Battery based electric vehicles of today and tomorrow.

[aczlan]

At my home 240V (50A circuit, 40A load) the car adds 29 miles per hour no matter how much is already in the battery. Only the last 5-10 miles to 100% slows. But once again, it is always ready by morning.
And reiterating on another gasheadism: EVs do not need "gas stations". Do not want "gas stations" on every corner the way the ignorant believe. The only need for an EV charging station away from one's home is for long distance travel.

Unless you do not have off street parking (say you live in one of the many neighborhoods where you get whatever spot on the street in your block is available when you get home, an apartment building, etc, etc, etc).
As for it being added, how will you "police" that only the apartment owner can park and plug in at a particular spot? How will you charge them for that electricity?
50 amps per parking spot is a pair of #6 copper wires (if not #4 due to distance) and a good sized ground, in today's market running that hundreds of feet to a parking spot wont be cheap.

The foolish $3.5T pork bill being rammed through Congress will prove the lack of need of the EV charging stations it builds when 10 years from now they are barely utilized. Why would anyone buy electricity from Electrify America (where the VW fines are being "invested") at 3x the cost of charging at home? Answer: Only if one is on a road trip.

The reason is that Electrify America is greasing the right palms to get it done.

“Renters can take the bus”
sign me up!

Pretty much.

Aaron Z

 

[Hay Dude]

"Rare Earths" are not rare. Marketing stroke of genius named them.

Furthermore the "rare earths" are not consumed. A used battery is a much richer source of materials than raw ore.


We call this "pulling number out of one's a..." Lets say her numbers are accurate. Then how much petroleum is consumed in refining petroleum?
How much petroleum is consumed mining iron to make conventional cars & trucks?
Put things in proper perspective.


Golly, as if we never used plastic in an automobile before!


Coal plants need to stay hot at night to be ready to produce by morning. Nuclear too. There is at least 50% excess capacity at night which is the prime time to charge an EV (the "gas station" model does not work for EVs). Large industrial electrical consumers can get power for pennies/kWh at night due to the excess supply. If the plant has to be kept hot is better to get pennies for that energy than nothing.

T.O.U. billing is being forced on consumers in most of the country explicitly to charge more for electrical power during peak demand, less during low demand, in attempt to shift consumer demand away from prime time. To encourage use of things such as a Tesla Powerwall to charge at night in order to have less expensive power during peak demand.

Coal generated electricity powering a Tesla Model 3 is as clean as a 50 MPG Prius on gasoline. But the Tesla can effortlessly use solar, if that is what is available. Effortlessly use nuclear, hydro, wind, coal, natural gas, oil, whathaveyou. The Prius can not.


Boo hoo hoo. Totally preventable. Just as with black lung.


There is a huge recycling effort in place. Minor problem is there are not that many lithium batteries in need of recycling.


is most definitely not worth the government picking winners and losers. EVs were coming with or without government but we have little Napoleons looking for causes to get in front of pretending to be the leader for their own fame, fortune, and aggrandizement.

Forgot to mention she said all those resources were used to build a relatively small number of electric cars.
Also the “cobalt lung” disease you poo pooed kills its victims in their 30’s.

 

[Grumpycat]

Forgot to mention she said all those resources were used to build a relatively small number of electric cars.

By golly, that makes her the world's leading expert!

Also the “cobalt lung” disease you poo pooed kills its victims in their 30’s.

So? Unscrupulous operators in 3rd world countries kill their workers all the time. You say that is the fault of cobalt? That it is impossible to mine and process without killing the workers? When the Prius hit the market similar fearmongers declared the mining of nickel to be the ultimate environmental disaster and health hazard. As proof they cited a mine which had been closed 40 years. Conveniently forgot to mention the nickel mine was closed or how current mines operated cleanly and responsibly.

First couple generations of Prius used NiMH batteries. Prius traction battery only weighs 100 pounds. Search failed to find a solid reference on how much nickel is in a NiMH battery per Wh.

Furthermore you wrongly accept her inference that cobalt is essential to an EV. And act as if we never ever used or needed cobalt before the EV appeared.

 

[Grumpycat]

Unless you do not have off street parking (say you live in one of the many neighborhoods where you get whatever spot on the street in your block is available when you get home, an apartment building, etc, etc, etc).
As for it being added, how will you "police" that only the apartment owner can park and plug in at a particular spot? How will you charge them for that electricity?

By golly you are right! EVs are a total fool's errand and not viable for anyone because someone doesn't have a place to park!

