Not only is it easier to regulate it, it's also much, much easier to make it clean. A powerplant puts out a lot less pollution per KWH than a small engine as used in a typical motor vehicle.

that's .72 now, just think if everybody started using the grid, they'd have to charge more.

and more for building new powerplants




And even more when the oil company's buy out the power company's...

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-1983 VW Rabbit LS Diesel (5speed, VNT/Giles build)

I agree that the price will go up, but the generation and distribution of electricity is inherently much more efficient than that of gasoline in small internal-combustion engines.

It will always be cheaper to burn electricity than gasoline, even in the power plants themselves are powered by such an expensive fuel.

There is loss due to batteries, of course, but the price difference leaves a lot of cushion to absorb that. Then, in addition, you can get a timer to charge your car only at night when there is excess capacity to be had, often at a lower price.

I'd like to see that proven.

For example, disposing of an IC car is relatively benign -- remove fluids and battery then sqeeze & melt. With an electric car the battery maintenance and disposal becomes very serious, a huge environmental problem. Not saying that IC emissions aren't a problem, just that I haven't seen a cost comparison of appropriately scaled data.

Also, I think gasoline & diesel burn more cleanly than most fuels burned in conventional power plants. Again I could be wrong, but I'd like to see it objectively compared.

Finally, just from thermal efficiency, the IC engine is thermally more efficient than an electric motor requiring conversion (fuel to mechanical to electrical) and transmission and conversion (electrical to mechanical), IIRC. I feel pretty sure that's correct, but again I'd liek to see an actual comparison.

B

We'd do the same thing with the electric car batteries as we are doing with the batteries in our cars now... ship em to China and let them "recycle" them in their oceans

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1985 CA 300D Turbo , 213K mi

It's the economy of scale that makes electricity cheaper per KWH. As for the pollution, it looks like a lot coming from a plant, but how many small IC engines does that represent? I too would like to see this aspect objectively compared. I am guessing that it can be better controlled at a large plant.

I do agree that current battery technology leads to a massive problem with disposal. Clearly we need new batteries for this to work. They also need to last longer (more cycles) than current batteries. The price will start higher, but as production increases that will come down, just like it does for everything else.

even the most modern batteries are to violent.


Know what lithium does when exposed to water? what about in a crash, where heat is involved? what about rescuing passengers from a car tangled in hi-amp/volt wires?

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-1983 VW Rabbit LS Diesel (5speed, VNT/Giles build)

Ever seen a LiPo battery in a laptop catch fire from being overcharged? Imagine 2,000lbs of those batteries lighting off!

Sounds like a lean running turbo.

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You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows - Robert A. Zimmerman

I haven't seen that. But I lost a friend to AC electrocution. Is DC electrocution the same hazard/amp as AC?

B

You should, it a very interesting event.
http://www.rcstuff.us/battery/lipo/lipo_DNA.html

AC or DC doesn't make too much of a difference since the battery systems are wired for 150-300V. Both will knock you on your @ss quite easily if you touch the wrong things.

Did she say: “…complete, and totally clean combustion…” ???

I didn’t know that fossil fuels were capable of “totally clean” combustion.

I understand the concept of “cleaner” and basic stoichiometry . But what is “totally clean” ???

- Shelby

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1980 300D - Veggie Burner !

Absolutely. Edison used to claim that AC was dangerous, but he was selling DC power and Westinghouse was his main competitor with AC power.

Edison went so far as to electrocute small animals at county fairs, to prove how dangerous AC power was.

The problem isn't AC v. DC., but rather the voltage. 4KV will kill you instantly, 110V might not. AC allows high-voltage transmission using transformers at the load site. DC does not, so you need 110V transmission lines. That also means that you have to live no more than a few miles from the generator. Think of the cost of electricity if Edison's plan had won.

If you assume that the human body has a constant resistance, then your explaination holds true. But if people get wet, sweaty, impaled by pointy electricified probes (current right into bloodstream)- the voltage required to draw .03Amps of current through your body goes down. (0.03A ? keep reading...)

The Navy taught me (I'm surprised you don't remember this Bot) that .03A is all that is required to end someone's life - which is why most cars and European (safety nazis come from Europe=) industrial equipment operate at 12 or 24v - If you only have 24v, over a Navy-assumed body resistance of 300ohm- (inter-post consistency fail), you will never get .03amps.

if I had a multimeter, I'd measure my resistance right now and post it up, but I'm at a Union plant and not allowed to carry one... =)

As to Bot's question - I think that the problem is too complex to define definitively- Rumors that I heard asid that getting shocked by AC will tend to make your muscles contract or jerk, and a DC shock will tend to make your muscles stay where they are. Obviously, the muscle jerk reaction will increase the chance that you dont keep touching what was shocking you, but I've been shocked by both 110VAC and 100VDC and while they felt different, I can't say that my arm muscles reacted any diffferently each time
I'm my opinion, both Ac and DC are equally capable of passing current through you and causing irreprable damage.
In the real world, sources of AC are usually at 110v (the wall outlet) and sources of DC are usually smaller (batteries, capacitors....). There is probably a "fault current capacity" arguement in there somewhere that says - the theoretical maximum current of a given battery is still less than the maximum current that can be delivered by a home/industrial AC circuit (before its breaker opens...) and like I parroted earlier, its the current that gets you. This last argument (which Is still my conjecture) flies in teh face of a car battery (which can instantaneously create a LOT of current and doesnt come with circuit breakers when installed)

Matt L - I'm not trying to e-thug on you, I'm sorry if my post comes across this way. Its also possible that the navy fed me crap for 6 years and the ET training that I based my conjecture on was flawed. Wouldn't be the first time that a military dude got fed crap =) If anyone has better facts, I'm open to hear them.

omg what a threadjack. back on topic - while we can make more efficient combustion-based engines, they stuff have to burn stuff, and therefore make CO and NOx's. No way around this (except nuclear power =)

-John

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2009 Kia Sedona
2009 Honda Odyssey EX-L
12006 Jetta Pumpe Duse
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Husband, Father, sometimes friend =)

No worries. What you posted sounds very reasonable.

Well, it's almost not a jack, since grid power will be used to supplement gasoline in the near future.