[Edited to note that I cross-posted with the last two posters]
Do you have a cite on that, Kiteman? In India, at least, the increase in the percentage of males is due to selective abortion of females. Since a male is seen as a boon to the family, and females a bane. I believe it's the same in China, and I thought they had the same reason.
http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/rough ... links.html
In any case, they are becoming more industrialized, and this will, if anything, be our salvation here, as indistrialization has been the only thing that has every worked long-term to curb population growth. Very simply, in agrarian societies, your children are your retirement policy. In industrialized societies, children are a financial burden you have to pay to educate to be able to compete.
Anyhow, earlier in the thread I was somehow accused of being against making electric cars, because I was unwilling to drive less. Yes, the argument made that little sense. I am for electric cars, but quite simply, I cannot afford to subsidize them myself. I have a car right now, one that burns fossil fuels, and will only abandon that transportation when I can afford to do so. That will not be made possible by me not taking my couple of annual $400 vacations.
While I am on the side of caution with Global Warming, what that means to me is that we have to look at it as an economic equation. No, I don't think that there's some particular moral imperative to save the environment. Only an economic one. How can I be so sanguine about this? Well, frankly the "environment" was massively altered by our appearance by about 100,000 years ago (despite our low numbers at the time). There is no "pristine" environment left anywhere on earth, and there has not been for thousands of years.
Even if there were... it's just plants and animals and such. Sorry, but I put people far higher in importance.
Now, sure, if you can show that we're causing more economic damage, more hardship to people, by our policies, then we should change them. But until you can make it plain, any theoretical damage we're causing now, to me, is balanced by the theoretical technological improvemets that we're going to make soon.
Because, well, unless we're going to cause irreprable damage to the environment in the next year, guess what? We're going to have electic cars available to use economically in that amount of time. And within ten years, cars that are not just viable, but which actually surpass the performances of the cars that exist now. At which point everyone will convert over, at least at a rate that will dwarf any problems with expansion.
Call me an optimist on this one, if you will. But the fact is that there's a potent economic incentive (several in fact), to create this technology, which is about the most certain indicator that it will be created, and is a constantly accurate predictor of the future. Far more accurate than predicting the weather. Tomorrow's weather, much less the next decade or centuries'.
The Malthusians are correct... people who read them as doomsayers always ignore that they caveat everything with "unless some technology comes along that makes things more efficient." Malthus was no fool. He was talking mostly about unintelligent populations, and warning us to either curb population growth OR make sure we're accounting for it.
Economics usually drives that technology growth naturally, so, well, I for one am not worried. When I can't get oranges in winter in Wisconsin at the grocery store (a modern miracle if there ever was one), maybe, just maybe I'll start thinking about worrying.
Nanos... all I can say is that your experiences in London are very different from those of the average American. Closer to that of a New Yorker, but even then very different. And, again, it'll be Americans buying electric cars that'll start the world market for them...
OK, I lie, the market has already begun in a much more populous country, India. Reva. But the automakers will get a much bigger whiff of the potential profits when they put these cars in showrooms in America, and they start to sell millions.
Again, that'll be a while yet, until we get just slightly better performance/economics out of them. Yes, London might pick up on them fast, but how many people there drive as opposed to using mass transit? Despite the costs? In America, they only use mass transit in New York, and a few other such places. Something like 90% of employed Americans drive to work each day. And we all drive many miles each year.
Yes, this is why we use up more resources in America than the rest of the world combined. But, um... no shortages here...
Mike
How did we convert from horse and buggy to automobiles
Mike,Mike Holmes wrote:[Edited to note that I cross-posted with the last two posters]
Do you have a cite on that, Kiteman? In India, at least, the increase in the percentage of males is due to selective abortion of females. Since a male is seen as a boon to the family, and females a bane. I believe it's the same in China, and I thought they had the same reason.
Actually, I was responding to the message citing China, I don't know a lot about India. As to a cite? Not really, but almost everyone I know who has adopted a baby has adopted a Chinese female. Their "one baby" policy and the Christian anit-abortion kick seems to play together to provide a lot of little Chinese girls.
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ravingdave
- Posts: 650
- Joined: Wed Jun 27, 2007 2:41 am
scareduck wrote:At this point, anything getting in the way of China modernizing their economy will be met with crushing blows. China is trapped behind a wall of an aging demographic, which decrees rapid industrialization. If they don't industrialize, there's simply no way to care for all those old people -- and then you have a social revolution on your hands, one they're barely containing now (among other problems, zillions of young men with no young women to marry).tomclarke wrote:In fact the system most able to do the right thing (which does ot mean that they will) is that in China. Government can persist with thoroughly unpopular measures.
