Is stealing electricity part of going green?

[Ace-Garageguy]

Regarding wireless electrical transmission brought up earlier, this appears to be the company taking the lead in a lot of it. They've done enough work that Toyota is buying use rights to some of their work.

http://witricity.com/

Charlie Larkin

Thanks for posting the link, Charlie. I'm trying to evaluate this tech as I have time, but I'd be really surprised if wirelessly-powered vehicles become mainstream within the life of the patent (and by the way...something doesn't actually have to WORK to receive a patent. Interesting, huh?). The hurdles to overcome here are much more difficult than getting cheap 3D printers on everyone's desks, and we all know the story there.

Wirelessly powering a CAR around town is a huge leap from powering a laptop or charging a cell-phone over a distance of a few meters in a room, and a lot of infrastructure changes would have to be made to get there from where we currently are..

We've already, as a culture, completely and stupidly overlooked other alternative-power-for-vehicle technologies that are much more efficient and easier to implement, and where the infrastructure is already widely in place, like compressed natural gas (CNG). It's plentiful, cheap, and works in cars as we know them.

Proponents of electric vehicles cite energy efficiency and reduced carbon-emissions as the selling points, but usually they only look at the tip of the iceberg. This quote from "Do the Math: MPG for Electric Cars?" points out some of the grave fallacies in the popular perception of EVs (electric vehicles) as the great savior of the Western world. (full text here: http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/08/mpg-for-electric-cars/

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"The present analysis leaves out two important bits. First, the energy consumption (and electricity costs) I calculated for the Volt, Leaf, and Tesla simply use the battery capacity—not the electricity delivered for charging. Charging efficiency may be anywhere from 70% to 90%. But that’s a small caveat compared to the second issue (and similar to the 25% energy overhead for refining gasoline from oil—which itself has an energy overhead of only about 5% in the extraction/delivery process).

In order to deliver 30 kWh to your house to fully charge the Leaf’s 24 kWh battery bank, for example—incorporating the charge efficiency this time, the source of electricity becomes a highly relevant factor. Two-thirds of our electricity comes from fossil fuel plants, typically converting 35% of the fossil fuel thermal energy into electricity. Only 90% of this makes it through the transmission system, on average. If your electricity comes from a fossil fuel plant, the 30 kWh delivered to your house took about 95 kWh of fossil fuel energy. The 73 miles the Leaf travels on a full charge now puts it at an energy efficiency of 130 kWh/100-mi. The MPG equivalent number is 28 MPG. From a carbon-dioxide standpoint, you’d be better off burning the fossil fuel directly in your car."

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Please notice that 28MPG is shown as the equivalent fuel usage for the EVs cited. You can get better than 40MPG from burning compressed natural gas(CNG) directly in a conventional vehicle of the same size. That's MUCH more energy-efficient than pure-electric, and dumps less carbon into the atmosphere (assuming YOUR electric power comes from a fossil-fuel burning plant...do you know where YOUR power comes from??).

America's energy crisis...and make NO mistake...It IS a crisis...has been politicized and spun out of all rationality. There's nobody driving the policy-bus who seems able to grasp the overall picture that how everything we do as a society, as a culture, and as individuals is interlinked. Knee-jerk patches aren't going to cut it in the long run.

Wireless power-transmission to on-road vehicles may be a lot closer than I think, it may be cooler than sliced bread, but it does nothing to address where the power COMES from unless micro-bursts of energy otherwise wasted from a long-down-the-road generation of self-charging vehicles (either direct solar PV charged, or EV-hybrids using hydrogen produced from solar PV) is beamed back into the grid. Possible? Probably, but don't hold your breath.

Edited December 10, 2013 by Ace-Garageguy

[Fabrux]

(assuming YOUR electric power comes from a fossil-fuel burning plant...do you know where YOUR power comes from??).

Hydro-electric dams supplanted by nuclear.

I'm patiently waiting for a long-range (I'm talking 500+ km) electric pickup truck that can tow my camper. And be able to plow snow. Or even drive in snow...

[Ace-Garageguy]

Hydro-electric dams supplanted by nuclear.

I'm patiently waiting for a long-range (I'm talking 500+ km) electric pickup truck that can tow my camper. And be able to plow snow. Or even drive in snow...

Good man.

But...OMG OMG !!!! NUCLEAR??? OMG OMG !!! And hydro-electric destroys natural habitats and should be done away with !!! OMG OMG !!! (Just kidding.)

It's good that you're patient too. You'll need to be.

[Fabrux]

We have two Bunker C plants here used for peaking only. One of them was supposed to run orimulsion but that kinda tanked....

[Ace-Garageguy]

Unfortunately, there are a lot of newer peaking plants burning natural gas because it's currently so cheap. Far more efficient to burn it directly in vehicles. Sigh.

[Greg Myers]

The Copenhagen Wheel : http://www.cnbc.com/id/101253202

[Ace-Garageguy]

That's pretty cool.

[lordairgtar]

It really is, and doesn't make the bike look like something was added as an afterthought.