In a climate of economic austerity in which European car sales have declined over the past few years, the renewable and other emerging technologies on display during the recent 2012 Paris Motor Show offered a glimmer of hope.
The two-week event that ended on October 14 featured the latest in electric vehicle and hybrid technology. Automakers, like BMW, that have been slow to enter the hybrid and EV markets, showed off concept vehicles while others demonstrated the latest technologies for squeezing more miles and kilometers out of each gallon or liter of gas.
Click on the image below to see some of the cars on display at the show.
The BMW i8 Concept can run on electric power alone. The energy supplied by the application-designed battery (installed between the front and rear axles) to the electric motor at the front axle gives the BMW i8 Concept an all-electric driving range of about 20 miles. The battery can be fully recharged in two hours in a standard power socket.
To add to the comment about lackluster sales of HEVs and Electrics:
I think the sales of HEVs and Electrics is purely based on desire of the company to promote it properly. The Prius has gone from a single model, to a family of models. This is because they advertise the model properly, and you can walk into a Toyota Dealer and walk out with one the same day. Americans want it here and now, and if they walk into a dealership and are told they can have it in 3 or 6 months, you will lose the sale most of the time. It is a system adopted by the American Companies, that is DESIGNED to fail, and yet... people ARE buying and waiting for them. Imagine if they were available for purchase THAT DAY!
When are we going to address the entire energy problem. In lieu of oil we will be burning coal, whose carcinogenic and radiation effects far exceed those of nuclear power.
P.S. 0-60 mph in under ten seconds is not the only criteria for judging speed. And let us not forget the 6 to 8 hour rest stop required after a 100 mile leg of your trip.
What about 0-60 in under 4 seconds says underpowered? The fastest IC car under $50K does 0-60 in 4.4 seconds while the fastest of all costs $2.4M. Cost for this level of performance just isn't an issue. Look for more split hybrid vehicles with independant electric direct drive at the wheels - torque at the wheels has a big advantage over torque into a transmission and independant control gives much better steerability. Also, brake fade is much lower. 0-60 doesn't tell all of the story though: vehicles with independent electric drive clean up on the serpentine. On a high performance car, it's relativley easy to add 100+ HP to each of the front wheels with a motor/brake module. While hauling around a battery isn't much joy, it does provide good distributed weight and low center of gravity for traction and stability in a way that's just not possible with a monster V8.
In my area in Florida (Florida Power and Light) we burn NO coal. 87% is natural gas and nuclear.
As a PHEV driver, I love the argument that federally regulated stationary stacks are worse than millions of mobile tailpipes burning a limited resourse, oil.
Fritz - forgot to respond to your second question. Tesla Motors is working on a supercharger network (which is actually free to Tesla owners) that will recharge their 300-mile ranged car to 80% of the battery within a 1/2 hour.
Enough with this stupid argument! The problem with EVs is that we have a dirty electric power industry? You could say the same thing about vacuum cleaners and microwave ovens! A dirty electric power industry is a problem that needs fixing regardless of what you plug into the wall. And don't minimize the impact of gasoline - it's far from just what comes out of the tailpipe: unconventional petroleum production and refining to gasoline has a very high energy cost where it takes 5 times as much energy to get it to the pump than you get when you buy it and then convert it inefficiently into kinetic energy. Even if you use dirty electricity, unless you drive a very good hybrid, the environmental footprint of your driving an IC vehicle is higher than a comparable EV. The only thing missing is a full size EV pickup truck for commuting American style.
Thanks for keeping it real, ChriSharek. It is the position of the oil-based economy and the confused to try and over state the shortcomings of electrics. I live in Florida also, but there are states that get a large amount of their power from coal, which is among the worst of the fuels we use in this country. Of course an array of solar panels will charge your EV car just fine, yes it will cost a little on the front end, but in the long run, after it is paid off, your "fuel" is really cheap, and how much do you think gasonline will cost in 10 years? Solar panels with current technology last 20 years or more.
Thx AKWAMAN. It's only a matter of time that more and more coal plants are taken off line or become cleaner through tightening regulations, more and more solar, wind, and renewable energies feed into the grid. I'm just wondering when Americans will wake up and embrace the technology that's already here.
Sure, I've used some gas in my Volt - 89 gallons, but the ODO reads 21,000 miles . . . gotta love that.
GeorgeG, last comment, I promise. By reducing our oil consumption and even using our "dirty energy" we at least are producing the energy domesticallly. This could lead to thousands of additional jobs in power production and distribution - instead of sending $37 BILLION per MONTH to countries that hate our guts for their oil.
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