Word, Excel, Acrobat Reader, Photoshop, Powerpoint… The computer programs you depend on are filled with bloat: unused features that hog your hard disk, crowd the CPU and drain your laptop’s battery– without adding to the action on the screen. Ditto SUVs. They are extraordinarily capable vehicles whose unused features guzzle gas, add weight and drain oil from the ground. In both cases, slimming down has few downsides– save the psychological. And therein lies the tale.
Just as there’s a cadre of computer users who know how to pip a file in CP/M, there’s a small slice of SUV/CUV/pickup owners who use their vehicles to their fullest. Clearly, obviously, most don’t. Instead they defend their vehicular choices by citing seldom-seen scenarios: towing equipment they don’t own, forging through storms they know they’ll avoid, and surviving crashes that have yet to occur.
Thankfully, drivers are wising up. Whether their change of heart’s been stimulated by the rising price of gas or environmental consciousness, they’re figuring out that sitting on several tons of metal to move a couple of humans from points A to B is silly. That’s why they’re looking for alternatives. Which is also why I’m disappointed with the Tesla Roadster.
In a world crying out for energy efficient transportation solutions, Tesla’s battery-powered sports car is a dead end. The Tesla is a toy that tries to combine the benefits of megapowered supercars with a warm ecofriendly buzz. This does not compute. The future of automobiles (self-movers) is energy-lean and speed-restrictive.
To perform adequately, all current electric vehicles (EVs) rely upon a light-weight frame. By using a featherweight Lotus as a donor and reducing its heft with carbon fiber, the Tesla Roadster attempts to maximize speed, acceleration and range. Even with no luggage or extra passenger space, it still illustrates the old saying, ”Fast, good and cheap. You can’t have all three.”
At the same time, the Roadster’s mass x velocity function makes the EV a pretty dangerous place to be should you experience sudden, involuntary deceleration (think early 1960s Formula 1 racer). Yes, Tesla is trying to work around those "challenges.” But the end result won’t change: a ludicrously expensive (if fast) EV with serious range and safety issues.
Maybe the work on the Tesla Roadster can create spin-off benefits for more energy efficient EVs. Tesla is already shopping their batteries around to other EV manufacturers (probably looking to share their high development costs). If that makes you think the future is filled with EVs zipping around silently at Roadster speeds, you can banish the thought.
There are far better ways of using stored energy than driving Hell for leather in a lithium-ion equipped Tesla Roadster powered by a consumer electric grid.
The other day the French pushed a TGV (a.k.a. bullet train) to 574 km/h (357 mph). I heard the news about the French train speed record while automobiling (self-moving) behind a tram. A poster on the rear of the tram said ”I can replace 1.5 km of cars.” We can fight for unrestricted travel as much as we want, but our assumed right to be part of that 1.5 km long line is about to be seriously restricted.
If nothing else, global warming is a political reality. Most automobile companies realize that the legislative move to reduce cars’ carbon footprint will have– is already having– a dramatic impact on what we drive, how we drive, and where we will be allowed to drive it. As the French prepare to cover Europe with TGVs, and the European Union considers legislation imposing mandatory carbon offsets for air travelers, it’s naive to believe that cars will continue to represent untrammeled freedom.
A period is coming where self-moving will again be considered a privilege, not a right. Where the cost of self-moving will have to be paid for on the spot, as a function of energy efficiency and estimated long term environmental impact. Available energy will be channeled to where it will deliver the most work per unit. You’ll be charged accordingly for less efficient energy use.
In other words, the days when you paid Southwest Airlines or Ryan Air prices to move will soon be a thing of the past. Which only makes sense. The party's over. We’re running out of oil. Both society and the individuals enjoying its protection must wake up to the throbbing skull reality of this situation, and face a new dawn.
Despite California Governor Schwarzenegger's pronouncement that "We don't have to take away the Hummers or the SUVs or anything like this," there is no Tesla-like cake-and-eat-it-too solution. Developing technology won't let you drive a fundamentally inefficient vehicle the same way you do now using alternative propulsion. Everyone in the energy food chain– from energy producers to daily commuters– must take on the challenge of using energy with the skill of rocket scientists, accounting for every calorie. The end result will be spectacular, and effective.
I already drive an Xb what more do you want from me? However thats by my choice. Government shouldn’t impose choices. 3 dollar gas does that naturally
Heh, I guess I’m in the vanishingly small overlap of people who can both pip a file in CP/M and use my SUV to the fullest.
I’m sure some people have wised up about driving an SUV for everyday transportation, but there’s little evidence they’re ready for a speed restrictive future.
troonbop: I think the assertion is that lower speeds will be a natural consequence of more efficient vehicles. Or something.
embrace the new reality – it is our salvation.
The Tesla is a toy – woah, you heard it here first. Oh, no, wait, you didn’t. You actually heard it first from every Tesla press release ever. Of course the Roadster is a toy, and Tesla have presented it as such from day one. They’re entering the market at a low volume, high margin price point. This allows them to refine the technology and get it ready for “prime time.”
Agree with TheChaz,
The fundamental flaw of this article is that it compares/contrasts the Tesla with mass transport. This is not the market for the Tesla, it is not the car of the future for everyone, or even 1% of the population. It is a unique automobile serving a very niche market.
We may ditch our SUVs, we may yet really start using public transport and this equation is not changed at all with the advent of the Tesla, and I don’t think the builders of the roadster think otherwise.
It does appear that the Tesla is meant to prime the pump for other electric cars. Once these arrive on the scene we can better discuss the merits of these vehicles becoming a key component of wise energy policy.
Which shibboleth do I start with? About the streetcar that replaces "1.5 km of cars." That fact that you were stuck in traffic behind it says something. That fact that in France, loving of trains and mass transit and everything urban-social-virtuous France, that they have to have a bumper sticker on the streetcar rubbing the noses of drivers stuck behind the streetcar in it about how virtuous the streetcar happens to be tells you something. Maybe it tells you that people in France are just like you and me (What are we, Americans? I recently had an unctuous person from Canada lecturing me with some phony numbers about the virtue of transit call me an "USian." We may have other-than-American visitors to TTAC, but I think it safe to say we share a love of cars, and I don't think there are any gearheads who call people "USians."). Why are people piling on the Tesla Roadster? Part of the love of cars is loving diversity. I like big cars, small cars, fast cars, underpowered cars, frugal cars, luxury cars. If my wife didn't put limits on this sort of thing, I would own all kinds of cars for different moods and purposes. I see a Tesla roadster as filling a certain purpose and market niche, and the neat thing about it they are going for an electric car that is cool rather than an electric car that is wheat bran squares. Sure, they may only sell one to Mary Steenbergen and maybe another to Burt Rutan, and maybe Jay Leno will pick one up to round out his collection, but is there anything wrong with a boutique car? The one thing about the Tesla Roadster is that they are claiming to have a battery that can store 50 kWHr and last at least 100,000 miles. That is a big deal if it works out because the EV-1 battery held only about 10 kWHr and was good for about 30,000 miles or less. As to the range thing, 200 miles is the magic number because that means I can get out to Dad's place, the trips out there accounts for about 2/3's the driving I do. 50-100 mile range would restrict the vehicle to within town, but 200 mile range would let me get most places in the state.
I think everyone who regularly visits here understands the Tesla roadster is not meant to be a replacement commuter car. I always understood that it was primarily a way for Tesla motors to generate revenue to continue development of more "mainstream" vehicles. And, even as a commuter, if I could afford the price tag, I would buy one; my commute is less thatn 20 miles each way and that includes car pooling with my wife.
Party pooper! Seriously, check out "hypercar" at rmi.org.
First, we are not running out of oil. We, however are probably running out of cheap oil. We are definitely running out of politicians/voters who are interested in finding/refining oil, especially here in the US. So get used to high priced gasoline.
It is nice to know that personal transportation and single family residences will once again be privileges of the rich, and everybody else can cram themselves into the urban 600′ sq. apartments and take mass transit like they are supposed to. Think Moscow circa 1972.
I have resigned myself to the fact that my favorite vices, cigars, beer, and the internal combustion engine (not usually all at the same time, at least not with other folks around), are all items my betters want to rid me of. Hopefully, I can keep my bad grammar.
Whether global warming caused by human activity is a scientific reality or not, I think being efficient is an excellent reason to reduce consumption.
If you need a diesel-powered truck to tow/haul (for work primarily) then by all means, one should be allowed to obtain one without a penalty. If you want a vehicle that clearly exceeds your daily needs (ie. large SUV, sports car or really a V8/V10/V12 anything) then there should be a premium paid for such luxury.
That being said, people should still be given the right to choose what they drive. Last I checked, the people who make up our governments (and many in the scientific community) are smart but are no smarter than the rest of us… and just as arrogant.
Conservation of finite resources is a good thing, no matter what you think of the global warming debate.
There’s no real shortage of oil at current prices, although it would take a while to build up production to replace the Middle Eastern bubblin’ crude.
There’s no real shortage of electrical generating capacity, now or in the foreseeable future, although it would take a while to build power plants.
There’s a real shortage of will in the West, where ‘progressives’ have made ‘progress’ a dirty word, and business eschews R&D in favour of legal and accounting games. Tesla may fail, but at least they act like they and we have a future.
My bad if my positive position on EVs isn’t clear. I think we’re headed for an EV/Plug-In Hybrid future and I’m convinced that doesn’t have to be a bad thing.
But the Tesla busts through the energy efficiency envelope in a manner that does not help us any if the ultimate goal is to conserve energy and reduce carbon emissions. The energy you put into the Tesla has to come from somewhere, and if you’re not in one of the few countries that can cover its energy needs with hydroelectric (or like Iceland with Geothermoelectric power), the Tesla’s willingness to slap on acceleration isn’t helping any.
