Green Options » Automobiles

Tesla Roadster Pictures From SF Green [Pics]

Clayton B. Cornell — Thu, 15 May 2008 18:35:51 +0000

In San Francisco last week I happened to bump into a Tesla Roadster outside SF Green. The pictures are below, but I also wanted to highlight something Daryl Siry, VP of sales marketing and service for Tesla Motors said during the event.

Daryl commented that yes, $100K is a lot to pay for an electric car (he also mentioned the new Whitestar sedan would be around $70k), but he reiterated how expensive the technology is for small companies.

To bring the price down (which is the eventual goal), he said that Tesla Moors would be open to partnering with larger automotive companies who have the manufacturing capacity to offer lower pricepoints to consumers. In other words, Tesla could offer their drivetrain up for implementation into larger scale production, and everybody would win as a result.

Any auto manufacturers hear that? I’d sure love to see an affordable electric car sometime soon.

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Photo Credits: Yours Truly, courtesy of Cristina at Huddler

Nissan to Sell Electric Cars in US by 2010

Clayton B. Cornell — Thu, 15 May 2008 17:43:37 +0000

The New York Times reported on Tuesday that Nissan plans to sell electric cars in the US in 2010. Nissan’s chief executive, Carlos Ghosn, said the company was motivated to accelerate the development of battery-powered vehicles by high gas prices and environmental concerns. Nissan expects to expand to a globally-marketed fleet of 60 electric vehicles by 2012.

John O’Dell, senior editor of GreenCarAdvisor.com, noted that this was a major announcement for the auto industry: “Nissan is upping the ante tremendously. They are the first to put it on the line and say we’re going to have an all-electric vehicle for a certain market by a certain date.”

According to the NYT, Nissan will be the first auto manufacturer to mass market all-electric vehicles worldwide. Mr. Ghosn didn’t offer much in the way of details about specific models or production numbers (he said said it would only be “hundreds of vehicles” at first). The new products for the US market would be something along the lines of a new Maxima sedan, Cube small car, and a new version of Z-family sports cars.

Mr. Ghosn added to the predominant sentiment in renewable technology investment these days: “What we are seeing is that the shifts coming from the markets are more powerful than what regulators are doing.”

“We are not interested in some ‘Stars Wars’ prototype,” he said, “but in really bringing a mass market product that everybody can buy. It’s really a new chapter in the life of this industry.”

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Source: New York Times (May 13, 2008): Nissan Plans Electric Car in U.S. by ’10

Photo Credit: Wikipedia Commons under GNU Free Documentation License.

A Truck That Runs on Coffee Grounds (and How Wood-Gas Powers Cars With Garbage)

Clayton B. Cornell — Wed, 14 May 2008 20:23:30 +0000

The Cafe Racer Truck Runs on 100% Recycled Coffee Grounds

A commenter on Ben’s wood-powered truck post pointed us to a similar car hack. The truck above is also powered by a wood gas generator, except this one runs on coffee grounds. The Cafe Racer is a 1975 GMC pickup that essentially burns up used coffee to create a combustible gas. The gas is filtered on its way to the engine and, Viola, a caffeine-powered truck.

It’s interesting to note that this and the last vehicle mentioned are promoting a specific fuel (wood and coffee grounds), since the onboard wood gas generators can gasify almost any type of combustible material.

Gasification is a non-selective method using heat and a controlled amount of oxygen to convert biomass into a flammable vapor. In addition to Coffee Grounds, the Cafe Racer could use wood chips, old tires, and municipal trash, almost anything—which, by the way, is the same technology Coskata is using to make cellulosic ethanol out of garbage.

As Wikipedia puts it, gasification “was an important and familiar 19th century technology” that was commonly used until petroleum took over around the close of WWII. Although popular at that time, wood gas conversions are a bit of a throw back, but you never know what could gain popularity as gas prices continue to rise. Additionally, wood gas generators aren’t restricted to vehicles, and have found use in heating, cooking, and electricity production.

So how can a wood gas generator power a truck?

The reason a wood gas generator can power cars and trucks is that the internal combustion engine is actually powered by vapor, not liquid. In a gasoline-powered engine, gasoline is vaporized before entering the combustion chamber. Diesel is a little different; it’s sprayed into the combustion chamber as fine droplets which burn as they vaporize. Either way, if you can put a clean combustible vapor into the engine, you’ve got power*.

(*Just to mention where this information is coming from, I thought I’d point out this interesting factoid: back in 1989, FEMA sponsored a series of “emergency technology assessments” that included a book on gasification conversions. The title of the book is “Construction of a Simplified Wood Gas Generator for Fueling Internal Combustion Engines in a Petroleum emergency.”)

