GM's VOLT gets a jolt

[Dr Mordrid]

GM's ramping it up;

TIME story....

Jolt for Volt: GM awards contracts to speed plug-in car

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — General Motors (GM) has awarded two contracts to companies that will help speed up development of its plug-in hybrid car called the Chevrolet Volt, GM Chairman Rick Wagoner said Tuesday.
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The contracts to design and test lithium-ion batteries went to Compact Power [Incorporated] and to Continental Automotive Systems, Wagoner said.

"Given the huge potential that the Volt and its E-flex system offers to lower oil consumption, lower oil imports and reduce carbon gas emissions, this is for sure a top priority program for GM," said Wagoner, who added that the company is trying to produce the Volt as soon as it can.

The Volt, unveiled in January at the Detroit auto show, has a battery-powered electric motor that can run the car for up to 40 city miles on a single charge. Beyond that, a gasoline-powered, one-liter, three-cylinder engine replenishes the battery, with a range of up to 640 miles, GM said. All the car's motive power would come from its electric motors.

The battery system can be plugged into a home outlet for recharging.
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[Brian Ellis]

By any definition, that is NOT a hybrid car. It is an electric car with gas recharging. A hybrid car requires a COMBINATION of fuel and electric drive to the wheels. Journalists should get their facts right.

[Dr Mordrid]

It is a type of hybrid called a serial, or series, hybrid but with plug-in charging.

It mainly differs in the absence of the usual mechanical drive line; it always uses electric motors. After the plug-in charge is depleted the voltage generated by the small diesel & generator powers the show instead of a tranny/differential etc. with the battery providing surge power and buffering brake regeneration.

An added plus to the design is that when other electric power systems arrive the manufacturers can update their designs using the alternative; fuel cell or whatever.

This makes it mechanically simpler and lighter.

Business Week....

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I can’t help thinking that this technology will make the current crop of hybrids like the Toyota Prius and Ford Escape look like Ford Excursions. Estimates vary. But given the fact that something like 75% of driving in the U.S. is made up of short trips well under ten miles round-trip, a growing fleet of vehicles that can do that on battery power instead of gasoline is a huge game-changer. No. Make that a world changer. The technology would create viable vehicles that get the equivalent of more than 100 miles per gallon of gasoline.

It pretty much relegates GM’s EV1, (Ford) Th!ink and today’s hybrids into the alternative power-train museum.
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hybridvehicle.org

[Wulfman]

100 miles per gallon of gasoline

and the (additional) plug-in electricity is for free? oh, I forgot - it comes out of the socket, not out of the power station...

do we have to expect to see "miles per kwh" soon?

mfg
wulfman

[az]

I expect we will see holistic emissions per kilometer (weighted by what substances are emitted, how electricity is generated for plug-ins and integrating emissions caused by refining fuel or harvesting biofuel crops) and price/km (or the other way around, kilometers per environment damage unit and kilometers per Euro) in the future, but it'll take a while to get there.

BTW, european light bulb manufacturers just agreed to phase out ordinary light bulbs till 2015.

[Brian Ellis]

Yeah, and if the power is generated by coal, NG or oil, the carbon emissions will be higher than if you use only the efficient internal motor or a conventional car of similar characteristics. This will work carbon-efficiently only where power is generated by nukes, hydro or renewables.

[Wulfman]

I expect we will see holistic emissions per kilometer (weighted by what substances are emitted, how electricity is generated for plug-ins and integrating emissions caused by refining fuel or harvesting biofuel crops) and price/km

would make sense, but I do see problems with that as well. different electricity-companies (let alone different countries) have a varying mix of power plants, so anything you calculate ("environmental damage units", "CO2 equivalents",..) won't apply to everybody. and I wouldn't want to see a "cost/km" figure, as it would change over time with the gas/uran/... prices. if you use a reference rate for the gas price at a certain date, it will become meaningless (or missleading) over time.

we'll probably see two figures/car: how far a car will go on batteries alone (kwh/km or km/kwh for our fellow americans ), and the regular "l/km or miles/gallon" thing for longer trips:

we should stick with simple gas engines, makes comparisons easier.

mfg
wulfman

[az]

would make sense, but I do see problems with that as well. different electricity-companies (let alone different countries) have a varying mix of power plants, so anything you calculate ("environmental damage units", "CO2 equivalents",..) won't apply to everybody.

