Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
#11
08-25-2005, 03:09 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Mitsubishi is planning some nice EVs for the semi-near future, such as this:
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2005...ubishi__1.html
4 in-wheel drive, the Lancer Evolution MIEV has a top speed of 180 km/h (112 mph) and a cruising range of 250 km (155 miles).
Each motor, manufactured by Toyo Denki Seizo K.K., produces a maximum output of 50 kW with 518 Nm of torque.
A 355V lithium-ion battery system comprising 24 modules fits under the floor between the front and rear wheels to provide power.
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2005...ubishi__1.html
4 in-wheel drive, the Lancer Evolution MIEV has a top speed of 180 km/h (112 mph) and a cruising range of 250 km (155 miles).
Each motor, manufactured by Toyo Denki Seizo K.K., produces a maximum output of 50 kW with 518 Nm of torque.
A 355V lithium-ion battery system comprising 24 modules fits under the floor between the front and rear wheels to provide power.
#12
08-25-2005, 04:06 PM
Pretty Darn Active Enthusiast
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Eastern Washington State
Posts: 443
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Originally Posted by xcel
Hi All:
___In regards to grid capacity at night … There are a lot of Peekers including Gas, older Coal, and even OIL fired units that come on during the day that help bring generation up to meet demand during the summer months. At night, these very expensive and usually far dirtier units are taken off-line if possible. There is not that much spare cap to just let everyone hop on the grid to charge their EV’s. The supply is much tighter, far more expensive, and far dirtier then you might have imagined
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net
___In regards to grid capacity at night … There are a lot of Peekers including Gas, older Coal, and even OIL fired units that come on during the day that help bring generation up to meet demand during the summer months. At night, these very expensive and usually far dirtier units are taken off-line if possible. There is not that much spare cap to just let everyone hop on the grid to charge their EV’s. The supply is much tighter, far more expensive, and far dirtier then you might have imagined
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net
Anyway, there is really no such thing as surplus power on the grid because power is consumed as soon as it is generated. There is no real effective way to store surplus power right now for distribution on the grid at a later time.
#13
08-25-2005, 06:59 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Originally Posted by JeromeP
Anyway, there is really no such thing as surplus power on the grid because power is consumed as soon as it is generated. There is no real effective way to store surplus power right now for distribution on the grid at a later time.
The two lakes essentially serve as a battery for storing surplus power to be used during the daytime. During the day when demand is high, water flows through the turbines in the dam from the lake to the lower basin. At night, they shut off the turbines and run pumps to use the surplus power from the nuclear plant to pump water from the lower basin back uphill to the lake. It's a mighty cool system, and probably **** effective as far as massive-scale batteries go.
#15
08-26-2005, 12:57 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Hi AZCivic:
___Many utilities pump at night to fill a reservoir for hydro during the day. One of the largest utilities in the US (Exelon) does the same in some of their eastern locations. Chicago even had an ice generator to help cool off some of the larger loop buildings during peak cooling periods too! The point is there is no excess. It has been estimated that the Grid can supply only 2% of this nations entire transportation needs. That is with all the nukes, all the dirt and oil burners, all the NG based CGen’s, all the hydro, all the wind farms, and all the PV, running at max cap! I have been told that this estimate was based on HP and we know we do not use all the HP we have available to us. In any case, even with every style of electric production plant up and running at 100% Cap Factor, no outages, nothing breaks, the grid itself is stable, and there are no weather events, you might have maybe enough power to supply 7 - 10% of our transportation needs. Of course you would have to give up water, heat, light, and electricity in your own home because the entire grids’ cap went to driving just 10% of us to work and back as well as transporting some of the nations goods down the highways with nothing left to spare. What do you think electricity would cost in a free market system then?
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net
___Many utilities pump at night to fill a reservoir for hydro during the day. One of the largest utilities in the US (Exelon) does the same in some of their eastern locations. Chicago even had an ice generator to help cool off some of the larger loop buildings during peak cooling periods too! The point is there is no excess. It has been estimated that the Grid can supply only 2% of this nations entire transportation needs. That is with all the nukes, all the dirt and oil burners, all the NG based CGen’s, all the hydro, all the wind farms, and all the PV, running at max cap! I have been told that this estimate was based on HP and we know we do not use all the HP we have available to us. In any case, even with every style of electric production plant up and running at 100% Cap Factor, no outages, nothing breaks, the grid itself is stable, and there are no weather events, you might have maybe enough power to supply 7 - 10% of our transportation needs. Of course you would have to give up water, heat, light, and electricity in your own home because the entire grids’ cap went to driving just 10% of us to work and back as well as transporting some of the nations goods down the highways with nothing left to spare. What do you think electricity would cost in a free market system then?
