A Study On Electric Cars

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

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Electric Cars

Introduction

An electric car can be defined as an automobile that uses one electric motor or more for propulsion, utilising electrical energy stored in batteries or any another energy storage device (Anderson 2). The use of these electric motors enables electric cars to have instant torque, which in turn creates a smooth and strong acceleration. be done at special charging stations or perhaps more slowly at a household electrical outlets (Anderson 9).

Technology Choice

Electric cars are a form of electric cars. Electric vehicle can be defined as any vehicle that is propelled by electric motors, while on the other hand, electric cars generally implies any automobile powered by electricity that can de driven on roads (Anderson 8). Electric cars which have motors that are powered by other energy sources are normally referred to by the form of energy they employ for propulsion, for instance a hybrid car is an electric car powered by a gasoline generator, while one that employs solar energy for propulsion is known as a solar car (Anderson 10).

In the latter part of the 19th century and early 20th century,electric vehicles were increasingly popular, until automotive advancements within the automobile industry, especially in internal combustion engine technology led to mass production of relatively cheaper gasolined powered cars, which in turn led to a huge decline in the purchase and use of electric vehicles (Anderson 76). Technology choices. This advancement in internal combustion technology made gasoline powered vehicles more attractive to customers. Many made choices of going with these gasoline vehicles over the numerous ellectric cars.

During the 1970s and 1980s when the world was hit by a huge energy crisis, which shifted perceptions of mmany people and reignited a short-lived interest back in electric vehicles, eventhough most of those cars didn’t make it to the mass market compared to today situation (Anderson 81). As recent as the 2000s, the manufacture of electric vehicless has seen a sort of a rebirth aonce again because of significant advances in power and battery management technologies as well as fears about the relative unpredictability and volatility of oil prices and also the need for to cut on the quite dangerous green house gas emissions.

Although some electric vehicles have very small motors thereby giving them a modest acceleration, many electric vehicles do have have large motors and very brisk acceleration (Anderson 98). To add on that, the relatively constant torque of an electric motor, even at extremely low speeds tends to increase the acceleration performance of an electric vehicle in relation to that of the same rated motor power internal combustion engine. Electric vehicles are also able to use a direct motor-to-wheel configuration that increases the amount of available power within the vehicle. Having multiple motors connected directly to the vehicles wheels enables each of the wheels to be used for both propulsion and as braking systems, thus increasing traction.

In transmission, a gearless or a single gear design in some Electric Vehicles does remove the need for gear shifting, giving electric battery vehicles both a smoother acceleration as well as a smoother braking. This gearless design is the least complex of other designs, but high acceleration requires high torque from the motor, which demands high current. It results to as Joule heating (Anderson 109). This comes about because the internal wiring of the motor has electrical resistance. The resistance dispels power as heat when a current is put through it. This happens in accordance to Ohm's Law (Anderson 187). Further on, as the torque of the electric motor is not reliant on its rotational speed, the output power of the motor is the product of both the torque and the rotational speed, which implies that more power becomes lost in proportion to the output power when the electric motor turns slowly.

Comparisons

Batteries

Electric vehicles have batteries are still hugely expensive, which makes them a reserve for a minority within the automobile industry. It is stimatet that an electric car battery usually ranges from between $12,000 to $15,000, which is roughly about one-third the price of an electric vehicle. This compared to gasoline powered cars, makes electric cars quite expensive. Many automobile experts are highly skeptical that a marked improvement in reducing the cost of electric cars batteries will come quick to enable a complete renaissance of the electric cars into the general automobile industry (Hirsch).

Electric vehicle batteries differ from their gasoline counterparts which are starting, lighting and and ignition (SLI) type of batteries. This is due to the fact that electric car batteries are designed in a manner so as to provide the power needed for the propulsion of these vehicles over sustained periods of time. Hence these type of cars use what is known as deep cycle batteries, instead of the starting, lighting and ignition (SLI) batteries. There are cetain unique characteristics that denote the batteries that are used to power electric vehicles (Whoriskey). Some of these unique features are relatively high power-to-weight ratio, smaller in terms of size as well as light batteries to reduce the weight of the electric vehicles and improve their performance and efficiency, and also a relatively high energy to weight ratio and energy density (Bredsdorff, Magnus, 2010).

The most expensive component of Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) is normally the electric batteries, being about a third to half the retail cost of the electric car. The cost of manufacturing batteries is quite substantial, but increasing returns so as to scale lower costs (green.autoblog.com, 2011). Nevertheless despite all tremendous advances in battery technologies that have been brought about as aresult of the demand drive for laptop computers and mobile phones, as consumers seek for longer battery time, which a driving force for research and development in the field of electric vehicle batteries, costs still remain extremely high, coupled with the limited range of these cars, and thus proving to be a huge barrier to the use of rechargeable batteries in electric vehicles. The Battery Electric Vehicle marketplace has however reaped awesome benefits from these advances particular advances.

The cost of an electric vehicle battery if distributed over the electric vehicle’s life cycle compared with only an up to 10 years life cycle of an internal combustion engine vehicle used by normal gasoline powered vehicles can easily be more than the cost of the electricity that will be used to power the electric vehicle. This is as a result of the high initial cost incurred during the production of an electric vehicle relative to the life of the electric batteries the car will run on.it is estimated that it will take a minimum period of about 10 years before battery prices of electric bateries comes down to 1/3 or lower of the present times. A Battery professor, Poul Norby argues that lithium batteries will be required to double up their energy density and bring down the prices from $500 as of the year 2010 to $100 per kWh capacity so as to to make a considerable impact on gasoline powered vehicles (Simonsen, Torben, 2010).

The development of safe, high voltage batteries such as electric vehicles is viewed as a major difficulty in the battery manufacturing industry. There are still no proper addresses to safety-related aspects of electric propulsion and storage systems that are employed in electric vehicles batteries.Because of that, it is quite a challenge to wade through murky waters of inconsistencies as well as gaps in the legal requirements and technical standards employed in the manufacture of electric vehicle batteries. This, if compared with the manufacture of normal gasoline internal combustion engines, one finds out that the safety levels and other difficulties in the production of these batteries is not as high as the threshold for electric vehicles batteries, even though both require lots of safety aspects during the production process (Société Générale de Surveillance, 2012.)

Fuel Costs

In terms of fuel costs, one observes that electric cars have minimal fuel costs as compared to gasoline powered cars. The non-reliance on gasoline to propel their engines make the equation of fuel costs quite cheap when it comes to electric cars. Electricity as a substitute for gasoline, is much cheaper. Depending on a particular period of time, say a month, electricity is on average around four to five times cheaper compared to gas per gallon equivalents, making it more favourable when it comes to fuel costs. The electric cost of propelling an electric car is under 10 cents per mile on average in the USA for example. On the other hand, it generally costs around 36 cents for every mile one drives using a gasoline powered car. Most electric cars are filled up to the charge by about only $10 ( Brad Plumer, 2013).

One big reason why many customers shift to an electric car has to do with the modern fuel economy. It is perhaps an open secret that electric cars have a much better fuel economy ratings in comparison to regular gasoline cars. The volatility of oil prices all over the world coupled with other economic problems such as the 2008 stock markets crash in the USA as well as the continuing Eurozone crisis makes the maintenance of the fuel costs of gasoline powered vehicles quite an expensive venture. Most of the mileage-related cost incurred by the users of an electric vehicle can be attributed to the maintenance and eventual replacement of the battery pack, since an electric vehicle has only around 5 moving parts in its motor, in comparison to a gasoline powered car that is composed of hundreds of parts within its internal combustion engine. To determine the cost per kilometer of an electric vehicle, it is hence imperative to assign a monetary value to the level wear incurred on the electric vehicle battery. As it continues to be used, the capacity of an electric battery also continues to decrease.

If one uses an example of the Tesla Roadster's very large battery pack, one gets to receive special insight into costs incurred in running an electric battery vehicle. This battery pack of the Tesla Roadster is expected to last seven years with typical driving and costs something close to US$12,000 when pre-purchased today. Driving 40 miles (64 km) per day for seven years or 102,200 miles (164,500 km) leads to a battery consumption cost of US$0.1174 per 1 mile (1.6 km) or US$4.70 per 40 miles (64 km) (Martin Eberhard, 2007 ).

A 2010 report by J.D. Power and Associates states that it is not entirely clear to consumers the total cost of ownership of battery electric vehicles over the life of the vehicle. The article goes on to state that there is still plenty of confusion about how long one requires to own an electric battery vehicle to realize ample savings on fuel costs, in compariosn with a vehicle powered by a conventional internal combustion engine such as the ones employed by gasoline powered vehicles.( J.D. Power and Associates, 2010).

