Even Low Efficiency Energy Storage Devices Become Competitiv

[zzbunker@netscape.net]

On Aug 11, 10:31 am, Bret Cahill <BretCah...@aol.com> wrote:

The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its chargable
component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes. Sure sounds like
a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.
Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.
The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is heavier
than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and reprocessed.
That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a big problem ?
Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is 12,500..
That's 34:1.
Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.
The battery drives a very lightweight electric motor, at 95% efficiency or so.
The gasoline drives a heavy ICE (+drivetrain/exchaust etc), at 20% efficieny or so (if you are lucky).

Some posters here have no education in thermodynamics which is why we
must constantly explain that an electric motor is 3X - 4X more
efficient than a diesel.

But, that doesn't really matter in the least bit.
Since the people who understand the efficiency of both of them,
are also the people
who invented digital, lasers, fiber optics, holograms, WWW, DVD,
GPS, bio-diesel,
robots, microcomptuers, USB, and cruise missiles.

The efficiency factor alone reduces the factor 34:1 to 7:1.
And the motor mass difference could make up for another factor of 4 or so (simple replace the heavy ICE by battery mass).
So in reality the Zi-air battery should be less than a factor 2:1 off with a gasoline driven car, and probably at par in many
applications.

Not worth worrying about.

Advantage is that the Zi-air technology is very simple.
Disadvantage is of course that an infrastructure has to be put in place to replace and recycle the Zi-oxide.

Gotta spreadsheet it including the cost of oil quagmires and then
convince the general public as well as Congress.

Bret Cahill

 

[Dean Hoffman]

BretCahill@peoplepc.com wrote:

We really need a tractor pull.


Bret Cahill

Tractor pulls don't really prove anything useful. But here are
some: http://www.ntpapull.com/
Tractor pulls are the equivalent of drag races.
This is far more useful for farmers:
http://tractortestlab.unl.edu/

Dean


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[John Larkin]

On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 18:00:42 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com>
wrote:

"John Fields" <jfields@austininstruments.com> wrote in message news:ujg1a499pak1t82s9aletdbte4prq73dhl@4ax.com...
On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:20:31 -0700, John Larkin
jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote:

On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 12:19:11 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com
wrote:


"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message news:l1i0a4hiqhbib5il3kumlrkr0ndh1grteo@4ax.com...
On Sun, 10 Aug 2008 18:58:58 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com
wrote:


"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message news:c0ou94h6skor1kicrp0brqo6eoq0ruc5on@4ax.com...
On Sun, 10 Aug 2008 13:14:39 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com
wrote:


"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message
news8bu94pft0vnpoh62j67rgvnujsovvpqob@4ax.com...
....

The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its chargable
component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes. Sure sounds like
a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.

Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.

Rob


The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is heavier
than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and reprocessed.

That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a big problem ?


Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is 12,500.
That's 34:1.

Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.

Not really. My kid's Toyota Echo holds about 12 gallons of gas, which
weighs around 32 KG. That's a practical amount of fuel for a usable
car. 32 * 34 = 1088 KG, so the zinc-air fuel cell weighs over a metric
ton. That's when it's "full"; it weighs more when it's "empty."

Even if the fuel cell is 2:1 net more efficient, that's still 1000
pounds.

Remember the efficiency difference ?
"The efficiency factor alone reduces the factor 34:1 to 7:1."

So if the mass of the zinc-air battery is 7 * 32kg = 224 kg, and with that will obtain the same range as the gasoline version.

rob



If it makes sense, how come nobody is doing it?

My guess is as good as yours. But I think there are multiple reasons :
(1) The cost advantage (of going electric versus running gasoline) is only pretty recent : oil was $35/barrel only 4 years ago, and
$70/barrel last year.
(2) As a result, there are virtually no vehicles with electric drive available where ANY (plug-in) battery technology can be easily
tried out or retrofitted.
(3) There is no infrastructure and no standards to swap out Zi-oxide for a new 'tank' of Zinc (no Zinc-stations). That's a LOT of
work and time right there, and that requires a deliberate political decision (to go for Zi-air) too. Currrent thinking is more in
the line of traditional batteries (Li-ion/NiMH/ZEBRA batteries) for (PH)EVs.

