2008 – the Year of the Electric Car?

EXTRACT FROM WIKIPEDIA:

PEAK OIL is the point in time at which the maximum global petroleum production rate is reached, after which the rate of production enters its terminal decline. If global consumption is not mitigated before the peak, the availability of conventional oil will drop and prices will rise, perhaps dramatically.

M. King Hubbert (a famous Petroleum geologist) first used the theory in 1956 to accurately predict that United States oil production would peak between 1965 and 1970. His model, now called Hubbert peak theory, has since been used to predict the peak petroleum production of many other countries, and has also proved useful in other limited-resource production-domains. According to the Hubbert model, the production rate of a limited resource will follow a roughly symmetrical bell-shaped curve based on the limits of exploitability and market pressures.

Some observers, such as petroleum industry experts Kenneth S. Deffeyes and Matthew Simmons, believe the high dependence of most modern industrial transport, agricultural and industrial systems on the relative low cost and high availability of oil will cause the post-peak production decline and possible severe increases in the price of oil to have negative implications for the global economy. Although predictions as to what exactly these negative effects will be vary greatly, "a growing number of oil-industry chieftains are endorsing an idea long deemed fringe: The world is approaching a practical limit to the number of barrels of crude oil that can be pumped every day."

If political and economic change only occur in reaction to high prices and shortages rather than in reaction to the threat of a peak, then the degree of economic damage to importing countries will largely depend on how rapidly oil imports decline post-peak. The Export Land Model shows that the amount of oil available internationally drops much more quickly than production in exporting countries because the exporting countries maintain an internal growth in demand. Shortfalls in production (and therefore supply) would cause extreme price inflation, unless demand is mitigated with planned conservation measures and use of alternatives, which would need to be implemented 20 years before the peak.

Liberal estimations of peak production forecast a peak will happen in the 2020s or 2030s and assume major investments in alternatives will occur before a crisis. These models show the price of oil at first escalating and then retreating as other types of fuel and energy sources are used.

Conservative predictions of future oil production operate on the thesis that the peak has already occurred or will occur shortly and, as proactive mitigation may no longer be an option, predict a global depression, perhaps even initiating a chain reaction of the various feedback mechanisms in the global market which might stimulate a collapse of global industrial civilisation.


FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, GOOGLE 'PEAK OIL'.

PEAK OIL HAS ALREADY HAPPENED.

GET USED TO IT.

OIL, PETROL, DIESEL, GAS AND ELECTRICITY PRICES WILL CONTINUE TO RISE.

GET USED TO IT.

THERE ARE NO TECHNOLOGICAL BREAKTHROUGH'S ON THE WAY THAT CAN POSSIBLY REPLACE OUR DEPENDENCE ON OIL.

98% OF THE WORLD'S TRANSPORT INCLUDING CARS, PLANES, SHIPS AND TRAINS RELY ON A STEADY SUPPLY OF OIL.

FORGET HYDROGEN AND ELECTRIC VEHICLES - THEY WON'T BE DEVELOPED IN TIME TO OVERCOME OUR LOOMING WORLD WIDE FUEL SHORTAGES.

CHINA AND INDIA ARE DEMANDING EVER GREATER SUPPLIES OF OIL AT A TIME WHEN WORLD WIDE PRODUCTION IS HEAVILY IN DECLINE.

EXPECT CONTINUING RESOURCE WARS FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIVES.

GET USED TO IT.

BYE BYE FOR NOW SHEEPLE. BYE BYE.

All right mr marktime, you win, I will ask him to enjoy himself in another country.
Mind you his choice of having fun is to do with cars so who are we to stop him. Besides, the smog will blow back here anyway.

So the question is do you want him to polute here or abroad?

The whole thing is a big con. Let the manufacturers get on with it and produce their electric cars. If they can produce the right products at the right price, then they will sell. But there will be no difference until the government stop taxing us to the hilt, as has been said by many previous correspondents. Those of us who can see the light realise that the government will continue to overtax us in order to keep the economy and, worst of all, their infernal machine going! They must be rubbing their hands with glee when they see (most of) us falling for these so-called "green" issues. Only time will tell, and I will say "I told you so!"

Whose future are you betting with, yours or your grand children's?

You can have plenty of fun without sniffing hydrocarbons.

Mr: Marktime The gentleman said he is just trying to enjoy his life. Why don`t you stop using your car so that you can cancel out the "fumes" he produces.

I can`t believe you guys, you work all your life and you can`t even enjoy your life. Or would it make you feel better if he took the car else where? He is right the fuel is not going to run out within the next 20 years

635 and others with your heads in the sand can you not grasp the concept of finite resources. In our land of plenty is it so easy to go the supermarket when we run out of anything. where do you think all this stuff comes from?

Have no doubt oil will run out, not overnight but by degrees and as it gets harder to extract it will cost than you can begin to imagine.

Ask youself if you were lost in a desert with only 2 pints of water, would you drink it all at once?

MarkTime

In these days of the UK's congested roads, Miles of cones with not a lot happening and those White Safety Partnership vans huddled over almost every bridge like great white vultures, isn't reaching 40mph some form of goal or accolade??

I wonder what the repair bills would be in relation to the current car if you ought to be in an accident.

In addition to that what about safety?

Head on colision at 40miles an hour = either death or death of your bank balance.

A lot of writers are missing the point about electric cars, as with any new invention (for want of a description) you get the first one and then someone copies it but hopefully does improvements, then someone else copies that, ad infinitum? pardon my latin. just look at the first aeroplane, the inventors (the wright brothers?) were extremely happy to get it off the ground and fly 100yds, now look at what we have got, the air bus, the Boeings and hundreds of others, give them a chance, someone will always come up with something better. As I mentioned in my earlier blog engines invented and bought up and shelved because either the car manufacturer or the oil giants dont want anything that will reduce thier profits, the government should change the law and set up a department to look at all registered inventions and anything that will do the people more good should be compulsorily bought and developed instead of letting the money moguls sit on them because it would hurt thier profits.
As for getting something for nothing, I was taught that there is no such thing as perpetual motion, for instance if you had a tank of wateron a tower drving a water turbine connected to a generator, you still would not have enough power from the generator to drive a pump to pump the water back into the tank (Perpetual Motion I think, thier will be plenty of brainier people than me telling me/us that I am talking out of my gas generator) and also do other work, like giving you free electric to run your house is totaly impossible, I'm sure some one has tried this at sometime in the past. On a lighter note the powers that be should instruct the road builders to make all roads run down hill then we wouldn't need engines in our cars. Come on people be a bit more imaginative and get your thinking caps on, lets get inventing instead of being so negative, and register your designs and give everyone the right to use them instead of letting the money moguls sit on them.

64% have voted yes,but i can not see 64%,of the comment's,agreeing to
E.V.s.As petrol is still going to be around well into the next decade,at the age of 52, i am happy, with my 3 litre v6, 27mpg, 7500 miles a year,£400 road tax it's cheap
compared to public transport,next time i might buy a v8.
Petrolhead no just, trying to enjoy my life.
Fuel crisis not yet !,when we have it rationed,even the Pruis will struggle.
Other people in this world want the same standard of living as U.K. enjoy while you can, because there is not enough energy to keep everyone happy, it's going to cost!

Why can't we buy green electricity ?

We can, from ecotricity. The only company in the UK pouring most of their profits into building more windfarms. They're a private venture, and they promise to price match your local supplier.

By the time demand reaches supply they have enough money to build more turbines so it's sustainable growth.

Not many emmissions come from windfarms as far as I know, adn built offshore they are a great source of power.

In Scotland we have 18% renewable electricity (source: IET) The emmissions are therefore much lower than the rest of the country, but the rest could easily be as high or higher, it's just a simple matter of user making the choice to buy green, most conventional power companies have a green tarriff.

It won't happen until you ask for it

If we all change to electrically powered vehicles and use some supply for them that does use not fossil fuel power stations, then we would cut carbon dioxide emissions.

Good. Err, no. The planet would cool down and we would be back to the freezing cold winters!

Now, Plan 'B' is..................

Yes, it's a lovely idea.... dream about 1p per mile running costs..... How long do you think our Government (regardless of colour) is going to ignore this very attractive milch-cow? Remember when Diesel was much cheaper than petrol? I suppose one day we'll all be obliged to find an alternative fuel source as the oil runs out. But all things considered, I would consider an EV at the right price and specification.

Having just returned from Japan, I was surprised to see how few Hybrid's were on the road. Tokyo has a great taxi service but I saw only one Prius! Is there a hidden message?

Well it's a well known fact that the power stations producing the electricity for all these wonderfull electric cars are FAR, FAR more damaging to the environment than the internal combustion engine. (I work in the very industy that makes these wonderfull power stations, the figures are in the public domain, only the government and the green parties won't promote them).

