https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-52328786
Using a squeezable sponge, they found that large quantities of hydrogen can be stored without the high pressures of existing gas cylinder based solutions. Highly pressurized tanks are expensive and less safe.
So does this material actually function like a sponge and physically trap H2 gas in its pores, or does it chemically capture hydrogen atoms and the release them as hydrogen gas?
Weird.
Strange that less space somehow creates less pressure.
Do they just squeeze the sponge to get the hydrogen back out?
Quote from: mzziaz on April 19, 2020, 02:30:07 PM
Weird.
Strange that less space somehow creates less pressure.
Yes, the entire notion of fitting the same mass of gas in the same, or less, volume at lower pressure violates the perfect gas law. Unless the "sponge" absorbs H2 at a chemical/atomic level rather than storing it as a gas.
Quote from: MX793 on April 19, 2020, 04:33:35 PM
Yes, the entire notion of fitting the same mass of gas in the same, or less, volume at lower pressure violates the perfect gas law. Unless the "sponge" absorbs H2 at a chemical/atomic level rather than storing it as a gas.
Magic?
The problems with hydrogen and the durability of batteries in EVs really convince me more and more that synthetic fuels are the solution...
Quote from: MX793 on April 19, 2020, 04:33:35 PM
Yes, the entire notion of fitting the same mass of gas in the same, or less, volume at lower pressure violates the perfect gas law. Unless the "sponge" absorbs H2 at a chemical/atomic level rather than storing it as a gas.
It's bigger on the inside.
Quote from: FoMoJo on April 19, 2020, 04:55:29 PM
Magic?
I was thinking more like this material acts, for hydrogen, like hemoglobin in the blood does for oxygen. It absorbs hydrogen at the molecular level, but that hydrogen can be easily extracted again.
Consider that if you extracted all of the hydrogen from 1 gallon (3.8L) of water, the hydrogen gas would take up over 4700 liters at 1 atmosphere of pressure. So clearly, if you can store the hydrogen chemically, rather than as a gas, you can pack a lot of it into a smaller space without high pressures. The trick is getting it out again. Pulling hydrogen from water takes more energy than you'll get from burning that hydrogen.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 19, 2020, 05:13:59 PM
The problems with hydrogen and the durability of batteries in EVs really convince me more and more that synthetic fuels are the solution...
Synthetic hydrocarbon fuels don't address the greenhouse gas issues.
Quote from: MX793 on April 19, 2020, 05:24:58 PM
I was thinking more like this material acts, for hydrogen, like hemoglobin in the blood does for oxygen. It absorbs hydrogen at the molecular level, but that hydrogen can be easily extracted again.
Consider that if you extracted all of the hydrogen from 1 gallon (3.8L) of water, the hydrogen gas would take up over 4700 liters at 1 atmosphere of pressure. So clearly, if you can store the hydrogen chemically, rather than as a gas, you can pack a lot of it into a smaller space without high pressures. The trick is getting it out again. Pulling hydrogen from water takes more energy than you'll get from burning that hydrogen.
Yeah, I suppose that must be it. Crazy if they have found an easy way to convert the hydrogen molecules back and forth like that.
Wonder how they will "squeeze the sponge' - electricity perhaps?
Quote from: MX793 on April 19, 2020, 05:24:58 PM
I was thinking more like this material acts, for hydrogen, like hemoglobin in the blood does for oxygen. It absorbs hydrogen at the molecular level, but that hydrogen can be easily extracted again.
Consider that if you extracted all of the hydrogen from 1 gallon (3.8L) of water, the hydrogen gas would take up over 4700 liters at 1 atmosphere of pressure. So clearly, if you can store the hydrogen chemically, rather than as a gas, you can pack a lot of it into a smaller space without high pressures. The trick is getting it out again. Pulling hydrogen from water takes more energy than you'll get from burning that hydrogen.
Nukes/alternative energy for electrolysis of aqueous NACl? You can get the H2, plus Cl2 and NaOH.
Quote from: Morris Minor on April 20, 2020, 09:37:38 AM
Nukes/alternative energy for electrolysis of aqueous NACl? You can get the H2, plus Cl2 and NaOH.
