Electric Jensen Interceptor.

[AH1951]

Very sketchy, with no technical details and no analysis.
If it is a biofuel process, how much land is used?
Available now at €5/litre.
Why would anyone be dumb enough to buy it now?

We've seen a number of madcap ideas on here in the last few years.
There were the special piston rings which would allegedly eliminate friction by generating vortices at the ring/cylinder interface.
That was obviously nonsense.

There was a separate pilot project in Zurich to produce fuel out of fresh air.

What happened to these wonderful ideas?
Sunk without a trace after the conmen had pocketed all the grant money.

[VFK44]

I know that it's all do so with electronic power but a car has four wheels, why can't the moving wheels be used to charge a battery. ( hopefully someone will explain in layman terms, why not )

They already do -. under braking you can select regeneration Mode, and instead of wasting heat through the brake pads, you put power back into the battery. Some cars effectively operate with just one pedal, using the brake pedal only for heavy braking.

[Chris_R]

True e-petrol requires a large amount of genuine renewable generated electricity.
Porsche are working on a project in Chile, in Punta Arenas to create a genuine e-petrol. There is an abundance of wind there to generate electricity. Hydrogen comes from water, Carbon extracted directly from the atmosphere and combined with the hydrogen to create a methanol which then gets synthesised to petroleum. Currently it is producing petrol at RON 94 and MON 92. This can be refined to improve it. The facility is already producing fuel and is being scaled up to produce up to 550 million litres within a couple of years.
Similar projects could be set up in different parts of the world where there could be an abundance of wind generated or solar generated electricity. More energy hits the earth from the sun than we ever need in a year, we just need to find a way to harness it and transform it into something else that can be stored and transported. Liquid fuels are the most efficient and the most energy dense. Hydrogen gas is very poor in that respect. Electricity, as we know, is difficult to store for any length of time and requires a lot of new infrastructure and is not really suitable for many applications or many parts of the world.

[Steve Payne]

Porsche are working on a project in Chile, in Punta Arenas to create a genuine e-petrol. There is an abundance of wind there to generate electricity. Hydrogen comes from water, Carbon extracted directly from the atmosphere and combined with the hydrogen to create a methanol which then gets synthesised to petroleum. Currently it is producing petrol at RON 94 and MON 92. This can be refined to improve it. The facility is already producing fuel and is being scaled up to produce up to 550 million litres within a couple of years.

This a great project and a great idea the problem is the USA uses over 1500 million litres a day at the moment. Hopefully the deserts of the world will be used for this in the future once all oil has run out.

Steve

[Mr.Mini]

Thank you Chris for the correct explanation!
It is correct there is energy necessary for the electrolysis to do the conversion in synthetic fuel .
The fuel P1 sells atm , is produced in the petrochemical cluster in Antwerp , through existing refineries because of their large expertise in this domain .
But the intention of P1 is to build a huge production facility in Morocco , because of readily available solar power , necessary as free energy to feed the electrolysis proces , thus making it cost effective to produce .
It is only a matter of time - supported by approval of the government - that these would become widely available to the market at competitive price .
To answer AH1951 : why should someone pay 5 euro a litre ? Because it is 100% carbon neutral and this way some forms of motorsport can continue NOW to be organized . Otherwise it will be game over for eg. Formula 1 in very short time , and we will all be forced to look at boring Formula E .Check your sources : P1 definitely is not a company in the cloud !

[AH1951]

Thank you for the explanation.
I shall rush out and spend €500 to fill my tank now.
By the way, the entire Carbon Neutral/Net Zero/Climate Change religion is complete nonsense.
CO2 has almost no impact upon atmospheric temperatures and an increase might even be beneficial.
For the collective West to self-flagellate, economically disadvantage itself, over CO2 output, an imaginary problem, when the major emitters continue to increase their own output is the height of absurdity.

In any case, only about 3% of CO2 is generated from mankind's activities, the rest being entirely natural.
That means that if humans were to all cease their CO2-generating activities, their impact on atmospheric CO2 concentration would be insignificant.

