Featured Toyota EV market innovation

They have the money, and have spent much of it on fuel cells through the years. Longer than Tesla has been a car company. The high costs of the cars might come down with mass production, but I don't think Toyota has done much to help with the costs of the infrastructure.

Solid state batteries might be great, but we don't have any out in the real world yet to say if they'll live up to the hype.

 

as much as i would like a toyota bev, so far, it has turned out to be the savvy business move. there's no money to be made in bev's yet.

 

I do not know what solid state battery implies, but I do not see a good way to circumvent the laws of phsyics...you are still going to need millions of mini-power plants for each car charger, because you need a sh*t load of electrons to match a gallon of gasoline.

If Gov Newsom and Elon Musk would kindly disclose, from Tesla's private data, how many electrons it has taken to drive those Tesla's around town, or Chevy from Volt, I bet we'd have second thoughts about how green that really is.

 

The EPA lists the kWh/100 miles for each EV and plug-in.

Bob Wilson

 

Mini nuclear reactor power plants.
Bill Gates’ Nuclear Startup Unveils Mini-Reactor Design Including Molten Salt Energy Storage

 

It’s always has been Hydrogen and will be hydrogen for the Mirai (Future)

 

That works for me. Everyone has the right to be wrong and that includes Toyota.

Bob Wilson

 

Who knows . . . . "real world" solid state batteries are certainly more likely than auto fuel cell practicality ... based on fuel cell costs never being able to compete (at least not for the past ½ century of promises to be "ready in just 10 more years" development) ... not even against liquid hydrocarbon fueled cars. Many continue to hint SS batteries are almost there. Not according to (at least) one automotive expert - Sandy Munro who many in the auto industry pay attention to, when it comes to innovation. Here's HIS take on SS Batteries being just around the corner, when he make SS tech references & his opinion on the topic, between minute mark 29:30 and 31 minutes;

BTW, & spoiler alert: The "Tesla Lies" title means that when the company puts out stat's / data ... it not true, because it's better.

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That
My tesla travels about 4 miles on a kwh. In the US we travled about 3.2 trillion vehicle miles in 2019. That would mean we need about 800 billion kwh. Really though there are less efficient type vehicles and grid losses so lets call it 1500 Gwh. In 2019 the US grids generated 4100 Gwh, In other words power needs to only go up 36% or 4%/year if it takes only 9 years to covert and it will take much longer.

In 2015 the US consumed 140 Billon Gallons of gasoline with the energy of 4700 Gwh. If the US substituted half of electricty for gasoline on our vehicle fleet by 2030 electric production would only need to go up 2%/year for transportation, and oil imports to the US would end.

I'm sure the governor does not know but Musk may have a good idea how much is being used. Its very little compared to air conditioning electricity right now because its only a small percentage of the fleet.

 

California drivers go a little less than the US average for annual miles; 14,435, What is Average Mileage Per Year? rounded up, that is 40 miles per day. For a Leaf, that is about 13kWh.

The average home in California uses about 7000kWh a year (https://www.eia.gov/consumption/residential/reports/2009/state_briefs/pdf/ca.pdf) averaging 19kWh a day. The Leaf would be a 68% increase of daily consumption. It's a lot but, home electricity consumption isn't a flat, steady rate; there are peaks and lows. Hypothetically, a large load added during a low won't require increasing generation capacity.

The US has about 1200 GW of generation capacity right now. Getting it to where it is needed, and balancing production to use for cyclical producers could mean current capacity is already enough for more plug in cars. America's Electricity Generating Capacity | American Public Power Association

 

The electrical demand drops dramatically at night which is when most of those EV's would charge. Electric utilities would love to have a constant demand 24 hours a day rather than the large daytime load with an early evening peak and then a dramatic drop in demand at night. Most utilities have natural gas peaker power plants that run just during those peak times.

A client for had several 3 megawatt electric arc furnaces and two large induction furnaces. They qualified for a cheaper electric rate if they ran them at night.

EV's and battery storage could boost the evening load which would be welcomed by the utilities. As EV's and battery storage become mainstream the electric utilities will have time to adapt.

 

Ironically, we could see hydrogen providing supplemental power at some DC fast-chargers. People don't take into consideration how expensive it really is to push a large amount of electrons quickly during peak hours; yet, they promote it as if that's going to be no big deal. We already see pricing around $0.28 per kWh from Tesla for their highest speed service. Imagine when demand goes up. There really isn't a discount for higher volume. In fact, it can be the opposite. You end up paying a premium.