Standardize by country (just take the country's average pollution emission/cost per kWh, the data's already there) or region (EU, USA, etc.). Maybe give people the option to enter their power plan's details (percentage of coal, gas, nuclear, regen plants and cost/kWh).

and I wouldn't want to see a "cost/km" figure, as it would change over time with the gas/uran/... prices. if you use a reference rate for the gas price at a certain date, it will become meaningless (or missleading) over time.

Have them in an online database that calculates the price, say, every year. Or even in real-time (which would be impractical, but easily doable).

we'll probably see two figures/car: how far a car will go on batteries alone (kwh/km or km/kwh for our fellow americans ), and the regular "l/km or miles/gallon" thing for longer trips:

So not "how far will it get on batteries", because that would be an unfair advantage for cars with larger batteries, but "how far will it go per Ah". This is what I proposed; just combine this with the cost of charging one Ah into the battery (so the efficiency of the built-in charger is also factored in).

[Dr Mordrid]

Dept. of Energy issued a report last fall saying that if people charge off-hours (8 PM to 6 AM) we already have enough capacity.

Cost of driving a charged mile has been estimated at 1/3 to 1/2 the cost of gas at recent prices.

[az]

It's not only about $$$ and not overloading the grid.

[Wulfman]

Standardize by country (just take the country's average pollution emission/cost per kWh, the data's already there) or region (EU, USA, etc.). Maybe give people the option to enter their power plan's details (percentage of coal, gas, nuclear, regen plants and cost/kWh).

that just doesn't go down well with the scientific "use universal units" doctrine I was exposed to.

Have them in an online database that calculates the price, say, every year. Or even in real-time (which would be impractical, but easily doable).

see above. if I want to quickly compare a 5 year old first-generation hybrid with a 5th generation hybrid some years later, I'm stuck. I'm thinking about car manuals or stickers with the consumption on the car here, as can be found now.

So not "how far will it get on batteries", because that would be an unfair advantage for cars with larger batteries, but "how far will it go per Ah". This is what I proposed;

agreed. if you talk about electric power/km you also include the total weight of the car, air drag, efficiency of the electric system, etc...

...just combine this with the cost of charging one Ah into the battery (so the efficiency of the built-in charger is also factored in).

why do you want to include cost in the equation? we are only talking about l/km now as well, and not about "10€/100km". if you want to include the loss through the charger, you could just calculate with the amount of electricity that you feed through the charger instead of the nominal capacity of the battery, no need for cost there.

mfg
wulfman

[Brian Ellis]

Dept. of Energy issued a report last fall saying that if people charge off-hours (8 PM to 6 AM) we already have enough capacity.

OK for the odd user, but if EV became mainstream, then you most certainly have neither enough generating capacity nor distribution capacity, no matter what the DoE pretends. This is simple arithmetic: do the calculations (remembering Californian brownouts during evening hours).

[az]

that just doesn't go down well with the scientific "use universal units" doctrine I was exposed to.

The hard numbers (range/Ah or whatever) below would still be published, but for practical purposes and for consumers to calculate the impact their car would have on the environment and their bank account these numbers get converted to "pollution units" or whatever, which are specific to how your electric current is generated.

see above. if I want to quickly compare a 5 year old first-generation hybrid with a 5th generation hybrid some years later, I'm stuck. I'm thinking about car manuals or stickers with the consumption on the car here, as can be found now.

