Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
Email Printer friendly version Normal font Large font Joshua Dowling Motoring Editor in Detroit
January 15, 2008

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THE world's biggest car maker, General Motors, believes global oil supply has peaked and a switch to electric cars is inevitable.

In a stunning announcement at the opening of the Detroit motor show, Rick Wagoner, GM's chairman and chief executive, also said ethanol was an "important interim solution" to the world's demand for oil, until battery technology improved to give electric cars the same driving range as petrol-powered cars.

GM is working on an electric car, called the Volt, which is due in showrooms in 2010, but delays in suitable battery technology have slowed the project.

Mr Wagoner cited US Department of Energy figures which show the world is consuming roughly 1000 barrels of oil every second of the day, and yet demand for oil is likely to increase by 70 per cent over the next 20 years. Some experts believe the supply of oil peaked in 2006.

The remaining oil reserves are deeper below the Earth's surface and therefore more costly to mine and refine.

"There is no doubt demand for oil is outpacing supply at a rapid pace, and has been for some time now," Mr Wagoner said. "As a business necessity and an obligation to society we need to develop alternative sources of propulsion."

He added: "So, are electrically driven vehicles the answer for the mid- and long-term? Yes, for sure. But � we need something else to significantly reduce our reliance on petroleum in the interim."

GM is so convinced about ethanol it has signed an agreement with a supplier that claims to have come up with a way of producing ethanol that is cheaper and more efficient than refining oil. The supplier claims it can produce ethanol from "almost any material" such as farm waste, municipal waste, discarded plastics - even old tyres.

The car industry has had a love-hate relationship with ethanol, which is most commonly derived from crops such as corn, wheat and sugar cane. At first, car makers criticised ethanol-blended fuel because most vehicles weren't compatible with it. Then car makers changed their tune and embraced ethanol-blended fuel after retuning engines to suit the new mix.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

It's beed up for 25 years now.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

I had a buddy back in the early 80s who had a diesel Rabbit that typically got 55-60 mpg. The Honda civic with the CVCC engine got around 55. I had a Geo metro w/ manual tranny that got 55-60. My best was 63mpg on a drive from Dallas to Omaha at 55 mph with a 25 mph tailwind. But we can't make cars like that anymore, right, go figure.

I know they are smaller, but give me a break.

These hybred cars are a joke.

SB

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

I'm glad to hear him say it, but we know about those cars just mentioned plus the excellent electric cars they crushed.

So why is it always somewhere over the rainbow, Mr GM man?

India is going to be rolling the first compressed air powered cars out sometime this year. If importing them is blocked I think we need to raise cain. Zero emissions if you power the compressor from the sun or hydroelectric. Non toxic, not explosive, the energy is stored as compressed air and the only emission is very cold air which can be used for air conditioning the vehicle.

I want that to be the next car I buy and I bet GM could get a license to build some here for a modest royalty that might equate to shipping cost from India. I sure wish they would.

The 2010 BS I just don't buy. They can build very high mileage cars or electric cars NOW because they already have, and know there is a market for them.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Tri Mode -

All Electric, All Petro Engine - or combo of both.

Best of all worlds.

http://www.chevrolet.com/pop/electri...process_en.jsp

Time's up ???
 

Quoted " some delay in battery technology"
like about a hundred years delay he should have said.
The basic understanding of inorganic chemistry was well established by the end of the 19th century.
Electric automobiles have been around for over a hundred years.
The USA has NOT the electrical generating capacity, nor the transmission lines available to support the level of commuter traffic seen at rush hour near any large city. The staggering amount of LEAD, SULFURIC acid and COPPER wire to put a passenger vehicle, and the necessary recharging equipment in place of even one half of the gasoline burning personal vehicles now in service would bankrupt this nation. you think the iraq war cost a few bucks? what do you think the price of lead would be if you had to put a thousand pounds of lead in each one of 70 million personal vehicles? for each of us to drive an electric car to work five days a week would take 70 BILLION pounds of lead. what do you suppose that would do to the price of base metals? demand like that has never been seen in ANY commodity.

Re: Time's up ???
 

Um .... they're talking about remote control thermostats in Calif. because they can't supply enough power as is. Imagine what happens when you have a neighbourhood trying to recharge cars? Anyone remember only being able to buy $5 of gas at a time? Better walk to church on sunday, because you'll be praying all week that you've enough charge to get to work.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

well this should put a damper on 2008 car sales. who the hell wants to buy a gas pig when they can wait 1 year and a half for a plug in car?

