Anyone with even a basic understanding of earth sciences knows that oil is a finite resource on this planet and we’re going to run out. Put all the politics aside of predicting when that last drop of dino juice will be consumed. Also ignore the whole easy vs hard to access deposits (tar sands, deep water, ecologically sensitive areas etc) because those are just the sad last ditch grasps of an addict who refuses to admit he has to get clean. The bottom line is there is X amount of oil on the planet and when X never gets bigger and you keep subtracting our demand Y eventually X = 0.
So what’s the answer to keep our beloved form of transportation, the auto-mo-car humming along into the next century? Vote and discuss. Poll is private.
With the amount of money Toyota is pouring into Hybrid (and everyone else is following/buying their old tech) The answer can only be electric. Obviously, depending on where you live in the country, you’ll get your electricity via water/wind or other sources. You get your water/wind or other sources (i.e. the sun) from different sources based on your location on Earth.
I think hybrids are just a stop gap measure. The complexity of their almost dual drive systems and continued reliance on oil makes them hard to see as a true long term solution.
Pure electric vehicles will be part of the solution, especially in 2 car families, but there are major technical hurdles to overcome regarding battery longevity when you start approaching consumer acceptable charge times for long road trips (5 minutes from empty to 90+% capacity). Some journalist might find it acceptable to take an hour break to hang out at a coffee bar while his Tesla recharges to get from NYC to DC but the average driver is going to stick with his 5 minute gas stop. Battery and capacitor advances might solve this hurdle but it’s definitely not a simple engineering problem.
What we have an abundance of is water. If anything with the threat of rising sea levels we’ve got too much of it. My bet is on fuel cells for the long term, with the hydrogen coming first from the falling natural gas prices fracking is causing and then as demand picks up advances in nuclear power and electrolysis methods. We already have the tech to fill a car sized fuel cell tank from empty to full in 4 minutes. We already have the tech to add hydrogen production to existing nuclear plants using the steam and electricity they currently produce.
CNG vehicles will probably make up a decent portion as well but even with increased natural gas supplies there simply isn’t enough to replace oil in our vehicle fleets and still heat our homes with it.
I’ve focused on batteries for four years and that hardly makes me an expert, but…
I’m actually very impressed by that compressed gas hybrid coming out of France. That’s a way cool idea.
Jay – I think you hit the nail right on the head. Our current batteries are not suitable for traditional vehicle use. I absolutely think there is a scientific answer, but we’re on the wrong path by building up production capacity. We’ve driven costs down considerably (engineering and manufacturing), but the batteries are still not ready from a physics standpoint. So maybe it is electrics, maybe it’s fuel cell, maybe it’s “whatever fits your needs best”.
As far as I know, Toyota is building a lithium battery plant with Panasonic. Whatever… I’m keeping an eye on Sakti3 because it’s a fresh idea taking advantage of the past 20 years of CVD advancements. The CEO, Dr. Ann Marie Sastry, is brilliant from all aspects and has really grown the startup in a smart direction rather than just accept any money offered.
I’m definitely interested in your take on battery tech. My personal experience there is from RC planes and helis which are always pushing the boundaries of EXISTING tech and some reading about potential future tech. I’d really like to hear from someone who’s been working on future tech.
And yeah Bobby, other would include human power, though that specific design looks really inefficient. How much do those stone rolling pin wheels weight do you think? Honestly I put that in there because I knew I’d forget at least one legit power source.
I think the big hurdle now are the batteries and not just with cars, any tech. The minute a company figures out how to get substantially more power to fit into a battery there is going to be an explosion of technology. The only question is how far out is that? My guess is we’ll figure that out before we run out of oil though.
The next step is pure electric. If stupid people would get over their Nuclear fears, we could have much cheaper Electricity. Couple that with a few more years of fast-charging research, and I think we’ll be seeing a solid era of all-electric vehicles.
I think CNG will be an interim solution until whatever form of electric/fuel cell is officially ready to go. Ideally something that utilizes solar or seawater. We have a shitload of natural gas but at the end of the day it’s still a fossil fuel.
Once this is proven on a large scale, and as long as some Jane Fonda type hippy doesn’t wage a PR war against it, we’ll be quite well off when it comes to electricity. Now how we use that electricity, either in electric cars or to create fuel cells for vehicles is yet to be known. And then there is the subject of infrastructure…
Essentially you can’t speculate as to what vehicles will be powered by (micro) until you know what next generation source of energy will power countries, cities, industry, etc. (macro)
Well, I only worked on future tech at UB. I’ve been working on lead-acid for a year and a half now. So, if you want answers about your SLI battery, your marine battery, your golf cart battery…
I think we’re moving in the right direction. The current manufacturing process for lithium-ion batteries is wet slurry particulates on metal foils. There is a considerable amount of waste here in terms of anatomy (i.e. very little of the battery cell’s mass contributes to the energy it can store). The metal foil, the binder to hold it on to the metal, the carbon in the cathode, the metal foils themselves, the electrolyte – all are participants and necessary but only the cathode active material (lithium cobalt oxide, lithium iron phosphate, nickel aluminum cobalt, etc) and the anode active material (graphite) store electrons. It’s also a process that is prone to inconsistencies. These processes were developed 20 or 30 years ago when we didn’t have the advanced manufacturing processes we have now.
So, I’ll just post a link to some videos below.
this one really explains where we’re going:
this one really explains the type of opportunities out there if we don’t wait around in the smoke of current technology:
and, more from the first speaker about how a startup should…startup:
