Thread: Electric vehicles, progress (from a marketing perspective)

And of course there are not the resources in the ground to switch the entire world transport fleet to batteries. Current first world maybe but not when the 3rd world comes online with electric vehicles.

So a totally electric world fleet is really just an intermediary step to something else - my guess is hydrogen once it is cost effective and non polluting to make it.

Meanwhile there's always another mountain in Kentucky to take the coal out of

You should all watch Justified just because its cool.

Regards,
Tote

Last time I checked, nearly 100% of Hydrogen available commercially (and cheaply) came from hydrocarbons and released metric shyte loads of CO2 in its production. A commercially viable quantity from a cleaner source (electrolysis of water by using solar power, wind etc) is currently not an option, at least in the near term.

PS. Nice clip Tote. That looks like a bit of fun TV!

Originally Posted by 101RRS

And of course there are not the resources in the ground to switch the entire world transport fleet to batteries. Current first world maybe but not when the 3rd world comes online with electric vehicles.

So a totally electric world fleet is really just an intermediary step to something else - my guess is hydrogen once it is cost effective and non polluting to make it.

Obviously Lithium is a stopgap, Lithium cells do not have enough energy density to satisfy petrol head range anxiety. Solid state or some other battery tech will be along shortly, even if its augmented by Fuel cell.

But notwithstanding there is no shortage of lithium

Is there enough lithium to feed the need for batteries?

I'm assuming someone knows how the numbers crunch on this (apologies if I'm bringing up something posted elsewhere but).


How much total 'bad gas' is produced to:
A) Drill for oil, convert to diesel, ship to a country, distribute to servos, fill diesel tank on my disco, drive 100km (15L/100km).
Generate electricity, transmit to my house, + mine for elements that go into batteries in BEV, to drive 100km.
?
C) Break down and dispose of my diesel engine.
D) Break down and dispose of batteries.
?

One of the points frequently overlooked in discussions such as "of course there are not the resources in the ground to switch the entire world transport fleet to batteries" is that these statements are always incomplete, in that they leave out "known".

Any mineral resource has a "known" reserve. This is the figure usually used in these discussions. In mining terms a "reserve" is legally defined and needs to have a very substantial degree of certainty. But it is also very heavily dependent on the price of the mineral and the mining technology. A good example is oil. If the price of oil goes up, the amount of reserves go up, and if it goes down, the reserves go down as wells are shut in when the cost of production exceeds the value of the oil produced.

There is a lag effect, as for most mining there are large capital costs, so the mine will not shut down until the operating cost exceeds the output value. (The operator may go broke, because they still have to pay interest on the loan, but the property will still be viable for the company that bought it at fire sale prices.) And no new mines will start, and there will be little if any exploration. Nobody spends money looking for minerals that they can't sell.

If we look at lithium (and the same sort of thing applies for other "rare" minerals used in EVs), until fairly recently, lithium was a niche product, mostly used in small (in mining terms) quantities in medicine and from WW2 in somewhat larger quantities in greases. Significant quantities have been used in nuclear weapons as well.

But because the demand is small, nobody has done anything much to look for it other than things such as literature searches, where it has been mentioned as secondary information noted while looking for something else.

So we really have no idea what quantities are available - and as noted, this depends on the price.

Some minerals, which are easy to identify, and are encountered looking for other minerals, may be "known" to exist way beyond "known reserves". These are often referred to as "resources" which is a much vaguer term, and not used consistently. A good example is coal. Coal is easily identified and is often seen in bores drilled for other purposes such as water or oil, and because of its known geological setting can be fairly confidently interpolated between these bores. We know from this information that Australia has truly vast coal resources - current and historical mining operations have barely scratched the surface.

This also gives an example of the things that can affect the viability of mineral deposits. Few today are probably aware that there used to be a coal mine at Balmain in inner Sydney, highlighting the fact that Sydney is entirely underlain by coal (but it is deep). Starting production in 1897, it hauled coal vertically over 800m, but its viability decreased as the railway lines from Lithgow and Newcastle were upgraded, making haulage of coal 150km cheaper than lifting it vertically 800m. Closed in 1932, it continued to produce methane until 1946. I wonder how many of the residents of "Hopetown Quays", now occupying the site are aware of this history?