It's funny how mankind always comes up with these ideas which are contrary to nature, and then look totaly shocked and suprised when nature reasserts herself !
Fire prevention in the southwest, Anti-biotic usage, communism.. etc.
David
Due to advances in LiIon technology battery performace is due to double (minimum) over the next 10 years (complete the research, pilot production, full scale production, commercial roll out).
http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/200 ... -sand.html
It would be unwise to ramp up current technology any faster than rational market conditions (no subsidies) allow.
If we go slow now the end result will be a faster lower cost final roll out.
http://gm-volt.com/2007/12/21/gm-voltco ... akthrough/
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/21750/page1/
http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/200 ... -sand.html
It would be unwise to ramp up current technology any faster than rational market conditions (no subsidies) allow.
If we go slow now the end result will be a faster lower cost final roll out.
http://gm-volt.com/2007/12/21/gm-voltco ... akthrough/
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/21750/page1/
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
Way more than necessary given untapped American resources.Aero wrote:Yes, that's great Simon. Oh, do you happen to remember what our daily USA oil import bill is? Duh!
Fortunately the new Democrat Senator from Alaska is a drill, baby, drill guy.
Not too different politically from the last (corrupt) Republican Senator. We will see how long this new guy can keep his fingers out of the cookie jar.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
Yes, way more than we should afford. And yes, the money could and some of it should be spent to drill for our own oil. Let me refresh you.
September, 2008, we imported 9,934,000 bbls of petroleum a day. OK, so lets drill for it. You do realize, don't you, that 10 million bbls is more than our total daily US oil production currently. But we're going to find oil that has been overlooked for 100 years, drill and bring it on-line and so achieve energy security. I think not, but I do agree that we should do what we can to bring in more oil.
Or maybe not. Oil has many uses besides fuel, and in the future those other uses may become far more valuable than oil as a fuel is now.
But we can power our personal transportation vehicles with coal, via electricity, and we can start now. With 250,000,000 registered vehicles on the road in the USA, it will take a long time (many years) to replace gasoline but the sooner we start, the more money we can save from imported oil. Ten million barrels of imported oil a day at $40 a barrel is $400 million a day. We as a nation need to keep that money for our own national and personal uses, and quit giving it to people who would slaughter us over our ideals. (Not all of them, but some of them would.)
Not everyone needs to drive an electric vehicle, there won't be enough electric vehicles for everyone for at least 20 years, even if we produced only electric from now on. But our energy security, our financial security and in a real sense, the security of our life style for each and every one of us depends on breaking the imported oil habit. And the bottom line is that we need the experience with electric vehicles to fully evolve the best technological solution for the future, because we will go electric and I am confident that we will overcome our energy security problems.
September, 2008, we imported 9,934,000 bbls of petroleum a day. OK, so lets drill for it. You do realize, don't you, that 10 million bbls is more than our total daily US oil production currently. But we're going to find oil that has been overlooked for 100 years, drill and bring it on-line and so achieve energy security. I think not, but I do agree that we should do what we can to bring in more oil.
Or maybe not. Oil has many uses besides fuel, and in the future those other uses may become far more valuable than oil as a fuel is now.
But we can power our personal transportation vehicles with coal, via electricity, and we can start now. With 250,000,000 registered vehicles on the road in the USA, it will take a long time (many years) to replace gasoline but the sooner we start, the more money we can save from imported oil. Ten million barrels of imported oil a day at $40 a barrel is $400 million a day. We as a nation need to keep that money for our own national and personal uses, and quit giving it to people who would slaughter us over our ideals. (Not all of them, but some of them would.)
Not everyone needs to drive an electric vehicle, there won't be enough electric vehicles for everyone for at least 20 years, even if we produced only electric from now on. But our energy security, our financial security and in a real sense, the security of our life style for each and every one of us depends on breaking the imported oil habit. And the bottom line is that we need the experience with electric vehicles to fully evolve the best technological solution for the future, because we will go electric and I am confident that we will overcome our energy security problems.
Aero
Aero,
The deal is: if we push faster than real (unsubsidized) market demand allows we will have wasted resources and have a lower efficiency mix than might be obtained by letting the market take its natural course. That matters because we would like to come up against electrical constraints later rather than sooner.
To keep oil prices low we need not replace all 10 mn bpd. A 1 mn bpd increase in supply would probably do the trick.
And there is no point in worrying about future uses for oil because biotech may give us lower cost feed stocks than oil.
Organic growth is best because it lets the supply chain build out in the most economical way.