I have two cars. My fun car has a speedometer that runs from 0-260 km/h. Top legal speed in the country where I do most of my driving is 90 km/h. I won’t say where I’ve had it well over 200 km/h, but I have.
However, there are tradeoffs to that kind of speed, from an energy efficiency viewpoint: the power required to overcome air resistance and other friction factors rises dramatically with speed.
The speedometer on that car reaches 90 at the 9 O’Clock position, 175 at 12, and 260 at 5 O’Clock.
The sad truth is that all that fun over 90 is soon going to be decoration, something of which I’m convinced, as governments mandate restrictions on the performance of vehicles. The movement towards this is no longer just a snowball rolling down the hill, it’s an avalanche building.
How about we also curl up and die, since this way we’ll not waste ANY energy?… Seriously, a big war is the easiest, most natural solution to this problem. Only as human beings we (sometimes) try to stand up to the challenge and, as you say, “have our cake and eat it, too”.
Tesla Roadster is as much of a “dead-end” as a 911. Sure, you won’t see millions drive them to work, but those who can afford them will have them. Just remember that those people will accelerate the coming of all-electric Corollas, and you’ll suddenly feel better about Tesla.
As for energy efficiency, we will always use as much energy as we can afford. Sure, oil is gonna run out in a hundred years or so. Just in time to be replaced by thermonuclear power plants and solar panels on a massive scale.
And I’ll be damned if I’ll not be driving a car with a 1.5 megawatt motor by then. At each of the 6 wheels.
All we need now is a convenient power storage system that is durable, reliable, efficient and spacious. Li-ion is a good first step, so I suggest we use it, instead of sitting on our collective posteriors, waiting for a miracle technology.
Damn! I have become Cassandra, holding out for the worst. But there are certain realities we have to face.
Here’s an interesting reality.
Going by known reserves of essential materials/resources, and with today’s production levels (not with hundreds of millions of suddenly wealthy Chinese and Indians factored in), we have:
28 years’ worth of copper in the ground, another 21 years’ worth of lead, a 17 year supply of silver, and 37 years’ worth of tin. There’s already a shortage of industrial grade silicon that has Silicon Valley spooked (as Fast Company puts it – “Moore’s Law never assumed we’d run out of sand.”)
(Figures from International Inst. for Environment and Development).
It’s time to think smarter.
Here’s what I think will happen.
1. For near transportation, feet, bicycles and Segway like solutions rule the roost.
2. For “private perimeter” transportation, EVs and Hybrids (plug-in particularly) will become very popular.
3. For transportation between such private perimeters, we’ll either use larger collective transportation solutions, or we’ll see private perimeter vehicles that can be put on board larger transit trains (or hooked together), to increase energy efficiency.
4. You’ll have to be very rich, or extremely privileged, to move in anything that breaks the optimal energy efficiency envelope. And this is what the Tesla does, it busts right through that boundary and into energy profligacy.
Timeline: 15-20 years maximum.
Alternative energy sources? Sure, we’ll see those coming as fast as we can count them, but nothing that will allow us to throw gasoline on the fire in the manner in which we have been doing.
If you build a house that generates more energy than you consume (there are many such houses already) you can put the excess into your Tesla Roadster instead of selling it back to the grid. Then you can eat your cake and have it, too!
CSJohnston “If you want a vehicle that clearly exceeds your daily needs (ie. large SUV, sports car or really a V8/V10/V12 anything) then there should be a premium paid for such luxury.”
Here is the problem with that line of reasoning. Right now there people (mainly in Detroit) who believe that I should be taxed maybe an additional 3 thousand dollars for the privilege of driving my Scion. This is because they disapprove of what I drive and they believe for the common good that a tariff should be imposed on imported cars. Strangely those people want tariffs on Toyotas even if they are made the US. It is a slippery slope to go down the path of taxing people based on what one perceives to be for the common good because we don’t all agree on the definition of what is the common good. America is free and a great country not because we allow other people the freedom to do what we agree is good but because we allow people the freedom to do what they consider good even if we don’t consider their actions good.
By the way, my mother spent a couple days in deep depression in her childhood years after she learned that the sun is about half-way through its “fuel”, and there are only a few billion years left of it.
She got over it.
Brooklyn doesn’t expand. Enjoy it while we’re here :)
I’m pretty sure that we’re gonna see some creative uses for excess energy when we’ll get to the mature age of fusion power. Think personal electric aircraft for every american family. With VTOL capability and supersonic fan drives. And a living room section with pool table and a shower.
I can already imagine an F23 in state-trooper gold’n’brown lighting up its siren behind me. “Sir, my AWACS clocked you at 1500 mph going over Kansas City, where supersonic speeds are prohibited…”
Only trouble is that I’m gonna be 50-60 by then.
The bulk worlds energy problems are political and psychological not technical – most of the technology already exists. The problem is one of cooperation. While it would be nice if the US was energy independent by using less, this will not solve the worlds pollution problems. China’s economic growth is limited by its supply of energy and every gallon the US doesn’t burn China will (and with less tailpipe restrictions). It is only once the alternative means of transportation makes economic sense that they will become more than a political fashion statement. While gas is cheaper than bottled mineral water people will use it without regard for the consequences. Once gas hits $5-6/gal then electric commuter cars will be all the rage and manufacturers will be happy to meet their demand but until then I don’t hold out much hope. In short – the long term interests of the human race is no match for short term wants of individuals.
As for any doomsday scenarios – I have heard a lot of those since the 70s when they also promised us we’d run out of copper and oil and as it happens the invention of satellites caused copper demand to tank and oil companies found more oil. Remember, mining companies do not go prospecting for posterity – they only look for what they need in the next few years.
As far as the assertion goes that folks buy SUV “for accidents that have yet to occur” – I recently got hit by someone doing 40MPH while driving a Mini Cooper and my physiotherapist agrees with me that maybe a Suburban would have been a better choice ;-)
From http://www.env-econ.net/2005/09/the_simonehrlic.html
“So, both of Simon’s hypotheses were confirmed: (i) human ingenuity can overcome the effects of increasing demand; and (ii) that ingenuity will take time to manifest itself.”
So continue with the sky-is-falling doomsday BS. Meanwhile, intelligent, enterprising, and rational people will be figuring out how to prevent your fears from becoming reality and will make bucket-loads of money doing so.
Sherman Lin: The problem with this line of reasoning is that you are equating “common good” with “personal good.”
Buying a V10 truck to commute to and from work might be personally good for me if I have quite a bit of money to burn and I like it’s style.
However, it is almost certainly not in the common good. Many don’t make buying decisions with deference to the common good (that most reasonable people would agree to) but rather the decision is almost entirely made out of what personal good will come out of it. So, charging an additional tax of some sort will help align the personal good with the common good. The key here is that no one is saying that you can’t have your V10, taxes are just insuring that you really need it.
In contrast, charging no additional tax assumes that people will make choices for the common good for entirely altruistic reasons. I don’t think that’s very reasonable to expect, nor very pragmatic.
I’d have to strongly disagree with most of this article. While you may see an expansion (and should) of mass transit it will not replace some form of the automobile. The country is too large and its population too dispersed to allow it. Hell if you can’t take away people’s guns you sure can’t take away their cars.
With improvements in battery technology and solar cells (we need a lot more research here) you will be able to generate your own electricity at your home and sell it back to the grid or power up your car.
The automobile may change but it’s not going away. I stand by my belief that I’ve stated many times in other energy related articles that if we improved our telecommunications and data systems a large percentage of people cold work from home many days of the week thereby realizing a huge reduction in energy usage.
To paraphrase the gun advocates out there: “You’ll get my steering wheel when you pry it from my cold dead hands.”
“A period is coming where self-moving will again be considered a privilege, not a right. Where the cost of self-moving will have to be paid for on the spot, as a function of energy efficiency and estimated long term environmental impact”
I am having a difficult time finding a period in our nation’s history where “self-moving” was a privilege. All I find in both our history and my personal experience is that in this country we have always had to the freedom to commute and move as we see fit.
And no, the sky is not falling. Alternative energy is really starting to ramp up now due to the great ole American Free Market. Wind is growing by leaps and bounds. Solar is starting to take off. Nuclear is showing signs of life if the politicians will get the heck out of the way. Automakers are scrambling to make up for years of missed opportunity to get hybrids/diesels/high mpg vehicles on the roads.
Chill out. Telsa is just another step on the right road. Not everything has to be battery powered Yugo.
I hate to break it to you guys saying that someday in the future we are going to be taxed depending on what we drive, but here in the Great White North we are being taxed (or ‘levied’ as the government puts it) depending on the fuel mileage your car gets. We are also ‘rewarded’ for driving cars which get good mileage. If you want to check it out go here: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/agency/budget/2007/excise-e.html and go here: http://www.tc.gc.ca/programs/environment/ecotransport/ecoauto.htm .
The gist of it is this, very fuel efficient cars getting less than 6.5l/100 km and trucks that get less than 8.3L/100km get between $1000 and $2000 and cars that get terrible mileage (I can’t find the exact number) can get levied up to $4000.
If nothing else, congestion is the on the way to killing cars as our almost exclusive means of daily transportation. Cars have everything against them right now.
“It is nice to know that personal transportation and single family residences will once again be privileges of the rich, and everybody else can cram themselves into the urban 600′ sq. apartments and take mass transit like they are supposed to. Think Moscow circa 1972.”
Think Europe 2007.
