Wind Power – Progress, Slowly

Converting the energy from wind to electricity is a huge mechatronic challenge.  Lots of backyard inventors are trying their hands at it.  At the end of the day, it will come down to what works economically.

The issue is that you have to convert the kinetic energy of the wind, which is very low depending on where you are, into enough mechanical energy to turn something that will turn a generator.  Sounds simple, and it is, up to a point.

The wind part can be thought of in Watts per Square Meter of energy.  So we have to come up with something that has very large surface area and very light weight.  Sailing technology comes to mind.  And there is a huge range of efficiency based on aerodynamics, which is why there is so much effort around blade design in the current generation of wind turbines.

But at energy levels of 150 W/m**2, it takes a lot of square meters to hit enough energy to be useful.  If you are thinking “small wind” for residential applications 2000-3000 watts peak power would require 20 square meters of surface area. That could be a rotor just over ten feet in diameter by eighteen feet tall.   That is a very large mechanical structure for a residential building.  And not easy to support securely against high winds.

2000  to 3000 Watts of intermittent power might displace half your power bill during the year if the wind blows a lot.  If not, maybe 1/4 of your annual power bill if you don’t get a lot of wind.  So you still need the power company unless you make the turbine 4 times bigger.

And the product cannot cost more than you are paying presently for the electricity. In states like New Jersey, New York or California where electricity costs are high, that might amount to $1500 if the value is for part of the annual power used.  In states where electricity costs are 11 cents/kWh, its really not worth it.

Land based wind farms have not done very well so far.  Think about the complexity of building gearboxes at the megawatt level that have to withstand sudden changes in wind conditions.  It’s nothing like the industrial world.  Historical costs of operation and maintenance (O&M) are being reported at 20 and 30% due to premature failure of gearboxes, electrical systems catching fire, blades breaking due to control system failures.  The list goes on.

So Wind Power still stands as a major mechatronic challenge.

What is the proper role of the government in the wind energy business?  President Obama says he is committed to promoting wind energy in this country.  Wind Energy will bring jobs to America.  Well, maybe for some of the construction guys.  So far, a significant amount of wind turbines sold in the US come from foreign suppliers.  And even for domestic wind turbines, a lot of the parts come from offshore suppliers.

If you look at all the new bureaucracy being created,  well, it will be amazing if anything ever gets done.  The newly formed Bureau of Ocean Energy Management Regulation and Enforcement has been created to oversee the sale of leases of Federal Waters, where offshore wind is expected to migrate. Seems like the only jobs being created are Federal jobs.  By the way, they have 14 openings right now and some of them are Petroleum and Enviromental Engineers, so if you’re not busy, check it out.

The process to get a lease from BOEMRE will take at least 2-3 years before you can even think about putting equipment out.  Can you spell Boondoggle?

Energy Saving and Industry

Energy conservation is a popular subject.  And a lot of commentary has been offered about the importance of energy conservation in the industrial community.  I agree.  But the desire for energy conservation needs to be tempered with real cost benefit analysis.  Which sometimes gets passed up.

Almost all variable frequency drives are sold on the basis of the amount of energy, and money, they will save as part of the justification for spending the money on the equipment and installation.  Fans and pumps can benefit from reduced power consumption, especially when there are hundreds of horsepower of load involved.   Mechanical life expectancy increases and maintenance costs are reduced as system speeds are reduced to meet the operating setpoint of the driven load.

Large material handling systems have found ways to reduce costs.  Systems that are divided into zones can be monitored for the the presence of product on the conveyor lines.  If there is no product present, the conveyor motor is idled which saves energy.  When there are large systems, like airport baggage handling systems, with hundreds of horsepower of equipment spread over miles of conveyors, the load requirements are similar and a 20% or 30% reduction in system energy consumption can be very significant.

But plant floor machinery can be very different depending on the industry you are in.  In the medical manufacturing arena, there are lots of machines and lots of stepping motors in them.  Sometimes 24 axes of stepping motors can be in a very small machine.  And medical manufacturing plants can have hundreds, even thousands of motors.  So you would think that there are similarities in terms of the energy savings opportunity.

But factory automation systems present different energy usage problems.  Stepping motors, for example, are low power consumption systems are always on.  The motor may not be doing any work, but the power supply needed to provide DC power is always on.  So power is being converted, even though the motors may not be doing any work.  But the fact is that stepping motor systems are fairly low power, 200 Watts is typical.  So even when there are loads made up of hundreds of stepping motors, its hard to come up with enough energy saving to return the cost of a complex effort to control it.

