Just 99 mpg: Isn’t it time to focus on more than plug-ins?
For change, or placation?
A battle has been won, but the war has just begun
While fuel economy, at least modest gains in highway fuel economy, are becoming a more important part of the automotive marketing mix, fuel economy is not driving the auto industry forward, especially the made for the USA auto industry.
And, if a small electric car like the Nissan Leaf can only achieve an equivalent of 99 mpg according to the EPA, it’s time to ask some serious questions. It’s not that 99 mpg is bad. It’s fantastic, but it’s pretty irrelevant if it cannot be mainstreamed. After a decade, for instance, hybrid cars have not mainstreamed, and many analysts claim that plug-ins are roughly on the same slow trajectory. Costs are just too high.
Consequently, can more be done in the interim to cheaper battery costs?
Recently, I’ve seen some commercials from an automaker touting its plans to invest in trees, solar power and a host of other green initiatives whenever someone buys one of their vehicles. That’s great, yet this automaker offers one of the least fuel efficient fleets in the US. Why not just focus on making the core business greener and more fuel efficient?
Unfortunately, such hypocrisy plagues the auto industry. It’s all about green halos not green fleet fuel economy. Perception not reality.
Is increased fuel economy even possible?
Advocates for greater fuel economy claim that downsizing, coupled with technologies such as direct injection, start stop, turbo-charging and entirely new engine designs, etc. could achieve remarkable increases in fuel economy at very little extra cost per vehicle, in packages essentially equivalent to today’s. The only thing needed is scale and automaker commitment.
Likewise, significant and cost-effective improvements in fuel economy were also suggested and supported very recently at the LA Auto Show by several automakers, particularly Hyundai which is forecasting industry-leading plans for improving fleet fuel economy without increasing vehicle costs. Similarly, the X-Prize also demonstrated that 100 mpg is achievable without the need for either hybrid or plug-in technologies.
Could such alternative technologies be mainstreamed at a cheaper cost than battery-powered vehicles?
Another theme at the LA Auto Show highlighted by many automakers was the reality that a one size fits all solution isn’t the future of the auto industry any time soon. Consequently, if only 10 percent of the population is going to really be interested in plug-in vehicles the next decade, how do we know that 10 percent wouldn’t also be interested in 100 mpg X-Prize-like vehicles, especially if cheaper than plug-ins?
Wouldn’t BOTH 10 percent plugged in and 10 percent X-Prize-like be better than just 10 percent of either? Moreover, wouldn’t competition between technologies be a good thing, especially based on what the auto industry itself is telling the world, particularly that no one technology is set for domination?
Collectively automakers claim that electrification is the undeniable future, whether powered by batteries, fuel cells, or both. While that’s an interesting conundrum in and of itself – the wining technology that is – the more interesting and important takeaway is that automakers openly admit that any electrified future is, minimally, decades away.
Decades away? As if the last few decades have proven the safety and security of US dependence upon foreign oil.
Yet, plug-in and hybrid fans seem to bury their collective heads whenever such acknowledgments arise. The revolution is here and now no matter what automakers say. Suddenly everyone is going to want a plug-in regardless of the undeniable mountain of empirical evidence against such mainstream adoption.
And while plug-in and hybrid fans can sit back and claim they’ve done their part by buying and advocating for such vehicles, the sad truth is that when it comes to foreign oil dependence and global warming, hybrid and plug-in fans are the loudest voices for change – or at least they have been. Recently, however, it seems we’ve been placated by openly-admitted to, very tempered plans for an extremely slow electrified revolution. In essence, we’ve been bought off.
Even though the importance of electrification is undeniable, it’s not nearly as undeniable as the fact that electrification is going to happen slowly, taking decades to effectively reduce foreign oil dependence and CO2 emissions. And the only way to add fuel this new energy revolution might be for battery fans to think far outside our battery-powered box, at least in the interim.
don’t give up your blog… it’s a contribution to the dialog and you are pretty much an honest broker of of the dialog.
I hear what you are saying EI and will definitely keep that in mind. I’ve come close to shutting this blog down since the LA Auto Show because I do realize how critical I’ve become in the last few years, and I don’t like it either.
