why plug into anything?
why not they just swap batteries at an gas station? then the only thing that needs standardizing is the batteries.
To make it catch on, take advantage of the existing distribution infrastructure, keep the economic interests (gas station owners, energy companies) on the team, and avoid the headaches of starting everything from scratch.
Stephen

while stationed in alaska they had outlets to plug our cars in that kept the cars oil from freezing overnight they had them all over the base why cany we do that here seems simple (they were connected to a warmer in the oil pan)

CRTC fort greely alaska

Here are the solutions:
1. Ditch the idea of selling electricity back to the grid - its ludicrous and wasteful. Batteries deliver DC power and the heat generated in turning it back into AC makes this prohibitive and frankly stupid.

2. Charging a battery at home? Easy. the power company traditionally sells you as much power as you need. If you don't have a electric car then great. But Battery charging at home should be done with a hard wired system that will not charge - or charge slower, if you are running your TV, A/C, Hairdryer, and electric stove all at once. Preference is given to the rest of the house. This means people will naturally charge batteries at night or turn everything else off to catch a charge during the day - without going over average usage for the domicile.

3. Your car comes with multiple batteries - switch em out.

4. If batteries are too big to switch-out at home, those guys who do the Blue Rhino canisters for gas grills have the business model all figured out. No worries. or get a hand truck. they can design one that will do the switching and save your back at the same time.

5. Smart chargers communicating with the grid? Total B.S. with the connectivity we already have, if you don't like my idea in #2, all you need is a small cell phone that can make a 3 second call to get the grid info. Location is already part of the infrastructure, as cell towers are very local. This is not difficult technology for LG or someone to figure out. No cell service? fine - a landline call can do the same thing. No land line? You are probably still driving a Studebaker...carry on.

6. Public Interface? Its called a garage. with the small margins in operating a gas station or garage these days these guys will happily get into this business. Seems to me a car company would have an interest in setting up garages to charge their batteries - it would make you more likely to buy THEIR electric car.

7 AND to avoid the charger wire issues, have all congress has to do is decide on a standard and make it a law. Once you tell Honda and TOyota and everyone else that their batteries must be 12v and have x-connector, they WILL fall in line. None of this letting the market sort it out. this is growth industry and we, as citizens, through our governement, have a right to decide how they can sell us X, Y or Z.

This is all about government dollars and the real easy solutions are right in front of everyone. When they try to tell you this nonsense is neccessary, they are lying and just trying to create wasteful spending and work it out so that they can still extract the same dollar amount, in profit, per mile driven - because their expenditures were so high in bringing us this vaunted technology that we already have.

CAN YOU BELIEVE I put this out there for nothing? I should be getting paid big bucks to come up with these ideas.

Interesting... In my own online article, "The New American Crisis", I point out large-scale energy storage as a critical element for a refurbished grid capable of meeting the demands of millions of plug-in vehicles. The approach I suggest is the building of UltraCap farms close to high-demand consumers.

A "smart" interface, however, (like the V2Green interface) would allow those many millions of electric vehicles to serve the same purpose! Brilliant!!

Regards,

Brad

Most of the "problems" that you are describing are not an issue with plug-in hybrids. Huge numbers of people commute less than 30 miles a day and could complete their trips under only electric power. They would need to charge their cars only at home. Anyone who must drive more than 40 miles a day would simply rely on the internal combustion engine to complete their trip. A trip from Oakland to Reno would be powered primarily by the internal combustion engine, as it is with today's Prii (plural for Prius).

You're right that relying on pure electric vehicles would present "a mind-numbing array of technical challenges."

P.S. I have been driving my Prius since July 2004. I'm currently averaging 53 MPG.

Then the batteries would have to be standardized. The size, shape, weight, connection, voltage, charging time, chemical makeup, operating temp.

Have you been to the Battery section at an auto parts store? You might as well be in a candy shop or cell phone store with all the choices/standards.

What may be right for a Smart car will never be enough for an SUV.

Who owns the batteries? What if they give you an 5 year old battery that only hold 80 percent charge?