Increasing CO2 may be a consequence of higher temperatures, not a cause of it.

TPTB want us Smurfs out of our cars, out of our country homes, and herded into 15-minute cities. They want us on foot, walking, cycling, or on public transport.
Climate Change is a useful psychological weapon for them to deploy against us.

[Chris_R]

Adrian, I think you being disingenuous to suggest that CO2 has no effect on climate temperatures. The science of CO2 absorbing heat is not new, it is over 150 years old. Scientists in the 1850s discovered that CO2 absorbs heat and even then suggested that if there was more CO2 in the atmosphere the temperature would rise.

[felixkk]

Adrian, I think you being disingenuous to suggest that CO2 has no effect on climate temperatures. The science of CO2 absorbing heat is not new, it is over 150 years old. Scientists in the 1850s discovered that CO2 absorbs heat and even then suggested that if there was more CO2 in the atmosphere the temperature would rise.

Chris, you with your crazy imaginations.

[felixkk]

I happenend to be waiting in front of a Polestar showroom and was studying the car- I noticed that on the display they were advertising the car with 0 g CO2 emissions per km, which I thought was a bit odd ("The production of one kilowatt hour of electricity caused an average of 420 grams of CO2 in Germany in 2021. In 2020 this value was 375 g/kWh, in 2019 it was 411 g/kWh" according to the Federal Environment Agency UBA- are these figures correct? And that is not taking into account the gray energy in producing the car). Anyway I went on to their website because I was interested in the longlevity of the battery:

8-year battery warranty:
-Any material defect in the lithium-ion battery pack.
-First 8 years of ownership or 160.000 km, whichever comes first.
- If the battery’s State-of-Health (SoH) drops below 70% of its original capacity within the first 8 years of ownership, the battery will be replaced at no cost.

Another thing that I thought was odd that on the website they didn't give the weight of the car- the figure is probably there somewhere but I couldn't find it. According to another webite the Weight Unladen (EU) is 2198 kg (https://ev-database.org/car/1170/Polestar-2).

Furthermore, this is what they state is the real range:

Polestar 2 (the basic model according to Polestar has a range of 518 km):

City - Cold Weather 385 km
Highway - Cold Weather 280 km
Combined - Cold Weather 330 km

City - Mild Weather 560 km
Highway - Mild Weather 360 km
Combined - Mild Weather 445 km

Indication of real-world energy use in several situations. Cold weather: 'worst-case' based on -10°C and use of heating. Mild weather: 'best-case' based on 23°C and no use of A/C. For 'Highway' figures a constant speed of 110 km/h is assumed. The energy use will depend on speed, style of driving, climate and route conditions.

[colin7673]

I know that it's all do so with electronic power but a car has four wheels, why can't the moving wheels be used to charge a battery. ( hopefully someone will explain in layman terms, why not )

They already do -. under braking you can select regeneration Mode, and instead of wasting heat through the brake pads, you put power back into the battery. Some cars effectively operate with just one pedal, using the brake pedal only for heavy braking.

Stephen, you say this is under braking. But I'm asking if you are driving from say. Birmingham to Devon, not stop, no braking, why can't the cars change the batteries then, a bit like dynamos did on push bikes to make the lights work

[Grant]

Stephen, you say this is under braking. But I'm asking if you are driving from say. Birmingham to Devon, not stop, no braking, why can't the cars change the batteries then, a bit like dynamos did on push bikes to make the lights work

