Cars & Motorbikes Electric cars

Began 10 years ago, if we are being fair dinkum...but it's only now as EV's start to become more mainstream that the demand will ramp up. What needed to happen was for car manufacturers to go all in on EV- and that's starting to happen now. Give it a few years and the cost of EV's will fall, and the range of EV's will rise... All those billions of dollars and bilions of euro's and billions of yen going towards R&D will make it so.

 

The funds being invested a are mind-boggling ...

 

Woohoo! Simialr to solar storage batteries - run them to 50% at first, then drain them down. It's good to know if they already have the battery longevity issue sorted as part of development (was an issue with some of the early iterations of solar batteries I understood).

Vertical integration, I'm seeing a business venture... now for that winning (big) lotto ticket.

 

Toyota Hilux to go electric

 

"It is a crucial difference between the ‘electric Hilux’ the Government says the ALP’s ’50 percent electric vehicle target’ requires, and what electrification of future car models will really look like.

In mild hybrid form, the Hilux will be able to store excess energy produced during coasting and braking in a small lithium-ion battery, which can be used to power a small electric motor to aid stop-start acceleration – when emissions and fuel consumption can be highest. The net result is a lower claimed measurement of grams CO2 (carbon dioxide) per kilometre."

Great link, thanks @wombat777 , it makes it a little clearer for me how the Govt can have it's cake and eat it too - 'mild' hybrid cars. Still need fuel - excise tick, 50% 'electric' cars - tick, contribute to global goals (lower CO2 emissions) - tick.

Still going for a full electric or plug-in car myself, but it is interesting to see the debate evolve.

 

We will all need to wait a few years for the tech to evolve, but I'd suggest that by 2025 for example, it will be pretty slick. There is just soooo much money going into it, and already Porsche's charge times are reportedly going to be many many times faster than what other manufacturers require at the moment. Does anyone remember Motorola " bricks"? Or flip phones? Where is Nokia now? Where is Kodak now? This stuff will move fast and wash away anyone standing in its way. This is what makes Morrison and Cash's protests so embarrassing for them. They are arguing the pre kickoff toss and the game is already well underway... in fact, a completely new game is already well underway, which makes it ever more embarrassing for them...

I can see a situation where home battery storage prices drop quite a bit within a few years at the same time as their capacities increase wquite a bit. They dont make finanila sense yet as they are offering around a 10 year ROI but only have a 10 year lifespan. So right now they are a break even proposition at best. But when capacity doubles or tripes, and prices reduce by 30,40 or 50% they will become compelling - so people will put solar on their homes, store excess in batteries and charge cars that way overnight. We don't get 365 days of sunshine obviously, but in a country like ours it will mean that most of the year, cars are being charged for free.

The more I look at Shortens policies on this, the more I think he is showing real "look ahead" leadership beyond the next 3 year election cycle... and the more I am reminded of how 10 years of interia has left a nation that should be leading the world in developing renewables, and making a fricken fortune from doing so- is a laggard now. Its not just about the kind of green you think of when you think of renewables ... its about the greenbacks ! We could be the worlds Lithium Valley and Solar Valley and food bowl....

 

Tony Abbott is still in "climate change" denial ... prior to that Labor were too busy infighting ... prior to that Howard was making to much money off coal ... Turnbull tried to get things moving but was roughshod by the backroom ... Morrison is still in denial ....

Looks like it might be Labor (house) - Greens (senate) - on my ballot for the first time ever

 

Hydrogen within 2 years ... 2,000km per tank ... I reckon that would do in the bush

Are electric cars viable for regional Australians?

... and before anyone gets antsy about big freightliner trucking ... Isuzu, Volvo and numerous other companies already have the big boys under construction, with the first deliveries already underway for testing

 

We are so at the bottom of the world.... Going to NZ recently, I heard that they, and Tasmania, are often left off world maps.....

 

A relatively isolated Tesla charger at Glenorchy in NZ ( photo from March 18 - was on my way to walk the Routeburn Track ).

 

Excellent! When we were in NZ last month, there were relatively more EV cars in the mix (and some very nice EV BMW and Porsches too!). I read on another forum that Australia's looking like becoming the next Cuba in the car world!

 

From the article:

Elon Musk makes incredible claims about Tesla Model 3 longevity, will offer battery module replacement

"Early data about Tesla battery degradation show less than 10% reduction in energy capacity after over 160,000 miles, but that’s about all we have."​

Elon Musk:

"Model 3 drive unit & body is designed like a commercial truck for a million mile life. Current battery modules should last 300k to 500k miles (1500 cycles). Replacing modules (not pack) will only cost $5k to $7k."​

... that translates to 482,803 km to 804,672 km

I've been driving for 29 years, averaged about 25,000km a year until 2-3 years ago. So 26 years @ 25,000 km = 650,000 km ... so a chance the battery modules could have covered all of my driving ( if use of charger is optimal ... ideally only charging when needed and limiting use of super-charger ).

This data is interesting - Tesla battery degradation at less than 10% after over 160,000 miles, according to latest data :

(extract)

 

Electric vehicle sales soar in China, as overall auto market falls | The Driven

From the article:

Official figures released on Friday show that in China in 2018, sales of “new energy vehicles” (NEV) soared by 80 per cent against an otherwise flagging automotive market.

In the first half of 2018, NEV sales doubled from the year before with a 106% increase, and saw a 68% increase in the second half of 2018, according to data from research house EV-Volumes .

 

Extract from a Bloomberg article is via twitter:
Rodney Hooper on Twitter

( who incidentally does great analysis of lithium demand-supply )

Full article:

Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

 

Heard this the other day and just checked it online now, Shenzen, China has converted their entire public bus fleet to electric (16,000 buses) and now looking to replace all the taxi's too (22,000).

Shenzhen's silent revolution: world's first fully electric bus fleet quietens Chinese megacity

 

This great tidbit was circulating last year:

China is adding a London-sized electric bus fleet every five weeks

 

Now Norway is mandating that all new cars sold are all-electric by 2025:

“Norway’s capital city of Oslo will be the world’s first metropolitan area to install wireless, induction-based charging stations for electric taxis, in a bid to make a zero-emission cab system by as early as 2023, according to Reuters. Norway wants to go even further than that, however, and is mandating that all new cars sold in the country be all-electric by 2025.”​

Norway will install the world’s first wireless electric car charging stations for Oslo taxis

 

It's volumes like these in China that we need to bring the cost of battery production down, and test the longevity of the batteries with frequent recharge cycles.

Interesting graph @wombat777 . Thinking about our solar battery, the battery health dropped from 100 - 98% in the first year, then it 4 years ('15-'19) to drop to it's current 88% health. How fast the battery loses it's health will determine the battery life (my uninformed thought is that short metro drives with a lot of stop-starts would be more taxing on the batteries, but knowing that braking can/does recharge the batteries, I may be very wrong there).

 

They (Europe particularly) are sooo far advanced compared to Australia (in many aspects of daily life), would love to live there for 6 months (summer please). We'll stick to plug in electric cars but it is interesting to see options out there.

If you have the TV on currently (7.20am Monday 15 April), ABC News Breakfast will have a discussion about electric cars in the next half hour or so.

 

Volkswagen ID. Roomzz unveiled | Drive Car News