Gasifying a solid material partially burns it, which preserves some of the energy that would normally be wasted in the gas (otherwise there wouldn’t be anything left for the engine to burn). The gas contains a mixture of carbon monoxide (CO), hydrogen (H2), carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrogen (N), and a small amount of methane (CH4).

The big question for wood gas use is (as usual), how do these systems compare to other petroleum alternatives in terms of environmental impact? The group behind Cafe Racer claims that it’s a carbon-negative demonstration vehicle, but they don’t substantiate that on their website. I wasn’t able to find much on the issue, except the risk of death from carbon monoxide poisoning in poorly designed systems, but my gut instinct tells me this isn’t the cleanest way to get around. If you know of a resource on the emissions of wood gas generators, please send it my way.

The important point here isn’t so much that you can run a truck on wood gas produced from waste materials (even though that’s pretty cool), but that this technology could play a major role in producing petroleum alternatives in the near future (more on that later).

If you enjoyed reading about this, check out these links, and see more pictures of the Cafe Racer below:

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Photo Credit: studiodeb at Flickr under a Creative Commons license

Sorry Folks, VW Diesel Electric Hybrid Not Coming to US

Clayton B. Cornell — Mon, 12 May 2008 17:00:47 +0000

Diesel Hybrid Electric Golf Doesn’t Make it out of the Showroom

It looks like VW won’t be sending a diesel hybrid to the US after all. VW announced the 70 MPG diesel-hybrid electric Golf at the Geneva Motor Show, but turned around in the March 27 edition of Auto, Motor und Sport to say they wouldn’t be building the car because it would be “too expensive.”

I’m not sure how this story slipped under the radar (except that the magazine is written in German), but the VW hybrid Golf’s demise is unfortunate. Pairing a clean diesel engine with hybrid system seems like the best of both worlds (especially for biodiesel users), but we might just have to rely on Mercedes and their diesel-hybrid SUV for now.

For more on what the car would have been, see A Biodiesel Prius? VW To Release 69.9 MPG Diesel Hybrid.

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2009 Jetta BlueTDI Comes to US This Summer, Sports 60 MPG and Cleaner Emissions

Clayton B. Cornell — Fri, 09 May 2008 17:20:44 +0000

VW’s Jetta BlueTDI: 60 MPG, 90% Emissions Reduction for NOx

VW’s ultra-low emission Jetta BlueTDI will be coming to the US mid-summer, according to an announcement made late last month at the Vienna Motor Symposium.

This newer version of the Jetta will meet the strictest emissions standards in the world—BIN5/LEV2—which are enforced by 5 US states: California, Massachusetts, Maine, New York, and Vermont. BIN5/LEV2 standards severely cap nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions (0.05 g/mile), one of the two tailpipe pollutants that have given diesels a bad rap (that and particulate matter).

As it happens, Bin5/LEV2 standards are tougher than their European counterpart, the Euro-5, and VW had to custom modify the Jetta BlueTDI for the North American market. NOx reductions were met with internal engine modifications—some of which are “unique worldwide”—and a maintenance-free NOx exhaust trap. Altogether, this system reduces NOx emissions by 90%.

Combining clean emissions with a road-tested 60 MPG highway fuel economy could make this a winner in the US. Dr. Ing. Jens Hadler, Director of Volkswagen Powertrain Development commented:

[H]igh fuel prices and a dramatic change in environmental consciousness means that diesel is becoming more and more attractive for American drivers every day. This is why many customers, especially in California, have been waiting for a super-clean diesel like our BlueTDI. I think this motor will help the diesel get its big break in America because it consumes so little and yet can go such long distances on a single fill-up. And in a country as big as the United States, this is a priceless advantage. On the highway, for example, this engine can reach up to 60 miles per gallon. This is an improvement of 12 percent over its predecessor, which had a lower capacity and higher emissions.

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[Via]

Photo Credit: VW

MicroFueler Makes $1/gal Homebrew Ethanol From Sugar

Clayton B. Cornell — Thu, 08 May 2008 18:59:04 +0000

Homemade ethanol guru Floyd S. Butterfield and Silicon Valley entrepreneur and innovator Thomas J. Quinn want to see you making ethanol in your backyard. Their creation, called the E-Fuel 100 MicroFueler, is a stacked washer-dryer sized reactor that can convert sugar into ethanol for (they claim) $1.00 per gallon.

Before you get too excited, please note that the unit is probably too expensive for your next block party, unless you’ve got an extra $9,995 lying around somewhere. Fortunately, state and Federal tax credits can halve this, but that still keeps it out of the price range of the average American.

How could making ethanol be so expensive? As Thomas Quinn quipped, this is “third-grade science. You just mix together water, sugar and yeast, and in a few hours, you start getting ethanol.” That’s not the hard part; what’s difficult is purifying ethanol to the degree that it can be mixed successfully with gasoline.

