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GM joins with U.S. utilities to study electric car impact

TOM KRISHER

Associated Press

Latest comment posted at 12:20 PM EST 23/07/08

Auto maker partnering with 30 companies to study issues from tax incentives for the vehicles to where and when they can be plugged in for recharging ...Read the full article

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  1. Jim **** from Canada writes: $0.80? That's all?

    Expect the price of electricity to rise sharply.

    What are batteries made from? Lead? Other heavy metals? Where are these going to come from, and where do they go when the battery dies?
  2. Rob Swanson from Edmonton, Canada writes: Some additional information already distributed

    http://my.epri.com/portal/server.pt?open=512&objID=243&PageID=223132&cached=true&mode=2

    and

    http://www.pnl.gov/energy/eed/etd/pdfs/phevfeasibilityanalysis_combined.pdf

    conclusion in brief, both the National Resources Defence Council and a consortium of Electrical Utilities believe the system is ready and able to adsorb the load increase.

    Full speed ahead.
  3. Dan Theman from Ottawa, Canada writes: 8 kw hour is the equivalent of 10.8 HP per hour which provides a range of 64km. On gasoline it will require 1.5-2 liters so $2-$3. Clearly it's cheper to run on electricity (especially on subsidized hydro), but even on gas (diesel) it's much better than most existing cars.
  4. Paul Wallnutz from Canada writes: Now they think of this?

    Canada consumes about 110 million litres of gasoline per day (2004 data). This does not include diesel or other extracts of oil.

    Canada consumed about 520 TWh (terawatt hours) of electricity last year (or about 1.4 TWh per day).

    A litre of regular gasoline has the equivalent energy of about 9,000Wh.

    If we replaced all of the gasoline with electricity (assuming that electric vehicles have higher efficiencies and use regenerative braking and factoring in electrical transmission losses), my rough estimate is that we would need an additional 1 TWh per day or up to a 75% increase in AVERAGE electricity demand.

    Of course cars could be charged with compressed air, hydrogen, or electro-chemical batteries during the off-peak hours (e.g., at night)…but this is still one-heck of allot of power in places like Ontario which are already facing shortages (Of course nuclear power plants are great for this type of steady load.)

    Building electricity generation plants that don’t burn fossil fuels, that we will rely upon for home heating and transportation, should become a national emergency.

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