The bottom line is, electric vehicles will be cheaper than gas.
Here is a video:
If the viewer doesn't play in your browser, here is a link: Green Skeptic on FOX Business.
Showing posts with label Battery electric vehicle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Battery electric vehicle. Show all posts
11 January 2011
Will an Electric Car Save You Money? The Green Skeptic on FOX Business
Earlier today I helped Stuart Varney on FOX Business answer a question from a viewer about the cost to charge an electric car versus a gasoline-powered engine.
The bottom line is, electric vehicles will be cheaper than gas.
Here is a video:
If the viewer doesn't play in your browser, here is a link: Green Skeptic on FOX Business.
The bottom line is, electric vehicles will be cheaper than gas.
Here is a video:
If the viewer doesn't play in your browser, here is a link: Green Skeptic on FOX Business.
16 August 2010
New Energy Symposium 2010
Co-hosted by the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering's (CNSE) Energy and Environmental Technology Applications Center (E2TAC), along with New Energy New York, a consortium of New York State-based energy technology organizations, the two day event featured panelists from industry and government, as well as investors and academic institutions, along with over two dozen presenting companies.
More than one jeremiad was tossed out by the speakers. Most agreed that the time is now to seed the opportunity and not cede it to other countries (China and India were among those cited).
As Dr. Pradeep Haldar, director of E2TAC and head of the Nanoengineering Constellation at University of Albany's CNSE, reminded the attendees, "We are falling behind the rest of the world by $240-260 million in terms of investment in cleantech."
Several presenting companies hope to get a piece of that investment pie and hope that it grows. Highlights among the companies include: Algal Scientific Corporation, Ener-G-Rotors, and Energy Materials Corporation, which were the three "most promising companies" chosen by the extensive panel of investors, including David Wells from Kleiner Perkins, Alex Kinnier of Khosla Ventures, and Annachiara Danielli of Golden Seeds.
Other companies of interest included Paper Battery Company, InnoSepra, and three NYC ACRE tenants, Wind Products, Sollega, and Rentricity.
My three take-aways from the two-day conference:
1.) Time-of-use pricing is essential to make the Smart Grid work and to manage pricing and habits;
2.) Storage to balance the load and demand is essential -- and large increases in intermittent generation (from distributed sources and Battery Electric Vehicles) will increase this need; and
3.) Energy efficiency is still the low hanging fruit and has still not been picked.
The bottom line? While progress has been made towards the new energy future, we've still got a long way to go.
There was a healthy discussion about the role of Europe and India in the future of energy, but the elephant in the room was clearly China.
As Congressman Steve Israel put it in his keynote address, "China is our Sputnik. We need to see China's taking leadership of the clean energy arena as a wake-up call."
06 August 2010
Green Skeptic Friday LinkFest - 08/06/10
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| An EV1 all-electric car by GM that escaped in 2005. |
After five months of intense work with some great clients, my consultancy, VerdeStrategy, finally has a couple of open slots for new projects and clients. Contact me here if your company can use some help with strategic communications, business planning or developing your investor presentations.
Now, after that shameless self-promotion message, on to the links.
A lot of Electric Vehicle love this week:
First, how'd you like to travel from Alaska to Argentina in an Electric Sports Car? Greentech Media has a story about two entrepreneurs who did just that: Sports Car
Anna Clark from GreenBiz explains that consumer choice will be the ultimate driver when it comes to EVs in Selling Electric Cars Requires Plugged-In Drivers
CleanTechies blog notes that Fast Vehicle Charging Goes by Many Names (Just don't call it Al...)
And here's a video link to my appearance on FOX Business Network this week on $GM and the Chevy Volt: Green Skeptic on FOX
All that EV goodness aside, our StockTwits pal Gregor MacDonald reminds us that we're still Eating Gasoline in America
Is solar now cheaper than new nuclear? A new US study says it's true in North Carolina: Solar
Up next: Two Energy Efficiency Stories from Beantown (or thereabouts):
Always smart @cleantechvc on Energy Efficiency: Where angels will shine.
And congratulations are in order for Green Skeptic-favorite EnerNoc (ENOC) on a profitable quarter and almost 5GW under management: $ENOC
Have a great weekend everyone!
(Disclosure: I hold long positions in ENOC. This post is for informational purposes only and is neither intended to be investment advice nor an offer, or the solicitation of any offer, to buy or sell any securities.)
29 June 2010
With Tesla IPO, Has the Age of Electric Vehicles Arrived?
Tesla Motors will have its IPO today. The Nissan LEAF electric vehicle sold out shortly after it was announced, many of the orders coming from first-time Nissan customers. The Chevy Volt may even hit the showroom later this year.
It certainly seems as if the age of the electric car is upon us. But hold on a minute. Let not all the hype keep us from seeing the speedbumps -- and maybe a few roadblocks in the way of a complete transition on our roadways.
Don't get me wrong, I believe the battery electric vehicle (or BEV for short) is the vehicle of the future. But this new generation of electric vehicles will have lots of challenges, including battery technology, range, and charging.
Let's take range. Today, we are used to driving 300 miles or so before having to pull into a gas station and, after inserting our credit card, choosing the grade, and popping the nozzle in the tank, we can be refueled and ready to go before we've had a chance to clean the windshield.
Contrast that with the currently planned charging experience for electric vehicles. Drive 100 miles and you need to charge it -- the LEAF will take 8 hours for a full charge at 200 volts -- and there is currently very little infrastructure to support electric vehicle charging.
You can get around this by increasing the number or density of batteries in a vehicle, which will add weight and cost, but as battery technology improves the weight and cost, life and range will increase.
Charging, however, still remains an issue. I'm concerned about the vision of the future that imagines hundreds of thousands of charging stations around the country, in cities, parking garages, and on-the-street parking (perhaps replacing the meters that have gone the way of the parking kiosk). That seems like an awful lot of infrastructure needing to be built.
And what about that volatile mix of bad weather and high voltage. Imagine the housewife, parking in the Whole Foods lot, plugging in while she goes in for groceries. She comes out, and some idiot parking next to her has dislodged the plug. Not only does she not have the charge she needs to go pick up Junior from day care, but now she's dealing with a live wire on a wet macadam. Doesn't sound like the way to go to me.
I've even seen plans for "battery replacement stations" where you drive in and your old battery is swapped out for a new one -- the batteries are on a huge circular conveyor. The Pep Boys, Manny, Moe, and Jack, are probably salivating at that prospect. But that doesn't seem feasible to me.
Which is why I was encouraged by this video from the UK-based HaloIPT of an alternative future featuring wireless, dynamic charging based upon inductive power transfer technology.
Momentum Dynamics, a Malvern, PA-based company I've written about before on this blog, also has a technology that may help advance the vision depicted above.
As Andy Daga, CEO of Momentum Dynamics said to me recently, the battery electric vehicle industry "Needs three things: improved battery technology (this is coming), improved vehicle integration of new technologies (also in the works), and finally, improvements in the technology and distribution of charging technology."
Of course, that is what Andy and his company are focused on, and which he feels "is absolutely critical to the industry."
I hope for the sake of the electric vehicle market that the Tesla IPO ($TSLA) goes well. I have concerns that, like $AONE, it will go from 0 to 60 and come to a screeching halt, like, well, a Tesla Roadster as it approaches a speed trap. (That won't be good for future cleantech IPOs -- some companies have already pulled their plans this year).
But I have larger concerns that we are ignoring the looming issues facing the electric vehicle industry that may well prevent it from going the distance.
It certainly seems as if the age of the electric car is upon us. But hold on a minute. Let not all the hype keep us from seeing the speedbumps -- and maybe a few roadblocks in the way of a complete transition on our roadways.
Don't get me wrong, I believe the battery electric vehicle (or BEV for short) is the vehicle of the future. But this new generation of electric vehicles will have lots of challenges, including battery technology, range, and charging.
Let's take range. Today, we are used to driving 300 miles or so before having to pull into a gas station and, after inserting our credit card, choosing the grade, and popping the nozzle in the tank, we can be refueled and ready to go before we've had a chance to clean the windshield.
Contrast that with the currently planned charging experience for electric vehicles. Drive 100 miles and you need to charge it -- the LEAF will take 8 hours for a full charge at 200 volts -- and there is currently very little infrastructure to support electric vehicle charging.
You can get around this by increasing the number or density of batteries in a vehicle, which will add weight and cost, but as battery technology improves the weight and cost, life and range will increase.
Charging, however, still remains an issue. I'm concerned about the vision of the future that imagines hundreds of thousands of charging stations around the country, in cities, parking garages, and on-the-street parking (perhaps replacing the meters that have gone the way of the parking kiosk). That seems like an awful lot of infrastructure needing to be built.
And what about that volatile mix of bad weather and high voltage. Imagine the housewife, parking in the Whole Foods lot, plugging in while she goes in for groceries. She comes out, and some idiot parking next to her has dislodged the plug. Not only does she not have the charge she needs to go pick up Junior from day care, but now she's dealing with a live wire on a wet macadam. Doesn't sound like the way to go to me.
I've even seen plans for "battery replacement stations" where you drive in and your old battery is swapped out for a new one -- the batteries are on a huge circular conveyor. The Pep Boys, Manny, Moe, and Jack, are probably salivating at that prospect. But that doesn't seem feasible to me.
Which is why I was encouraged by this video from the UK-based HaloIPT of an alternative future featuring wireless, dynamic charging based upon inductive power transfer technology.
Momentum Dynamics, a Malvern, PA-based company I've written about before on this blog, also has a technology that may help advance the vision depicted above.
As Andy Daga, CEO of Momentum Dynamics said to me recently, the battery electric vehicle industry "Needs three things: improved battery technology (this is coming), improved vehicle integration of new technologies (also in the works), and finally, improvements in the technology and distribution of charging technology."
Of course, that is what Andy and his company are focused on, and which he feels "is absolutely critical to the industry."
I hope for the sake of the electric vehicle market that the Tesla IPO ($TSLA) goes well. I have concerns that, like $AONE, it will go from 0 to 60 and come to a screeching halt, like, well, a Tesla Roadster as it approaches a speed trap. (That won't be good for future cleantech IPOs -- some companies have already pulled their plans this year).
But I have larger concerns that we are ignoring the looming issues facing the electric vehicle industry that may well prevent it from going the distance.
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