In the servo world because multiple servo axes are not all on at the same time, average load and power supply sharing have led to a number of servo amps that use common dc bus architecture. This is a great way to say money and reduce equipment size.  But even large systems are limited to 10 kilowatt average power.  And frequently these systems have the ability to manage the input power so that the AC load is fairly efficient.

But once in a great while, there are applications where excess bus energy is generated, or regeneration is taking place.  This is the case when a palletizing machine lowers its load.  The weight of the material on the pallets drives the motors instead of the amplifiers.  This puts generated electricity onto the input voltage bus.  Imagine the surprise of the electrical maintenance department getting an emergency call that the palletizing equipment was generating too much power!

Every prospective energy saving project needs to be considered in the context of the industry, application and cost benefit.    A simple Pareto analysis of the major segments of energy consumption can be conducted which will categorized and quantify the opportunities for energy cost reduction.  Many of the best opportunities will come from unexpected areas.

Change the World

As we approach the end of the year and contemplate the coming year, it is a natural point in time to reflect on our accomplishments and consider our goals for the future.  So forgive me if I wax philosophical.  But I would like to offer the opinion that engineering is about changing the world. If it isn’t, it should be.  Change the world, make things better than you found them.

Engineers Without Borders has completed a project in Lashaine Village Tanzania that will increase their ability to harvest rainwater, treat and store local water supply up to 120,000 liters, and add 1080 Watts of solar panels that will power an upcoming computer lab.  This project literally impacts hundreds of families by creating improved water quality and availability.  It also creates an electrical infrastructure that will enable the Middle School students to run computers and radically improve their educational opportunities.  This is a part time, volunteer organization that raises funds for projects and sends out teams all over the world to provide improved conditions in the lives of people who have a need and couldn’t get it done without outside help.

At a fundamental level all engineering should be about leaving things better than we found them.  Every project I have been involved in represented incremental improvements that provided more benefit to the business than the investment cost.  And we should consider context carefully.  For the employer who delivers a product or service, being competitive and producing quality are what keep the company in business.  So as engineers we are frequently engaged in the development of technology that enables our employers to be more successful, by way of improved product quality, increased throughput, decreased part costs, or any of a number of parameters by which the company you work for may measure success.

And that may not always “feel” like we are getting something done that Changes the World.  But it can make the difference between being open for business and having to close.  It can make the difference between having steady employment, and adding new jobs because of expanding sales. It’s not always as direct as going to a remote part of the world and helping people to have water to drink, wash and grow crops with.

The creative drive to develop something new and useful shows up in all new products.  Certainly the new “tablet” computers and hand help “Pad” computers are marvels of technology.  Does this product feed a starving person in a foreign land?  No.  But it creates real value that people are willing to pay for, to the tune of an estimated $5 Billion in new product revenue for Apple with much more to come.   And this will enable Apple to employ more people, some of whom will either give from their income, or be able to participate directly in their spare time, in projects like those of Engineers Without Borders.

My encouragement to each person out there is to think about your role in the context of what interests you, what skill and training you have been given, and where you can apply those skills to leave things better than you found them.  For yourself and for others.

Lithium – The Next Big Thing

Modern lithium battery technology got started in then US in the 1970′s.  As with all emerging technology, cost was a secondary consideration to the opportunity to create improved energy density batteries.  The potential, of course, was huge.

Everything from power tools to electric cars would be impacted by a new battery chemistry with less weight.  The latest generation of light weight laptop computers is largely a result of light weight battery technology.  Cell phones and various computer pad platforms are all impacted as well.

The new Chevy Volt will be one of the first production cars with a major lithium battery pack.  And every major auto maker is poised to deliver and electric of some type in 2011. Volkswagen Electric Golf with an 85 mile estimated drive range, a Lincoln Fusion Hybrid with a 41 mile per gallon fuel efficiency.  New power density levels makes possible a wide range of vehicle options from the modest all electric Think being manufactured in Indiana for the US market, to high performance sports cars like the Fiskar and Tesla cars.

Interestingly, much of the development work done on lithium battery technology was done in the United States.  The initial supply of lithium was mined in North Carolina.  MIT and University of Texas contributed significantly in the development, and Exxon owned the technology at one point.