Ethanol has been made from yeast-fermentation of grain, fruits, and vegetables for thousands of years. Distillation, which gets around the 15% alcohol concentration limit that kills yeast, followed shortly thereafter. Adding ethanol to motor fuel takes things one step further. To mix properly with gasoline, ethanol must be anhydrous (containing no water) at 100% pure, or 200-proof. Homemade ethanol stills can easily produce 95% pure, or 190-proof, ethanol. But getting that last 5% of water out of the ethanol can require just as much energy as it did to get out the first 95%.

It could be the ingenuity of putting several thousand years of knowledge into one box makes the MicroFueler so costly. It can fill its own 35-gallon tank with E100 (100% ethanol) in about a week by fermenting the sugar, water and yeast internally, then separating out the water through a membrane filter.

Compared to homebrewing biodiesel, which can be done with less than $100 worth of equipment, making ethanol for motor fuel seems complicated and expensive. While sugar appears to be a cheap, ubiquitous resource, according to one expert it takes 10 to 14 pounds of sugar to make a gallon of ethanol. Right now, raw sugar sells in the United States for about 20 cents a pound.

Although the cost of each gallon of ethanol produced in the MicroFueler depends on the price of sugar, electricity, and water, Thomas Quinn maintains that it can be made for somewhere around $1 per gallon. The company is trying to make inedible sugar available from Mexico, which can be bought for as little as 2.5 cents per pound.

I like the idea, but this probably isn’t something that will go mainstream unless the price comes down. If you want more information about homebrewing ethanol, or plans to make your own still (which would be substantially cheaper), see these resources:

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Via: NYT
Photo Credit: Popular Mechanics

Are Plug-Ins and Electric Cars A Health Hazard?

Max Lindberg — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 16:17:52 +0000

It had to happen, just when we were beginning to think that plug-in hybrid and electric cars were the best things since sliced bread, someone has intimated that there may be a health risk involved in driving those vehicles.

You remember, the power line scare back in the ’70’s (which really hasn’t gone away) and of course the more recent flap about cell phones emitting dangerous electromagnetic fields to the brain. In case you want to read more on these issues, a specific Google entry should suffice.Now, before you go somewhere else, hang on, there’s more to this electromagnetic field issue than you may think. That’s coming up, along with a short tip of the hat to the man who got us started on our way to the world we live in.

Back to the story. A New York Times article suggests that the flow of electrical current to the motor that moves a vehicle, in this case a hybrid, sets up very large electromagnetic fields that could result in health risks to both adults and children. Again, the reference here is to children and the danger of leukemia. Sound familiar?

Now, we live with electromagnetic fields (EMF) every day. Where electric current flows, generally speaking, there are EMF’s of varying degrees. There are no specific government, or scientific standards for EMF exposure, so much of this concern is pure conjecture, or so it seems. As for plug-ins and electric cars, it is thought that drivers and passengers could be exposed to large EMF’s for extended periods of time.

The NYT article told the story of a Staten Island woman who bought a Honda Civic Hybrid in 2007. She drove the car about 200 miles each week as part of her employment. After a while, the woman said she fell asleep at the wheel three times, and her blood pressure rose. She believes the strong electromagnetic fields produced by electrical systems in the car caused the malady.

There could be many causes for her affliction, but just remember that it’s her reality, specific to her alone. The woman clearly stated those were her own conclusions and not based on a doctor’s opinion.

To make a long story short, both Toyota and Honda say their hybrids meet all recognized safety standards. They say their plug-ins are tested for EMF’s and they stand by the safety of their products.

Just to set the record straight, man-made EMF’s may not be the only threat to health. A recent article in New Scientist tells of research in Russia that indicates the earth’s very own EMF’s may result in suicides. And there is ongoing research into the effects of the earth’s magnetic fields on humans. A trip to Google is suggested for further research.

While preparing for this article, I thought of the man who brought electromagnetism into the public mainstream, and made everything we hold electrically dear today possible.

His name, Nikola (Nicholas) Tesla, a Serbian immigrant born in 1856. He’s often been called “the man who invented the twentieth century.”

Tesla held more than a hundred patents, including the transmission of electric power, an electro-magentic motor, a regulation system for alternating current, which powers our world today. His inventions made radio and TV possible, his induction motor has made it possible for nearly everything that moves on wheels today. In spite of all that, he never became financially wealthy, dying in 1943, and according to some, penniless.

Was Tesla affected by electromagnetic fields? After all, he spent his life exploring them, often living for hours within high concentrations. He was 87 when he died. Could they have helped extend his life, or were his genes just right for a long life?