From memory transportation (including air, land & sea) only accounts for something like 11% of Britains man made emissions. Of that 11% the petrol driven motor car is about 2% from memory. The rest comes from power stations producing electricity. The global figures are somewhat different and I think globally the motor car is less than 1% of man made emissions. Use more electricity (to charge your electric cars) and the these power stations produce Exponentially more power and hence produce Exponentially higher emissions.

Is a fully electric car the answer? No. It's just moving the problem from one visably taxable area to another far more polluting one. And then as previously stated with the electric car you have the environmental nightmare that is known as "the battery". You can't recycle them and it takes a huge amount of energy (and hence emissions) to even produce one.


Hydrogen fuel cells make more sence and Honda will be launching the first HFC powered car this year in Japan and the USA. From an environmental stand point it is the true way forward.

ps. If the UK stopped producing all harmfull gases right now it would take less than 3 days for China to plug the gap left by our new clean living thanks to thier power stations and production industry, absolutely nothing to do with the motor car. Think about it

Lets face it if electric cars came on to the market at a reasonable price, how long before the govt. decided to tax it into oblivion, as per usual.Remember the good old days when diesel was cheaper than petrol? But it would only be to save the environment don,t you know.

progress is wonderful but where is the cost of disposing of the battery pack which I am told is fairly frequent and costly. What is truth?

Posted by Mike Tobin, 14th January 2008 11:07pm


>>>
Mike, the truth is that it pays to recycle the batteries, it doesn't cost. The recycling procedure is so profitable that the refined materials from the recycling process are sellable.

About 99% of all lead acid batteries are recycled in the UK, and of the recyclers at least two have shown they recycle 100% of the battery materials, collectively making a profit in the process.

The same gameplan holds true for nickel metal hydride and lithium cells

Your council is obliged to provide you with a battery dropoff point at a local amentiy site, there is only waste and pollution where battereis are concerned when we don't dispose of them properly. When we do it properly a profit can be made

TO BE REALISTIC ANY FORM OF ENERGY SAVING VEHICLE IS A BENEFIT TO US ALL, IF IT REDUCES THE AMOUNT OF OIL CONSUMPTION THEN MAYBE PRICES WOULD START TO FALL AGAIN AS THEIR WOULD BE LESS DEMAND. THE ONLY THING WITH ELETRIC CARS IS THAT THERES NO PROVEN RELIABILITY AND AGAIN PRICE FOR CHARGING YOUR BATTERIES WOULD HAVE TO BE A LOT CHEAPER FOR PEOPLE TO START SWITCHING OVER. SOME PEOPLE HAVE TO BIG OF AN EGO TO TO SWICH TO AN ELECTRIC CAR AS EVERYONE WANTS THE LUXURY VEHICLES WITH ALL THE MOD CONS. PEOPLE COULD SAVE FUEL AND MONEY IF POEPLE STARTED TO DRIVE MORE ECONOMYICALY BY NOT DRIVING TO FAST ON MOTORWAYS AND DRINKING FUEL MORE QUICKLY, REMEMBER THE FASTER YOU GO THE MORE FUEL YOU BURN.

M. Matthewman: Sadly, the Ford Nucleon from the '50s never caught on. But it was a car with a fission pile that would give you 5,000 miles on one set of fuel rods.

People should know from Daily Mirror last year, there is already a British company in Alton, Hants who have made an electric "engine" which attaches to each wheel of the car. Their prototype is a new Mini and the results are stunning in terms of cheap running costs - no overnight charging - etc etc. Like most things there is a downside, I asked how much they are. Answer "it's not for sale" because there is only the one prototype and it would probably cost £500,000 They are trying to get industry backing to launch mass production. Probably cheaper to buy the company.

I have missed this blog for a few days now. I was away doing. Boy, have I missed it. People are still moaning and missing the point. Hain has been caught with his fingers in the till. Duggie Brown will back him, but only to a point. Those politicians, of whatever perception, talk honesty whilst filling their pockets. The solution, which no one likes,but which has been bandied about for years, is to shoot all lawyers first, then all the politicians, and then, maybe, just maybe, we could be back in the land of milk and honey.

Why not go the whole hog? Install a small, secure, indestructable nuclear plant - never have to fuel the vehicle again! The long term advantage is that the vehicle will last for ever, thus reducing the need to keep building new cars.