It amazes me to what extent people/voters want to ruin their their own lives. Must be a kinda leader-worship thing. Maybe it is people wanting to ruin other peoples lives, a kinda envy/schadenfreude thing.
“We” are not running out of oil. With the current trend of Gov’t taking over energy production/usage, it is a political energy shortage not actual.
CsJohnson wrote: Whether global warming caused by human activity is a scientific reality or not, I think being efficient is an excellent reason to reduce consumption.
I agree with you there. Global warming is a scientific reality allright, but as for it being caused by human activity, that’s far from certain. Perhaps if we think it’s our fault we will try to do something about it. In any case, using less energy in any form to get from A to B is always a good idea.
zoomzit I don’t think we should tax people based on common good grounds. What you think is common good again is different from someone else. I drive an Xb without any prodding or tax. I am cheap and I can see where gas prices are going. I also believe it or not needed more room than my Honda Accord had. I needed to carry lawnmowers, air conditioners etc for some rental houses I own. I chose my Xb because I think it is best for me. I don’t believe anyone should try to impose their values on others through taxation or other means.
Worst article I have read on this site to date.
First, what exactly is foolish about having crash saftey in a car when you haven’t yet been in an accident? Perhaps you think it’s wiser to wait until one happens to you to buy a stronger vehicle?
Next, the automobile as we know it will not be going away too soon in the states. Our voters love their cars, and know the facts are that it costs less for us to drive ourselves rather than take a bus. Mass transit is a loser.
The tragedy about global warming is that the scientists and academics have lost all credibility with the common sense crowd. Their ability to ally with the tax and spend elitists gets cut off every time they get in power long enough to show their stripes.
If someone came up with proof of global warming tomorrow, half the world would not listen.
“28 years’ worth of copper in the ground, another 21 years’ worth of lead, a 17 year supply of silver, and 37 years’ worth of tin.”
There is 125 years of oil in the ground. When there is that much known quantity, people tend to not blow precious capital looking for more. The Vikings were farming Greenland 1000 years ago which means Jesus and Romans drove Hummer H1. Gives whole new meaning to “What would Jesus do”.
doesn’t Japan tax on engine displacement? you know all we do over here is copy them so give a few years and thats where we will be.
Cgraham, the US has had a ‘Gas Guzzler Tax’ since 1978.
If you’re to tax anything, tax the gas. Taxing vehicles depending on what kind of mileage you can EXPECT from them can lead to all sorts of loopholes and cheating.
As in, Corvette gets 28mpg highway but I’m pretty sure that if I were to have one, I’d be getting single-digit MPG’s.
—-
Anyone who says that we MUST be driving econoboxes/taking public transport/generating electricity a la Matrix, should first tell me why they think they understand the true meaning of life. I’ll keep a straightjacket handy, because the greatest philosophers have been cracking their heads at it for centuries, and I’m yet to see an agreement :)
Sherman,
By necessity, governments have to impose some common values on their citizens such as, it’s bad to steal, it’s bad to murder, it’s bad to double park on a busy street during rush hour… Governments impose penalties on these bad activities because it is the interests of most of it’s citizens, that is influencing these activities is for the common good.
Levies on inefficient cars is no different. It is not in common good of US citizens to be overly dependent on foreign oil. I think most people agree to this concept. As such, we should be crafting some sort means to wean ourselves off of this dependence. Levying inefficient cars and applying this revenue to the research of more efficient vehicles is a way to do this.
As an alternative, we could just leave it up to the market. As oil becomes more scarce, prices go up, and people change their purchasing habits.
The problem with this concept is that it assumes that the markets will increase prices in sync with what is best for the good of the country. Historically this idea has not played out well in practice.
I’d argue that we would be in far better condition as a country had we done more to wean ourselves off of gas following the oil crisis of the 70’s. However the cheap gas of the 80’s and 90’s encouraged our vehicles to be MORE inefficient, rather than less exasperating our current condition. In this instance the effect of the markets on oil prices in the 80’s and 90’s produced exactly the wrong actions for it’s citizens. This leads me to conclude that we need another force at work to encourage certain behaviors.
“If you’re to tax anything, tax the gas. Taxing vehicles depending on what kind of mileage you can EXPECT from them can lead to all sorts of loopholes and cheating.”
Totally agree with this statement. I have a relatively efficient car, however, I do drive it 110 miles every work day commuting. Environmentally and politically, better the H1 who drives 5 miles every day than the subaru traveling 110 miles. This should be taxed accordingly and the only way to do this effectively is to tax the gas.
zoomzit:
*PRECISELY*–the gas tax already takes into account those evil, rotten, no-good SUV drivers that simply must be punished *formychild’sfuture*. so those that say we must punish those that choose to buy pickup trucks “unnecessarily”–done and done.
miked: “vanishingly small” does not begin to describe the minority in which you find yourself :) what’s your fleet average these days? 12mpg?
and, yes–global warming is a “political reality.” that is so true i can’t hardly stand it. think about it for a second. say it slowly: political…reality…political…reality…
As an engineer, the first thing I worked on fresh out of school 34 years ago was nuke related. Then it all went away. But if you want your cake and eat it too vis a vis personal transportation, then hydrogen fuel cell powered cars with the hydrogen produced by nukes is the way to go. Produced with any hydrocarbon fueled power plant is not so hot an idea because thermodynamics sez you always put more in than you get out – nukes cheat that a little in a practical (not rigorous) sense. And you get rid of the stupid carbon footprint (non)issue and annoy greenies who have to balance the benefits of fuel cells versus their fear of any kind of nuke anywhere. But then again, if hydrogen fuel cells were to become practical, the greenies would turn on them because they put out the deadliest greenhouse gas of all – water vapor.
In and on itself, mass transit trumps any other form of transportation for fuel-efficiency, even electric cars. The issue, however, besides perceptions and the “need” to scratch your nose while in our car, is that public transport cannot adequately carry everyone from point A to point B, except in dense urban environments.
Suburbs are just too expansive to be covered by mass transit. Even in NJ, trains really only go to New York. If you work elsewhere in the State, you HAVE to take a car.
Solutions: ditch the ‘burbs!! Develop teleporters!!
I’m french and used to be quite socialist, but know have come to accept that it’s impossible to circumvent people’s individual needs. Howver, market evolution combined with government action can steer people in different directions.
Europeans don’t drive small cars only because they are more environmental than Americans, but mostly because gas is so expensive.
Tax gas (think $5/gal), and the era of the SUV is over. People who need them or really want them will still be able to get them, but will pay a proportionately greater cost.
High gas prices would also encourage people to move closer to work, and could prompt the develoment of geographically tighter communities, which would allow for shorter commutes and probably be more energy efficient in and on themselves (think parks rather than individual lawns).
And, best of all, this gas tax could be the perfect solution for replacing the dangerously growing Alternative Minimum Tax.
This article is crap. Show me some proof that the Tesla isn’t any less safe than driving around with a hot engine filled with flamable liquids. Oh wait…you don’t have any. Bah.
have no objections to the Tesla in that it’s the classic example of capitalism at work.
There’s a perceived market desire for a vehicle which allows one to (culturally) sin without social penalty. (Think of Al Gore’s carbon-credits along the same lines – he’s been purchasing indulgences for his carbon sins). Will there be enough of a market for the Tesla to survive? Well, the Hollywood types are particularly driven by the shame of their success, so perhaps they can sell a few thousand. Can’t you see Shaun Penn et al pulling up to the Oscars in a Tesla?
In the long run (a hundred years), however, I don’t think that the environmentally focused religion of Science will maintain its cultural power. Remember a century ago, America was riding a wave of industrialization and MORE was BETTER.
The thought about the world’s poor was that they should have MORE too! Today’s sackcloth attitude that we must give up ours so that the poor can have some won’t last. My prediction? Nuclear power (Perhaps Fusion) will come into vogue and gasoline and gas will be available for our cars.
Wow, I’ve even bored myself.
NickNick, First off, avoid misconstruing my argument. I am in no way saying SUVs or trucks are evil, they certainly aren’t. People who have legitimate needs for these vehicles should purchase them.
Yes, we have a gas tax. Yes, it probably has changed some people’s behaviors, but we as a country still use more gas than is prudent for our national security so we probably do need to increase this tax to drive down consumption.
Listen, this tax is meant to modify behavior (just like a cigarette tax), as a bonus the state makes more money and could conceivably lower your income tax. They are going to get paid one way or another, so why not tax gas and help move our consumption in the right direction?
As for the *formychild’sfuture* shot. Hell yes, I’m thinking of my child’s future, and your future and the country’s future. All of our actions have consequences. Might as well acknowledge that and act accordingly instead of shirking responsibility.
This article sounds as though it was written by a Brussels bureaucrat lusting for yet more government mandates. Sure, the Tesla may not work, but so what if it doesn’t? As long as they are spending their own money to develop it, why should it concern me? In fact whether it works or not, much will be learned that will doubtless benefit us all. I salute the Tesla folks for their courage and wish them the best of luck.
Stein X Leikanger:
April 13th, 2007 at 1:36 pm
My bad if my positive position on EVs isn’t clear. I think we’re headed for an EV/Plug-In Hybrid future and I’m convinced that doesn’t have to be a bad thing.
But the Tesla busts through the energy efficiency envelope in a manner that does not help us any if the ultimate goal is to conserve energy and reduce carbon emissions. The energy you put into the Tesla has to come from somewhere, and if you’re not in one of the few countries that can cover its energy needs with hydroelectric (or like Iceland with Geothermoelectric power), the Tesla’s willingness to slap on acceleration isn’t helping any.