After covering this story for almost a decade, familiar patterns begin to emerge in politics, the auto and energy industries, etc. that have repeated themselves throughout the last several decades.
A while back I read a book called Initiative in Energy published in 1979 by Dresser Industries, the oil giant of the day. It was provided to shareholders and outlined the future of the energy industry, the growing dangers of foreign oil dependence, changing social and political sentiment away from oil dependence. Every topic discussed on this blog regarding energy dependence, I realized, goes back decades, many decades, with great change always on the horizon. The same warnings over and over. The same relative ideas for solutions. Yet, decade after decade – even after serious problem after serious problem caused by foreign oil dependence – little has changed and continues to change.
Even 9/11-Afghanistan-Iraq has resulted in little change and greater warning signs are painted on the walls. Yet, gas prices go down, gas guzzling increases. Plain and simple.
Then when you follow the latest data from energy analysts, the academic studies, the plans of automakers, etc. – which was quite shocking at the LA Auto Show – it becomes obvious that until it becomes highly profitable to end foreign oil dependence, we’re going to be foreign oil dependent. Plain and simple.
To me, the path the US is on regarding energy is nothing short of insanity based upon the last few decades of history and the realization that I can do nothing to change that is making me insane since I’ve spent so much time trying to advocate for change.
Instead of pointing out that the science doesn’t justify the current plug-in tax credit and that the government is significantly funding the development of the Chevy Volt, for instance, at the expense of more cost-effectively viable architectures, I could just call the Volt a revolutionary game changer. It is in many ways, and it might one day actually change the game. of course. I’d get more ad deals and make more money.
Yet, I feel guilty. Used. Just a part of the status quo. Bob Lutz, the guy that essentially created the Volt concept, told me and has stated many times that the Volt was created for marketing, and the science seems to show it wasn’t built on idea for the cost-effective conquest of foreign oil dependence. Yet, the Volt essentially justifies massive gas-guzzlers sales, massive tax incentives, and I realize I CAN’T be a part of that status quo.
And maybe that means maybe I can’t be part of Hybridcarblog anymore.
Anyway, thanks for the honest comment, EI, and thanks for the years of excellent comments and insights that you’ve always contributed to this blog.
CaTiC-
“As to the “decades” you purport it will take to electrify cars, I suspect your claim is based on the cost of current technologies.” you stated.
No. It’s based on the bulk of data available. According to the latest battery research, including much from the many scientists that develop lithium 30 years ago, even if a major battery breakthrough were achieved today, it would probably take decades to cost-effectively scale into the auto sector based upon their experience developing lithium technologies. I can provide exact quotes from some of the most eminent battery researchers whom have all presented serious studies on this subject this year alone.
That’s not my opinion, nor is it my gut-feeling. It is the data that is being produced by the bulk of the battery industry, automakers and supported by a ton of academic studies. Believe me, I wish the data was telling a different story, but is is not.
Today’s, lithium technologies are cost-ineffective based on their basic commodity costs alone. That’s a fact. That’s why JD Power predicts less than 10 percent EV and Hybrid penetration, combined, by 2020. They aren’t guessing. They are analyzing supply chains for every element of the powertrain, whether lithium, lithium cell manufacturing, lithium battery assembly, rare earth availability and cost, automaker powertrain plans, electric motor production plans, etc. ,etc., etc.
5 years ago I believed the same as you, but since then numerous analysis has been done across academia, the battery industry – all over the world – and most of the conclusions are the same.
We can choose to pretend this isn’t the case and almost assuredly wait decades before we finally have a shot at ending foreign oil dependence, or we can grab the bull by the horns.
Just today, for instance, Carnegie Melon called the current plug-in tax credits wasteful and possibly counterproductive. Again, the science demonstrates that hybrids still offer more bang for the buck – cost-effectiveness – and that the best case scenario for plug-in vehicles is small battery plug-in hybrids – about 15 -25 miles of EV range only – with constant charging.