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net
#16
09-21-2005, 11:37 AM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
http://www.evworld.com/view.cfm?sect...le&storyid=897
This is a very good story from EV World about how plug-in hybrids are more efficient and cleaner, even if coal is the method to deliver the electricity for the overnite recharge.
Makes a TON of sense !!
This is a very good story from EV World about how plug-in hybrids are more efficient and cleaner, even if coal is the method to deliver the electricity for the overnite recharge.
Makes a TON of sense !!
Coal Considerations
The concept of electric plug-in hybrids has been around for about a decade. Andy Frank and his students at the University of California at Davis have built a number of prototypes based on sedans and sport utility vehicles. Electric companies are attracted to the idea because it would enable them to sell more of their surplus overnight power. Carmakers, which have started to shift their position on this issue lately, historically have tended to denigrate both electric cars and the plug-in hybrid concept as contributing to global warming. They point out that most utilities currently generate electricity from coal, and because gasoline burns cleaner than coal, the argument is that a shift to electric cars would generate more air pollution, not lessen it.
But it turns out that this argument is not correct. Plug-in hybrids actually will contribute less climate-altering carbon dioxide (CO2) than gasoline. Here’s why: A conventional gas vehicle releases about 24 pounds of CO2 and travels about 24 miles on 1 gallon of gas. It would take about 6 pounds of coal, creating just 12 pounds of CO2, to produce enough electricity to travel the same distance in a plug-in hybrid. What’s more, not all our electricity comes from coal; roughly 30 percent of the grid electricity that would be used by plug-ins comes from non-CO2-producing or CO2-neutral sources, including nuclear and hydroelectric plants, biomass and renewables such as wind and solar energy. This means that plug-ins would produce only about 8 pounds of CO2, or about one-third as much as a conventional 24-mpg gasoline engine. Burning coal gives off other pollutants, including mercury, particulates and sulfur, but these either are captured, or soon will be captured, using advances in technology at newer power plants.
What’s the payoff to you? Assume your utility charges you 5 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for off-peak usage between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. Let’s also assume you drive a plug-in hybrid that operates on electric power alone for about 25 miles, requiring 6 kWh of energy to recharge its batteries. To travel 25 miles in an average car, you’ll pay more than $2 in gas, and in some areas, closer to $3. To travel the same distance in a plug-in hybrid would cost you only 30 cents, or about one-tenth of a conventional car. If you drive only 25 miles a day, your trip will cost just pennies, and your visits to the gas station will be few and far between.
This difference in the cost of gas versus electric power is due in large part to the fact that electric motors are much more efficient than internal-combustion engines.
The concept of electric plug-in hybrids has been around for about a decade. Andy Frank and his students at the University of California at Davis have built a number of prototypes based on sedans and sport utility vehicles. Electric companies are attracted to the idea because it would enable them to sell more of their surplus overnight power. Carmakers, which have started to shift their position on this issue lately, historically have tended to denigrate both electric cars and the plug-in hybrid concept as contributing to global warming. They point out that most utilities currently generate electricity from coal, and because gasoline burns cleaner than coal, the argument is that a shift to electric cars would generate more air pollution, not lessen it.
But it turns out that this argument is not correct. Plug-in hybrids actually will contribute less climate-altering carbon dioxide (CO2) than gasoline. Here’s why: A conventional gas vehicle releases about 24 pounds of CO2 and travels about 24 miles on 1 gallon of gas. It would take about 6 pounds of coal, creating just 12 pounds of CO2, to produce enough electricity to travel the same distance in a plug-in hybrid. What’s more, not all our electricity comes from coal; roughly 30 percent of the grid electricity that would be used by plug-ins comes from non-CO2-producing or CO2-neutral sources, including nuclear and hydroelectric plants, biomass and renewables such as wind and solar energy. This means that plug-ins would produce only about 8 pounds of CO2, or about one-third as much as a conventional 24-mpg gasoline engine. Burning coal gives off other pollutants, including mercury, particulates and sulfur, but these either are captured, or soon will be captured, using advances in technology at newer power plants.
What’s the payoff to you? Assume your utility charges you 5 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for off-peak usage between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. Let’s also assume you drive a plug-in hybrid that operates on electric power alone for about 25 miles, requiring 6 kWh of energy to recharge its batteries. To travel 25 miles in an average car, you’ll pay more than $2 in gas, and in some areas, closer to $3. To travel the same distance in a plug-in hybrid would cost you only 30 cents, or about one-tenth of a conventional car. If you drive only 25 miles a day, your trip will cost just pennies, and your visits to the gas station will be few and far between.
