Progress on electric cars....

Today’s post: Weds, 3-19-2008

Fossil fuel for cars & trucks is now one of our biggest uses. It definitely is the most visible one to the average person.

Biofuels are one way to power cars & trucks that will help replace fossil fuels. But initially they will be in limited supply. And, they still produce some air pollution in the cities where they are used. Using current technology, they are also mixed with fossil fuels NOT as total replacements.

Since most of the use of electricity is during the day for businesses & for air conditioning & for lighting at night before 11:30 pm & some after 4:30 am with light use from 10:30 am to 5:30 am,
there is existing electric generation capacity not now being used between about 10 PM & 6 AM, particularly between midnight & 4 am.

And, we can both use renewable sources to generate electricity and get increasingly better control of pollution generated by other, centralized sources than we can individual cars & trucks that burn fossil fuels. (As we will cover in next week’s post, some nuclear power as a transition use may also work.)

That means that a major shift to electric cars & plug-in hybrids can help free our cities of air pollution & be a major step to weaning our economy away from fossil fuels.

So drivable, acceptable, cars & trucks that run on electricity or as plug-in hybrids are an important piece of our switching to an economy that runs on renewable energy.

Plug in hybrids are coming. But real electric cars as opposed to slightly supersized golf carts may be available first.

Tesla Motors is close to production on its electric sports car. And, has plans for a sedan within a few years.

This has gotten car enthusiasts’ attention in part because the Tesla Roadster gets good enough acceleration to be very competitive with the best street racers & muscle cars.

It definitely appeals to people who want both performance and to support renewable energy & energy independence at the same time.

What may be less well known is that most electric cars will have better acceleration available at the driver’s demand than most gasoline powered cars – not just the electric sports cars.

Here are two articles relating to this theme.

The first one is about one of the more significant companies that will compete with Tesla Motors.

( I added some paragraphing to the article to emphasize some key points that I think deserve it that were made by the CEO, Jeff Boyd, who was interviewed.)

The second is about a minivan like electric car conversion.

( This article was in an online source called VentureBeat )

“Q&A with Jeff Boyd, CEO of Miles Electric Vehicle

Chris Morrison March 5th, 2008

Everyone knows the name Tesla Motors. High-profile VC fundings, a high-performance sports car and its layoffs have gotten the company endless coverage. However, there’s also a slew of lesser-known electric car companies. One of the handful with real potential (and real funding) is Miles Electric Vehicle, a Santa Monica, Calif. company with plans to release a highway-speed electric car, the XS500, in 2009.

Miles already sells a few low-speed models, but the XS500 will be the most acceptable to Americans — with a top speed of over 80mph, a range of over 120 miles, and the looks and features of a normal car, unlike some all-electric designs that many people find downright bizarre (see some examples here). The planned price is in the $35,000 to $40,000 range, cheaper than Tesla’s Whitestar, which is aiming for $50,000. The company caught my attention with a recent $15 million financing, so I called up CEO Jeff Boyd for a quick interview.

Do you think you’ll get competition from bigger companies?
We hope that there is a lot of competition. A decade ago, the all-electric car failed, for a variety of reasons.

But at this point, we’ve got the catalysts: The homeland security issue, the emissions issue — this is no longer a fad, a niche market or a matter of curiosity. We think it’s a revolution, and we hope manufacturers all over the world are working in the area.

It’s going to take a lot of work and money to make the dream come to fruition. There’s plenty of market to go after, and we anticipate being one of many.

Will you be competitive with larger automakers?
From a technology standpoint, we feel that we can compete. As far as branding and distribution, the traditional automakers are very advanced and mature. But there’s plenty of room in the market when there’s an emerging business. If you look at the US selling 16 million new cars a year, Europe doing a similar number and about 50 million total around the world, there’s no reason we shouldn’t have enough sales to make a business. We welcome competition, we want everyone to jump in so we can reduce our reliance on foreign oil and change how we handle transportation.

Tesla has taken a lot of money — nearly $150 million to date, with more than twice that planned in the future. Will you need to take less money than Tesla has to commercialize?
We don’t anticipate needing anywhere near that amount of money. Our original private funding and the first round of our equity financing looks like enough to continue research on the XS500 and expand our distribution model.

Where does design come in?
There are three keys to our business model. First and foremost, we want to be all-electric. Second, we want to be completely safe and meet all the regulations. And third, we want to be low-cost. In order to be low cost, we’ve adapted chassis that have already been manufactured. Rather than starting with a clean sheet of paper and coming out with a completely new chassis design for our low or high-speed vehicles, this is allowing us to keep our costs down. If we’re going to bring a car out that will really change our reliance on oil, it needs to be cheap. [ed. note: It’s also worth noting that Miles manufactures its vehicles on cheap production lines in China. Tesla also used a pre-existing chassis for the Roadster, but it was a very expensive model from Lotus.]

