[Transport] Green Vehicles News Round Up

electric smart car EV

electric smart car EV

According to star-telegram.com:

Fort Worth entrepreneurs try to make electric cars a thing of the now

Long and O’Neal, with initial backing from a handful of other investors, have formed Evcarco (for environmental car company) to develop a chain of dealerships that would specialize in the sales of new and used green vehicles.

Read the full article at star-telegram.com:

Recently, Volkswagen and Toshiba signed a letter of intent to cooperate on the development of electric vehicles.which may spur some positive market movement in both companies.

Ford plans to have a family of plug-in, battery and hybrid vehicles by 2012. Chevrolet plans to introduce an electric car to the consumer market by the end of next year. Toyota says it plans to add solar panels to its hybrid Prius in 2010.

French tire maker Michelin SA and car-parts maker Valeo SA Friday said they will link up to develop systems for electric and hybrid vehicles.

The two companies have signed an agreement to develop new technologies for creating tires, drivetrains, systems for engine and battery-cooling management, climate control, lighting and energy management.

Honda said that demand for hybrid vehicle Insight is soaring in Japan with orders topping its monthly target of 5,000 in just over a week.

- It seems to me that the world is currently stirring with excitement to the new possibilities of green vehicles such as plug-in hybrids & full electric vehicles, it’s now the battle for the most energy efficient cars and hopefully this MAY be the real bail out from their recent financial troubles.

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[Transport] Electric Car Evolution

Electric Vehicle

Electric Vehicle

The current craze for transportation in the post oil future is to go electric and these cars have many existing obstacles to overcome especially the consumer confidence.

Many motor corporations’ stocks are now almost at the all time low by holding on to their proprietary oil based vehicles design for a very long time and with a serious mindset change by the public had seriously plummet the demand of oil based cars.

The economic crisis had also contributed to the fall of public spending on oil based vehicles…and many are desperately seeking alternative energy powered vehicles to commute within the city and minimised long distance travels or totally avoid travelling unnecessary.

Let me list a couple of problems of the old electric vehicles or misconceptions of electric powered vehicles.

  1. Limited Travel Distance
  2. Long Charging Time
  3. Lack of Infrastructure for charging

There are more problems including the expected cost of buying  electric vehicles & charging them compared to the oil powered vehicles.

The usual excuses that drivers make is that they think it’s too costly, too troublesome, fear of being stranded in the highway with limited battery capacity, not fast enough to suit their needs and for countries that do not have renewable energy or totally dependent on fossil fuel may counter that it’s not environmentally friendly anyway.

HOWEVER, I need to reiterate that the future of oil powered vehicles WILL NEVER BE LONG LASTING.

The fact that oil is finite and we are approaching a possible global peak in oil production and now with economic crisis causing many non-conventional oil supply to delay their expansion or even caused OPEC to cut more oil supply to “stabilize” oil prices.

I found a news article that echo one of my ideas about the possibilities of electric vehicles swapping depleted batteries at kiosk that can be set up anywhere with existing lamp pole infrastructure.

This method will solve the limited distance problems provided all the kiosk carry the SAME type of batteries for your electric vehicle.

Another news article quoted the possibility of an electric car that have 700 HP and can go from 0 to 60 mph in just 4 seconds! This solved the speed problem and the same electric vehicle claim to be able to recharge in 10 minutes!!

Well, if you do not have the budget to buy a “experimental” vehicles that bound to change in technology similar to computer devices…feel free to try to D.I.Y. your own electric vehicles with permission from local Land Transport Authority of course.

My dream electric minivan comes with a roof full of solar panels & a simple charging mechanism to an array of car batteries running a electric motor that can travel within small city of Singapore with no problems at all.

If there are excess electricity, the electric minivan can be used as a mobile office with laptops & chairs behind hopefully powering a small ventilation fan as well.

Feel free to comments and give your ideas of your dream electric vehicle!

Popularity: 3% [?]

Bolivia Has Half of World’s Lithium for Electric Cars, NYT Says

Energizer® Ultimate Lithium Batteries

Energizer® Ultimate Lithium Batteries

Feb. 3 (Bloomberg) — Bolivia holds as much as half of the world’s lithium reserves, a key component in making hybrid or electric cars, the New York Times reported, citing Oji Baba, an executive with Japan’s Mitsubishi Corp.’s base metals unit.

- The future of our electric powered vehicles need one key component to be light & compact enought to be practical however half of the lithium is in this country Bolivia.

According to Nation & World:

UYUNI, Bolivia — In the rush to build the next generation of hybrid or electric cars, a sobering fact confronts both automakers and governments seeking to lower their reliance on foreign oil: Almost half of the world’s lithium, the mineral needed to power the vehicles, is found in Bolivia — a country that may not be willing to surrender it easily.

Read the Full Article at Nation & World:

- The above article describe Bolivia as “Saudi Arabia of Lithium” but also have difficult nationalistic government that had been hard for foreigners to draw on it’s lithium resources for profit.

Having discovering that where else can we find lithium deposit?

According to US Geological Survey

  • 5.4 million tons of lithium could potentially be extracted in Bolivia
  • 3 million in Chile
  • 1.1 million in China
  • 410,000 in the United States.

These articles also noted several corporations are desperately seeking these lithium for development of the next generation electric vehicles or electronic devices.

They are

  • Mitsubishi and Sumitomo
  • A group led by a French industrialist, Vincent Bollore
  • General Motors next year plans to roll out its Volt
  • Nissan, Ford and BMW, among other car makers, have similar projects.

Demand for lithium, long used in small amounts in mood-stabilizing drugs and thermonuclear weapons, has climbed as makers of batteries for BlackBerrys and other electronic devices use the mineral. But the automotive industry holds the biggest untapped potential for lithium, analysts say. Since it weighs less than nickel, which is also used in batteries, it would allow electric cars to store more energy and be driven longer distances.

Knowing the above information may give some ideas on opportunities for investment directions however bewarned that lithium batteries are potentially explosive when over charged hence users have to be extremely careful while charging these babies.

The future may spell danger if countries that hold such valuable resources refused to “sell” them quickly to other countries to manufacture electric vehicles hence resulting a reduce the dependence of oil…which simply means “Huston, we have a problem…again”.

Unfortunately, in the times of economic crisis…many countries had started their own “protectionistic” campaign to protect their own country from recession shockwave which might result in “a significant slowdown” in the progress of future technological improvement of the world of electronics.

Oh, we don’t want another Iraq War or nuclear war but hopefully someone can invest in Bolivia enough to convince them to open the lithium “tap” wider for the benefit of the world future development on “alternative” energy to divert away from dirty fuels such as coal or crude oil.

Popularity: 2% [?]