But the mine in North Carolina is relatively small compared to the amount needed to supply the current demand.  So where will all the lithium come from?  Presently, most of it is coming from South America.  Chile, Argentina and Bolivia have huge deposits of lithium that are currently developed and they are supplying to battery companies around the world.  Interestingly, Afghanistan is supposed to have $1 Trillion worth of lithium, the largest deposits in the world.  A great way to generate revenue for the Afghan economy instead of poppies.

If the lithium is coming from South America, where are the batteries going to be made?  Presently A123 Systems is the largest US maker of lithium batteries with a major effort going in to the Detroit area to supply batteries to US auto makers.  But A123 also touts their Asian supply relationships.

Yes, I get it.  Lithium battery technology is still the most expensive part of the electric car.  So price is still an issue if the electric car market is going to expand.  So there is a lot of pressure.

With the existing market pressure for improved lithium in computers and cellphones, and the prospect of auto markets with hundreds of times more sales available, the R&D effort to improve the technology at the chemistry level is massive.  Even the federal government has made billions of dollars available in the recent stimulus bill to fund improvement in the technology.  This is a rare case where I agree with the role of government in supporting this technology.  The US needs to be a world leader in lithium batteries, not just on a technology development level, but on a manufacturing level as well.

So why is Chevy sourcing the battery pack for the Volt from Korea?  Isn’t there enough supply in the US?  Not yet, but its coming.

Solar Power is Alive in LA

The Solar Power International 2010 just finished at the Los Angeles Convention Center.  This is probably the largest get together of people in the solar industry in the United States.  The top vendors from all over the world were present.

Among the many interesting developments, many new product technologies, many new solutions focused on cost reduction, and many lessons learned along the way.

In the new developments, there are a number of new product entries, especially in the concentrating solar panel area.  As a subset of the Concentrating Solar category, there are a group of products which are similar to conventional solar panels, but use a lens like a magnifying glass to concentrate the sun’s light on a small patch of silicon that converts light to electricity. This approach has been around for a while, but in the past has had thermal problems due to the heat that is produced.  Remember setting a dry leaf on fire with a magnifying glass when you were a kid? Same thing.

The cost of the optics have come down and combined with the reduced cost of the silicon used, makes this type of concentrating solar more competitive.  But this type of concentrating solar technology requires 2 axis solar tracking with a fair amount of precision in order for the optics to do their job properly.

So there are a lot of new tracking systems coming into the market as well.  Large array trackers with high angular precision and high force from vendors like Bonfiglioli of Italy, Sener and TGB Group of Spain.  These systems are generally high reduction ring gears with a precision worm and spur output in the final stage.  Once again, a major mechatronic challenge in the middle of solar technology.  To say nothing of the incredible mechatronics required to manufacture solar panels.

There are five or six vendors who have built and installed these CPV systems have an interesting advantage.  They are reporting efficiencies of 22% and higher.  This is really amazing considering that the conventional photovoltaics are are typically in the range of 12% and thin film are 8%.  These are very significant developments in making the technology more cost effective.

And the forecast growth for solar in the US continues to be, well, “sunny”.  Sales of solar products in the US are expected to double again next year.  Which is amazing.

Its hard not to get excited about it.  But there is an important truth to be considered.  Solar Energy is still highly government subsidized.  The history of solar energy is built largely through the “Feed In Tariff”.  This is a mechanism where the utility company agrees to pay a premium price for electricity generated with photovoltaic equipment.

In the early years of 2000 the Spanish government set the highest Feed In Tariffs in all of Europe.  This caused a massive influx of companies to ramp up to manufacture and install huge amounts of equipment.   And therein lies the problem.  Spain has too much capacity and not enough demand.

Germany, which has relatively poor sunlight, has led the entire EU in solar installations. German PV engineering and capacity are well know around the world.  But what’s different about the situation in Germany is that the feed in tariff is being reduced gradually to allow the industry to adjust to demand that is not subsidized.

There are 2 lessons here that are very important.  We must be careful to not “overbuild” based on enthusiasm.  And we must protect American interests by purchasing domestic products.  And currently, our political leaders do not appear to be paying attention to either of these issues.

Electric Cars Coming Soon

GM has announced the release of the Volt scheduled for mid November this year.  I guess as long as its still 2010 they can still say they are on schedule.  The first markets that will receive the vehicles for sale are Austin Texas and New York City, New York.   Full rollout of the Volt will, of course, be in 2011 with hopes of selling and shipping 10,000 vehicles.   The cars’ announced selling price of $41,000 is higher than expected.  But the Federal Government is offering a $7500 incentive making them very competitive with the vastly more complex dual drive train hybrids like the Prius.

