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Official Post Anything Electric Vehicle Related Thread


Jedi2155

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source - http://www.engadget.com/2013/02/13/usc-battery-wields-silicon-nanowires-to-hold-triple-the-energy/

 

There's no shortage of attempts to build a better battery, usually with a few caveats. USC may have ticked all the right checkboxes with its latest discovery, however. Its use of porous, flexible silicon nanowires
for the anodes in a lithium-ion battery delivers the high capacity,
fast recharging and low costs that come with silicon, but without the
fragility of earlier attempts relying on simpler silicon plates. In
practice, the battery could deliver the best of all worlds. Triple the
capacity of today's batteries? Full recharges in 10 minutes? More than
2,000 charging cycles? Check. It all sounds a bit fantastical, but USC
does see real-world use on the horizon. Researchers estimate that there
should be products with silicon-equipped lithium-ion packs inside of
two to three years, which isn't long to wait if the invention saves us
from constantly hunting for the nearest wall outlet.

 

How far "out" is this? Is this just one of those "we see promise but won't see market for 20 years" things or is this closer than that? I'm directing this question to our in-house electric car experts.

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my school got a hydrogen combustion prius, havn't gotten a chance to ride in it yet.

 

Really!? Hydrogen combustion....I had read up on a hydrogen combustion converted Prius back in 2005 and I thought to myself WHY WOULD ANYONE DO THAT. It is grossly inefficient. If recall somewhere along the lines of 30-35 per kg, equivalent vs. 45-55 MPG with standard gas. IMO, the biggest problem with fuel cells is not the car (even though I really do not like the issues in their development), but the production of Hydrogen.

 

1 KG of hydrogen costs roughly $20 to produce using electrolysis (thats ~ 60-80 kWh) which is almost the same amount of energy to fully charge up a 300 mile range Model S. Except you're only getting 35 miles. A a fuel cell vehicle for comparison that would net you somewhere around 40-80 mi/kg. Put it in a hydrogen combustion engine and you're looking at 1/2th that. A hydrogen infrastructure is possible through steam reformation of natural gas, but why bother with hydrogen? Just burn the damn natural gas vs. all the inefficiencies of converting it to hydrogen!

 

I don't know enough about battery technology to comment. I'd like to know how much more, if any, this technology increases the cost of the batteries though.

 

If anything this will make batteries cheaper. The main issue is that batteries are labor and energy intensive to make .The raw materials are not necessarily the most expensive components. Increases in capacity typically mean decrease in $/watt*hr. Anyways, stories like this are quite common, but whether or not they change the overall scope of things is uncertain still at this point. Until they can demonstrate that in a pouch cell, I'll take it like another grain of salt.

 

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In case no one has heard this news story yet:


"The term "Brodering" was coined: running out of power due to humanerror, or generally dropping the ball when dealing with electric cars. These owners were determined to not broder it up that day. "

 

http://green.autoblog.com/2013/02/15/cnn-proves-tesla-model-s-can-make-infamous-road-trip-more-attem/#aol-comments

 

 

We made the trip north past Baltimore, and into Delaware. When we
arrived at the supercharger station at the Delaware Welcome center,
there were a few Model S filling up at the superchargers. Some guys from
the owner's club and some Volkswagen engineers testing a Model S and
the supercharger system
. The VW employees unplugged and left us to plug
in to the four supercharger stations.

 

http://strassenversion.blogspot.ca/2013/02/tesla-road-trip-debunking-new-york-times.html

Don't "Broder" my EV brosef...


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Really!? Hydrogen combustion....I had read up on a hydrogen combustion converted Prius back in 2005 and I thought to myself WHY WOULD ANYONE DO THAT. It is grossly inefficient. If recall somewhere along the lines of 30-35 per kg, equivalent vs. 45-55 MPG with standard gas. IMO, the biggest problem with fuel cells is not the car (even though I really do not like the issues in their development), but the production of Hydrogen.

 

1 KG of hydrogen costs roughly $20 to produce using electrolysis (thats ~ 60-80 kWh) which is almost the same amount of energy to fully charge up a 300 mile range Model S. Except you're only getting 35 miles. A a fuel cell vehicle for comparison that would net you somewhere around 40-80 mi/kg. Put it in a hydrogen combustion engine and you're looking at 1/2th that. A hydrogen infrastructure is possible through steam reformation of natural gas, but why bother with hydrogen? Just burn the damn natural gas vs. all the inefficiencies of converting it to hydrogen!

