I have been thinking about electric cars lately. No, not because I plan to buy one – that would take actual money. It’s partly because we may need a second vehicle in the family just because the local transit system is not very good. It’s also because I saw a few brands of electric cars at the Living Green Expo and was impressed.
None of these vehicles can make it over about 35 MPH. The basic idea is that a second car is used around town for small trips, so why not go electric? The range is generally less than 50 miles on a charge, but that would get me to Minneapolis and back several times.
What I found most interesting is that all of them use a 72 volt lead-acid battery system (6 batteries in series). This isn’t any kind of new technology, but it is apparently a standardization around things that exist. The industry that makes these appears to use very standard motors and other systems.
The one that I like best is the Zenn Car from Montreal. Not only does it look and feel like a real car, it also holds 4 people if needed. The cost for this car is $17k, which is not bad for a second car these days (even if it is about 8 times what I paid for my last used car, and 170 times what I paid for the one before that). You can find out more about them here:
The most interesting angle on these electric cars is how cheap they are to operate. The standard pitch is that the total cost is about 1/6 overall versus any of the gasoline engines. Certainly, having only 1400 pounds to move around helps that a lot, but the bulk of the savings come from the inherent efficiency of using electricity.
The standard Otto Cycle piston engine has about 12% efficiency overall. That means that of the energy stored chemically as hydrocarbons, 1/8 is made into turning force and 7/8 is turned into heat. For an electric car, the power is generated at about 40% efficiency and there is a small loss by the time it gets to your house; the batteries and motor are nearly 100% efficient from that point on. About half of the claimed cost savings are pure efficiency gain, with the other half being less maintenance and the general dollar-efficiency of making electricity in bulk.
Is this a technology that can save our nation from energy dependence? As I’ve said before, no one thing is going to solve all our problems. But this looks like something that could help. It’s not the greatest technology in the world, but it is functional and very economical. Think of it less as saving the planet and more as saving money, and perhaps we might have a deal, eh?
Comments?
It’s Tuesday, the day I answer my mail. Except that today I refuse to.
Well, that’s a strong word. What’s happened is that Author’s Den finally put a comments section at the end of every post, which is I what I wanted all along. Now that I’ve started to remember to check them, we can have a nice discussion the way blogs are supposed to.
In order to register for this free service, go here:
http://www.authorsden.com/join/
You’ll get your own control panel homepage where you can select “Author Tracker” and be updated by e-mail when I (or anyone else) makes a new post. Why would you want to do that? If nothing else, the notification includes the title of the post, so you can ignore the stuff I rant about that you don’t like.
So let’s see if we can get some discussion going. None of this is about me – it’s about the ideas and perspectives that may be unusual. I think they’re worthy of some discussion, which is why I write about them. So let’s have at it!
Thank you again for reading my work and considering my ideas. I do appreciate it more than I can tell you. You can still send me mail as wabbitoid47 at yahoo.com if you prefer.
Barataria - The work of Erik Hare 