Chevy Volt

Nissan’s Leaf is expected to release about the same time with a battery electric drive train and a driving range of about 100 miles.  And an all electric Smart Car with an 82 mile drive range is expected although no date has been set.

Nissan Leaf

And this is where it gets interesting.  What are the EPA standards for electric car mileage reporting?  They are still working on them.  So, there aren’t any right now.  Maybe this should have been the responsibility of the DOE.  Or would that be the start of a turf war?

Miles per gallon is pretty straightforward.  The EPA reporting standard generally doesn’t resemble any real world driving situation, so the numbers are somewhat abstract.  But since all cars are tested and reported using the same basis the comparison data is somewhat useful.  Just don’t expect to achieve their numbers with your new car purchase.

But electric cars have a different metric; kilowatts per mile.  And pure hybrids like the Volt should be rated on that basis until the gasoline engine kicks in, somewhere in the 25 to 50 mile range.  But since the EPA hasn’t sorted out reporting and testing standards, there is no consistent reporting of kilowatts per mile for Chevy Volt, Nissan Leaf or anyone else.

As one data point, BMW reported it’s E car to get 100 miles of drive range using 33 kilowatts of electricity while cruising on the highway.  This is kind of a “Best Case” scenario, just enough energy to overcome friction and wind drag.  But not very helpful in terms of what to expect from city driving.

You have to admit, 3 miles per kilowatt is fantastic, especially if you pay 11 cents a kilowatt, that’s 3.6 cents a mile in equivalent fuel cost.  Fantastic!  And no oil changes!  In fact, there was even a discussion of using discounted billing rates for charging the electric car because the utility companies have the night time capacity sitting idle.  So its a great value add for them!

What is the average daily commute to work? 16 miles.  Which is obviously what Chevy had in mind when designing the Volt.  Electric vehicles do not have to compete with gas engine vehicles in drive range.  That’s a fallacy that the industry has used to convince consumers that electrics aren’t practical.   Cars can easily be segmented by drive range.  Look at the Golf Cart.  In my neighborhood, they drive them to the golf course and back, as well as on the golf course.  And you can drink a beer while you drive a golf cart, because they aren’t regulated by the Department of Highways.

Electric Car Prequel

The electric car, hybrid or plug in, continues to be an elusive goal.

One model sports optional 2 wheel or 4 wheel in-hub mounted drive motors.  With a large battery pack and a curb weight of 3300 pounds, it’s a bit ponderous.  But it has a 50 mile drive radius and rarely requires any maintenance.  What year will this vehicle be ready?  1899. It’s the Lohner-Porsche.

Recognizing that the weight the battery pack was a major obstacle, Ferdinand Porsche, still working for the Lohner Coachworks, came up with a hybrid model.  The vehicle used a small gasoline engine to power a generator and a single motor mounted on the rear axle of the vehicle. Porsche raced the car himself in the Semmerling competition near Vienna, and with top speeds of 75 miles per hour, won against a very competitive field which included Benz gasoline powered cars.  The 75 mile per hour top speed was unprecedented, especially from an electric hybrid.  The year? 1900!

So all things old are made new again.  If the 2200 pound weight of the Lohner Porsche battery pack could be reduced by 4:1 by using Lithium batteries, then a curb weight around 1500 pounds should be feasible.  The reduced weight of the vehicle leads to significantly greater driving range.  The Smart Car electric model is expected to have a range of 120 miles per charge.  Which, actually, is enough for a lot of vehicle applications.

In wheel drive motors are not my favorite solution, but if the weight can be reduced, then problems relating to suspension dynamics can be managed.  And that’s exactly what the folks at Protean Electric are doing.  They have produced a number of conversion vehicles as demonstrations of their electric motor technology.  And if the motors perform as expected, they will carve out a niche in the plug-in and hybrid electric vehicle world.

There are a couple of important points that need to made here.

#1) based on the “Absolute Value of Technology”, the only thing that matters is the vehicle costs per transportation mile.  That is made up to two components, the purchase price and the expected cost per mile driven.  Admittedly, if you can run an electric vehicle at $.04/mile, it is cost effective to own, even if the car costs more up front, because over the life of the vehicle, the low operating cost will overtake the purchase price.

The IRS deduction for vehicle operation is $.50/mile.  Electric hybrids and especially plug-in electrics are not expected to have any major maintenance costs.  Even if you add insurance, the cost per operating mile will be significantly lower.

