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Is a segment on the evening news where Sweden has developed a system of putting plate right under the asphalt and equipping the vehicles with receiving Wi-Fi plates so that all electric cars will be charged as they drive down the road
 
^Its neat and all, but I can't see it being greenlighted for public sale without some form of safety cage around all those, whirling blades of death and dismemberment.

I don’t seem to remember anyone ever calling propellers that way since their existence. Or any other high-energy air, land, sea or space transport for that matter. But I’m sure they and their clients would be happy to hear about any issues they may have missed:

https://jetsonaero.com/
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Is a segment on the evening news where Sweden has developed a system of putting plate right under the asphalt and equipping the vehicles with receiving Wi-Fi plates so that all electric cars will be charged as they drive down the road

I find those interesting but they seem expensive. I still don’t know how anyone can make these profitable.

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I’m starting to really like this Aptera. Like the Prius and BMW i3, it’s not a conventional look. However, everything about it seems to be purpose-built, with Cd being a top priority.

 
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It can't. It takes about 500,000 pounds of STRIP MINING to make a single Tesla battery. Using a bunch of flashlight batteries was a dismally juvenile idea. Without a major tech breakthrough, we'll have to strip mine all of China to meet Cali's mandates.

And then, the power generated to charge these, is produced dozens of miles away, and as much as half of it will be wasted to powerline loss before it ever gets to the car.

Only good news. Residential solar power cells are becoming viable. I think I'll be selling these soon.
 
It can't. It takes about 500,000 pounds of STRIP MINING to make a single Tesla battery. Using a bunch of flashlight batteries was a dismally juvenile idea. Without a major tech breakthrough, we'll have to strip mine all of China to meet Cali's mandates.

And then, the power generated to charge these, is produced dozens of miles away, and as much as half of it will be wasted to powerline loss before it ever gets to the car.
Source for the strip mining or powerline loss statements?
 
It's amazing how reliable 'from at work' turned out to be...
I might be willing to believe that 50% of power generated gets to grid users for a very limited set of circumstances, basically where the utility doesn't have much peaker capacity and an awful lot of base load capacity. In that kind of setup, they basically throw away a raft of power overnight. I don't know if anyone actually operates that way anymore. The irony is that if there were a bunch of electric cars charging overnight, it would really balance out the usage and make the utility a lot more efficient.
 
Ya know, its cheaper or more efficient to load coal into trains and ship it to remote electrical power generating stations, than to generate the power near the mine and transfer the power over transmission lines. Wouldn't it be awsome of storage batteries were so cheap and efficient that you could recharge the batteries near the coal mine, and move them by rail to the remote users?
 
From your link, there seems to be significant confusion on the actual numbers...

Statement 1: 'only two-thirds of the energy in the raw materials actually make it onto the grid in the form of electricity'
Statement 2: 'Energy lost in power plants: About 65%'

These two directly contradict each other...

Also, from the same article comes this statement:
Energy lost in transmission and distribution: About 6% – 2% in transmission and 4% in distribution
Not exactly the 'as much as half' that you fabricated just a few posts above.



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Your original statement:
And then, the power generated to charge these, is produced dozens of miles away, and as much as half of it will be wasted to powerline loss before it ever gets to the car.
My reference from Schneider:
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Your "pessimistic" reference:
1650982802077.png
There is nothing further to discuss here regarding power transmission and distribution losses. Although not perfect, the grid is pretty efficient (although not perfect, obviously). Power plant efficiency is a completely separate topic.

Neither topic is relevant for this thread.
 
You missed a line:
Energy lost in power plants: About 65%, or 22 quadrillion Btus in the U.S. in 2013
 
I can't use the good studies since they have customer corporate logos on them.

Sounds like a closed loop to me, so I'd stay out of it.

