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Electric Cars & Solar: Will They Make Gasoline & Utilities Obsolete?
yahoo ^ | 1/23/2014 | John Voelcker

Posted on 01/23/2014 8:24:46 PM PST by ckilmer

These are interesting times in the automotive and electric-utility businesses.

(Excerpt) Read more at autos.yahoo.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy
KEYWORDS: electriccar; solar
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To: ckilmer
And many electric-car owners turn out to have solar panels on their homes

That's because both are taxpayer scams. The solar panels on roofs are both a taxpayer and ratepayer scam. We pay a rebate when they install the panels, then we pay full retail for their unreliable and off-peak solar power. The exception is in the desert where the solar power can actually be used right when it is needed, on hot sunny days. The electric car scam is a bit more subtle. Basically we, the taxpayers, pay $40-50k in subsidies for every electric car built. We would be much better off buying all those people a 20k gas car with the money and keeping the other 20k. But in that case we would obviously be better off paying nothing for any of this crap.

The simple reason for all this is that the entire scare about extreme climate change is a giant scam that has propagated all the rest of the scams.

81 posted on 01/24/2014 3:07:22 AM PST by palmer (Obama = Carter + affirmative action)
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To: Axenolith

Any PM’s down in that wasteland?


82 posted on 01/24/2014 3:09:50 AM PST by palmer (Obama = Carter + affirmative action)
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To: ckilmer
The question begs, will the game changer not be a magical battery or uber solar cell but pump and tankage breakthroughs that allow you to fill you car with CNG @ home with a low cost pump and into a normal shaped gas tank with a high tech bladder in that holds more CNG than meets the eye...

Go to these links, the impression I get is they are at least researching the possibilities I noted above.

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2012/07/move-20120712.html

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2012/02/doefoa-20120224.html

From the article: "The secondary objective of MOVE is to fund the development of critical components to achieve the overarching systems-level goal. Specific aims include technological advancements in the areas of:

* new sorbent material for low pressure storage of natural gas; and
*new high-strength, low-cost materials and manufacturing processes for conformable tanks capable of high pressure (250 bar) natural gas storage. (Low-pressure approaches inherently reduce the burden (cost) of home refueling.)
* Innovative low-cost high-performance compressor technology for high-pressure approaches."

Look @ the Chart in this link, I can't figure out how to post it as to who the players are and what they are researching...

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2012/07/move-20120712.html

83 posted on 01/24/2014 3:13:15 AM PST by taildragger (The E-GOP won't know what hit them, The Party of Reagan is almost here, hang tight folks....)
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To: Squawk 8888

Gasoline contains 33.4 kW-h per gallon. If one does the math vs. solar it becomes quite clear that it is not feasible, especially considering it takes me 3 minutes to fill my 18 gallon tank.


84 posted on 01/24/2014 4:34:25 AM PST by gore_sux (Ellison's Minnesotastan = America's terrorist training haven)
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To: ckilmer
As an Electrical Engineer the problem of electrical storage in adequate supply to hurl a 2000 pound car down the road at 80 mph will not be overcome in the near term, if ever.

The only way electrical car will work is to figure out how to get the car the electrical energy like trains do now, but do it without the third rail. Like slot cars of old. But even that would require HUGE infrastructure.

85 posted on 01/24/2014 4:41:36 AM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: ckilmer

the cost of distributed solar energy will fall so low by around 2030 that it will make electricity from fossil fuels essentially redundant.


This writer needs a dictionary. Redundant and obsolete are very different concepts.


86 posted on 01/24/2014 5:30:53 AM PST by Atlas Sneezed ("Income Inequality?" Let's start with Washington DC vs. the rest of the nation!)
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To: ckilmer

I don’t think this is very likely. It’s not just cost, although cost is an issue. It’s also what’s physically possible for a given residential user.

I priced out a $40K system for my house. Turns out, because of where I live and other geographical factors, I’d generate enough electricity to offset maybe 15% of my electricity usage. I’d have to cover my house, my detached garage, and my two sheds with solar cells to generate the bulk of the electricity that I use. At a cost way higher than $40K. And without needing the electricity for an electric car.

