Could Change of Motive Power in Cars Change the Way Cars are Sold, Run and Used?

Absolutely and I'd be all for it.

I think vehicles are going to be usage-specific in the near future. Times are far different now than when I was growing up and even as a young adult. One vehicle per family was the norm. Now the norm is one vehicle per driver in the family. That's a huge increase in sales over 40 yrs.

I can definitely foresee where families still have one vehicle per driver but where buying decisions are made based on the types of usage for that family, where they live and where they drive most frequently. I'd be all for this type of segmentation because it applies the most efficient technology to it most useful application.




For example:

• Why try to force BEVs into an application where they're at a disadvantage such as cross country driving?
• Why use ICE's at their worst, in stop and stop and stop city driving?

A coherent policy IMO would include:



1.) All major cities banning ICE vehicles inside a predetermined area of high congestion.

• Individuals wanting to 'go downtown' would have to use public mass transit or BEVs which they'd own or rent.
• All in-town taxis would have to be BEVs.
• Individuals could 'rent' BEVs from the city at the border of the No-ICE-Zone.
• All delivery vehicles inside a city would have to be BEVs. Lot's of synergies here.

2.) EREVs and PHVs would be directed primarily to the suburbs where personal plugin stations are more easily found. The source of fuel for the supporting ICE's could come a variety of sources depending on that locality. For example using corn ethanol in the Illinois suburbs but butanol or celluosic ethanol in the Southeast suburbs around Atlanta and Savannah and in the Northwest. Biodiesel from algae can be made anywhere. In fact it can be made in evey municipality in the country. Thus every town and city can make it's own fuel and if there's an excess sell it to the public. Lots of synergies.

3.) For long distance driving such as family vacations and sales people on the road Fuel Cell and Compressed Nat Gas vehicles have significant range benefits over BEVs.

4) The current traditional hybrids like the Prius can fit into any of these three categories with the benefit that right now they can fit anyone anywhere and they are very cost effective. But there are better choices available in the future. Hopefully.

5) Over-the-road trucks and railways may have to stay using diesel until more technology is developed. Personal trucks for usage off road and for towing may also have to continue to use diesel primarily but this usage needs a lot of study and R&D.

The problem is one of which comes first. Which technology gets the investments in R&D and infrastructure in order to push it to the fore.

Comments?

 

I have a prediction to make.

Right now the only game in town for electric vehicles seems to be Lithium Ion. However, there are other often overlooked alternatives such as lead-acid and Ni-Mh.

Currently NiMh is hampered by patent issues because it is owned by Exxon-Mobile. (or is it Texaco, I can't remember) and currently they don't license the technology to anyone unless the car is designed to run off of gasoline only. But once Lithium becomes the norm, and it becomes obvious to the patent owners that they aren't going to stop the electric car revolution, they may loosen the license terms so they can make more money on their battery product.

But the most interesting of all is Lead-Acid. Here's why. It has been proven that you can produce an electric car that can go 80 miles on a charge using sealed-lead-acid batteries. The GM EV-1 used them and they worked fine. Their main drawbacks are weight, range, and life-expectancy.

Now I've said all of that to get to this point - If electric cars really start to take off, then manufacturers are going to be in hot competition and they may want to start offering a low-cost electric car to the public. Lead-Acid would be the way they could achieve this goal. It has several advantages to the manufacturer. 1 - It would allow them to roll out a cheaper electric car with a battery pack costing $2,000 instead of $12,000. and 2 - The owner would be guaranteed to return for replacement battery packs every 3 to 5 years. This could make up the profit difference for dealers and manufacturers on what they would loose with the oil-changes and other maintenance items.

The only reason they aren't going this way right now is because they are targeting the high-end consumer with the electric cars and those consumers want good range, and don't want to worry about replacing a battery pack every 3-5 years. But I think once EVs become popular, car makers will be trying to figure out how to get the price down for entry-level vehicles and this may be the way they achieve that.

 

When I read adric22's claim about an oil company having the patent for Ni-MH technoligy, I had to do some Googleing and sure enough, here, toward the bottom of the page you'll find a link entitled "Chevron/Texaco's patent on the NiMH battery". From that link, if you read down to about the 3rd paragraph under Discription it reads "Nickel-metal hydride batteries ("Ni--MH batteries") are superior to lead-acid batteries and are the ideal battery available for electric vehicles, hybrid vehicles and other forms of vehicular propulsion. For example, Ni--MH batteries, such as those described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,277,999, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, have a much higher energy density than lead-acid batteries, can power an electric vehicle over 250 miles before requiring recharge, can be recharged in 15 minutes, and contain no toxic materials."
Seems pretty simple now as to why electric cars arn't widely and readily available. I't's not any technological barrier, but an oil barrier. I mean really, 250 miles, a 15 minute recharge and an oil company owns the patent.
There are several dates on that document. Can someone decipher when the patent will end?