Less lazy fat-asses is fine with me. Some douche pulled out in front of me on the street yesterday with a smug ass expression, Busted his fucking rear windsheild and dissapeared into and alley. Cause fuck him, that's why.

probably not, sadly.

Electric cars, powered by electricity from hydro, nuclear, or even solar plants?
Also, i sure hope DEMO is up and running by 2040.

As a pilot in training, i feel like i will be one of the last that enjoyed (powered) flying. For non-astronomical price that is.
We currently do not have a viable solution for powering engines. And i am pretty sure we won't make one by the 2050, when the peak oil will occur, according to 90% of researches.
And we should have a viable solution ready by 2030, because only that would provide a seemingly seamless transition from fossil fuel energy...

It won't be an evolutionary change like the industrial revolution, but a true and abrupt revolution. Enjoy your flight lads, your kids might not.

>>305559
What is DEMO?

>>305560

(DEMOnstration Power Plant)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEMO

>>305563
>>305559
Sounds good, but while we're waiting for that to be built, why don't we use the fusion reactor we already have?

say hello to ships sailing over the atlantic!

>>305565

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power#Current_status

Quote from Wikipedia ( i know i know, not realiable and stuff):

As of July 2010, the largest experiment by means of magnetic confinement has been the Joint European Torus (JET). In 1997, JET produced a peak of 16.1 megawatts (21,600 hp) of fusion power (65% of input power), with fusion power of over 10 MW (13,000 hp) sustained for over 0.5 sec. In June 2005, its successor, ITER, was announced by the seven parties involved in the project - the United States, China, the European Union (EU), India, Japan, the Russian Federation, and South Korea.[2] ITER is designed to produce ten times more fusion power than the power put into the plasma over many minutes; for example 50 MW of input power to produce 500 MW of output power. ITER is currently under construction in Cadarache, France. DEMO is intended as the next generation of research from ITER, and to be the first reactor demonstrating sustained net energy-producing fusion on a commercial scale. It has been proposed to begin construction of DEMO in 2024.

>>305568

lol 3 minutes into that article and i already have 12 (!!!) tabs open

gonna make me some coffee, this will be a loong night read

it's reasonable to keep combustion engines around if we can run them on something other than fossil fuels, simply because they're so cheap and easy to build compared to batteries and electric motors. in order to make every car sold in the USA a lithium-powered electric car using current technology (ie still with a 40 mile range), we'd have to use 140% of the current yearly lithium production...40% new mines and that's not even counting the industries that already use it. OTOH, you can build a 40 horsepower motorcycle engine for a couple hundred bucks with semi-skilled labor, and that'll run on basically any liquid or gaseous fuel, reliably for 60,000 miles.

the problem is that people have way more than they need. If everyone had a 40-horsepower motorcycle with a catalytic converter on it, they'd get better gas mileage and have lower emissions than even the fanciest hybrid cars out there, even running on gasoline; switch to bioethanol and you've got a fuel that produces no heavy hydrocarbon residue, just C/CO/CO2 and water.

if we replaced SUVs with small cars and small cars with motorcycles, according to actual vehicle use; shifted towards locally-grown and locally-manufactured products instead of shipping them from around the world; and got to work on genetically engineering algae to produce biofuel, we'd be set. Fuel the trains and planes with biodiesel and the cars and motorcycles with bioethanol. You could cordon off a chunk of the pacific ocean the size of texas and just grow obese algae in it, and produce enough diesel-like fuel to feed the whole country with zero land use. On top of that, the algae would fix carbon from the atmosphere as they grew, effectively offsetting the emissions of the cars that they fueled.

all 100% possible if we just got over our gluttony for oil and used what we needed instead of what we wanted.

>>305576
Remember when gas prices were $4.00 a gallon a few years ago, and big-ass SUV's were sitting on the lots unsold? Remember when gas prices then fell to $1.40 a gallon? Right away, Americans started buying big-ass SUV's again. Proof positive that the only way to keep those abominations off the road is to punish the people who drive them with sky-high fuel costs.

