Tesla Trumps Toyota

How about climate change pushing for FCV and getting off fossil fuels.

You missed mentioning the above in your statement. Climate change alone would be enough to have governments, industry, and consumers move to FCV technology.

DBCassidy

 

I think you missed that point which is mentioned in my post. It might be worth rereading. FCVs are powered by mostly fossil fuel (natural gas). The FCV driver has no control over where the H2 comes from in the handful of H2 refueling stations in existence. These station use natural gas as the H2 feedstock. BEV and PHEVs are much easier to power from renewable fuels. The owners often have the option of buying green energy from the utility, or can even select to have a home or cooperative solar refueling station. (e.g. Telsa supercharging station). If getting off fossil fuels is the goal (and it is a good goal), then the more productive path is electric, not hydrogen.

 

CARB requires H2 to be generated from renewable energy, higher percentage than electricity. Your concern and conjecture is not valid.

Your post also shows BEV bias and you probably didn't even notice. You assumed that supporting a specific technology and giving out incentives not basing on the measurable results, was the right direction. I see the the funding adjustments now, being the correct path from the previous off course set by Chu admin.

Recommendations came out of recent study (should have came out 5 years ago!):

Consider federal and regional strategies for promoting electric vehicle adoption most strongly in the regions where they can do the most good.

Avoid treating PEVs as though they are all the same. While the Nissan LEAF has lower GHG emissions than the gasoline Toyota Prius in several regions, the Chevy Volt has higher GHG emissions than the Toyota Prius across much of the US. Policies that target outcomes (e.g., GHG emissions reduction) rather than specific technologies are generally preferred.

Green Car Congress: Researchers find Nissan LEAF creates less CO2 than Toyota Prius hybrid in west US and Texas, but more in N. Midwest

BEV does the same but also switches from oil to coal and natural gas.

Which is fine if you want to use domestic fuel to gain energy independence.

Both BEV and FCV allow the use of renewable. BEV is easier now due to massive solar panel incentives which you are against (perhaps only toward hydrogen).

FCV has more potential to cut off oil import and get us from using renewable energy with super fast refueling speed without changing behavior.

BEV drivers has no control as well. I believe, electricity from natural gas power increased faster than renewables.

Being an owner of PV home system and a plugin car, less than half of my usage actually came from my roof panels. Majority went into the grid which I will pull back in the winter, would come mostly from fossil fuel.

Until home H2 stations are affordable, BEV does have ability to use more renewable energy but not ALL RENEWABLE as you were implying. I also disagree with your statement of ALL H2 made from natural gas.

 

A couple of points worth mentioning:
1) "Carb requires H2 to be generated from renewable energy." So why is this not happening???? Seems CARB is saying one thing and enabling something completely different to proceed. If CARB uses all it's resources to promote fuel cells and very little resources to come up with a viable large scale renewable H2 system, then CARB is sabotaging sustainability, not supporting it. One of the core discussion point keeps revolving around what is the starting line of a true sustainable, renewable energy source. It is more physics than technology showing when the starting energy source is the sun, the best finishing line is electric propulsion, not fuel cell propulsion. No amount of CARB mandates can change physics. My BEV bias is caused by a bias towards physics.
2) Look at this line from your post: "Policies that target outcomes (e.g., GHG emissions reduction) rather than specific technologies are generally preferred." It is unquestionable that CARB is doing the exact opposite. They are focusing on forcing one specific technology as a first priority and definitely not on GHG reduction as a first priority.

 

It is. 30% renewable in H2 is required by law. We need similar law for electricity. Cut the solar panel incentive and see how much the true cost of renewable electricity will reveal. That is the same thing you guys are criticizing hydrogen with. H2 is expensive, don't provide incentives to allow mass marketability, etc.

I believe they are targeting based on OUTCOMES (GHG is one). One of the important targeted outcome is fast refueling ability. Slow charging and swapping is not acceptable and has already failed (Better Place).