Such immediacy could be accommodated by fuel-cells operating on premise. In fact, locally supplied hydrogen could be a source of new green jobs complimenting the green efforts we see in the solar & wind industry. Excess capacity needs to be stored somehow. Putting it where it would be most valued is a win-win.

The ironic nature of the symbiotic relationship is quite amusing. BEV supporters have fought intensely against hydrogen, assuming it would be counter-productive to their green objectives. Instead, it could prove to be missed opportunity.

 

The fight against hydrogen cars is mostly about the efficient use of public resources to achieve those green objectives.Take the ZEV program. the credit structure means a car maker can put fewer ZEV cars on the road than if they offered a BEV. The tax dollars spent on refueling stations for those few cars would have provided chargers for a lot more plug ins, or in just upgrading the grid.

Green hydrogen is also a large user of electricity. Which is part of the reason why it costs more than gasoline and electricity per mile. But without the mandates forcing its use, the hydrogen would just come from fossil fuels, giving just a fraction of the environmental benefit, if any.

Then it isn't cheap to move hydrogen around. The lowest cost is to add it to the natural gas supply, which doesn't do any good for cars and stationary PEM fuel cells. Refueling intrastructure in the US for cars would cost billions. Less for trucking along limited routes, but that goes back to efficient use of resources; a BEV truck will go more miles on the electricity used to make and compress the hydrogen for a FCEV truck.

I do think hydrogen might work out as storage for green electricity from solar and wind. It is an option among many though. Between the various battery types, capacitors, flywheels, pumped hydro, compressed air, hoisted giant bricks, and whatever else is being tried, hydrogen will be niche player, if it makes it as energy storage.

I don't see it working as a buffer supply to a charging station. DC fast chargers do not take up much real estate. Without the space for low pressure tanks, the hydrogen system will need a high pressure or hydride system, which means higher costs. Batteries or capacitors would be cheaper to install and run, with less turn around losses of the energy, and without the safety and zoning issues of a flammable gas.

 

The problem is fuel cells don't have the power, the kW, needed to supply the charge for a BEV. It works better if you have a large battery that is 'slow rate' charged when the station is idle and then provides the high power needed when a BEV plugs in. Electrify America has already contracted with Tesla for battery packs to augment their chargers.

This is not a good fit for fuel cells because they tend not to have the high power needed. They can feed a battery pack that can provide the power needed.

Bob Wilson

 

There is H35, H70 and now there is H70M, any idea what the M stands for?

 

A basic unit will deliver 100 kW. During times of high-demand, why wouldn't that be a good supplement?

btw, here's a little tidbit I uncovered when verifying my facts were correct:

 

Well, you could have a fuel cell stack powerful enough to fast charge a BEV. It will just be large and expensive. The ramp times of a fuel cell could mean slightly longer charge times. There is also the lag time in making the hydrogen during slow periods, and compressing it.

Not having those issues, a battery, capacitor, or even a flywheel is a better fit for an EV charge station.

Maybe meta. This was the only thing I found; CORDIS | European Commission Metatron - META M-H70 2.0 PRESSURE REGULATOR FOR HYDROGEN FUEL CELL VEHICLES

If that is what H70M refers to, then it isn't involved with refueling. The pressure hydrogen is at in the tank needs to be reduced before going into the fuel system; the Mirai's is 200psi, IIRC. H70M, H70-M, or M-H70 is regulator for that purpose that has been designed for a car. It's claimed to have a longer service life than what is currently used.

Fuel cells are slow to ramp up and down output. That's why FCEVs have batteries to buffer that output. Unless this hypothetical stationary fuel cell has a battery or other buffer, charge times could lengthen.

Fuel cells can do stationary power now. They might work for grid level storage of renewables. They don't work well for rapid dumping of energy to high demand appliances. They'll need that battery intermediary. in which case, Just skip the fuel, and save money just installing a larger battery.

The petroleum industry gets all they hydrogen they need from crude at the refinery. It is a by product of some refining steps, and reformation can be done onsite if they need more. Using renewable hydrogen ther will likely increase costs without much environmental benefit. Renewable would reduce the need to make fossil hydrogen for other industries, like ammonia

Hydrogen has uses, and we'll need a source for it if we move away from fossil fuels, but that doesn't mean fuel cells are a viable alternative for transportation.