>>305581
These days, the up-front costs of those monsters are enough to get people to stop buying them - turns out recessions are good for some things.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2011/06/obama-team-taps-strategic-oil-reserve/1

Obama tapped America's strategic oil reserve. Great! If we keep tapping it, this (see link below) will happen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmVzk5PHlP4

bump

bump bump bump

>>305584
Tapping resources, huh. Here's what they need.

>>305556
yea because we'll have hovering flying saucers like the Jetsons

transportation has always improved in terms of convenience, speed and range. getting rid of cars before we have anything better would be a huge step backwards

and yes--buses, bicycles and trains AREN'T better than a car that you can drive anywhere you want, any time you want to go.

All that land that's wasted on streets and parking lots will finally be put to use. I'd turn it all into hiking trails/parks but growing food on it is A-OK as well.

>What will replace cars?

We'll have high speed rail everywhere for long-distance trips, and for medium to short distance travel (<50 miles), people will ride automated vehicles that are similar to buses but larger and wider (think store-sized) that allow you to board and unboard at will.

>>305609
dumb magic. back in my grand pappys day they played real games and they were called world war two

>>305623
wat

>transportation has always improved in terms of convenience, speed and range.
Concorde goes whaaah?

What evidence do you have to support that claim OP?

>>305622
>All that land that's wasted on streets and parking lots will finally be put to use.

you mean all that empty space between the western two-thirds of the USA? Or most of Canada? Or the entire Australian interior? Or inland China? Or Russia?

>We'll have high speed rail everywhere for long-distance trips, and for medium to short distance travel (<50 miles), people will ride automated vehicles that are similar to buses but larger and wider (think store-sized) that allow you to board and unboard at will.

yea, anywhere along the route that they run on. and as long as they're not already full. fail x2

>>305625
>Concorde goes whaaah?

Concorde was mass-transit, was it not?

>>305629
I don't know if you consider a luxury super sonic airliner mass transit, because I don't.

>>305630
if you paid to ride it along with a bunch of other people you don't know, it's mass transit

(I think they were flown private a few times--where somebody bought all the seats on the flight, just to fly without other people on board--but not often)

>>305631
You mean chartered. Yes, that happens, but no, I don't think that the Concorde really qualified as "mass transit." It was all luxury for the most part with HIGHLY limited seating and infrequent flights. If the Concorde is mass transit then so is a limo.

>>305618
>>305628
>>305633
Gas will run out, meaning that cars as we know them will no longer be viable. I look forward to that day, for cars cause thousands of deaths, pollute the air, make roads impassible with traffic congestion, are noisy, cause the urban heat island effect, and enable suburban sprawl. Before suburban sprawl, nobody in the cities needed a car; everything was in walking distance.

>>305629
Canada, Russia, the western U.S. and Australia are mostly uninhabitable because of climate, but the eastern U.S. has lost thousands of acres of the best farm land in the world to strip malls and subdivisions. Without cars, we will have neither the need for, nor the ability to sustain, all that grass and asphalt.

i hope so man.

>>305556
Wrong.
/thread

>>305667
The U.S. alone consumes 378 million gallons of gasoline a day! Gasoline is already pennies below $4.00 a gallon in California. If we keep up this rate of consumption, how expensive do you think gas will be in 70 years?

>>305669
Except oil isn't the only way to get "gasoline". Ever hear of bio-diesel,ethanol?

One of my classmates has a car that runs on grease from restaurants. Keep dreaming you nuts.

>>305713
Manufacturing that shit is not efficient

Not a replacement at all

>>305669
Gasoline will only be around another 40 years.

Gasoline powered cars no longer viable except as collector cars or leisure cruisers within or lifetimes? Probably. No cars at all (IE electric, hydrogen etc.) Very unlikely.
As a car guy how does this make me feel? Well, rather indifferent. People/organizations continue to use old technologies for recreation even when they're no longer used for practical purposes widel or at all. For example, archery, black powder weapons, sailing boats, riding horses, steam locomotives, vintage automobiles, vinyl records, old musical instruments and probably many more I cant think of. When new technology comes along that replaces something old, very rarely does the old disappear or become abandoned, rather the old is freed from its practical mundane tasks and liberated to the field of enjoyment and recreation.

If energy sources collapse fast enough, and greed and paranoia tear our civilaztion apart....then populations will also crash (Malthusian fantasy?).