This guy explains it all pretty well. Note that he gives citations for the information. It seems pretty unbiased to me, and he seems to have done the relevant calculations

To summarise, EV’s win the emissions debate even if they use coal power stations for the energy.

YouTube

Originally Posted by jezzarezza

This guy explains it all pretty well. Note that he gives citations for the information. It seems pretty unbiased to me, and he seems to have done the relevant calculations

To summarise, EV’s win the emissions debate even if they use coal power stations for the energy.

YouTube

I watched the video twice, and both times I failed to see where he added the emissions output in the production of the fuel for the ICE dependent car as well.
That is, he calculated the emissions output of the ICE vehicle, and then compared the emissions output of the EV vehicle, but never factored the additional emissions output to manufacture and distribute the fuel used for ICE.

So, the emissions output advantage of the EV will be a shorter time frame than he's calculated.

I still don't think battery powered EVs are the long term future, and why the hydrogen fuel/fuel cell option is the best way forward .. long term.
EVs now are the better option going into the future too, as they're easy(er) to then redesign to then switch over to a fuel cell setup.

Wind power shouldn't be a difficult task to use as the option for H2 production in the future.
The two downsides to wind power are lack of wind and what to do when there's too much power in the grid when the wind is still blowing?

Both issues shouldn't be too hard to offset adding hydrolysis mechanisms into their operation(apart from other storage mechanisms) into their overall power setups.
That is, when the wind is blowing and over capacity in the grid, then the wind turbine would then continue power production and channel that into hydrolysis.
The current favoured path for power storage for wind power is to refill hydro stations as a battery/storage system .. but why not a localised hydrolysis system instead?

What do you do when there's an excess of power production capability, and the grid is already at capacity? ... you keep the generators generating and then turn that into a potential energy .. whether that's battery storage(stupid idea on a large scale!) .. or refilling hydro network .. or better yet. . make H2

My main issue is vehicle cost.
I'm not rich, and I'm not the only one that's in this situation.
$40-70K for a new car .. just to feel better about myself coz I'm doing a part for the environment .. never going to happen.
Govt needs to step up to the task here and make it an option in whatever way they can .. eg. zero interest loans for exactly this purpose. eg. say I need $40-70K for a vehicle, if they had a 10-15yr no interest loan system that would cost me say $5K/yr to replay .. it'd be worth my while to seriously consider it.
As of now tho .. to get finance for a car that will end up costing me 2x the amount of initial purchase over a 5 year term .. AND to lose all that value due to depreciation! .. err no thanks .. I'd rather keep on outputting my CO2 allocation

There are literally million of 'Me's' in a similar situation .. a govt system would be 'household' means tested, so the already well off wouldn't then rip off the system to make it a viable mechanism.
This way the glacial pace of uptake that is invariably inherent with any new tech would be accelerated .. and the usual supply/demand mechanism would take over and new industries and markets are formed .. jobs and growth as former political party used to shout and dance about not too long ago.

if no one is driving hydrogen powered vehicles due to impossible an impossible price point, then the entire system is going to be a niche. lets say even 1000 vehicles on the roads .. across what ... 50K klms of road network?? .. how many refill stations would you expect to see?
How much H2 production would you expect to be made?
Give people the ability to buy into the system, x 1 million .. and I'm sure there's a rich fella somewhere rubbing their hands at the prospect of tapping into those billions.

Same thing happened all those years ago with diesel fuelled vehicles and LPG.
Even maybe 30 years ago .. try to find a non trucking type petrol station that sold diesel? Wasn't as easy as it is now. I can't remember the last time I drive past a petrol station that didn't sell diesel.
Same with LPG .. had to drive for miles to fill up back in the mid to late 80's .. then the LPG rebate came up as a govt scheme, and BAM!