This difference in the cost of gas versus electric power is due in large part to the fact that electric motors are much more efficient than internal-combustion engines.
#17
09-21-2005, 12:05 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Thank you Larry for finding that article! That pretty much backs up my assumption that electricity is still better than personal fuel because generally a massive-scale plant will better turn a fuel (any fuel) into power than automobile engines. From that article, it would seem to be at least twice as efficient from a CO2 production standpoint when compared coal to gasoline, and 3x as efficient based on our current infrastructure. For costs, they estimate a whopping 10x as efficient, which I find hard to believe, but that gives enough headroom that you know it's going to be less expensive one way or another.
#18
09-21-2005, 01:11 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Originally Posted by AZCivic
Thank you Larry for finding that article!
Yes, at even HALF the 10x cost efficiency you are making bacon !!!
And we all know that solar and wind power are both advancing and slowly but surely becoming a larger percentage of our electricity capacity.
#19
09-21-2005, 01:30 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Hi AZCivic:
___The pack in a Prius II currently costs Toyota ~ $1K. They would need 10X’s the cap to run the PHEV out 30 - 40 miles. That is not the only detriment. I work at a Nuc station and we basically give off no GHG in the production of Electricity. The thing is the grid is tapped! You will not see another Nuc built until Yucca Mountain storage facility is settled. The Gas plants are screaming because their fuel prices have increased by > 3X’s in the last 5 years. Those with long term contracts are sitting Ok for the moment but their long term’s run out in as little as 2 years! Solar is not doing a thing for us. Hydro is about tapped. Wind … Now here we have something that may work. Except its being brought in at a rate so slow as to barely keep up with the US’ increased demand as it is let alone the massive increase we will see if everyone goes EV! So what are we going to do? I would love to have the Mitsubishi Colt EV w/ a 155 mile + range for < $19K because the cost per mile to drive beats gasoline hands down. The problem is you cannot have everybody all of a sudden purchasing EV’s and pulling off a tapped grid to commute like they have been using gasoline. Coal/Gas/Nuc Plants cost a hell of a lot of money and nobody wants to pay the up front cost or NIMBY. You cannot place wind power units up without the locals screaming about bird kill and aesthetics. These questions are a lot tougher then most know from the Electricity production side. There simply are not enough units to supply what we will need if there was a massive shift to EV’s over a short time frame.
___In terms of CO2 production, the article used a 24 mpg automobile. My wife drives one of those but I certainly would not. You have to remember that Nuc and coal stations are only a bit over 33% efficient too. They have the same thermodynamics governing them as the ICE does. The low quality waste heat is basically thrown away because you cannot give away millions of gallons per minute of 90 + degree water to the local residents without all kinds of other problems that can spring up … A 55 mpg car has lower CO2 output then a coal station. Not a NUC. There are combined cycle gas units that have exceeded 50% and some that actually do pipe some of their LQ waste heat to local industry but this stuff is of such low quality (heat energy, not water contamination) that you cannot use it for much other then heating spaces and it doesn’t do such a great job of that either! There are also automobiles available that can achieve better then 70 mpg year round which throws the CO2 balance out the window as well …
___Either way, the grid is darn near tapped and we most certainly are not adding cap in a fashion for everyone to hop onto the grid for their daily commute. There is only so much reserve and that goes to cool our homes in the summer or heat our homes in the winter months let alone trying to get everybody back and forth to work. Kayakwill works at a Dirt Burner out in Oregon somewhere and the last time I spoke with him, he said their coal deliveries had to be scheduled upwards of 4 - 6 months in advance because the lack of train car delivery capacity cropping up as of late! Because of the US’ system of free market, there isn’t an incentive for anyone to build more then they need today let alone 5 years out and it is stretching the capacity of everything energy related right to the bleeding edge. The same thing you see going on in the oil industry today is happening in the energy and transportation sectors too. It is a vicious cycle but one we have apparently survived for all this time and who knows, we may survive it for the next 100 years as well? I just have never seen us so close to the edge of cap constraints in any number of industries as I do today is all.
___Finally, a few EV’s are not going to push us over but when a few hundred thousand hit the grid, look out.
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net
___The pack in a Prius II currently costs Toyota ~ $1K. They would need 10X’s the cap to run the PHEV out 30 - 40 miles. That is not the only detriment. I work at a Nuc station and we basically give off no GHG in the production of Electricity. The thing is the grid is tapped! You will not see another Nuc built until Yucca Mountain storage facility is settled. The Gas plants are screaming because their fuel prices have increased by > 3X’s in the last 5 years. Those with long term contracts are sitting Ok for the moment but their long term’s run out in as little as 2 years! Solar is not doing a thing for us. Hydro is about tapped. Wind … Now here we have something that may work. Except its being brought in at a rate so slow as to barely keep up with the US’ increased demand as it is let alone the massive increase we will see if everyone goes EV! So what are we going to do? I would love to have the Mitsubishi Colt EV w/ a 155 mile + range for < $19K because the cost per mile to drive beats gasoline hands down. The problem is you cannot have everybody all of a sudden purchasing EV’s and pulling off a tapped grid to commute like they have been using gasoline. Coal/Gas/Nuc Plants cost a hell of a lot of money and nobody wants to pay the up front cost or NIMBY. You cannot place wind power units up without the locals screaming about bird kill and aesthetics. These questions are a lot tougher then most know from the Electricity production side. There simply are not enough units to supply what we will need if there was a massive shift to EV’s over a short time frame.
___In terms of CO2 production, the article used a 24 mpg automobile. My wife drives one of those but I certainly would not. You have to remember that Nuc and coal stations are only a bit over 33% efficient too. They have the same thermodynamics governing them as the ICE does. The low quality waste heat is basically thrown away because you cannot give away millions of gallons per minute of 90 + degree water to the local residents without all kinds of other problems that can spring up … A 55 mpg car has lower CO2 output then a coal station. Not a NUC. There are combined cycle gas units that have exceeded 50% and some that actually do pipe some of their LQ waste heat to local industry but this stuff is of such low quality (heat energy, not water contamination) that you cannot use it for much other then heating spaces and it doesn’t do such a great job of that either! There are also automobiles available that can achieve better then 70 mpg year round which throws the CO2 balance out the window as well …
___Either way, the grid is darn near tapped and we most certainly are not adding cap in a fashion for everyone to hop onto the grid for their daily commute. There is only so much reserve and that goes to cool our homes in the summer or heat our homes in the winter months let alone trying to get everybody back and forth to work. Kayakwill works at a Dirt Burner out in Oregon somewhere and the last time I spoke with him, he said their coal deliveries had to be scheduled upwards of 4 - 6 months in advance because the lack of train car delivery capacity cropping up as of late! Because of the US’ system of free market, there isn’t an incentive for anyone to build more then they need today let alone 5 years out and it is stretching the capacity of everything energy related right to the bleeding edge. The same thing you see going on in the oil industry today is happening in the energy and transportation sectors too. It is a vicious cycle but one we have apparently survived for all this time and who knows, we may survive it for the next 100 years as well? I just have never seen us so close to the edge of cap constraints in any number of industries as I do today is all.
___Finally, a few EV’s are not going to push us over but when a few hundred thousand hit the grid, look out.
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net
#20
09-21-2005, 01:44 PM
Re: Toyota’s officially responds to a plug-in Prius
Wayne, is it not true that those cars would be filling up their batteries overnight, when demand is lowest? Are we talking about the draw of say a 220V electric dryer running all night overnite, or are we talking closer to like a 150 watt lightbulb running overnite?
My guess is that most people who have the Plugins will not completely expire their battery capacity EVERY SINGLE DAY, so they will not really be filling their batteries with juice all night every night. Some might, but my guess is that the number of people who would do that will be a small percentage.
Me for example - I have about a 10-12 mile commute, round trip. If I did nothing else than my commute, for three consecutive days, I would likely only need to charge the battery again at the end of the third day, after 36 miles of driving. If there are a few thousand like me out there with very short commutes, I think the impact of those users would be small on the grid.
For us to get to 100,000 plugin drivers is most assuredly many years away. One would hope that battery storage capacity would increase at a faster rate than the additional grid burden.
My guess is that most people who have the Plugins will not completely expire their battery capacity EVERY SINGLE DAY, so they will not really be filling their batteries with juice all night every night. Some might, but my guess is that the number of people who would do that will be a small percentage.
Me for example - I have about a 10-12 mile commute, round trip. If I did nothing else than my commute, for three consecutive days, I would likely only need to charge the battery again at the end of the third day, after 36 miles of driving. If there are a few thousand like me out there with very short commutes, I think the impact of those users would be small on the grid.
For us to get to 100,000 plugin drivers is most assuredly many years away. One would hope that battery storage capacity would increase at a faster rate than the additional grid burden.