Sure, but how much space will a nuclear reactor take up in a vehicle?
Quote from: mzziaz on April 20, 2020, 08:09:19 AM
Yeah, I suppose that must be it. Crazy if they have found an easy way to convert the hydrogen molecules back and forth like that.
Wonder how they will "squeeze the sponge' - electricity perhaps?
Whatever method is used to extract the hydrogen from the sponge needs to draw less energy than is contained in the hydrogen extracted.
Quote from: MX793 on April 19, 2020, 05:26:28 PM
Synthetic hydrocarbon fuels don't address the greenhouse gas issues.
As I understand it, they're made using CO2 taken from the air, the CO2 is removed for the most part and they burn even better in ICE than oil-derived gasoline/diesel fuel.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb_8DJF6Hp0
www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_0ftKqQ9XE
In German, but they claim their synthetic fuel is completely carbon- and CO2-free.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kG759INJ7Y
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 20, 2020, 12:45:39 PM
As I understand it, they're made using CO2 taken from the air, the CO2 is removed for the most part and they burn even better in ICE than oil-derived gasoline/diesel fuel.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb_8DJF6Hp0
www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_0ftKqQ9XE
In German, but they claim their synthetic fuel is completely carbon- and CO2-free.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kG759INJ7Y
You have to harvest electricity which goes into the process of synthesizing the fuel. You have to transport the fuel, which is wasteful and hazardous. Then you have big thermal losses because ICE engines convert most of the chemical energy into heat, not motion. So many middlemen in the process. Just send the electricity to homes and enjoy the huge electric acceleration!
Quote from: Laconian on April 20, 2020, 12:48:45 PM
You have to harvest electricity which goes into the process of synthesizing the fuel. You have to transport the fuel, which is wasteful and hazardous. Then you have big thermal losses because ICE engines convert most of the chemical energy into heat, not motion. So many middlemen in the process. Just send the electricity to homes and enjoy the huge electric acceleration!
Nuclear power is the answer to everything. Duh! :lol:
Call me old-fashioned, or a believer in the ICE, but EVs seem like a step-backward to me. Leaving aside the acceleration, you have generally less range and long charging times (quick charging is not good for battery life AFAIK). And while most people don't do 250 km daily trips, the range on EVs seems so finicky.
An affordable Renault Zoe has a range of 395 km - on paper. In the winter it's half of that. Then you have the on-board electronics or convenience features like heating or A/C which will further deplete the battery and range. So basically I want to say that the range on an ICE car is more or less stable, but on an EV it's majorly dependent on what creature comforts you're using. Range anxiety...
One of my clients has a Tesla Model 3 Long Range, and in the winter he claims he can't make it from Munich to Innsbruck in Austria on a 100% charge (admittedly with some fast Autobahn driving involved...).
Range affects some people more than others. I know a lot of EV owners who prefer the low cost and convenience of at-home EV "filling". Of all my driving over the past year, the only two times EV range would've affected me would have been a trip to Whistler and a 4 hour ride from Belgium to France.
I don't think synthetic fuels will be much more than an interesting historical footnote. There's a lot more R&D to be done to produce it at a mass scale, and there probably isn't enough life in the idea for the capital costs to be amortized over time. Government subsidies are probably what's keeping the R&D moving along, but if it was brought to mass production, I don't think synthetic fuels would be profitable at all. ICEs will likely continue just exploding dinosaurs or perhaps biodiesel.
I wish we kept developing nuclear power. Nuclear is actually very safe and we've newer reactor designs which physically can't meltdown. Chernobyl was too much of a mindfuck though. :cry:
Quote from: MX793 on April 19, 2020, 04:33:35 PM
Yes, the entire notion of fitting the same mass of gas in the same, or less, volume at lower pressure violates the perfect gas law. Unless the "sponge" absorbs H2 at a chemical/atomic level rather than storing it as a gas.
+1 Yeah, this doesn't make sense to me. Unless it's doing some sort of phase change into something more molecule dense, I don't understand how this could work.