I was in downtown Nashville last week and had a hard time finding a place to park at even $10/hour. But somehow I got a parking place, paid for it, and nobody took it from me!

Clearly no automobile is viable because parking is so difficult!

When an EV's doors lock they also lock the EVSE umbilical. Must unlock the car to unplug.

You missed my earlier statement how Tesla can cryptographically read the VIN from the car via EVSE cable. A Tesla Supercharger will not charge unless your car is associated with an account in good standing. There is no card reader or display on the Supercharger, it is all inside the car. The car is the credit card.

50 amps per parking spot is a pair of #6 copper wires (if not #4 due to distance) and a good sized ground, in today's market running that hundreds of feet to a parking spot wont be cheap.

Limited minds use copper. #2 Aluminum is 1/4 the cost of #6 Cu. Need (2) #2 and (1) #4 for ground. Tesla 240V does not use neutral. The service entrance to your house is wired with aluminum. If running power to charge EVs is so expensive and difficult then how ever did we afford to wire homes?

The reason is that Electrify America is greasing the right palms to get it done.

My statement was, "... will prove the lack of need of the EV charging stations it builds when 10 years from now they are barely utilized." Electrify America is pure Crony Capitalism. The cronies will profit, no one else will benefit.

The biggest problem I see is the ignorance of the We Know Everything But Have Never Done It Before crowd is their absolute belief that EVs need gas stations exactly like ICE vehicles.

 

[Hay Dude]

Grumpycat, clearly your passion is overwhelming your ability to see theres a lot of downside to EVs, too. Your cynicism towards anyone who demonstrates the downside of EVs is a little too strong. While you may think they are the greatest thing in the world, they’re far from a perfect solution. Try understanding other voices are a good thing.
We have only scratched the surface to their drawbacks. As they are forced on us, we will see they are mostly a solution for the wealthy. Telling the poor to “take the bus” or “tough luck” is immature at best. EVs are unavailable to them. You’re not going to get you a lot of support from 100’s of millions of poor people and more coming every year. It’s a rich suburban virtue signal on wheels.
The environmental impact to produce them is a disaster, to recycle them in the future? We don’t even have solutions in place. That’s going to be the be the next worldwide disaster to play out.
While you can cynically dismiss this woman’s findings, I can tell you she’s a nationally syndicated automobile columnist, so she does know her car technology.

 

[Hay Dude]

​

Interesting Bloomberg interview with Mary Barra-GM,
and other insights into EV's

​

Just the Facts: The Auto Industry's Electric Future

The future of the auto industry is electric. Will it be the traditional car companies like Ford and General Motors that lead the way, or will they have to make room for the pure play electric vehicle makers like Tesla and Rivian? David Westin explains on "Bloomberg's Wall Street Week." (Source...

www.bloomberg.com

​

Bloomberg is VERY pro-China. Which ever way China is going, Bloomberg is right there cheering them on. They can’t stop blathering about Nike, either.

 

[aczlan]

By golly you are right! EVs are a total fool's errand and not viable for anyone because someone doesn't have a place to park!

Really? I am pointing out some of the real world problems with everyone having an EV and trying to charge it at home.

I was in downtown Nashville last week and had a hard time finding a place to park at even $10/hour. But somehow I got a parking place, paid for it, and nobody took it from me!

Clearly no automobile is viable because parking is so difficult!

When an EV's doors lock they also lock the EVSE umbilical. Must unlock the car to unplug.

You missed my earlier statement how Tesla can cryptographically read the VIN from the car via EVSE cable. A Tesla Supercharger will not charge unless your car is associated with an account in good standing. There is no card reader or display on the Supercharger, it is all inside the car. The car is the credit card.

My comment was more along the lines of how will someone in that situation be able to charge their electric vehicle? If it's not feasible to pull it up to the house because you don't have off-street parking you almost need to have your own EV charging station like the ones that they're putting in for commercial use at $30,000 to $40,000 a piece, you could put a box out by the road, but if you cannot guarantee that you will get that spot every day (which people with on-street parking often cannot) you may or may not be able to charge your EV.
The same goes for parking in a parking garage, in a good-sized parking garage that means that you need literally thousands of amps of power available (20 EV spots will need 1000 amps) and somehow you need to meter how much goes to each persons vehicle, make sure that the right person gets charged for it and that they are the only one who can use it.

Limited minds use copper. #2 Aluminum is 1/4 the cost of #6 Cu. Need (2) #2 and (1) #4 for ground.