But the higher price of the vehicle will be an obstacle from a pure economics standpoint.  For this reason, some manufacturers have considered the option of the local power utility company supplying the battery pack and maintaining it.  Since this is the single largest expense, leasing it to the vehicle owner in the monthly power bill is a good deal.

The second major point to be considered is plug in electrics, even with limited drive range, are the biggest contributor to American energy independence.  These vehicles will directly reduce oil imports every day they are operated.  Because almost none of the electricity in the United States is generated using fuel.  It’s either coal, natural gas or nuclear.

So if we really want to get after the issue of energy independence and stop funding governments that support terrorist activity, the electric car is the path forward.  As are 40+ mpg gasoline cars, and drilling and refining of oil in the US.

Let’s get after it!

$2 Bil more for Solar

The President announced $2 billion dollars will be given to fund solar projects in Colorado, Arizona and Indiana yesterday in a radio address.  The funding will pay for several large solar plants that will add permanent power capacity to the respective states.

One report indicated that the $2 billion would be funded as part of the scheduled $863 billion stimulus fund already appropriate by congress.  Another report indicated that the funds would be provided as loans.  There is a huge difference between the two, and the fact that the various reports are not clear on this point is very curious.

As a sidebar, I guess this is the new style of legislation.  The government passes a law first and decides what it means later.

$400 million is provided as a loan (or loan guarantee) to assist Abound Solar to add 2 major manufacturing facilities and new product lines for the company.  One facility in Indiana will be built from an existing automotive plant that will be re-tooled for solar manufacturing.  The company is expected to add several hundred new production jobs.

Abengoa Solar of Spain, which has operations in the United States will be receiving $1.45 billion, although it is not clear if the money is a loan or a grant.  And while Abengoa has operations in the US and has an excellent reputation as a contractor of large energy projects, it seems very peculiar to be giving money to a foreign entity.

This leads to a couple of really important questions about American energy policy.

From the standpoint of cost effectiveness, if you take the $1.45 billion for Abengoa and divide it by the 1500 projected jobs, the cash cost of each job is over $966,000,  per position.   It would be the same as paying $96,000 to each employee for 10 years.  This has to be the most ineffective use of public funds imaginable.

The other public policy question which has come up before is, why are US taxpayer funds being given to foreign companies?  Major green energy projects in every sector are being built by foreign companies with US government funding.   There needs to be a “Buy American” clause in all this pork barrel spending.  If these are loans, or loan guarantees, how does the government get paid back?

The corollary question for US Energy policy is why should the Federal Government be making loans or guarantees to private companies?

Fiskar Automotive, for example, has secured $500 million in loan guarantees from the DOE for it’s electric car program.  But Tesla Motors raised $2.1 billion in the private financial markets.  Does this constitute a scenario where the Federal Government is creating unfair competitive conditions by providing financial support to companies of their choosing?  And not providing similar funding to other companies.

This is also true on the larger scale.  As the Federal government continues to direct where the majority of US research and development funds will be spent, the process itself disconnects the efforts of the research community from the potential economic benefit that the research should be targeting.

The goal of all research is to produce a benefit.  And the benefit must be weighed in the context of economic utility.  When the development of technology is subjected to bureaucratic decision making, it is dissociated from the decision making process of economic benefit.

This will result in massive waste as limited resources are put into projects with poor return in value.  We appear to have entered a period of time where the process of free market decisions are being circumvented, and everything is to be decided by government.

Because, after all, these folks are professionals at spending your money and they know better than you, or the market, what is most important.

Gears Boxes and Life Expectancy

Gear boxes are a complex subject in their own right.  The equations of motion required to generate gear teeth are pretty complicated.  And the issues associated with gear box reliability are even more complicated.  The parameters of merit are precision and load capability.  But cost is always a factor, and ultimately every system’s performance must be measured within the context of its life expectancy.

One of the most complex parts of the automobile is the transmission, which is a multistage gear reducer that “tunes” the speed range of the engine to the desired speed range of the vehicle at power levels of several hundred horsepower.  What makes this so extraordinary is that the workings are almost entirely automatic.  And the gearbox life expectancy is huge.  I just sold a 15 year old car and it’s transmission system is still working perfectly.