Quote from: Laconian on April 20, 2020, 01:25:18 PM
I wish we kept developing nuclear power. Nuclear is actually very safe and we've newer reactor designs which physically can't meltdown. Chernobyl was too much of a mindfuck though. :cry:
Apparently the trade war with China really messed up nuclear development headed up by Bill Gates:
https://fortune.com/2019/11/22/bill-gates-nuclear-reactor-china-trade-war/
Quote from: Laconian on April 20, 2020, 12:48:45 PM
You have to harvest electricity which goes into the process of synthesizing the fuel. You have to transport the fuel, which is wasteful and hazardous. Then you have big thermal losses because ICE engines convert most of the chemical energy into heat, not motion. So many middlemen in the process. Just send the electricity to homes and enjoy the huge electric acceleration!
+1
EVs have a lot of development potential (mostly battery tech) and seem to make the most sense in the long run, due to the simplicity of the energy supply chain. Fossil fuels are amazing only because a lot of tough middlemen work has already been done naturally over the past however many million years.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 20, 2020, 12:45:39 PM
As I understand it, they're made using CO2 taken from the air, the CO2 is removed for the most part and they burn even better in ICE than oil-derived gasoline/diesel fuel.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb_8DJF6Hp0
www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_0ftKqQ9XE
In German, but they claim their synthetic fuel is completely carbon- and CO2-free.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kG759INJ7Y
OK, let's put some perspective into this. Yes, you can extract CO2 from the atmosphere, combine it with water and electricity and create a carbon fuel like Octane (the part of gasoline you really derive energy from).
Let's put aside the challenge of extracting CO2 from the atmosphere in large quantities. Let's assume you already have an unlimited source of CO2 and purified H2O ready to go.
When you burn Octane, the chemical formula looks like:
2 C8 H18 + 25 O2 = 16 C O2 + 18 H2 O
This process releases 5500 kJ per mole of energy. Reversing it to convert water and CO2 back into Octane will take, at least, 5500 kJ per mole of energy (electricity).
One liter of Octane contains 6.15 moles. So the amount of electricity to create 1 liter of Octane is 33,825 kJ. The US alone consumes 1,462,012,000 liters of gasoline PER DAY. That's 16,921.4 liters per second. That works out to 572,367,545.1 kJ per second (kiloWatts), or 572.4 GigaWatts, of constant power just to keep up with the demand. Applied constantly for a year, that's a bit over 5e12 kWh
The entire electrical output of the US last year was 4.118e12 kWh.
So you'd need to dedicate at least 21% more than the current total electrical output of the US just to manufacturing synthetic fuel in order to keep up with demand for gasoline in the US.
And that doesn't include inefficiency (physics says there have to be losses) or the energy required to extract CO2 from the atmosphere. Even offsetting 10% of America's gasoline consumption would require the equivalent electrical output of Germany.
The dream will never die!
Wimmer always goes through troll phases. This is the "...but synthetic fuels!" phase. Except I don't even think I can call it trolling because he believes in it.
Quote from: giant_mtb on April 21, 2020, 09:04:45 AM
Wimmer always goes through troll phases. This is the "...but synthetic fuels!" phase. Except I don't even think I can call it trolling because he believes in it.
I'm not sure I'd call it trolling. I think he reads an article or watches a video on synthetic fuels that is light on technical details and simply doesn't have technical/scientific background to see the technical hurdles involved that most of these news snippets tend to ignore.
I think wims just really want ICE cars to survive. I can definitely understand that.
Also the hype is really one sided. Lots of pop science coverage is poorly grounded in reality.
Quote from: Laconian on April 20, 2020, 01:17:21 PM
Range affects some people more than others. I know a lot of EV owners who prefer the low cost and convenience of at-home EV "filling". Of all my driving over the past year, the only two times EV range would've affected me would have been a trip to Whistler and a 4 hour ride from Belgium to France.
I don't think synthetic fuels will be much more than an interesting historical footnote. There's a lot more R&D to be done to produce it at a mass scale, and there probably isn't enough life in the idea for the capital costs to be amortized over time. Government subsidies are probably what's keeping the R&D moving along, but if it was brought to mass production, I don't think synthetic fuels would be profitable at all. ICEs will likely continue just exploding dinosaurs or perhaps biodiesel.