Rob

Actually, some zinc-air vehicles have been built... google turns up a
number of them. I haven't seen any numbers on the overall fuel cycle
efficiency.

There are suggestions that battery life is short, months maybe.

John

 

[Bret Cahill]

I give everyone a chance but once it becomes clear their minds have
been shut down then there isn't much you can do.

Even if you _want_ to humor them it ain't gonna happen.

Try alt.origins for awhile and it'll converge even faster.


Bret Cahill

 

The last thing my farmer relatives want to do is waste their
time refueling when doing the field work.

No one ever promised that post peak would be a rose garden.

Maybe algae diesel will work out. That's plan A.

If it doesn't then we need a plan B.

Plan C is oxen.


Bret Cahill

 

We really need a tractor pull.

Bret Cahill

� � �Tractor pulls don't really prove anything useful. �

I personally wouldn't find them very enlightening but I'm not
everyone.

A lot of solutions require collective action, traffic regulations,
etc. Public policy is inextricably intertwined with farming.

We need some kind of understanding on the part of the general public
that cannot be expected to have the time let alone the ability to do
energy calculations.

But here are
some: �http://www.ntpapull.com/
Tractor pulls are the equivalent of drag races.
ďż˝ This is far more useful for farmers:
� �http://tractortestlab.unl.edu/

Bret Cahill

 

Even those who do have that size of tractor cannot wait even a
minute if they're haying and trying to get it baled and inside
before it rains.

No question it is a challenging problem.


Bret Cahill

 

The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its chargable
component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes. Sure sounds like
a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.

Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.

Rob

The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is heavier
than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and reprocessed.

That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a big problem ?

Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is 12,500.
That's 34:1.

Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.

Not really. My kid's Toyota Echo holds about 12 gallons of gas, which
weighs around 32 KG. That's a practical amount of fuel for a usable
car. 32 * 34 = 1088 KG, so the zinc-air fuel cell weighs over a metric
ton. That's when it's "full"; it weighs more when it's "empty."

Even if the fuel cell is 2:1 net more efficient, that's still 1000
pounds.

Remember the efficiency difference ?
"The efficiency factor alone reduces the factor 34:1 to 7:1."

So if the mass of the zinc-air battery is 7 * 32kg = 224 kg, and with that will obtain the same range as the gasoline version.

Yesterday I posted:

"Some posters here have no education in thermodynamics which is why
we
must constantly explain that an electric motor is 3X - 4X more
efficient than a diesel."


Bret Cahill

 

[jmfbahciv]

BretCahill@peoplepc.com wrote:

The last thing my farmer relatives want to do is waste their
time refueling when doing the field work.

No one ever promised that post peak would be a rose garden.

Maybe algae diesel will work out. That's plan A.

If it doesn't then we need a plan B.

Plan C is oxen.

Nope. Horses.

/BAH

 

[jmfbahciv]

rlbell.nsuid@gmail.com wrote:

On Aug 11, 8:31 am, Bret Cahill <BretCah...@aol.com> wrote:
The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its chargable
component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes. Sure sounds like
a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.
Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.
The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is heavier
than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and reprocessed.
That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a big problem ?
Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is 12,500.
That's 34:1.
Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.
The battery drives a very lightweight electric motor, at 95% efficiency or so.
The gasoline drives a heavy ICE (+drivetrain/exchaust etc), at 20% efficieny or so (if you are lucky).
Some posters here have no education in thermodynamics which is why we
must constantly explain that an electric motor is 3X - 4X more
efficient than a diesel.

Only if you ignore the efficiency of whatever makes electricity. We
cannot just pump electricity out of the ground, nor does it fall from
the sky in a readily collectable form. It has to be converted from
some other energy. Our best option, efficiency wise, is natural gas
fired, combined cycle plants with thermal efficiencies advertised at
60% (GE H1), so the electric motor is limited to 57%, not counting
transmission losses, and assuming a connection from the power station
to the vehicle without having to store it in a battery.

