When it comes to promoting electric vehicles as the future of transportation, the federal government has put its money where its mouth is. From bailouts of GM and Chrysler to $2.4 billion in money for EVs and batteries, the Department of Energy is betting big that domestically manufactured EVs and batteries will greatly enhance Detroit's chances at being globally viable.
There have been questions if offering a few thousand people discounted EVs and free charging equipment is a fair use of taxpayer money. This legitimate concern is answered that the automakers, Department of Energy, and city planners need data on driving habits from the early adopters to know how the vehicles are being driven, and in return for the discounted driving, participants agree to have data collected.
However, if establishing a commercial market for plug-in vehicles and all-electric vehicles is the end game, shouldn't the DOE maximize the visibility of EVs by making them available to the largest possible audience through car-share, car rental, and taxi fleets? Potential EV owners can kick the tires by renting a car for a few hours or a day, and since the cars are always returned to the same spot, charging should be relatively simple.
While rental car companies such as Enterprise, which is buying 500 Nissan Leafs, will charge a hefty premium for the EVs, customers won't have the hassle or expense of filling up the cars. Some community car share programs such as CuseCar.org in New York are receiving a small portion of the DOE's investment. Japan is testing electric taxis, but the federal EV programs have missed an opportunity by not sponsoring a similar program in the U.S. Imagine how many people could get a feel for the Volt or Leaf if they were used as cabs in New York or L.A.
Despite some issues about renting EVs, going forward the DOE would maximize public money by making multi-driver programs a strategic part of their EV rollout program. This would include providing subsidized chargers to community car share programs and even to hotels, which could enable tourists to charge rental EVs overnight.
What's not helping is GM's disparaging of EVs and the overblown notion of "range anxiety." The company has done a 180 in the past two years on describing the EV as an electric car. Back then they tried hard to make us believe that despite the gas tank, it was an electric car because the generator only provided power to charge the batteries the drove the vehicle. It seems that GM has changed its propulsion strategy and is now promoting the Volt as a "real car, not an electric car." This is not the way to grow an industry, and expect significant backlash from the EV community to ensue.
Follow John Gartner on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jggpdx
Amory Lovins, the founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute, has designed a 5 passenger composite thermo plastic car that weighs 1,000 pounds and is 12 times stronger than steel. The reduction in weight is key to reducing battery cost or extending range. The Nissan Leaf has antipated range of 110 miles in economy mode. Imagine the range of his vehicle with the same battery pack planned for the Leaf or the battery cost reduction by only needing a 1/3 of the battery pack to travel 110 miles.
The composite thermo plastic design is more expensive to fabricate its 14 body parts, but 3 of 4 steel body stamps are eliminated as is the paint shop since the color can be added to the composite material. Lightweighting vehicles opens the door to reduce the cost of fuel cell powered and cars as well. You can see Amory Lovins MIT Video called "Winning The Oil End Game" by typing the same at your google browser.
Visit his site to learn more about more about mobility and vehicle efficiency.
The way green energy is promoted is what's troublesome. Pro-solar, wind, etc are only harping about the climate, pollution, and so on. Commercial interests don't care about that; they see "the environment" as something that costs money in exchange for a minor public relations boost.
You have to interest businesses where they really care: money. Ask a business, "how would your bottom line be affected if you didn't have to pay a power bill-- at all? How would it help you if you had a program where people could recharge their cars in your parking lot, making them stay in your store for up to an hour, and they had to buy at leats $20.00 worth of merchandise to make the power-up 'free'? Would that help you make money?"
Corporate America would lead the charge to green tech.
In order for EVs to be the future of transportation, we'd had to generate much more electricity than we do now...,
In a world of dwindling hydrocarbons, Peak oil, and depletion in general will make that highly unlikely. The best thing to do would be to double or triple the gas tax, invest heavily in subways, light rail, high speed rail and re-design cities around feet.
Green energy is diffuse. So far wind is our best bet, but solar energy is diffuse and both solar and wind are intermittent. Plus, both sources of energy must be scaled up by orders of magnitude.
Thin film solar relies on rare earth elements that will become a problem soon. Like oil, they will someday become increasingly expensive.
Rather than try to increase electricity production, why not do more with less?
There is enough excess capacity at night to recharge 80 million electric cars. Right now we spend a billion dollars a day on foreign oil. All that currency flowing out of the country is a drain on the economy.
Let's keep that money here. We could have $3.6 Trillion over the next ten years to invest. That would buy a lot of clean electricity production, and maybe we could close most of our dirty coal plants..
first of all, it is exactly the "diffuse" nature of solar that makes it incredible. every rooftop in America, and many other urban spaces should be covered with PV now, so we can shave peak load and switch to clean energy without killing our deserts.
secondly, there is nothing about solar panels that suggest using "more." quite the opposite. if you ever spoke to a solar installer (or applied for a rebate program), they will want a full energy audit with a efficiency upgrade of all the "low hanging fruit" to reduce the cost of a solar installation by reducing consumption. if we had feed in tariffs like the rest of the world, we would also be financially rewarded for producing more clean power than we use, which will, in turn, increase the payback and motivation to conserve. rooftop solar (not desert solar) and conservation are natural partners.
thirdly, these direct drive electric motors are much more efficient than refinery-dependent combustion motors, which waste most of the oil.
So, cheer up. solar and EVs are much more do-able than you thought.
Although i would prefer a "battery exchange" refueling system (similar to swapping the small propane tanks) rather than solely a "recharging" system which is impractical for on-the-go refueling.