The problem with EVs is that they won't work for everyone. If you have your own garage and your commute is predefined and the range will work then go for it.
Most people in the city for example do not have their own garage and park their car on the street. Where are they going to charge their cars?
I think synthetic fuels do have potential, especially since they're practical. The energy density is high, they can be transported in fuel cans and they are renewable. At least they can be used for the next decades to 1) reduce CO2 output and 2) reduce dependance on foreign oil and 3) keep the ICE alive until EV technology is ready for the masses.
Quote from: MX793 on April 20, 2020, 04:49:12 PM
OK, let's put some perspective into this. Yes, you can extract CO2 from the atmosphere, combine it with water and electricity and create a carbon fuel like Octane (the part of gasoline you really derive energy from).
Let's put aside the challenge of extracting CO2 from the atmosphere in large quantities. Let's assume you already have an unlimited source of CO2 and purified H2O ready to go.
When you burn Octane, the chemical formula looks like:
2 C8 H18 + 25 O2 = 16 C O2 + 18 H2 O
This process releases 5500 kJ per mole of energy. Reversing it to convert water and CO2 back into Octane will take, at least, 5500 kJ per mole of energy (electricity).
One liter of Octane contains 6.15 moles. So the amount of electricity to create 1 liter of Octane is 33,825 kJ. The US alone consumes 1,462,012,000 liters of gasoline PER DAY. That's 16,921.4 liters per second. That works out to 572,367,545.1 kJ per second (kiloWatts), or 572.4 GigaWatts, of constant power just to keep up with the demand. Applied constantly for a year, that's a bit over 5e12 kWh
The entire electrical output of the US last year was 4.118e12 kWh.
So you'd need to dedicate at least 21% more than the current total electrical output of the US just to manufacturing synthetic fuel in order to keep up with demand for gasoline in the US.
And that doesn't include inefficiency (physics says there have to be losses) or the energy required to extract CO2 from the atmosphere. Even offsetting 10% of America's gasoline consumption would require the equivalent electrical output of Germany.
I'm no chemist or engineer, and I believe it that a lot of energy is required to produce this fuel, but I also believe that there are really smart people working on this attempting to simplify the process while yielding more results and using less energy.
The energy needed to produce synthetic fuel for example can be derived from overproduction from wind, solar, hydro etc. There are a handful of companies in Germany, in the north, which produce hydrogen from excess power generated mainly by offshore and inland wind power plants. Instead of letting that energy go to waste, use it for the production of hydrogen and synthetic fuel.
And this is another argument to use nuclear power, especially in Germany which had advanced and safe nuclear power plants. But Merkel was afraid of Tsunamis in Japan wrecking havoc in German nuclear power plants... in Germany... literally.
I do believe the future will be mixed: EVs, Fuel Cell, Synthetic Fuels and perhaps something else will come along. I'm just not excited about pure EVs, which aside from being fast, don't do much for me in terms of emotions. Yeah, they're less maintenance-intensive than an ICE, but some of us think with our emotions, not our wallets. :praise:
Quote from: mzziaz on April 21, 2020, 02:21:47 PM
I think wims just really want ICE cars to survive. I can definitely understand that.
It's hard to adapt to a "new technology" when you've grown up with an "old technology" which just seemed so normal and worked. I love the ICE. I love how the torque builds up, how it sounds, how the transmission reacts with the engine, how it feels... it's an emotional thing to me. EVs just feel so soulless to me.
Also, I do not see any advantages for me in owning an EV, because frankly I don't care about emissions, CO2 etc. An EV is also not practical for my driving needs. One day I got a project in the city, the next day I got a project a little further away. I need a car with range or that at least can be refueled quickly. Another thing: electricity is not cheap in Germany. We have the second highest electricity costs in the world. Some EV charging stations in Munich demand 70 cents per kWh!!!
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 22, 2020, 12:06:36 PM
I'm no chemist or engineer, and I believe it that a lot of energy is required to produce this fuel, but I also believe that there are really smart people working on this attempting to simplify the process while yielding more results and using less energy.
