VW’s Talking about Electric Vehicles
Here’s an article on Volkswagen’s ambitions for its line of electric vehicles. Note that it claims a range of 300 miles (at 3 miles/KWh) and a charging time of 15 minutes. That’s nice as long as you have a 400KW charging source, say 1000 volts and 400 amps. But there are problems with that: a) such a thing is not available, and b) even if it were, I wouldn’t want my wife and kids within about a quarter mile of it.
Another problem with charging that fast is that it would probably shorten the battery life.
There are various things which limit how fast a battery can be charged, including the power line which provides power to the charger. It is unlikely that an electric car battery could ever be recharged within an order of magnitude of the time it takes to fill a fuel tank of a non-electric car.
But with a range of 300 miles, if it is actually that, consider how long it would take to drive 300 miles. Last I checked, the highest U.S. speed limit was 80 mph, in Texas. At 80 mph, it would take 3.75 hours, or 3 hours and 45 minutes, to drive that distance under prefect conditions where the speed limit is that high for the entire distance, which is unlikely. Rarely would one be able to cover that distance in less than 4.5 hours. A couple stops along the way for various purposes would generally provide adequate time for re-charging.
So, if the car will actually go 300 miles at highway speeds on one charge, then for most users the range problem would not be important. But would it actually go 300 miles between charges? Such claims are typically made with the heater and air conditioner turned off and with ideal weather conditions.
VW began to release media about its EV efforts just after they were taking a hit over scamming the diesel engine pollution tests so you might expect some of this to be a bit of a red herring… just lots of hype.
Quick charge times for electric vehicles will probably eventually use advanced ultracap/battery hybrids or “xxx/air” batteries. They are already available but not widely used due to cost: https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Hybrid-Energy-Storage-Systems-Get-Best-of-Both-Worlds
Car batteries do not have to achieve the energy density or an energy capacity equal to a tank of gasoline because the electric motor is so much more efficient than a petrol engine. The Tesla model S contains about as much energy as about (85 KWH / 33.41 KWh/gallon of gasoline =)2.5 gallons of gasoline yet will allow the car to travel about 200 to 300 miles.
On the other hand Craig, while most people would agree that lots of potential electricity could be a dangerous thing we don’t think twice about putting 12 gallons or more of gasoline into our vehicles. This is the equivalent energy of (12 x 33.14) that is used by a typical American house in about 13 days. http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=97&t=3
Craig you are showing signs of enlightenment regarding “the energy equation” dear friend. At last!
You have nailed it right on the head in your posting on the round-robin energy transformation cycle of vehicle battery charging, and you might not have even been fully aware of the profoundness of your posting on the subject. It just popped up in conversation without much analysis perhaps?
I am always talking about “the huge energy world we should all be striving for” to support the energy intensive new age industries that we must have. Electric vehicles is one stark case in point.
This is THE most important topic in the climate change debate bar none, and unfortunately I must admit that not many people give a hoot about “the energy equation” but they should, because the technological solutions necessary in reversing greenhouse gasses are immutably connected to the “global energy technologies sector” and more specifically the “future global energy technologies sector” which is a very different look to the current “global energy technologies sector”.
The answer of course is in new age energy dense; clean; safe, generation technologies that can fulfill the global energy imperative of “abundant and affordable” huge energy for all people. You already know that I reckon.
But I remain convinced that you do not fully grasp this simple premise – yet.
Maybe you do get it, but prefer to stay “mum” on this point not wanting to cause a confrontation with your network of climate change “soft hitters”.
Frank Eggers understands “the energy equation” a bit better than most but I haven’t seen others discuss it at all really.
It needs a push please, because it underpins the way the global corporate market place should move forward on new energy technologies, and let’s get to a point of agreement quickly that what is needed is NEW energy dense technologies.
If we can – then maybe EVERYONE can own an electric car before 2050! and be able to CHARGE it up!
Lawrence Coomber
Lawrence, perhaps we should look at the “huge” energy equation posed by electric vehicles. You can call this “fact checking.”
We can imagine an all electric transportation system with maths. First we convert the total amount of gasoline used by all petrol vehicles to electricity. The amount can be found in EIA figures, but here is a shortcut: http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=23&t=10 (.14043 trillion gallons x 34.13 kwh/gal = 4.7929 trillion KWH) Then we look up how much electricity was generated for the same year http://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.cfm?t=epmt_1_01 and this comes to a remarkably similar number 4.087 trillion KWH. But while the average fuel economy for present vehicles is about 25MPG http://www.autoblog.com/2016/02/11/us-fuel-economy-average-edges-up-in-january/ The average fuel economy for electric vehicles is 4 times as much. This gives us an overall grid demand for an all electric fleet that can be expected to be from 25% to a 30% increase. But wait.
