why aren't electric cars more affordable?

[Rosa Luxemburg]

we need to entice people to switch to electric as soon as possible. Why are they so expensive? There is also a problem - the ones that look nice cost $109,000. The ones that I could afford look like golf carts!

http://venturebeat.com/2008/01/10/27-electric-cars-companies-ready-to-take-over-the-road/

[Freddie Stubbs]

1. A cheap battery has yet to be invented

[Rosa Luxemburg]

2. I'm hoping they are working on that

I gues they didn't have much incentive for that before since they had oil

[kristopher]

35. That isn't quite correct...

The problem is that we haven't yet captured the benefits of large scale production.

That isn't because technology is lacking, but because the demand for batteries hasn't been large enough to entice people to build manufacturing plants.

What you are seeing now is the beginning of a ramp-up phase for manufacturing batteries. Obama just gave a group of American companies 2.5 billion to build a large lithium battery production facility. This by itself won't be enough to reduce battery prices as much as the need to go down. What it will do however, is reduce the price enough so that a larger segment of the people can afford them. This increases not only supply but demand, but we have to build the plant first.
Other programs to increase demand now are tax credits (which are large), the desire by people to "go green", incentives to trade your older, high mileage vehicle, and probably most important, there are the high oil prices that will return as the economy turns around.

All of those 'demand drivers' will convince people looking to invest money that making batteries is a good business to be in right now. You've seen what this process does if you've watched the price of a mass produced electric commodity like a flat panel TV start at say $10,000 and in the course of 6-10 years drop to $800.
The image shows the best guess of EPRI (Electric Policy Research Institute, the US national laboratory that is charged with planning for our national electric system) as to how the transportation fleet will transition. They and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) probably have the best understanding of the topic. For reference there are about 280,000,000 vehicles on the road, and we sell about 12-14 million each year.


In the process we also improve technology as the people who have or want market share compete to make a better mousetrap.
PHEV Grid Impacts Technical Review
March 14th, 2007
Mark Duvall

[jwirr]

3. They will be someday but what we need right now for those of us

who will never be able to buy a new car is a very affordable conversion package. I am willing to bet that there are a lot more drivers who need that conversion package than those who are going to buy new. If we are looking at the change in the numbers then we go with conversion.

[Grey]

4. And it's street legal......

Search Results
Welcome to Plasma Boy Racing, home of White Zombie, the world's ...
If that's still not enough White Zombie info, click on the 'Videos' button and watch this high powered electric car take out muscle cars and hot import drag ...
www.plasmaboyracing.com/whitezombie.php - 13k - Cached - Similar pages
Welcome to Plasma Boy Racing, home of White Zombie, the world's ...
I googled White Zombie and this is what I found....

White Zombie V8 Burnout (9-28-05) For those who still love the sound of a built V8, here's a fun clip that will have you laughing! There was a muscle car ...
www.plasmaboyracing.com/videos.php - 43k - Cached - Similar pages
YouTube - Speed Records White Zombie


6 min - 24 Sep 2007 -






The White Zombie as appeared on The Speed Channel's "Speed Records".See http:// www. ... White Zombie Datsun 1200 Electric drag car. 16647 ...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Fmy4tWvr8c
White Zombie: electric-powered drag car
The car he calls “White Zombie” has gone through several incarnations since he started racing it, back in 1994. It now has a drive train that starts in the ...
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1972 Datsun 1200 Electric 1/4 mile Drag Racing timeslip specs 0-60 ...
You can vote for this Datsun 1200 Electric to be the featured car of the month on the ... I got a chance to see the White Zombie break some NEDRA records in ...
www.dragtimes.com/Datsun-1200-Timeslip-7484.html - 40k - Cached - Similar pages

[dana_b]

9. I just heard about ths guy in Portland last week!

can you imagine?? a fucking Datsun beating a muscle car?! that's fantastic!!

[LiberalEsto]

5. Probably for the same reason that calculators

cost hundreds of dollars when first developed. Only the wealthy could afford them. $500 was a LOT of money in the 1970s.

Now you can get cheap calculators for a couple of dollars at a discount store.