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When a car is plugged in and charging, it only has to be at 100% when user picks it up. In the mean time, a large number of such plugged in cars can be used as a large battery to smooth out power peaks on a grid. Here's an article on Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) tech:

https://innovationatwork.ieee.org/vehicle-to-grid-v2g-technology/
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I'm not sure how common regenerative braking is on e-bikes but these ones will have it:

https://cooperbikes.com/collections/cooper-e-bikes
Lots of anouncements about products to come years in the future. I try to avoid them unless it's something like this that's new to me. Those delays are consistent with ongoing lack of batteries, lithium, minerals (all of which are recycled as far as I know).
 
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I hope scientists are working on affordable fuel cells for automobiles. Fuel cells will solve the issues associated with generating electricity and battery disposal. Every manned US spacecraft from Gemini 5 through the shuttle was equipped with hydrogen oxygen fuel cells. They produce electricity and the waste product is drinkable water. That would be a major win for the environment.
 
Fuel cells will solve the issues associated with generating electricity
1) Fuel cells do not solve any problem associated with generating electricity. Instead, they create problems with generating, storing, and distributing hydrogen.
and battery disposal.
2) The solution for battery disposal is recycling. These are still early days in battery recycling, there is still much work to be done.

Fuel cells are cool and there will always be applications for them, but it's unlikely to be in cars.
 
You missed a line:
Energy lost in power plants: About 65%, or 22 quadrillion Btus in the U.S. in 2013
Ah, moving the goalposts after being proven wrong! My favorite!

Also, energy losses in a car's ICE are higher than power plants (68%-72% per the feds). So using a power plant to power an electric vehicle is actually ... a good thing for overall efficiency of the transportation system. (Not even counting the costs of transporting, storing, and pumping fuel, all of which are more efficient at power plant scale than at gas station scale.) As noted, also not relevant to this thread. I'm done on this branch.
 
I hope scientists are working on affordable fuel cells for automobiles. Fuel cells will solve the issues associated with generating electricity and battery disposal. Every manned US spacecraft from Gemini 5 through the shuttle was equipped with hydrogen oxygen fuel cells. They produce electricity and the waste product is drinkable water. That would be a major win for the environment.

"Affordabe" is in the eye of the beholder, but there's the Mirai:

https://www.toyota.com/mirai/However, no one seems to be keen on building a fueling network and I think it's because in the case of cars, fuel cells have few if any benefits over batteries. They surely have benefits for other applications, but I haven't made that analysis yet myself. I'd surely welcome a thread on that topic.

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As for lithium, in case anyone is wondering where it's from:

"Lithium has historically been produced from two sources: brines and hard rock mining. Producing lithium from brines remains the most efficient and cost effective process"

http://www.lithiummine.com/lithium-mining
But of course it's being recycled and that part of the supply chain is being built (I posted many links to this already, Northvolt, Redwood, etc.). In the coming decades, an increasing proportion would come from recycled batteries.
 
"Affordabe" is in the eye of the beholder, but there's the Mirai:

https://www.toyota.com/mirai/However, no one seems to be keen on building a fueling network and I think it's because in the case of cars, fuel cells have few if any benefits over batteries. They surely have benefits for other applications, but I haven't made that analysis yet myself. I'd surely welcome a thread on that topic.
Well it's about time that fuel cell cars are available. They're definitely more affordable than battery cars having similar range, and they can be re-fueled in minutes rather than hours. Like recharging stations, fueling stations will be built once the cars become popular. But "fueling networks" (which aren't really needed) won't overload existing electric networks like chargers do; fuel is transportable by ship or truck and store-able just like gasoline is. Fuel cells are the best solution for long-range vehicles.
 
Well it's about time that fuel cell cars are available. They're definitely more affordable than battery cars having similar range, and they can be re-fueled in minutes rather than hours. Like recharging stations, fueling stations will be built once the cars become popular. But "fueling networks" (which aren't really needed) won't overload existing electric networks like chargers do; fuel is transportable by ship or truck and store-able just like gasoline is. Fuel cells are the best solution for long-range vehicles.
I’m afraid fuel cell cars will never be mainstream. Too inefficient, too expensive and too much infrastructure required.
https://electrek.co/2022/02/15/stud...annot-catch-up-battery-electric-vehicles/amp/
 
Well it's about time that fuel cell cars are available. They're definitely more affordable than battery cars having similar range, and they can be re-fueled in minutes rather than hours. Like recharging stations, fueling stations will be built once the cars become popular. But "fueling networks" (which aren't really needed) won't overload existing electric networks like chargers do; fuel is transportable by ship or truck and store-able just like gasoline is. Fuel cells are the best solution for long-range vehicles.

