[Vision2020] who killed the electric car?

[Ted Moffett]

All-

I do not doubt that the corporate manipulations regarding the electric car
in California were obstructive to improving and implementing consumer use of
these cars...

But the bottom line on electric car/trucks being practical for widespread
use (even ignoring the limited range of these vehicles before needing
recharging, which has been a significant negative in many consumers minds)
is the huge amount of electricity that would be needed.

California has problems supplying enough electricity for current needs.  To
implement widespread electric car use in California would require huge
increases in electricity generation.

Paul's suggestion that electric cars make it possible to turn off coal fired
electric plants that might power these cars en masse, by replacing the coal
fired plant with nuclear, wind or solar plants, is not a practical
solution.  The need for the massive amounts of electricity involved would
require adding more coal, natural gas and nuclear plants, plus adding wind
and, well, maybe solar, though solar is currently too expensive.  We need to
cut back on coal electric generation as it is, due to CO2 output, or switch
to CO sequestered coal power, yet we still get 50% of our electricity from
coal, and there is tremendous resistance to cutting back on cheap coal
generated electricity, cheaper than nuclear, wind or solar.  New nuclear
fission plants have many drawbacks also.  Wind and solar electricity to
power widespread use of electric cars can be a part of the solution, but not
enough to turn off coal plants.

To solve these problems nationwide would require a massive reorganization of
and expansion of electricity generation requiring cooperation across
numerous sectors of the economy.  Even if the oil and auto industry pushed
the electric car option for widespread use, they might not succeed.

The elephant in the room of the energy/fossil fuel depletion/global warming
crisis is the fact that our current consumption of energy for
transportation needs of all kinds uses too much energy, and increases in
efficiency and implementation of new technology will not sufficiently solve
the problems quickly enough, even if they can eventually be solved, given
our current economic and lifestyle demands on energy consumption.  It is
hard to get around the need to radically downsize transportation energy
consumption.  Almost no one wants to face this fact, the economic and
lifestyle implications.  It is assumed we can have our energy cake and eat
it to...

There is no patent that the oil or auto industry is hiding (though they may
be hiding some) on electrical generation sources or super efficient electric
motors that will make solving these transportation energy problems easy, nor
is lifting corporate control over the work of engineers going to make the
problem less daunting, though that might help.

We could use more coal combined with CO2 sequestration to generate some of
the extra electricity needed to power electric cars, but coal will deplete,
and coal electricity with CO2 sequestration is more expensive,
though absolutely necessary to avoid catastrophic climate change. We could
expand natural gas generated electricity, but this source will deplete.  We
could build 100s of new nuclear power plants to power electric cars.  Good
luck with that idea, with the nuclear waste problem, the expense of nuclear
plants, and the storage of dangerous nuclear material in a world of
terrorists threats.  More hydro could be implemented, as if our rivers are
not damned enough already.  Wind power is being expanded and is a realistic
option, but will eventually be needed to replace coal and natural gas
energy... Solar is currently too expensive, though hopefully it will become
less.  What else?  Hydrogen fuel for electric fuel cell cars...?  Some of
the options for generating large amounts of hydrogen fuel suggest building
more nuclear plants.  Again, good luck!:

http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2002/kiss.htm

Third, hydrogen ? unlike electricity ? can be stored, and so the tremendous
value of nuclear power can be translated into energy for the transportation
energy system, a vast market into which nuclear power can now penetrate.
Professor Paul Kruger of Stanford University has estimated that requirements
for meeting this demand, but avoiding carbon emissions, will require
hundreds of nuclear plants in the coming decades, unless one believes that
renewable energy systems can grow at staggering rates [Ref
16<http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2002/kis-ref.htm#[point16]>
].
-------

What else?  Biomass, biofuel, geothermal, tidal or wave electric
generation?  Probably not solutions for powering a nation wide fleet of
electric cars.

The development that might make electric cars practical for widespread use,
even hydrogen fuel cell electric cars, that could be the energy breakthrough
of human history, fusion, is currently just a gleam in the eyes of the
physicists and engineers building ITER in France, a 10 billion dollar
project that is the largest internationally funded scientific project after
the International Space Station:

http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/News/2005/ITER_Host.html

Ted Moffett





On 2/5/07, Paul Rumelhart <godshatter at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Bill London wrote:
>
> Yes, engineers likely could design more efficient vehicles and better
> power sources -- but will they be allowed to do so?
> That is the lesson of the electric car fiasco in California.
> When the gas/auto industries were able to destroy the state mandate for
> zero emission cars, they stopped their engineers from improving the existing
> electric cars, stopped their customers from buying any (or transferrring
> their leases to purchases), and destroyed all existing vehicles.
> BL
>
>
> I think they will eventually be allowed to do their designs.  What I can't
> tell you is if they will be allowed to do so by the forward-thinking
> progressives or by those who will be picking up the pieces after the oil
> runs dry and the economy comes crashing down.
>
> I definitely want to watch the DVD.  I am entertained by watching
> self-serving billionaires ruin everything for us because they have a level
> of greed most people stamp out of their children by the time they are four.
> Gives me faith in humanity.
>
> Paul
>
>
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