HiYa Colin, You cannot get out more than you put in, so a bit like when your fans come on in your Interceptor you will notice the idle speed drop, this is because the Alternator comes under-load due to having to put out more current to cope for the fans, this is the extra energy it needs to cope with the extra load, the energy in that case would come from using extra fuel, so the same with having power outputs on the wheels of the Lecky Car, it would need more energy to turn the power source to charge the battery..the only available energy in the Lecky Car is from the batteries, so you cannot get more out than you put in.
I guess if you were coasting down a hill you could use the gravity of the pull of the car rolling down to get some energy to charge though, a bit like a wind farm would get it's energy from the wind, but when the car need propelling on the flat or up hill you couldn't get out anymore as you need the energy to propel the vehicle, this is only my own thoughts..I did build some very fast electric bicycles about 15years ago, I actually set off the speed cameras with them, we still have them out in our holiday home in Ibiza, they are so fantastic and we have got more use from them going around Island than anything else we have ever had, but, I did read about how to try to get them to charge the batts whilst on the move and that ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ is sort of what I picked up from it all, I could be totally wrong and things change all the time, but the physics normally stays the same and the rule of "Can't get more out than you put in" I think still will remain ..
The theory of the dynamo on the bicycle will/can only get the energy from your legs
I apply this theory to the Grandkids when they want money from me..Just keep telling them to do more for the same 50p!!

[johnw]

Stephen, you say this is under braking. But I'm asking if you are driving from say. Birmingham to Devon, not stop, no braking, why can't the cars change the batteries then, a bit like dynamos did on push bikes to make the lights work

It loses some conversion energy to charge while driving on the flat. The dynamo slows a bicycle down quite a bit. Spin the wheel with conventional lights on vs lights off, and it stops a lot more quickly with lights on. So the car will charge up only on downhill runs rather than speeding up under gravity as a normal car would.

Eco ICE conventional fuel only VWs are specified with deeper cycle batteries, and they run the car battery at a lower charge level than normal cars, and if the driver blips the brakes going down a hill, it will start the regenerative braking and fully charge the normal 12v battery, so that it can avoid energising the alternator clutch later on in the drive. I replaced the dud expensive deep cycle battery with a conventional smaller battery from the farmers store and notice batteries are lasting 7 years+ on those cars. The varied charge cycle seems a +ve for inexpensive batteries. Switzerland have mandated daytime headlight use, which will bump up everyone's fuel consumption.

[Chris_R]

Adrian, I think you being disingenuous to suggest that CO2 has no effect on climate temperatures. The science of CO2 absorbing heat is not new, it is over 150 years old. Scientists in the 1850s discovered that CO2 absorbs heat and even then suggested that if there was more CO2 in the atmosphere the temperature would rise.

Chris, you with your crazy imaginations.

Look up Eunice Newton Foote (1856).

[Chris_R]

I know that it's all do so with electronic power but a car has four wheels, why can't the moving wheels be used to charge a battery. ( hopefully someone will explain in layman terms, why not )

They already do -. under braking you can select regeneration Mode, and instead of wasting heat through the brake pads, you put power back into the battery. Some cars effectively operate with just one pedal, using the brake pedal only for heavy braking.

Stephen, you say this is under braking. But I'm asking if you are driving from say. Birmingham to Devon, not stop, no braking, why can't the cars change the batteries then, a bit like dynamos did on push bikes to make the lights work

In summary you can neither create or destroy energy. You can convert it from one form to another. If you are riding a bicycle on a flat road at a steady speed your legs will put enough energy into the bicycle to overcome friction and wind resistance and keep it moving forward. If you switch on the dynamo that will take energy. If you don't push harder with your legs the bicycle will slow down and stop so to keep it going and run the dynamo you have to push harder, put more energy in.
It's the same with an electric car. The car is taking exactly the amount of energy from the battery it needs to overcome friction and wind resistance to keep it moving. If you add a dynamo or other device to charge the battery from going along you would have to take extra energy from the battery to power the dynamo so you wouldn't gain anything. In fact you would probably lose a bit because of internal friction in the dynamo.
For the regenerative system, you use a lot of energy to accelerate the car up to speed, if you have a car with an instant MPG read out you can see that when you are accelerating from rest, the regenerative systems reverse that energy flow and use the wheels effectively as dynamos to generate electricity which is sent back to the battery. On Tesla's you can use one pedal driving and never use the actual brakes at all. As you lift off the accelerator the action of applying the dynamo system to the brakes causes the car to slow down and it is quite powerful too. Some drivers I know would only use the actual brake pedal in an extreme emergency.

[felixkk]

Look up Eunice Newton Foote (1856).

I'm impressed. Thank you, Chris