"Wayne.B" wrote in message
...

On Sun, 24 Jun 2012 10:50:38 -0700, "Califbill"
wrote:

How did we generate the electricity to charge the
batteries?

Most likely natural gas at this point in time. New driling technology
has enabled the domestic production of more natural gas than we can
currently use. Many power plants have already converted from oil or
coal and most of the rest will convert within 5 to 10 years.
Compressed natural gas (CNG) is also becoming a transportation fuel
but the distribution and retail infrastructure will take a lot of work
and investment.

What is the efficiency of the charging process?

Depends on the battery technology and the charger. On balance I
don't view it as being all that important.

Most of us are not against electric cars, we are against stupid subsidies.

I think it's safe to say that everyone is against stupid subsidies.
It is not at all clear however whether or not that is the case with
electric autos. Everyone agrees that battery technology is critical
to long term success. If subsidies can hurry along better battery
production, I view that as a good thing that will also have positive
fallout in other areas like off grid energy storage.

It is a huge mistake to politicize this issue in my opinion.


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I think it is already politicized. As to efficiency, that is a big
question and problem. We are losing about 8-10% in line loss now, just
getting the power distributed. We are maximum generating capacity in a lot
of areas. with the huge growth in electronics usage, we have not kept up
with power generation. We use a lot of natural gas in generation but lots
and lots of coal, which is a fairly dirty source. Lots of Radon gas
released in mining, and we better have great scrubbers on the stacks. Most
of the mercury in fish from the open ocean is from the Chinese coal burning
plants. No scrubbers, and mercury is an off shoot of burning coal. Both
better battery technology is required for better charging operation and for
higher power density in the battery. If you use a flooded cell battery, you
are going to be using tons of battery to get distance. The higher tech
batteries still are going to have huge weight for enough KWH's to run a car
a long distance.