There’s a story on EV World about Tesla’s so-called “Black Magic” touring car. It was a 1931 Pierce-Arrow, supposedly converted by Tesla and his nephew to run on some sort of energy created out of a box of electronic circuitry measuring 24 x 12 x 6 inches. He replaced the gasoline engine with an electric motor, hooked the circuit box up to the motor and they were off. The car is said to have been capable of reaching speeds up to 90 mph.

Eventually, the car reportedly wound up on a farm near Buffalo, New York, and the magic “converter” box disappeared.

The article asks, had he tapped into the earth’s magnetic field, or, found zero point energy or gravitation waves?

I’m sure we’ll never know.

As for today’s hybrids and electric cars being dangerous to our health, it appears more scientific study is needed to answer that question.

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Bolt-On Kits Convert Cars to 85% Ethanol, Part of Green Auto Service Offered by AAMCO

Clayton B. Cornell — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 20:56:37 +0000

Converting the nation’s vehicle fleet to run on 85% ethanol (Flex-Fuel) may have gotten a whole lot easier.

AAMCO, one of the world’s largest chains of automotive service centers, has started an initiative designed to promote environmental sustainability and energy efficiency across the nation.

The Eco-Green Auto Service initiative will certify automotive centers that meet a stringent set of criteria while adding services that cut emissions, improve mileage, and reduce hazardous waste associated with owning a vehicle.

AAMCO is also promoting alternative fuels by installing E85 conversion kits that allow vehicles to run on ethanol blends up to 85%. Their service centers will use kits provided by Flex Fuel US ®, called the FLEX-BOX SMART KIT™, which is the only ethanol conversion kit fleet-certified by the EPA.

The FLEX-BOX is an aftermarket bolt-on kit that continuously monitors the engine’s emissions and delivers supplementary fuel injection as needed, since blending high levels of ethanol into gasoline will make the engine run lean.

As I mentioned yesterday, auto manufacturers tend to make a big fuss out of vehicle conversions like this one. General Motors has done so with their plan to convert half their fleet to run on 85% ethanol by 2012, and there really isn’t an incentive for them to convert older vehicles. I haven’t found out how much these conversions cost yet, but AAMCO’s website indicates that up to 85% (coincidence) of the conversion price can be offset by state tax credits.

Only one problem though: all the ethanol in the US is currently made from food. If you feel like filling your gas tank with corn, the price of a gallon of E85 is only $2.67, although that works out to about the same price as gas when you factor in the lower energy content of ethanol. Converting the nation’s automobile fleet to E85 doesn’t seem to make sense until cellulosic ethanol facilities go online.

AAMCO’s Eco-Green auto service has other important attributes besides ethanol conversions though. They’ll be attempting to create a “closed-loop environment” to recycle materials and eliminate waste streams, such as recycling waste transmission fluid into fuel to power heaters or air conditioners. AAMCO will also be using water-based cleaners to avoid hazardous solvents and will be using biodegradable lubricants (like vegetable oil) in their hydraulic equipment.

“We are creating a closed-loop environment for our centers, where whatever comes in is reused, and whatever goes out has minimal or no environmental impact,” says Todd Leff, AAMCO’s CEO. “Our franchisees are converting their centers into the cleanest car care businesses on the planet. I’ve long believed the automotive aftermarket industry can do more to minimize its impact. Now AAMCO centers are out to make a difference.”

To learn more: AAMCO’s Eco-Green auto service and Flex Fuel US ®.

To find an environmental friendly auto-service center, click here.

Without Clean Electricity, Plug-In Vehicles aren’t So Hot

Benjamin Jones — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 16:47:05 +0000

This is something I (and a lot of other people) have been wondering about for a while in regards to plug-in electric vehicles (PHEVs, like the Chevy Volt) and pure electric vehicles (EVs, like the Lightning GT and Subaru R1e). PHEVs are not a new thing, and they have been discussed on Gas2.0 before, but there is some interesting news that recently came out of Carnegie Mellon University suggesting that if we don’t make our power generation system less carbon intensive, PHEVs could have little benefit over regular hybrids (HEVs).

More after the jump!

Unfortunately, if you want to see the original article, you’ll have to buy it, but for the rest of us, Green Car Congress has written a good article about the findings and the implications of this study.

There is no doubt that PHEVs result in good fuel economy figures — GM is currently touting its PHEV-to be, the Volt, as getting 150MPG over all. However, they aren’t necessarily super efficient. Instead, they achieve these high numbers by supplementing the power produced by their gasoline engines with power taken from the grid. This has caused controversy lately, as hybrid-opponents often claim that battery production and the use of energy from the grid actually makes these cars bigger GHG polluters. However, if you look at this chart posted by GCC, you can see that both HEVs and PHEVs have a clear advantage over conventional cars, even when battery production is factored in:

This chart assumes the national mix of power from the grid, and as I said, shows pretty clearly the advantage of HEVs over conventional vehicles (CVs), but also shows that with the current mix of power sources on the grid, PHEVs aren’t that much better than your standard HEVs. I don’t say this to suggest that we should be shutting down PHEV research or production, but rather I think we should embrace the ability to consolidate our efforts in “greening” only one particular industry rather than trying to attack every one separately.