Another study conducted and published in 2011 by the Belfer Center, Harvard University, discovered that the gasoline costs savings of plug-in electric cars over their lifetimes do not offset their higher purchase prices. The study did a compariosn of the lifetime net present value at 2010 purchase and operating costs for the US market with no government subidies. The study estimated that a PHEV-40 is around US$5,377 more expensive compared to a conventional internal combustion engine used in gasoline powered vehicles. The study asserts that over a period of time, PHEVs, will be more expensive than Battery Electric Vehicles in most of the comparison scenarios between the two, and more expensive than conventional cars unless battery costs become very low while gasoline prices soar. An Electric Battery Vehicle recharged from the US grid electricity as of the year 2008 emits approximately 115 grams of CO2 per kilometer driven (6.5 oz(CO2)/mi), while a conventional US-market gasoline powered vehicle emits approximately 250 g(CO2)/km (14 oz(CO2)/mi), most of which is derived from its tailpipe, while some is derived from the production and distribution of gasoline.(Belfer Center, 2011).

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) undertook and published a report in the year 2012 with an assessment of average greenhouse gas emissions that result from charging plug-in vehicle batteries considering the full life-cycle (well-to-wheel and also according to the amount of fuel and technology used to generate electric power by region in the United States. The study used the Nissan Leaf all-electric car to establish the baseline of their analysis's and they expressed their findings in terms of miles per gallon rather than the conventional unit of grams of carbon dioxide emissions per year. The study discovered that in areas where electricity is produced from natural gas, hydroelectric, nuclear or any other renewable sources, the potential of plug-in electric vehicles to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is relatively significant.

Contrastingly , in regions where a high proportion of power is produced from coal, hybrid electric vehicles produce less CO2 emissions than plug-in electric vehicles, and the best fuel efficient gasoline-powered vehicles produces slightly less emissions than a plug-in electric vehicle. In the worst-case scenario, the study asserted that for a region where all their energy is derived from coal as their source of energy, a plug-in electric battery vehicle would emit greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to a gasoline car rated at a combined city/highway fuel economy of 30 mpg-US (7.8 L/100 km; 36 mpg-imp). The study further found out that for around 45% of the U.S. population, a plug-in electric battery vehicle will release lower CO2 emissions compared to a gasoline-powered vehicle capable of a combined fuel economy of 50 mpg-US (4.7 L/100 km; 60 mpg-imp), like the Toyota Prius (Union of Concerned Scientists, 2012).

Discount Factor/Subsidies

Many Governments all around the world have instituted a number of incentives for plug-in electric battery vehicles as a financial incentive inorder for vehicle consumers to purchase a plug-in electric battery vehicle. The level of such incentives normally depends on the size of battery and also the electric range of the vehicle, and in some countries, governments extend these benefits to fuel cell vehicles, as well electric vehicle conversions of hybrid electric vehicles and conventional internal combustion engine vehicles.( Gordon-Bloomfield)

Within the US, the Energy Improvement and Extension Act of 2008, and abit later the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES) allowed tax credits for new qualified plug-in electric battery motor vehicles. "The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" of 2009 (ARRA) also did authorize federal tax credits for converted plug-in vehicles. Such incentives are not available for normal interna combustion gasoline or diesel powered vehicles.

As it is defined by the 2009 ACES Act, a Plug in Electric Vehicle is a vehicle which gets its energy of propulsion from a traction battery with at least 4 kwh of capacity and uses an offboard source of energy to recharge such a battery. The tax credit for new plug-in electric vehicles charge is worth $2,500 plus $417 for each kilowatt-hour of battery capacity that is more than 4 kwh, and the part of the credit determined by battery capacity cannot exceed $5,000. Therefore, the total amount of the credit allowed for a new PEV is $7,500.

The new qualified plug-in electric vehicle credit phases out for a PEV manufacturer over the one-year period beginning with the second calendar quarter after the calendar quarter in which at least 200,000 qualified automobiles from that manufacturer have been sold in the United States (Voelcker). Due to this, cumulative sales are calculated as from December 31, 2009 (Klayman, and Crawley). Qualifying PEVs are suitable for 50% of the credit if acquired in the first two quarters of the phase-out period, and 25% of the credit if bought in the third or fourth quarter of the phase-out period. Both the Nissan Leaf electric vehicle and the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid, launched in 2010, are entitled to a maximum of $7,500 tax credit. The Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid, scheduled for 2012, is eligible for a $2,500 tax credit due to its smaller battery capacity of slightly more than 5.2 kWh2009 (Klayman, and Crawley).

