I snapped this photo while driving southbound on California’s Interstate 5 recently. We all know that Prius owners tend to be a bit smug, but this vanity plate takes the cake.
Click for a larger image
Now before anyone gets all bent out of shape, I’ll point out that I own and drive an electric car myself. But I don’t go rubbing other peoples noses in my wattage.
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Jack Simmons (08:17:09) :
Electricity is a means of conveying energy, not generating it. Hydrogen falls into the same category.
So far, so good. I agree with a lot of your points, but on a couple of them I think you are repeating things that are often said in other sources, but not accurate…
Electricity is not even a very good way of conveying energy. A windmill farm in the Dakotas generating 100MW of power and sending the electricity generated to California will lose all but 7MW in transmission inefficiencies, basically heating up the atmosphere in between the states.
American Superconductor (AMSC) makes superconducting transmission systems. See: http://www.amsc.com/products/htswire/HTSCables.html They are installing one of them in New York.
There is also the small matter of the Pacific DC Intertie:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie
That connects the Pacific Northwest with the L.A. basin for 3100 Megawatts worth… Older technology, yes, but it’s always nice to have an existence proof of something to cite…
There is not really a problem with moving lots of electricity around the country long distances with acceptable low losses. We literally do it every day.
Jack Simmons (08:17:09) :
(Please forgive me if this is a duplicate. It seems to have vanished when posted…)
More good stuff about French nukes… then …
There are four isotopes of plutonium in the fuel rods. Only one, PU239 is useful for weapons. The mere presence of these other isotopes poisons the fission process in a nuclear bomb, making the use of this plutonium in weapons IMPOSSIBLE.
This is often stated, but quite wrong. It is easy to be lead to believe this. McPhee in “The Curve of Binding Energy” quotes Taylor, one of our best bomb designers, on the subject. As a rough paraphrase his statement was “There is good Plutonium for making bombs and less good Plutonium, but there is no bad Plutonium for making bombs.”
OK, that’s a theoretical from a long time ago. How about a real world?
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/India/IndiaMomentum.html
the delay gave them time to prepare additional devices – two sub-kiloton experiments, and a boosted fission device using reactor-grade plutonium to enable India to draw upon its very large inventory of power reactor produced material if desired.
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/India/IndiaShakti.html *with PICTURES*
talking about the Shakti III device:
This device was an experimental fission device using “non-weapon grade” (reportedly reactor-grade) plutonium. It was probably a test of fusion boosted device without the boost gas to prove the ability to use lower grade plutonium from India’s large power reactor plutonium stockpile.
Since just about anyone with an internet connection and a decent physics education can design a bomb and U can be gotten from the ocean with plastic mats I’m not real worried about this path to a nuke; but it has been done. They also made a U233 device, as was our MET device of Teapot:
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Usa/Tests/Teapot.html
which proves the Thorium to U233 path works (even though you will find folks saying it won’t work due to U232 contamination being too hot).
I don’t know if it’s deliberate misinformation or just that so much of this was classified, but the fact is that you can make bombs out of a lot of nuclear material that isn’t ordinarily thought of as ‘boom stuff’.
Don’t ask why I know this… hanging out with kids who’s dads designed bombs it just kind of comes up in conversation…
You bought that, right? 😉
Jack Simmons (08:17:09) :
More good stuff about French nukes… then …
There are four isotopes of plutonium in the fuel rods. Only one, PU239 is useful for weapons.[…] making the use of this plutonium in weapons IMPOSSIBLE.
This is often stated, but quite wrong. It is easy to be lead to believe this. McPhee in “The Curve of Binding Energy” quotes Taylor, one of our best bomb designers, on the subject. As a rough paraphrase his statement was “There is good Plutonium for making devices and less good Plutonium, but there is no bad Plutonium for making devices.”
OK, that’s a theoretical from a long time ago. How about a real world?
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/India/IndiaShakti.html with PICTURES
talking about the Shakti III device:
This device was an experimental fission device using “non-weapon grade” (reportedly reactor-grade) plutonium. It was probably a test of fusion boosted device without the boost gas to prove the ability to use lower grade plutonium from India’s large power reactor plutonium stockpile.
Since just about anyone with an internet connection and a decent physics education can design a bomb and U can be gotten from the ocean with plastic mats I’m not real worried about this path to a nuke; but it has been done.