The energy needed to produce synthetic fuel for example can be derived from overproduction from wind, solar, hydro etc. There are a handful of companies in Germany, in the north, which produce hydrogen from excess power generated mainly by offshore and inland wind power plants. Instead of letting that energy go to waste, use it for the production of hydrogen and synthetic fuel.
And this is another argument to use nuclear power, especially in Germany which had advanced and safe nuclear power plants. But Merkel was afraid of Tsunamis in Japan wrecking havoc in German nuclear power plants... in Germany... literally.
I do believe the future will be mixed: EVs, Fuel Cell, Synthetic Fuels and perhaps something else will come along. I'm just not excited about pure EVs, which aside from being fast, don't do much for me in terms of emotions. Yeah, they're less maintenance-intensive than an ICE, but some of us think with our emotions, not our wallets. :praise:
One important takeaway from my post is that it is idealized.
Those numbers represent perfect efficiency (which is physically impossible). That is the best case scenario.Simply offsetting 10% of US gasoline consumption would require over 500 terawatt-hours per year of power just to combine CO2 and H2O into fuel. That's as much electricity as all of Germany produces in a year from all sources combined (wind, nuclear, solar, coal, etc). Best case scenario. And, again, that's just the idealized power required to make octane from CO2 and H2O, not gathering the CO2 from the air or any other supporting processes associated with making synthetic gasoline.
IOW, it's physically and logistically impossible for synthetic fuels to keep the ICE dream alive.
Quote from: Laconian on April 22, 2020, 12:40:57 PM
IOW, it's physically and logistically impossible for synthetic fuels to keep the ICE dream alive.
Unless we more than double the number of powerplants globally, or master cold fusion, I don't see synthetic hydrocarbons fuels being anything more than a niche product, sold in relatively low volume, catered to vintage car collectors so they can still drive their antiques every once in a while. Basically like super-high octane racing fuels today.
My guess is that fossil fuels will be used in some form for the foreseeable future, especially for cargo/freight. So diesel's safe, at least. Not sure about gasoline - that's much more of a consumer product.
Quote from: Laconian on April 22, 2020, 01:23:23 PM
My guess is that fossil fuels will be used in some form for the foreseeable future, especially for cargo/freight. So diesel's safe, at least. Not sure about gasoline - that's much more of a consumer product.
We could produce "renewable" bio fuels like ethanol or biodiesel easily enough. But the notion of making synthetic hydrocarbon fuels from CO2 and water in large enough quantities to make a dent is not feasible without some other kind of major technological breakthrough is power generation.
Quote from: MX793 on April 22, 2020, 12:34:30 PM
One important takeaway from my post is that it is idealized. Those numbers represent perfect efficiency (which is physically impossible). That is the best case scenario.
Simply offsetting 10% of US gasoline consumption would require over 500 terawatt-hours per year of power just to combine CO2 and H2O into fuel. That's as much electricity as all of Germany produces in a year from all sources combined (wind, nuclear, solar, coal, etc). Best case scenario. And, again, that's just the idealized power required to make octane from CO2 and H2O, not gathering the CO2 from the air or any other supporting processes associated with making synthetic gasoline.
I hope that the process will be simplified so that more can be produced while using drastically less energy. I'm a believer! :lol:
Quote from: Laconian on April 22, 2020, 12:40:57 PM
IOW, it's physically and logistically impossible for synthetic fuels to keep the ICE dream alive.
Unless there is a good mix in the future of EVs, Fuel Cell and Synthetic Fuel. There are companies worldwide researching this, attempting to improve the process. I don't think they'd invest resources, time and money into this if they thought it's a dead end.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 23, 2020, 10:22:43 AM
Unless there is a good mix in the future of EVs, Fuel Cell and Synthetic Fuel. There are companies worldwide researching this, attempting to improve the process. I don't think they'd invest resources, time and money into this if they thought it's a dead end.
Daimler just ended hydrogen fuel cell development of cars because it's too expensive compared to EV.
https://electrek.co/2020/04/22/daimler-ends-hydrogen-car-development-because-its-too-costly/
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 23, 2020, 10:22:43 AM
I don't think they'd invest resources, time and money into this if they thought it's a dead end.
Government: "Save the planet! $10B worth of grants for carbon-neutral R&D research!"
