CDB
Registered User
I say send anything that can't be recycled to Mercury, or some other planet we won't conceivably colonize anytime in the far future.
Foxnew Says Stop Crying About Gas Prices?
- Thread starter anabolicrhino
- Start date
I say send anything that can't be recycled to Mercury, or some other planet we won't conceivably colonize anytime in the far future.
EasyEJL
Never enough
CDB
Registered User
Meh. It might leak and scare the greenies. Send it to Mercury and no one can complain about five legged dogs.
CDB
Registered User
Nah, the sun is too key to our survival to think of messing with it, even if we aren't actually messing with it. Mercury is an iron ball that's too hot even for the skinnyfat and old chicks in my last office. No one cares about Mercury.
Tiberius
Member
Currently, won't necessarily always be true. NASA developed extremely efficient solar cells which instead of generating electricity, split water into Hydrogen and Oxygen. They did this for the Helios project. The cells were far more efficient at converting the water into hydrogen used to refuel a hydrogen fuel cell than modern solar cells are for electricity directly.
FBRs don't. FBRs convert all waste into fuel. There is no waste in an FBR. The problem with them though is the initial cost to build one is much higher than a standard reactor, and the cost of Uranium and the cost of waste storage is still less than the initial cost of building an FBR.
When FBRs were first designed, many in the energy industry didn't want them because they knew the public demand would be high for the decrease in waste. So the tactic used was a standard one: scare tactic. FBRs are breeder reactors so politicians gave the false impression that these reactors could be used to build weapons. They can be modified to do so but they don't necessarily do so by design. This wasn't just in the US they did that though. They did that in France and Germany as well. It was a much bigger deal in those countries because of the huge nuclear power industry there.
What we need is more efficient BATTERY technology. Lithium Ion is the best right now and they are still too heavy for the power they store IMO. And still too expensive as well. Tesla and some other companies have developed some really awesome electric cars with high ranges. One new car will have an optional gas generator you can attach that would be used to recharge the batteries for long road trips. When it is used it gets 80mpg. When it isn't used you get about 250+ miles before needing to recharge the batteries.
The following need to happen to make electric more feasible:
1) Batteries need to be cheaper
2) Batteries need to be able to recharge in the same time it takes to fill a gas tank; i.e. 1-3 minutes.
3) On a full charge a car needs to be able to get over 300 miles reliably (which is the current standard min for most gasoline powered cars)
The cost of recharging the batteries of a Tesla Roadster is about $2.50 at current energy prices. It gets 250 miles on a full charge. It takes about 10 minutes to recharge the batteries to 80% but many hours to go from 80% to 100%. So right now it is only good for commuting or summertime leasure driving. You can't take it on long trips because you can't even go 200 miles before you have to stop for at least 10 minutes.
Additionally battery replacement is ridiculous. It costs thousands to replace a single battery (these are not simple car batteries) in an electric car. Over time batteries degrade and have to be replaced. In fact, probably in only 5 years.
Electric cars have many advantages though if they can get over the battery issues. Maintenance is very light. The engines are actually very simple and are low heat low friction. You can lube them with vegetable oil and they don't require oil changes because they don't heat up so the oil never breaks down. They have regenerative breaks also which increases the lifespan of break pads and rotars incredibly. Regenerative breaks can last well over 100,000 miles without ever needing any kind of work whatsoever.
Plus while some car enthusiasts might not like it, people not driving the cars will: electric cars are almost silent.
So if we can get over those 3 hurdles with battery tech, you'll see a revolution in the auto industry.
CDB
Registered User
Got a link for this? I had always thought the oil paranoids had a point because it seemed odd to go with the massive complexity of a hybrid car over simply using a fossil fuel powered electric generator to power an otherwise fully electric car. The only reason for choosing the hybrid over the latter (technically still hybrid) seems to be to keep people on the gas station line. If you had an electric car that just needed a generator, that unit being interchangable, you could use propane, hydrogen, ethanol, etc. Pretty much whatever you choose. Kinda cuts the oil companies out right from the get go if you so choose.
Edit: Just looked into it a bit and it looks like GM is set to offer one fairly soon.
For anyone who is interested: Invalid Link Removed
Don't the ones where you change electrolytes pretty much accomplish this?
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spunkles182
Member
:goodpost:
Another problem with the lithium Ion is that they sometimes explode. its a 1/10,000,000 chance but the Telsa car has 7,000 batteries in it and with the cost of the car $100,000 I dont think that the investment will make up for the savings in fuel cost. but companies like Altair Nanotechnologies are projecting to 50% returns on their iinvestment in mid 2009 early 2010 so we'll see what happens.
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Tiberius
Member
The Tesla Roadster is a powerful sports car. They aren't selling it becuase it saves money. They are selling it to rich people who want to "go green." I know I sure as heck would rather drive a Tesla than a damn Prius. The Tesla goes 0-60 in 4 seconds with a top speed of like 140. That sucker is FAST. It performs on the level of Ferraris. In other words, it performs on the level with other $100,000 sports cars.