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

How about one of these?
http://evolution.loremo.com/images/s...rontpage_m.jpg
http://evolution.loremo.com/

They get 157 MPG and probably could be modified to run on fryer grease (or the grease modified to run in the car).

Or one of these (apparently the oil mob doesn't have as much power on the Indian subcontinent -- they couldn't have the people involved developing this idea there whacked)?

http://www.theaircar.com/

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

You're all missing the point, electric cars can be powered by any source of electricity. If you have a solar charging station at your house there will be no increased demand for grid power. TPTB don't want you to have total control over your movement, hence they are always pushing vehicles that are complicated and they have a virtually monopoly on the oil supplies.

Not to mention, you can't tax fuel you make.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Generating your own has it's own failings. The added cost and maintenance involved to start with. Having enough room to install said system (or sufficient additional capacity to a site already equipped). The lack of anywhere else to charge when you're not at home.

In reality, anyone with the space and capability to self charge is probably too far away from where he's going to use existing electrics in the first place. Electrics really only work for urban commuters, and they've seldom the space needed to self charge.

My personal experience comes from using an electric forklift, with a huge charging transformer. We'd often be lucky to finish a shift on one battery, and swapping out for a spare could be done by one person alone .... provided noone official busted you. Officially it was a two man job, because of the masses involved

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

goldsilverman: "You're all missing the point, electric cars can be powered by any source of electricity"
Sir, respectfully; YOU miss the point. the energy density, portability, ease of storage, reasonable price, and incomprehensibly VAST reserve quantities of petroleum fuel is what makes them so economically attractive.
An illiterate teenager is easily able to work a low grade minimal wage job at Mcwhopperworld, purchase,maintain and fuel a modern four wheel drive vehicle, and not only commute, but use said vehicle recreationally.
In regard to solar electric power generation and storage, that is indeed possible. I have on the south wall of my house a pair of 130 watt peak output photovoltaic panels, feeding 30 volts at 9.5 amps to a bank of lead acid batteries weighing just a bit over one thousand pounds. this battery bank stores 16 kilowatt hours of electricity. 16 kilowat hours of utility power here costs 2 dollars. the battery bank to store this much energy cost 2600 dollars. you do the math, then tell me how cheep solar power is going to haul YOU and your family and groceries around.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

What does gasoline look like

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

So gasoline is something like c7h16 right? If anyone here is talented with chemistry, maybe you could compare c7h16 to h2o in terms of weight, energy density and volume.

I think tesla and langmuir may have been onto something when they screwed around with resonant frequencies and hydrogen.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Consider heavy traffic periods on ,say, I-5 or the LA freeway, or chicago area at 530 pm, anywhere a great many americans are going to or leaving work... ok, got your mental picture? okay, now consider all that rolling stock powered by electricity... except THERE IS NOT ENOUGH ELECTRICITY IN THE WORLD to move all those automobiles, run all those air conditioners ( or heaters/defrosters) get this through your heads greenies: there is not enough electricity to convert your AUTO-MOBILE lifestyle to electric traction power. even if you could afford all the lead for all the batteries for all the cars, there is not enough electrical generating capacity on this continent to recharge all the batteries that would be run down in a days worth of commuting, shopping, soccer practice, hauling topsoil form the garden store, and the kids going to the movies in the evening.
"this aint rocket science, just basic thermodynamics"

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

In many ways I think GM is looking in the right direction, which as a Ford guy is hard to admit.

Electrical power for charging is NOT an issue, it's a matter of peak power vs. baseload power. Don't most places in the country have time of use charges for electricity? For example, my nighttime electricity costs 3 cents/kWH, middle of the day is around 12 cents. Most people will drive several blocks to save a couple cents a gallon, so I think it's obvious that you would charge at night when the electricity only costs a fourth as much.

A limited, but reasonable battery powered range. 40 miles is enough for most driving, and you have a gas engine to generate electricity for further trips. Battery power for 40 miles can charge in a few hours at reasonable current densities. An all electric car, like the Tesla Roadster, needs a dedicated circuit at around 50 amps to charge in 4 hours.