With the latest EVs, recharge time isn't really a problem because people charge at home (each day or every 2-3 days, like a smartphone). As for range, a 200 mile range covers normal daily needs for most people. On a road trip, range is only a problem if you insist on skipping meals (65 miles an hour for 200 miles is a 3-hour drive). Stopping for a break every 200, 300, 400 miles isn't so bad. Unless maybe you have to do that trip very often, like some professionals, but that's not the typical case.

I came accross an article or report somewhere that compared electric cars with hydrogen fuel cell cars, and there was no contest. The infrastructure and delivery logistics are much more complex for hydrogen. If I find it again, I might post it, but I don't want to start an argument about which energy source is better, start a cage match, and then see someone brought to the ER or something.

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The Saudi government will be ordering thousands of Lucid cars.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/26/lucid-to-deliver-up-to-100000-evs-to-saudi-arabia-government.html
 
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Sure, I'll play too. 5.3 tons of lithium carbonate ore to make one ton of lithium metal. 10 kg of lithium in one car = 53 kg of ore. Looks like you're off by three orders of magnitude. I'll even quote my sources.

https://qz.com/2156463/why-elon-musk-wants-tesla-to-start-mining-lithium/
Feel free to show your own work.
Thanks for that. There’s an incredible amount of misinformation out there about this subject.

Also, Tesla is changing the battery chemistry in many of its cars to reduce the amount of nickel and cobalt used.
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/10/20/tesla-switching-to-lfp-batteries-in-all-standard-range-cars.html
 
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The Saudi government will be ordering thousands of Lucid cars.
A Lucid showroom has popped up in a local mall (Short Hills Mall for those in the area who might know it). The store itself is clearly fashioned after the Tesla showroom that used to be in the mall but eventually closed, to be replaced with a Polestar showroom. All these are showrooms and not stores because they can't sell you cars due to the antiquated dealer laws.

Anyway: the Lucid Air is a very interesting car. I found it's appearance to be much more striking in person than I ever found it to be in pictures. The rear end is particular unusual. Interior looks beautiful, and I really like the dash LCD design. Biggest negative I saw was that the trunk opening is *tiny*, due to the almost hatch-like rear window. Tesla solved that in the Model S by actually making it a hatch, which makes it an incredible hauler.

The car is waaay out of my price range, but it's definitely a company to watch, given that they've actually gotten to the point of shipping cars (albeit in small volumes.)
 
With the latest EVs, recharge time isn't really a problem because people charge at home (each day or every 2-3 days, like a smartphone). As for range, a 200 mile range covers normal daily needs for most people. On a road trip, range is only a problem if you insist on skipping meals (65 miles an hour for 200 miles is a 3-hour drive). Stopping for a break every 200, 300, 400 miles isn't so bad. Unless maybe you have to do that trip very often, like some professionals, but that's not the typical case.

I came accross an article or report somewhere that compared EV with hydrogen fuel cell cars, and there was no contest. The infrastructure and delivery logistics are much more complex for hydrogen. If I find it again, I might post it, but I don't want to start an argument about which energy source is better, start a cage match, and then see someone brought to the ER or something.

Most Americans live in apartments and condos, and don't have the ability to charge at home. Many others can charge only at Level 1, which require 10 hours or more for full charge.

I take a break every 200-300 miles when traveling, but only for a few minutes not hours. Most chargers are Level 1 or 2; even "Superchargers" require over an hour for full charge.

Yes delivery logistics are inferior now for hydrogen, but like superchargers (which are not widespread either) that will change with adoption of fuel cell vehicles just like with battery cars. At least you can store hydrogen in tanks, which are much cheaper than huge batteries. Infrastructure evolves.

You'll never see a battery-powered rocket.
 
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