[earth mom]

6. Because it's in Mobil & Exxon's best interests to keep us slaves to gasoline. nt

[ProgressiveProfessor]

13. Not that discarded meme again...

[earth mom]

54. There you go-muddying the waters of Truth.

Here, educate yourself and make sure you watch the second hour where it is explained what the Oil companies are all about: Greed:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7065205277695921912&hl=en

[ProgressiveProfessor]

67. Next you will claim they are suppressing 200mpg carburetors

Its not that they are not trying to make and keep profits,but there are limits to their activities

[earth mom]

68. Battery technology was BOUGHT by oil companies so they could destroy it.

http://www.greenoptimistic.com/2009/01/15/ev1-electric-vehicle-oil-companies/

[lumberjack_jeff]

7. Because the cheapest available suitable batteries

cost $15,000 for even a small car with any reasonable range.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

10. are there tax incentives if you buy electric cars?

I know there are for energy saving household things?

[ProgressiveProfessor]

21. Used to be HOV advantages here in CA, but those went away

Others have claimed Prius sales slumped afterwards

[lumberjack_jeff]

47. That doesn't change the price of the car. n/t

[underpants]

70. No govt. funding for the early research on batteries

at least not enough

[dana_b]

8. too bad GM killed the EV 1

I think it looked alright - not like a golf cart. 33,000 - 50,000 in the 90s. Would be much less now.

[Romulox]

11. Hard to explain why Toyota or Honda hasn't introduced an affordable electric, isn't it?

:think:

[dana_b]

12. true - because it would be profitable for them.

we have electric cars at work that look like a Prius. They may be - I'll have to look closer next week.

[Kalyke]

19. The Prius is ugly, though.

At least the new Ford Focus doesn't look as much like a bubble as the Prius (I hate the bubble look that is so popular now. Ick!)

[Romulox]

27. Occam Razor suggests precisely the opposite. nt

[DainBramaged]

73. They believe in HEAVEN FORBID, profit over people, but most here don't believe it.

THAT is why you won't see a truly affordable EV or Hybrid from them.

[Juche]

14. A professor at UC Davis has created a kit that converts any car to a plug in for 10k

http://www.thegreenmotorist.com/index.php/professor-creates-hybrid-conversion-kit/

Right now it costs 10k, but with mass production and increases in battery technology maybe they can get the cost down to 5-6k within 5 years.

Combine that with a $3000 per car tax rebate (which assuming 1 million cars a year are converted will cost $3 billion) and you could convert a car for $3000


Looking at the electric car list from the OPs link I liked the Zap!. It reminds me of the car Mr. Bean used to always run off the road.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

18. I have been following electric cars for sometime...its not quite that cheap or easy

It requires more owner savvy and work than many people are willing to put in their cars. Also ignores the cost of replacement batteries or the environmental issues associated with traditional batteries. This approach, while fun and cool, is still that of a hobbyist or aficionado more than one for the mass market.

[Juche]

33. That sucks

I thought batteries now could last 100,000 miles. I hope the technology is ready for mass production within 10 years because cars are going to be everywhere in China, India and Brazil very soon.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

42. Mr bean could have used one of these!

[Lorien]

15. The Prius has the same wheel base and interior space as a Camry

and costs the same amount. About 22k. The "ones that look nice" as you say, cost what their counterparts-cars like a Lamborghini -cost. The problem is that people are always comparing apples to oranges. The Prius is much bigger than a corolla but they compare them anyway, which makes no sense at all except to spread disinformation.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

17. Try getting in and out of one...

I say this as a person with multiple skeletal surgeries.

[Statistical]

16. No big oil conspiracy the truth is more more mundane.

Battery are extremely (in term of energy per unit) EXPENSIVE & HEAVY.

Which is exactly the opposite of what you want for a fuel tank.

NiHM batteries are going to run you about $10K - $15K.
More powerful lithium ion are double that.

Of course the "simple" answer is make a better battery. Right?
Some people would say the oil industry is keeping that technology under wraps. WRONG.

If anyone I mean anyone on the planet anywhere in a company, in the garage, in a university lab could make a battery with say 10x current energy density they likely would be riches man/woman in the world within a decade even with a small royalty per battery.

An radically improved battery would be useful just about anywhere.
imagine cellphones that last 1-3 months before recharging.
imagine whole house battery backup system good for 7 days in power outage for couple grand.
imagine a laptop that runs a week without recharging
imagine space explorations that are smaller cheaper and last decades (the mars rover finally stopped simply because the battery had been charged/discharged too many times)
imagine non-nuclear submarines that could stay submerged for weeks at a time
imagine communication blimps offering highspeed data access to rural america (and emerging markets) that could stay aloaft for weeks.
imagine pacemakers, artificial hearts, or diabetes pumps that never need replacement (lifetime battery).
....
oh yeah an low cost electric car.