 

 

If anything this will make batteries cheaper. The main issue is that batteries are labor and energy intensive to make .The raw materials are not necessarily the most expensive components. Increases in capacity typically mean decrease in $/watt*hr. Anyways, stories like this are quite common, but whether or not they change the overall scope of things is uncertain still at this point. Until they can demonstrate that in a pouch cell, I'll take it like another grain of salt.

 

 

I don't know the details but our school has a huge fuel cell program. We just got our refueling station up and running. I believe its the biggest one in the LA/San diego area so we have an agreement with lots of car manufacturers to start testing fuel cell vehicles. My faculty advisor for ecocar is also the head of the fuel cell program here. We initially wanted to do fuel cell for our car but its just too expensive.

 

They are going to start renting out fuel cell vehicles in the area from honda(?) from what I hear. They needed the station up and running before they could start renting vehicles.

 

I have no idea the details of hydrogen efficiency, creation, etc. but im pretty sure they're just using it as a research vehicle/proof of concept.

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60 KG production per day / 60 kg storage. That's about 3x larger than the one Chevron had at SCE. But that means they're only able to make 2.5 KG per HOUR.

 

Compare that to a super charger from Tesla:

100 kW Supercharger = 300 mile range in 1 hour

150 kW H2 generation = 2.5 KG @ 50 mi/kg = 125 miles in 1 hour.

 

350 bar = 5000 psi. Good pressure. I wonder how long it takes to fill.

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60 KG production per day / 60 kg storage. That's about 3x larger than the one Chevron had at SCE. But that means they're only able to make 2.5 KG per HOUR.

 

Compare that to a super charger from Tesla:

100 kW Supercharger = 300 mile range in 1 hour

150 kW H2 generation = 2.5 KG @ 50 mi/kg = 125 miles in 1 hour.

 

350 bar = 5000 psi. Good pressure. I wonder how long it takes to fill.

 

its 700 bar capable I believe

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Jeezus, I didn't know they went that high now:

 

 

http://lincolncomposites.com/products/tuffshell-hydrogen-fuel-tanks/

 

Any idea on any vehicles that has that yet? How many kg's can the vehicle store?

 

the only one i've heard of that can use 700 bar tanks is the mercedes benz f-cell, but im sure there are more out there.

 

don't know details on storage and other stuff. i don't work with fuel cells, i just talk with my faculty advisor about it sometimes.

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Toyota: solid-state batteries coming in 2020, 3-4 times better than li-ion

 

Toyota has never been a big fan of lithium ion batteries, and has a plan in place to replace them with solid-state batteries that are three-to-four times more powerful. Toyota will commercialize solid-state batteries around 2020 and lithium air batteries – which offer a fivefold increase for the same weight – could follow several years later, said Shigeki Suzuki, managing officer for material engineering. Suzuki didn't offer details on a rollout plan or vehicle volumes.

As for Toyota's limited interest in lithium ion batteries, they are present in the Toyota RAV4 EV (pictured) and the Toyota Prius V, but nickel metal hydride batteries have been the mainstay in the automaker's hybrid lineup for years. Solid state and lithium air batteries have advantages over li-ion and NiMH batteries. They're smaller and use less expensive materials than li-ion, such as rare earth metals.

There are obvious benefits to solid-state batteries. The liquid electrolyte found in li-ion batteries is replaced with a solid material (hence the name), and solid-state packs are more compact and stable, allowing a higher voltage to be packed into a smaller space, Suzuki said. Toyota has been working on solid-state batteries for years and might be taking the lead over competitors such as Sakti3 and Planar Energy in the plug-in vehicle market.

With lithium air batteries, the lithium cathode used in li-ion batteries is replaced with material that interacts with oxygen. It offers much higher density than current li-ion batteries.

For Toyota, the goal is to make a battery that has an energy density approaching that of gasoline, Suzuki said, because li-ion batteries can only offer electric vehicles limited range because these batteries typically have an energy density only one-fiftieth that of a tank of gasoline. While they're still years away, solid-state or lithium-air batteries may provide the solution Toyota's been looking for.

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http://green.autoblog.com/2013/03/16/volkswagen-chief-fuel-cell-vehicles-not-possible/

 

The head of Europe's biggest carmaker says the prospects for hydrogen vehicles are vanishing into thin air. Yes, when recently asked about fuel-cell technology, Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn said it's nearly impossible to build those vehicles at a "reasonable cost."

 

I agree entirely. Battery technology is at least has a plan on making it more reasonable in cost, but all long term hydrogen vehicles are just completely off the scale in terms of cost with no reasonable technological plan to drop its costs.

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