“we will not use our coal, and we will embark on a decade or two long project of playing with electric cars.”
We can not increase grid consumption by 50% on current generation capacity. If they won’t use coal or nuclear, we can have all the electric cars we want … and we will be charging them at night with gasoline generators!
Interesting article about the oil “contango” here:
http://blogs.wsj.com/environmentalcapital/2008/12/08/oil-glut-why-contango-is-stretching-the-oil-market-and-why-you-should-care/
JimB
D Caldwell (21:40:05) :
E.M. Smith
I am under the impression that the internal combustion engine, due to heat loss and mechanical friction, only delivers about 30% of the original energy in the fuel to the drive wheels of the vehicle.
If varies with the vehicle (Diesels are much better) but between 30% and 45% Max is probably about right.
I’m thinking that we will need alternatives at some point in the future.
We need alternatives NOW. We are at the top of Hubberts peak and it’s all down hill from here on oil supply. What we don’t need is a bunch of lawyer politicians picking winners in DC. Let the market sort out the winners. There are many alternatives that all work fine. Let folks choose what they want.
With that said, there are some technologies that clearly beat others. Hydrogen is not among them. Why? Making & storing the fuel…
I have no idea what the equivalent energy efficiency of an electric might be overall, but the electric power grid already exists whereas an enormous new infrastructure must be created to accomodate the widespread distribution of hydrogen.
I agree. There are some modular hydrogen production cells that just take a water connection and an electrical wire. But that’s not the problem. The problem is that there are no hydrogen wells. The hydrogen has to be made from something else and that something else is almost universally better used directly in the car, or via a single step conversion to car fuel.
For electrics, the best power grid generators run a bit over 50%. But then you must add in transmission losses, battery charge / discharge losses, controller losses, motor losses. Or for hydrogen, electrolysis losses and fuel cell losses.
In the end, the added conversions kill your efficiency. A great battery will have an 80% charge / discharge efficiency. So 50% (generation) to 45% (line losses) to 36% (battery) to 32% after motor losses… Gee, about the same as an ICE… and I’ve ignored the charger itself and controller losses…
Fuel is made and transported to the generator too, so I don’t think the fuel distribution ‘losses’ are much of an issue.
What’s most effective? Turn that coal or natural gas into gasoline or diesel and dump it in the existing fuel distribution system. No new infrastructure. Works in the present vehicle fleet. Right behind it? Algae based liquid fuels and cellulosic fuels. Most efficient? Just put the natural gas directly into a CNG or LNG vehicle.
Why go through: Gas turbine, grid, charger, battery charge/discharge, controller, electric motor
when you could just do: Gas, car.
Add a hybrid battery system (really just a regenerative breaking system) if you like and your done.
anna v (22:48:57) :
Can somebody enlighten me why we are not hearing more about this?
My guess would be cost. There are many things we can do, but not very many that can compete with gasoline at $2 or even $4 a gallon.
If they can get it cheap enough, hey, great…
Interesting photo capture — so that’s what’s meant by a classless society!
ah but if they give off water vapour,,,, how long before they are banned because it is a greenhouse gas?
Perhaps, but it likely would be the difference in supply so constricted that the price could rise as high as fast as it did this past summer.
The biggest advantage of electric cars especially in Europe is that unlike liquid fuels it is tax free. In fact in many European countries you get tax breaks on electric and hybrid cars. This is fine when they are a small number but if electric cars become more popular in the coming years then rest assured a way will be found to tax them, how else would roads be paid for?
This is what our friends in china are going to build.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7779261.stm
Slightly off topic, but still in the ball park.
Some of us at the office were discussing one possible unintended consequence of hydrogen powered vehicles. The issue being the water vapor exhausts. This is not a problem when such vehicles are rare and the temperatures are warm. But, imagine an 8 lane freeway jammed up during the morning rush hour at some city like Boston when the road surface temperature is say 20 deg. F and every one of the cars is pumping out water vapor. There would appear to be the potential of turning the road into a very long ice skating rink. Even if the heat in the vapor is enough to keep it from freezing on the road, you would at least have a very large linear fog generating machine. Traffic reports would not be about road congestion but would rather be about visibility in the 10 to 15 feet range.
Ok…non-scientist here…so go easy.
