Green Basics: Electric Vehicles and Cars
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 08.16.07
Ed. note: We're now up to the sixth post in the Green Basics series of posts that TreeHugger is writing to provide basic information about important ideas, materials and technologies for new greenies (or those who just need a quick refresher). Read on and stay tuned!
The electric vehicle (EV), or, more colloquially, electric car, is gaining traction as a viable alternative form of personal transportation, and remains just out of arms' reach as a mainstream way to get around. The cars run on energy stored in large packs of batteries instead of the more conventional internal combustion engine, making them very attractive to those concerned with using less oil and causing fewer greenhouse gas emissions. When driving, they don't emit any carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gas, nor any nitrogen oxide or other smog-forming compound. The first electric car to be commercially available in the US, General Motors' EV1, is pictured above; much more on the car, below the fold.
Before we dive in to the EV1, a little context: historically, EVs have had issues with high battery costs, limited travel distance between battery recharging, charging time, and battery lifespan, which have limited widespread adoption. Ongoing battery technology advancements have addressed many of these problems; many models have recently been prototyped, and a growing handful of future production models have been announced. Toyota, Honda, Ford and General Motors all produced EVs in the 1990s in order to comply with the California Air Resources Board's (CARB) Zero Emission Vehicle Mandate, which was later defeated by the manufacturers and the federal government.
The EV1 was back in the news in 2006 with the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?" (check out their new site here), a look at the development, limited commercialization and subsequent death of the car amid rumors of conspiracy and control from oil companies and the government. Though the car never achieved widespread use, the car was an important step forward, representing proof that such cars were technologically possible and viable with few modifications to the current transportation infrastructure.
Since the "death" of the EV1 and the development of battery chemistries better suited to power something as large as a car, there have been big claims from a growing number of manufacturers about bringing EVs to the market. Not least of these is the Tesla Roadster, pictured above (read the latest on Tesla here). Offering gaudy numbers like 0-60 in 4 seconds, the equivalent of 135 miles per gallon, more than 200 miles per charge and a price tag hovering around $100,000, Tesla's hot-rod looks and performance have become the poster child for the next generation of EVs, and several other manufacturers have thrown their hat into the battery-powered ring as well.
Between them all, they offer a wide variety of styles, levels of performance and price; after Tesla's two-seater sexiness, Miles Automotive Group's XS 500 (pictured above) represents the sensible family sedan under $30,000 and Phoenix Motorcars offers an electric pick-up truck. All offer the zero-emission (while driving, at least) alternative and the ability to get up to a couple hundred miles per charge while achieving highway-like speeds. Though these examples were developed to be driven like conventional cars, they excel at the shorter, commuter-type trips that dominate much of our driving these days. And, of course, the prototype caveat remains: none of the above cars has come to market, leaving a question mark on their true performance and viability until they show up at a dealership near you. But there's a whole other crop of smaller EVs designed especially for this commuter-type driving behavior, and you can even buy a few of them today.
These vehicles are not often "cars." They often have fewer wheels, much smaller features or other very distinguishing design features from what many of us consider to be a "car." A case in point is the diminutive Tango (above), developed by a company called Commuter Cars; though it has four wheels, the two-seater's seating arrangement is similar to a motorcycle, with the driver in front and passenger in back. Though Commuter Cars is waiting for more funding to scale up production, George Clooney thought enough of the idea to buy one, and has been seen tooling around town in it.
ZAP is another manufacturer with high electric hopes; they have a handful of scooters, trikes and other three-wheeled vehicles available now (most are NEVs, or "neighborhood electric vehicles" -- they're street legal, but not powerful enough to get much above 30 miles per hour or go more than 50 miles per charge; great for running to the store but it'd be a short road trip in one), and are putting lots of their eggs in the fully-electric car basket, with the development of the ZAP X (pictured above) and Alias three-wheeler (pictured below). The ZAP X, which they're calling a "crossover"-type car, will give the Tesla a run for its money in acceleration and speed -- it's a full-on "car" -- whereas the Alias and its three wheels aren't subject to the stringent safety tests required of cars in the US, so it may come to market much more quickly.
