Electric Transport is beginning to happen....

Today's post: Wednesday, 7-21-2010

We need an 80% reduction in fossil fuel use by 2050 to avoid the worst global warming effects. And, practically speaking, we need to also double our electricity generation and double the useful work done per unit of electricity & other energy sources as well during that same time to have a decent economy.

At some point, the oil that we’ve been using to power much of our economy will begin to run low enough that our world economy will shrink due to lack of supply or excessive costs or both. Kuwaiti scientists recently predicted peak oil in 2014 – just 4 years from now.

And, once the demand for oil picks up again with the apparent economic recovery or supply begins to plateau or drop, the prices will again go back up. That will cause more hard times economically unless we have enough alternative sources of energy to turn to.

Today’s post:

Electric transport is beginning to happen.

1. Tesla is beginning to look like it will successfully become an established car company making upscale electric cars similar to what Audi or Acura or BMW does now for gasoline powered cars. They also have technology they will share with larger car companies.

2. Within five years it looks as if all the following major car companies will make all electric or plug-in hybrid cars that run over 90 % of the time as electric cars.:

Toyota; Honda; Nissan; and Mitsubishi from Japan.

Ford and Chevrolet in the United States.

And, just yesterday, I found out the Volkswagen is making a serious effort to become a leading manufacturer of electric cars.

3. And, if you didn’t see it, this was in our post 3 weeks ago:

And, that’s not all. Coulomb Technologies is developing multiple ways to support building networks of charging stations for electric and plug-in hybrids. They have a large deal with Ford and also are ready to support the Nissan Leaf and are working with Siemens to support an EV (electric vehicle) Siemens is developing.

A company called Better Place is setting up a combination of fast charging stations and electric cars that work with them in several places.

And, Amprius in the Silicon Valley says they have a technology to increase the charge lithium batteries can take and deliver by 40%. If they do and get it into production, that will either increase the range cars can drive using only electricity or lower the cost and weight of their battery packs or both.

And there are also many new advanced technology battery companies as well. These include A123 Systems and Boston Power both in Boston plus the high technology battery companies in China that venture capitalist, John Doerr says are doing well despite very little coverage here.

There’s good news and bad news in this.

The best news is that this will dramatically cut our dependence on and use of fuels from petroleum. It will lower the maintenance cost of transport and driving because electric cars are simpler and far less complex than internal combustion engines.

Since peak oil and price run ups in fuels from petroleum look likely within that same timeframe or soon after it, this transition will really help our economy.

The bad news is that it may make our transport systems vulnerable to solar electromagnetic storms which have melted telegraph wires in the past.

But the likely bad news is that it will put a lot of pressure on the utility companies to generate and deliver more electricity. Some powering of electric cars can be done with existing generation facilities at night when the demand for electricity for lighting, business, and air conditioning is far less.

But it also means that more natural gas and coal will be burned to generate electricity.

All of this makes development of clean energy sources of electricity such as photovoltaic solar, thermal solar, and wind –and -- cleaner and more efficient ways to generate electricity from natural gas and coal even more important than they are now. And, it will increase the demands to build more nuclear plants to generate electricity.