

Plug-in Electric Vehicles


Many friends have been talking about a start up company in Palo Alto called Better Place.  Better Place is advocating for the use of electric vehicles as the transportation solution to climate change.  Shai Agassi Talk About Electric Vehicle Charging Stations  The premise of Better Place is much like the premise of the pioneering work of Socolow and Pacala’s on Stabilization Wedges.  Socolow/Pacala Stabilization Wedges  Both assume that we don’t invent new technology and that if we do its a bonus.  Given that parameter, both try to solve for climate change. 

What is interesting about Better Place is that they also assume that we want affordable vehicles and don’t want to fundamentally change how we get around.  That led Better Place to explore various alternatives to gasoline and oil as a fuel source.  They determined that ethanol took more (or if not more, almost as much) energy to produce as would be saved through its use.  An exploration of other biofuels and hydrogen based fuel cells came to a similar conclusion. 

Then they stopped thinking like scientists and started thinking like economists.  They realized that if you took existing car technology and existing battery technology and simply took the expense of battery ownership away from the consumer, you were there.  Their idea is to create charging stations, where owners of electric vehicles would have thier batter replaced, rather than charged, at existing gas stations.  The stations would then charge the batteries and use them in other vehicles.  Think propane tank instead of gas tank.  This small change in perspective, all of a sudden makes electric cars affordable (batteries that would power a car 120 miles cost about $10,000-$15,000), and viable.  No one will wait eight hours before they can drive their car again, but they would wait a few minutes while their battery is being switched out.  The other necessary component of this plan is that the U.S. moves away from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources – which is a good idea anyway.   

The flaws in the plan are 120 miles is about 1/3 of what we currently get on a tank of gas, but if charging stations are ubiquitous and convenient, that may be an obstacle that could be overcome.  Better Place will test their plan in Israel, Denmark, Australia, Hawaii and California in the next few years.  Watch for success.

Catherine Hill

4 Responses

  1. Andy says:

    The thing is these are coal powered cars.

    More then 50% of our electricity comes from coal. The enormous energy consumption of automobiles assuringly would greatly increase that number. A 150 HP car uses 100 kW of electricity or about 1/15th of what a big wind turbine puts out. 15 cars would consume the energy of the 1.5 MW turbine. Coal is the only source of power, at mass scale that can power the need for greatly expanding the grid, should electric cars be put on their at mass.

    Rather then focusing on imaginary coal electric cars, with lithium batteries (mined by creating massive pools of toxic brine in Chile), we should focus on improving our urban transit systems. We should follow Portland Oregon’s goal, and try to seek reduce personal vehicle travel to below 6.5 miles per capita a day.

  2. Cathy Hill says:

    Not exactly. You are right that if we keep our generation infrastructure coal based, then not as much carbon is abated. However, if we move to renewable electricty sources, then this idea could be carbon neutral. In addition, in New York, only 9% of our generating capacity came from coal (although we do generate a large percentage of our electricity with natural gas and oil). But that doesn’t tell the whole story. These batteries would be charged at night. Currently in New York, electricity often trades at negative margins at night, because you can’t really turn off hydro or nuclear and you can just turn down coal and oil. That means that wind turbines free spin at night. Wasted green energy could recharge these batteries. But your point is well taken, how this is done is just as important that this is done.

  3. Andy says:

    Automobiles are inherently unsustainable. A healthy and sustainable society with automobiles is kind of like a society with healthy cigarettes. Even more fuel efficient automobiles don’t help much, because they just promote more driving and sprawl. Automobiles also create massive amounts of water pollution via the roads they run on. They require the demolition and destruction by neglect of cities. They wall off rivers and natural features from public access (witness I-787). They create anti-social behavior (road rage) along with death and destruction (crashes).

    Regarding the grid, it is true that we generate more electricity at night then we use in New York. The NYPA Lewiston dam is at peak production (2,500 MW) at night when we shutdown Niagara Falls. Other hydro plants are similar. With lights out and businesses not using AC or computers, electricity use drops at night. Yet, that energy can be stored and used beneficially, assuming their is sufficient pump-storage in the system. Lewiston can pump-store 250 MW.

    Also, a lot of New York’s energy is generated by nuclear power. We actually generate more nuclear then hydro + wind in our state. And that certainly is not clean power by any means, especially with no real way to dispose of the waste. I’d rather see fossil fuels, used efficiently, then mess with some as horrific as nuclear waste.

    Finally, the grid probably can’t move the level of power around needed to power automobiles. And we know what an environmental disaster new power lines can be, as witnessed by the NYRI proposal. Electrical-magnetic fields are believed to cause cancer, ecological disturbance.

    I believe that reducing the mileage cars need to be driven, is the single most important environmental innovation. It’s far more important then fuel standards or high-tech stuff. The highway-system and cars (regardless of their fuel), is so destructive — especially at the level of mass use of today.

  4. Jeff Gordon says:

    This is a logical and rational idea to replace the internal combustion engine. Obviously, battery technology will need improvement, and the electric powered car will need more speed and size. The fact is that American is not like Europe, and we are not sufficiently densely populated to replace the car with mass transit, and we do not want to live in liberal, crime-infested cities. If we elect an intelligent President that will allow the NRC to move into the 21st century, we can produce clean, reliable nuclear energy.

    These anti-car zealots are merely the Luddites of the 21st century. I strongly recommend they consider reading something besides the Gospel according to St. Algore.