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A Practible Electric Car?

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It shifts the pollution to the generation of the electricity (which can be clean or dirty) rather than directly burning the hydrocarbons.
 
No, you must be wrong, ewh, they say:
Zero Emissions Equals Zero Guilt

Lots of cars claim to be planet-friendly. At Tesla, we set out to build a “zero emissions” vehicle that can‘t be accused of being just an “emissions elsewhere” vehicle. Our lithium-ion battery pack delivers unprecedented energy density in a smaller footprint. So you can actually enjoy greater performance behind the wheel without an ounce of guilt. "
This is a page which shows not a single wind turbine, not a wind farm and not a power station, just scenery.

So, ewh, they say this isn't an "emissions elsewhere" vehicle. Of course, they don't justify that claim and they ignore exactly the points made in the SUV thread.

One item of information lacking was the typical battery life... if it is like my laptop, mobile phone, etc etc there'll come the day when I run out of charge miles from anywhere... what's the equivalent of a spare gas can?

I would guess Ted Danson and the green Hollywood Elite bought all the first 100 cars ( ... )

Next thing you know these guys will be pointing the finger at the Prius owners and accusing them of being polluters!

(Why did Michael Chriton's "State of Fear" have such a poor image of Hollywood Stars turned environmentalists? is that modelled on any one?)


JMW
 
Ah, but they state that "we set out to build...", not that they achieved this. You are right that unless they only recharge with electricity which was cleanly generated, they are only moving the pollution.
I don't think it can be considered a replacement for all cars in all situations, just that seems to be much better situated for current urban driving than a hydrogen vehicle would be, for example.
 
I found the site fasinating enough to read the FAQ's. They say that the battery life is 500 recharges. At 250 miles/recharge they're claiming 125,000 miles on a set of batteries.

Their "zero emissions" is just nonsense. They don't even account for the emisssions from fabrication of the steel/plastic/carbon fibers used in construction, or the emissions from the coal-fired power plants that provide electricity. It takes a well-defined number of ergs of energy to move a known mass from one point to another--you just can't fool Mother Nature. Those ergs come from somewhere and it is really disingenous to claim that they don't. It could be that the whole process is a point or two more effecient than a Prius, but I would be suprized if it were more than that.

David
 
Their caveat is the it's zero emissions from oil usage, since US electrical production uses coal, wind, hydro, etc., but not oil.

TTFN



 
I think there is still about 5% of the power generation capacity in the U.S. that is fuel-switchable between natural gas and #2 resid (oil).

Wasn't some gas/diesel used in the transportation of parts to the fabriction plant or ore to the foundry? The zero oil contention is just marketing puffery.

It still looks like a pretty cool vehicle.

David
 
It takes a well-defined number of ergs of energy to move a known mass from one point to another--you just can't fool Mother Nature.

Huh? Not that it's relevant to the thread, but how many ergs does it take to move 100lbm 10 feet horizontally?
 
For a regular car that gets 20 mpg, it takes 1.1742E+11 ergs; your mileage may vary ;-)

TTFN



 
Ergs???

Watts! Joules! Kilograms! Metres!

Mother Nature measures in S.I. these days. [wink]

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image.php
Sometimes I only open my mouth to swap feet...
 
The units weren't related to the answer I was after - use whatever units you like, and tell me how much energy is required to move a known amount of mass by a (horizontal) distance.


 
Let's start simply be temporarily ignoring rolling friction, sliding friction and media (wind, water, other media) resistance.

The first component of energy use will be acceleration.
Variable.
Now, in a propeller driven, frictionless, vehicle such as a boat or a hover craft the energy to decelerate will equal the energy to accelerate.
In a vehicle with heat disipation braking, the energy will be one half of the energy used by our propellor driven vehicle.
That is only the energy used for acceleration.
In a vehicle that uses an efficient regeneration system of braking, almost all of the acceleration energy may be returned to the source. Think efficient, battery powered, electric vehicle.
Now we can consider the variables of friction losses of several types.
Would these ergs be the type described in?:

respectfully
 
Quite a performance difference and a quanit "retro" look web site....

I notice it has "climate control" (no pun intended, we hope).

By the way, in the UK, milk has been delivered by electric "milk floats" for ever since I can remember. Top speed around 10-11 mph, I think.

JMW
 
Then there is the General Motor EV1, no longer in the market:

"The EV1 was the first production quality battery electric vehicle produced by General Motors in the United States and, at the time, was the only electric vehicle in the history of the company to bear the "General Motors" badge."


cheers,

Joseph
 
Ah.

The British Milkfloat.

Built out of girders with a tonne of Nickel Iron batteries... (they used to be NiFe, but who knows these days...)

Do try not to hit one coz you'll come off worse...
 
The older milk floats had 5/8" teak comb jointed battery boxes, if not teak then some pretty durable timber that has to withstand battery acid leaks and the weather.... I have about a dozen of these in assorted sizes which pretty up very well indeed... they cost me nothing since I got them from a company that was scrapping the vehicles and salvaging the betteries but dumping the boxes.
Latter floats have fibreglass battery boxes.
I hate to see wood go to waste...

One school mum decided to have one coverted for the school run but alas, she mistook the difference between average traffic speed and milk float top speed. These may match for a milk float but it meant she was an even worse obstruction on the school run than most other mums.... where the trafffic could normally top out at 30-40mph, they were now stuck behind here at an 11mph max.

JMW
 
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