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Video of Shai Agassi's Project Better Place
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The link points to
Return of Inductive Charging?
Also from Project Better Place.
Inductive Charging is not a very efficient method of recharging the batteries.
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Please give us references to your statement. The only losses are heat and heat losses are always there. Induction is used throughout our electrical grid with very low losses. I think you pulled that out of your butt. Sorry.
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JoeReal,
Be careful, Texas always want you to do his work for him, then he will apply some abstract metric, instead of overall feasibility, to declare your approach not just inferior, but completely unacceptable.
Be careful, Texas always want you to do his work for him, then he will apply some abstract metric, instead of overall feasibility, to declare your approach not just inferior, but completely unacceptable.
That's been my experience too.
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You mean abstract metrics like numbers, calculations and efficiency analysis? If that's what you mean then I'm guilty as charged. I think when we look back in a few years and read our posts you will finally see the light. Ever hear the saying, "follow the money"? well I say, "follow the energy". Many of the things you two bring up just don't make sense in terms of efficiencies and competition with other solutions. I can't change your minds so I say let's wait and see. Here is a short list of thoughts:
1) The BEV will beat the hydrogen passenger car in the market place.
2) The compressed air motor will never be practical compared to other solutions.
3) Drilling in ANWAR is useless. A pimple worth of oil.
4) Nuclear fission is a non-renewable waste of time and money.
5) Drilling our coastline will take a long time and will do nothing to change the price of gas or reverse our addiction to foreign oil.
6) Solar and wind with pumped storage hydro is the best solution for our energy crisis. If another electrical storage system becomes available that is better and cheaper than pumped storage hydro then great! When that happens I'll change my position. I don't expect to have to for a long time.
7) We are at or very near peak oil. Get over it.
8) We Americans will need significantly more pain before we change in any significant way. No pain, no change.
Well, I think that's enough for now. What about you two? What is your vision of the future?
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Texas
Too many butt references.......
Jason always seems to make a logical point without using anatomical or personal references....
Can you please explain what is meant by, and give any credible technical reference to " pumped hydro storage" ??
Too many butt references.......
Jason always seems to make a logical point without using anatomical or personal references....
Can you please explain what is meant by, and give any credible technical reference to " pumped hydro storage" ??
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No need to go past this statement, as you simply don't understand mine. You can have hard numbers on insignficant or abstract metrics like efficiency, but if you exclude upfront capital costs, then you ignore those things that consumers use to select winners in the marketplace.
Yes, batteries are more efficient, but the Air Car, and now the fuel cell are now cheaper than battery packs. Certainly, there is a cross-over point after 5, 10, 20 years of driving where it would have been cheaper to have paid for the batteries upfront, but most people don't have that much money laying around, and can't afford the interest on a loan, so they opt for low upfront costs, and more expensive fuel.
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Inductive reasoning
Inductive coupling is not as efficient at transferring electrical energy as a direct wired connection. The important question is whether inductive coupling is efficient enough to be used in a particular application, weighed against the need for eliminating exposed electrical contacts.
My electric toothbrush uses an inductively-coupled charger, which eliminates the need for a direct electrical connection in an environment that is inimical to such things. Of course, transfer efficiency in this application is almost irrelevant, weighed against the safety and reliability of not having exposed electrical contacts.
For transferring larger amounts of energy, it is reasonable to achieve efficiencies above 95%, but this takes effort. I wouldn't expect reasonable efficiency at the standard line frequency (50/60Hz) because the magnetic components would need to be very large. Airplanes use 400Hz AC to keep the size of their power transformers and inductors small to save weight. This means you would have to have some kind of AC (60Hz) > DC > AC (100kHz) converter, which would make a small efficiency "hit" and be somewhat expensive. I use the frequency of 100kHz as a reference only; other frequencies higher than 60Hz could also be used, depending upon the needs of the application.
Bottom line: like so many things, inductive power transfer can be made to work with reasonable efficiencies, and the safety of having no exposed electrical contacts is desirable. It just takes a liberal application of that universal lubricant, money.
Inductive coupling is not as efficient at transferring electrical energy as a direct wired connection. The important question is whether inductive coupling is efficient enough to be used in a particular application, weighed against the need for eliminating exposed electrical contacts.
My electric toothbrush uses an inductively-coupled charger, which eliminates the need for a direct electrical connection in an environment that is inimical to such things. Of course, transfer efficiency in this application is almost irrelevant, weighed against the safety and reliability of not having exposed electrical contacts.
For transferring larger amounts of energy, it is reasonable to achieve efficiencies above 95%, but this takes effort. I wouldn't expect reasonable efficiency at the standard line frequency (50/60Hz) because the magnetic components would need to be very large. Airplanes use 400Hz AC to keep the size of their power transformers and inductors small to save weight. This means you would have to have some kind of AC (60Hz) > DC > AC (100kHz) converter, which would make a small efficiency "hit" and be somewhat expensive. I use the frequency of 100kHz as a reference only; other frequencies higher than 60Hz could also be used, depending upon the needs of the application.
Bottom line: like so many things, inductive power transfer can be made to work with reasonable efficiencies, and the safety of having no exposed electrical contacts is desirable. It just takes a liberal application of that universal lubricant, money.
I hope by "you two", you don't mean me and Jason, because Jason and I disagree on many, many things. What you meant to say was, "don't make sense to me". Because, Texas, you aren't the final authority on what makes sense.
I think the point about the up-front costs is really important, because many, if not all, of the things we need for a sustainable energy infrastructure (wind, PV, solar-thermal, geothermal, energy storage, EV's, PHEV's) all require high up-front capital costs. I think we all agree on the goal of a sustainable energy infrastructure, but what is the best way to overcome the hurdle of the high capital costs?
