The Theory of Replacing Electric Cars with Cars With Combustion Engines
What are some of the things we need before we are all comfortable with electric cars? One of the first things we need is much better charging times which would be the equivalent to the time it takes to fill up the tank on a gasoline powered car. We also need many more charging stations and they should be able to charge every type of electric car, or the electric cars should all have one standard for charging and be able to use the same chargers. We need more investigation into the effects on drivers and passengers from sitting over a huge battery which is putting out EMF radiation. Hardly anyone talks about this. EMF Radiation is Electromagnetic Fields Radiation. We need this radiation to be tested so we know if it has any effect on humans. We certainly wouldn’t want people to be getting sick in the future from it or limiting their life span.
Another problem, which is not prevalent, but does occasionally happen, is fires. We have to find out the causes and try and find a fix to this problem. I have read reports where it is very hard for firemen to handle an electric car fire. The cause is a lithium ion battery on fire is especially dangerous. It doesn’t help that the battery pack in the car is so large. The rate for electric car fires is said to be three tenths of a percent and for gas powered cars 3.4%. The batteries burn much hotter and are far harder to put out. Some of these fires are said to take many hours to control and have even burned for days. It was said the heat from one burning electric car melted the road under it.
Some companies have announced a change in the composition of their batteries to make them safer. It is believed this will cut down even further on the amount of electric car fires.
Scientists are working on a next generation battery which charges much quicker. Lithium metal batteries should come into the market place soon and it is being said they will not go on fire, but I guess we will have to wait and see about that. There was a problem with these batteries and it was they easily short circuited. It is now being said scientists have solved this problem. It is also being said these new batteries are longer lasting. One of the problems was fast charging made cracks develop in the ceramic case of the batteries. Scientists have worked this problem out along with other problems.
Not every car company is convinced electric cars are the way to go even though they are producing both electric and gasoline cars. It turns out electric cars are terrible for the environment. They pollute more during manufacture and it takes years for them to get ahead of gasoline cars in pollution and when the battery packs have to be disposed of they are very dangerous to the environment. Even recycling the batteries is polluting. In the end the only viable replacement for the gasoline engine might be the use of hydrogen or some sort of non-polluting fuel that will burn in a gasoline engine.
Porsche is known for its incredible sport cars and now its SUVs. What many people may not know is the company has invented a new fuel which just might save the gasoline car engine and beat out the electric cars. While every other car maker is trying to make their electric cars better at the expense of their gasoline powered ones, Porsche has invested millions of dollars to develop a new non-polluting fuel that can easily be burned in a cars combustion engine. They have joined forces with Siemens Energy to create a factory to manufacture their new fuel. The fuel is said to be synthetic and carbon neutral, which means it does not produce carbon when it burns. Wind energy will be used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen which will be used with carbon-dioxide from the atmosphere to create synthetic methanol, which will be converted into synthetic gasoline by a process invented by Exxon. The company believes it is much safer for the environment than battery power and could save combustion engine cars if enough companies manufacture the fuel.
I have read a lot of reports on electric cars and some of them talk about the fact temperature effects the range of the cars. A study was done by the American Automobile Association on the effects of cold weather on electric cars. One of the problems was when you use the heater. The study stated when the temperature goes down to 20 degrees Fahrenheit the car could lose as much as 43 percent of its range. It seems the colder it gets the faster the battery is drained. There is another problem which was not covered by this particular report and it has to do with towing even relatively light loads. Towing seems to reduce the range greatly. One report of an electric SUV towing about 3,000 pounds stated the range was reduced significantly. The driver who was conducting the test said he believed it was because the electric cars are said mostly to have a one speed transmission.
One thing that can not be denied is many electric cars are extremely fast on acceleration, but should this be a selling point for most of us? I don’t think so, and the reason I feel this way is most gasoline cars have sufficient acceleration for our normal needs and some have more than enough. It is not like the old days when some of the cars had a hard time getting on a parkway in traffic like the Ford Falcon which couldn’t even get out of its own way. Even the smaller cars are fast enough for any traffic situation.
It seems to me electric cars are just too devastating to our planet. All that mining for battery material and even child labor doing this dangerous work, just to create a battery which might be dangerous and cannot safely be disposed of without causing terrible pollution seems to refute the very reasons for buying an electric car. Many in the past have thought the answer to the pollution was the fuel we burned in our cars and now since we are developing a new pollution free fuel and it is using a formula developed by an American company Exxon, many other companies besides Porsche can lease the right to make this fuel and that would be the end of the carbon emissions in our cars, but the process would also take carbon from the atmosphere during manufacturing, which is another advantage.