If we spend a lot on battery production method X and it turns out method Y is vastly superior we will have more unusable capacity on our hands than otherwise. Given the rate improvements are coming - method Y is almost a sure bet although we can't tell at this point if it will be Y1, Y2, Y3, or Yn.
We are also having a revolution in propulsion tech from centralized motors and gears/shafts to motor in wheel technology.
Gently is the best way forward. Esp. with oil prices low and falling.
http://www.bloomberg.com/energy/
The deal is: if we push faster than real (unsubsidized) market demand allows we will have wasted resources and have a lower efficiency mix than might be obtained by letting the market take its natural course. That matters because we would like to come up against electrical constraints later rather than sooner.
To keep oil prices low we need not replace all 10 mn bpd. A 1 mn bpd increase in supply would probably do the trick.
And there is no point in worrying about future uses for oil because biotech may give us lower cost feed stocks than oil.
Organic growth is best because it lets the supply chain build out in the most economical way.
If we spend a lot on battery production method X and it turns out method Y is vastly superior we will have more unusable capacity on our hands than otherwise. Given the rate improvements are coming - method Y is almost a sure bet although we can't tell at this point if it will be Y1, Y2, Y3, or Yn.
We are also having a revolution in propulsion tech from centralized motors and gears/shafts to motor in wheel technology.
Gently is the best way forward. Esp. with oil prices low and falling.
http://www.bloomberg.com/energy/
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
I would like to agree, but when I compare your hypothetical wasted resources to the $400 million wasted daily on imported oil, I come up short. There is no way in H*** that we will waste anything approaching $400 million per day by pushing EV development. The waste comes about from your approach, by continuing to spend $400 Million a day for imported oil instead of pushing the research, development and fielding of electric vehicles.MSimon wrote:Aero,
The deal is: if we push faster than real (unsubsidized) market demand allows we will have wasted resources and have a lower efficiency mix than might be obtained by letting the market take its natural course. That matters because we would like to come up against electrical constraints later rather than sooner.
What trick? It certainly would not reduce our $400 million a day imported oil bill. The price of oil is at or very near the bottom right now with no place to go but up. If oil prices continue under downward pressure, oil will be taken off the market according to news reports form OPEC nations and their past practices. Then, look out, when we start coming out of economic recession.To keep oil prices low we need not replace all 10 mn bpd. A 1 mn bpd increase in supply would probably do the trick.
Yes, it may but you are now talking about renewables. Its a difficult problem finding a large enough source of feed stocks to replace today's non-fuel use of oil, but maybe not impossible. If we burn the oil as fuel, then we will be (our children and grand children will be) forced to find a replacement.And there is no point in worrying about future uses for oil because biotech may give us lower cost feed stocks than oil.
Yes, as an ideology, but it trades time for money. And that time is costing us as a nation $400 million a day.Organic growth is best because it lets the supply chain build out in the most economical way.
What do you mean by "a lot" compared to $400 million per day? I'll tell you a secret; Y1, Y2, Y3, Y4 and even EEStor's ESTU all give electricity in volts and amperes. Given even a small motivation, those battery units can be interchangeable. And I think that saving $400 Million dollars a day is more than a little motivation. And I'll tell you another little secret. EEStor (although they may not be successful) has only invested about $6 million over 5+ years for their complete company. How many ideas of that size can you start with $400 million per day? Thousands and thousands and thousands. And yet another secret - Battery Packs wear out and can be replaced with more efficient batteries if and when they are developed.If we spend a lot on battery production method X and it turns out method Y is vastly superior we will have more unusable capacity on our hands than otherwise. Given the rate improvements are coming - method Y is almost a sure bet although we can't tell at this point if it will be Y1, Y2, Y3, or Yn.
That is true, and maybe the automobile market cannot absorb more than one design of electric car, but I doubt it. I see that the automobile market is flexible enough to absorb 2 and 4 wheel drive, standard and automatic transmissions, gasoline, natural gas and diesel, 3 cycinder, 4 cylinder 5 cylinder, straight 6, V-6, straight 8, V8, V-10 V-12, horizontal 4, horizontal 6 and I'm sure others I don't know of. But maybe it cannot absorb more than one kind of battery and one kind of drive train. HaWe are also having a revolution in propulsion tech from centralized motors and gears/shafts to motor in wheel technology.
Is $400 MILLION Dollars every DAY just to large a number for people to wrap their mind around? Maybe I can break it down to human size. $400 million a day is about $1.60 a day for every man, woman and child in the USA. If you live alone, that's only $48 a month or $96 a month for a man and wife, a couple. For the average U.S. family with 2.4 children, that's $211.20 per month and for a small town of 600 people it comes to only $28,800 a month, that's a new sewer plant, every month. For a city the size of Rockford, Illinois, population 150,115 (2000), it comes to $240,184.00 per day, or $7,205,520.00 per month. That is money taken out of the economy and sent overseas.Gently is the best way forward. Esp. with oil prices low and falling.