Is a fueling station a vast warehouse (next to a power station) of batteries charging? Is this self service for the mom or man in a suit?

That said, swapping is great for fleets like USPS, FedEx or Taxis.

All power company vehicles should be mandatory electric in 2 years.

Cause its not a little battery up by your engine meant to give enough juice to the starter and then being recharged by the generator. Its a huge battery, usually down in the center of the undercarraige, but also in the trunk. And they are fork-lift heavy.

Seriously, now....

This would be great tho, a lot of people live in windy areas and could have a little windmill on their house, which would charge their cars.

Swapping batteries at the gas station is a great idea!

Why don't we also focus on better mass transit? Not just in cities, but between them.
I'm not talking BioFuel busses. I'm talking about non vehicular people movers.

The whole problem is that we're having essentially one car being manufactured for one person. It seems like the energy needed to move that person, including the energy used to manufacture the car, is overkill.

We should look at this in terms of "energy in, waste out, goal accomplished". Rather than "how do we convert an existing infrastructure" that was built under completely ignorant circumstances relative to our impact on the environment and real sustainability.

I imagine that we could use all the metal in cars to build truly useful devices.

YetiMan

Just got back from France on business and couldn't help but notice all the vehicle plug in stations all over Paris. If the French can do it, why can't the US? Add a credit card machine and voila', new business opportunity...

Brent Quebman
Executive Director
www.energyQue.com

What about dedicated solar panels and special inverters just for the plug in?
Could possibly also tie a wind or hydro generator directly into the system.
Maybe tie into the grid with this system to get credit for those cloudy and no wind days.
Wouldn't it be nice to drive for free (excluding maintenance costs)most of the year??
Now if we could just see some decent tax incentives in this regards or is this too utopian of an idea?

Sorry, I screwed up the hyperlink to my online article "The New American Crisis". This one should work. Thanks, again for your terrific article.

The news that electric cars will hit the streets en masse is a VERY VERY GOOD THING.

Stop fretting about the details, even the Model T lacked air conditioning and power windows.

Give the technology a chance before all the armchair QB's try to tear it down. Besides, do you have a better choice other then a bike.

As for batteries and charging, yes, solar will help as will wind. Also you can "fill batts right at the utility for large scale shipping. I was once told, we lose about 50% of the electricity just transmitti8n it over long distance.

This is a fanatastic breakthrough which will only get better as storage devices come down in price and up in performance. The TESLA specs are exactly whats needed for urban vehicles.

Technologies will soon be in production that eliminate the need to plug in to recharge electric cars.

This revolution can turn future cars into power plants when parked.

See our website: magneticpowerinc.com

The energy sources have never before been utilized in practical systems.

They are abundant, renewable, available everywhere, and make possible inexpensive electric and mechanical power.

Mark Goldes
Chairman, Magnetic Power Inc.

These are all questions that Shai Agassi has answered, a long time ago. Project Better Place is implementing the EV revolution in Israel, Denmark, amongst other locations right now. You need only take a trip across town to Silicon Valley, where Mr. Agassi is HQ'd, to understand these issues.

Nor is electricity a totally clean source of energy.

Coal, nuclear and hydro sources are fairly will tapped out with present consumption. There are huge variances in power rates throughout the country.

So it will be necessary to build additional power plants and a new electrical grid to carry the increased power.

While thinking of the above remember the phrase “Not in my back yard”.

Swapping out a 1,500# battery sounds simpler than it is likely to be and it will not be free.

All batteries have finite service lives and pose disposal issues.

Compatibility problems will abound.

Think about a car that works to get you to the store, vs. the implications of travel to say sparsely populated Canada or Mexico. The domestic alto consumo rate (high consumption) in Mexico varies regionally but runs about $0.40 per kwH + tax and the more you use the higher the rate.

This raises questions about where it will be possible to sell these cars.

Also, as electric cars become more efficient and technology improves, there will be a huge depreciation amongst older models, which were originally sold at premium prices. It will likely be parallel to the development of personal computers and we all know the value of a 10 year old computer.