Another important target is driving range. Mirai has about 4x the range of BEV with similar well-to-wheel efficiency. FCV scales even higher range, better than BEV.

 

This is a good point. It's just too early to tell what's going to happen.

 

So the actual CARB target is 70% natural gas consumption for vehicles? (Is Pickens in charge of CARB?). I would stress again, the issue is forcing a technology instead of an end goal. It this case it is two very separate technologies, fuel cells and H2 production from the sun's energy. The latter technology will just not appear out of the blue because CA made a law stating it must appear out of the blue. It is clear that CARB is a fuel cell advocacy organization. I like fuel cells and their many and varied uses. I also like all other non-polluting propulsion techologies that CARB undercuts. My opposition is to policies designed to reward corporations for successful lobbying.

No, they are targeting a technology. Just read the way credits are awarded. It is technology based awards, not outcome based awards. Those are the facts. For example, How fast one refuels is totally GHG independent. Making that a factor is gaming the awards system to favor fuel cells, not reducing pollution or advancing sustainability.

 

I think you are confusing some things. The carb rules only talk about subsidized fueling stations. There is no california or federal law requiring stations to be renewable, but california will only fund a renwable mix. Here is a snap shot of california and federal funded stations by 2020 according to the fuel cell lobby.

Stations Surpass Renewable Hydrogen Requirement | California Fuel Cell Partnership
These stations are funded with $220M in california tax payer money plus unknown levels of federal and corporate money. You can see by the chart that more renewables will be funded than 30%. In 2020 if there are 51 planned stations (purple line) with capacity of over 3 million kg/h2 per year with over 40% renewable available. If the average fcv goes 12,000 miles and gets 60 miles/kg that is enough fuel for 15,000 fcv. How much renewable actually is used depends on cars and fueling habits. The chart also accounts for if the additional 49 stations are built using mostly public money.

Now I don't quite understand how spending $220M of california money on 100 stations (90 new plus maintaining 9 old) from california would mean you should also cut renewable incentives which are federal. Federal fcv and hydrogen money have already spent over $3B. The bulk of new renewable power in this country is not solar but wind and biofuels. We can see exactly what the wind incentive is $0.022/kwh, because that is what is being paid. So that $220M would subsidize 10 billion kwh of wind electricity. The wind is subsidized for 10 years but the wind turbines last much longer. Lets divide that by 10 (the years it would pay) and we get 1 billion kwh versus probably 9 million kg of hydrogen, hydrogen incentives are a order of magnitude higher. Why would we add a 30% requirement for electricity and remove funding at the same time? By the way california, austin, and many other places have a over 30% renewable electricity requirement in their future, but that doesn't mean the whole country.

AFAIK better place has done better than fcv, but creditors were smart enough to cut funding. California promised 200 hydrogen stations by 2010. Car manufacturers promised 50,000 fcv on the road by 2015. What is different this time?
Will California's Hydrogen Highway Survive This Time Around?
Perhaps we should lower expectations to reality. This dog won't hunt today. Maybe in the future but why pretend the cars are ready today. One problem with the first hydrogen highway was corruption, but another was carb's insistence on renewable making stations too expensive for the state to fund, so only federal funding built stations. We know that if you spend enough tax money you can build stations with renewables, but why not just build the stations cheaper, and see if the cars actually work? Why pretend they are greener than they are and give them higher incentives. That is not a level playing field that is a money funnel.

Who cares about wheel to well efficiency. If it costs $0.04 or $0.05 cents/mile to put renewable fuel in a plug-in but $0.15/mile to put mainly fossil fuel in a fcv and that is after taxpayers payed to subsidize the car and station, I say that efficiency is the least of that plug-ins problems.

 

Fast refuel speed can be a factor in GHG emission depending on the distance of the trip. Even if it doesn't, it is the standard already set by gasoline. The competing alternative must do as good if not better. It is a valid criteria in my mind, if the goal is to eliminate ICE cars (for tailpipe emission).