Bosch: "Uh, yeah, sure, this thing is totally gonna happen. Now gimme dat money. "
Government: "OK, u can haz money."
Bosch: "Money!"
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 23, 2020, 10:20:47 AM
I hope that the process will be simplified so that more can be produced while using drastically less energy. I'm a believer! :lol:
Faith cannot overcome laws of physics. Conservation of mass and energy are science law. You can't make something from nothing. If burning a liter of octane gives off 33.8 MJ of energy, producing a liter of octane cannot require less than 33.8 MJ or else the balance is broken. The absolute least energy required to produce synthetic octane is what I've shown in my math. Not including the energy consumption involved in harvesting and processing CO2 from the air.
I'm curious. Do you guys really want the ICE to die!? :cry:
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 24, 2020, 02:33:33 PM
I'm curious. Do you guys really want the ICE to die!? :cry:
Wanting something REALLY REALLY HARD doesn't change reality.
Quote from: SJ_GTI on April 24, 2020, 02:40:58 PM
Wanting something REALLY REALLY HARD doesn't change reality.
I just can't see EVs working for the entire world and for everyone. That's also a reality.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 24, 2020, 02:43:02 PM
I just can't see EVs working for the entire world and for everyone. That's also a reality.
I agree, there are diminishing returns the harder you work to make EVs ubiquitous. There will still be diesel and ethanol to power the ICEs that need huge energy storage.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 24, 2020, 02:33:33 PM
I'm curious. Do you guys really want the ICE to die!? :cry:
It won't. Emerging nations will be using it much longer. Lots of oil left.
Quote from: Laconian on April 24, 2020, 02:50:08 PM
I agree, there are diminishing returns the harder you work to make EVs ubiquitous. There will still be diesel and ethanol to power the ICEs that need huge energy storage.
The real limiting factor with BEVs right now is battery capacity paired with recharging time. Range is on the low side compared to an ICE powered car, and that's paired with recharge times that take much longer than an ICE. The shorter range would be tolerable if a charge up was as fast as an ICE car. The longer recharge times would be more tolerable if they had much more range. However, remember that even a "big" battery doesn't hold much energy compared to a fuel tank. 75kWh is the equivalent energy released from burning about 7 liters (1.8 gallons) of diesel fuel or 8.3 liters (2.2 gallons) of gasoline. Imagine a car going over 200 miles on so little fuel.
Quote from: shp4man on April 24, 2020, 03:01:44 PM
It won't. Emerging nations will be using it much longer. Lots of oil left.
Trucks, tractors, mopeds. Glorious-sounding V8s will probably be gone - it's not like Ferraris are bound in any way by practicality.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 24, 2020, 02:33:33 PM
I'm curious. Do you guys really want the ICE to die!? :cry:
No. But they are NOT the most efficient machines. So much is lost to heat from every cylinder explosion.
I think my biggest regret with losing the ICE will be the loss of manual transmissions, but they're essentially all dead anyways...
Quote from: Laconian on April 24, 2020, 06:07:11 PM
I think my biggest regret with losing the ICE will be the loss of manual transmissions, but they're essentially all dead anyways...
Besides transmissions, the general character that a drivetrain lends to a vehicle. Different engine notes, different shaped power bands. Some cars have early torque and no top end, others come to life when the tach needle crosses a certain threshold. Electric motors all have the exact same power delivery characteristics and all pretty much sound the same, too. The only difference from vehicle to vehicle will be power to weight ratio.
Then again, just as MTs have pretty much died out, the ubiquity of the 2.0T engine configuration these days is kind of priming us all for the monotony of powertrain character that is to come.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 24, 2020, 02:33:33 PM
I'm curious. Do you guys really want the ICE to die!? :cry:
It won't.
We still have steam engines.
Steam's external combustion ;).
But no, ICE ain't going anywhere. EV's are a dog that just don't hunt.
