New York Times brought out this article on Sunday narrating the experience of an electric car from behind the wheels. A good read!
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/opinion/sunday/26car.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=is%20this%20our%20future&st=cse
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Monday, June 27, 2011
The Wonder Car
Probably the two biggest topics in the news these days are technology companies’ IPOs and electric vehicles. While the former is out of the scope of this blog, despite their fantastic performance, I deem this a good time to write about electric cars in my post this week. The question that comes first to my mind is, where do I begin?:)
An electric car, per Wikipedia, is an automobile propelled by electric motors, using electrical energy stored in batteries or another energy storage device. Electric cars are not something new and they have been around for more than a century now. In fact, as Wikipedia has it, electric cars were preferred to gasoline cars at the dawn of the 20th century and only the rapid advancement in internal combustion engines coupled with the significant reduction in oil prices drove them out of the market. The vigor with which new models of electric vehicles are being rolled out, it seems that the time has come to right that wrong!
The most memorable push for electric vehicles in living history was during the 90s and mostly centered on California. California Air Resources Board (CARB), their emission control agency, mandated the development of zero emission vehicles which led to the development of EV1 by GM and RAV4 by Toyota. (Side note: GM swiftly, and almost shockingly, canceled their EV1 program, something that has been beautifully documented in the must-watch documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car”.) Toyota sold just about 1500 of RAV4s and cost and range limitation were cited as issues with the car.
Around the same time as RAV4, Toyota also started selling its hybrid car, the Prius. A hybrid car is one which can be powered by both gasoline and electricity. Typically, the distance such a car can be propelled by electricity is much smaller and the gas power takes over when this car is driven longer distances. The Toyota Prius uses a small, regenerative battery having a driving range of no more than a few miles. Charging of the battery is done internally by the gasoline engine and the energy generated in the car by the braking process. This car was hailed as an engineering breakthrough as it seamlessly combined the electric and gasoline fuel to propel a car. The smaller electric range in the car was just enough for the needs of the urban dweller, with enough miles to cover his/her trips to the grocery store. This is the reason why more than 2 million Priuses have been sold globally, so far.
It could be argued that the Prius used its battery power to supplement its gasoline engine. Lately, the major car companies have come up with models which have a markedly higher battery power, most prominent among them being Tesla Roadsters, GM’s Volt, Nissan’s Leaf and Toyota’s re-designed Prius. These cars have either significantly increased their mileage from electric power, like Volt and the reformed Prius, or have gone completely electric, like Leaf. The electric range of Volt is about 35 miles while the new Prius can take you upto 13-14 miles on its batteries. The all electric Leaf, on the other hand, can go about 73 miles with a single charge. The amount of power provided by a battery varies a lot with weather and driving conditions. So this number will go down if you are driving on a hot, humid day in dense traffic.
The most critical design element in these cars is the size of the battery, something whose impact cannot be undermined. Battery technology available today is really not capable of meeting the intense demands of electric transportation. The low energy density of batteries necessitates packing more volume of them to get a higher output. This greatly increased both the cost of a car, the cost of battery alone for Leaf is about $18,000 and the volume to fit the larger battery.
There has been a global push in research to drive down the cost of these batteries while also increasing their energy density. So, if you have an idea for a battery that is cheap and packs in a great energy, run straight to one of the car manufacturers! You could choose not to work for the rest of your life:)
Despite all the constraints, there is a definite tailwind behind electric cars, not only because of the generous subsidies provided by governments around the world but also because the common public is getting increasingly intrigued by the concept of charging a car like they charge their laptops or mobile phones. I knew that this topic will take up more than one blog post and I look to follow this up with more on battery technologies. I look forward to making one of you filthy rich!
An electric car, per Wikipedia, is an automobile propelled by electric motors, using electrical energy stored in batteries or another energy storage device. Electric cars are not something new and they have been around for more than a century now. In fact, as Wikipedia has it, electric cars were preferred to gasoline cars at the dawn of the 20th century and only the rapid advancement in internal combustion engines coupled with the significant reduction in oil prices drove them out of the market. The vigor with which new models of electric vehicles are being rolled out, it seems that the time has come to right that wrong!
The most memorable push for electric vehicles in living history was during the 90s and mostly centered on California. California Air Resources Board (CARB), their emission control agency, mandated the development of zero emission vehicles which led to the development of EV1 by GM and RAV4 by Toyota. (Side note: GM swiftly, and almost shockingly, canceled their EV1 program, something that has been beautifully documented in the must-watch documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car”.) Toyota sold just about 1500 of RAV4s and cost and range limitation were cited as issues with the car.