If the number of people who need cars gets small enough, there will be more than enough oil to go around.

Feels bad man. But I'm inclined to call bullshit. When cars came around, did people stop riding horses? For transporation, sure. For recreation, no, they still do. Gasoline cars are like horses, as oil becomes harder to extract gasoline prices will rise, causing market demand for alternatives, hydrogen or better electrics. Eventually these will become the majority of cars, and gasoline cars will be used almost exclusively for recreation.
To those who don't get the love of cars, watch this. If you still don't get it, you have no soul.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AApsYK-mfV4

>will someone please think of the plastics!

We emerged from microbes and muck. We battled sabre-tooth tigers and wolly mammoths. We survived winters, predators and disease with absolutely no technology. We built civilizations from nothing. Roman aqueducts, the light house of alexandria, the colosseum, the pyramids, all without technology. Our civilizations collapsed into the dark ages. It was our darkest hour, the most violent time in human history, unprecendented war, famine, human suffering, disease, tyranny and corruption. But out of nothing, with no technology and no assistance, humanity rose from the ashes. We conquered the night, we had enlightenment and an age of reason, in two centuries we invented quite literally everything we have today. We went from horses to automobiles and freeways in a generation, cloth winged wooden frame flying machines to jumbo jets, the concorde and the saturn V in little over 60 years.
We can do all that, figure that out, but now some say we will fall when we run out of oil? Such people are a disgrace to humanity, historical ignorant pampered human trash. Keep your negativity to yourself, and get out of our way, there's a universe to explore.

>>305725
We'll surely find some alternative means of transportation, but the current "drive everywhere for everything in a gas-powered car at any time of the day or night" model can't go on forever.

Only two good things can come of gas prices. Either:

A) They go down, increasing consumption by the idiotic American public and further depleting supplies.

or

B) They go up, causing very well-deserved pain at the pump for drivers. SUV drivers will be hit the hardest.

Thank God gas is a finite resource literally buried deep underground.

bump

>>305769
Of course. The most likely replacement, however is the "drive everywhere for everything in a hydrogen or electric car at any time of the day or night" model.

>>305791
Sounds good enough. There'd be no more air pollution, though we would still have to endure the other evils of car culture.

Super batteries will come before we run out of oil.

>>305793
Well then it will be as it is now. If one finds the evils of public transit less offensive than the evils of car culture, one can move to an area where they can use public transit for their needs. Or if one prefers the car one can move to an area where it is used, pretty awesome how not everyplace is the same amiright?

If you look at the modern Hydrogen cars you can tell the future is already here, the cost even today of producing hydrogen fuel is comparable to gas. The only major problem is the infrastructure isnt here, but easily could be if more gas stations would offer it. The cost can only go down.

>>305559
>As a pilot in training, i feel like i will be one of the last that enjoyed (powered) flying.
My Vans RV-6 gets 22 MPG at 150 knots. Just sayin.'

>>305798
Exactly, so essentially all that's needed is economic demand, ie gas becoming more expensive someday when oil is more expensive to retrieve, there by giving market demand and economic incentive for gas stations to offer hydrogen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AUurBnLbJw

I sure hope not.

>>305793
What evils might those be? Maybe you mean traffic, but if someone chooses to live in the city I don't think they should be overly upset to discover an abundance of other people around.

>>305812
Highway fatalities. Also, people travel more than they need to, causing excess traffic.

>>305629

Nope, I mean that all that asphalt that's wasted on streets and parking lots is wasted space. And that space in an urban environment is infintely more valuable than an equivalent space in the middle of nowhere, and put to better use as a green space.

>fail x2
???

>>305841
If one wishes to live risk free, hide at home in the closet. People do many things more than they need to. No one really needs to do anything more than sleep a certain amount each day, eat some bread and water and reside in a climate controlled 10x10 white room. But what fun would that be?

>>305865
Car crashes are a major social problem. Not being a shut-in and eating tasteful food are not.

That's okay, I'll just keep driving around in my Firebird with its loud exhaust being a jackass.

>>305994
Enjoy it while you can.

100% electric cars exist and are viable right now. May they maim and kill 1,000,000 more bicycle riders.