On the contrary: You could not only compare the old hybrid to the new one you're thinking of buying, you could even compare it to a gasoline, diesel, fuel cell, plug-in electric, hybrid of any sort or biomass fueled vehicle in terms of environmental impact and running cost. You just give the system the details of your power plan or use the standard power plan approximation for your region. Of course if you'd want to compare two cars using the same technology, you could still use the underlying numbers (l/km currently - although this doesn't translate directly to cost with diesel vs. gasoline cars, and gets even more complicated when you want to compare emissions).

I'm not saying we get rid of the simple units used now - we need them to calculate the abstracted ones I propose - just that we also employ a system to directly and easily compare cars which use different power plants.

why do you want to include cost in the equation? we are only talking about l/km now as well, and not about "10€/100km". if you want to include the loss through the charger, you could just calculate with the amount of electricity that you feed through the charger instead of the nominal capacity of the battery, no need for cost there.

Because l/100 km directly translates to cost, and is usable for all vehicles in use today. It even allows you to calculate cost for diesel vs. gasoline cars very easily. It isn't usable for plug-in electric cars, nor for gas powered ones or fuel cell vehicles. Km/Ah wouldn't be usable for current cars. So you need to translate both to a common unit, and while you're at it, you could make the unit what it's really about: price. And another unit for emissions. Common to all cars, regardless of technology used. To get to that unit requires a little math, so let's automate that, put it into an online database and let people compare what difference a choice between two cars would make for THEM.

[Dr Mordrid]

OK for the odd user, but if EV became mainstream, then you most certainly have neither enough generating capacity nor distribution capacity, no matter what the DoE pretends. This is simple arithmetic: do the calculations (remembering Californian brownouts during evening hours).

The US has a huge over capacity off-hour. California's rolling blackouts are a heat related problem. 95% of the country doesn't have its combination of desert heat, high population and NIMBY attitude regarding generating stations.

Also;

Length: 170 in / 4318 mm
Width: 70.5 in / 1791 mm
Height: 52.6 in / 1336 mm
Passengers: 4-5

Engines: 1 Liter 71 bhp 3-cylinder; 120 kW/160 bhp electric
Generator: 53 kW
Fuel tank: 12 gallons (45 liters)
Battery volume: 100 liters or less, centrally mounted
Charge time: 6.5 hrs on 120v house current
Range: 40 miles (64 km) battery ; 640 miles (1030 km) fuel
Top speed: 120 mph (over 190 km/h)

A fuel cell version was shown at the Shanghai Auto Show. It's said to do 0-60 mph in 8.5 seconds. The gas/electric version should be faster.

The hydrogen Volt would get 300 miles on four kilograms of hydrogen

They're "80 percent optimistic" the design for a commercial fuel cell system will be ready by "11:59 p.m. on December 31, 2009."

[Wulfman]

I see your points, but I don't think that we should try to reach the "level of comfort" (easy comparison) that you propose at a "technical level". that's what websites like the ones linked to earlier or ADAC/ÖAMTC/whatever statistics are for.

just imagine what would happen at MURC if you start talking about your new 99EP/km-car (ecological points):

1 person would point out that germany still uses coal plants, and that the official rating is totally off.
1 person would call the whole rating a fake, because it was invented by left-wing-treehuggers, who didn't consider the driving style.
1 person would call the whole rating a fake, because it was invented by right-wing-nuts, and they were, after all, funded by some mineral-oil-company.
1 person would c&p a long list of all historical cars, and find that the 1943 wood-gasifier-car was actually the most economical car, just beating Edisons original electric vehicle.
3 persons would stumble over the difference between 99EP/km, 0.01km/EP and 0.08miles/EP (nautical, imperial or whatever).
1 person would link to a website showing off a prototype based on new technology, that will "definitely be on the market within 6-36months", an estimate that will held up for the following 10 years.

and, of course:

1 person would point out spelling mistakes.

mfg
wulfman