What I mean by this is that if our vehicles all drew power from the grid, making the grid more efficient would both improve standard energy usage as well as make motor vehicles less polluting. As it stands now there is a huge rift, where some are trying to improve the grid by adding things like wind power and others are trying to improve vehicle fuel economy or introduce hydrogen cars.

In fact, as noted by GCC, if the grid were low-carbon, PHEVs would reduce lifecycle GHG emissions of 51-63%, something anyone would admit is a huge improvement for motor vehicles.

You can check out this chart (if you can read it, click for a bigger version) to see how the different vehicles compare under different scenarios:

How do you all feel about PHEVs? Are they the new thing of the future or just another set-back on the way to pure EVs? Or is a hydrogen economy in store for us in the future?

Mercedes 40-MPG Diesel Hybrid: Cleanest SUV on the Planet

Clayton B. Cornell — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:38:51 +0000

Mercedes plans to release a diesel-hybrid SUV capable of 40 miles per gallon, with cleaner emissions than your standard car. Demo’d at the 2008 Geneva Auto show, the SUV is built on Mercedes’ relatively new BlueTec emissions control technology—a combination of catalytic converters and advanced chemical processing that scrubs out the worst pollutants produced by the diesel engine.

The 4-cylinder, 214 horsepower engine will also break the world’s record for lowest carbon emissions (157 g/km) in an SUV.

The new Vision GLK BlueTec hybrid sports a standard hybrid-electric system: An electric motor seamlessly supplements the 2.2 liter diesel engine during fuel-intensive acceleration. Regenerative braking repowers the lithium-ion batteries, and start-stop technology shuts the motor off when the car is at a dead stop.

What isn’t standard is the 40 MPG fuel economy, which beats many passenger cars but still gives SUV-hungry consumers the option. I’ve never been that impressed by sub-30 MPG hybrids (or straight 30, like the original Ford Escape Hybrid SUV) even if the industry claims the hybrid drivetrain boosts fuel economy on any model by 25%.

It isn’t clear from the story when we might expect to see this model released, but if I had to guess I would say 2010—which seems to be the year for big changes in green car technology.

Will Mercedes support a 40 MPG biodiesel SUV? Don’t count on it. At this point Mercedes only supports a B5 biodiesel blend in their common-rail (CDI) diesel engines.

Via: Ecogeek

Smaller Is Bigger

Max Lindberg — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 02:59:02 +0000

Car buyers are thinking small.

Auto sales in the U.S. during the last three months have been down, except for the smaller, cheaper and not-so-thirsty cars, with starting prices from $12,000 to $14,000, according to Autodata.

The Toyota Yaris led sales with a 70% increase, Honda’s Fit sales were up 61%, and Kia’s Spectra saw a 41% increase in sales. While the percentages are impressive, the number of cars sold is not large.

15,651 Honda Fit’s were sold in the first quarter, and Toyota moved 30,377 Yaris models in the same period. Sales leader was the Ford Focus, when 49,070 cars drove off the salesroom floor, closely followed by over 48,000 Chevrolet Cobalt sales.

Take a look at some of the top-selling smaller cars this year.

The figures are comparisons with 2007 sales figures for the same period and represent the only bright spot in U.S. auto sales so far this year.

150 MPG Chevy Volt Sneak Peak Video

Clayton B. Cornell — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 20:51:13 +0000

Yesterday, according to Jalopnik, a reporter leaked out the first video of the Chevy Volt electric car. While GM is keeping their work under pretty tight lock and key, the excitement is tangible—even though the car won’t be officially released for another 2 years (2010)!

Check out the video (click on the image to go to Jolopnik) to see what the release model might look like (that is, if you can estimate what’s underneath about 10 yards of duct tape). There’s also some discussion about the Volt getting 150 MPG, and the advances in battery technology since the EV1.

How Solar Panels Could Power 90% of US Transportation

Clayton B. Cornell — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 21:26:57 +0000

In January, Scientific American writers unleashed an ambitious plan to halt global warming, eliminate our dependence on petroleum and the substantial trade deficit, boost the economy and create 3 million jobs, and brighten the dismal forecasts for the mid twenty-first century.

The plan is conceptually simple but would be substantial to implement:

Construct a 30,000 square mile array of solar panels in the Southwest,
along with concentrated solar power arrays and,
a massive direct-current power transmission backbone to distribute electricity throughout the country.
Excess power produced by the photovoltaic arrays would be distributed and stored as compressed air in below-ground caverns.