I just feel that the future of mobility should be mixed. EVs make sense for those who literally just drive short distances in the city and never venture outside. But for those of us who require more range and faster refueling, an EV does not make sense, especially in its current state. Teslas might be the exception, but all of the more affordable EVs like the Nissan Leaf, Renault Zoe etc. have drastic range drawbacks the moment you turn on the radio - literally. :tounge:
Quote from: MX793 on April 24, 2020, 05:03:54 PM
The real limiting factor with BEVs right now is battery capacity paired with recharging time. Range is on the low side compared to an ICE powered car, and that's paired with recharge times that take much longer than an ICE. The shorter range would be tolerable if a charge up was as fast as an ICE car. The longer recharge times would be more tolerable if they had much more range. However, remember that even a "big" battery doesn't hold much energy compared to a fuel tank. 75kWh is the equivalent energy released from burning about 7 liters (1.8 gallons) of diesel fuel or 8.3 liters (2.2 gallons) of gasoline. Imagine a car going over 200 miles on so little fuel.
^THIS!^ :ohyeah:
EVs have insanely efficient motors paired with inefficient energy storage tanks.
ICEs have inefficient motors paired with insanely efficient energy storage tanks.
Quote from: CaminoRacer on April 25, 2020, 11:08:01 AM
EVs have insanely efficient motors paired with inefficient energy storage tanks.
ICEs have inefficient motors paired with insanely efficient energy storage tanks.
So what we need is an electric motor that burns gasoline/diesel. :tounge:
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 25, 2020, 11:19:27 AM
So what we need is an electric motor that burns gasoline/diesel. :tounge:
Finding the solutions to both inefficiencys would be awesome. Both EV and ICE vehicles could travel 1,000-1,500 miles on a single tank.
ICE development has come a long way from the 60/70s. Emissions are down, mileage is up. Still a long way to go, though. ICE thermal efficiency is like 30-40% compared to electric motors at 90-98%.
My Bolt battery is the equivalent of about 2 gallons of gas, so it's got about the same amount of improvement needed.
Quote from: CaminoRacer on April 25, 2020, 11:25:29 AM
Finding the solutions to both inefficiencys would be awesome. Both EV and ICE vehicles could travel 1,000-1,500 miles on a single tank.
ICE development has come a long way from the 60/70s. Emissions are down, mileage is up. Still a long way to go, though. ICE thermal efficiency is like 30-40% compared to electric motors at 90-98%.
My Bolt battery is the equivalent of about 2 gallons of gas, so it's got about the same amount of improvement needed.
Yeah, the efficiency of the ICE engine has been improved big time, but it's still nowhere near an electric motor.
If memory serves me right, I saw or read something awhile back which stated it was theoretically possible to get a gasoline engine to run at 40%+ efficiency and a Diesel at 47%+ efficiency.
Will be interesting to see what the future will hold in store for us. Fuel Cell seems dead... so EV or synthetic fuels (I still believe in them...). :mask:
The 40% and 47% numbers seem pretty far removed from where we're at today.
(https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/images/energy_reqs_combined_072517.jpg)
The Model 3's permanent magnet reluctance motors are apparently 97% efficient at converting energy into motion. So replace that "Engine Losses - 68-72% loss" with "3%". And the "parasitic losses" part would probably be at a similar number, albeit for cabin heaters and battery temp management.
Quote from: Laconian on April 25, 2020, 01:07:10 PM
The 40% and 47% numbers seem pretty far removed from where we're at today.
(https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/images/energy_reqs_combined_072517.jpg)
Keyword was "theoretically", and I'm probably off a bit. I just remember the figure 47% for a Diesel engine, again, in theory.
Oh well, gonna enjoy my ICE for as long as possible.
Quote from: cawimmer430 on April 25, 2020, 01:25:36 PM
Keyword was "theoretically", and I'm probably off a bit. I just remember the figure 47% for a Diesel engine, again, in theory.
Oh well, gonna enjoy my ICE for as long as possible.
Ditto for me and my 6MT Miata. I sold my G37 because I saw the future of automobiles is in too-fast barges; lightweight and manual-shifted cars are a truly endangered species.
Efficiency without considering energy density or how intensive it is to get it to the vehicle is kind of meaningless.
If nuclear cars were invented tomorrow, but were only 30% efficient, but cost 3 cents to make, almost no energy required to make it, and produced unlimited range for vehicles and plenty of power, would we care at all what the efficiency is?