The problem w/ electric car is nobody has made a high storage battery. Battery improvements have slowed to essentially 1-2% improvements per year. It is unlikely they will be improved further.
It will require something radical like a safe low cost high energy capacitor (current capacitors have the side effect of exploding violently in a crash).

Mass production won't solve the problem. Batteries (even lion) are already mass produced. Worldwide sales is in the billions. It is simply a physics/chemistry problem.

Bad news is there may not be a solution. We may need an alternate method like Hydrogen.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

20. There is another post which claims that the Obama administration is moving away from hydrogen

and fuel cells in favor of plugins. IMO, that is not the right thing.

Post is here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x191243

[Spike89]

29. large article in our local paper yesterday about hydrogen

The article talked about some of the federal stimulus money funding research into microbial hydrogen production. I sounds great and perhaps no more than a few years out from becoming viable. The thrust of the research is also fascinating in that they stressed that the guiding principle is seeing how nature already produces hydrogen and then finding ways to make it commercial with as little change as possible.

[kristopher]

45. Barring a miracle level breakthrough in H tech, the H car is dead.

Every manufacturer is bringing PHEVs and EVs to market. The uncertainty over what the new transportation infrastructure will look like is over; it WILL be EV. That was settled when the idea of vehicle to grid power was developed. Battery electric vehicles are a huge part of making a renewable energy infrastructure possible.

One other major factor is system efficiency. For example, to power all of our transportation fleet with wind (building 5MW turbines) "the array spacing required by wind-BEVs is about 0.35-0.7%, for wind-HFCV it would require 1.1-2.1% of the US land area.**
That shows that the end efficiency of H technology requires nearly between 3X to 7X more electricity to be generated.

H is just not the way to go.

**Review of Solutions to Global Warming, Air Pollution, and Energy Security
Mark Z. Jacobson
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford

[amborin]

22. or solar?

like toyota's solar panels on cars?

[Rosa Luxemburg]

41. they could use the movement of the wheels to generate electricity too

[Statistical]

57. Perpetual Motion Machine Alert

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perpetual_motion_machine

[Rosa Luxemburg]

62. many thanks for the link. If we could invent such a machine we wouldn't have to rely on energy

maybe we should have an inventors forum on DU. I'm sure there are many learned people here.

[Codeine]

65. You can't invent such a machine.

It's literally impossible. It violates the way physics works.

[daleo]

25. The gasoline distribution system is big and heavy too

Refineries, gas stations, pipelines, tanker trucks...

Going away from gasoline would leave a lot of stranded assets. I think that is a consideration.

[kristopher]

36. Before you dismiss the effect of the oil industry

I'd suggest you ask yourself what your current transportation options would be had Jimmy Carter's energy policies not bee discarded by RayGun in 1981.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

61. Reagan ruined things

[kristopher]

63. At the behest of the fossil fuel industy.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

40. I wish I could invent one but things aren't moving fast enough on batteries

I'm sure someone somewhere has the technology for small long lasting batteries. I would love a laptop battery to last for mor ethan a week.

[tabbycat31]

23. the technology is still fairly new

and as time goes on technology gets cheaper. When the iphone first came out it was $700. Now it's $200.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

24. Actually its not. There is not that much room left to mature or cost reduce

That is why new technologies are needed

[Politicalboi]

26. We need alternative fuels

Not electric cars that no one can afford to buy. Let them sit there. The one in the picture is a nice looking car but the rest are ugly. Why not keep our cars but change the fuel. It's a lot easier and cheaper to do. We can use Hemp, waste, Marijuana, switch grass and others to fuel our cars we have now.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

39. wind powered

it would be good to be able to store the power from the movement of the wheels. My grandson like the idea of a car with a sort of windmill on top LOL! Not sure how that would work!

[lumberjack_jeff]

49. Storing the power from the movement of the wheels...

... assuming you're talking on downhills, they do this through regenerative braking. Stepping on the "brake" pedal of the prius simply engages the electric motor, thus using the kinetic energy to generate electricity to charge the batteries.

[applegrove]

28. They also don't have a strong enough battery for the electric car.

[lumberjack_jeff]

52. Batteries are plenty strong.

They are simply prohibitively expensive to purchase enough Kwh of energy.

11.466 seconds at 114.08mph

http://www.plasmaboyracing.com/whitezombie.php

[applegrove]

55. I really meant long lasting. They don't have a battery that will drive

a car for more than a few hours. That is a problem because people then won't buy them.