So maybe you can tell all us why GM and Toyota stopped going with the inductive charging method and the Honda and Ford conductive charger won out. Clearly, the inductive is superior, unless your not telling everyone here the full story.
The Edison EV project that was running these chargers were expensive, not customer friendly, and had numerous quality problems. Oh and if you want some facts you can go Google them and type in edison EV.
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Swapping batteries? Induction charging all over the place? Let's see, we know it takes about a 16kwh battery to go 40 miles and that battery weighs 400 lbs. That battery ain't swapping all that fast. Think of all the cars you now see at a filling station on a busy day. Now think of all the fancy robotic/hydraulic equipment needed to service those cars in a timely fashion. Add to that all the spare batteries that the station owner would have to keep on hand to anticipate demand and how much space, power and expense that would be for that person. Until batteries get much, much better power density, this solution just isn't one.
Induction charging would require a lot of infrastructure modification and a whole lot more demand on the grid. Neat idea, charge your car as you go or where ever you park with no hassle to the driver. Only problem is, it's a chicken and the egg thing. Nobody is going to spend the huge piles of cash needed to install this equipment until there is a proven demand. There's not going to be any demand because without this system in place, EVs will have to use some other type of charging system. I don't know about the towns you guys live in, but mine can't even manage to keep up with the pot holes much less install charging pads and stations all over town.
A better place indeed. So is Shangri-La. The solution lies with reinventing the automobile, not reinventing the whole transportation system.
Induction charging would require a lot of infrastructure modification and a whole lot more demand on the grid. Neat idea, charge your car as you go or where ever you park with no hassle to the driver. Only problem is, it's a chicken and the egg thing. Nobody is going to spend the huge piles of cash needed to install this equipment until there is a proven demand. There's not going to be any demand because without this system in place, EVs will have to use some other type of charging system. I don't know about the towns you guys live in, but mine can't even manage to keep up with the pot holes much less install charging pads and stations all over town.
A better place indeed. So is Shangri-La. The solution lies with reinventing the automobile, not reinventing the whole transportation system.
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You bring up several good points. I am not the final authority? If not me for myself then who? I am my final authority and that is what drives my actions. However, collectively we have to ask what drives the actions of a nation. Hummm. Ok, how about I change "Don't make sense" to "Don't make sense to most sane people". Is that better?
It would be great if our discussions were read by the top minds in the world (yeah, I know it would be a waste of their time) and they were able to cast a vote and add their comments. There could be extra points for someone who was a recognized expert in the field of discussion. I would be great to just say, “OK, let's put this up for an expert vote.” It would end a lot of this back and forth bickering. I guess that would take the fun out of things in a hurry.
Most inductors used in the grid are efficient, but the one illustrated in the car is not. Particularly, it is not in an enclosed system. There are too many wayward magnetic fields that are open to losses as opposed to a completely enclosed system. Even if I pulled that one out of my butt, it has much more credentials than you think, sorry!
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Well, Project Better Place is moving swiftly ahead with their plans. I guess Israel will have to be the test case for us that are not believers. They say it will only take about 10 years for the transition but we should be able to see if the system works in about 5 years or so. It will at the very least give us a lot of data on what works and what doesn't.
My thoughts are still that we Americans should move swiftly with plug-in hybrids for the short-term. This along with E85 made from 2nd generation biofuels (not made from using arable land) could get our passenger fleets down to using around 10% of our current gasoline demand. This would make a huge dent in our oil problem. Next we will transition to quick-charge BEVs when the technology becomes available. I'm guessing the hybrids will be around for quite some time until the quick-charging infrastructure is in place. It will all depend on the price difference between using gasoline and charging with the grid (along with other political and geopolitical issues). If the price of gasoline continues to rise (which I think it will) it will provide the incentive for quicker transition.
While Project Better Place’s vision of swapping out batteries may be good for Israel considering their current geopolitical situation (hated by most OPEC countries) I don't think we need to go the swap-out path. Plug-in hybrids will do very nicely for the short-term.
For those still on the fence about our ability to quick-charge batteries I would like you to consider that this is very easy to do, assuming safe, quick-charge batteries are developed. For example, please assume for a moment that the new Toshiba quick-charge batteries (should be on sale before the end of the year) are great and also have a reasonable cost (eventually) or that EEstor's technology is not fake. If we have that energy storage technology then it’s a relatively straight forward process to charge them. My idea was to have a few hundred quick-charge ports installed at even distances along our interstate highways. Every couple hundred miles would be good for a start and would keep the capital costs down. It would be an automatic or semi-automatic system that attaches to your car's charging port and delivers the required energy.
Some say it will put too much stress on the grid or that substations will be needed. You can do a search in this forum for detail discussions of how this can be done but the simple answer is that each charging port station has the required electrical energy storage. The grid slowly charges this energy storage all day and night. When a car comes in for charging, the station basically provides a battery-to-battery energy transfer though a charging port. This charging port could be induction or conduction. I do feel that it should be a hands-free operation. We don't want Grandma touching anything that is capable of moving 50 kWhs of energy in 5 minutes. That is a serious power flow!
Thus, let's adopt plug-in hybrids today that will drastically reduce our imported oil demand followed by using pure, renewable BEVs as the infrastructure is built out. The more pain caused by oil the faster that build out will happen.
For our big trucks we can use biodiesel, hydrogen, full electric, or other appropriate technology. We will just have to wait to see what becomes available. For those who just snickered when I said full electric let me say I included that because there are rumors that EEstor will provide 3rd party verification of their technology. If their technology proves to be anywhere near what they claim we will be able to not only power trucks but even airplanes with their technology. While I am not holding my breath I'm willing to at least include the possibility.
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