Want to save the planet? I do. Want to save money, the public health, energy and not be reliant on Big Oil? Me too.
Okay, here’s the equation then: Internal combustion engines are inherently inefficient – losing as much as 85% of the power that goes into the gas tank along the way to moving the vehicle.
First thing to do? Replace the internal combustion engine with electric vehicles, hybrids, plug-in hybrids and fuel-cell vehicles. (Fuel-cell cars, at the end of the day, are EVs too.)
Now the next problem is the massive amount of energy wasted in central power plant production, transmission and distribution – two-thirds!
Insane you say? All that coal, oil and natural gas going up in smoke? Polluting, expensive and wasteful! Who needs it? We don’t. The push is on to leave the old energy economy behind. For one thing, the technology-driven energy economy is here to stay. For another, the age of the EV appears to be upon us.
GE to buy 25,000 electric vehicles is the word from SmartPlanet. “The move comes as GE is aiming to roll out electric vehicle infrastructure such as its WattStation. GE has also formed partnerships with other EV players like Better Place.”
Oh, that’s just a few charging points, you say, at hippie communes in San Francisco and Bali. Well, the good folks at Pike Research are reporting that by 2015, there will be a million charge points available in the US alone, with another four million or so in the rest of the world. Some of the bigger operators like GE, Project Better Place and Coulomb Technologies are hard charging – pun intended.
The range on EVs is growing too. Toyota has just announced its entry in 2012 will go 62 miles (100 km) with a top speed of 75 mph (120 kph). This is apart from their joint venture with Tesla. Tesla, it must be said, is bringing out its own sedan in 2012: the Model S. Looks great and it will get 300 miles on a charge! It just keeps getting better.
Don’t want to spend a fair bit of money on a high-end car? How about an electric motorcycle? Pike Research also reports that the market is growing in the US. It’s a small market, yet, but it’s growing. Electric bicycles too, are growing, with annual sales skyrocketing in the US and Europe, and China the world leader with over a hundred million on the road. (Great series on this at Grist.)
Don’t believe the hype on EVs? Neither does J.D. Power and Associates. Their analysis is that only 7.3% of vehicles sold in 2020 will be electric, less than the 10% that many industry watchers are predicting.
In any event, we are going to see a sharp growth curve on EVs. That’s got a lot of extraordinary implications for getting at the climate crisis, not to mention the other problems that the internal combustion engine engenders.