This isn’t the first study to make this kind of claim. There have been numerous studies. Again, I wish the studies were saying that plug-ins make cost effective sense, we just need this and this and this for it to happen.
However, why not listen to what the studies are saying. If we want more than a few to 10 percent penetration by 2020, we are going to have to think differently than we are today. We’re going to have to come together – industry, government and consumers. But, if we just stay on our current trajectory, in a decade or two, after some horrible even related to US foreign oil dependence, we’ll again wonder how this could have happened.
Nor is the energy to produce motors, mine and refine rare earths and lithium.
Nonetheless, there is no doubt that electricity is superior to gasoline in a perfect world. the problem is the battery technology is not yet cost-effectively supportive.
Pet peeve: MPGe takes into account the energy consumed in delivering the alternative fuel (electricity in the case of the Leaf) to the car as a means to compare fuel economy between different fuel types.
Yet, the energy consumed in extracting, refining and transporting gasoline is not considered when comparing regular gas vehicles to battery electric or Plug-in Hybrids.
Hmm, I’m neither impressed with your arguments nor am I about the message you are trying to convey.
It seems to me you are missing the bigger picture: the push towards electrification has three driving forces: the need to reduce our economic dependence on foreign sources, the need to improve our national security and the need to reduce CO2 emissions. To me, that makes electrification a near certainty and an urgent one.
As to the “decades” you purport it will take to electrify cars, I suspect your claim is based on the cost of current technologies. Yet, there are so many promising technologies being developed today both in energy generation and storage that will make drastic changes in the rate of electrification that there is no doubt in my mind that BEV and PHEV will outsell all other fuel saving technologies within 15 years – possibly even 10 years.
The mileage estimate also does not factor in the fact that electricity prices are very stable and will increase very slowly over time.
Meanwhile, gasoline prices are very volatile, and could increase significantly at any time….
Dear (fellow) Americans,
GM is surviving because of massive
sales in the East.
Same goes for major European car brands.
(Available)fuels are not an issue worldwide,
for no one controls them,although they are
kind of limited in a few decades.
That is a sad truth.
I drive a Prius 2005.
After 5 years,
I now think; why?
We will end up all-electric;
Public transportation…
Liquid fuel will be designated for the
production of agriculture products.
forget the meat!
see you in 30 years!
More importantly than the actual number of MPGe is where the energy compes from.
100% of the energy that drives this vehicle is American made. It does not use a drop of foreign oil
Can’t believe that plug-ins are on the same trajectory than hybrid cars. Right, costs are high, but the result is worth it.
I’m not sure what this blog is about anymore. It seems nearly every article is a complaint about one aspect or another regarding the move away from a fossil-fuel based economy.
Change takes time, and will happen at the pace the populace accepts. Most reading this blog want things to happen faster, myself included, but the constant complaining is tiring. And of course there are countless examples in history where the population does not change fast enough, and ends up suffering severe consequences. That is a possibility, but not not a given.
So, if the purpose of this blog is to keep attracting new readers and getting out the word that change is good, maybe the tone and content is fine for that. But for someone like me, who has already converted all the lights in his house to CF, who pays a roughly 10% premium to powers his home with 100% renewable (we can select the power provider and plan here in Texas), and who has now saved almost enough money to buy a mainstream plug-in electric or hybrid, this blog constantly comes across as negative and depressing.
I’ll say again – change takes time. I suggest you try a different tact in your messae and tone if you want to play a part in trying to speed things up.
Honestly, I believe that hybrids are starting to become mainstream because there are SO many of them around the area where I commute to, for work (South Orange County). Just about every day I see at 10 Prius cars on the freeway, I always seem to be stuck behind a Prius too.
I think it really depends on the area where you live. It seems that people around here are super green. I am actually surprised to see how many of these cars I see out on the road. I know I’m going to be stuck behind another Prius when I hit the freeway home in an hour.
This mileage is with current infrastructure and technology….we’re at the limit of IC technology and at the beginning of EVs.
What would the mileage be if the charging was solar? Or from another renewable source?
It makes no sense at this point in time to compare mileage ratings…the benefits of EV’s comes in forms other than simply MPG.