CARB's responsibility is to reduce smog and emission in the city. They want zero emission miles and promotes/rewards it's range and the speed to refill it.

It may not be perfect. At least they are not basing ZEV credit by the size of the hydrogen tank. That would be picking winners and losers.

 

I agree with you with the efficiency is highest if solar energy is charged directly into BEV. However, you cannot always charge BEV when the sun is shinning and you don't always have the PV panels big enough to "quick" charge it. You'll need solar storage battery system and that also add cost and efficiency loss (still slightly higher than FCV).

Photolysis into hydrogen is not as efficient as photovoltaic. However, it adds the ability to store that energy and refuel it very fast. Those are the capabilities that solar electricity has not achieved economically (storage) or technically (recharge speed).

So far, solar electricity has been using fossil fuel grid to acts as a storage. Not many people realized it until Tesla introduce the Powerwall battery storage system. It has not achieved "off-grid" ability yet but it should get there soon.

Once battery energy density at affordable price, is solved, next is the ability to discharge the energy very quickly. The current Powerwall is limited at 2kW so, there is a long way to go. In order to charge 300 miles EV (100kWh pack) in 5 mins, you'll need a battery storage that can discharge 1.4 Gigawatts (15% charging loss included). You'll need 700 of Powerwall packs.

These mission critical (to replace gas cars) functionalities have already been solved with FCVs. The only thing left is to mass market and make the cars and refueling stations widely available. Cost is already below BEV. Efficiency improvement can be done with Kaizen.

 

The difference is, GM promised but Toyota delivers. I see this could be a repeat of PNGV. GM promised Precept but Toyota delivered Prius.

Buying renewable electricity does not mean, getting it. You know there is bait and switch business going on. You can pay to pump renewable electricity to the grid but what you get is the grid-mix electricity. A storable energy is worth more. Without fossil fuel in the grid, that bait and switch scheme won't work.

Now, recalculate the real cost of putting renewable electricity into a plugin at the same speed as FCV. You may be fine with a slow overnight charging but gas-like refuel speed using renewable is a premium feature that (now) has premium price.

Last I checked 1kg of H2 is $5. Mirai will go 67 miles with it so it comes out $0.075. DOE projected mass produced H2 price to be comparable with gasoline.

 

I want to remain balanced. There are clearly situations where both refueling time and energy density considerations are important priorities. FCV is obviously a strong performer in these applications. But the implied point is refuel time and availability are inevitable considerations for commuter vehicles. In reality, a lot of accumulating evidence shows that life cycle cost is the most fundamental consideration for commuter vehicle selection. If cost is the primary consideration like it has been in the past, then efficiency will be a more fundamental consideration than refuel time.

There is some excessive liberty in calling the grid a "fossil fuel grid". The grid handles electrons, not fuel. Renewable storage has not been an driving priority till now. Now there is a huge market developing and Tesla is looking to get in on the ground floor.

Believe it or not, I can see where an local industrial facility using H2 and large Fuel Cell systems might store a lot of solar and wind energy during the productive periods. Don't forget the original Kramer's Junction solar plants (still operating!!) used NG for filling in the few cloudy days of the Mojave desert. Those large industrial operations can operate at much better efficiencies than a FCV ever could.

Again, Important for some must not be overextended into being important for all.

I'm sorry, "Cost is already below BEV." needs some real numbers to back that up. (No question the price of a Mirai is less than a Telsa Model S.)


If H2 stations are ever installed widely in Florida, I'll expect it will be when PriusChat is an antique car forum.

 

I heard the promise of a high volume production SUV (highlander derivative) that cost $50K and 68 mpge (3x that of gasoline suvs). What I see is the promise of 3000 4 seater cars for $57,000 that are 1.7x more efficient than the 5 seater camry hybrid that costs so much less.