It also puts food production into a single point failure condition.
No functional power grid, no food nor meat.

It would be extremely stupid to transform to electric power.

<snip>

/BAH

 

[jmfbahciv]

jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com wrote:

In sci.physics jmfbahciv <jmfbahciv@aol> wrote:
Jonathan Grobe wrote:
On 2008-08-11, jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com <jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com> wrote:
In sci.physics Bret Cahill <BretCahill@aol.com> wrote:
When the farmer gets out the tractor, it usually runs for hours and
hours under load. The straight line distance isn't a factor.
That was back in the old days _pre_ peak oil.
Things might not be quite so simple post peak oil.
The requirements of farming haven't changed since humanity howed the
first row.

Some are having difficulty accepting what should be a simple concept:
Pre peak: Easy street.
Post peak: Extra labor suddenly becomes cost effective.
Without tractors most everyone will starve.

Human labor isn't an option. If it were, Africa wouldn't be starving.

I believe the author's philosophy is that you operate the
tractor say for a half hour and then spend 5 minutes re-charging
the battery---and that the cost of the tractor operator's
labor spent re-charging batteries is less than the additional cost
you would use with the higher priced fuel (diesel vs electricity).

The author has no farming experience. How is he going to recharge
those batteries? There isn't any power outlet in the middle of
1000 acres. Run power lines? Then a plow can't plow the soil and
a combine can't harvest. Going around things is not a nice thing
to have to do when farming fields.

All real world problems are trivial to the arm chair, hand waver who
has never done any real work nor paid the bill for their own ideas.


I'd spent a year in this newsgroup when I decided that one solution

to the abject stupidity was to have all kids spend 2 years working
on a farm.

/BAH

 

[jmfbahciv]

Rob Dekker wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message
newsd12a4ta8aatlfg9iailsodfgb5s16opc6@4ax.com...
....
If it makes sense, how come nobody is doing it?
My guess is as good as yours. But I think there are multiple reasons :
(1) The cost advantage (of going electric versus running gasoline) is
only pretty recent : oil was $35/barrel only 4 years ago, and
$70/barrel last year.
(2) As a result, there are virtually no vehicles with electric drive
available where ANY (plug-in) battery technology can be easily
tried out or retrofitted.
(3) There is no infrastructure and no standards to swap out Zi-oxide for
a new 'tank' of Zinc (no Zinc-stations). That's a LOT of
work and time right there, and that requires a deliberate political
decision (to go for Zi-air) too. Currrent thinking is more in
the line of traditional batteries (Li-ion/NiMH/ZEBRA batteries) for
(PH)EVs.
Rob


Actually, some zinc-air vehicles have been built... google turns up a
number of them.

I found these too. Zn-air seems to be a serious candidate for electric
vehicles.
What I found that it is often compared to 'hydrogen' fuel cell vehicles, and
then it performs better in many ways.
But hee, pretty much anything is better than hydrogen as a 'fuel'.

I haven't seen any numbers on the overall fuel cycle
efficiency.


I googled this at another computer, and found only some bloggers that
mention cycle efficincies between 30% and 50%. Nothing solid (in terms of
numbers) since the efficiency relies very much on HOW the ZnO is recycled
back to Zn pellets. But it seems clear that cycle efficiency is not as good
as secondary (rechargable) batteries, which often get 90% or better cycle
efficiency.

There are suggestions that battery life is short, months maybe.

Well, it's not really a battery in the strict sense of the word.
It's actually a fuel cell : put Zn pellets in and get ZnO and electricity
out.
The fuel cell has much longer lifespan than months AFAIK.

John


Interestingly, there is also an Al-air battery (or let's say fuel cell). Up
to 1300 Wh/kg (2000 Wh/kg). Now we are talking real gasoline-equivalence,
with batteries of less than 100 kg for a full range similar to gasoline.
Powered by electricity (at less than $1/gallon equivalent).

