In 2050, many countries want to stop selling gasoline and diesel vehicles. Will humanity be able to switch to electric cars?
In Paris, at the UN-sponsored COP21 global climate conference, an unexpectedly loud statement was made: Great Britain, Germany, the Netherlands and Norway, as well as several US states, after 2050, are ready to "ban the use and sale of cars on combustible fuels." This is how the piston internal combustion engine, which has served faithfully for the second century in a row, was assigned the date of death.
What then will humanity ride? The transport of the future is electric vehicles, which are still surrounded by many myths. We have collected the most popular speculations regarding electric transport, and, by interviewing experts at COP21, we tried to figure out what is true and what is not. And since the eco-summit is partnering with Nissan, the Leaf electric hatchback, which recently underwent a refresh, is cited as an example in many cases.
There won't be enough electricity for electric vehicles
No new generating capacity will be needed. For example, in the United States, according to the estimates of the independent agency EIA, if the entire fleet of 250 million cars is switched to electric traction today, then at night (during the period of the so-called load failure) there will be enough energy to charge 79% of cars. And in the afternoon? There is also a daily decline in energy consumption: the total "free energy" is enough for the same 79% of cars, but it is important that the cars arrive for charging not sometime, but at the right time. This issue is solved by a smartphone application, which will tell you the optimal time for "refueling" with electricity.
In Europe, there is a different problem. In Denmark, Norway and many other countries where alternative energy is developed, the problem is not a shortage, but an excess of generation! So it is already profitable to transfer a significant part of the European vehicle fleet to electric traction. Moreover, due to energy-saving technologies, electricity consumption all over the world is constantly decreasing, but power remains - in the future, these "free kilowatts" will be used to charge the batteries of electric vehicles.
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Electric cars charge for "forever"
According to estimates by SAP, a manufacturer of industrial software, the optimal ratio of the number of charging stations of all types ("slow" and "fast") and an electric vehicle fleet should be 2.5: 1. As for the CHAdeMO stations (marked on the map), there are now about 9,800 of them around the world: 5,500 in Japan, 2,900 in Europe, the rest in the USA
With the so-called "slow charging", the Nissan Leaf battery will "fill" in 4-8 hours (depending on the amperage). But "fast charging" from a DC station through the CHAdeMO connector allows you to "fill" the battery by 80% in just half an hour, and in the near future the charging time will be reduced to 15 minutes. Thus, the duration of the "refueling" directly depends on the infrastructure, so the number of charging stations around the world is constantly growing and in just 4 years has grown from 150 to 9800 units.
Electricity is a "dirty" energy source
In the world, 60% of all electricity is generated at thermal power plants - in order to get "clean" electricity, you need to burn "dirty" coal, oil or gas … But! Firstly, when transport is switched to electric traction, there will be localization of the harmful effect on nature - cities will be able to breathe clean air, and all emissions will be concentrated in the areas around the TPP. Secondly, even the most archaic CHP plants emit (in terms of a kilometer) much less carbon dioxide than an internal combustion engine: the CHAdeMO association assures that an electric car is three times (!) More environmentally friendly.
In other words, even if we assume that Western ecologists are engaged by the authorities and wishful thinking, there is one argument that is difficult to dispute. Power engineers are supplied with liquid fuel by the same companies as motorists, but moreover, a kilometer of an electric car's mileage in practice costs at least three times less than a gasoline car comparable in power (we will talk about this separately) - which means that much less muck is thrown into the atmosphere.
Li-ion batteries are too short-lived
Let's start from afar. In many countries, electricity tariffs depend on the time of day, so it is logical to buy energy at night and use it during the day. For energy storage, drained batteries will serve! For example, Nissan, with the support of Eaton, is launching the Vehicle-to-Grid product on the market - buffer stations that extend the battery life up to 25 years: 10-12 years the battery serves on an electric vehicle, losing 20% of its capacity, and the remaining time works buffer.
Electricity is not profitable
Take a pair of Nissan hatchbacks - the electric Leaf (109 hp) and the petrol Tiida (117 hp). In the combined cycle, according to the NEDC method, an electric car consumes 15 kWh / 100 km, so that at the most expensive Moscow tariff of 5.58 rubles per "kilowatt", the cost of a kilometer will be 84 kopecks. For a gasoline car with an average fuel consumption of 6.4 l / 100 km and the price of a liter of "ninety-fifth" 36.78 rubles a kilometer will cost as much as 2.35! Net benefit? Alas, electric cars themselves are quite expensive: in Germany they ask for 23 thousand euros for a Leaf, and a petrol Pulsar (an analogue of our Tiida) can be bought for 18 thousand.
In many countries, the difference is now compensated by various kinds of subsidies - for example, in France, if you rent a diesel car over 14 years old, you can get a 10,000 euro discount on an electric car. But! As experts predict, if environmental standards continue to tighten, by 2020 gasoline and diesel cars will cost the same as "electric trains". By the way, the most expensive component of an electric vehicle is a traction battery: for each "kilowatt" of its capacity you need to pay 150-200 euros, so a "battery" of the basic version of the "Leaf" for 24 kWh costs about 4,500-5,000 euros.
Trucks will not be able to switch to electric traction
Scania begins testing electric trucks, which are a hybrid of a road train and a trolleybus: a pantograph is mounted behind the cab, through which not only an electric motor will receive electricity, but also a battery pack, outside the electrified area, the road train will be able to run on the energy stored in batteries, and then completely switch to diesel engine
Long-haul tractors, whose most of their lives pass at cruising speeds, are not in danger of switching to batteries: a purely electric road train will cost 150-200 thousand euros more than a conventional diesel one, and the cruising range for a 12-ton truck with current technologies will be … no more than 100 km … But you can transfer commercial vehicles to electric traction! So far, the most suitable idea for engineers seems to be trolley cars - trucks equipped with pantographs so that the car can be powered like a trolleybus, from wires stretched over the road.
Electric cars are not suitable for long journeys and cold climates
In the world, 90% of drivers drive no more than 90 km daily! But you must agree: the very opportunity to drive 300 km should be. That's just the efficiency of the electric transmission, which is the battery-electric motor bundle, decreases with increasing speed - at 90 km / h Leaf consumes up to 20 kWh … The problem can be solved. Firstly, there are already technologies to increase the capacity of batteries while keeping the same dimensions. Secondly, the massive appearance of "fast charging" stations levels the modest power reserve.
As for the cold, electric vehicles can be driven at temperatures down to -30 ° C. True, the "stove" turned on to the maximum will consume 5-6 kWh, sharply reducing the "range" of the car … However, we just have to change our habits: we will need to warm up or cool the interior before the trip, while the car is powered from the household network, then energy the "climate" will need much less, just to maintain the temperature. The second drawback - when “minus”, the lithium-ion battery gives up energy less willingly - is corrected by heating the battery.