54 replies to this topic

[Ethel]

What goes on before the energy gets in the vehicle will be at least as important.

 

We're either going to have to supplement green energy or store it. If it's to be the latter, that's right in the territory of vehicle technology.

 

Interesting nugget from R4 last night - apparently contrails have a much bigger environmental impact than the exhaust from the jets that made 'em - bouncing back radiation.

[Dusky]

I did the calculation for Belgium. ( who is now planning to close its nuclear power plants and replace them with.... gas turbines...);
We do 84 billion miles with passenger cars per annum. Replacing all these miles with nissan leaf miles would require 14 Twh extra electricity. That's multiple big new nuclear plants. It's all a dream.

[Spider]

I did the calculation for Belgium. ( who is now planning to close its nuclear power plants and replace them with.... gas turbines...);
We do 84 billion miles with passenger cars per annum. Replacing all these miles with nissan leaf miles would require 14 Twh extra electricity. That's multiple big new nuclear plants. It's all a dream.

 

I suspect part of 'the dream' is to recharge these electric cars with renewable energy, from wind and solar, only they seemed to have seriously miscalculated the overall total life environmental contribution, it's worse than what we have now.

[sonikk4]

All major UK Airports are supposed to be going full electric with all Airside vehicles in the not too distant future. Already a lot of the small utility vehicles you see batting around (think baggage trolley tugs here) are fully electric and they are starting to introduce Aircraft tugs as well.

 

Now herein lies the rub with regards to Aircraft Tugs. Large Aircraft (think B747, A380, B777 etc) all need a tug that weighs roughly 40 + tons to be able to physically manhandle these monsters. Now short tows off stand for a Aircraft departure is a no brainer (MTOW Max Take Off Weight) but when you are looking at towing to remote stands that leads to bigger challenges with regards to battery life. Night time especially as some of these tows can be miles. (Lots of lights, Beacon, cab heating, Radio comms) all battery burners and a potentially very heavy Aircraft laden with anywhere between 10 to 40 tons of fuel (depending on maintenance requirements etc which is about as high as we go for a Aircraft input.) Flight use fuel depending on A/C is double that and then some.

 

So a huge drain battery wise and will require some heavy duty charging facilities. Like all power networks, how much redundancy is built into the existing system that can handle virtually every vehicle on the Airport being charged simultaneously????

 

From our hangar point of view, there are lots of questions with regards to charging personal vehicles on site. At the moment there is one Tesla and a couple of company vehicles so no more than 4 at this point in time. And only one proper charging point currently.

 

So from an infrastructure point of view, a hell of a lot needs to be done to facilitate proper charging for all vehicles used at an Airport let alone any personal vehicles. None of this is cheap.

[MikeRotherham]

Not knowing anything about the electric system in domestic properties, surely there is ia limit to the amount of current that can be drawn.

 

The last few homes I've lived in have had a 100amp main fuse. Is that good for 19 kw? Some one correct me.

 

If a home owner has a 7kw or greater charger that doesn't leave a massive amount left over for things like electric showers, electric heating, electric cooking, etc

 

Have i got it completely wrong?

Edited by MikeRotherham, 09 July 2021 - 07:14 AM.

[sonscar]

I think newer houses have a 60 amp main fuse now,Steve..

[IronmanG]

19kw is about 80 amp depending on your voltage.
Luckily in electrics there is something called diversity which basically means you arent using everything all the time.
Also a 100 amp fuse doesnt blow at 100 amp funnily enough. It takes a lot more. The scale is logarithmic so they could take maybe 250 amps but for a short period of time

[IronmanG]

Just add up the mcbs in the consumer unit. Even in a 2 bed flat will probably add up to higher than the main fuse

[wilsonch]

Have you noticed that no one has mentioned BEV's towing caravans.
Theres not many real world tests, but those there are show just how much towing an average caravan effects the effeciency.
And trying to pull into a 'charging bay' with a van attached is asking for trouble.
My boss tows a hefty van with a jag f pace and on his way to Devon only stops once (mostly for a wee) but even with fuel fill its 30mins max.
I can see a BEV taking ALL day.
Lets also not forget MOST EVs dont have type approval to tow...

Edited by wilsonch, 09 July 2021 - 11:42 AM.

[DomCr250]

Not knowing anything about the electric system in domestic properties, surely there is ia limit to the amount of current that can be drawn.

 

The last few homes I've lived in have had a 100amp main fuse. Is that good for 19 kw? Some one correct me.

 

If a home owner has a 7kw or greater charger that doesn't leave a massive amount left over for things like electric showers, electric heating, electric cooking, etc

 

Have i got it completely wrong?

 

If you buy a very expensive charging point it has a sensor built in that calculates the rest of the house load, it then changes the charging point load to make sure it never exceeds the maximum rated KW that the house can supply.  So if you have the cooker and the tumble dryer on the car charges slower than if nothings on.

 

Nobody's taken into account the banning of gas boilers soon for new builds, a typical gas boiler is about 8 - 10Kw, so to replace that with some form of green heat exchanger will still require maybe about 4Kw, add in everything else (say a peak of another 8Kw, electric shower and the tumble dryer) and you will have little capacity left for car charging in the daytime.

