Project Better Place - Page 16

JRP3 · 05-14-2009, 07:26 AM

Much like hydrogen, the more you look at PBP the worse it appears.

James · 05-14-2009, 08:20 AM

The posts the past few days, pointing out the problems with PBP swapping, are really good. A lot of really solid points exploring the real issues with this model.

From my experience with two EVs so far, the only viable solution is to make recharging stations common in parking lots and parking garages. Perhaps a parking meter / recharge station along streets.

220 volts / 40 amp recharging stations would just about handle anything. A one hour recharge would get most cars 20-25 miles of range so it would be perfect if that type of infrastructure was common in the shopping mall parking lots or grocery store parking lots.

"Shop at Best Buy and your recharge is FREE !!!"

If you were at work, your car would have 8-9 hours of recharge time during the day.

vfx · 05-14-2009, 09:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BBHighway

All winter long there has been virtually no demand at all for battery swaps at the beach, and suddenly there are 20,000 cars wanting batteries Friday evening, and another 20,000 on Sunday looking for a swap for the drive home.

So, what do you do?...

Reallocating inventory is not unusual. Seasonal distribution is quite common in many sectors. (think of the isles in your local store that are dedicated to holidays). That off-season stuff sits in warehouse all across the the country. And weather is something that is a factor on the ski slopes and the beach. Stuff happens.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BBHighway

,... you truck in battery packs for the weekend on diesel powered trucks, largely negating the advantage of using electric cars in the first place...

A diesel truck hauling 40 batteries is not that bad given the option of an equivalent tanker hauling gasoline to fill gasoline burning cars..

Also, a company that is in this business might well have an electric truck. See our TMC thread on the many available.

vfx · 05-14-2009, 09:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rsquared99

PBP is treating the battery like fuel,

So that brings it down to class. Consumers with money to own a home and a garage for charging don't need the PBP low budget car.

Less affluent need to buy the budget car and pay the PBP price for battery swap charging.

But it's really not that bad:

*Electric Fuel is 5 times cheaper than petrochemical fuel. It would take a lot of changes for electricity to get even close to gasoline prices -assuming gasoline pricing stays the same!

*cars will still be chargable and unlike sourcing gasoline, owners have the option and ability to get clever about charging at work, crazy long extension cords, plugging into street lamps, etc.

The reason PBP works is it covers everything at once. Solve the chicken/egg problem by getting an automaker to agree to make the car, get an isolated area like Hawaii and get them to agree to saturate the area with chargers. Everyone shakes hands and builds it.

* the PBP plan includes thousands and thousands of chagres in a region. The whole battery swap idea is there for two reasons.
1 for allaying "range anxiety" fears in a new customer market
2 legitimate long trips.

Charge stations are a marketing necessary evil. If it was not there it would be harder to sell the concept. Once they are in, they will surely fade from disuse.

James · 05-14-2009, 10:29 AM

I tried to summarize all of the posts here (that I agree with) on my blog.

Project Better Place is going to be a financial train wreck « Peak Oil Garage

vfx · 05-14-2009, 10:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vfx

Charge stations are a marketing necessary evil. If it was not there it would be harder to sell the concept. Once they are in, they will surely fade from disuse.

Anyone know the ratio? How many battery swap stations per charge stations? I'm thinking something like 50 battery swap stations per 1000 chargers.

Put most of them at the edges of town along highways and a few in very visible locations in the center of the cities. After all they are mostly for show until people realize hey don't need them.

BBHighway · 05-14-2009, 11:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vfx

Reallocating inventory is not unusual. Seasonal distribution is quite common in many sectors. (think of the isles in your local store that are dedicated to holidays). That off-season stuff sits in warehouse all across the the country. And weather is something that is a factor on the ski slopes and the beach. Stuff happens.

...

A diesel truck hauling 40 batteries is not that bad given the option of an equivalent tanker hauling gasoline to fill gasoline burning cars..

Also, a company that is in this business might well have an electric truck. See our TMC thread on the many available.

I'm not saying that these issues can't be worked out, just that everything is not just as simple as a car pulling into a garage and a robot taking care of everything. There are logistics that need to be to be dealt with. They aren't impossible, but they shouldn't just be ignored either.

Still, shipping electrons through a wire as needed sure sounds like an improvement over shipping gasoline in a tanker or shipping batteries on a truck.

James · 05-22-2009, 03:29 PM

AutoBlogGreen just wrote about our Project Better Place discussions here on TeslaMotorsClub.com

Thinking through the Better Place strategy: is it seriously flawed?

They referenced my summary on my website at PeakOilGarage.com

Project Better Place is going to be a financial train wreck « Peak Oil Garage

I had a few people in the discussion debating it.
But I also wrote that it was a summary of my thoughts and those of others from this thread on TMC.com.

JRP3 · 05-22-2009, 07:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vfx

*Electric Fuel is 5 times cheaper than petrochemical fuel. It would take a lot of changes for electricity to get even close to gasoline prices -assuming gasoline pricing stays the same!

Constructing extra battery packs, shipping them back and forth to swap stations, building complex machinery to swap them, adding complexity to vehicles to make packs swappable, and adding a profit margin to PBP, all go a along way to increasing the cost of electric Fuel.

Quote:

The reason PBP works is it covers everything at once. Solve the chicken/egg problem by getting an automaker to agree to make the car, get an isolated area like Hawaii and get them to agree to saturate the area with chargers. Everyone shakes hands and builds it.

Why would you ever need a swapping infrastructure, or even a fast charging infrastructure, in a small place like Hawaii? The longest dimension of the largest island is 93 miles. The smaller places such as Hawaii and Israel where this is being pushed are the last places you'd need swapping, it makes no sense at all.

James · 05-22-2009, 08:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JRP3

Why would you ever need a swapping infrastructure, or even a fast charging infrastructure, in a small place like Hawaii? The longest dimension of the largest island is 93 miles. The smaller places such as Hawaii and Israel where this is being pushed are the last places you'd need swapping, it makes no sense at all.

That is an excellent point. Current battery range can already make battery swapping pointless in Israel, Denmark and Hawaii. Imagine how useless those swap stations will be in five years when battery range has doubled.

Right now I am getting new LiFePO4 batteries to test from ThunderSky.
They are claiming their new 190 Ah batteries are the same physical dimensions as the older 160 Ah batteries.

That is almost a 19% improvement in energy density in just one quick jump.