Development of such a system could provide almost three-quarters of the nation’s electricity by 2050.

If this sounds like fantasy-land, it’s not. The technology is already here, and even if it wasn’t the need for renewable power is very real. Some scientists are calling for an all-out Manhattan-Project-style focus on developing alternative energy sources. One thing is almost certain: if we can’t move beyond coal as our (worldwide) primary energy source, we’re in for a rocky future.

I’ve written several posts lately about plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and their need for renewable energy charging sources. PHEVs are a stepping stone as the future of transportation heads toward electric vehicles powered either by batteries or hydrogen fuel cells. Solar power would be the ultimate source of clean energy for either type of electric vehicle.

The authors of the Scientific American article think all of this energy can come from solar power. Here are some excerpts:

Utilizing only 2.5% of the sun’s energy falling onto the 250,000 square miles in the Southwest suitable for constructing solar power plants could match the total power used in the US in 2006.
With a massive investment in solar power plants and infrastructure, solar could provide 69% of US electricity and 35% of total energy (including transportation) by 2050.
If wind, biomass, and geothermal power sources were also developed, the US could produce 100% of its electricity and 90% of its transportation energy (in the form of hydrogen) from renewable sources.
To make this happen, the US would have to invest $10 billion per year for the next 40 years. For comparison, the US is now spending $12 billion per month for military involvement Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz. The entire solar array would cost approximately 15% of the total bill for both of these operations. $420 billion is also less than the tax subsidies paid for the nation’s telecommunications infrastructure in the last 35 years.
A conversion to renewable energy of this scale would displace 300 coal and 300 natural gas-fired power plants, and eliminate all imported oil. Even better, greenhouse-gas emissions would be reduced to 62% below 2005 levels.

In sum, the potential is there, but it’s going to take some work. As the authors conclude:

The greatest obstacle to implementing a renewable U.S. energy system is not technology or money, however. It is the lack of public awareness that solar power is a practical alternative—and one that can fuel transportation as well. Forward-looking thinkers should try to inspire U.S. citizens, and their political and scientific leaders, about solar power’s incredible potential. Once Americans realize that potential, we believe the desire for energy self-sufficiency and the need to reduce carbon dioxide emissions will prompt them to adopt a national solar plan.

NEW: First Algae Biodiesel Plant Goes Online April 1, 2008

Read Sustainablog’s take on this article here.

Source: Scientific American (Jan. 2008): A Solar Grand Plan

Photo Credit: GreenOptions

Need a New Car? Nope, Just a New Engine!

Benjamin Jones — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 02:34:01 +0000

Image source: motoringfile

Engine Repower is a new (as far as I can tell) service that gives car owners the option of replacing their old, worn out engine with a rebuilt engine of the same vintage instead of simply buying a new car or repairing specific problems. When a first saw this page, I was very interested, as I am a proponent of keeping your car as long as possible to reduce wasteful manufacturing processes, even in the face of promises of lower emissions made by newer cars.

For more on repowering, follow the jump!

Here’s what Engine Repower has to say about their service:

Technology and auto manufacturing have advanced dramatically in the past two decades. Cars and trucks last longer. Paint is better. Bodies are more corrosion resistant. Interior materials are more durable, and even suspension and other components last longer. So when an engine “dies,” it does not have to be the end of your vehicle. When a car or truck suffers major engine damage, the first response and reaction of many consumers is to buy a new or used vehicle. Sometimes disposing of your current vehicle might make sense, but often it’s simply not necessary.

Obviously, being an advertisement, they are very high on themselves, but they do make some good points. When cars die, it seems it is most often due to accidents or blown engines. Very rarely do cars rust so badly or generally devolve to a point of undrivability before the engine begins to have trouble. Also, one of the biggest issues with emissions from old vehicles is that those vehicles have fallen out of spec and are no longer getting the best fuel economy or releasing the least emissions.

The Engine Repowering Council seems to focus on domestic vehicles, but using their find-a-shop feature, it’s likely that you can find someone to rebuild an engine of almost any make. These engines almost always come with warranties and, in my opinion (as someone who has worked at a shop in the past), will be rebuilt as carefully as anything else coming from that shop. So, if you’re considering this, pick a shop you know and trust, and that offers a good warranty.

While the service is certainly not ideal (you can’t just put a newer, cleaner engine in an old car), the ability to put life and reliability back into an old car is about as close as you can get to recycling and reusing in the automotive world.

Google To Spend $10 Million on Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle Project

Clayton B. Cornell — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 22:36:15 +0000

As usual, Google is at the forefront of, well, everything. But this one is a little surprising: their philanthropic branch, Google.org, is putting $10 million into plug-in electric hybrid research and real-world testing. If you’ve been reading Gas 2.0 lately, you already know that’s as much as will be rewarded to the winners of the 2010 Automotive X Prize for revolutionary green car technology.

Last September, Google offered up the $10 million in a formal Request For Proposals (RFP), saying they wanted to invest in any company that would “accelerate the commercialization of alternative transportation that reduces vehicle fossil fuel use and climate emissions.” In other words, getting plug-in hybrids, fully electric vehicles, vehicle-to-grid capabilities, and batteries and other storage technologies on the market.

Google’s own project, called RechargeIT, hopes to accelerate the development of plug-in hybrid and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology. They’ve already set up a demonstration fleet by adding plugs and batteries to four Prius and two Ford Escape Hybrids. In an ongoing analysis, Google will be using performance data from the fleet to examine the usefulness of plug-in hybrids and their ability to transfer power to and from the electricity grid (that’s the V2G part). Google will also experiment with drawing power for the cars from their solar charging stations campus.

You can follow along with the results of Google’s performance data on the RechargIT.org dashboard or blog. You can also compare emissions and mileage data to your own vehicle with Google’s Vehicle Calculator.

To find out more about how a Prius or Escape hybrid can be converted into a 100 mpg+ plug-in vehicle, see these posts:

Source: SolveClimate.com (Mar. 23, 2008): Google’s New Search Function: The Best Eco-Engine

Photo Credit: RechargeIT.org

Tesla’s First Electric Vehicle, 2008 Roadster, Now Under Production

Clayton B. Cornell — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 21:18:06 +0000

On March 17, Tesla Motors began limited production of their all-electric, zero-emissions sportscar, the Tesla Roadster. It’s a car that can go from 0-60 in 5.7 seconds without using a drop of gas, and promises to be the first of a wave of new plug-in electric vehicles available in the United States.

It’s been almost 2 years since Tesla debuted the prototype in July of 2006, but Tesla had to delay release until now due to problems with the Roadster’s two-speed transmission. The vehicle will go into production anyway with in interim transmission, and Tesla is offering a free powertrain upgrade, when it becomes available, that will boost acceleration to 0-60 in 4 seconds.

While 900 models have already been reserved (at $98,000 each), Tesla will only build about 600 for the 2008 year (due to the trani problems). Tesla is now taking orders for 2009, and plans are in the works to ramp up production to 2,000 per year in the near future. The company also has plans to release an electric, 5-passenger sports sedan in 2010.

Fun facts about the Roadster:

It’s a 248 horsepower, rear-wheel drive two-seater with aluminum chassis and carbon-fiber skin.
It has a top speed of 125 mph with a range of 220 miles.
The charging time for a completely drained battery is 3.5 hours.
The Roadster achieves the equivalent of 135 mpg at a cost of 2 cents per mile.
Tesla says the lithium-ion batteries will last for 100,000 miles.

For more background on this sexy beast, see Tesla’s website, Tesla’s Press Release, and these articles:

USA Today: Tesla: Little electric roadster that could.
EERE News: Tesla Motors Starts Production of its Electric-Only Roadster

Electric Tara Tiny Steals Tata Nano’s Position as World’s Cheapest Car

Benjamin Jones — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 21:35:25 +0000

There’s been a lot in the news recently about the Tata Nano, the world’s cheapest car, which also has a lot of green features. However, just recently, Tara International announced that it will be selling two electric vehicles for even cheaper than the Tata Nano.

These two cars will be priced at approximately 99K Rupees (2,475 USD), and are built in partnership with a Chinese company named Aucma. To compare, the cheapest Tata Nano comes in at just about 100k Rupees. Not much of a difference on the face of it, but the Tara vehicles being electric compared to the Tata’s gasoline powertrain would make you think the Tara would be much more expensive.

More after the break!

These cars will be able to travel between 80 and 100KM after an 8 hour charge (but a 220 volt, 15 amp socket is necessary for the charging). Tara will also be selling electric bikes with a similar range that charge more quickly and require less beefy plugs (just 5 amps).

But what’s the biggest disadvantage? The speed. The Tara Tiny can only reach speeds up to 50 KM/H.

About competition with the Tata Nano and the Tara’s image as a green car, Tara Ganguly (company head) had this to say on the website Reddiff:

But the cars that I have conceptualised are ‘green’ cars. Therefore, the question of comparing these (environment-friendly cars) with the Nano doesn’t arise at all.

It will certainly be interesting to see how this plays out in the coming months after so much controversy with the Tata Nano. Will another cheap car cause bigger problems on Indian roads? Would a mass-production electric vehicle strain the country’s power network? All these things remain to be seen.