There is also a federal tax credit equal to 50% of the cost to buy and install a home-based charging station with a maximum credit tax of US$2,000 in each power generating station. Businesses qualify for tax credits up to $50,000 for larger installations. These credits expired on the 31st December, 2010, but were extended for one year with a reduced tax credit equal to 30% with a maximum credit of up to US$1,000 for each power generating station for individuals and up to US$30,000 for commercial buyers (Klayman, and Crawley).

Results

In terms of results between these two types of automobiles, the top range for an electric car is about 300 miles eventhough most of them are even presently operating under 50 miles. Many of the electric cars that have been manufactured do have a provision of a gas engine incase an individual wants to go for a longer trip. For instance, an electric car like the Chevy Volt have a quite incredible miles per gallon ratio for its gas engine, which is usually over 50 miles to the gallon. In comparison with many regular gasoline only cars, we find that normal gasoline cars are unable to achieve such high numbers, with the best a gasoline car can manage is still under $ 40 miles to the gallon (Klayman, and Crawley).

In terms of efficiency, electric motors are more efficient compared to gasoline ones and they possess an added advantage of having the ability to supply their maximum level of power immediately rather than waiting, as the gasoline ones, for the engine to rev up (Prigg). This particular quality gives electric vehicles excellent and steady acceleration over gasoline powered batteries. Gasoline powered engines are however powerful and abit inexpensive, especially if you compare the costs with electric car batteries.In addition to this, gasoline and gasoline stations are readily available throughout the world, and this in a way provides good results for gasoline powered batteries. Gasoline powered engines are however not as efficient as the electric car engine systems and the always produce noise as well as vibration while they are running.

Electric vehicle engine systems also have a couple of things that may be deemed to be affecting their resuslts, for instance they also require very frequent recharging, just like normal technology gadgets such as laptops, mobile phones and tablet. This frequent charging too mustindefinite range,due to the fact that they can be quickly re-fueled. Electric battery vehicles often have a less maximum range on one charge than gasoline or diesel powered vehicles, and it takes a considerable amount of time to recharge them to full capacity. This concern infects consumers with a worry reffered to as range anxiety, where people get really concerned that they may run out of energy from their electric car battery before they have arrived at their intended destination.

The Tesla Roadster, which can travel 245 miles (394 km) per single charge, can be fully recharged in approximately three and a half hours from a 220-volt, 70-amp outlet which can be installed even in a home.however, using a European standard 220-volt, 16-amp outlet, a fully complete charge will take a duration of more than fifteen hours.

Car automakers are working hard to be able to extend the short range of electric battery vehicles by building them with what is known as battery switch technology. An Electric Battery Vehicle with this battery switch technology and a driving range of approximately 100 miles (160 km) will be able to go to an available battery switch station and switch a depleted battery with a fully charged one in 59.1 seconds, giving the electric vehicle an extra 100 miles (160 km) driving range (Matgasnier). This kind of process, designed to improve the results of elctric battery vehicles is much cleaner and faster compared to filling a tank with gasoline or diesel and the driver too remains in the car the entire time the recharge is taking place. However, due to the high investment costs of this particular processs, how to go about it is quite unclear. As of the latter part of the year 2010 there were only 2 companies which have made plans to integrate the battery switching technology to their electric battery vehicles. These two companies are Better Place and Tesla MotorsA similar idea is that of the range-extension trailer which is attached only when going on long journeys. The trailers can either be rented or owned only when necessary.

Electric battery vehicles are praised for being able to contribute to much more cleaner air in cities and other urban centres, due to the fact that they produce no harmful pollution whatsoever at the tailpipe from the onboard source of power, pollutants such as particulates (soot), hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, ozone gases, volatile organic compounds, lead as well as other various oxides of nitrogen (Saturn). The clean air benefit is mostly of a local nature because, depending on the source of the electricity applied to recharge these electric batteries, air pollutant emissions are moved to the location of the generation plants of the electricity used to recharge the batteries. It has been noted that the amount of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere relys on the emission intensity of the power source that is used to charge the electric battery vehicle, as well as the efficiency of the electric vehicle and aslo the amount of energy wasted in the charging process.