Taxis should all be electric cars

Cool Mo D

Just to put some efficiency figures in perspective, an average petrol engine can get about 20 - 25% of the chemical energy in fuel converted to motive energy. A diesel car is 30 - 40% efficient, and a power station around 60% efficient. So even using the same fossil fuels, there is lots of scope for reducing fossil fuel use by switching to electric cars.

paulm17781

Thanks BK, I was wondering a lot of that.

The thing is, if electric cars became big, you'd probably see huge increases in their ability, once the market goes that way, innovation would follow. I would prefer that to depending on oil companies still cornering a market. Even if they converted every petrol station to a charge point, and charged for usage, I would prefer that to having to be dependent on them they they want hydrogen to be.

bk

BendiBus wrote: »

Who were they? And nobody anywhere is suggesting 100% wind power with pumped storage! Not a very realistic report unfortunately.

I've been looking for the report, but I can't find it.

I think the point of the report was to dispel some unrealistic ideas that some people have about the capabilities of "green" energy. I've certainly meet many people who actually think we could use wind for 100% of our energy needs.

Realistically wind may reach 10%, maybe another 5% with others like hydro and wave, but realistically 80% of our power will continue to be generated by coal/oil/gas and we probably need to decide do we want to continue with that or potentially switch to nuclear.

ianwalsh2

petergfiffin wrote: »

I don't know how long these electric cars take to charge but if it's 30 mins you've lost nearly half a day's potential earnings out of your working week.

Currently they can take anything from 6 hours up to 12 hours to charge, this combined with the short range (160 - 200km) I really can't see the electric car in its current form being hugely practical for a taxi! The only person it may be useful for is the short distance commuter or the person dropping the children at school etc who can leave the car charging overnight. Although there surely will be improvements on the charge times, in fact the new Mitsubishi iMIEV has a short charge option which takes a half an hour to get something like 80% of the charge. However as you have said, a half an hour to get 128km (80% of 160km) really isn't feasible.

paulm17781 wrote: »

I'd disagree, hydrogen is being led by oil companies, to keep their revenues up. I don't think it's really a solution.

Here's a question, please let me know if I'm wrong. If we're going to be using hydrogen powered cars, is this going to water shortages? All that hydrogen has to come from somewhere? If you have some useful info for me to read, please post.

Hydrogen is surely the realistic future. It allows us to continue as we have done for the past 100 years, whereas the electric car woud be a huge step backwards for motorists and motor technology. After seeing the episode of Top Gear where they tested the Honda Clarity Link I became interested in the subject. In this car there is a cell which reacts the hydrogen with oxygen to form water, the energy caused by this reaction generates electricity which powers the electric motor (the same type as the ones which drive the rechargable electric cars).

The main stumbling block for the hydrogen car is creating the hydrogen in the first place. There are a number of ways of producing Hydrogen however the realistic way of producing the amount which may be required in the future is to split water into H2 and O, which requires a lot of energy! The law of conservation of energy states that "energy cannot be created or destroyed, the only thing that can happen with energy is that it can change form". That means that the amount of energy created by the hydrogen and oxygen joining can only be equal to the energy (electricity) required to seperate them in the first place. The hydrogen car in this form probably uses as much electricity as charging the electric car, however it will allow us to continue refuelling cars as we always have.

By the way in answer to the question, theoretically there is absolutely no water lost, as the hydrogen reacts with the oxygen and comes out of the exhaust as water vapour and back into the water cycle.

thebman

ianwalsh2 wrote: »

The main stumbling block for the hydrogen car is creating the hydrogen in the first place. There are a number of ways of producing Hydrogen however the realistic way of producing the amount which may be required in the future is to split water into H2 and O, which requires a lot of energy! The law of conservation of energy states that "energy cannot be created or destroyed, the only thing that can happen with energy is that it can change form". That means that the amount of energy created by the hydrogen and oxygen joining can only be equal to the energy (electricity) required to seperate them in the first place. The hydrogen car in this form probably uses as much electricity as charging the electric car, however it will allow us to continue refuelling cars as we always have.

By the way in answer to the question, theoretically there is absolutely no water lost, as the hydrogen reacts with the oxygen and comes out of the exhaust as water vapour and back into the water cycle.