If we power a car with hydrogen, as the vehicle consumes the hydrogen, water is a by-product. Why can’t it simply be captured? It can’t weigh as much as the hydrogen that’s being consumed…so it’s not like we’re ADDING weight to the car.
So it gets stored in a water reservoir, and disposed of properly when it’s appropriate?
JimB
David Y had some great comments earlier.
I own a Prius and it is NOT a technological scam. Hybrids work. If Diesels are better, then a Diesel Hybrid is the best. BTW, I went out to dinner once with the Robert Bosch CEO and told him to get working on it. I’ve read many comparisons of the Prius to ultra-small compact cars. The Prius is not a ultra small car and when driven correctly I can get 52MPG city and highway combined. Normally driven I get around 44 to 48 MPG. I’ve thought about putting a gun rack in mind so people don’t confuse me with a Greenpeace supporter.
Just because many of us are skeptical of the global warming claims of Al Gore, we should not be anti-technology or technology skeptics. We should encourage and support technological invention. I believe Detroit is asking for a bailout today in part because they have refused to advance technology and instead sought political cover. We should also support less dependence on oil from countries that hate us.
Detroit is not only screwing us on gas mileage they are screwing us on a whole host of safety, traffic control, communications, etc. These technologies are cheap, ready to go, and being rolled out in Europe. It is so annoying to go to Europe and ride in my sales reps cars and see innovations that are not available in the US for 5 years. I learned about back up cameras, GPS nav, yaw rate sensors, etc. this way.
Solar power (the other nuclear power) is efficient, it takes 1.5 years for a solar wafer to payoff the energy necessary to create it.
Nuclear power should be made small local and go everywhere – and people should stop freaking out about radiation.
Often the cost associated with these technologies has a lot to do with regulation, permits, etc. This is the same reason why we can’t build airports, factories, semiconductor fabs, chemical plants, refineries, etc. in the country anymore. The actual cost of these technologies is not that extreme. We’ve let the Greens; put up massive job barriers, hurt our economy, encourage business to outsource their new facilities and with it the great high paying supporting engineers, …. as warming skeptics let’s not hate technology. Energy efficiency = More money, a better economy
JimB
“If we power a car with hydrogen, as the vehicle consumes the hydrogen, water is a by-product. Why can’t it simply be captured? It can’t weigh as much as the hydrogen that’s being consumed…so it’s not like we’re ADDING weight to the car.”
Actually you would. The water is composed of the hydrogen you’ve just burned plus the oxygen you’ve taken out of the air. Not to mention the weight and complexity of carrying around a condenser to turn the vapor into liquid.
The automaker won’t open its first Prius plant in the United States in 2010 as planned. Toyota Motor apparently doesn’t expect demand for cars to rebound until well past 2010–the automaker has pushed back plans to produce some models from that date
The question I would have regarding electric cars with a lithium battery is . . . just how much lithium is there available for making large numbers of lithium battery cars in the first place? I would estimate that there isn’t enough, nor is there going to be enough to make even several hundred thousand lithium battery cars per year. And I would also estimate that the price of lithium batteries would increase substantially with any “significant” production of lithium battery operated cars.
There is a good reason as to why cars still have a lead-acid battery for the sole electrical storage device . . . virtually all of them. It is because lead is readily available and relatively cheap, and lead-acid is one of the very best working ways of storing electrical power at a price which can be afforded.
Electric powered cars aren’t about to make a whit of difference as to solving our energy supply situation. Just madness . . . from people who aren’t very, if any good at all, at making arithmetical calculations from the start.
Stan W (06:14:48) :
Slightly off topic, but still in the ball park.
Some of us at the office were discussing one possible unintended consequence of hydrogen powered vehicles. The issue being the water vapor exhausts. This is not a problem when such vehicles are rare and the temperatures are warm. But, imagine an 8 lane freeway jammed up during the morning rush hour at some city like Boston when the road surface temperature is say 20 deg. F and every one of the cars is pumping out water vapor. There would appear to be the potential of turning the road into a very long ice skating rink. Even if the heat in the vapor is enough to keep it from freezing on the road, you would at least have a very large linear fog generating machine.
That’s what happens now: 162 gms water/114gms octane consumed!
