The future of hybrid cars

From: Alex Terrell (alexterrell_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 10/10/04 

Date: 10 Oct 2004 14:03:02 -0700

Hybrid cars seem a good start for hybrid cars, and is selling well
enough to get economies of scale on key components. The next steps
seem to be:

- Increased battery storage to enable 1 hr, or about 30 miles of
running
- Improved primary generator (diesel, or later, fuel cell rather than
petrol)
- Plug-in capability - to recharge the batteries from a domestic power
supply.

I estimate that 10 kWhrs should be enough to run a mid-sized car for
an hour, or 30 miles. Most cars, most of the time, do less than this
in a day. So owners would charge the car at night, on cheap
electricity, and do all day's runs on electric power only. Only for
long journey's would they use the high efficiency generator.

At night time rates, 10 KWhrs costs 25p or 40c. This would replace a
gallon of petrol (~£4 in the UK, $2? in the USA). This would make it
very attractive for consumers.

As most charging would be done at night, there would no need
(initially at least) for extra distribution or genration capacity. In
time, unused cars could even become standby generators to sell
electricity at high rates back to the grid.

Comments?

Also, is electricity currently wasted at night? I think some
generators (gas, hydro) can turn off to reduce supply. Lower prices
can encourage demand. Pumped storage can store energy. Is this enough?
What is the CO2 impact of increasing night time electricity load.

Quantcast