Manufacturing processes associated with gear manufacturing have evolved to help deal with the various demands for performance at lower costs.  The traditional method of gear cutting using machine tools generates accurate parts, but metallurgists found that the grain of the metal cut by machining caused weakening of the gear tooth.  Powder metallurgy had been progressing to the point where it was more cost effective to mold gear profiles in sintered powdered metal and do only finish surfacing with machining processes.  Later improvements in the process include the ability to load higher strength materials where needed in the design to produce higher strength parts at lower cost.

But as load requirements increase, all of the performance issues are magnified.  And unique environmental conditions can play a part as well.  In the current design of horizontal wind turbines, the gear box design is a critical component.  The gear requirement at 2.5 megawatts is certainly a challenge, but adding the need for precision and and durability to survive 25 years of operation make the task incredibly difficult.

There are a couple of subtle aspects to gearbox operation that need to be considered.  One is reversal stress.  How does one calculate reversal stress?  It’s the absolute value of the power, two times the power for simplicity, divided by the time period of the reversal.  This is usually a really big number.  And as the time allowed for the reversal decreases, the number goes up.

It doesn’t matter if the application is a servo motor system on piece of machinery or a gear increaser on a wind turbine.  The situation is the same.  It’s just more expensive when it’s a 30,000 pound reducer that’s 180 feet above the ground on a pole.    But the principles are all the same.

Keeping the machinery running is a tough task regardless of the field.  But monitoring the mechanical systems is key place to start.  Next generation gear boxes will likely include electronics to monitor the loading and condition of the gearbox to prevent catastrophic failures.

Mechatronics, Mobility, and New Options

The American fascination with mobility, aka the automobile, is going through a lot of change presently.  The introduction of the Segway began a new generation of personal mobility devices.   And the demand for environmentally friendly means of transportation have added unique constraints to all of the vehicle offerings coming to market from both large and small manufacturers.

The direct energy cost per mile or equivalent mpg is one measurement of performance for human mobility.  A fully loaded cost per transportation mile, including vehicle cost, insurance, maintenance, etc., is more consistent with what we really experience.  So there are competing values that each person must consider in the mix of personal mobility.

2 wheeled transportation used to mean bicycles and motorcycles.  But the boundaries are getting fuzzy.  The Seqway puts the two wheels side by side with independent drive motors with a drive train similar to an electric powered wheelchair.   The wheels are independent and capable of operating as an electronic differential permitting these systems to turn in place, a turning radius of zero!  Pretty neat from a maneuverability standpoint.

But the new EN-V from General Motors takes the Segway concept to a 2 passenger vehicle that’s smaller than the Smart Car and designed for short range city mobility.   It’s very compact at 1/6th the footprint of a small car, so parking is not a problem.  And since it’s enclosed, it works in the rain.  The battery powered drive train will reach 24mph maximum speed.  Driving range and equivalent MPG’s have not been announced.

All of the mobility issues are tied up in one formula, namely F=ma.  Force = mass x acceleration.  So as the mass of the vehicle and its design payload, passenger capacity, is reduced, like in a Segway, a motorcycle or the new EN-V, the force needed to move that mass is decreased proportionately.   A 1 or 2 passenger solutions is much easier to deal with than a mini-van that has to have a 400 mile drive range.

In a very extreme response to the mass part of the equation, Honda has demonstrated it’s U3-X electric unicycle, borrowing the balancing concepts of the Segway, but converting the drivetrain to a single wheel system with perpendicular rotating elements where the tread would be so that the unit can move a person from side to side.  (check the video demos on YouTube)  At 22 pounds it is an astounding feat that it can move a person comfortably at 4 mph for 1-2 hours.

The General Motors EV-1 had over 2200 pounds of lead acid batteries in it.  Which made it impractical.  With the improvements of lithium batteries, a 400 pound payload of batteries, which is much more acceptable, makes electric vehicles practical on a technical level.  But due to lithium batteries cost, the Tesla roadster battery pack being well in excess of $10,000, the hybrid solution becomes more cost effective.

By reducing the drive range and acceleration, energy storage requirements are greatly simplified.  The designer can focus on the exact type of mobility sought in a given new product.  This change in thinking is giving rise to a whole new group of design concepts including autonomous drive options as envisioned in         “Minority Report” and the recent DARPA autonomous vehicle challenges.

In crowded urban areas with a highly networked communications infrastructure, new options like the EN-V become much more interesting, more cost effective at many levels, and potentially more safe than today’s smog filled city centers.  And as the supporting technology in battery storage and electric motor technology continue to progress, new solutions and options will continue to be pioneered.

I like new options.

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