Around the same time as RAV4, Toyota also started selling its hybrid car, the Prius. A hybrid car is one which can be powered by both gasoline and electricity. Typically, the distance such a car can be propelled by electricity is much smaller and the gas power takes over when this car is driven longer distances. The Toyota Prius uses a small, regenerative battery having a driving range of no more than a few miles. Charging of the battery is done internally by the gasoline engine and the energy generated in the car by the braking process. This car was hailed as an engineering breakthrough as it seamlessly combined the electric and gasoline fuel to propel a car. The smaller electric range in the car was just enough for the needs of the urban dweller, with enough miles to cover his/her trips to the grocery store. This is the reason why more than 2 million Priuses have been sold globally, so far.
It could be argued that the Prius used its battery power to supplement its gasoline engine. Lately, the major car companies have come up with models which have a markedly higher battery power, most prominent among them being Tesla Roadsters, GM’s Volt, Nissan’s Leaf and Toyota’s re-designed Prius. These cars have either significantly increased their mileage from electric power, like Volt and the reformed Prius, or have gone completely electric, like Leaf. The electric range of Volt is about 35 miles while the new Prius can take you upto 13-14 miles on its batteries. The all electric Leaf, on the other hand, can go about 73 miles with a single charge. The amount of power provided by a battery varies a lot with weather and driving conditions. So this number will go down if you are driving on a hot, humid day in dense traffic.
The most critical design element in these cars is the size of the battery, something whose impact cannot be undermined. Battery technology available today is really not capable of meeting the intense demands of electric transportation. The low energy density of batteries necessitates packing more volume of them to get a higher output. This greatly increased both the cost of a car, the cost of battery alone for Leaf is about $18,000 and the volume to fit the larger battery.
There has been a global push in research to drive down the cost of these batteries while also increasing their energy density. So, if you have an idea for a battery that is cheap and packs in a great energy, run straight to one of the car manufacturers! You could choose not to work for the rest of your life:)
Despite all the constraints, there is a definite tailwind behind electric cars, not only because of the generous subsidies provided by governments around the world but also because the common public is getting increasingly intrigued by the concept of charging a car like they charge their laptops or mobile phones. I knew that this topic will take up more than one blog post and I look to follow this up with more on battery technologies. I look forward to making one of you filthy rich!
Monday, June 13, 2011
Let there be light!
If a survey was carried out for the most innocuous, under-rated, unassuming piece of equipment in anybody’s home, the incandescent light bulb would probably be top the list. After all, how many of us even register the presence of this ubiquitous bulb in our homes, until we get rid of it for the “cooler” and energy efficient CFL. Well, it might come as a surprise to all of you that this same old bulb is lining up to be at the center of a great battle in the near future. Find out below why exactly it should be so.
Light was not always meant to be this abundant and easy as it is today until electricity came along. Prior to electricity, light was expensive, a product of exhaustible, and expensive, resources like whale oil. Edison’s invention really made light a commodity and took it to the masses in limitless quantities. On Dec 31, 1879 he unveiled his incandescent device, which provided illumination by running a current through a filament encased in a vacuum-sealed glass bulb. The newspapers compared the orange glow of the bulb to the “mellow sunset of an Italian autumn”. Obviously, not everyone agreed. Remember that this bulb was competing against the gas flame and some found the light to be unnatural and lacking the comforting attributes of the latter.
The initial bulbs were fairly expensive as well, going for 44 cents apiece in 1891, which when adjusted for inflation becomes $10 in today’s world. However, as electricity became the backbone of lighting in the world, the price of bulbs keeps plummeting. Falling prices and the rapidly growing demand for the existing product stalled advancements in home lighting for more than a century. That the bulb was highly inefficient, giving off 90% of its energy as heat and not light, was largely ignored in the hundred years that ensued. It was not until the energy crises of 1970s that these shortcomings of the bulb came to light, pun intended, and compact fluorescents were invented.
This sets up a nice background about the current war being waged in the realm of lighting products in the US. The US Congress approved a bill in 2007, which mandated a 25-30% increase in lighting efficiency starting January of 2012. The incandescent bulb, as we know it, is not capable of being that efficient; this could very well be the end of the 150 year old invention. As the deadline for this law draws closer, the arguments get more polarized and one could see a badly waged battle on this front.