There are just an amazing amount of new battery possibilities when vehicles
finally move away from the inefficient, polluting, and heavy ICEs, and
towards an era of clean electric drive.

I keep hearing that phrase, "clean electric drive". Electricity is not
clean.

Go work in a wire manufacturing factory for a while.

/BAH

 

[John Larkin]

On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 04:28:03 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com>
wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message
newsd12a4ta8aatlfg9iailsodfgb5s16opc6@4ax.com...
....
If it makes sense, how come nobody is doing it?

My guess is as good as yours. But I think there are multiple reasons :
(1) The cost advantage (of going electric versus running gasoline) is
only pretty recent : oil was $35/barrel only 4 years ago, and
$70/barrel last year.
(2) As a result, there are virtually no vehicles with electric drive
available where ANY (plug-in) battery technology can be easily
tried out or retrofitted.
(3) There is no infrastructure and no standards to swap out Zi-oxide for
a new 'tank' of Zinc (no Zinc-stations). That's a LOT of
work and time right there, and that requires a deliberate political
decision (to go for Zi-air) too. Currrent thinking is more in
the line of traditional batteries (Li-ion/NiMH/ZEBRA batteries) for
(PH)EVs.

Rob



Actually, some zinc-air vehicles have been built... google turns up a
number of them.

I found these too. Zn-air seems to be a serious candidate for electric
vehicles.
What I found that it is often compared to 'hydrogen' fuel cell vehicles, and
then it performs better in many ways.
But hee, pretty much anything is better than hydrogen as a 'fuel'.

I haven't seen any numbers on the overall fuel cycle
efficiency.


I googled this at another computer, and found only some bloggers that
mention cycle efficincies between 30% and 50%. Nothing solid (in terms of
numbers) since the efficiency relies very much on HOW the ZnO is recycled
back to Zn pellets. But it seems clear that cycle efficiency is not as good
as secondary (rechargable) batteries, which often get 90% or better cycle
efficiency.

There are suggestions that battery life is short, months maybe.

Well, it's not really a battery in the strict sense of the word.
It's actually a fuel cell : put Zn pellets in and get ZnO and electricity
out.
The fuel cell has much longer lifespan than months AFAIK.


John


Interestingly, there is also an Al-air battery (or let's say fuel cell). Up
to 1300 Wh/kg (2000 Wh/kg). Now we are talking real gasoline-equivalence,
with batteries of less than 100 kg for a full range similar to gasoline.
Powered by electricity (at less than $1/gallon equivalent).

There are just an amazing amount of new battery possibilities when vehicles
finally move away from the inefficient, polluting, and heavy ICEs, and
towards an era of clean electric drive.

Rob

There are/have been demonstration vehicles using flywheels, fuel
cells, compressed gas, storage batteries, turbines, steam, all sorts
of stuff. Most were done at incredible expense and most fade away to
junkyards eventually.

What we need are good batteries, but that may be just plain
impossible. Plug-in hybrids make sense, especially small, slippery
ones.

The design of the 4-cycle gasoline piston engine hasn't fundamentally
changed in 100 years: crank, camshaft, pistons, rings, poppet valves,
spark plugs. That's impressive.

John

 

[John Larkin]

On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 00:30:56 -0700 (PDT), BretCahill@peoplepc.com
wrote:

The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its chargable
component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes. Sure sounds like
a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.

Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.

Rob

The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is heavier
than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and reprocessed.

That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a big problem ?

Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is 12,500.
That's 34:1.

Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.

Not really. My kid's Toyota Echo holds about 12 gallons of gas, which
weighs around 32 KG. That's a practical amount of fuel for a usable
car. 32 * 34 = 1088 KG, so the zinc-air fuel cell weighs over a metric
ton. That's when it's "full"; it weighs more when it's "empty."

Even if the fuel cell is 2:1 net more efficient, that's still 1000
pounds.

Remember the efficiency difference ?
"The efficiency factor alone reduces the factor 34:1 to 7:1."

So if the mass of the zinc-air battery is 7 * 32kg = 224 kg, and with that will obtain the same range as the gasoline version.

Yesterday I posted:

"Some posters here have no education in thermodynamics which is why
we
must constantly explain that an electric motor is 3X - 4X more
efficient than a diesel."


Bret Cahill

Show us something substantial, like some numbers or something. All we
hear from you is fuzzy stuff and juvenile insults.

Have you ever driven a tractor?

John

 

[John Fields]

Because of the contemptuous cowardly cahill's currish clippage, it
might have gone unknown that the knowledgeable John Larkin wrote:

Show us something substantial, like some numbers or something.

Then, of course, being bereft of skills in arithmetic and,
consequently, being unable to defend his untenable position, the
knowledgeunable Bret Cahill dodged with:

It'll be a waste of time for anyone to try to explain thermo to you
until you pass some thermo courses.

---
That, after posting a cartoon depicting some sort of primitive heat
exchanger with no explanatory notes or even a mention of its
efficiency.

Tsk, tsk, tsk...

JF

 

[John Larkin]

On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 17:17:24 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com>
wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message news:5r04a4d87bh0u33c9ka5ns617r62fg03tn@4ax.com...
On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 04:28:03 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com
wrote:


There are just an amazing amount of new battery possibilities when vehicles
finally move away from the inefficient, polluting, and heavy ICEs, and
towards an era of clean electric drive.

Except that everything else, so far, is less efficient, more
polluting, and heavier. Not to mention way more expensive.

This is not true.

Electric drive is 4X more efficient (not even counting regenerative braking), zero-pollution at the tailpipe (it has none), and is
much lighter than an ICE.

Only if the electricity magically comes from somewhere free, and you
lug enough batteries for 20 miles of travel.

But the electricity sas to be generated somewhere, at thermal
efficiency levels. Transport, chargers, and batteries throw a bunch of
it away. Batteries are heavy and full of nasty chemicals.

More expensive ? Prototypes are always more expensive.
But let's see :

ICE : Complicated engine with lots of rotating and moving parts, with oil + water cooling system, with emission control (incl
catalytic converter with precious metals), with transmission and a differential and exhaust system and a massive amount of pipes
and sensors.

And it all works great. I can load up 200 HP-hours worth of energy in
about 2 minutes at a gas pump. That's about a 5 megawatt equivalent
charging rate. And I can drive coast-to-coast on about an hour of pit
stops.

Sometimes I get into my Rabbit in the morning, start it up, drive away
5 seconds later, turn on the radio and the heater, ignore the steep
hills and the cold rain, and marvel at the whole process. And that
hundreds of millions of other working people can afford to do the same
thing.

Electric drive : a few melon-size electric motor/generators and a power control unit.
Add a small (40hp) auxiliry power unit and you drive a 80mpg vehicle.

Mmmm. What would be cheaper in mass production ?

What *is* cheaper? If electric cars are cheaper and more efficient,
why aren't they popular? Conspiracy?

Batteries cost ?
If you are an average American, you spend around $3,000/year in gasoline right now.
I bet that for $3,000/year you can lease a top-of-the-line battery pack. Even at current low-volume prices.

What is cheaper ?
What is cleaner ?
What is more efficient ?
What is better prepared for the post Peak-Oil era that we just entered ?

The peak oil point is always 10 years away.

Hey, build yourself an electric car and save a bundle. There are lots
of conversion kits on the market.

There just aren't any good batteries.

John

 

[John Larkin]

On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 19:01:41 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com>
wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message news:rja4a4h09trf53mdoh6jbjdac0pjam04pj@4ax.com...
On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 17:17:24 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com
wrote:


"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message news:5r04a4d87bh0u33c9ka5ns617r62fg03tn@4ax.com...
On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 04:28:03 -0700, "Rob Dekker" <rob@verific.com
wrote:


There are just an amazing amount of new battery possibilities when vehicles
finally move away from the inefficient, polluting, and heavy ICEs, and
towards an era of clean electric drive.

Except that everything else, so far, is less efficient, more
polluting, and heavier. Not to mention way more expensive.

This is not true.

Electric drive is 4X more efficient (not even counting regenerative braking), zero-pollution at the tailpipe (it has none), and is
much lighter than an ICE.

Only if the electricity magically comes from somewhere free, and you
lug enough batteries for 20 miles of travel.

But the electricity sas to be generated somewhere, at thermal
efficiency levels. Transport, chargers, and batteries throw a bunch of
it away. Batteries are heavy and full of nasty chemicals.




More expensive ? Prototypes are always more expensive.
But let's see :

ICE : Complicated engine with lots of rotating and moving parts, with oil + water cooling system, with emission control (incl
catalytic converter with precious metals), with transmission and a differential and exhaust system and a massive amount of pipes
and sensors.

And it all works great. I can load up 200 HP-hours worth of energy in
about 2 minutes at a gas pump. That's about a 5 megawatt equivalent
charging rate. And I can drive coast-to-coast on about an hour of pit
stops.

You seem to confuse electric drive with EVs.
Electric drive with a small auxiliry power unit will give you all the benefits of the current gasoline (or another fuel)
infrastructure.
Like in the Volt (the only model with electric drive that GM actually has a plan for)....

Stuff like this has been "planned" for decades. I'll be impressed whan
quantities of them are on the road.

A plug-in hybrid does make sense for city drivers. But small, light
cars make sense no matter what propels them. A small, light
gasoline-powered car may make the most sense.

Sometimes I get into my Rabbit in the morning, start it up, drive away
5 seconds later, turn on the radio and the heater, ignore the steep
hills and the cold rain, and marvel at the whole process. And that
hundreds of millions of other working people can afford to do the same
thing.

Yes. me too.
The ICE has served us greatly over the past 100 years that oil was abundant and cheap, and the engineering advances made are
magnificent.
The ICE also enabled an astounding economic growth that we (as the people of this planet) have created for ourselves.
It also created a number of really big problems, which start to become apparent, increasingly difficult and pressing as well as more
and more expensive.
More expensive for individuals, as well as nations, as well as the planet's eco systems.
It's time for change (before another 2 billion people join in our lifestyle).



Electric drive : a few melon-size electric motor/generators and a power control unit.
Add a small (40hp) auxiliry power unit and you drive a 80mpg vehicle.

Mmmm. What would be cheaper in mass production ?

What *is* cheaper?

Want to bet ?
In mass production, I want to bet that electric drive is significantly cheaper to produce than ICEs.

If electric cars are cheaper and more efficient,
why aren't they popular? Conspiracy?

John, I don't believe in conspiracies. In a free market the most cost efficient solution wins. But big changes take time.
The incentives are there now (to start moving to electric drive, away from oil and towards electricity), but only for the last
couple of years.
Also the political will to change (to start moving away from oil and fossil fuels) has not been there.
We are just getting started (with PHEVs).
This process is going to take a while (to move vehicles away from oil and towards electricity).
15-20 years is my estimate.



Batteries cost ?
If you are an average American, you spend around $3,000/year in gasoline right now.
I bet that for $3,000/year you can lease a top-of-the-line battery pack. Even at current low-volume prices.

What is cheaper ?
What is cleaner ?
What is more efficient ?
What is better prepared for the post Peak-Oil era that we just entered ?

The peak oil point is always 10 years away.

That is impossible.
Oil will peak at some point if it did not already.


Hey, build yourself an electric car and save a bundle. There are lots
of conversion kits on the market.

I might just do that, although retrofits are very seldom cost-effective.
I pretty much have to throw away half the vehicle (ICE/drivetrain etc etc you know it).
And the other half (chassis) got crumbled on I 238 last week (


There just aren't any good batteries.

After all we talked about, this is what you say ?
It seems to me that you have made up your mind on this subject.

Where's the great battery? I suspect a really good auto battery may be
impossible.

John

 

[jmfbahciv]

jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com wrote:

In sci.physics jmfbahciv <jmfbahciv@aol> wrote:
BretCahill@peoplepc.com wrote:
The last thing my farmer relatives want to do is waste their
time refueling when doing the field work.
No one ever promised that post peak would be a rose garden.

Maybe algae diesel will work out. That's plan A.

If it doesn't then we need a plan B.

Plan C is oxen.

Nope. Horses.

Nah, lpg or synthentic fuel (whatever the feed stock).


You are assuming that there will be manufacturing and bottling

plants. I wasn't. My relatives would use horses, as they
did before, not oxen. I don't remember anybody using oxen.
I wonder why horses were the default.

/BAH

 

[jmfbahciv]

BretCahill@peoplepc.com wrote:

The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its chargable
component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes. Sure sounds like
a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.
Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.
Rob
The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is heavier
than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and reprocessed.
That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a big problem ?
Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is 12,500.
That's 34:1.
Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.
Not really. My kid's Toyota Echo holds about 12 gallons of gas, which
weighs around 32 KG. That's a practical amount of fuel for a usable
car. 32 * 34 = 1088 KG, so the zinc-air fuel cell weighs over a metric
ton. That's when it's "full"; it weighs more when it's "empty."
Even if the fuel cell is 2:1 net more efficient, that's still 1000
pounds.
Remember the efficiency difference ?
"The efficiency factor alone reduces the factor 34:1 to 7:1."
So if the mass of the zinc-air battery is 7 * 32kg = 224 kg, and with that will obtain the same range as the gasoline version.
Yesterday I posted:
"Some posters here have no education in thermodynamics which is why
we
must constantly explain that an electric motor is 3X - 4X more
efficient than a diesel."

Show us something substantial, like some numbers or something.

It'll be a waste of time for anyone to try to explain thermo to you
until you pass some thermo courses.

A few can do it without a formal education but you ain't one of them.

But have you ever driven a tractor? Answer the question.

/BAH

 

[jmfbahciv]

Rod Speed wrote:

jmfbahciv <jmfbahciv@aol> wrote:
rlbell.nsuid@gmail.com wrote:
On Aug 11, 8:31 am, Bret Cahill <BretCah...@aol.com> wrote:
The ideal battery might use air as one reactant, have its
chargable component refreshed off-vehicle, and dump its wastes.
Sure sounds like a fuel cell to me. Or a gas engine.
Or a Zinc-air battery.
Which has the additional advantage that it produces no waste.
The vehicle still has to lug around the zinc oxide, which is
heavier than the original zinc. And it has to be collected and
reprocessed.
That is correct, but is keeping the zinc oxide in the vehicle a
big problem ?
Wiki puts zinc-air fuel cell density at 370 WH/KG. Gasoline is
12,500. That's 34:1.
Well, that's kind of comparing apples and oranges.
The battery drives a very lightweight electric motor, at 95%
efficiency or so. The gasoline drives a heavy ICE (+drivetrain/exchaust etc), at 20%
efficieny or so (if you are lucky).
Some posters here have no education in thermodynamics which is why
we must constantly explain that an electric motor is 3X - 4X more
efficient than a diesel.
Only if you ignore the efficiency of whatever makes electricity. We
cannot just pump electricity out of the ground, nor does it fall from
the sky in a readily collectable form. It has to be converted from
some other energy. Our best option, efficiency wise, is natural gas
fired, combined cycle plants with thermal efficiencies advertised at
60% (GE H1), so the electric motor is limited to 57%, not counting
transmission losses, and assuming a connection from the power station
to the vehicle without having to store it in a battery.

It also puts food production into a single point failure condition.

No big deal when the grid is so reliable now.

It is? You really do need to clean those rose-colored glasses.

No functional power grid, no food nor meat.

But the functional power grid always comes back quickly.

No, it doesn't. It requires people who know how to work for
that to happen. There are no new power plants being built
that doesn't depend on the swear a.k.a. carbon fuels.

It would be extremely stupid to transform to electric power.

Have fun explaining how come factorys manage that fine.

What factories? Have you ever met and _listened_ to a plant
manager?

/BAH