I have a client-friend who has a Tesla, and he loves it. It is a marvelous car! I have driven it and it is amazing. It will come to you from a parking lot, steer itself, drive itself, and stop at stop signs and red lights. Frank says that within 20 years, there will be no more gas stations, as everything will be electric. I understand his feelings, and I almost have to agree with him. Tesla is developing a highway 18 wheeler tractor than will supposedly go three hundred miles without a charge, and I have recently submitted an article to TRAINS magazine, proposing that the hundreds of un-used diesel-electric locomotives, be converted to battery power, elucidating my plans and reasons why it should be done.
Modern lithium batteries have far exceeded the old-style lead-acid types, making electric propulsion odor free, pollution free, and noise free. Electric cars and trucks will have no cooling systems, exhaust systems, transmissions, or an engine of diesel or gasoline type. 60 years ago, I built an electric car to cruise my drive-in theatre. I took a little Isseta front door opening car, took the engine out and substituted a series wound, two horsepower D.C. motor and 12 batteries. I used a screen door spring as a speed control, and It worked well.
My problem, is simply that the world is going through probably the biggest scientific fraud in history, and that is climate change, and all that goes with it. The Earth’s temperature has risen 1.8 degrees over the last hundred years, which, if history is examined, is not at all unusual, and even the most basic common sense will tell you that all the solar collectors in the world as well as all the wind farms will never do more than provide 25-35 % of current power needs, and future needs, probably a hundred times more, with universal electric mobility. Fossil fuels are the cheapest method of generating electricity, and as electric car, truck, and even railroad locomotives come onto the scene, where will the juice come from to power all the electric vehicles?
Daily, hundreds of billions of gallons of gasoline and diesel fuel are burned in ships, locomotives, cars, and trucks. There is scant electrical power anywhere to power all the future vehicles which are planned to use electric batteries to power them. In order to generate the trillions of kilowatts needed to power future electric vehicles, every coal powered generating plant will have to be re-opened, and whether there is enough natural gas to even begin to fire ex-coal, fired plants is questionable, plus obviously, new ones will need to be built. Power to charge millions and trillions of batteries around the world for future electric vehicles is a huge problem, and nowhere near being solved.
Nuclear power? Nuclear plants are being shut down all over the world, due to the fact that a simple accident could doom a thousand square miles, and a satisfactory disposal method of nuclear waste has yet to be found.
In addition, current electric cars are good for a couple hundred miles before needing a charge, which is not acceptable. In order for an electric car or truck to be useful, it will have to go at least 500 miles on a charge, which so far, has not been achieved, due to weight on vehicles and tires, although perhaps not in locomotives, where weight is useful to prevent wheel slip. Current electric cars are fraught with problems, including fires and accidents. I will bet that 30 years from now, if the current trend continues toward all electric vehicles, even the Tesla will be visited in museums, so much improved will be the status of electric propulsion. Cars and trucks using fossil fuels are paying per gallon taxes on their fuel, which builds and repairs roads. With no fuel being burned, how will taxes be collected? Will government have access to your odometer, and charge you per mile you drive?
Currently, my local power company is constructing quite a few acres of a solar farm, I am sure because of green pressure, which with its hundreds of collectors, may be no more than 30% efficient, since they do not follow the sun’s path, and are useless when the sun doesn’t shine. What a waste! Without subsidies, no wind or solar farm is even remotely efficient at economically generating electricity, and their cost to erect and maintain are huge, compared to a modern coal fired generating plant. Modern coal fired plants, take coal and grind it to face powder fineness, and blow it into a fire box at high pressure, where it is instantly burned in 3,000 pound pressure boilers which generate steam to power efficient turbines generating electricity. Coal plants, long ago collected any cinders or exhaust residue from combustion, and coal is very efficient and clean, regardless of media trash reporting.
I am ever so weary of carbon dioxide nonsense and all the goofiness urged to bury it or neutralize it. With an average of 40 volcanos per day erupting around the world, spewing millions of tons of carbon dioxide, current ‘science’ is simply absurd. A hundred years ago, 200,000 steam locomotives ruled the railroads, cars and trucks were grossly inefficient, and most homes, factories, and businesses were heated with coal. There were no problems then, and today’s are imaginary. I love the small of coal smoke. Think about it.
The preceding is merely my opinion, as are all of my columns, but I suggest that it is premature to invest in or buy an electric car at present!
– Don Stott
don@coloradogold.com