New Electric Car

[birgco]

GM recently announced the production of its electric hybrid car the "Chevy Volt" set to hit showrooms sometime in 2010.
(for anyone counting that's a little more than a year away)
Now call me naive, call me simple-minded, but never call me a negative thinker because this automobile and others like it, will mean the demise of oil and gasoline as the primary source of power to move us from point A to point B . Of course the nay-sayers will point to the EV-1 and say we've been down that road before, but what makes this car different is a better battery storage system, quicker charges, a small back up gas engine in case you do run out of power and 4 passenger seating. GM claims that about 90% of consumers will use no gasoline at all.
I can also see an electric vehicle in the very near future, with solar cells fused into the paint surface that would eliminate the need to charge up during the day, and with an advanced battery system, could eventually mean no charging at all. Imagine a car with no oil changes, no gas bills, no tuneups and no emissions.
Now the doom and gloom crowd will also point to the fact that electricity will still need to be produced at dirty power plants. This is true, but there is the existing technology, wind, solar and geothermal, to make coal and oil fired utilities a thing of the past.
Also, while not the perfect solution, domestic natural gas is cleaner burning than coal or oil and would make a good transition fuel until cleaner technologies are put into mass production and there is plenty to last well into mid-century and beyond. The dirty power plant solution will take leadership from the Federal Government ( I can't believe I used "leadership" and "Federal Government" in the same sentence) and intense pressure from the public, but stranger things have happened.
Our independence from fossil fuels and the subsequent reduction in greenhouse gases is possible, especially if we can stop all the whining and focus on the positive solutions at hand to solve the problem.

[csintexas]

The volt is ugly. I think the Aptera is a much better design and shows the benefits of thinking outside the box (although it is only a 2.5 passenger car and larger cars will have to be produced).

People have already produced cars completely covered by PV panels, but unless we can get the conversion up to near 100% the sun will not supply enough power to make an all solar car practical.

I still don't see how only saying positive things helps. I certainly believe it is possible to live entirely off renewable fuels but people won't actually do it because it will require a much simpler life style.

This Chevy Volt is a good example why. Chevy is struggling to make the 6 speaker stereo system more efficient whereas I would just take the whole system out, not only saving energy but also weight and cost. If people want to listen to something when they are driving they can bring their devices with them. It looks like the estimated cost is up to 35k making it not affordable for a very large part of the population.

In order to accomplish what we are talking about will require actual change. Technology is not magic and saying only positive things doesn't make it better.

The compressed air powered car http://www.theaircar.com/acf/air-cars/the_air_car.html
is probably a much more realistic solution unless battery technology changes substantially.

[birgco]

[birgco]

Btw, the Volt ugly? maybe, but $4.39 per gallon of gas is really ugly!!!

(member of the sub-millenium club and proud of it)