Who Killed the Electric Car?
<div class="IPBDescription">Full Length Video on Google</div><a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3546315576859340929&hl=en" target="_blank"><img src="http://greyfalcon.net/whokilled.png" border="0" alt="IPB Image" /></a>
Incase anyone wanted to watch it.
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<u>Synopsis:</u>
1990 California made a law that required 2% of a carmaker's fleet in California be electric
Cars got made
Car makers sued
Chairman of the Committee got bribed with a top position on a Fuel Cell organization
Law got changed
Nearly every one was crushed to smithereens
Grand promises were made about fuel cells
Incase anyone wanted to watch it.
_
<u>Synopsis:</u>
1990 California made a law that required 2% of a carmaker's fleet in California be electric
Cars got made
Car makers sued
Chairman of the Committee got bribed with a top position on a Fuel Cell organization
Law got changed
Nearly every one was crushed to smithereens
Grand promises were made about fuel cells
Comments
Equivalent to tl;dr but in video form would be nice.
Equivalent to tl;dr but in video form would be nice.
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tl;dw?
GreyFlcn, do you ever post anything <b>not</b> related to the environment?
And what's wrong with GreyFalcon taking a special interest in the environment? If you're not interested, don't read his posts. And environmental issues, or specifically; global warming is a major focus of intellectual discussion everywhere nowadays.
This video deserves to be watched. : <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/confused-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="???" border="0" alt="confused-fix.gif" /> <!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Possibly, but I'm lazy. I can barely sit down to watch a one and half hour movie that's supposed to entertain me - let alone one that's educational.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->And what's wrong with GreyFalcon taking a special interest in the environment? If you're not interested, don't read his posts. And environmental issues, or specifically; global warming is a major focus of intellectual discussion everywhere nowadays.
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Nothing, but that's literally all he seems to post about. No other "intellectual discussions" seem to be involved, just the environment ones. It just seems odd to me.
I'm a college student with an Environmental Studies major. (Energy Focus)
It's my thing <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
er... I've never heard of this vehicle...
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I've never understood people taking their ignorance of certain topics and doing the metaphoric equivalent of hoisting it up on a flagpole and running in to the middle of a battlefield. I mean, assuming you're not the kind of person that <i>we</i> assume probably wouldn't know anything either way, there's no point in pointing it out for us. Just keep quiet unless you have something valuable to add beyond "wow this totally goes right over my head, I have nothing constructive to say because I lack the required knowledge!"
Everybody thinks that technology will magically come down in price. Yes, to a point this is true, but not with the thousand-pounds or so of batteries needed to run the thing. At the time, it started with LEAD-acid, then moved to NiMH. While NiMH was better, these things still have a tendancy to DEGRADE OVER TIME. Take a look at hybrids, made almost ten years after the EV1. They use about $1k worth of batteries instead of $20k worth, plus they're climated controlled, selectively charged, and conditioned almost exclusively for longevity. This mean no deep cycles, no rapid recharges, etc. And even with that, people are skittish to buy, and warrenties on the batteries still extend out to just 8years/100k miles. That's the point where an automaker is comfortable taking liability for a failed battery.
Watching this movie, i'm in absolute AWE that they didn't sit down AT ALL and say "Well, how much would these things cost? How long will the batteriest last? Will they cost $20,000 to replace?" All they focused on is what range the batteries would provide, not how long they'd last.
Mass production might have made the car components come down in price, but for a similar car just look at the Honda Insight. Aluminum frame, weight saving components, aerodynamic body. Cost about $18k, from what I remember. Did many people buy those? A few hundred a month.
The EV1 is fairly similar to the Insight, the difference is that the EV1 was packed to the gills with batteries.
Want to see what modern technology can do? Look at the GM Volt. 40 miles on batteries alone, with a gas charging motor. Seems promising. It's using LION, which makes me somewhat nervous, as up till now LION has always been unlimited-cycle(good!) but fairly fixed longevity (bad!)
And I'm with Jimmeh on watchin the video. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
I've never understood people taking their ignorance of certain topics and doing the metaphoric equivalent of hoisting it up on a flagpole and running in to the middle of a battlefield. I mean, assuming you're not the kind of person that <i>we</i> assume probably wouldn't know anything either way, there's no point in pointing it out for us. Just keep quiet unless you have something valuable to add beyond "wow this totally goes right over my head, I have nothing constructive to say because I lack the required knowledge!"
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It wasn't meant like that, sorry. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/sad-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":(" border="0" alt="sad-fix.gif" />
I've just been interested in this topic and I didn't know they actually cared about the environment in America <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/nerd-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="::nerdy::" border="0" alt="nerd-fix.gif" />
However, if I were to buy a car, I would like to know that on occasional I can drive out of state. Or that it is useful outside of California. So obviously, I'm not the targetted urban consumer.
Frankly the electric car discussion has been run into the ground. I mean, how many topics on this exist already? Sure, each may have a slightly different twist, but the consensus seems to be, we're ready for something a little different.
And I'm with Jimmeh on watchin the video. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
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This consensus is amongst you and seemingly one other guy o.o
Anyway, reading these threads make me feel smart, and the subject is still hot, so I at least have to disagree with it being 'run into the ground.'
<u>Synopsis:</u>
1990 California made a law that required 2% of a carmaker's fleet in California be electric
Cars got made
Car makers sued
Chairman of the Committee got bribed with a top position on a Fuel Cell organization
Law got changed
Nearly every one was crushed to smithereens
Grand promises were made about fuel cells
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I can understand regulating existing products based on safety concerns, but should the government really have the right to force companies to make something?
What's next? They don't like violent video games so UWE has to make a telatubbies game along with NS2? <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
Until then, the common good requires government to intervene for many reasons. Government is our protection against monopoly, our protection against cartels, our protection against bad services and goods, our protection against fraudulent business practices, and sometimes our government has to be the one that forces new technologies. For example, our incumbent telecoms [virtual] monopoly was forced to rollout broadband services and to unbundle their service for resellers. Without this we would have remained in the dark ages in terms of broadband access. Our government has also required car importers to stop supplying cars that ran on leaded fuel, another important step, and I see the need to diversify our energy requirements as central to our economic health. We are not an oil producing nation, but we are one of the most oil dependent nations in Europe. We need to diversify quickly, and we are currently not leveraging our enormous wind harvest at all. Business does not stand to make much profit in the transition directly, but indirectly they stand to trade in a more robust economy and this is essential for the common good.
However, if I were to buy a car, I would like to know that on occasional I can drive out of state. Or that it is useful outside of California. So obviously, I'm not the targetted urban consumer.
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Thats where plugin hybrids come into play.
[youtube]oDjSbWTJbdo[/youtube]
(Note, I dunno how much sense Vehicle-2-Grid makes, but using <a href="http://blogs.business2.com/greenwombat/2007/06/photo_green_wom.html" target="_blank">electric car batteries to store electricity in this way</a>, makes a hell of a lot of sense)
(Also what makes more sense than "Prius's with bigger batteries"
Is instead "Electric cars with smaller batteries, and a small gasoline generator"
The difference is about 10x less components.
These are called "Series Plugin Hybrids")
They also literally killed one to get a free prize. By driving it into the ocean. All these stories about laws and bribed chairmen... they seem far fetched by comparison.