin_Andrei »

twothamendment wrote: post #399
Florin_Andrei wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A car should be able to charge another car. There needs to be some kind of standard here. Or else small portable batteries need to become more common. Or I could envision a service where, if you run out of electrons, you tap a button and a drone is dispatched with a portable battery to your location. Or maybe the car itself could place the call automatically.

How big would a battery have to be to get a dead EV off the side of the road and 25 miles to a charging station? Can a drone fly a 25 or 50 pound battery? What would the range on the drone be? I'm guessing a tow truck with the ability to charge a car is more likely.

What if the battery shipped by drone is what powers the drone itself?

(I'm just trying to imagine some extreme scenarios, I'm not saying this is The Solution.)

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#416

Post by polynomial »

greglindahl wrote: post #366
mschuster91 wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but the load peak when everyone arrives home/at work is what's dangerous for the grid. Even 10k cars at only 10 kW of charging power are a peak load of 100 MW. 100k cars are 1GW - which means the city of Munich with 700k cars has a load potential of 7GW at the minimum. Either we get a grid that's intelligent enough to balance stuff out or the grid has to be built out with massive reserves, and that's everything…

Today's electric cars already have the ability to delay the start of charging. It doesn't need that smart of a grid, just a smartphone app.

How does this work in practice, with a high number of cars with such apps? Say everyone arrives home from commute at roughly the same time, how is the delay factor decided/distributed?

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#417

Post by pilom »

NickM wrote: post #319
mschuster91 wrote: post #213

Biggest problem I guess will be expanding the charger network, simply due to physics. On the country side, laying cables for 1MW peak load (4 superchargers @ 250 kW) will be expensive - the grid in rural areas is enough for some farms and small villages, that's it. In cities, electric-car chargers will have to deal with political obstacles (no one wants to sacrifice free-for-all parking spots!), in addition to the el…

Tesla has already started incorporating stationary storage into some of its supercharger stations to help cut down on peak load. This is not just an act of goodwill, it actually makes economic sense for them, since it cuts down on demand charges from the utilities for high peak loads, as well as reducing the need for bigger transformers and such leading up to the station. The electrical grid is already sized for peak…

> Incorporating stationary storage cuts down on the costs incurred by both of these inefficiencies.

at the cost of 10% more power usage due to the inefficiencies of charging and discharging batteries. Might still be worth it from an electric company's bottom line, but in most markets, it increases greenhouse gas production because we need more kwh of power.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#418

Post by ghaff »

icc97 wrote: post #334
slfnflctd wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt many will go out of business. At least in the U.S. the stations themselves make maybe 2-3 cents a gallon profit, which likely doesn't even begin to cover operating costs. The vast majority of their income is from the convenience store items. All but the most poorly run will pay whatever is needed to install electric chargers and stay in the game.

I imagine that they will have to invest in things that will keep people there longer. For instance at the moment in the UK many supermarkets are putting mini stores in petrol stations. However with electric charging taking longer, I can imagine that McDonalds might start buying up petrol stations.

It's very common already to have fast food outlets either connected to or adjacent to convenience stores at gas stations.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#419

Post by JoeAltmaier »

icc97 wrote: post #388
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wrong metric. Its kWh / kg (not price) that matters for transportation. Until we get metal-air batteries that's not going to change much.

You're right that's better, but it doesn't completely invalidate my prediction, it just means I might be out a bit with the time. Battery kWh / kg is also improving too, I just don't know if it's at the same rate as price. Its possible now with Teslas to buy the higher kWh batteries and they go further, so it's not like weight is the only factor. The new Tesla Roadster coming in 2020 [0] has a 620 mile range because…

Like rockets, there a point of diminishing returns where you have to have some battery to push the other batteries around, which push the car around. Its kWh/kg that's king.

Re: What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

#420

Post by pilom »

schiffern wrote: post #320
kozak wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I understand, the car asks the Level 3 charger for a certain amount of volts and amperes, and the charger delivers exactly what the car needs (being able to vary the parameters for each type of car - and yes, those Level 3 DC chargers are big, complex, and expensive). Then the current goes directly to the battery. And this is why the charging gets so fast: there are no intermediate steps. The car just needs…

>> the superchargers take AC from the grid > the charger delivers exactly what the car needs You're both right. A Level 3 charger does deliver the right DC voltage the car needs, and it does so using power electronics that convert regular old grid AC into DC. Level 1 & Level 2 charging: AC grid -> cable -> onboard charger converts to 400V DC -> battery Level 3 charging: AC grid -> offboard charger converts to 400V DC…

Wouldn't there be an additional stepping at the transformer for level 1 and 2 chargers to go from AC distribution grid at 480V AC to 110V/220V where the level 3 superchargers can plug directly into the 480V AC mains without a transformer?
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