There are two issues at stake in this debate, price and quality of light. That the Edison’s bulb is dirt cheap is already acknowledged. What is often missed is the quality of light this bulb produces. Research says that the light from an incandescent bulb mimics the natural spectrum and produces light that is in best agreement with the human physiology. CFLs and other forms of lighting products are believed to produce light that is “unnatural”, to say the least and could potentially be harmful to our physiology. This is one argument that would be played several times in this debate.
The ride has not been smooth for these CFLs since their inception and any amount of subsidies or “green branding” has not made the light bulb obsolete. The price of a CFL could be the primary reason for its mild acceptance; the first CFLs sold for $25-$35 a bulb in the 1970s.
There is also active interest in using LEDs(Light Emitting Diodes) for lighting. Scientists at Phillips have put together a LED bulb that also produces light that nicely agrees with the natural spectrum. One such bulb is supposed to last anywhere between 17 and 22 years but the cost of one is an exorbitant $40. Getting this number to a price less than $10 apiece, the magic number reported for consumer acceptance, is only part of the problem. This product would also require intelligent marketing to sell a product that is supposed to last for a generation. Proponents of this technology claim that switching to LED bulbs from the traditional ones would eliminate carbon emissions by 200 million tons, about 3% of the total US carbon emissions.
The next time when you look at your bulb, if you still own one, make sure you remember the 150 year history it carries:)
Light was not always meant to be this abundant and easy as it is today until electricity came along. Prior to electricity, light was expensive, a product of exhaustible, and expensive, resources like whale oil. Edison’s invention really made light a commodity and took it to the masses in limitless quantities. On Dec 31, 1879 he unveiled his incandescent device, which provided illumination by running a current through a filament encased in a vacuum-sealed glass bulb. The newspapers compared the orange glow of the bulb to the “mellow sunset of an Italian autumn”. Obviously, not everyone agreed. Remember that this bulb was competing against the gas flame and some found the light to be unnatural and lacking the comforting attributes of the latter.
The initial bulbs were fairly expensive as well, going for 44 cents apiece in 1891, which when adjusted for inflation becomes $10 in today’s world. However, as electricity became the backbone of lighting in the world, the price of bulbs keeps plummeting. Falling prices and the rapidly growing demand for the existing product stalled advancements in home lighting for more than a century. That the bulb was highly inefficient, giving off 90% of its energy as heat and not light, was largely ignored in the hundred years that ensued. It was not until the energy crises of 1970s that these shortcomings of the bulb came to light, pun intended, and compact fluorescents were invented.
This sets up a nice background about the current war being waged in the realm of lighting products in the US. The US Congress approved a bill in 2007, which mandated a 25-30% increase in lighting efficiency starting January of 2012. The incandescent bulb, as we know it, is not capable of being that efficient; this could very well be the end of the 150 year old invention. As the deadline for this law draws closer, the arguments get more polarized and one could see a badly waged battle on this front.
There are two issues at stake in this debate, price and quality of light. That the Edison’s bulb is dirt cheap is already acknowledged. What is often missed is the quality of light this bulb produces. Research says that the light from an incandescent bulb mimics the natural spectrum and produces light that is in best agreement with the human physiology. CFLs and other forms of lighting products are believed to produce light that is “unnatural”, to say the least and could potentially be harmful to our physiology. This is one argument that would be played several times in this debate.
The ride has not been smooth for these CFLs since their inception and any amount of subsidies or “green branding” has not made the light bulb obsolete. The price of a CFL could be the primary reason for its mild acceptance; the first CFLs sold for $25-$35 a bulb in the 1970s.
There is also active interest in using LEDs(Light Emitting Diodes) for lighting. Scientists at Phillips have put together a LED bulb that also produces light that nicely agrees with the natural spectrum. One such bulb is supposed to last anywhere between 17 and 22 years but the cost of one is an exorbitant $40. Getting this number to a price less than $10 apiece, the magic number reported for consumer acceptance, is only part of the problem. This product would also require intelligent marketing to sell a product that is supposed to last for a generation. Proponents of this technology claim that switching to LED bulbs from the traditional ones would eliminate carbon emissions by 200 million tons, about 3% of the total US carbon emissions.
The next time when you look at your bulb, if you still own one, make sure you remember the 150 year history it carries:)
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