Add wind to the mx. A new type of battery storage (not relevant to cars, alas) is going to make wind much more versatile and economical.
Landcrusher: Next, the automobile as we know it will not be going away too soon in the states. Our voters love their cars, and know the facts are that it costs less for us to drive ourselves rather than take a bus. Mass transit is a loser.
The evidence for this is that even in places where you can practically walk as fast as you can drive, people insist on driving. The driving has to be pretty bad and/or the masstransit unusually good (think NYC, London, Paris) before people abandon the first for the second.
Landcusher: The tragedy about global warming is that the scientists and academics have lost all credibility with the common sense crowd. Their ability to ally with the tax and spend elitists gets cut off every time they get in power long enough to show their stripes.
I don’t know who you mean by the “common sense crowd,” but one of the problems is that there are a lot of people with bullhorns (Bill O’Reilly, et al) who don’t look at the evidence, and there’s a lot of money (ExxonMobil for one) that is working to convince people there’s not a problem.
Hmmmm…..
http://dailytech.com/Nissan+and+NEC+to+Bring+Lithium+Ion+Hybrids+in+2009/article6910.htm
Luther, there was an article today about Lithium-ion batteries in the Wall Street Journal. The gist of the article stated that GM wants more government spending on how to make these batteries work for autos. GM said in the article that Japan has better tech in this regard, but they don’t want to share it so GM need the Government to help it catch up.
@Landcrusher
You write: First, what exactly is foolish about having crash saftey in a car when you haven’t yet been in an accident? Perhaps you think it’s wiser to wait until one happens to you to buy a stronger vehicle?
You’re referring to: Instead they defend their vehicular choices by citing seldom-seen scenarios: towing equipment they don’t own, forging through storms they know they’ll avoid, and surviving crashes that have yet to occur.
Before an edit to the text, this was written as: Most of us are driving factors of car way in excess of what we need. We defend this with the quaint excuses that we have to haul the b(l)oat and be able to pile-drive any car we crash into.
I should have caught the change in meaning that my editor introduced. :-)
Greetings,
Your Brussels Bureaucrat!
As to bureaucracy. I’m actually very optimistic about the kind of vehicles that will be developed in response to the energy and resource crunches we are facing and need to tackle.
The fact that we may be moving slower doesn’t mean there won’t be a kick to be had from the experience. Whether we should call it Brussels bureaucracy or not is up for discussion, but when Germans are discussing introducing speed limits on their Autobahns it means change is coming.
Alex Rashev: I’m pretty sure that we’re gonna see some creative uses for excess energy when we’ll get to the mature age of fusion power. Think personal electric aircraft for every american family. With VTOL capability and supersonic fan drives. And a living room section with pool table and a shower.
One of my professors, now head of the American Association for the ADvancement of Science, got a PhD in nuclear fusion in the late ’60s because he had the same hope for it. It did not take him long to realize that fusion wasn’t going anywhere. And the light at the end of the tunnel is no closer now than it was when he got his PhD.
He-he.
That should be fun, millions of fusion reactors zipping about on the roads.
Oil and gas was nature’s way of capturing the sun’s energy through biomass and process. We will have to find an alternative source of effective propulsion.
I’m quite encouraged by the advances in storing hydrogen inside metal molecule lattice structures. It turns to be a very efficient way of storing great amounts of hydrogen without the dangers of pressurisation.
zoomzit:
yes, after rereading your prior post, it looks like i bent it the wrong way–i was skimming and i just picked up on the gas tax thing. i didn’t mean to imply that you were saying that SUVs are evil. i was trying to refute the whole SUVs are evil/carbon conciousness business, and i was using your mention of the gas tax to do it. sorry for the confusion. i do think that if there is to be any taxes at all, they should be usage taxes, and the gas tax is a great example of one.
toll roads would be another.
one that i hate is property tax–why are residents’ property taxes used to offset the tax breaks given to strip malls to “create jobs?” make the malls pay taxes, and have the shoppers pick up the tab.
as for the *formychild’sfuture* comment–i wasn’t directing that at you as a cheap shot. i use that or *won’tsomebodythinkofthechildren* when i feel that environmentalists or safety crusaders misdirect their efforts. as was stated above, water vapor has a far greater insulating effect than carbon, yet the environmentalists are just aching for hydrogen power. there is no CAUSAL relationship shown between carbon dioxide and global warming. there may be evidence of the contrary–CO2 is *less* soluble in water as temperature increases. if the sun is heating the earth and the ocean, CO2 will be released from the water. there will be a definite correlation between temperature and CO2 concentration, but there is no proof of a causal relationship. anyway, i’m sidetracked–the whole CO2 business pales in comparison to clean drinking water crises looming. get the trash out of the rivers and get clean water to the poor and we’ll really have something. anyone that cries out for our children had better fight for water before they start fighting us for gasoline.
it is sometimes difficult to properly voice opinions in print (as opposed to a one-on-one conversation)–so, zoomzit, i apologize for the tone of my previous post.
One thing that worries me about technological breakthroughs for efficient cars in the future is cost. It seems that there are always articles in Popular Science or USA Today touting lightweight and other advanced materials for the car of tomorrow. Yes, if you build a Camry out of carbon fiber and titanium, it may get 60mpg, but it will cost a fortune. The usual defense is that mass production will bring costs down. Let’s look at mass produced bicycles:
Huffy (Yugo or Chery): $69, 45lbs
Entry level Trek or Cannondale (Ford or Chevy): $279, 30lbs
Nice Trek/Cannondale (Lexus): $749, 25lbs
Entry level race bike (Z06): $2499, 19lbs
Carbon/Aluminum wonderbike (Enzo): $5499, 16lbs
People will line up to buy a superlight Camry like they’ll buy a superlight bicycle. Steel is as much a part of today’s future as it was in 1850.
OK, so increase the gas tax, say a dime a month up to $5/gallon. But instead of using that money for wars and to prop up social security spend 1/3rd on offshore wind turbines, 1/3rd on solar installations & research, and 1/3rd on research for battery tech. Don’t give the money to govt departments, but to US businesses that go thru a grant process.
End result is a huge advantage for the US in these departments, really clean air, and no more dependancy on foreign oil.
Or we could have just spent the Iraq war billions on this and avoided the impossible to get approved tax I just proposed.
The editorial slams Tesla for focusing on speed rather than efficiency, but I don’t think they have much choice. Their first vehicle has to be small because the battery technology will not be able to cope with a larger/heavier car. The production numbers will be small because they’re a small company, so the vehicle will be expensive. Nobody is going to pay $100k for an electric Chevy Aveo, so it has to be competitive with other cars in that price range (911/XK8 et al) in looks/performance/style.
I applaud Tesla for trying and not just bleating like some bullied schoolgirls to the government like the Big 3 have done. Every innovator (Ford, the Wright brothers) was probably told they were crazy to even try, but even if they fail I hope someone else picks up the baton as says “if only they’d done it like …” until someone succeeds.
Pure and simple, the tesla is a halo car. If nothing else, it says to all those guys who loved their old camaro that new technology does not mean death for the car nut. In the same way a camaro, mustang, 350z, etc increase foot traffic and people end up buying reasonable cars, the tesla will lead to more people paying attention to electrics and buying and electric civic, corolla, etc in the future.
Nicknick: water vapor has a far greater insulating effect than carbon, yet the environmentalists are just aching for hydrogen power
I wondered about that myself. Turns out considerably more water vapor is given off by internal combustion of hydrocarbons than would be given off by using hydrogen.
Re NickNick’s recent post extrapolating on light weight v price on cars from bicycles:
Price, particularly of items that are not at all necessities, such as carbon fiber bicycles, are determined by what the market will bear rather than by the cost of production. (This accounts as well for the far higher profits on luxo SUVs than econoboxes).
Right now, the cost of producing carbon fiber bodies for cars is prohibitive but research and mass marketing (and gov’t mandates for gas mileage, if they get high enough) will bring it down to garden variety levels.
“We’re running out of oil…”
Uh…No.
We went through this in the 1970s, when Paul Ehrlich and others like him predicted the same and more. All industrial commodities would become scarce and expensive. We’d be living in the dark, freezing in a new Ice Age in 30 years.
Wrong. Every important commodity declined in price in real terms and became more plentiful, including oil. That new ice age? Hmm….
Several weeks ago, the LA Times reported that new steam injection techniques are restoring some old and presumed-spent oil wells to upwards of 80% prior peak production.
Around a trillion barrels of oil have been pumped out of the planet to date, since oil first spewed from the Drake well in Pennsylvania in 1859. Daniel Yergin, who has gotten oil supply projections consistently right for the past 35 years, estimates that current known reserves are 4.8 trillion barrels, and if history is any guide, even more will be found.
We’re not running out of oil in your lifetime. We might choose to switch to something next in fuels, before we need to, for other reasons. We do need more refining capacity. Yes, China and India will compete for the available supply in any given year, driving up prices somewhat. And yes, oil isn’t fairly spread around the planet. A lot of it is in the hands of treacherous and difficult governments.
I do, however, agree with you about the Tesla Roadster being a dead-end. Heck, it isn’t even remotely beautiful, sexy or brutal. Just bleh. But the company has been open about the sports car being an idea marketing vehicle and a revenue-producing development platform. Safety-compromised, it will attract enough buyers with trend egos and more money than sense, as all edgy technologies require from early adopters. The point is to prove to the market that an EV doesn’t have to be ponderous, slow, boring and short of useful range. We’ll see. So far, every EV has performed in the real world well below the claims made for it.