But don't misunderstand me, I'm not saying that converting to electric vehicles will save the population of Rockford $7,205,520 per month, because it will cost to fuel the electric cars. About one-fourth as much, but because I am only addressing imported oil, and the other half of a tank full, domestic production, is also burned as fuel, the citizens of Rockford will only save about half, about $3,602,760 per month. But the nation as a whole will save all of the $7,205,520 per month because we will not be importing the oil and sending the money overseas.
Yes, it will cost money to start the EV revolution, and the early adopters driving an expensive electric vehicle may never see a return, but they should be given that option!
I see that the spot price of oil today is $2 to $3 higher than I used. So jack the savings up by 5 to 8 percent if you want accurate figures.
Our nation cannot afford to go at a slow and measured pace in introducing electric vehicles. $400,000,000 a day is to high a cost for the luxury of long R&D phases and dozens of prototypes. We must act now, just as we must soon act on the Polywell research money.
Aero
Actually what you say is contrary to the way real markets work. If junk is pushed to market it will give electric vehicles of various sorts (BEVs, HEVs, PHEVs) a bad name. That will depress the market rather than expand it.Our nation cannot afford to go at a slow and measured pace in introducing electric vehicles. $400,000,000 a day is to high a cost for the luxury of long R&D phases and dozens of prototypes.
The only way to do it faster is to start several years earlier.
There are about 100 comments here:
http://gm-volt.com/2007/12/21/gm-voltco ... akthrough/
Read them all to get a feel for the problems (lots of good tech stuff in the comments). All it will take is a few vehicles catching on fire from bad battery packs and you won't be able to move these things at any price.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
> London might pick up on them fast, but how many people there drive
> as opposed to using mass transit? Despite the costs?
There is more to the UK than just London
Ok, so we only have 60 million people living here, but still, I reckon thats a big enough market to develop something, after all, we did manage to run a car industry at one point in our history..
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7009776.stm
> As many as 71% of British workers travel to work by car
>
> We need to plan for the diverse 18m car journeys that
> are made every day
>
> It found the average distance of a British worker's daily
> commute was 8.7 miles
Looks like a big enough number of customers who drive a short distance to work every day that could use a cheap electric vehicle even with a limited range.
I'm sure though that if someone could develop a low cost long range vehicle that would suit US customers, that yes they would have a world beater on their hands.
But those in countries with a shorter travel requirement could do well with yesterdays technology to solve todays problems.
Which might cause the US some trade issues if such countries end up producing cheap goods because of their lower transport costs...
But I'm sure that could be solved if you trick them with some finanical hocus-pocus so they end up giving you the goods for little bits of paper..
> as opposed to using mass transit? Despite the costs?
There is more to the UK than just London
Ok, so we only have 60 million people living here, but still, I reckon thats a big enough market to develop something, after all, we did manage to run a car industry at one point in our history..
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7009776.stm
> As many as 71% of British workers travel to work by car
>
> We need to plan for the diverse 18m car journeys that
> are made every day
>
> It found the average distance of a British worker's daily
> commute was 8.7 miles
Looks like a big enough number of customers who drive a short distance to work every day that could use a cheap electric vehicle even with a limited range.
I'm sure though that if someone could develop a low cost long range vehicle that would suit US customers, that yes they would have a world beater on their hands.
But those in countries with a shorter travel requirement could do well with yesterdays technology to solve todays problems.
Which might cause the US some trade issues if such countries end up producing cheap goods because of their lower transport costs...
But I'm sure that could be solved if you trick them with some finanical hocus-pocus so they end up giving you the goods for little bits of paper..
The problem in the US is the wide range of climates.
Everything from deserts to very deep snows.
American vehicles are designed to operate in temps from -40 F to +120F (-40 C to 49C). That is rather a wide range. Batteries that will operate over that range are tough.
Also distances traveled are about 2X the Euro average.
Everything from deserts to very deep snows.
American vehicles are designed to operate in temps from -40 F to +120F (-40 C to 49C). That is rather a wide range. Batteries that will operate over that range are tough.
Also distances traveled are about 2X the Euro average.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
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Mike Holmes
- Posts: 308
- Joined: Thu Jun 05, 2008 1:15 pm
Nanos, let me try this a different way to see if I can get you to understand my point:
Yes, the people in the UK, and much of Europe have good reason to purchase electric vehicles, better than those in the US.