Detroit is in a world of hurt for a variety of reasons. One of the biggest reasons is that Congress has mandated that the auto-makers manufacture, with CAFE standards, cars which almost no one wants to buy, and which no one is willing to pay a price for which would give the manufacturer any sort of reasonable profit. They have to make and somehow foist off some 5 or 6 cars at little or no profit at all to be able to sell one car which people would want to buy and be willing to pay a sufficient price for which would result in a good profit for both the manufacturer and dealer.
I am a retired highway/transportation engineer, and have seen many an accident report in my career. Tin cans on skateboard wheels crunch up all too easily, absorbing far to little energy in the process, and the people in them who do get in accidents suffer far more pain and injury than people who get into accidents who are driving substantially heavier cars. F=MA still works, and it is the rate of deceleration of the car versus the rate of deceleration of the passengers which causes the injuries. It isn’t the speed which maims and kills, it is the sudden high rate of deceleration, along with the factor of just how much energy can be absorbed by the body and framework of the car in an accident before it gets transmitted to the passengers in the car.
I wouldn’t even ride for a single block in these tin cans on skateboard wheels which our “leaders” are insisting that we have to drive. I value my life and physical well being far too much for that. But then I am, after all, an engineer, and do understand Newton’s laws of motion.
John:
“Detroit is not only screwing us on gas mileage they are screwing us on a whole host of safety, traffic control, communications, etc. These technologies are cheap, ready to go, and being rolled out in Europe. ”
Sorry…it’s not detroit. Amazing how these beliefs get propogated. The technologies you’re talking about being rolled out in Europe?…Are in part being rolled out by GM/FORD/Chrysler. Those vehicles aren’t “legal” in our country…I’ll leave it to you to figure out why, but it’s not because the Big 3 don’t want to sell them here.
JimB
LarryOldTimer: It is possible to make a light, safe, car; here in Europe we drive them all the time: Google for EuroNCAP.
f=ma also applies to the probabilty of stopping before you hit something with infinite inertia! Of course, if you get a head-on between a light car and a heavy one, the heavy one has the advantage, but then you’re into game theory…
mcates:
You have no idea how much I enjoy when work takes me down to Seattle and Portland and I fill up down there. I soooo hate the BC carbon tax. I GLADLY pay your taxes as I realize I’m not putting money into the BC Gov’t’s hands for their pet projects. (Yes, I ‘m putting money in the WA/OR State’s hands for their pet projects.) If Oregon ever got rid of the silly, “somebody has to fill your car” law, you could get even CHEAPER gas down there. It is our pleasure to supply the USA with oil.
Novoburgo says way above:
******
Here in central Maine there are very few days in the year when you don’t need air conditioning or more importantly – heat.
*****
I’ve thought about this a fair bit, and can’t think of any pure-battery solution (supplying “heat” from a battery will discharge it pronto). You almost have to have a small IC engine or propane burner to supply reasonable heat for the vehicle occupants in a cold climate. A/C could reasonably be run by a 5HP IC engine also.
Obviously, this is easily achievable by available tech.
Not having a crash is always a good idea.
I think you Colonials call saloon cars “Sedans”.
The main reason you need such huge cars is to get your huge posteriors into them!
😉
Looking at pictures of all those Pick-ups, with their enourmous V8 engines, cost a fortune to run and that handle like a wet lettuce is probably the reason that the US motor industry is in dire straights.
Lighter car = better performance and handling.
Bigger car = better performance and handling in Pendleton right now. Small cars are sliding down the hill. Even ones with all wheel drive. My Jeep Commander V8 is a rear wheel drive but has low 4 on demand with anti-skid technology. I also have studs (and chains if I need them). I am able to go up or down my steep hill with ease and it has been zambonied by local kids sledding down the hill all morning. Sorry but in rural temperate areas, a small car just can’t take the kind of environment we live in or the jobs we have. When I lived in the city, I did have a small car with a somewhat crunch resistant cage and good gas mileage. Once I moved back out into the country, my little Corolla started falling apart with all the pot holes, washboard roads, dust, winter weather, and rough treatment. The bumpy roads and up and down terrain wore my breaks out within the first two years of owning the thing and the shocks in one year. Not to mention that the stapled and glued interior was falling apart. If the government wants to force me to use a car that can’t even haul a month’s worth of grocery’s, it will have to hogtie me first. Hell, those little cars can’t even haul a hogtied female to jail.