If you look at Tesla's plans though the next car will be a luxury car like the high end 5 series Beemers (why they are targetting the 5 instead of the 7, I don't know). I imagine Tesla would have problems meeting demand anyway with economy cars at this point, nevermind the fact that with the current tech they'd lose money on each car in order to be competitive.
No Tesla's plan is a good one. Start with a niche group that has high profit margins. High end sports cars. Once you clear a profit on those, you use that to target a slightly larger group with slightly lower margins. Upper midrange luxury cars. Then at the last you go for the broadest group with the slimmest margins. Family sedans.
Plus look at the minds behind it, eBay and Paypal. These are smart businessmen. They'll likely succeed. It won't be overnight, but give them 10 years and they'll have very strong market presence.
CDB
Registered User
People riding around at 60+ mph in cars made of razor sharp metal with tens of gallons of explosive fuel worrying about a battery explosion in a car made largely of composite material and with little to no overall explosive potential seems a bit... I don't know. Odd?
The devil you know I guess.
Tiberius
Member
The risk of explosion is smaller than the risk of your gas tank exploding in your car. Plus that risk indicator is bogus. It comes from IIRC Sony producing a few batches of faulty batteries that overheated and exploded. That's called faulty production and is not a risk associated inherently with all Lithium ion batteries. Plus as mentioned, a battery exploding isn't going to hurt you badly in a Tesla. Certainly not as bad a fire in an internal combustion vehicle.
As I said, Tesla's plan is a very good one. Plus the R&D they'll be doing is likely going to be mostly centered around lowering their costs. That means cheaper batteries. They are the first big player to invest serious capital and serious interest into the production of electric cars so I'm sure they are going to be the ones making the most significant progress. I see a lot of conceptual designs other companies are groups are coming up with but the Tesla Roadster is a real car, not a concept one. That's a huge difference. High concept cars are to the auto industry what vaporware is to software. A whole lot of great ideas with no execution.
Expect to see Tesla carrying patents for most of the major advances in battery technology in the coming years.
CDB
Registered User
Normally yes, but Lutz over at GM has a specific goal of no more BS concept cars that never make it to market. The Solstice was an example, the production car is in line with what was seen and claimed for the concept. The Camaro looks like it will be another much more linear development. So hopefully this new EV-2 will pan out. The main problem as I understand it with series hybrids is they weren't the best on highways. If they found a way to minimize any problems there, the EV is in. I'll definitely get one, and I vowed never to buy American cars again after my experience with Honda. At a projected 80 mpg it'll be worth it.
spunkles182
Member
you seem to have stong opinions on this and Telsa. thats cool, im not arguing for it or against it. im not an expert on this by any means but what ive read the lithium ion battery is sensitive to heat.
"Lithium-ion batteries can easily rupture, ignite, or explode when exposed to high temperatures. The mid-2006 recall of 10 million Sony batteries used in Dell, Sony, Apple, Lenovo/IBM, Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu and Sharp laptops was stated to be as a consequence of internal contamination with metal particles. Under some circumstances, these can pierce the separator, rapidly converting all of the energy in the cell to heat. he mid-2006 Sony laptop battery recall wasn't the first of its kind, but it was the largest. During the past decade there have been numerous recalls of lithium-ion batteries in cellular phones and laptops owing to overheating problems. Last December, Dell pulled about 22,000 batteries from the U.S. market. In 2004, Kyocera Wireless recalled about 1 million batteries used in phones.[15] In March 2007, Lenovo recalled another 205,000 9-cell lithium ion batteries because of an explosion risk."
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I dont think Tesla will be a big player, they are a joint-venture private capital company without much capital. The biggest problem with R&D intensive companies is the amount return that the R&D will bring back. but good luck to them.
spunkles182
Member
CDB
Registered User
The Tesla is cool as hell. Unfortunately even if I could afford one, I couldn't fit my 6'4" fat ass into one. I tried to get into a Lotus when I went out to the west coast last month. Not pretty. You need to be a contortionist just to shift gears in that thing.
Tiberius
Member
They use different batteries in electric cars than they do in laptops. It even says it in that Wikipedia article. Lithiated metal phosphate as opposed to lithium cobalt oxide. Lithiated metal phosphate doesn't explode.
Plus if you read the recall of Sony batteries was from contamination with small pieces of metal; i.e. faulty production. Other recalls didn't tell us why. It wasn't because lithium ion is inherently dangerous otherwise problems would happen with all li-ion batteries. It's that li-ion batteries aparently require more strict manufacturing processes. They seem to be more susceptible to manufacture and design flaws.
spunkles182
Member
hmmmm... i did not know that. thanks for the info
spunkles182
Member
CDB
Registered User
If GM pops out and EV-2 that gets 80 mpg and is a true series hybrid, and it's not a piece of **** which isn't too hard given series hybrids are a lot less complex, they've got my money back and then some.
anabolicrhino
Well-known member
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