The US is a 3.5 million square mile country that will have 400 million people flung around the continent by the end of this century — still a density well below most other countries. Private transport — “self-moving” as you call it — is embedded in our culture both of necessity and the fact that it supports personal freedom. We’ll just make it progressively more efficient and cleaner. Don’t get me started on the anthropogenic climate change myth….
Phil
NickNick,
No problem. Reading over my reply, I realize it was a wee bit highstrung. As you say it’s hard to convey emotion via text.
I personally feel that Tesla has a decent chance of being profitable for the company. Any mass market vehicle after that would definitely be a stretch. Anyone have a sense of the market viability of the M5 fighter sedan that Teslas talking about for their next project?
Thanks, 213Cobra, for demolishing that “we’re running out of oil” meme and your other sound observations. Oil will very likely get more expensive, for various reasons, but we’ll never run out.
Apparently, many people don’t understand that estimates of oil reserves are based on the economics of extracting oil. That is, if the market value of oil increases, there will be new reserves that were known but not recognized as economically-recoverable until the price got high enough. Such “newly-defined” reserves don’t even require drilling more holes in the ground.
Although the Tesla is a toy, at least someone is making an attempt at producing an electric car. Not every technological advancement starts out as a practical, safe, and efficient product. Hopefully some of the lessons learned by Tesla (and the Chevy Volt for that matter) will eventually make their way into the main stream. In the mean time someone needs to be plugging away at the concept. It’s way to early in the game to criticize any idea or design – or to predict the future of personal transportation.
Stein, thanks for the article.
Whether you believe in anthropogenic GW or not, peak oil is the elephant in the room that nobody wants to acknowledge.
The Cheney sentiment that the American way of life is “non-negotiable” is in for a rude awakening when, in the face of increasing global demand, we realize that every year will bring less oil than the year before.
The future for the IC-engine powered automobile is bleak, as is the future of car-dependant suburbs. It is time to support politicians that take the unpopular stances in favor of increased consumption (read gas) taxes and promotion of cheaper mass-transit. Gas will get very expensive in 10-15 years — if it gets a lot more expensive in the next two we might reduce consumption enough (and plow enough revenue into alternatives) to have a chance at a function society.
I would rather have $5/gal gas than restricted speeds. My motorcycle still gets pretty good mileage at insane speeds!
It’s scary to hear applause for burdensome measures “for the common good” and politicians who’ll “take unpopular stances.” We need more faith in market-oriented solutions, and more wariness about bureaucratic rent-seeking. Indeed, the market is already responding to greater consumer interest in fuel efficiency, and will continue to do so–probably at a faster pace.
Our system works wonderfully when we heed the Founders, who understood it’s about Life, Liberty and the [individual’s own] Pursuit of Happiness.
“Our system works wonderfully when we heed the Founders, who understood it’s about Life, Liberty and the [individual’s own] Pursuit of Happiness.”
Our founding fathers also knew that there needed to be law and order so that one individual’s pursuit of personal happiness would not endanger the good of many. That is, our democracy works because we have laws that protect the common good.
Market force will indeed promote certain actions. However, the forces of the market does not necessarily equate to what we ought to do, or what is in our (common or individual) best interest.
@213 & 50merc
We are, in fact, running out of oil. Both the cheap and the expensive kind. Yes, as the price of oil increases, it will be viable to install pumps to get oil in deep reservoirs out, to clean oil contaminated by salt water and other minerals, to extract shale oil and even to build behemoth rigs that can weather Arctic and Antarctic ocean storm conditions.
That simply means that our present “I’ll just hop in the car” mentality will change apace with this development. And it is this I mean by the future of “self-moving” (auto — mobile) being up for reconsideration.
The fact that we are having to consider expensive oil alternatives also brings another point home: oil is a source for myriad other compounds, plastics, composites, paints, insulating materials, explosives, lubricants, etc., etc., etc.
What will substitute for those products once we’ve run available, less expensive petroleum through our IC engines? With our dependency on electronics, for instance, it’s pretty obvious that we’d like to keep insulating wires for quite a while yet.
As you’ll see in my next article in this series, smart investors are seeing the future without politics or wishful thinking confusing the issue.
@ “Let market forces find a solution.”
That is precisely what is going to happen, and is why EVs are returning to the scene, just years after the majors dumped them as uneconomical and irrelevant; and why hybrids are the most popular cars out there.
I think we’ll see a healthy interplay of popular pressure, market forces, ingenuity and bureaucracy driving the solutions we require. The same interplay that gave us cars that are a lot safer than they were just a few years ago.
Stein,
Nearly 5 trillion barrels of oil identifiable and recoverable at various costs does not translate to “we are in fact running out of oil.” Historically, whenever fuels have grown scarce, new sources have been found. For example, when England was deforested, there was a shift to coal. As oil and gas came online, they found appropriate places in the mix alongside coal. We have the option of sensibly embracing nuclear power in fixed uses to extend portable energy for transportation. Aside from the large oil reserves identifiable, we have vast coal reserves under our direct control in the US, which can be converted into liquid, gas or used in native solid form. We’re going to get much better at using coal responsibly. And we have loads of unexploited wind, wave and solar energy to recover.
Markets have historically been excellent allocators of resources to demand, and instigators of replacements for anything growing scarce. Within this century, we will see global population peak and then decline, due to increasing wealth and the practices it instigates. We will see the mix of energy sources grow more diverse with portable sources preserved for mobility. There is nothing in human history that supports the gloomy pessimism of intractable crisis, and any geophysical precedent indicates sources of disruption far beyond human cause.
Fuel will get more expensive in real terms from time to time, but as we saw from 1981 – 2000, it can also get cheaper despite conventional wisdom to the contrary. Every prediction of a one-way escalation in real cost to consumers has not been sustained. If we really were in the endgame for oil, that could be different, but with 5X more oil identifiable than has been pumped out of the planet to date, an endgame is not to be, anytime soon.
Now, there are good reasons to use less energy per person that have nothing to do with oil supply or false alarm about anthropogenic climate change. We have lots of room for improving efficiency without giving up “self-moving” transport. My first new car weighed 1750 lbs. and got 38 mpg at 70mph on a steady freeway drive, in the 1970s. I can get back to that if I choose to.
Regardless what class of vehicle someone drives today, their next replacement will be more efficient. Even a new Escalade is both more powerful and a bit more efficient than the model it replaced. The tide turns without all the hysteria. Resist the panic and the social engineering, and watch the market work.
Transportation is only a piece. What’s your whole environmental footprint? Do I give up personal transport so some people can live in a 15,000 square foot house? No. In the long run, the problem everyone worries about takes care of itself. Wealth drives down population growth. Innovation drives up and diversifies supply of food, materials, energy. It will be that way until the big headlight in the sky swells to burn us to a crisp and then collapses into a dwarf. We have plenty of time to get off this rock in the meantime.
Phil
Stein,
“..and why hybrids are the most popular cars out there..”
Uh…not even close. Pickup trucks alone outsell all hybrids by more than 10:1. Add SUVs, Camry’s, Accords, Impalas, etc. and hybrids fade. Moreover, funny that Toyota has been running incentives / Cash-Back on Prius this year.
According to the LA Times today:
“In the first three months of the year, sales jumped 91% compared with the same period of 2006, to 59,613, according to research firm AutoData Inc. In March, year-over-year sales of the segment-leading Toyota Prius climbed 142% to 19,156.”
In a 16+ million units per year vehicle market, you can see this sales performance is far short of “the most popular vehicles out there.”
And for all the EV dreamers out there, if you got your wish for an EV fleet in the US, you’d be transferring your pollution to someone else near power plants, plus creating a new environmental problem in the massive toxic battery disposal burden resulting. There is no free solution, but there can be balanced ones that don’t empower bureaucrats and enable carbon dictatorships propped up by demagoguery.
Phil
@Phil (213Cobra)
Popularity of hybrids.
I was wondering how long to make that posting, as I took a few things for granted. If you go by number of days people are willing to wait for a vehicle, number of days a vehicle spends from time of manufacture to sale, and proportional increase in volume of vehicles sold — then hybrids are clearly the most popular choice out there; and that’s why most carmakers are now including the technology in their line-up, after initially opposing them.
If you go by type of car sold, overall, then your rankings are valid. However, as my editorial is about the watershed change about to overtake the automobile industry, I made the assumption that it was the implications of this change we were discussing.
A clarification on my disappointment with the Tesla Roadster.
The drag coefficient affecting a vehicle relates to its velocity in a very counterproductive manner. Drag varies as the square of velocity, and the power needed to overcome it is relative to the cube of said velocity.
If the point of moving to EVs is to conserve energy, and to clean up how we use it, then creating very fast EVs isn’t the best solution.
Tesla reaches for Green Cred while offering a non-Green solution. If they just stop touting their Green credentials and present their car as an alternative propulsion, fast toy, then go ahead. But they are touting their environmental friendliness and expecting EV vehicle right of way statutes to cover them.
@213Cobra – availability of oil.
There is a lot of discussion back and forth on what reserves are available. And then there are facts “on the ground”. Last year, Saudi oil production fell by 9%, in spite of the Saudis stating they were going to cover any slack in production — this was coupled with serious indications that Saudi oil reserves have been significantly overstated.