The cost is still high for the XS500 — will prices come down?
The cost of lithium ion [batteries], which is right now still a fairly expensive technology, will come down over time. We also have a five year development plan with a variety of models in it. The next model after the XS500 is a small cross-over unit that will be priced lower. Whether we can reduce the price on the XS500, we’re not sure. But even if we don’t, we’ll be bringing out lower-cost models over the next two to three years that will expand the market for all electric vehicles.”

….

“Will electric cars be competitive with plug-in hybrids?
I’m not aware of any [plug-in] hybrids that are very close to production. We’re a little over a year away, so we think we’re maybe two or three years ahead of most plug-in hybrid vehicles. We applaud the efforts of the ethanol, hybrid, hydrogen, fuel cell communities, but fundamentally, we think those are transitional technologies toward all-electric. In effect they [all-electric cars] have zero emissions.

About half of our electricity is from coal, but the technology exists to change that. It’s within our grasp to generate electricity without any emissions.

We also like all-electric because the US electric utility grid is capable of handling the charging requirements of a lot of vehicles without expanding greatly.

You took funding from a private equity firm, Angeleno Group, rather than a venture capital group. Why?
The principals [directors] of Angeleno Group have been associated with Miles Rubin [the company’s founder] for many years, so it was natural as we developed for them to reach out to us. We weren’t seeking investors, but upon engaging we were impressed with their true commitment to alternative energy. When you enter a partnership like that, it’s helpful if it goes beyond the cash infusion. If they can help with planning and business development, it can really be meaningful.

What sort of future do you envision? Acquisition, IPO, staying private?
We really don’t have any plans to do any more than continue on the path we’re on, as a private company.”

I found this info online looking for electric cars on Yahoo. I had also heard that there were Scion conversions. So far the progress has been on the boxy minivan model not the more car like Scion model. And, the conversions are a bit pricey. But it IS progress.

And, it shows what some of the potentials are for electric cars when cheaper lithium ion batteries are installed into cars as they are manufactured & the companies realize economies of scale to bring the cost down.

“Scion Electric Car Conversions”

"AC Propulsion, a California-based company that just debuted its eBox, a converted Toyota Scion xB with an electric engine. After you bring your own Scion, AC Propulsion will do the deed for $55,000. So what're the specs on the eBox? We're glad you asked: 180 mile range, top speed of 95 mph, and you can get a full charge in five hours right from your garage's wall outlet. Sure, that sounds like a lot for a car that's ordinarily pretty freakin' cheap (~ $18,000), but when you think that you'll never have to buy gas again over the life of the car, it just might be worth it."

"Sure, a few companies have recently introduced plans for two-seat electric sports cars in the $70,000-$100,000+ price range, but the eBox offers similar performance on a platform that can carry five adults. And the eBox is currently taking orders for delivery in 2007. It is true that I cannot afford $70,000 for a car right now, but if I could, I would insist on buying one that could haul my whole family of four. The eBox fits that bill without any struggle. The fact that it can blow away a Mustang GT is only icing on the cake. "

1. www.scionlife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=152318 eBox Scion XB conversion

2. AC Propulsion's Scion xB electric car conversion keeps getting better ...
www.evworld.com/view.cfm?page=article&storyid=1172

3. AC Propulsion converts stock Scion xB into fully electric "eBox" car ...
... AcPropulsion, ebox, electric car, Electric Car, toyota scion xb, Toyota Scion Xb ... gas costs $4 per gallon, that the Scion normally gets 30 MPG, and that you drive ...
engadget.com/2006/12/11/ac-propulsion-converts-stock-scion-xb-into-fully-electric

4. Play Video YouTube - My Scion xA EV Electric car conversion project
We're converting a Scion xA from a gas car to a fully battery electric vehicle! ... ZAP Xebra and GEM Electric Car Race. 00:58 From: Xebranut. Views: 8,477 ...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdmM4iO4W9c - 113k –

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As more electricity becomes available from renewable sources & the costs of electric cars & plug-in hybrids come down, we will make substantial progress to transport that is NOT dependent on fossil fuels. And even in the nearer future while some of our electricity comes from sequestered coal fired plants & nuclear, electric cars & plug-in hybrids will help drop the air pollution in our cities a lot.

So, three cheers from here for electric cars & the people who make them.

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Brad & I believe the switch from fossil fuels & an energy wasteful economy to an economy that is based almost 100 % on renewable energy that is very efficiently used is the new phase of the "industrial revolution" as much as the development of the internet -- perhaps much more so in fact.

This blog is dedicated to helping speed this conversion.