So why haven't they? Electric cars are available, and always have been. Especially so called Neighborhood Electric Vehicles, governed to run at about 25 MPH. But now a wider range. If, in fact, the UK could drive this market, I would argue that they already would have. Given the apparently lower barrier to entry.
Part of the "problem" is that you Europeans are so bloody sensible about using mass-transit. In the US in most places it's considered socially demeaning to use mass-transit. The bus here is subsidized, and would be cheaper to take to work than to drive my car each day. But I still drive my car. Because I'm an American.
We drive the auto market here in the US, because we have an unreasoning cultural fascination with automobiles. Put more simply, the population of the US is about five times that of the UK, but we have ten times as many cars. There are more cars in the US than people who are licensed to drive.
A real question about electric vehicles will be whether or not Americans psychologically accept them as a replacement for the rumble of the internal combustion engine. Here in Milwaukee, we manufacture the Harley Davidson motorcycle, which has been know to be an irrationally good seller, simply because of the particular roar the engine has (actual studies have shown this, and Harley has actually patented the sound).
Mike
Yes, the people in the UK, and much of Europe have good reason to purchase electric vehicles, better than those in the US.
So why haven't they? Electric cars are available, and always have been. Especially so called Neighborhood Electric Vehicles, governed to run at about 25 MPH. But now a wider range. If, in fact, the UK could drive this market, I would argue that they already would have. Given the apparently lower barrier to entry.
Part of the "problem" is that you Europeans are so bloody sensible about using mass-transit. In the US in most places it's considered socially demeaning to use mass-transit. The bus here is subsidized, and would be cheaper to take to work than to drive my car each day. But I still drive my car. Because I'm an American.
We drive the auto market here in the US, because we have an unreasoning cultural fascination with automobiles. Put more simply, the population of the US is about five times that of the UK, but we have ten times as many cars. There are more cars in the US than people who are licensed to drive.
A real question about electric vehicles will be whether or not Americans psychologically accept them as a replacement for the rumble of the internal combustion engine. Here in Milwaukee, we manufacture the Harley Davidson motorcycle, which has been know to be an irrationally good seller, simply because of the particular roar the engine has (actual studies have shown this, and Harley has actually patented the sound).
Mike
I disagree. With so much money at stake, the market solution should be to bring product to the market as soon as humanly possible. I lived in California during the time of the EV1 and we did start several years ago. The EV1 was killed in court, not on the road, but it was a well loved car by those who drove it. Compare it to the Volt:MSimon wrote:Actually what you say is contrary to the way real markets work.Our nation cannot afford to go at a slow and measured pace in introducing electric vehicles. $400,000,000 a day is to high a cost for the luxury of long R&D phases and dozens of prototypes.
Code: Select all
EV1 Volt (Plug in Hybrid)
Battery type: Lead Acid LiIon
Battery volume: 300L 100L
Charging voltage: 220V 110V/while driving
Charging Time: 8 hours 6-6.5 hours
QuickCharge Capable NO YES
Passenger capacity: 2 passengers 4 passengers
Acceleration (0-60) 8-9 sec 8-8.5 sec
Top speed: 80 mph 120+ mph
Pure EV Range 60-90 miles 40 miles
Total Range 60-90 miles 640 miles
Curb weight: 3084 lbs 3140 lbs
There is no record of any EV1 driver considering it "Junk," quite the contrary, it was a very desirable car, and similar technology today could be fielded in a heartbeat, if there was the will to do so.If junk is pushed to market it will give electric vehicles of various sorts (BEVs, HEVs, PHEVs) a bad name. That will depress the market rather than expand it.
It is true that many American teenagers identify with their car, but they usually out grow it when a family comes along, or when the muscles stiffen with age.But I still drive my car. Because I'm an American.
Why is no one addressing the $400 million each day that we send overseas to import oil? If we could keep it what would it do for our balance of trade, the strength of the dollar and our American standard of living? It would make a tremendous improvement, that's what.
Mike - Why does my electric car have to satisfy your standards about how a suitable car should perform? I'll bet that after a few times of coming in second in a drag race with an all electric, that throaty rumble of your Volt won't sound so pretty.
Yes, technology is advancing rapidly in this area. But if that means that we should wait to see what else works, then by that same logic we should tell Dr. Nebel and the Navy to hold off, because something better than the Polywell might be discovered. There are a lot of physicist working on fusion theory, after all.
That argument makes about as much sense as do yours and Simon's. There is to much at stake, money and security, to justify holding off on either EV's or Polywell. And don't worry, the only thing that will force you or anyone to drive an electric car will be economics. There will always be ICE powered vehicles for those who can afford them.
Aero