Two good books on this, covering each side of the debate, are reviewed in this link:
http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,2055772,00.html
Cars are equivalent to freedom. Without a car, I will suffocate like a non-moving shark. Without cars, we’re not shopping anymore, not working outside of urban areas, not skiing, not fishing, not surfing, not doing most of the western life style quality activities. As usual, when it comes to technical-logical-logistical questions, our politicians seems totally clueless. First, to save energy, look at the waste. A small diesel car consumes one tenth of the fuel of a commuter diesel bus. If there’s more than forty passengers is the bus it’s OK, but most of the buses I see runs 10-15 passengers. With the car, you save time and can take more baggage. And the car have a particulate filter. The (dis)comfort? About equal. And why do we heat/cool our homes and offices when we are not there? Answer: they are made of stone. If made of Styrofoam, rooms will heat or cool in minutes, comparable to the short discomfort when entering a hot or cold car. No one would run the car engine during the day in the office, right? And by the way – who’s gonna supply the energy for all the battery cars? More nuclear power plants, or personal wind mills?
Stein,
Yeah, Saudi production fell last year, but that is unrelated to the planet’s identifiable reserves, only to how much has been invested in recovery in established wells, and in new exploration in Saudi Arabia. Yergin has reliably estimated reserves for decades, and his figures (which are not the most optimistic) say peak oil is well in front of us. The other factors that will diversify the energy supply, in addition to further discovery, will likely extend that. I’m not worried about running out of oil and you shouldn’t be either. If you want to burn less for other good reasons, and advocate the same behavior in others, go right ahead. Just don’t clamor for legislation because you fear peak oil is behind us.
Popularity is not velocity of change in demand. The most common definition is “widely liked or appreciated.” If hybrids are widely liked or appreciated, many other vehicles are much more widely liked, by evidence of demand. CHANGE in demand might be a trend, but then again it might not. Right now, Toyota is paying people to elevate demand, through discounts, incentives and cash back schemes, just like Chrysler had to do to move K-cars in the ’80s. It might prove to be a clever move, but it’s still a helping hand to their market. Those positive deltas for Q1 hybrid sales cited by the LA Times come relative to flattened demand as tax incentives and carpool stickers petered out. So Toyota stepped in with direct incentives. Turns out to be a subsidized market at current prices after all.
Hybrids are a bridge. They are architecturally inelegant and needlessly complex in parallel form. Serial hybrids (Chevy Volt) are more encouraging — using electric motors for the drivetrain, and a fueled engine to power a generator, with a battery pack as reserve. But they aren’t here yet. And then further progress will either improve power source or the power source will be primary and we’ll get back to a single drivetrain.
Alas, in the hydrogen car everyone is hoping for, hydrogen is just another battery, since the energy needed to extract hydrogen locked up in conventional fuels or in water is large. Perhaps large solar arrays powering mass electrolysis of water to produce hydrogen is as environmentally “free” as portable power sources get, but we’re a long way from that.
Phil
Phil,
Your argument about “discoveries to be made” is not really acceptable. After decades where new oil fields were discovered that exceeded annual consumption, we’ve now had a long stint where new discoveries are seriously below consumption.
Numerous companies have mapped land and ocean with geoseismic and other survey technologies, and there are no big blotches anywhere, barring data that has been kept from the public eye. Many of these companies are private, and their data are not secret. (Interestingly for them, their market cap’s have skyrocketed, as investors estimate that the hunt for small pockets of oil will make captured data valuable).
I have been in Saudi Arabia, in the Shah’s Iran and on North Sea/shore oil installations. The rig market is booming in anticipation of the surge to explore for more oil, in the hope of finding new Ghawar fields, but that oil is going to be expensive, as a combination of exploration costs and skyrocketing demand.
Which means we need to reexamine our dependency upon oil for transportation …
The alternatives are coming fast now. Suzuki just entered into an agreement with Intelligent Energy for a fuel cell powered motorcycle. Shanghai banned IC scooters years ago, there are 1,8 million EV scooters there now …
http://www.intelligent-energy.com/index_article.asp?SecID=15&secondlevel=798&artid=3806
Stein,
CERA has been right time and again, for decades. This release, titled “Peak Oil Theory – ‘World Running Out of Oil Soon’ – Is Faulty; Could Distort Policy & Energy Debate.”
http://www.cera.com/aspx/cda/public1/news/pressReleases/pressReleaseDetails.aspx?CID=8444
And this precedes a more recent uptick in CERA’s estimates.
As Daniel Yergin points out:
“This is the fifth time that the world is said to be running out of oil,” says CERA Chairman Daniel Yergin. “Each time — whether it was the ‘gasoline famine’ at the end of WWI or the ‘permanent shortage’ of the 1970s — technology and the opening of new frontier areas has banished the specter of decline. There’s no reason to think that technology is finished this time.”
Look, I don’t doubt you believe oil is running out, but it’s not anytime soon. If some of the oil to be extracted rises in cost, that’s not the same as “running out.” More to the point, we have a tight spot of our own making, wherein the low price years of the ’90s flattened exploration, and now that prices are up somewhat older wells are being worked with superior extraction practices.
EVs will have their place. We’ll have a mix. But EVs will also bring their own new environmental problems. I think we can all agree that the situation we have today is much better than 110 years ago when a thousand horses were dying a day in New York alone, often taking days to remove them, and massive amounts of horse manure in the streets helped to spread typhoid and other debilitating diseases. The average life span was about 50. No doubt and with no legislation at all, in another 110 years this whole situation will be better still, and there will be oil remaining in the ground for the taking.
Phil
Maybe I’m a little too optimistic, but I don’t think it’s gonna be that bad. I believe that technology will save the day eventually. My best bet for the moment are BTL fuels, but we’ll see.
Another interesting point is a study by the University of Lancaster. They actually compared the energy use of a Volkswagen Passat TDI, a British Inter City train, the French TGV and an Airbus A321-100. And now get this: The Passat had the lowest energy consumption per passenger. Second was the Inter City, third the Airbus (!!!) while the TGV came in last.
If anybody is interested, here’s the link:
http://www.engineering.lancs.ac.uk/research/download/Environmental%20impact.pdf
So you see, if you want to save the planet you better stay where you are…and you better stop eating beef, since the cows on this planet produce more greenhouse gases than all the cars combined, as do humans through their breathing by the way.
zoomzit “By necessity, governments have to impose some common values on their citizens such as, it’s bad to steal, it’s bad to murder, it’s bad to double park on a busy street during rush hour… Governments impose penalties on these bad activities because it is the interests of most of it’s citizens, that is influencing these activities is for the common good.”
Your rights end where mine begins and vica versa. Personal rights are not surrendered to the concept of a greater good. You assume that what you define as the greater good is in fact that.
Let’s see if I understand this. Mrs. B earns $250,000 per year as a lawyer. She buys and drives a Toyota Prius because she can afford it, gets a tax credit and want to save the planet by reducing greenhouse gases. Manuela, her housekeeper, drives a 1985 Chevrolet Impala that gets 11-16 mpg. She could afford this car that she needed to drive to Mrs. B’s house to do her housekeeping job, it only cost her $800 even though it cost her $50 to fill the tank with gas and she only pays $50 per month for insurance. Manuela’s husband is able to keep the car running at a cost of $100 per month in parts and repairs, the labor is his own. Manuela can’t use the bus like she did when she lived in San Antonio because city buses are not allowed to travel the streets in Mrs. B neighborhood. If gas doubled so that it cost Manuela $100 to fill her tank, she would not be in a position to purchase a new car since she is making $1,500 per month and pays $600 in rent, $300 for food, $200 for utilities and the remaining $400 goes to buy clothes, shoes, a meal out on Sunday and a contribution to her church.
There are more Manuela’s than Mrs. Bs. I hope you don’t suggest that taxes should be increased on gas so that more of Mrs. Bs friends will trade in their SUV’s like she did because this is really going to hurt Manuela and her friends. The right thing to do would be to subsidize the sale of a Prius for Manuela and her friends so she could have a fuel efficient car. Of course this would mean the Mrs. B and her friends would have to pay a lot more income tax and you know that Mrs. B’s friends in Washington DC aren’t going to do that.
“After decades where new oil fields were discovered that exceeded annual consumption, we’ve now had a long stint where new discoveries are seriously below consumption.” Years of oil priced in the teens were years when exploration and development were curtailed. Exploration takes huge amounts of walk around money and the stones to spend it. Once you find a decent show, it takes years to plan out and develop a field to get best yield.
Oil is expensive because we are paying for it with dollars that are worth less than half of what they were worth in 1999. Gold closed at about $680/oz yesterday. It was around $275/oz in the late 90s. Watch that price to see where the price of oil will go. The problem is too many dollars floating around. Oil is one of the commodities most sensitive to the value of the dollar.
Last time I looked at the masthead I was still reading The Truth Abotu Cars, not the Truth About Mass Transit, Socialism and Self-Loathing.
If I may poke one large hole in the op-ed piece. What the Tesla brings to the table and likely it’s most important function in life, is mass market acceptance for the EV. If I were a greenie I would be thanking… um… I would be thanking the collective secularism that someone finally produced an EV that didn’t look like a the automotive equivalent of a propellored beanie. If you want your average American to even consider the option of an EV you had better start by rolling in a serious amount of sexy. Or at least remove as much Ed Begley Jr. as possible.
Of course, if the every other car on the road was an EV that would sort of remove the fun for the self-loathing elitist. When does that Tesla go on the market again?
Anyone that will allow these chimerical global impact scenarios to be used as an exculpation of governmental control/regulation of the people is looking for a world of pain. Maybe we won’t experience it but our children will suffer from our craven ways. For those that are educated enough go to http://www.climateaudit.org and decide for yourself why these scare mongering think tanks will not allow their global climate program maps/data sets/and MBH98 software to be scrutinized by non affiliated(i.e. people/companies/universities/government agencies that don’t stand to profit from “global warming”) third parties. Their methods of data collection are dangerously engineered to canalize and manipulate the outcome. Some are volitionally so, others are just quacks with federal grants.
@treyhermann
Last time I looked at the masthead I was still reading The Truth Abotu Cars, not the Truth About Mass Transit, Socialism and Self-Loathing.
Sorry, haven’t said a word about socialism or self loathing, so I’ll put those readings on your account!
Yes, as I write the Tesla can migrate technologies to other platforms (they’re already desperately seeking battery partners), and the attention it’s received may pave the road for a more general acceptance of EV technologies. I do not see how that pokes a hole in the op-ed, though.
TTAC has spent quite a while critiquing the car majors, while attempting to look for alternative strategies for the 2.5 to pursue. During the past year, they have clearly changed tack on smaller vehicles, on what engines to stick in them and what should provide the energy required to move them.
I don’t consider it socialism to point out that there’s a hell of a lot of money to be made on manufacturing efficient EVs for all those who require transportation and don’t have $100.000 plus to burn on a Tesla – that’s solid business sense. Just ask the Chinese who are now ramping up manufacture of EVs (with assistance from Mitsubishi and engines on all four wheels); or the Indians, who are turning them out just as fast. So, will Detroit miss this train as it heads out of town?
Stein,
You better watch that editor fellow more closely:)
Also, I am very familiar with the squared and cubed relationships because I am a pilot. Becoming a pilot slowed my driving considerably. I haven’t gotten a ticket since I got my license. In the EU where you live, the governments have destroyed general aviation by taxing it to death while subsidizing scheduled aviation considerably. The small planes can be more fuel efficient per passenger mile, but the government has taxed them away in an apparent class warfare whim as if only rich people take up flying for a hobby. In the states, you can easily spend more on golf than flying (hoepfully that will continue).
I am all for pollution taxes. I find it seriously cruel that we tax labor (the only thing a poor person has) instead of taxing impact on society. However, I worry about the lack of decent science involved in figuring out impact.
“Your rights end where mine begins and vica versa. Personal rights are not surrendered to the concept of a greater good. You assume that what you define as the greater good is in fact that.”
I don’t quite know what you think it means when you decide/or were born a citizen of the US, but the quote above does not encapsulate this. I’ll try my best to reiterate the fact that being a citizen in a country means that you, in fact must at times bow to the needs of the greater good above and beyond yourself. This of course ties to our discussion in that driving less, willing to accept a gas tax, et al are issues that may be personal sacrifice for the greater good.
Remember when you were 18 and you had to sign your draft card? By signing the draft card (which is mandatory) you are stating that you understand that if the government reinstates the draft, they can call you into duty.
In short, the Government reserves the right to force you into active duty, go fight a war on it’s behalf and possibly die. In no way does the government ask or assume if this is for your personal good. The government doesn’t care. There are not exceptions to the draft based on “personal good.” You do these things because you are required to, because you agreed to abide by the laws of the land, and these laws look out for the greater good of the population.
So it is with our energy policy. You may really really want a 457, but ultimately this most likely isn’t in the interest of our society, and so the government has the right to do something about this to effect change. I am not saying that mandatory rules should take effect. I am just saying that it is in society’s best interest to charge a gas tax to change behaviors.
All this talk of taxing gasoline to change behavior would be more appealing if practical experience suggested it made any sense. Europe has taxed fuel for decades. Are they any better off for it? Their mass transit utility is mostly a function of compact countries with high density centers in close proximity to each other. Countries on that continent are considerably more dependent on imported oil than we are in the US, they came late to pollution controls on cars so their air has been dirtier longer, and high fuel prices did not prevent SUVs from being a major growth category there among people who can afford them.
And what cars do they elect to sell in the US? 14 mpg Range Rovers; Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Maserati, Ferrari vehicles that give mixed mileage in the teens or worse. I have to laugh about European claims of seriousness on carbon when the EU looks the other way while its manufacturers ship heavy, inefficient luxury and performance cars and SUVs to North America in exchange for dollars. If the true believers in regulation in Brussels were really serious about carbon, there wouldn’t be a ridiculous Porsche SUV, nor for that matter a Porsche 911 Turbo, an AMG division at Mercedes, any M-cars at BMW. No 8 mpg Lamborghinis, Ferraris, nor lightness-intending aluminum Audis that weigh a ridiculous 4300 lbs. Fuel-wasting AWD would recede from European car design. They’d insist that people who want fast cars import Corvettes for their superior mileage. Range Rovers and their ilk would have to yield to GMC SUVs that get better fuel economy. We’d see serious investment efforts by Europeans to sell their small fuel-efficient cars here, using market-making techniques like Toyota has done with the Prius. But the truth is, the regulators just like to regulate. They can’t help it. And they really don’t like people making their own choices when regulators could make choices for them. They are really not interested in science to inform their regulatory decisions. However, all of this enthusiasm for bureaucratic regulation stops at the point that principle collides with economic opportunity to earn truckloads of dollars by selling heavy metal to the country that can most afford it.
Transport fuel is a necessity in a mobile society, just like food, clothing, housing, etc. In many states with sales taxes, clothing and food are exempted. Should we tax synthetic fiber clothing because it’s oil-derived, or should we tax cotton because it’s a water-intensive crop? Some state income taxes have rent deductions. Taxing fuel to artificially raise its cost merely damages working class and poor people economically while barely inconveniencing wealthier people who are blindly swallowing junk claims of crisis. Gasoline could double in price and it wouldn’t affect how much I drive, nor my vehicle preferences, and the same is true for most of the people I know. But it is easy for me to see how damaging even market-driven increases in fuel cost are to average wage-earners or lower. Those folks are buying cars from the annual 43 million used car sales pool in the US, rather than from the annual 16 million new car transaction stream here. Don’t look for hybrids in their driveways for years.
Even if I could live with other people taking the pain of taxation that would be of incidental consequence to me, I see no precedent for confidence that the large windfall to governments would be spent productively. And I’m a Democrat.
To get this back on track, I should say something about the Tesla Roadster. It’s OK for them to sell a few hundred cars to make EVs sexy in the popular imagination, but we’ll know whether this company is serious when we see an EV sedan at a price no more than 10% above the average new vehicle purchase price in the year it appears, and that average people can get through the day on in a single charge.
Phil
Zoomzit, let me explain my take. My parents left China in 1949 specifically because the government there wanted the citizens to be subservient to what the government run by well meaning people thought was the common good. In that case the common good prohibited private property or the concept of personal rights. I will repeat my earlier post.
“It is a slippery slope to go down the path of taxing people based on what one perceives to be for the common good because we don’t all agree on the definition of what is the common good. America is free and a great country not because we allow other people the freedom to do what we agree is good but because we allow people the freedom to do what they consider good even if we don’t consider their actions good.“
In this country we have the Bill of Rights specifically to limit government against the rights of individuals. The concept of common good overriding personal rights is not what made America a great country. It is that our personal rights will not be trampled by those seeking to impose what their definition of common good is.
Zoom,
Your point is well put, but the other side has a good point as well.
We have the possibility of a draft because our democratically elected legislators have decided that we might need one. How many of them will be in office next go round if they mandate changes that the electorate vehemently disagrees with whether its reinstating the draft, increasing taxes on certain fuels or cars, or banning certain cars?
Tesla’s and Volt’s can and ought to be built if the companies want to make them. They should be bought if the buyers want them. The minute someone passes a law that costs the voters too much money or limits their choices is the minute when they better have real facts about global warming and its relationship to autos.
Until then, this is all so many angels on the head of a pin. Just because a near majority has stated belief that there is something to global warming doesn’t mean they won’t demand evidence when you threaten their lifestyle, wallet or safety.
The best thing is to let the market sort it out. People will buy electric cars when they want them whether they are ecologically sound or not (which has not really been shown either). A benevolent government’s job in all this is to help study and disseminate the FACTS, not AGENDAS. DDT anyone?
Replying to 213Cobra:
Europe has taxed fuel for decades. Are they any better off for it? Their mass transit utility is mostly a function of compact countries with high density centers in close proximity to each other. Countries on that continent are considerably more dependent on imported oil than we are in the US, they came late to pollution controls on cars so their air has been dirtier longer, and high fuel prices did not prevent SUVs from being a major growth category there among people who can afford them.
And what cars do they elect to sell in the US? 14 mpg Range Rovers; Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Maserati, Ferrari vehicles that give mixed mileage in the teens or worse.
You forgot Japan. They put heavy tax on gas as well and they completely dominate the fuel-efficient car game. The European makers will definately bring more such model, had there not been a Japanese dominance.
Landcrusher,
I think your post has a lot of wisdom to it. Being able to vote for our leaders allows us to put checks on their ability to run our lives. This fear is encapsulated by Sherman’s description of Communist China.
Also, as you say, in one sense this really is the equivalent of talking about angels on a head of a pin. Politicians aren’t going to do anything with this unless they see it in their own political best interest. It is hard to conceive of a time in which the gas tax would equate to this.
However, this is why we discuss these things. I believe that we need to fundamentally change our consumption behavior, I think slowly, more people are agreeing with this line of thought. The more we can discuss these things, the better the possibility for change. Perhaps eventually a large swath of america will believe that our energy policy has everything to do with our security and environmental policy and thus changes to behavior will begin.
213Cobra: The US is a 3.5 million square mile country that will have 400 million people flung around the continent by the end of this century — still a density well below most other countries.
Are you going to be one of the people to move to the Great Plains so that those of us on the coasts can keep our population density where it is, at close to the density of England? And if you do, where are we giong to get the water for you since the Oglala, the aquifer that provides water for the Great Plains, is steadily receding. The water situation in the west is probably even worse. And by the way, even conservative projections give us more than 400 million by 2050. We’ll be lucky if we aren’t well beyond half a billion by 2100.
