There's no such thing as an 'electric car'. In the US these are primarily coal powered cars. Hardly cleaner than diesel. Essentially electric cars are only as clean as whatever powers the outlet they are plugged in to. The US is notoriously behind in this area, with most of it's electric production coming from hydrocarbon burning power plants. Also, I like how the green types love yapping on about electric cars, but they totally forget about the hundreds of pounds of batteries in these cars. Batteries that will wear out and need replaced in less miles than a gasoline engine will provide. Batteries that must then be disposed of. Yet all the years of screaming by greens to reduce the amount of batteries we put in landfills seems to be forgotten when it comes to the electric car discussion. Also they are totally impractical for a large percentage of the population. It's usually these California bus pass types that think they are a great idea. But if they had to ever live in a rural environment like half the population, they'd find out pretty quick that the range of today's electric vehicles suck. Not to mention the amount of time spent recharging is effectively time you don't have a car. Also, these cars are less efficient in the colder climates that much of North America lie in. Diesel-electric hybrids do make a lot more sense than gas-electric hybrids. I don't know why they aren't already in use other then consumers have stupid misconceptions about diesel based on following dump trucks, buses, and cars from the 70's. Hydrogen is a pipe dream. A stupid one. Why waste electricity cracking water to create hydrogen to burn? Just use the electricity directly. It only makes sense as an energy storing medium. Since we don't have solar panels on every house, or wind turbines, etc. And we don't have hundreds of next generation hydrogen producing nuclear power plants, there's no clean way to create hydrogen...yet. We're back to the problem of the electric vehicles. A hydrogen powered car at present is really a coal (or whatever) powered car, just like the electric car. Except its a much less efficient one. If I were 'in charge' I'd quit wasting resources on E85 and use what ethanol is produced to replace Methanol in bio-diesel reactors. Then I'd create subsidies for farmers to convert the remaining ethanol crops to crops most suitable for bio-diesel production based on their local climate. For example rapeseed or canola. Also set-up federal regulations on disposal of waste vegetable oil. Requiring it be picked up and recycled into bio-diesel, bio-heat (fuel oil), etc. Next promote clean diesel, bio-diesel, and diesel-electric hybrid vehicles. Increase taxes on gasoline to encourage consumers to switch and give manufacturers subsidies and tax breaks to produce more clean, diesel and bio-diesel capable vehicles and diesel-electric hybrids. Next work on simple, modular, fail-safe nuclear power plant designs that can also produce hydrogen as a side effect. Once the design is complete and tested, implement them all over the country. Think county power plants. Start mandating hydrogen pumps at fuel stations. Tax subsidies for hydrogen research and vehicles to move there in the future. Use nuke plants to power national and local rail lines, maybe even mag-levs. And work on a rail gun project to dispose of nuclear waste into space, or into the sun. Promote building of bases and processing plants on the moon to mine helium-3. Tarif foreign oil and use funds to provide subsidies, grants and loans for residential alternative power installations like solar, wind, etc. Well, that's my pipe dream for now. Martin Klingensmith wrote: > I think the big thing in the next 5 years will be diesel-electric > hybrids. Which people will then modify, like the prius, to be plug-in > vehicles by adding 500 pounds of batteries and charging circuitry. > > Few people in our culture want to be potentially limited by not being > able to drive their car all day every day, even though we don't. This is > a main reason that people aren't as quick to adopt electric vehicles. > The person trying to sell it says "It has 120 miles range" and the > potential buyer says "that's not enough" though they probably only drove > 30 miles that day. > > Hydrogen is nice in theory and all, but you mention all of the main > problems. There are promising advances in solid oxide fuel cells that > could run on alcohol, CNG, or some other hydrocarbon, but then their > efficiency and PRICE has to surpass already mature and dirt-cheap IC > technology to become viable. > > Electric vehicles are quite viable, despite jokes like Olin's. Most > people don't need to drive very far. If you commute 20 miles to work, an > electric is a very real possibility for you. The only problem is that > you either need to build it yourself, buy someone else's conversion > (which may be a mixture of compromises), or buy a really expensive > rich-boy-toy (tzero, etc) - which is why I come to the conclusion that > plug-in diesel hybrids will be the next logical step. > > -- > Martin K > > Russell McMahon wrote: > >>> James Newtons Massmind wrote: >>> >>> >>>> Over all the future of diesel cars looks good to me. >>>> >>>> Rebuttals? >>>> >>>> >> Good technology but still not good enough long term. >> >> Std diesels make particles of a size which make them amongst the most >> carcinogenic substance known to man. Doesn't seem to be well known. >> Hard to filter and filters that work tend to be somewhat power >> robbing. Not insurmountable. >> >> Still a hydrocarbon IC engine. Less refined fuels than petrol and >> easier from a bio base but still energy intensive to produce. Still >> caught up in the peak oil catastrophe and /or "in real terms >> everything takes more energy to produce than it makes". Fusion escapes >> that web, but a fusion powered car seems unlikely this millennium. >> (BTTF notwithstanding). >> >> Hydrogen, alas, is liable to have more long term potential once the >> storage and distribution issues succumb to volume market. >> Nasty stuff. Terrible mass density. Terrible volume density. Nasty >> storage issues. Dangerous flames (invisible). Superb energy per mass. >> >> Stirling will save you, but only after you put 100 billion odd into >> R&D. >> If you really really really must you could make an essentially >> identical Stirling run on petrol, diesel, LPG, alcohol, Hydrogen, >> Methanol, bio whatever, wood, coal, tar, rice husks, paper, garbage, >> solar, nuclear thermal, ... . ie most thermal sources. External >> combustion so NOX emissions can be vvvv good. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> > > -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist