From Guest Blogger Jessica Greenberg: The Future of Fuel Efficient Vehicles – Will It Become a Reality?
With gas prices rising every month, people who don’t have a car yet are now having second thoughts because of such issues. While it’s true that we really can’t do something about our planet’s dwindling fossil fuel sources, we can, however, choose to get vehicles that are fuel efficient. Or perhaps, one could go straight to the challenge of getting vehicles run by electricity.
It’s interesting to note that for several decades, mankind has always been searching for alternative sources for vehicle fuel. Airplanes, for example, is one kind of vehicle that is most experimented upon. In the 1970’s, an unmanned 27 lb aircraft named Sunrise made the world’s first solar-powered flight. And every year since then, aviation innovators have worked tirelessly in order to build airplanes that can run and fly in the air while using clean energy for longer periods of time. Aviation experts and parts suppliers believe that solar powered or electric powered planes is the key of unlocking fuel efficient planes. Of course, if this is possible for planes, then why can’t you just install solar panels into cars?
If only it were that easy!
Remember that cars are used everyday and is now considered more of a “need” than “want”. If your car doesn’t function in the dead of the night after working overtime in an office, how exactly would you feel? That’s the problem with cars run on alternative energy; they haven’t been proven yet when it comes to everyday use. Most of the land vehicles are still within the experimental stage, that is until modern technology introduced methods on how to build compact and fuel-efficient motors for cars and sedans.
A few months ago, Mitsubishi presented the i-miev as one of the latest in electric powered cars. Some people complain that it is quite small and space is a big issue, especially if you have a big family, so this is perfect for people who are yet to experience owning a car and are still living on their own. While there are lots of electronic cars in the market, people often question reliability and the availability of spare parts when it needs to be repaired. Some electric cars have parts that are difficult to buy. Some have spare parts that are really expensive, but the costs of fuel maintenance have indeed reduced for people who were able to get these vehicles. But yet agan, mass production remains a big issue since most companies aren’t quite sure that these cars will indeed sell.
Back to solar powered cars. races involving cars run by solar power have become popular and more people are now learning on the fact that solar powered cars can be marketed and mass produced. However, experts believe that building a solar powered car means creating a design that is able to fit the solar panels on the vehicle. It’s a small wonder why some of the solar race cars have weird or odd designs. Nevertheless, the road to mass producing a solar powered car or an electric powered car will happen sometime in the future!
Author Biography:
Jessica Greenberg is an experienced blogger/alternate energy researcher from San Diego, California. She spends most of her time writing and surfing the Internet for forums and discussions about alternate energy, natural gas, taking basic pilot lessons, and how to stop global warming. If not busy on the Internet, she spends her time going out with her friends or going to the beach for a swim.
“That’s the problem with cars run on alternative energy; they haven’t been proven yet when it comes to everyday use”.
I would say the principle has been proven; the basic challenge is cost rather than performance. Tesla’s new S Model can do up to 300 miles on a charge, you don’t need to have a hugely greater range than this and charge time would not be an issue for probably at least 99.9% of the population, how many people need to do more than say 500miles without a substantial recharge break (for driver and car), but at about $100K for such a car cost is the real issue, but cost and performance of batteries are improving all the time (see EOS).
Regarding solar powered cars, with current solar panel technology a realistic production electric car (energy use 200 to 250 Wh/mile) in a temperate climate such as the UK would need several tens of square metres of panels to collect enough energy to provide about 10,000 miles per year travel;this would be a very big car. However using CPV (Concentrating PV, not suitable for vehicle mounting) located in a sunny desert 1 year’s/10K miles of electricity could be produced from 2 to 3 sq metre’s of panels.
Regarding electric planes, I would be surprised if they ever made economic sense. High efficiency means big wings and slow speeds; an electric powered airship might be a possibility for passenger or goods transport, but how many people these days would be content with a two to three day flight from London to New York. The real answer here is evacuated tube transport, (see ET3.com) which effectively gives space travel at ground level, London to New York in a couple of hours with an energy efficiency better than electric trains, now that is an alternative to air travel.
I would agree with Nick’s premise. The theory behind it all is sound but we need increased investment and efficiency before it becomes viable to use.
Who knows what the future may hold technology wise.