Landcrusher: Also, I am very familiar with the squared and cubed relationships because I am a pilot. Becoming a pilot slowed my driving considerably. I haven’t gotten a ticket since I got my license.
I find this very interesting, and I wish tyou woud elaborate on exactly why you think this happened. I’ve flown just a couple of times for a half hr each. If you think this is too off topic, pls email me offlist: motorlegends.com. Tx. David
@Cobra 213
Europe has taxed fuel for decades. Are they any better off for it? Their mass transit utility is mostly a function of compact countries with high density centers in close proximity to each other. Countries on that continent are considerably more dependent on imported oil than we are in the US, they came late to pollution controls on cars so their air has been dirtier longer, and high fuel prices did not prevent SUVs from being a major growth category there among people who can afford them.
And what cars do they elect to sell in the US? 14 mpg Range Rovers; Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Maserati, Ferrari vehicles that give mixed mileage in the teens or worse.
I agree with your point later in your comment about European manufacturers not shipping their fuel inefficient SUVs to the US. On the other hand, with US gas prices and the US penchant for a cavalry charge under the hood, the temptation was probably too great. The US drove the SUV market.
I don’t agree with your comment about proximity motivating mass transit units setting Europe apart from the US. There are regions in the US where people live in similar proximity, and where a better mass transit system would be just as motivated.
Europe has smaller cars, and made diesel engines a standard, precisely because of the more expensive fuel; to a certain extent, the high price has also driven people to using mass transit more.
The average American drives 37 miles/day.
In the UK (2005) they drove 16 miles/day.
In Norway (2005), 23 miles/day, and the gas is four times as expensive as in the US in that country.
The difference between the UK and Norway can probably be accounted for through the large distances between population centres in Norway. (The driving distance from the south to the north is 1606 miles.)
Europeans are more inclined to use their feet or bicycles or mass transit (having access to efficient same). The US remains in love with the automobile — but US drivers responded to rising gasoline prices in 2005 as average use fell.
http://www.cera.com/aspx/cda/public1/news/pressCoverage/pressCoverageDetails.aspx?CID=8533
Sales of SUVs peaked in 2004. Sales of smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles is rising significantly.
Are the differences the result of more expensive fuel? Of course.
Which brings us to the topic of the op-ed: alternatives to IC in response to various factors that are forcing a change upon us.
In my opinion, the Tesla represents the kind of energy profligacy that has been identified as a problem, and therefore does not contribute to the solution.
The easiest way to describe that problem in a US frame of reference is that the US consumes 25% of the world’s hydrocarbons, while only having 4% of the world’s hydrocarbon reserves within its continental shelf.
@ The comment: Let’s leave it to market forces to sort things out.
Sure. Only I would really worry about the US car industry then. If it’s one thing it has proven singularly incapable of responding to, then that’s precisely market forces. Thus landing itself in a world of pain.
@ David Holzman
Landcrusher: Also, I am very familiar with the squared and cubed relationships because I am a pilot. Becoming a pilot slowed my driving considerably. I haven’t gotten a ticket since I got my license.
I find this very interesting, and I wish tyou woud elaborate on exactly why you think this happened. I’ve flown just a couple of times for a half hr each. If you think this is too off topic, pls email me offlist: motorlegends.com. Tx. David
I’ll let Landcrusher provide his own answer, which I suspect won’t be off topic at all.
I fly gliders, which means gravity is your engine and air circulation is your potential fuel (if you find air going up). You really learn optimal energy management when your task is to fly several hundred kilometers. Altitude is your stored energy – if you hedge, you move forwards too slowly, if you go too fast, you lose too much altitude and have to spend time regaining it before continuing.
Same with a powered aircraft, but there “altitude” is stored in your fuel tank. If you push the aircraft into the energy inefficiency zone, beyond the optimum lift/forward movement drag coefficient, you burn through your fuel faster, reducing range and constricting your safety margin at your destination. (Or not even reaching it …)
It becomes a habit, and it informs your driving. I know it did with me, and I suspect that’s what Landcrusher is referring to.
Replying to David Holzman:
The energy you put into the Tesla has to come from somewhere, and if you’re not in one of the few countries that can cover its energy needs with hydroelectric (or like Iceland with Geothermoelectric power), the Tesla’s willingness to slap on acceleration isn’t helping any.
Almost every type of large electricity generator is cleaner and more efficient than your car’s ICE due to the production scale.
cgraham:
I hate to break it to you guys saying that someday in the future we are going to be taxed depending on what we drive, but here in the Great White North we are being taxed (or ‘levied’ as the government puts it) depending on the fuel mileage your car gets. We are also ‘rewarded’ for driving cars which get good mileage.
As a Canadian, I am outraged by how stupid these politicans can get.
I don’t oppose to the idea that encourage efficient cars. But the method they use is, again, stupid. The government totally ignored 2 points:
1) EPA numbers are debatable，and under different conditions they can vary.
2) They should encourage less usage of the cars as well. 30MPG at 100k miles per year is certainly worse than 28MPG at 30k miles per year.
The best, and simplest, way is to put more taxes on gas itself. And leave the choices to the car makers and buyers.
Stein – heard of these guys?
They are messing with the Law of the Wall with some interesting results – at least the AIAA is listening. First application is gliders, but the link on the site points to some scale tests and a simple mod to a fullscale minivan.
@chuckR
Yes, it’s typical of the kind of counterintuitive thinking that leads to insights. I used to spend years polishing and polishing gliders and boathulls – and then it turns out that having microscopic and patterned surface irregularities helps reduce boundary forces. Some very interesting experimentation going on.
Gas tax makes more sense than the current CAFE tariff’s. And it’s purpose is more visible and understandable for Joe Consumer. A gas tax will also accelerate market forces to deliver alternate fuel sources.
wsn:
April 15th, 2007 at 10:53 am
Replying to David Holzman:
The energy you put into the Tesla has to come from somewhere, and if you’re not in one of the few countries that can cover its energy needs with hydroelectric (or like Iceland with Geothermoelectric power), the Tesla’s willingness to slap on acceleration isn’t helping any.
this was not my comment
My god, that’s a lot of response. I love the intellligent interaction on this site.
My issues with the article stem from its central thesis that Tesla should be the greenest green they can be. Of course, that isn’t their goal and I don’t think its fair to saddle them with that sort of baggage. They propose to set the intersection of green/performance as high as possible. Sure, they could make a car that would have extraordinary milage and go no faster than an aveo, but what would be the point? The Telsa roadster is (as was mentioned before) a halo car. Not just for Tesla, but for EVs in general. The interest they have generated in alternative vehicles more than makes up for any percieved shortcomings in their green credentials.
How about shortcomings in performance, then? The car’s vaporware:
On April 12, Darryl Siry, Tesla VP of Marketing, issued a statement that they “need to revise our initial range estimates downward. We now anticipate that the range of the Roadster will still be greater than 200 miles, but will not meet our original target of 250 miles.” This is because of “design changes to maximize safety and durability of the Roadster, both in its chassis and in its battery pack. These changes added several hundred pounds to the weight to our original design.”
Expect additional downsizing of this “halo” vaporware offering.
Do anyone know the dimensions of the batterypack?
1. The Global warming debate: I love how people either think that global warming is with out a doubt happening, or it is just a Chicken Little cry and that “technology” is going to take care of any problems we face. The fact is that “technology” is part of 150 year experiment called capitalism, a minuet period of time in the history of the world. Debating whether or not global warming is happening or whether we have 20 or 80 years of copper left is childish. It like two five year olds arguing who’s smarter. None of you or anyone for that matter knows how much natural resources we have left, but there are two facts: The rate that the global human society is plummeting the earth of its natural capital is a phenomenon that has never occurred in the history of the earth; and the natural ecological system that humans evolved in to was completely flawless at sustaining life, one which has taken millions of years in the making. These two facts should/is scaring people in to morphing the current system in to one that takes after nature’s perfection; this is called bio-mimicry. This goes way beyond putting up solar cells or driving electric cars, but the explanation is to long of an explanation for this blog. It is all in Paul Hawkins “Ecology of Commerce” the bible of the new industrial revolution. Read It. For anyone to claim that world is coming to an end or that technology will bail us out is mere proof of the arrogance of man thinking that he can predict or control the very thing that created him.
2. The future of cars debate: This one is a little more up in the air, but my bets are on EC and ill tell you why. As of now there are basically four options. 1. Continue to run our cars on gas. 2. Hydrogen fuel cells. 3. Ethanol/biofuels or 4.Electric cars. The first option is probably the most likely until market forces/ governmental forces make it other wise but when that happens, and it certainly will happen whether its in 2 years or 100, the other three options remain. Really it all comes down to infrastructure. I don’t know how much it will cost to build hydrogen fueling stations across the US, put the fact is that for hydrogen cars to replace gasoline cars this will eventually have to happen. The way I see its not going to happen. Anyone who thinks that it can, I encourage you to make me think otherwise, I would love to drink water from my car. In terms of biofuels you have a similar infrastructure problem as hydrogen although not as extreme, I think that they will play a vital role in the change of this country put will pale in comparison to the electric car. And here’s why: the Infrastructure is virtually already here. electricity is everywhere in the US, building any additional infrastructure to cater to an American fleet of electric cars would be a fraction of what anything else would cost. The one thing holding the electric car back is the storage, but I have a feeling that market forces will take care of this when the potential is realized. This paragraph unlike the other one is more based on opinion than facts, so please those who disagree with me tell me why you think im wrong.