[IronmanG]

Not knowing anything about the electric system in domestic properties, surely there is ia limit to the amount of current that can be drawn.

The last few homes I've lived in have had a 100amp main fuse. Is that good for 19 kw? Some one correct me.

If a home owner has a 7kw or greater charger that doesn't leave a massive amount left over for things like electric showers, electric heating, electric cooking, etc

Have i got it completely wrong?

If you buy a very expensive charging point it has a sensor built in that calculates the rest of the house load, it then changes the charging point load to make sure it never exceeds the maximum rated KW that the house can supply. So if you have the cooker and the tumble dryer on the car charges slower than if nothings on.

Nobody's taken into account the banning of gas boilers soon for new builds, a typical gas boiler is about 8 - 10Kw, so to replace that with some form of green heat exchanger will still require maybe about 4Kw, add in everything else (say a peak of another 8Kw, electric shower and the tumble dryer) and you will have little capacity left for car charging in the daytime.

Yep nowhere near enough capacity. Gas boiler I just installed was 25kW combi.
I am just about to outfit a house with a heat as you use electric system. So 10kW shower. 6 kW basin. 6kW kitchen sink. So it only costs when you turn the tap on. No stored water at all. An electric combi needs 3 phase to get near to a gas combi equivalent
Gonna need some bigger windmills!

[Spider]

I was chatting with a mate the other day about the looming 2030 deadline.

We both feel that the powers to be know this is likely unachievable, but have thrown down this gauntlet to encourage industry to steer their thoughts away from Petrol as fuel for cars. It's possible, even likely that 6 to 12 months out from the 2030 deadline, an extension will be granted.

 

Personally, with the direction so far being dragged down the Electric road, I can't see how, if ever, the whole shooting match would be ready in that time. The current (hahaha) EVs and Batteries is hardly even 1/4 baked, taking in to account the infrastructure needed and while batter technology has came a very long way, it still has a very very long way to go.

Australia is one country that is at a huge disadvantage with the push to EVs. Within our cities, that would work as well as anywhere, but we do have very long distances between centres that presently have no infrastructure, not a cable of any time for hundreds of miles in any direction. Despite this, these spances are driven very often (as in daily) by lots of people and mostly for commerce in one form or another. EVs outside of our cities is simply not feasible and not likely to be so ever, simply because many of these areas are baron, either desert or semi-desert, so, no one presently lives in these areas and not likely to for a very long time, if ever. No people = no infrastructure. 

We also have no local car industry now, so with the world's car manufacturers dumping the IC engine in favor of EV, it's going to set us back around 200 years, further compounding the issue of population and infrastructure.

Moving on from that, if there is to be a move away from fossil fuels, like James May, I see it in Hydrogen, and it maybe in 2 ways. Fuel Cells are one practical way of getting the energy density needed to make EVs practical and can also be refilled fairly quickly, similar time as it takes to fill a car presently with petrol. The other way Hydrogen can be used is to burn it in IC engines. This too is very efficient. JCB are a fair way down this road already for their excavators. The present down side of Hydrogen, while being the most abundance element in the Universe, extracting / converting other compounds to capture it or make it is quite inefficient. Once that is somehow overcome, I think batteries will be dropped like a hot potato.

[Ethel]

 

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Yes a lot of things need to happen. And on the back of covid and possibly brexit depending how that goes, govt money isnt going to be available in the same quantities it was.

 

Ah but the government is starting to use MMT (Modern Monetary Theory or Magic Money Tree).  Endless amounts can be brought into existence by central banks.  No one will notice the purchasing power of the currency diminishing, not for a while anyway.

That's the SNP independence monetary policy, are you Nicola Sturgeon??

 

You know the high street banks have been doing that for decades? Remember 2008.

[Ethel]

Moving on from that, if there is to be a move away from fossil fuels, like James May, I see it in Hydrogen, and it maybe in 2 ways. Fuel Cells are one practical way of getting the energy density needed to make EVs practical and can also be refilled fairly quickly, similar time as it takes to fill a car presently with petrol. The other way Hydrogen can be used is to burn it in IC engines. This too is very efficient. JCB are a fair way down this road already for their excavators. The present down side of Hydrogen, while being the most abundance element in the Universe, extracting / converting other compounds to capture it or make it is quite inefficient. Once that is somehow overcome, I think batteries will be dropped like a hot potato.

 

I think EVs will be here to stay. When you rationalise the equation, whatever they run on our vehicles will mostly be sun, wind or wave powered & the first stage is going to be converting that in to electrical energy. Converting energy without losing some is next to impossible, so the most efficient system will do it least. Electricity is also the ubiquitous energy infrastructure, like VHS videos & Windows PCs.

 

I take your point on energy density & hydrogen may well fill that gap. My prediction would lean towards fuel cells as it would be effective supplementary technology. Maybe well all be driving cars with city dwellers having smaller batteries that'll just manage a commute & optional fuel cells for everything else?

[sonscar]

Or you will use an app on your chosen platform and a vehicle will come and pick you up ,drop you off and keep on doing this for all day etc.No ownership,no parking,no deaths?Plus other socially acceptable non specific benefits.Just a scenario,Steve..