These are just a few of the available options and manufacturers working on electric vehicles today, but a singular trade-off remains fairly constant between them all: you can either have a small, slow, commuter-only car right now or you can roll the dice that one or more of the real cars delivers on its promises, but you'll have to keep guzzling gas until they arrive in showrooms. Will electric cars be the next revolution in transportation? Only time will tell.
For more information, check out Wikipedia's entry on EVs, and hit up the manufacturers websites: ZAP, Phoenix Motorcars, Tesla Motors, Commuter Cars and Miles Automotive Group. For further reading in TreeHugger, read the Tesla tag or type it in to the TreeHugger search box, if you've got some time to kill. Try a similar maneuver if you really want to dig in to TreeHugger's archives of electric cars, but beware: you might fall in and not be able to dig out for an hour or two. For more on greening your personal transportation, check out our How to Green Your Car guide.
TreeHugger's Green Basics column appears every Thursday here at TreeHugger.
Don't forget the pre WWI EVs that had a higher market share than ICEs did for a while.
now that we know who killed the electric car...who will be the one to revive it?
I want that Tesla Roadster. Sure, it's expensive, but it's sooo pretty. but then again, i know nothing about cars, so I'm not even sure if it is actually that great. But dang, it'd look shiny in my driveway...or anywhere else for that matter.
As president of the Central Virginia Electric Auto Association (a chapter of the EAA) in the mid 1990's, I led a group of interested individuals through the process of converting "real" cars to electric drive. There are success and failure stories in any category of vehicles, even ICE (internal combustion engine) type cars, and electric cars are no exception. My own '73 bug could do only about 20 mile per charge but had the benefit of working defrost, which it's ICE counterparts never had. One member's converted Mercury Lynx was driven daily at highway speeds 60 miles.
The concept that we should wait for some wizbang electric that will do everything our ICE car could do is the wrong argument. What we should be looking at is why our ICE cars are engineered to drive well over 100 miles per hour (though we never do OR are allowed to) and have the torque equivalent of a herd of horses! We can survive with much less power-waste and capacity in our vehicles without loss of "comfort", "freedom", "luxury" or any of the other concepts sold to us by the auto industry.
Challenge: Write down your Miles-per-Day figures for the next week. If the daily total is less than 50, you can purchase an EV today, or have an ICE car converted.
Don't let Detroit's concept of what a car "is" box your thinking. Be a little more independent.
Oh, and for a nice explanation of American transportaion, try reading this:
http://users.pandora.be/fietser/fotos/VM4SD-FVDWsm.pdf
Don't forget the totally cool Myers Motors NmG. Formerly the Sparrow, it is a 3 wheeler that is very affordable, and fills the commuter niche.
The fact that EV's in the 1990's California never sold well is not surprising. GM never sold one that I know of. Most manufacturers only leased EV's. I for one want to buy a car, not rent (lease) one for an extended period of time. At the end of the lease period, you're forced to go bargain your way through that same dealership just to either give the vehicle back or buy it.
Hi Collin,
I enjoyed reading your interesting post on electric vehicles. Just wanted to add that in India, we have the Maini Group which makes the Reva - a sleek, light weight car.
It's available in three models:
REVA Standard
REVA AC and
REVA Classe
Christened G-Wiz in UK, Reva has been voted the most ethical car by Ethical Consumer in 2005. The site has a section that makes you really curious. It's titled, "Make your own Reva". May be readers would like to find out more about it at www.revaindia.com.
Advanced to charge battery on the moving wheel. Extra unit to be install in the the front wheel.From power star 2 wheelers.
There are a large number of common people who can only afford one car. If you have the money to own one for comuting and another to drive longer distances then you seem to be set. However, if I have to stop every 200 miles to charge my car for two hours instead of 5 minutes to fill the tank every 300 miles, I might as well own a horse.
It is of interest that the car was seen as a way to reduce polution from horses. Their polution particulates are rather large and smelly.
I want to know if there is any groups, attorneys, or organizations to turn to regarding my local city trying to tell me that LSV's (Low Speed Vehicles) are ILLEGAL on public streets when there IS a state law defing and permitting the use, BUT not LOCAL law even forbidding it. I seriously need some support an a matter that the local City Attorney's interruptation of the law is completily unjust and NOT helping our environment. He just doesn't want to be wrong and have to change his ruling.