[Stevenmarc]

30. Well until the car comes this is a good start

It's the bike I use

http://www.ezeebike.com/index.htm

[Johonny]

31. Why aren't cars more affordable in general?

[Angleae]

32. Electric cars are highly impractical

How do people recharge them? Some of us don't have a garage. And on top of that the power grid will shut down if everybody is charging their cars at night. Not to mention they don't have the range people need, yes it's good the "daily commute" but you're tethered to about 100 mile range on weekends, vacations, etc.

[Stevenmarc]

34. This would be the solution to that

http://www.betterplace.com/

[Rosa Luxemburg]

37. they have to improve

instead of gas stations recharge stations.

[Statistical]

58. Batteries are limited in speed of charging and discharging.

Charging or Discharging a battery to quickly damages it.

This limit doesn't only apply to cars.

Imagine if you could charge your laptop, camcorder, cellphone, digital camera, or ipod battery in 2 minutes.
Use it for 3-4 hours then plug it in for 2 minutes and blah 3-4 more hours. Nice huh? Think there might be a market for that?

You would pay a premium for that right. As would millions of other consumers. Any company who could bring such a product on the market would make billions.
The problem is there is no battery that can withstand that level of current flow.

Charging a EV car takes 4-12 hours. There will never be electric "gas" stations.
Maybe office parks with plug in terminal.

Of course some transportation will never be able to work on electricity.
Take semi trucks for an instance. Many truck drivers drive 12-16 hours in a day. Put 500, 600, sometimes even 800+ miles in a day.
Can you imagine the size of a battery pack requires to just move a prius 600 miles? Now imagine what it would take to move fully loaded semi.

H2 is far less efficient but it can be fueled up in matter of minutes (similar to gasoline).

[Indy Lurker]

43. The grid has plenty of power

Electricity usage peaks in the summer when AC usage runs the highest. Even during the summer, the load is light enough at night for everyone to charge their cars.

[Angleae]

46. The amount of power is sufficient, the ability to transmit it isn't.

The power grid (power lines) are not up to the task.

[lumberjack_jeff]

48. Every place is different.

In the northeast, they have the bad combination of private utilities, high Kwh prices, coal-fired generation, a substandard grid, and high winter nighttime (heating) loads.

In the west and southwest, we have a higher percentage of renewable sources, a decent grid and a lower average nighttime load.

Here in the west, an EV is a great solution.

[Angleae]

66. In the southwest they have brownouts in the summer due to A/C.

Or at least they used to (have the upgraded and I missed it?). Imagine that everyone plugged their car in at night.

[lumberjack_jeff]

69. They also have clouds of smog

pick your poison.

Their climate suggests that there is an opportunity for off-peak charging after midnight.

[lunatica]

38. They're probably waiting to see if there's a market for electric cars

Or maybe they're waiting to see if global warming is real. Ya know, it's been a mighty cold winter!!!!!!

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[dkofos]

44. The auto makers and dealers don't make any money after the sale

on constant service.

[mbperrin]

59. A winner! 2/3 of the revenues of the auto companies come from parts and

service, and electrics need very little of either. Look at what you've had done for your current car:

oil changes, transmission fluid changes, belt replacement, alternator replacement, water pump replacement, oil pump replacement, radiator flush and clean and refill, hose replacement, thermostats, air filters, muffler, catalytic converter, transmission repair or replace, spark plugs and wires, ignition modules, starter replacement,

and more.

Electrics have none of these. Electric motors are uber-reliable. When's the last time you replaced a refrigerator because the motor failed? Most likely it was to change the color or to get ice crushed in the door.

There's a reason buggy companies didn't build cars. Outside their model and thinking. That's why the electrics will be built by new companies, too. The old guys just feel broke without that 66% cushion on parts and service.

[lumberjack_jeff]

50. Can you afford $15,000?

http://www.evalbum.com/1397

[Rosa Luxemburg]

56. my husband used to have one

it was black. It was great to get through the snow. Now my husband bicycles!

[spanone]

51. cause they're still pumping oil out of the ground and will continue to.

[plum eggplant]

53. Um...can we say RESOURCE WARS?!

(Knew we could...)

[Rosa Luxemburg]

60. electric cars will be here in the next few years

[deaniac21]

64. You really understand the market. It's an outrage how we bein'

treated!

[Rosa Luxemburg]

71. by the way I found AIR COMPRESSED cars!

http://www.inhabitat.com/2007/06/01/tata-motors-air-car/

[TheKentuckian]

72. I personally believe advanced battery technology is owned and suppresed by big carbon

We're batteries away from making dead dinosaurs extinct again. Well...except for plastics and such.