Aluminum has its place, but being larger it also needs larger conduits, more care for corrosion resistance, is more susceptible to breaking from vibrations and flexing, etc.

Tesla 240V does not use neutral.

I said nothing about neutral, I know that its not needed for 240V only loads.

The service entrance to your house is wired with aluminum. If running power to charge EVs is so expensive and difficult then how ever did we afford to wire homes?

Yep, the power company will be happy to put in a meter for a 50 amp service to power your EV, the ROI on a 50 amp service is just like the ROI on a 200+ amp house service.

My statement was, "... will prove the lack of need of the EV charging stations it builds when 10 years from now they are barely utilized." Electrify America is pure Crony Capitalism. The cronies will profit, no one else will benefit.

My sentiments exactly.

The biggest problem I see is the ignorance of the We Know Everything But Have Never Done It Before crowd is their absolute belief that EVs need gas stations exactly like ICE vehicles.

If its not feasible to charge at home, you will need someplace to charge. Call it a EV gas station or what have you, you will need to park somewhere for several hours to fully charge.

Aaron Z

 

[3930dave]

Aluminum has its place, but being larger it also needs larger conduits, more care for corrosion resistance, is more susceptible to breaking from vibrations and flexing, etc.

Aaron Z

Al residential wiring was tried up here in the 70's. Total ____-show.

It was so bad that it had to be disclosed when selling a house. I haven't seen a Sale contract in decades, but I'd be surprised if it wasn't still there.

A guy I went to college with had it in his parent's house. His Dad (active-duty military; Get It Done) went through the entire house at least once a year, and re-tightened all the Al wiring connections.

Attractive for being cheaper, but the higher coefficient of thermal expansion can be a PITA.

Rgds, D.

 

[Grumpycat]

Grumpycat, clearly your passion is overwhelming your ability to see theres a lot of downside to EVs, too. Your cynicism towards anyone who demonstrates the downside of EVs is a little too strong. While you may think they are the greatest thing in the world, they’re far from a perfect solution. Try understanding other voices are a good thing.
We have only scratched the surface to their drawbacks. As they are forced on us, we will see they are mostly a solution for the wealthy. Telling the poor to “take the bus” or “tough luck” is immature at best. EVs are unavailable to them. You’re not going to get you a lot of support from 100’s of millions of poor people and more coming every year. It’s a rich suburban virtue signal on wheels.
The environmental impact to produce them is a disaster, to recycle them in the future? We don’t even have solutions in place. That’s going to be the be the next worldwide disaster to play out.
While you can cynically dismiss this woman’s findings, I can tell you she’s a nationally syndicated automobile columnist, so she does know her car technology.

Your own bias keeps you from reading me correctly. You seem to think if an EV is not perfect for all applications it is not acceptable for any.

You missed my statements to the effect, "government picking winners and losers is wrong." That Electrify America is wrong in every way. Is very wrong for government to be building EV "gas stations". And wronger still where they are putting them.

You choose to view peak demand electrical shortages as proof there is not enough capacity to charge EVs while ignoring the surplus available at night. Or how night is the most desirable time to charge an EV even before the added benefit of available electrical power is considered.

Cobalt? How about lead? Nasty, poisonous stuff. About 40 pounds of it in your starter battery. But somehow greedy capitalists in search of profit have managed to recycle 98%. The same is occurring for EV batteries as well. You just don't see it because people such as this "journalist" you admire choose to F.U.D. you for their own gain.

Search for "George Will Prius Nickel" for the example I cited of a "famous journalist" getting it totally wrong.

 

[Torvy]

Your own bias keeps you from reading me correctly. You seem to think if an EV is not perfect for all applications it is not acceptable for any.

I don't agree with everything you say on this topic, but you are spot on here. Personally, I think a pure EV is limited in use for people outside a city. It should just be one among many options in our transition to alternate fuels. People who think we need to eliminate all use of fossil fuels are just as uninformed and shortsighted as those who decry any alternative as a bad idea. I am a fan of a hybrid approach to solutions. Enough either/or and more both/and.

EV, right now is best for applications where most daily drives are less than the capacity. A good hybrid is better for more people and does not require or expect the government to spend to make it worthwhile. If they make tractors that are EV, but still have at least the capability of a similarly sized diesel, I'd be all over it. Fewer mechanical parts are less likely to have problems. Tractors do not have to be away from the barn overnight (mostly). That means they can charge every night and work all day. I don't want it for any reason other than cost to my bottom line. When it makes sense economically, I'm there.