It has been estimated that 84% of our entire fleet of vehicles could be charged at night with extra off peak capacity. (Generating capacity must be sufficient to meet the high of peak daytime demands leaving extra capacity off peak.) That would bring us back to only about (30% x 16%) 5% additional capacity required on the grid to charge all vehicles.
But then we should allow that Petrol refineries also require “huge” amounts of electricity. Last reports to the US before the petrochemical industry stopped reporting on the use of electricity indicated that about 4.5 kWh of electricity is required in the refining of 1 gallon of gasoline. http://gatewayev.org/how-much-electricity-is-used-refine-a-gallon-of-gasoline Some electricity they produce themselves but refineries in California and other areas are the largest single customers of grid power. Our “huge” demand for electricity has now been hacked down through conservation and more efficient electric motors to what may very well be a surplus.
Poof! So much for the “huge” demand electric vehicles will pose to our electric grid. In fairness you are raising some very old arguments that have been debunked years ago: https://cleantechnica.com/2012/04/20/are-electric-cars-green/
Breath on the wind said:
“Poof! So much for the “huge” demand electric vehicles will pose to our electric grid. In fairness you are raising some very old arguments that have been debunked years ago:”
Debunked? Thank you Breath.
The key phrase here is not “poof!” but “our electric grid”. And it explains a lot about Breaths breadth of understanding of the greenhouse gas science that he likes to “selectively cut and paste” and (unwittingly I believe) re-badge as a home-grown all American scientific phenomena.
Breath this is a global issue that is strangling dear old planet earth mate – it is not a US only issue!! So referring to “our electric grid” in the context of the global emissions (energy generation technologies by extension and association) debate is not going to cut it Breath. You are only exposing yourself to ridicule as a commentator whose thinking is constrained by self-imposed boundaries that don’t exist.
I know you can do a lot better than that from what I have seen of many past well considered comments you have made on several kindred issues.
Greenhouse gas emissions are derived from fossil fuel consumption (globally). We need to move beyond fossil fuel consumption for both “power generation” and “reciprocating engines” Breath – forever, and I say again, this premise applies to ALL people not just the 5% of the world’s population that you like talking about so much.
And here is the salt in the wound Breath. The remaining 95% of people beyond the US borders all require and desire access to the same amount of power that your fortunate 5% have ready access to, in order to move their lives into the modern era. It’s a no brainer Breath.
You should now challenge yourself to go back to the excel spreadsheet and run a few scenarios that can achieve that, and an interesting start might be to build up a simple formula based on the one you have already constructed that applies to the US car fleet; power generation; charging power demand; and fossil fuel consumption, then plug in the African Continent equivalent figures. After that plug in the Asian Continent figures, if you are still a bit confused by then plug in the South American figures. Then pick yourself up from the floor.
You will be surprised and overwhelmed by the results Breath.
And maybe this will jolt you into reality regarding “the new age global energy imperative” as it applies to the urgent reversal of global greenhouse gasses from fossil fuel use (GLOBALLY).
The science is in – we all know that, so stop talking about it and redirect focus now to achievable technological solutions to solve it, and the foundation stone to all that is new power generation technologies that can achieve this and also provide for massive power generation increases to power the energy intensive technologies and industries that are “just around the corner” that will facilitate a new paradigm shift in global development.
No one in the world wants to retreat back to stone-age times as a hostage to the lack of availability of “huge” power, and without “huge” power modern aspirations, prosperity and development will be non-achievable for those without access to it.
Continued “unevenness” between people is directly connected to power generation and we are seeing an increasing intolerance to this inequity around the world.
New power generation technologies are an absolute must have this next 20 – 40 years. They are what I call “global social balancing and harmonising technologies”. “Huge power technologies” are a global imperative that can be solved and reasonably quickly with the right leadership and mobilisation of industries globally.
So back to the beginning. What does the “energy equation” have to do with all this stuff? Well as it turns out, just about everything.
Lawrence Coomber
Lawrence thanks for your “energetic” response.
As Craig has made a new post of this issue and I first saw a copy of this response there you will find a comment on that post. http://www.2greenenergy.com/2016/08/30/environmental-impact-electric-transportation/#comments
Craig.
Like all EV manufactures VW remains hampered by problems concerning ESD.
EV’s use energy like any other vehicle, except storage capacity and refueling times remain restrictive. Some valuable work has been done to improve this situation, Tesla has improved storage capacity while introducing a supercharger network, various battery and capacitor research projects are being pursued, but a commercially viable “breakthrough” remains elusive.
I hate to be skeptical but the release from VW does seem to be trying just a bit too hard in the wake of the diesel scandal.