Batteries are the limiting technology. I suspect the battery cost for the Volt will be around 10 grand alone.

Obligatory PM note, silver ion batteries have a lot of promise to replace Lithium ion as a safer, higher density battery technology.

Time's up for common sense.
 

ok we are still not all getting the picture here.
yes YOU can have an electric vehicle. And the high school genius experimenter across town can build an electric vehicle. so far we are in the realm of possible.
the OTHER 70 million of us daily automobile drivers can not ALL drive around with a thousand pounds of batteries, and then each get home in the evening and all plug in to the existing power grid ( or any power grid that you could possibly build) and RE charge all the energy that you depleted from your thousand pound battery bank over the course of your daily travels.
Please understand: THERE IS NOT enough electricity. not at 12 cents per kilowatt hour. probably not even at 25 cents per kilowatt hour. If you get into dedicated 240 volt 50 amp charging circuits for each daily driven automobile you will need (multiple) nuclear reactors in every suburb. and without heinously expensive government (taxpayer) subsidy, that is just not going to happen.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Hey fullpower, for someone who looks like he knows a lot about the subject, I've gotta ask you, has the thought ever crossed your mind that a surplus of energy may drive the cost too low for the producer's taste? Could engineered scarcity turn a bigger profit than abundant surplus? How about Peak Oil?

Do you think that maybe the solution isn't really quite as complex as everyone is making it out to be? I think it might be. Just look at history, TPTB sell treatments, not cures. Their treatments are more often than not, designed to treat symptoms of a problem they created.

I think stanley meyers was onto something. Those aqyugen people seem like they've got the right idea too.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Maybe the US can't or doesn't want to. But my wife drives a 2004 VW TDI Golf to work every single day and has since we bought it new. Turbo diesel, great acceleration, just a nice car. Nobody who drives it can believe that it is an "econo-box." But it is rated at 50 mpg. You used to be able to get that engine in the Golf, Jetta, Passat, and even the Beetle. 10,000 miles between oil changes as well.

VW is supposed to be releasing a whole new line of diesel cars this spring and summer. I'm waiting!

Gregg

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

These new diesels are very finicky, they have to have low sulfur diesel. TPTB are promoting this new technology that is much more complicated and gives no big improvement in efficiency. Diesels used to be able to run on peanut oil, but that would cut off their monopoly.

BTW, I believe peak oil is a myth, but I realize that the amount of capital to drill and refine limits the players to the big multinationals. That is why I am against the technologies and fuels that aid and abet them

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

I have heard that they are blocked from importing (some crap about crash test safety):banghead:

These don't even use batteries and could be charged with solar or wind power.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

1. It has more to do with freedom than cost, sure keep your petro car for the long haul, but don't deny access to vehicles that have a range for regular working commutes.

2. When I talk about alternatives don't assume I only promote electric cars, I like the air car, steam cars, diesels running on vegie oil, ethanol (derived from sugar, not starch and not subsidized)

3. Do you really think the gov't would enjoy losing a source of tax revenue?:no_ma:

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

10 silver rounds says that the police and military will still be running on reliable fossil fuels. Anyone want to take that bet?

Electric and other weak shit, low range PTB brainfarts will become common place for the hoy-poloy sheeple that must remain in the flock and close to the satanic shephard.

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

With ya tulsamal, my next car will be a Passat Diesel Wagon!

Re: Time's up for petrol cars, says GM chief
 

Since such a huge proportion of driving is short distance commutes, the air car is a great idea for that use. Sure, I would keep my gasoline powered old vehicles for long trips, but 90%+ of our driving is under 30 miles round trip. Recharging the air via solar electricity at home = freedom. You can compress a tank of air from the sun all day then fill up your car tank when you get home. No battery bank. Inexpensive, non explosive fiberglass air tanks.

I do think the sticking point is they want to bill us monthly for everything... all they do now plus they are working on preventing seed saving and charging us for the:censored: rain!!

In Bolivia a multinational claiming ownership of rain was what terminated the old IMF lackey government. In India the big seed firms are pushing hard to force annual purchase of seed. In Canada, too.

I read on this board that the state of Colorado claims to own rain.

There are things so outrageous they cannot hold.

But I do think it is to trap 99.9% of humanity in wage slavery for every bit of energy, every bite of food and every drop of water that is the real line in the sand. And it is going to get washed away in this storm.