In the meantime, Tara will be rolling these cars out onto Indian streets with plans to release them in the US in the future. One English company has already placed an order for 100 of these tiny electric vehicles.

More news to come as the story unfolds!

Here are some more images from Reddiff:

Source: Reddif via Darin @ EcoModder

Subaru Unleashes R1e Electric Car on New York

Benjamin Jones — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:50:51 +0000

ABG recently reported on the fact that the new Subaru R1e has recently been spotted tooling around the streets in New York City as part of an official trial in the US, which is an extension of the 40 (soon to be 100) car trial currently taking placing in Japan.

In light of this new development, I thought it would be prudent to show off some of the most exciting features of theR1e, beginning with the fact that it is an all electric version of a production car made by major manufacturers to be affordable and useful to average citizens (though these needs might be a bit different depending on the market).

It’s exciting enough in and of itself to see a major initiative from a major manufacturer (yeah yeah, the Volt, sure), but this car is pretty sweet on its own.

More after the break!

The test is taking place in Kanagawa Prefecture, where Subaru plans to set up 150 of its “fast charge stations” to complement predicted sales of 5k+ EVs in the next five years. These fast charge stations are different from normal outlets and can deliver an 80% charge to the R1e in just 15 minutes! At home the 40 kW lithium-ion pack requires 8 hours for a full charge.

The R1e’s lithium pack is good for 50 miles at up to 65 MPH, with its most impressive feature being a 10 year or 124,000 mile lifetime expectancy. This issue has troubled hybrids and EVs in the past, so this kind of durability guarantee is certainly exciting to see in a production vehicle.

For those of you who don’t know, the Subaru R1 is a small car that is well known in Japan and perhaps perfectly suited for EV conversion. It might be a little smaller than the norm in the US market, but we’re seeing more and more talk about importing these kei-class cars to the US so by the time it happens it might not be as revolutionary as it seems.

I’ll be looking forward to more news, for sure.

Source: ABG

Plug-In Hybrids Could Require 160 New Power Plants By 2030 (Or None At All)

Clayton B. Cornell — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 16:02:38 +0000

Plug-in Hybrids (PHEVs) have taken some undeserved heat lately, with the recent hullabaloo over their potential to drain U.S. water supplies. But as some readers pointed out, it all depends when you charge them.

This week’s report from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which evaluated the impact of a substantial increase in PHEV ownership, found that nighttime charging of PHEV’s would not increase electricity demand over baseline levels. In other words, no (or very few) new power plants would need to be constructed if plug-in owners only charged their vehicles at night.

While nighttime charging makes sense, since it can be incentivized by power companies and prices are cheapest after 10 p.m. anyway, there’s no guarantee that the average car owner will wait until then to charge up. The worst case scenario, in which all PHEV owners charged their vehicles at 5pm, could require the construction of up to 160 new power plants.

Obviously, vehicle charging will take place at different times during the day, but it may be important (even vital) that new plug-ins be charged during nighttime hours. Study authors estimated the impact on electricity generation would be greatest by 2030, when PHEVs have become well-established in the U.S. market.

See the press release here.
See the study here.

[Via] and Photo Credit

100 MPG+ Plug-In Hybrids Already Available (Check ‘em Out)

Clayton B. Cornell — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:19:50 +0000

Not everyone is waiting until 2010 to get their first plug-in hybrid. As I reported previously, Hybrids Plus out of Boulder, CO, is offering conversions for the Toyota Prius and Ford Escape hybrids, turning them into 100 MPG+ superstars.

I’ve collected a little more background on Prius hybrid hacks, and a few more resources. Check out this video, which should give you a good feeling for what getting 100 MPG would be like:

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/9HjI1zPHUvI" width="425" height="355" wmode="transparent" /]

Hybrids Plus’ conversions add lithium-ion batteries to the trunk, and come in either 30 or 60 mile ranges, depending on the buyer’s average commute. The conversion doubles fuel economy by running on a blended mode of gasoline and electricity. And here’s a 30-second video to show you how it’s done:

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/4OOkgHCgnK0" width="425" height="355" wmode="transparent" /]

But Hybrids Plus isn’t the only group interested in Prius Hacks. Another organization, CalCars.org, claims to have built the world’s first plug-in Prius back in 2004, using lead acid batteries to prove it would work. CalCars maintains a list of shops offering plug-in hybrid conversions and how-to advice.

While fun to look at, these conversions are probably only fit for the economically solvent or seriously committed. Even Hybrids Plus admits their prices are steep, but it’s possible that prices will drop as production volume increases. For a more in-depth look at Hybrids-Plus, take a look at their professional video, which covers all the bases:

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/3-oME7zhlWM" width="425" height="355" wmode="transparent" /]

Resources:
Hybrids Plus
CalCars.org

Photo Credit