The promise was oil companies would pay to install stations for these desireable beasts, and it would be competitive with gasoline. Instead taxpayers are paying for the stations, and hydrogen is so high in price the lobby doesn't even want prices displayed.

toyota like the whole fuel cell lobby, over promised on efficiency, cost reduction, and ease of refueling, and of course now are trying to say their high consumption and cost numbers are low.

As has been pointed out to you many times, on good programs this is simply a lie. I don't know why you want to spread this lie or why you believe it. when you buy renewables those renewables get built and offset non-renewabes on the grid. Someone uses them.

Alternatively when carb pays to build renewable hydrogen, it doesn't get produced unless somone leases a fcv and goest to that renewable station.

Renewables are being built for plug-ins many times faster than for fcv. This is not a fair comparison because fcv are so small in number and so much less efficient on renewables so renewable hydrogen costs just so much more.

Where did you check? $13/kg on existing US stations is average cost and those stations were all subsidized so much higher for a non-subsidized station. Bullish Toyota admits hydrogen won't be cheap
Toyota projected out that it would be $10/kg at first and that is why they are initially giving it away. Let'd build the 61 and see what the hydrogen costs. Part of the high cost is low volume, but promises of high volume demand seem premature to me.

Again with this low volume why not build these things as cheap as possible and not pretend how green they are. Its a test. Even after 68 stations toyota only expects 10,000 cars. That's 21 cars/day/station assuming once a week fil up, hardly enough for high volume efficiency. Maybe they will take 85 kg/h2 per station per day. Many of the first 51 won't even be able to fill up 100 vehicles a day.

 

Ditto. I find myself defending FCV from misinformation and political attacks (should stay in Fred's house) that I rarely have time to rave about my solar panels and plugin car.

67% of those electrons comes from fossil fuel. I think that's enough to call it that.

In 2011, FCV-R was revealed.



In 2013, the new FCV concept was revealed.

That's the point. When I buy something, I expect to get it.

In this bait and switch scheme, you don't get renewable electricity. Someone else does. You are actually donating for the public usage. Actually, the utility company gets the ownership and SREC for it. You don't.

I have had my roof top PV system for about a week. 25% of the electricity produced from it gets used -- home and car. 75% goes out to the grid. When I pull that 75% back, it'll likely from fossil fuel. So, I am 25% cleaner than my neighbor in electricity carbon footprint.

If I have a solar battery storage system and go off-grid, I could get it up to 100% solar. To do that, I'll need 350 kWh pack to get through winter. Heating the home with electricity would require more, perhaps another 350 kWh pack.

 

i think you are 100% cleaner than your non renewable neighbors. the only thing that matters is that you're producing clean energy, not where it comes from when you buy some back.

 

The pump we used quoted the price of hydrogen at $5 per kilogram. The actual cost for pump hydrogen in the future is difficult to estimate with any accuracy, though, since the volume and infrastructure aren’t yet mature. Balch cites studies that foresee the price of hydrogen leveling off between $2 and $4 per kilogram, and he points out that a kilogram of H2 typically provides more range than a gallon of gas.​

Hydrogen Filling Stations Are Still Rare

I would agree with you if NJ grid is 100% clean energy. It is not, for a good reason. It has no way of storing renewable electricity. The time-shift or "storage" is due to the capability provided by fossil fuel.

 

They were given credit for the battery swap but due to the lack of usage and abuse and exploit, they closed the loophole.

Tesla Battery Swap: CARB's Bridge To Nowhere - Daily Kanban
Doubting is thinking: CARB says "Tesla has not submitted data on battery swap events" and may not do so until May 2016!

If you use grid, you are using fossil fuel to boost the power. Flywheel or capacitor seem like a good idea but it'll cost more and reduce efficiency, for sure. The point is, there is extra value/effort in fast refuel.

Now, it is due to limited FCVs on the road. Scaling is not an issue with the mass-market roll out. Remember the current phase is not intended for the mass.

Where is the evidence of the actual Model S cost, without revenue from selling ZEVs and erroneous battery swap credits.