There was this on digg a while back:
http://digg.com/d1oDMi

ianwalsh2

thebman wrote: »

There was this on digg a while back:
http://digg.com/d1oDMi

If that works out it makes the hydrogen car even more ideal.

Actually I have a question about the batteries for the electric car. I bought my laptop two years ago with a battery life of 6 hours, two years later this battery lasts less than one hour, less than 17% of the original capacity. I believe the batteries in these cars are basically a very large laptop or mobile phone battery and as we know, these batteries all lose capacity over a year or two and die eventually. So does this mean that after 2-3 years the car will only be capable of a small fraction of the original capacity? Will the battery need to be replaced every year or two? Judging by the prices of mobile phone and laptop batteries surely these battery-packs will cost the guts of a grand, if not more.

I remember back in the 70's, there were several ideas put forward for electric cars to have slot-in battery modules. The idea being that you drive into a charging station that was a bit like a carwash. The machine under the car disengaged the battery module, lowered it away and then replaced it with a fully charged set.

Then the original batteries were placed into a charging bank.

thebman

Deleted User wrote: »

I remember back in the 70's, there were several ideas put forward for electric cars to have slot-in battery modules. The idea being that you drive into a charging station that was a bit like a carwash. The machine under the car disengaged the battery module, lowered it away and then replaced it with a fully charged set.

Then the original batteries were placed into a charging bank.

What happens when you get a bad battery that won't hold the charge?

Personally I think hydrogen is the way forward. I don't want to charge my car every night and I don't want to have to change batteries. Not to mention the jobs that disappear if all the filling stations in the country close down because everyone is charging at home.

Where are the current filling stations going to keep these hundreds of batteries? They'll take up a lot of space.

thebman

thebman wrote: »

What happens when you get a bad battery that won't hold the charge?

Personally I think hydrogen is the way forward. I don't want to charge my car every night and I don't want to have to change batteries. Not to mention the jobs that disappear if all the filling stations in the country close down because everyone is charging at home.

Where are the current filling stations going to keep these hundreds of batteries? They'll take up a lot of space.

As I said, it was an idea from the 70's, as for bad batteries and stowage of charged batteries, that's the garages responsibility - you never actually own them you just buy the charge and return them, like gas bottles.

As for jobs, new industry, just like mechanics replaced blacksmiths & farriers at the start of the 20th century.

But anyway, more than one way to skin a cat!

Spook_ie

Victor wrote: »

Cue 3:32am Sunday morning all the taxis run out of electricity as they've all been on the go for hours.

More likely to be

" Northside bud, Nah don't do Northside my cable isn't long enough! "

MOH

thebman wrote: »

What happens when you get a bad battery that won't hold the charge?

Personally I think hydrogen is the way forward. I don't want to charge my car every night and I don't want to have to change batteries. Not to mention the jobs that disappear if all the filling stations in the country close down because everyone is charging at home.

I'm onto you and your Stonecutter propaganda!

Two articles in yesterday Irish Times motors supplement:

2020 target for 350,000 electric cars

and underneath it, proving once again that we're not ahead of everyone else:

Norway: plan to ban petrol, diesel cars by 2015

bk

Deleted User wrote: »

As I said, it was an idea from the 70's, as for bad batteries and stowage of charged batteries, that's the garages responsibility - you never actually own them you just buy the charge and return them, like gas bottles.

Again I can't remember where I read this, but supposedly people are looking into this option again.

One disadvantage of Hydrogen over electric, if that it is less efficient. People normally talk about well to wheel efficiency, basically taking into account all the energy used to extract, process, transport and use the energy.

Electric is excellent at 93%, petrol comes in around 80% and hydrogen comes in around 60%, as it is quiet power intensive to create, then it needs to be compressed and liquefied which also uses a lot of energy so that it can be transported.

So electric is actually the best way to distribute power, but as others have pointed out it's weakness is it's batteries, which are expensive, only give limited mileage and tend to degrade over time.

That is why the volt is such an excellent idea. It has only a relatively small battery which gives you 40 miles on the battery (enough for most peoples daily commute) and after you have used that, a petrol motor kicks in giving you an additional 600 miles. IMO this is the way to go, in the long term the petrol should be replaced by hydrogen produced from a nuclear power plant.

spank_inferno

Regarding making taxi's Electric....

Can anyone tell me how much batteries it takes to power a taxi.
By their nature taxi's have to be larger with a big boot for luggage.

My father owns a former taxi car, its a skoda diesel that is 10 years old, has over 200,000 miles on it, can seat 5 adults can store 3 large suitcases and a few other bags in the boot. It can tow well over a quater of a tonne load when the need arises also.

Does anyone know of an Electric vehicle that can do this?

AFAIK Lithium batteries lose about 15% of their power per year of operation?
How much room do they take?
Is there enough Lithium on the planet to make it happen?

Capt'n Midnight

The BIG problem with hydrogen is storage. It's the lightest substance know. 5g of it would take up 100 Litres, while providing a bit more power than a teaspoon of petrol. If you compress it you will need very large heavy tanks and the power to weight ratio falls. You can use it as a metal hydride but that adds a lot of weight as metals may only hold a few % hydrogen and only release it at 400 C.


If we develop a cheap reliable Methanol fuel cell then Hydrogen can be bypassed. Methanol can be made synthetically from carbon dioxide and water and lots of power.

Recycling of batteries / their life is why cradle to grave analysis of petrol hybrids doesnt show them to be better than diesels.

BTW Peru has half of the worlds lithium and they don't want any foreign operations taking it over since they've been repeatedly screwed over gold , silver, oil , gas and every other natural resource by big corporations.

Taxis spend a LOT of time at the ranks so having chargers there is a no brainer. Also reserve more of the ranks for electric cars to encourage conversions.


But if the scheme is just to promote petrol-hybrids then it will lead to cleaner air in the city centre, but won't show up as a reduction in resources used or as a reduction in balance of trade

ianwalsh2

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

If we develop a cheap reliable Methanol fuel cell then Hydrogen can be bypassed. Methanol can be made synthetically from carbon dioxide and water and lots of power.

I'm not sure of the ins and outs of a methanol fuel cell, but surely it involves releasing methane out of the exhaust pipe and into the atmosphere? As methane is 20 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide that'd leave us out of the frying pan and into the fire in relation to climate change. The big advantage of hydrogen is that the emissions are completely harmless to the environment, i.e. water.

thebman

MOH wrote: »

I'm onto you and your Stonecutter propaganda!

Two articles in yesterday Irish Times motors supplement:

2020 target for 350,000 electric cars

and underneath it, proving once again that we're not ahead of everyone else:

Norway: plan to ban petrol, diesel cars by 2015

Lol stonecutter WTF?

I just don't like electric cars. I don't think they are as practical as environment nuts go on like they are. I think hydrogen has much more potential in the long run and requires a less dramatic shift in how we do things currently. A lot of people in favor of electric cars just seem to want to get one over on oil companies more than anything else.

We've been trying to make efficient batteries for years and we have never succeeded in making a major breakthrough that would make them good enough for electric cars on long distance journeys that I've seen.

I don't see the point or the efficiency in having a commuter car and a weekend car for driving half way across the country. Makes even less sense in bigger countries.

I agree that the Chrysler Volt is about the smartest electric car I've seen so far but hydrogen will ultimately replace electric cars IMO. I know I won't be buying one until they become affordable and they have worked out all the problems with batteries and long distance journies.

Cool Mo D

ianwalsh2 wrote: »

I'm not sure of the ins and outs of a methanol fuel cell, but surely it involves releasing methane out of the exhaust pipe and into the atmosphere? As methane is 20 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide that'd leave us out of the frying pan and into the fire in relation to climate change. The big advantage of hydrogen is that the emissions are completely harmless to the environment, i.e. water.

There's no reason why a methanol fuel cell would release methane. It would have to release CO2 and water though, as opposed to hydrogen, which reacts with oxygen to give only water.

Capt'n Midnight

ianwalsh2 wrote: »

I'm not sure of the ins and outs of a methanol fuel cell, but surely it involves releasing methane out of the exhaust pipe and into the atmosphere? As methane is 20 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide that'd leave us out of the frying pan and into the fire in relation to climate change. The big advantage of hydrogen is that the emissions are completely harmless to the environment, i.e. water.

methanol can be a renewable fuel or a way to store methane / hydrogen's energy is a liquid form that mixes with water easily
and I said a methanol fuel cell there is no exhaust

methanol is to methane as water is to hydrogen, it's different by an -OH :pac:

Hydrogen is a great fuel to burn (fuel cells are still expensive) but storage and transport is a problem.
project suntan was a 1960's project for a hydrogen powered aircraft for the US military. Aircraft have no limits of the size of the tank, you simply make a bigger aircraft. Also all the places where the plane was to refuel were owned by the airforce so no problems with infrastructure. They shelved the project because it would cost $2 billion in todays money to provide the infrastructure.

Also hydrogen has to be made, it's an artificial fuel so it's really an energy store like a battery and by volume doesn't store a whole lot of energy.

MOH

thebman wrote: »

Lol stonecutter WTF?
.

Simpsons episode where Homer joins a secret group very like the Freemasons. In a song about themselves, they claim responsibility, among other things, for holding back the electric car.

Just figured this would be my only chance to use it

paulm17781

thebman wrote: »

I just don't like electric cars.

Fair enough.

thebman wrote: »

I don't think they are as practical as environment nuts go on like they are.

Have you seen the latest ones? They're rapidly approaching a level with petrol cars.

thebman wrote: »

I think hydrogen has much more potential in the long run and requires a less dramatic shift in how we do things currently.

Change isn't a bad thing, often it makes things better. Just look at the internet. You may have hated it 20 years ago. A dramatic shift is often what is needed to break the old inefficient ways. Why use machinery and pay well when slaves used to do all the construction work for nothing? That was surely a dramatic shift.

thebman wrote: »

A lot of people in favor of electric cars just seem to want to get one over on oil companies more than anything else.

If you want to be dependent on oil then so be it. I would rather have the option to charge my car, at home, overnight (possibly by own generated electricity) than have to go to a petrol station. It's not about hating oil companies, it's about not seeing the need for them or wanting to depend on them.

Capt'n Midnight

paulm17781 wrote:

Have you seen the latest ones? They're rapidly approaching a level with petrol cars.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster
An improved, Sport version of the Roadster has been released with adjustable dampers and a new hand-wound motor, capable of 0–60 mph (0–97 km/h) in 3.7 seconds. The Roadster's efficiency, as of September 2008[update], was reported as 120 mpgge (2.0 L/100 km).[2][3][4][5] It uses 110 W·h/km[6], (177 W·h/mi) battery-to-wheel, and has an efficiency of 90% on average

http://www.speedace.info/jeantaude.htm

The Comte de Chasseloup-Laubat set a land speed record of 57.6 mph at Acheres, near Paris on the 4th March 1899 in this formidable vehicle weighing over 3,000lbs or 1,400kg.

This vehicle had an electric motor and was powered by Fulman Batteries. This vehicle is credited with the first land speed record.

The only problem with electric cars over the last 110 are the battery life, energy density and time to recharge. we don't need more efficient cars or better motors than 100 years ago, what we need are either
- induction coupled or overhead charging while on the road
- better fuel cells that can handle methanol or similar quick replacement fuels

dowlingm

Hydrogen can be produced cheaply at nuclear plants but energy density and building distribution stations are the main problems.

As for the 1995 corolla reference above - what's the maximum allowable age for taxis?

Ham'nd'egger

dowlingm wrote: »

Hydrogen can be produced cheaply at nuclear plants but energy density and building distribution stations are the main problems.

As for the 1995 corolla reference above - what's the maximum allowable age for taxis?

It's 9 years maximum for cars to be used with taxi or hackney plates registered and issued from 2009 onwards; these are issued with a number starting from 45,00. It was meant to be 9 years for any change of car made from 2009 onwards for use with any plate but the Regulator fudged this; a new entrant to the trade can currently buy an old plate and register any age of car with it.

Wheelchair accessible taxis are exempt from this 9 year rule.

edanto

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Also hydrogen has to be made, it's an artificial fuel so it's really an energy store like a battery and by volume doesn't store a whole lot of energy.

+1
Hydrogen is more of a energy carrier than an energy source and I would see the Bush-era moves to a 'hydrogen economy' as a response to the Oil lobby who would see many of their future profits coming from owning the hydrogen supply infrastructure.

As long as the electricity supply infrastructure can be held by orgs with a public service ethos (eg the ESB) but with the most cost-efficient operations, we'll all be better off.

I would see the best future in electric cars hinging more on getting quickly rechargable battery technology into them instead of going too far down the hydrogen route. I'm glad to see that Eamon Ryan seems to have a similar idea with the recent ESB announcements.

BendiBus

edanto wrote: »

Hydrogen is more of a energy carrier than an energy source and I would see the Bush-era moves to a 'hydrogen economy' as a response to the Oil lobby who would see many of their future profits coming from owning the hydrogen supply infrastructure.

I think Bush & Oil supported the hydrogen economy because it's so far off they could continue with the oil economy for the forseeable future.

It's one of those technologies where you can do a photocall beside a hydrogen car and provided you don't have to explain that the vehicle costs over a million dollars then it looks like you're doing something.

kravmaga

Stupido wrote: »

They can do it in New York.....why not here?

Government subvention could help (Green Party Policy) with dedicated 'recharging stations' around the city. This would allow a critical mass of electric cars on the road to make the recharging stations commercially viable, and encourage private car users to switch. Power could also be obtained from green energy.

Would reduce emmissions by 20,000 cars a day. Also stop the drivers moaning about cost of fuel, as the energy could be regulated.

Buses can be next.


Thoughts?

Its a good idea, I was in London last week and the Met Police are using electric cars in central London, max speed 50 mph, not bad considering London inner city traffic.

But knowing this country it may take about 10yrs

thebman

paulm17781 wrote: »

Have you seen the latest ones? They're rapidly approaching a level with petrol cars.

I don't think they are approaching that level.

Change isn't a bad thing, often it makes things better. Just look at the internet. You may have hated it 20 years ago. A dramatic shift is often what is needed to break the old inefficient ways. Why use machinery and pay well when slaves used to do all the construction work for nothing? That was surely a dramatic shift.

I never hated the Internet. This isn't a change like the abolishment of slavery. It is an engine change and we should weight up the pros and cons of all technologies. If it was good enough, you could build one and market it and people would buy it as is. There is a reason people aren't buying electric cars and it isn't because they are resisting change. They just aren't good enough yet and may never be with battery problems.

If you want to be dependent on oil then so be it. I would rather have the option to charge my car, at home, overnight (possibly by own generated electricity) than have to go to a petrol station. It's not about hating oil companies, it's about not seeing the need for them or wanting to depend on them.

Your not dependant on Oil to produce hydrogen. You don't even need oil companies involved in hydrogen production. That is why people always come off as just being anti-oil to me that are for electric cars. Why would you assume that hydrogen would be made and distributed by oil companies? It doesn't make sense as an assumption. Their facilities can be bought like Topaz bought pumps here. The production of hydrogen does not have to be from non-renewable sources and can also be from nuclear power which is the future of power generation realistically as it is the only way we will reach the levels of production we will require as energy demand is only going one way.

The problem I have with electric cars is the batteries and cost. Batteries weigh a lot, limit mileage to unusable levels with current batteries with no developments that I have seen recently that solve this problem or that solve the degradation of the battery over time rather rapidly especially if short charging.

I'm not saying there isn't a market for the electric car. Commuters going into Dublin can use them. I just wouldn't use one for a cross country trip. Nor would I like to buy an initial model and end up with early production problems and battery problems which I think will plague them probably for the first 5 years or so at least when they hit mass market.

People are right that Hydrogen is just an alternative to a battery but so is petrol and they are used for a reason. Batteries just aren't very good, never have been and there is little reason to assume they are magically going to solve all the problems in a short period of time when they have been trying to improve them for years and never made much significant improvement IMO.

You can say they just need it to get to market so it becomes worthwhile to invest but batteries are in everything already. Cars/phones/laptops/iPod's etc... and they all suffer the same problems in these products and it would pay to solve the problem but they haven't. One has to ask is there a solution or are batteries just inherently a poor form of storing energy?

Capt'n Midnight

if the taxi's go electric then we'll have to pay in coins so they'll have something for the meter

Ham'nd'egger

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

if the taxi's go electric then we'll have to pay in coins so they'll have something for the meter

If it means I don't have to change €50 notes, all the better

dowlingm

While I don't think it's a "beyond a reasonable doubt certainty" that the oil companies would be the ones driving hydrogen infrastructure, they are the guys with the experience in such technologies and the money to do it (given how much was raked in when oil was north of $100/bbl).

Electric cars can work but ideally you would want to make it unwise to charge them outside of the 10pm-6am period, using time-of-day metering. That way, you're using baseload power (hydroelectric and nuclear where I am) and not peak power (coal, gas)