Mmm, smell the alpha emitters in the exhaust.
Quote from: MrH on May 12, 2020, 02:15:04 PM
Efficiency without considering energy density or how intensive it is to get it to the vehicle is kind of meaningless.
If nuclear cars were invented tomorrow, but were only 30% efficient, but cost 3 cents to make, almost no energy required to make it, and produced unlimited range for vehicles and plenty of power, would we care at all what the efficiency is?
We might care if low efficiency meant a lot more radioactive waste.
Quote from: MrH on May 12, 2020, 02:15:04 PM
Efficiency without considering energy density or how intensive it is to get it to the vehicle is kind of meaningless.
If nuclear cars were invented tomorrow, but were only 30% efficient, but cost 3 cents to make, almost no energy required to make it, and produced unlimited range for vehicles and plenty of power, would we care at all what the efficiency is?
:wtf:
Quote from: Laconian on April 25, 2020, 01:09:42 PM
The Model 3's permanent magnet reluctance motors are apparently 97% efficient at converting energy into motion. So replace that "Engine Losses - 68-72% loss" with "3%". And the "parasitic losses" part would probably be at a similar number, albeit for cabin heaters and battery temp management.
Those numbers are thermodynamic efficiency numbers for how well the engine converts heat energy into mechanical energy. When it comes down to bow efficiently they propel a vehicle down the road, a lot more goes into that.
Running heaters, ac and fans and such can't really be considered losses in the same way as heat out the tail pipe, because they are doing something you want.
Quote from: Soup DeVille on May 13, 2020, 01:50:37 PM
Its called a hypothetical argument.
If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier in cutting them down?
We might, if they screamed all the time for no good reason.
Quote from: Laconian on May 12, 2020, 02:58:09 PM
Mmm, smell the alpha emitters in the exhaust.
:lol:
Quote from: MX793 on May 12, 2020, 03:01:10 PM
We might care if low efficiency meant a lot more radioactive waste.
Yes, but efficiency by itself is meaningless number.
Quote from: MrH on May 13, 2020, 02:33:18 PM
:lol:
Yes, but efficiency by itself is meaningless number.
If we're talking about hydrocarbon-based energy source, efficiency is important for understanding the carbon footprint. Assuming the engine is a typical configuration and not some 500hp AMG turbo four pot in an A-class monstrosity. :lol:
Quote from: Laconian on May 13, 2020, 02:34:26 PM
If we're talking about hydrocarbon-based energy source, efficiency is important for understanding the carbon footprint.
But the benefit of electric cars is that they don't have to be hydrocarbon based?
But even if they are, the efficiency of the electric vehicle itself isn't important. The total efficiency, from converting hydro carbons into electricity, transmitting that electricity, and then usage, needs to be considered. Just looking at one step of that just seems like a meaningless number.
That issue has been considered in depth already: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-15/electric-cars-seen-getting-cleaner-even-where-grids-rely-on-coal
Quote from: Laconian on May 13, 2020, 02:34:26 PM
If we're talking about hydrocarbon-based energy source, efficiency is important for understanding the carbon footprint. Assuming the engine is a typical configuration and not some 500hp AMG turbo four pot in an A-class monstrosity. :lol:
This is true; and has little to do with efficiency. Large low speed diesels are more efficient than car engines; but are horrible when it comes to environmental damage.
The point he was making, as I took it, was that efficiency alone is a poor benchmark.
Efficiency alone, maybe, just like clock speed or core count are meaningless for CPUs. But generally you assume that a mass produced thing is going to be well-rounded and not suffer serious bottlenecks. So if you brag about your 16 core CPU, I'll assume that it's 64-bit and also clocked pretty high. There aren't many 16-core 1-bit CPUs out there. :lol:
(There are, however, 1024 cored 1-bit CPUs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connection_Machine)
Quote from: MrH on May 13, 2020, 02:42:33 PM
But even if they are, the efficiency of the electric vehicle itself isn't important. The total efficiency, from converting hydro carbons into electricity, transmitting that electricity, and then usage, needs to be considered. Just looking at one step of that just seems like a meaningless number.
Seems like most people in this thread have been looking at the whole system. :huh: