MadMonk Posted November 25, 2012 Share Posted November 25, 2012 Not necessarily. In order to harness the power of the sun you have to have massive amounts of solar cells. Black solar cells attracting heat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Ambien Posted November 26, 2012 Share Posted November 26, 2012 Already have two hybrids so that's a pretty easy answer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghostsof1915 Posted November 26, 2012 Share Posted November 26, 2012 Renewables: Wind Solar Tidal Wind is becoming a very viable source of electricity, solar is behind only because the efficiency. Currently solar panels are at 21%. If that were to be improved through research and development it's been stated they can get up to 32% or more. Tidal is the least developed and potentially has the ability to develop a large amount of electricity. However putting turbines in the ocean isn't as easy. You have to deal with salt-water corrosion, sea life, and transmission of the energy, and possible erosion of the shoreline (depending on design) In Nova Scotia we have the only tidal power station in North America, the Annapolis Royal Generating Station. Producing 50 Gwh of electricity per year. Concepts like SeaGen might raise the possibility of more widespread use of tidal energy. Marine Current Turbines which built SeaGen, must be showing signs of great potential because Siemens bought up the majority of shares. Marine Current Turbines is working on a project to build 3 1.2 Mw Turbines in Campbell River. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SeaGen and http://en.wikipedia....urrent_Turbines Hydrogen fuel cells are a great concept, but the earth doesn't have many natural sources of hydrogen. So that means we need to burn energy to make the fuel. Then there's the whole concept of storage, and that hydrogen is very flammable. Of course the holy grail would be to develop nuclear fusion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghostsof1915 Posted November 26, 2012 Share Posted November 26, 2012 Nuclear - the car might outlive refueling. http://auto.howstuff...powered-car.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
canucklax Posted November 28, 2012 Share Posted November 28, 2012 Watch the whole video, offers a possible solution that would almost completely reduce emissions while creating an economic boom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aGENT Posted November 28, 2012 Share Posted November 28, 2012 If the research/tech could get there... I'd love to see the "gas station" of the future carry compact, swappable battery packs. Imagine standardized battery packs that work across all vehicles that you merely swap out at stations so that you're able to travel far distances without recharging. You simply pull up and (depending on size/complexity) you/an attendant pulls your old pack out and slides in a new, fully charged one. You pay for the electricity used to charge it and a small charge for the station to pay employees, overhead for storing and maintaining packs etc and make a profit. This would also allow for somewhat centralized (around the station) electricity delivery/creation. It would be fairly simple to have the entire roof of a station be solar panels for example. You could of course still charge your existing pack at home as well if you choose. Larger vehicles (trucks for example) could simply have multiples of these packs so you'd pay to have two or three swapped out in this case. This of course would require smaller, lighter packs, standardization across the industry as well as some way of easily accessing them from all vehicles for swapping. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hobble Posted November 28, 2012 Share Posted November 28, 2012 If the research/tech could get there... I'd love to see the "gas station" of the future carry compact, swappable battery packs. Imagine standardized battery packs that work across all vehicles that you merely swap out at stations so that you're able to travel far distances without recharging. You simply pull up and (depending on size/complexity) you/an attendant pulls your old pack out and slides in a new, fully charged one. You pay for the electricity used to charge it and a small charge for the station to pay employees, overhead for storing and maintaining packs etc and make a profit. This would also allow for somewhat centralized (around the station) electricity delivery/creation. It would be fairly simple to have the entire roof of a station be solar panels for example. You could of course still charge your existing pack at home as well if you choose. Larger vehicles (trucks for example) could simply have multiples of these packs so you'd pay to have two or three swapped out in this case. This of course would require smaller, lighter packs, standardization across the industry as well as some way of easily accessing them from all vehicles for swapping. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aGENT Posted November 28, 2012 Share Posted November 28, 2012 That is definitely an idea worth exploring. These stations would then just recharge the batteries they swapped out of cars, and when fully charged after a few hours, will put them out to be inserted into new cars. However, I guess this would make battery warranties pointless, seeing as you'd have a new battery pack after every charge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ronthecivil Posted November 28, 2012 Share Posted November 28, 2012 If the research/tech could get there... I'd love to see the "gas station" of the future carry compact, swappable battery packs. Imagine standardized battery packs that work across all vehicles that you merely swap out at stations so that you're able to travel far distances without recharging. You simply pull up and (depending on size/complexity) you/an attendant pulls your old pack out and slides in a new, fully charged one. You pay for the electricity used to charge it and a small charge for the station to pay employees, overhead for storing and maintaining packs etc and make a profit. This would also allow for somewhat centralized (around the station) electricity delivery/creation. It would be fairly simple to have the entire roof of a station be solar panels for example. You could of course still charge your existing pack at home as well if you choose. Larger vehicles (trucks for example) could simply have multiples of these packs so you'd pay to have two or three swapped out in this case. This of course would require smaller, lighter packs, standardization across the industry as well as some way of easily accessing them from all vehicles for swapping Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aGENT Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 Building a better battery is obviously a goal of a lot of research. However existing chemical batteries are really already closed to max what being a chemical reaction and all. There might be some neat things in the future using superconductivity but it's a ways off if ever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InTheCrease Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 Nuclear - the car might outlive refueling. http://auto.howstuff...powered-car.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aeromotacanucks Posted November 29, 2012 Author Share Posted November 29, 2012 Can you imaging an accident in a nuclear car? it would be the Pinto all over again.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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