The problem is that I live in the middle latitudes of the US, not an area where there’s enough strong sun enough days of the year, where we can expect a certain number of days of rain and cloud cover. So, not only do costs need to fall by an order of magnitude, but efficiency needs to increase by nearly as much.

I’ve been hearing about “breakthrough” solar technology “just around the corner” since I was a teenager. I’m in my 50s, now. I figure I’ll be driving fossil fuel vehicles till I die, and so will most everyone else.


87 posted on 01/24/2014 5:46:11 AM PST by sitetest (If Roe is not overturned, no unborn child will ever be protected in law.)
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To: ckilmer
The amount of energy stored in the batteries of even the highest capacity electric vehicle equates to only a fraction of a gallon of gasoline. It's not even enough to heat or cool an electric vehicle for a small part of the range that gasoline or diesel vehicles provide. Until new inventions in battery technology, with an order of magnitude, or more, of improvement are uncovered, electric vehicles will remain toys for the rich, or the subsidized.

As for solar panels, they only can provide electricity when the sun is shining, when most of us working schlubs are at work. How's that gonna charge the batteries?

88 posted on 01/24/2014 6:29:26 AM PST by norwaypinesavage (Galileo: In science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of one individual)
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To: HiTech RedNeck
"I could see a solar-chemical process, possibly, which would produce fuels."

What you "could see", and what gets invented involve two entirely different processes. I think you would be better off "seeing" a gold mine. The probably of success, in your lifetime, is much better with that.

89 posted on 01/24/2014 6:34:51 AM PST by norwaypinesavage (Galileo: In science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of one individual)
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To: babygene
"My bike battery probably holds about the same energy as a 1/2 gallon of gas"

You're not even close. It's not even close to a half CUP of gasoline.

90 posted on 01/24/2014 6:56:06 AM PST by norwaypinesavage (Galileo: In science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of one individual)
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To: RockyTx

I am in California and actually saw my first Volt on the highway. Was on the 101 by Ventura. See tons of Priuses here but that’s my first Volt.


91 posted on 01/24/2014 7:15:44 AM PST by sheana
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To: central_va

I think the proper place for solar, in terms of running your car, is supplementary. Ford recently came out with a car that, probably under optimal conditions, can generate enough power on its own using solar to get about 8km a day. When you multiply that over the life of a car, you are looking at about 40 fill ups. This isn’t much right now, but if solar improves enough, this could eventually mean 100 fill-ups or more. If they can get the price of solar down enough, it could be financially feasible.

But I do agree that solar will not replace gasoline or diesel.


92 posted on 01/24/2014 7:26:52 AM PST by Jonty30 (What Islam and secularism have in common is that they are both death cults)
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To: norwaypinesavage

You might be right... It’s 40 volts and 20 amp hours.


93 posted on 01/24/2014 7:29:33 AM PST by babygene ( .)
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To: babygene
"It’s 40 volts and 20 amp hours.

40 volts times 20 amps gives you 800 Watt hours, or .8 Kwh. Gasoline can have about 40 KWh per gallon. Your battery holds about .8/40 gallons, = .02 equivalent gallons. There are two cups in a pint, and 8 pints in a gallon, so a cup is 1/16 gallon, = .06 gallons. So your bike holds about a third of a cup in equivalent gallons of gasoline.

That's more than I would have expected for a starting battery on a motorcycle. You must have a battery powered bike.

94 posted on 01/24/2014 8:13:33 AM PST by norwaypinesavage (Galileo: In science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of one individual)
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To: palmer

I’m sure there are. :-) I know there’s copper/silver mines, and among non PMs are lithium and nitrate.


95 posted on 01/24/2014 8:36:51 AM PST by Axenolith (Government blows, and that which governs least, blows least...)
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To: sitetest

Good post about your circumstances [$40K outlay] ...

Don’t forget, the life expectancy is only 10-12 years, so you gotta figger in the cost of replacement too!


96 posted on 01/24/2014 11:57:34 AM PST by Lmo56 (If ya wanna run with the big dawgs - ya gotta learn to piss in the tall grass ...)
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