Electric cars are cleaner, even when the power comes from coal

While I am not a fan of General Motors and their horrible past scandals with the electric car or their current federal financial bailout, I am surprised by the falsehoods that writers use to describe the Chevy Volt. The Aug. 10 column by Jonah Goldberg, a conservative commentator, has the facts just plain wrong.

Goldberg does not seem to understand some basic energy principles. Even with the source of electricity coming from the most polluting methods of production, in this case, coal, electric vehicles will produce significantly less CO2 and other toxic pollutants into the atmosphere than produced by gasoline engines.
This is because the efficiencies of electric motors are far greater than their gasoline counterparts. Gas engines produce lots of heat (thus are about 25 percent efficient), while electric motors produce little heat and thus can be up to 95 percent efficient.

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Hybrid revolution builds momentum

Could one American automaker's plan to sell a hybrid automobile for the same price as its gas-powered counterpart lead to more drivers enjoying a greener ride?

The car -- the Lincoln MKZ sedan, which debuts this fall -- will run on both gas and electrical power and get more than double the mileage of the traditional version in city driving.

Still, at $35,000, it doesn't come cheap.

The Lexus HS 250h, the MKZ's closest competitor, costs about $2,500 more than the Lexus IS, a similar small, gas-powered sedan. Ford charges $8,840 more for the hybrid version of its Ford Escape SUV.  

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Anti-global warming push also best for the economy

Until just recently the view prevailed that there was a tradeoff relationship between achieving respectable economic growth and reducing the emission of greenhouse gases, most of which consist of carbon dioxide. This led to a wide debate on how to achieve both goals.

A major change has occurred, however, since U.S. President Barack Obama initiated his Green New Deal, which has led me to believe that attaining CO2 

reduction targets requires the promotion of environment-friendly products and renewable energy, and that therein lies the driving force for economic growth among industrialized nations.Take, for example, solar cells, which are, at present, installed on the rooftops of only 2 percent of residential houses in Japan. The current cost of installing solar cells is about ¥600,000 per kilowatt of electricity. So, about ¥1.8 million — about the price of an automobile — is needed to equip a house with cells generating 3 kw.

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New Battery for Cheap Electric Vehicles

A new startup company will attempt to solve the biggest roadblock facing electric vehicles today--the cost of their batteries.

The new company, called 24M, has been spun out of the advanced battery company A123 Systems. It will develop a novel type of battery based on research conducted by Yet-Ming Chiang, a professor of materials science at MIT and founder of A123 Systems. He says the battery design has the potential to cut those costs by 85 percent.
The battery pack alone in many electric cars can cost well over $10,000. Cutting this figure could make electric vehicles competitive with gasoline-fueled cars.
The new company has raised $10 million in venture-capital funding, and about $6 million from the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), which will fund collaboration between the company and MIT and Rutgers University. A123 Systems will work closely with the new company, and owns stock in it. The name stands for "24 molar," referring to material concentration levels that Chiang cryptically calls "technically significant" to the company.

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Emissions Free Electric Vehicle Bus Uses Leo Motors 120kW EV Power Train

PRLog (Press Release) – Aug 14, 2010 – Leo Motors, Inc. (Stock Symbol: LEOM) announced today that it has developed and begun marketing of its 120kW power train, which is equivalent to a 5,000cc Internal Combustion Engine (ICE). See the Leo Motors website (http://www.leomotors.com) for images, EV technical information and more details. 

Power trains of this size are used in the bigger passenger cars, middle-sized buses and t 
rucks. Consisting of a proprietary motor, controller and battery pack, the 120kW power train incorporates Leo’s innovative power management solutions designed to control vehicles better than their ICE counterparts. 

Leo’s 120kW power train was tested in a 24-seat bus for more than six months. Leo converted Hyundai’s County bus and had it run at more than 70 MPH with the power train. According to the test results, the converted bus ran faster and smoother than its ICE counterparts, but without emissions, noise or vibration. 

Leo will market the 120kW power train in two ways: 

1) Leo is primarily going to provide conversion services to clients who need EVs for their vehicle fleet operations. 


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Could Tata's EV beat Nissan to the streets?

Electric vehicles from Indian manufacturer Tata could be on European roads ahead of its high-profile rivals, according to reports earlier this week.

On August 11, Tata vice chairman Ravi Kant told Indian publication The Hindu Business Linethat the company would launch two electric vehicles in the UK and Scandinavia this fiscal year, which ends March 31, 2011.

The Indica Vista EV could be launched in the UK as early as September or October, saidBusiness Line.

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Companies ready for electric cars

Southern California Edison expects 100,000 electric vehicles in its service area within five years.

“In 10 years, we expect somewhere in the order of 400,000 to 500,000,” said Steve Powell, SoCal Edison's manager of plug-in electric vehicle readiness.
The Southern California utility wants to accommodate and educate prospective electric car buyers after years of anticipation, talk and recent buzz about the eco-friendly vehicles.
The initiative comes as electric cars such as the Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt begin to roll onto showroom floors at several Coachella Valley dealerships before the end of the year.
Electric and hybrid vehicles are expected to be among the hottest topics at the 2010 Inland Empire Auto Show on Aug. 27-29 at the Ontario Convention Center. Show goers will get a chance to peruse the latest electric vehicle technology on “EcoStreet.”

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