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Boston Oil Party, Anyone?
Hi Steve
Why can't we start with a practical car design. If it only needs to go 50 miles an hour, why do we fit engines that are so oversized. Any engine has an optimum operating speed. A thottled engine is very inefficient and using it over a broad speed range guarantees inefficiency.
A small gas engine running at constant speed can charge batteries that feeds an electric motor. This is called a series hybrid, and leaves the electric motor coupled to the drive wheels which provides the regenerative braking at lowest design cost.
What is being sold now as a hybride is a pretty inefficient system

I agree that hydrogen is not an answer, it's an energy carrier and takes 4 times more energy to make and store then use electric than a lithium battery.
We also need to make all vehicles lighter and more efficient. Amory Lovins has a great power point on his Rocky Mountain Inst RMI website. It shows that most of the energy for any vehicle is used to moce the wieght of the vehicle itself. Make them lighter , smaller more efficient.
Hybrids can do that and allow us to use all the super light batteries we can afford. Then add more if they become lower in cost. A hybrid also uses regenerative braking to cature wasted braking over a regular car. This reduces brake dust and wear too.
A hybrid could run on many types of fuel. Even solar and wind can be used to charge and sell back energy in hybrids with V2G options.
The bicycle is the most efficeint transportation for 1 person. It even helps you exercise. We need to use the right vehicle for each task.
the solar stacks
Hey Steve,
Let's hope no one *actually* dumps oil into the harbor or the Charles... sticky mess that'd be. But I love the literal image. Big floaty 'OIL' barrels...
But let's talk fuel cells. They aren't a solution, just a more efficient 'engine'. And when you look at where the H2 comes from, unless the source is solar or nuclear the net gain is essentially wiped out.
Mobile uses for energy are going to rely on oil for a long time, but we need to stop wasting petroleum on fixed installations. We need more primary energy first (solar), and energy conversion technologies (FC) second.
The Light is Green!
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The BMW Hydrogen 7 is the world's first production-ready hydrogen vehicle. Will it go the way of the electric car that was killed by Detroit on the 70's? The answer lies with politicians, oil companies and other world leaders. At the Boston Tea Party the political answer was in the hands of the people throwing barrels of tea overboard (would now that they be barrels of oil).
If democracy were a little more virile the answer might lie in the hands of the people - and if the American people were less polarized into so-called left 'pro-government' and right 'free market' mindsets, we might stop political bickering, band together and find political solutions squarely in the middle, understanding that absolute power in either direction corrupts 'absolutely'. A totally free market without regulations (we are dangerously close to this now) gives unlimited power for corporations to monopolize an industry (oil), buy off the government, defeat alternatives or competition and endanger the consumer.
A government controlled system crushes initiative and innovation, and oppresses the people for the sake of the state. We have seen the abysmal failures of Marxism and other totalitarianism. Somewhere between the elements of socialism and free enterprise, both of which exist in our society, there needs to be a strengthening of the checks and balance or some cognitive recognition when the direction of the dollar is 'to hell in a handbasket' that we need an alternative route out now, not when we run out of oil. Unfortunately, that would be too late, and we will be inextricably bound in that hot unfortunate place.
We need a hybrid car which uses hydrogen fuel cells instead of gasoline. Since both technologies are currently being used in commercial cars, I just don't get why they aren't being combined. There is also a car in production right now that is 100% electric,
goes 225 miles on one charge and from 0-60 in 3.8 seconds. It's called the Tesla, but it costs $100,000 dollars.
The auto industry could mass produce something like this for a fraction of the cost, but we need to insist that the next administration in Washington have the independence from oil lobbyists to push oil companies out of the way for this to happen. This way we could get some energy independence without a heavy cost to the environment.
The largest threat to our national security is oil; it has infiltrated our country by thwarting other technologies, empowering rogue oil nations and attracting their terrorists, and by corrupting Washington's proclaimed goal of representing the American people.
Exxon-Mobil, Shell, and BP have been waiting over 30 years to take the oil in Iraq, which has the second largest store of underground oil in the world alongside along with Iran.
The oil fields are now being drilled, so in that sense it is 'mission accomplished'.
If we spent 200 billion$ (many would call that 1/10 of what the Iraq war has actually cost the US) on fuel cells they'd be out there, and we wouldn't need to deal with these guys at all.
Steve Mento
233 Meadow Ridge Rd.
Galloway, NJ 08205