Michael

A $100 a barrel might be what the cost is currently, but take a look at the futures markets and see their prediction for next year in fact they are saying $200 a barrel plus! Now where does that leave us? Also Tata motor corporation announced today their Nano model, costing just £1200, this will open up a huge market for first time car ownership and also place even greater pressure on an already dwindling fuel resource.

Electric cars need to be able to travel further on their batteries but the cost of electricity is always going to increase. Unless the motorist is prepared to stand up and be counted regarding fuel charges then they will just continue to increase. The only way fuel prices will be reduced is for the public to support a fuel blockage all over the country. People do not seem to realise that the rocketing cost of fuel has a knock on effect with everything they buy. Transportation costs increase for all goods and services so who pays for it all? The consumer of course. Do wages/pensions increase to cover the cost of the increases? No of course they don't. We need an organisation to coordinate a fuel storage blockage to bring the country to a standstill until the government reduces the levy on fuel.

In a few minutes I can fill the tank of my Fiat Scudo van with about 85 litres of diesel which will take me and a decent load about 800 miles without re-filling. When range is as good, and when battery re-charging is as quick or battery changing is as clean, maybe I will start to think seriously about electric propulsion. Until then it is simply not a credible option, and probably never will be unless electric propulsion can be applied to heavy goods vehicles first, with light vans following.

progress is wonderful but where is the cost of disposing of the battery pack which I am told is fairly frequent and costly. What is truth?
As with nuclear generated electricity is the true cost of electric cars in the disposal of the waste.

Oh and I forgot, the price of electric cars will fall as production increases, simple as that, and Henry Ford didn't invent the petrol car but he did make it widely available - in black

Martin Pook

surely electric cars are a waste of time until we find a way to produce masses amount of electric for very little cost and no CO2 out put surely if we ALL got a electric car the extra power needed for us all to use them would creat equal amount of CO2 in production of this extra power.
a besides our "OH so great" tossers in the labour goverment would only wack a huge tax on that on them!
they have as much intrest in saving the plant as i have in the gun control network (another bunch of useless idiots i must quote)
at the end of the day the evidence and infomation i have viewed shows no but....

The original question was would you buy an electric car. Yes, if one were suitable for my needs. I run a Landcruiser (yes 4x4 3L turbo diesel) which is used for towing so it will be an interesting vehicle to replace it. I remember trolley buses in Bournemouth and the acceleration was staggering so I have little doubt it could be done.
How about an electric car with a genset to recharge? The American Railways use these as shunters, diesels running at set speeds are much more economic and can charge your batteries as required.
The only sensible way to generate electricity is nuclear, you can top up with wind or tide or photo but you need a solid base of electricity whatever the weather.
On the subject of taxation, if you want all the things governments provide, health service etc., then you have to pay tax on something.
Of course politicians think we are morons - we must be, we voted for THEM
Martin Pook

I understand that this site is not empowered by the green, nor I 1m one, whoever we have to look at the big picture. One day or another fossil fuel will stop. In the mean time and in order to not have to drop our live styles, why not make some changes. Do you need to go to work?? Can you work from home? That is 200gbp per month better off. You cannot avoid the office or factory. Fine get a motorbike a bike, which can do the small middle week shop run as well. A still remember on my young age (long time ago) we would join 4 our 5 of us and use only one car and do the week shopping, which was not a problem as the supermarket was visited on a Saturday afternoon after the pub. If I couldn’t go, a list was ready made and money left to a trustworthy person. Let technology come out of necessity instead of panic.
EV ‘s will only displace the problem. No one will be giving us free energy, that commodity is too profitable. We will have to get around the fact that energy is costly, and we have to payee for it. Our action and way of thinking have to change, our society as to be more acceptant of impositions, us as a WORLD have to stop been egoist and self-centre. Perfection is extremely difficult to achieve all great man tried and failed, but compromise is easy and it work. We are a capitalist society. So money needs money to make money. Place more silver on the scientist’s hand and let him work.

Tell our politicians the laws of physics apply as well in politics, all action as an opposite reaction.

But above all remember ‘’ if you think that knowledge is expensive and costly! You should experience ignorance’’

What I m trying to say is, if you want to sort out this diesel, petrol, electric, ….
Problem / solution we have to sort out ourselves first. The truth only hurts until we realize that the other one is right, the lie hurt forever.

EV's are a viable reality and we should have had the option to drive them years ago.

Car manufacturers are inextricably linked with the oil/petrochemical industry and if there is oil to sell at an expensive price, the industry and government will keep promote EVs as a thing of the future until they can find a way to make the same kind of profit out of it.

What we need to do is ensure that everyday people realise that EVs are a practical cheap and environmentally better option than petrol - if people have the demand some manufactures will produce and then EV demand will snowball.

EVs are exciting to me because it represents a way of getting freedom from a socially and environmentally damaging economy which is based on the extraction of fininte resources. I want out and everyone else should too - decentralised energy production through solar wind and combined heat and power is the way forward in my opinion and this would take the control out of this insane so called 'modern' society.

Convert a car to an EV, get a pro to do it for you - it will much less than a conventional car in the long run and will help you escape the grip of government and industry.

If you could produce your own energy with your neigbours at a low cost and then put it in to your vehicle without anyone taking a - frankly disgusting profit - from damaging your own habitat, wouldn't you want the choice?

what i want to know is how long would it take me to get to inverness or west coast of scotland its approx 300miles so i would have to stop and get a charge up at least twice and where would i put the luggage and dogs?????

Electric Cars,Water Powered Cars, in the end the Government will find ways of imposing taxes vat @? + so on & so on, in the end it is the consummer who still pay $ suffer.

This is now the way forward as petrol prices are only going one way-UP. As a self employed sales rep on the road daily I welcome a reliable EV with open arms.

Booboo: Clearly you can list these papers then. I'd be most interested in reading them if I haven't already done so, because your claim that contradictions exist so big as to doubt climate change is equally amusing. There is no doubt about anthropogenic climate change, simply over how bad it may be and the details on how it will affect certain areas.

I await your response, list author, study title and journal, if you could.

Thank you.

Just got back from Egypt, petrol there is 13 Lts. for one English pound

They think the price we are paying for petrol is a big joke.

Fred (604) your car awaits you at your nearest Honda or Toyota dealer, their petrol / electric hybrids work just as you describe (except the solar roof). Although their battery capacity is quite small they avoid the fuel overhead of pulling away and as a result give outstanding fuel economy in their class (50-60 MPG) (some will say a pocket diesel is better but that is a different class).

The petrol / elecric hybrid is the stepping stone to the EV of tomorrow, more interest in these cars today will hasten the development of pure EV's.

There are government inducements to use these cars £15 VED, congestion charge exempt, really cheap to run as a company car. Get these tax breaks while the're hot, it won't last forever!

MarkTime

Oliver L. Shaw, many thanks for your contribution

For me the ideal car will have

-brake system which charges battery
-battery which is used when in city, as it would mean a lot of stop and start, which kills the mpg on a combustion energy
-stop and start technology, if a combustion engine is needed
-if a combustion engine is used, the fuel consumption would be electronically regulated, so acceleration would be limited (I know I can dramatically improve my mpg, by taking into account I am gonna encounter another stop light in the next 30 secs :-)
-the roof should be made of solar panels so batteries are continually charged.

the big problem is capacity of the batteries, which hopefully, science will address. Seems like progress is made on a daily basis

I think environment is a matter of Globe politics; us little end-users are not going to be able to do much about this, at most we can tell our politicians we would like a viable alternative. But if Presidents, Prime ministers, Monarchs,...do not decide to put their foot down and agree on 1 direction,...well, let's face it, there is not much you can do about it.

I think, on a political level, we are stuck because no politician will dare to impose restrictive laws on producing 'dirty' cars, scared not to be re-elected or not receive those valuable 'donations'. But hitting the voters is so much easier. Why do we not have a Governmental commission that sets targets, regardless of what colour governs the country at that point in time?
As soon as 1 MP decides to make a step forward, we change government and punish people who decided to stand up. Sooner or later we are gonna have to face up, and the sooner the better, as it will only hurt more and more, until 'Nature' decides to modify the course of action.

(We know we should achieve something by 2010, but nobody enforces or measures it and it we are gonna miss the boat and feel even more deflated)

So yes I do believe the Government is to put there money where their mouth is.

As a motorist that does 30k+ miles a year because of the distance I have to
drive to get to work. (can't afford to move closer because of the huge increase in house prices and the stamp duty costs) Over the last few weeks petrol companies have been increasing their prices 1p a litre almost every week.
This has resulted in the price going up by 8p a litre that's almost 40p a gallon and you see a difference in the same town of 3p a litre.

Since the prices broke through the £1.00 a litre barrier the petrol companies
seem to be out to raid our hard earned cash quite openly.

Also before the £1.00 barrier was broken the difference between petrol and
diesel was 1p now its 5p that's a 500% increase in 8 weeks.

Is it any wonder people are fed up with the way they get treated by major
corporations and this Government.

I was a teenager at the end of the seventies when labour were last in power for longer than they should. Then we had power cuts no fuel etc and the infamous "winter of discontent" talk about De ja vue. Trouble is unlike then the people of this country have been battered into submission due to the constant bombardment from those PC morons.

Please lets get the fight back in this country and break-free from this Nanny
state. More importantly lets stand up and fight these highway robbers that
quite openly steal our hard earned cash.

Ok so most of us could use an Electric car!.
So i question why are they so expensive?, they dont have any where near as many moving parts with the exception of the drivetrain they dont have cooling systems,water pumps,fancy sensors, no lube oil we reduce the moving parts by probably 100 yet i note to find that they are more expensive than a conventional petrolcar and will be until battery technology improves. Do the cars prices reflect a replacement battery pack of about £2000+?
After that you cant sleep at night due to the power stations pumping out C02 while you charge the damn thing so your doing nothing for global warming, and as soon as the government start losing tax, yes you guessed, we will get clobbered.
Yes i would consider an Electric car but hell get real on the prices,stop ripping us off!

Oh dear!! (Posts 31 and 69)

Unfortunately the system described, of an electric car in which the motion of the car is used to recharge the batteries (when driving at a steady speed on a level road), is a form of perpetual motion. Despite this having been sought after in some quarters for at least as long as there has been recorded history, it is scientifically a non-starter. It is entirely contrary to the laws of physics, specifically the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

In this instance, any vehicle moving through the air loses energy to the air by friction and other mechanisms; this energy eventually reappears as waste heat (in the air), and is dissipated. Similarly energy is lost due to friction in all the bearings of the moving parts, and due to hysteresis in the tyres, and all this lost energy eventually reappears as waste heat, which is dissipated to the environment. One very promising field of development over the last hundred years, and more, has been and continues to be to minimise these losses, most visibly seen in the streamlined body shapes of today's cars and of "concept" cars auggested for the future - but although they can be reduced they can never be completely eliminated.

That is the bottom line; even without considering the form of power unit, and ignoring any needs for acceleration, and for hill-climbing (let's keep things as simple as possible there, by assuming that we eventually arrive back at our starting point, e.g. home), if we move any structure at all on wheels through the air this dissipates energy in the form of waste heat. In order for movement to take place, energy therefore has to be supplied, ultimately in order to balance that loss of energy.

If you use the motion of a car to charge a battery, you are then extracting even more energy from the movement of the vehicle, so you correspondingly increase the amount that you have to supply in the first place.

Unfortunately we can never have a system that is 100% efficient, i.e. one in which the overall losses are reduced to zero (this is another consequence of the Second Law of Thermodynamics). So if we extract energy to charge a battery, the amount of new energy that we now have to supply is MORE than the energy that we can put into the battery.

So the system as described actually increases rather than reduces the inefficiencies of the system, and so increases the net fuel (or energy) consumption.

What CAN be done, and has occasionally been done (from as far back as the 1920s, as with the Owen petrol-electric vehicles if I remember correctly), is to use battery charging instead of brakes to recover PART OF the energy which has previously been used to accelerate the car (and is now stored as kinetic energy by virtue of its speed) when the time comes to slow the vehicle down. Brakes simply waste energy, converting it into waste heat (which is why brakes get hot), whereas battery charging stores part of it (most of it in a well-designed and matched system), and dissipates only a modest proportion as waste heat.

Similarly when descending hills, PART OF the energy which has previously been used to climb hills (and is now stored as gravitational potential energy) can be recovered and stored in a battery, rather than using brakes to control the speed of descent.

This helps considerably, and is already well-known technology. Without checking I suspect that it may be the basis of the Telma brake used on some long-distance coaches, and may possibly also be exploited in the Toyota Prius, and it was certainly in use in a handful of vehicles eighty or so years ago. However although this helps, we can never recover all the energy used in moving a vehcile, let alone make a profit on the process, for the reasons explained above.

Hope this helps the understanding.





Oliver L. Shaw
Retired Head of Physics, and A Level Physics Examiner

I welcome anything which reduces one's carbon footprint and also reduces the cost of motoring, but there are still immense problems that remain unsolved. High amongst these, whether for electric vehicles or for alternative fuels for internal combustion engines, is the distribution network for recharging / refuelling. At present this is geared almost exclusively to (mineral) petrol & diesel, with LPG coming a desperately poor third, biofuels barely starting to scratch the surface of the problem, and hydrogen and electricity effectively non-starters as yet.

Given that situation electric vehicles may well suit those whose motoring is only short range, but they still seem to be very seriously limited for longer journeys, and for virtually any use away from one's home area. With petrol or diesel one has a reasonable tank range, and then one can readily fill up on a journey in the space of a few minutes.

Recharging a battery, even if charging points were readily available, is a matter of hours rather than minutes, which is quite useless if the need arises during the course of a journey. A possible way forward might be an exchange battery scheme, with an extensive nationwide network of battery exchange stations, but this would be an enormous undertaking to set up, and I suspect that the exchange battery costs would go vastly higher than the figures quoted in your article, and probably much closer to the costs of petrol.

Even LPG, which is a semi-green option - no particulate emissions, and insofar as it is what would otherwise be a waste product and have to be burned at the refinery it has zero new emissions when burned instead in a car engine - is severely limited by distribution problems. There is little to be found in Wales (even in Milford Haven, where they refine the stuff, and where they also import it!) - not much in Cornwall or Norfolk, and none at all in the Western Highlands. I found this problem the hard way, when I ran my previous car on it. And this alternative fuel has been around for perhaps ten years.

Biofuels, which are potentially more promising, and which I am now trying to use in my present car, are incredibly difficult to source. There are just two biodiesel outlets listed in the whole of Merseyside, one of which has never yet answered my phone calls, and the other was closed for a full fortnight over Christmas and New Year. There are none at all listed in North Wales, just one in the whole of Cheshire (at Birkenhead), none in Norfolk, none in Suffolk, etc. etc.

One cannot practically rely on any alternative fuel if it is not readily available, not only at home but also on a journey.

And quite a lot of us cannot afford to run an additional vehicle purely for (and necessarily restricted to) local running; even if some of our driving is indeed local we need a vehicle that will also serve for non-local use.

A second problem, particularly in the winter months, but also late evening or very early mornings in autumn and early spring, is how do you adequately heat an electric vehicle?

Before someone else asks; what length of longer journeys do I typically do? Routinely, up to about 250 miles (each way, with of course the opportunity to re-charge at my destination, if using an electric vehicle), often towing a boat (so I can't use public transport instead), when I visit my godson and his family; this is up to half a dozen times per year. Occasional business trips, up to 200 miles each way, with potantial need then to recharge overnight at the hotel - and how many hotels do you see offering this facility?...); these are up to three or four times per year. Holidays (almost always towing either caravan or boat): main holiday anything from 1000 to 2500 miles touring, over the course of four to six weeks; shorter breaks anything up to perhaps 500 miles per break.




Oliver L. Shaw

In my opinion whether electric cars " take off" or not the Government will ensure that some sort of new tax is introduced. After all we are ripped off with petrol so why not some other form of transport. All they want is our money to waste on something or other. I also firmly believe that because of the number of cars on the road the only thing they can do is to gradually make motoring so expensive that some cannot afford it anymore. It is political suicide to say so but over time they will keep increasing the costs so that more and more give up driving. I guess they will hope that as this is a gradual thing they will not be penalised politically. Don't trust a single one of them!!!

Been following this Blog with interest and amusement. So far we seem to have captured just about all the extreems of opinion. Personally I signed up
to "petrolprices" in the hope of reducing my fuel outlay a little bit. I already drive a hybrid car and that helps a lot. For others who wish to shave a bit more off their fuel costs there is one simple measure which works for hybrid, petrol or diesel... don't drive faster than 60Mph. Once you start to exceed 60 the extra enrgy needed to push you vehicle through the air increases rapidly with resultant greater fuel consumption.
As to the Electric car, I feel sure this will eventually be the norm, but it's still a long way off and the hybrid (possibly with plug-in option) will be an intermediate step. It will happen, but some people will just take longer to catch on.

Yes, I can see it now, the hard shoulder of the M4 littered with little cars with flat batteries, lane one full of standard electric cars unable to overtake HGVs, lane two with freshly charged vehicles and lane three reserved for Duracell powered vehicles only!
Pulling in to 'fill up' on a long journey with an electric car, i.e. changing the batteries is a bit dodgy, five miles up the road and then you find that the batteries are faulty!
What happened to the guy in the 60's who claimed he could run a car on two tablets and water?

I KNOW PETROL IS DEAR BUT IF YOU GET AN ASDA CARD YOU GET 2p off A LITRE,IF YOU GET YOUR PETROL OR DIESEL FROM THERE STATIONS BUT MAKE SURE YOU PAY OFF THE CARD EACH MONTH OR THEY CHARGE YOU INTEREST.

incidentally along with trying to be energy efficient at home (a+ rated appliances, energy saving lights bulbs and all that) i'm also into recycling - which is why i now own a 1972 ford capri. instea dof buying a swanky new car which has cost a lot to environment for the production etc i'm resuing a car that's already been around a long time - it has been well maintained, has an engine which is suitable for it's size - it's enough to move the car at the speeds needed for our roads but not so ridiculously big a 3 litre plus engines in these pointless 4 wheel drive monstrosities people insist on driving their kids half a mile to school in. it will be converted to lpg purely to help save me a bit of money and will be maintained to ensure it's as environmentally friendly as far as emissions go etc (it's also much simpler to maintain myself)

it also has the bonus of being tax exempt and also exempt of tolls :)

without wanting to sound too much of a pessimist (and possibly repeating what others may have mentioned) firstly the government *love* taxes, it keeps their wallets fat and them in fnacy houses and snazzy cars. if everyone switched to lpg/electric/hydrogen etc they'll just start adding duty to that instead so int he long run it could cost just as much.

second if everyone sacks fuel driven cars in favour of electric where/who do we sell the old fuel cars to? if everyone wants an electric/alternative fuel car noone is going to buy the petrol/diesel car you currently own - i doubt there's many who can afford to just chuck away the old car for nothing and buy a brand spanking new one(i know garages currently do part ex etc but that's only because currently they know they can sell it on to another customer).

third in order to fully combat alleged global warming we'd need to make sure the electricty used to power these vehicles was also from a green source - granted many of these vehicles are carbon neutral so allegedly they balance the amount of carbon produced by the power station to produce the electricity but this sin't exactly a solution, in order to be totally green the electricity would need to be produced in a clean green way also.

finally what happens if you break down on the motorway/main road/little country road in the sticks because you've run out of charge? with a fuel car it's simple enought o find a nearby petrol station with a jerry can and get a couple of litres of fuel to help you limp to said garage to top up. unless they plan on installing plug sockets along the length of the m1 etc this could prove tricky - or would force people to all join breakdown services just so on the off chance you ru out of juice they can tootle along with a generator to charge you up (and probably at an extortionate cost as it's they have a capative market)

i'm a scientist and am fairly skeptical of this view that we are the sole cause of global warming and a lot of what is rammed down our throats is just propaganda as far as i'm concerned (i did study climate ad climatic change as part of my degree). yes it is an issue but there's many many factors involved not just the drop in the ocean of increased co2 - take into account firstly the earth was a damn site hotter a few thousand years ago and second as an example during the industrial revolution (a time when we went nuts with burning fossil fuels and churning co2 into the atmosphere) global temperature went down - the government are clever at picking out the bits of info from the years of scientific research to support their own point of veiw and leaving out the rest as it may disprove what they are claiming.

I do agree that meausres need to be taken to protect the earth and try and undo some of the damage we have cause so far but crippling the motol industry will not do this (plus increased fuel costs and duties also has a knock on effect of increasing costs of everything else too - train fares, bus fares (the public transport they push us to use instead), food, home items plus any servicing as it requires transport to get to your home etc... public transport also needs to be more favourable to get people to use it - it's heavily unreliable and inconvenient - i live just in the suburbs but would be unable to bus to work and back home as the earliest bus isn't early enough to get me to work for 8:30 and the last bus leaves at 5:30 so if i need to work a bit late i'm stuck with a bus ride half way home and a half hour walk - it's just not feasable.

sorry rant over!

electric is the way to go.finnish with the oil crisis.only we will have to have diesel for heavy goods for a decade

I'am a petrolhead,ever since i first tuned a 1600 X-flow on an MkII Escort.
All electrical cars should be given a boost though,25000 volts to fry them.and a gallon of petrol and a match to be on the safe side.