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Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

estonianworld.com

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Re: Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

#2
Estonia has impressed me with their forward thinking policies. Everything about their execution of this plan has me impressed. They have executed well in financing the building of this network and in creating a sustainable business model for the future.

Related note: 5 Months ago I remember hearing about their plan to introduce programming into elementary curriculum. http://developers.slashdot.org/story/12/09/04/2136256/estoni...

Re: Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

#4
post #2

Estonia has impressed me with their forward thinking policies. Everything about their execution of this plan has me impressed. They have executed well in financing the building of this network and in creating a sustainable business model for the future. Related note: 5 Months ago I remember hearing about their plan to introduce programming into elementary curriculum. http://developers.slashdot.org/story/12/09/04/2136…

On the related note: Wolfram announced a few days ago Estonia becoming their first CBM country for computerbasedmath.org to rewrite key years of school probability and statistics from scratch: http://blog.wolfram.com/2013/02/11/announcement-our-first-cb...

Re: Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

#7
post #6

Unfortunately, because Estonia derives almost all of their electrical power from coal, this is a wasteful setback for the environment. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/estonia/electricity-producti...

How so? Aren't coal-fired plants more efficient than internal combustion engines?

Re: Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

#8

What happened to hydrogen cars? I was expecting them to come out on top, but it seems electric charging stations are growing much faster than hydrogen refill stations.

It does not occur naturally on earth, takes energy to make, takes energy to compress, is prone to exploding, and is only liquid at extremely low temperatures. Or that's what Musk keeps saying every time he's asked, I'm not sure what the general consensus is among scientists and engineers on the subject. As things stand right now it does not appear to be a useful fuel source for cars.

Re: Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

#9
post #6

Unfortunately, because Estonia derives almost all of their electrical power from coal, this is a wasteful setback for the environment. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/estonia/electricity-producti...

How so? Aren't coal-fired plants more efficient than internal combustion engines?

Not even close. First of all, mining and burning coal is far worse for the environment than oil. Mining is destructive, impacts water tables, and burning coal produces lots of toxic byproducts like mercury and other heavy metals. Further, there is significant loss/waste as you push electricity across the grid.

There's no environmental case for EV-only cars, unless you are powering the grid with solar, wind, or hydro.

Re: Estonia becomes the first to open a nationwide electric vehicle charging network

#10
post #6

Unfortunately, because Estonia derives almost all of their electrical power from coal, this is a wasteful setback for the environment. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/estonia/electricity-producti...

To be more precise, Estonia burns Oil shale rather than coal. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_shale_in_Estonia
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