As I recall, in the 1990's poster Jim Robb was a pioneer who drove an electiic car from Richmond to Washington D.C., and in the Cherry Blossom parade. That converted vehicle was usually charged under a carport covered with solar panels. I've experienced enough EV transportation in the past 15 years to agree with him. The "problem" with electric cars is not an electrical, chemical or mechanical engineering problem. It is a social engineering problem. Home built electrics could satisfy most peoples daily driving needs. And for occasional long trips we have mass transit and rental cars. Thanks goodness you don't have to build your own anymore.
Check out Zenn Motors,
makers of electric cars in Canada.
Check out Zenn Motors,
makers of electric cars in Canada.
YOU'ALL FORGOT PROBABLY THE MOST IMPORANT LINK: http://www.projectbetterplace.com/
Seems like the Tata Nano is the way to go
Treehugger's post on electric vehicles says they are "attractive to those concerned with using less oil and causing fewer greenhouse gas emissions." But how do we think those batteries are going to be charged? If an electric car owner is equipped with solar electric panels and charges his/her car this way, then the electric car is a great solution. But most of us will use electricity from the power company, which produces it primarily by burning oil (or other carbon-based fuel), thus creating greenhouse emissions. Not only that, but about 2/3 of the energy obtained from burning that carbon-based fuel is then lost due to the inefficiencies of converting it to electricity and transmitting the electricity to our homes. This information should be right up front in your post, so that we can make truly informed decisions about greener transportation.
dude that car sucks
Having the ability to charge electric cars with clean energy is an important consideration.
So lets create a clean energy grid. Here's a proposal to convert the U.S. energy grid to solar.
Scientific American A Solar Grand Plan
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-solar-grand-plan
Green Wombat has several articles about progresss already being made in California and Arizona with solar thermal power plants.
http://blogs.business2.com/greenwombat/
The plan above stresses concentrating PV power plants, while it appears that solar thermal plants are further along in development and are much more low tech. Also, the proposal empahasizes using cadmium teluride solar cells, which makes me think that First Solar was on the panel that created it. Some have raised questions about the availability of teluride and the fact that cadmium is toxic.
I see a more diverse mix of energy than this plan calls for, with more distributed energy. However, we need more grid capacity and doing something very similar to their plan would go a long way toward a clean energy future.
Here's what one solar thermal company says.
"Solar thermal power plants such as Ausra's generate electricity by driving steam turbines with sunshine. Ausra's solar concentrators boil water with focused sunlight, and produce electricity at prices directly competitive with gas- and coal-fired electric power."
""Solar is one the most land-efficient sources of clean power we have, using a fraction of the area needed by hydro or wind projects of comparable output. All of America's needs for electric power – the entire US grid, night and day – can be generated with Ausra's current technology using a square parcel of land 92 miles on a side. For comparison, this is less than 1% of America's deserts, less land than currently in use in the U.S. for coal mines."
Electric cars are the way to go! Zap has several car models to chose from, scooters too! Check out the Xebra sedan in Zebra print! Awesome, stay green. www.zapworld.com
how about this.
make these electric motors cheep enough so that any body can own one.
i my self, i would love one, the sun is a free sorce of energy
we take fossel fuels fo granted.
come 20-40 years. we will have, to relie on a alternative sorce of energy
so why cant we, start to do it now? 4 our great grand childrens sake.
we can use water to make energy. so we can use it to take us from A-B!
so why are we stil messing around with fosell fuels then?
http://www.lionev.com for conversion of Ford Rangers (200 mile range) and SUV Escapes (120 mile range) for around 40grand. More money will give you more battery range...
I like the xaps, but if I gotta spend $15K for a very limited and weird shaped car, I would rather go the 40K route and get a truck that looks like everyone else's!
like these cars
To make Electric Cars viable, we need to have a standard 230v plug (such as the one Tesla uses) made available for charging ALL electric cars. These need installed in ALL major shopping plazas parking areas so that people can recharge on the go when needed, and have an interesting time while doing so.
The Electric Car, and greening of our electric grids will reduce pollution on the planet and make life better and healthier for all.
i seen that exact small car when i was in France 3 years ago so technically ya'll are late in selling this car seen it and drove it and i don't like it but it can fit anywhere.
It is a good site that contain most of these future cars.