Speaking of ICE noises....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_kwxzU4wL4
The thing is, kids growing up with electric supercars/race cars will probably prefer those noises over what I prefer. I imagine they would think of me the way I think of pre-war vehicles. Just not my style.
I think people are way too optimistic about the progress of the electric car. A lot of the projections rely on advances that haven't happened yet. We've made tiny steps on a long path. If you want an indicator of when electric cars will surpass ICE cars, "some Toyotas" by 2050 isn't it. Wait until more than half of the F150's sold are electric. I have a feeling that you will be waiting for a while.
What would be required for commercial air travel to get away from fossil fuels?
Well "combustion" they are going fuel cells like Honda has had in low volume production since the late 90s so...
Boost_Crazy wrote: I think people are way too optimistic about the progress of the electric car. A lot of the projections rely on advances that haven't happened yet. We've made tiny steps on a long path. If you want an indicator of when electric cars will surpass ICE cars, "some Toyotas" by 2050 isn't it. Wait until more than half of the F150's sold are electric. I have a feeling that you will be waiting for a while.
"Ray Kurzweil, 89 out of 108 predictions he made were entirely correct by the end of 2009. An additional 13 were what he calls “essentially correct" (meaning that they were likely to be realized within a few years of 2009), for a total of 102 out of 108."
It's closer than you think and this guy is making big money off of it.
In reply to Flight Service:
It would have been really nice if batter technology had changed as fast at ICE technology has over the last 100 years.
It IS a lot better than it was 100 year ago, but I don't see it as equal development.
Sure could change and catch up to the fuel tank, but we will see.
Battery and EV technology was pretty much ignored between the late 1800s and the late '80s. ICEs advanced greatly in that time but are DEEP into the diminishing returns now. Since EV and battery tech has gained interest in the last few decades, the progress has been vastly quicker than it ever was for ICEs. Look at the difference between a GM EV1 and the Tesla S. The difference in performance is like that between a '30s car and a current one.
In reply to GameboyRMH:
While I will agree that EV technology was at a virtual standstill, I will very much disagree that battery tech was.
It has evolved quite a bit, getting much smaller, and much more reliable. And when paired with electronics technology that has reduced the power requirement to do something- well..
But cars run on movement physics, which has not altered in 100 years. And when paired with bulk storage not changing much with the evolution of batteries, well...
The thing is that battery technology has taken off like a rocket since the '90s, driven by portable consumer electronics. In the late 1800s to 80s, there were minor advancements in lead-acid, the invention of alkaline batteries, nickel-iron batteries, ni-cads, a little early experimental work on ni-mh and li-ion...and that was it. And now battery tech is advancing at a speed rarely seen outside of the semiconductor industry. We already have li-fe and li-po batteries and there are new types in the prototype stage that will make everything we have now look like junk in comparison. Even current plain-jane li-ion batteries are good enough to drive on every day, if they were a bit cheaper EV adoption would skyrocket. And half of the problem of battery price holding EVs back is the artificially low price of oil right now.
GameboyRMH wrote: And half of the problem of battery price holding EVs back is the artificially low price of oil right now.
If this is true, wouldn't we see EV adoption in much of Europe be much higher than the US because fuel prices are artificially high due to taxation? Is EV adoption higher in countries with high fuel prices?
In reply to GameboyRMH:
If you focus on battery evolution using the electric car as your only filter, your reaction is pretty natural.
But EV battery evolution didn't really get going until LEVII legislation got going, which "forced" automakers to sell I think 5-10% EV's in California. Which lead to the EV1, and everyone making some kind of electric car. Once the PZEV rule trumped the EV part, that really relaxed everyone, but the development that DID happen resulted in hybrids.
Even those hybrid got (and still get) legislation help. Just as EV's do right now.
Before that, there always has been progression of smaller and more efficient batteries- not all mobile devices were purely electronic- as many also had motors spinning things. Those evolved before EV's did. All of the button batteries out there pre-date EV's by a pretty wide margin, and my first rechargeable batteries pre-dated LEVII by a few years.
We don't develop in a vacuum. Nobody does.
Again, I applaud Toyota for announcing this aggressive plan, but from where I sit, I'm not seeing the path- especially the 15 year path that some of you have posted.
It's one thing that systems are good enough, to you. But it's another that consumers don't generally agree with that.
I can't predict the day when I can get an EV that I can drive home and back on a -20F day, stay warm, and make it home and back in a car that makes a profit at $25k. That's when they become really good enough.
Well, I've been an EV tech since the nineties (electric forklifts and other industrial vehicles). I've been saying since the late nineties that the only thing holding back electric cars (from a technology standpoint) is battery tech. The motors and drive systems have been ready and waiting for a while. The forklift industry started switching over to AC drive in the late nineties, had it reliable by the early 2000s, and is now using AC even on the smallest electric pallet jacks.
You have to remember almost all of the EV tech in the 80s and early 90s was developed to defensively prevent tech from being sold. They aggressively wanted to kill it.
GM and Ford both killed very desirable for the time EVs GM the EV1 and Ford the EV Ranger.
In reply to Flight Service:
Actually, when the industry demonstrated vehicles that were cleaner than electric plants, they showed that the EV only law would violate the state constitution since PZEV cars were so much cleaner and cheaper than the EV mandate. And the deal was 5 PZEV's per EV was the trade off. PZEV's were cleaner and cheaper than EV's- so they were adopted.
If you look it up, every OEM had an EV- everybody would have rather had PZEVs.
GM spent $1B on the EV1. That's a lot of money just to kill it for no reason.
In reply to Flight Service:
It's closer than you think and this guy is making big money off of it.
I think you are applying this incorrectly. Computing power is not the same as battery technology. Show me a chart that shows battery capacity, life, and charge time doubling every 12 to 18 months. I don't think anyone questions the viability of electric motors or electricity. It's the battery storage and charge time, which has real physical limitations. That part of the equation has been very slow to advance when you step back and look at the big picture. We are a long way from an automotive battery that will store the energy equivalent of 10 gallons of gasoline, can be recharged in minutes, will last for years, and be cost effective.
Right now is the peak of the ICE. It is more efficient, powerful, reliable, and cleaner than it has ever been. I've said it before, the future is not EV's, it's hybrids. Two complimentary technologies, that replace the shortcomings of each other.
In reply to Boost_Crazy:
No this applies to tech in general. There is an exponential curve that if follows within a few years.
It is really amazing.
You'll need to log in to post.