>>306016
As long as they're emission-free, I wouldn't mind; I'd put up with sitting in rush hour traffic if I could just roll the window down and breathe without suffering a CO-induced cardiac arrest. Hell, I'd probably enjoy driving one, and I wouldn't be exposed to the elements as on a bike.

I don't know very much about 100% electric cars. Are you referring to battery-powered or hydrogen technology?

>>306016
>100% electric cars exist and are viable right now.

electric cars have existed for 100+ years. ever wondered why they didn't sell well?

here's a hint: its not the evil oil companies keeping them down.

the ONLY electric vehicle that has gained world-wide use is electric TRAINS, and that is because they are fed from overhead wires, and so are free of the need for storage batteries....

>May they maim and kill 1,000,000 more bicycle riders.

not that many bicycle riders in all of USA prolly. u might have to back up and run over the same people 4-5 times

>>305985
Lets not blow shit out of proportion. Do you ever think 'omg what if I die today, better stay home' I doubt it. With modern vehicles you have to be a bigger idiot than ever before to manage to kill yourself in a car crash. Of course idiots still die, but idiots have been killing themselves in idiotic ways since the dawn of time, and it's not really a bad thing.

>>306030
Unfortunately, idiots also kill some of the rest of us. If idiots were only killing one another, I'd be all for it.

>>306034
But as a driver if you're unable to avoid the idiots, you are also therefore an idiot, and a poor driver.

>>306035
No, many people get killed on the highway through no fault of their own.

>>306036
Rarely. In the vast majority of cases it could've been avoided. But the thing is it doesn't matter, if an individual finds the risks of a particular activity too great, then they should choose not to participate in said activity.

>>306037
They can't when society and government force everyone to be completely dependent on cars.

>>306043
If they're that scared of dying in a car accident they could take the bus. Or live in a city with a subway system. Or man the fuck up and stop being a pussy.

They will not, but they will start to have less people using it when the traffic becomes terrible and gas prices skyrocket.

I LOVE L.A.! I LOVE L.A.!

>>306170
cool shoop bro

but LA is fucking terrible

>>306197
Shoop?
That's how it gets, man. Granted, it's usually only in one direction, but I've seen it get that bad in both directions before.

but as you delay and delay implementing public transportation, the logistical difficulties and costs only become greater

>>306199

L.A. Doesn't have any freeways with 10 lanes/side, either.

Bio-diesel, anyone?

>>306021
>>306022

Nissan Leaf, already 4,000 sold and are on the streets. Then there is Tesla Motors who sold 1,400 cars (in the last 3 years) but are now working with Toyota to create a 100% electric Rav4.

FUCK YEAH FUTURE

>>306238
1) Electric cars do not solve the problem of the roads finite capacity:
>The carrying capacity of a freeway lane is roughly 1800 vehicles per hour, or 2000 people per hour given average vehicle occupancy of 1.11 passengers. A typical six-lane freeway therefore carries up to 12,000 people per hour in both directions.
>A double-track suburban railway, meanwhile, can easily support one train movement every three minutes in each direction without straining its capacity. A six-car train can carry around 1000 passengers before reaching crush conditions. Thus the rail line can carry at least 40,000 people per hour in both directions, and perhaps more depending on the signalling system and vehicle design.

2) Where does an electric car get its power? From the electrical grid. How will the grid cope and where will the additional power come from when there are hundreds of thousands and then millions of electrical cars demanding recharge? Is this the best use of resources compared to using it to power metro & commuter trains and streetcars?

3) What happens to the batteries when they wear out? Is there a plan to recycle them or are they going to be thrown in land fills where their toxic heavy metals will leach into the soil?

>>306238
watch the episode of Top Gear where they take a Leaf and a Peugeot iOn for a drive in the English country side
the results are pretty embarrassing

Electric cars are neat, but they are as environmentally friendly as SUVs are. Those fancy batteries with rare earth metals an lithium in them take tons of energy to make. The waste that comes from their manufacture is fairly toxic. The only way electric cars are going to become mainstream in the long term is if a new chemistry is developed that is cheap to make and is non-toxic.

As gasoline becomes more expensive 1 of 2 things is going to happen

1. People drive less, switch to smaller cars/motorcycles.

2. We bring back some nazi superscience(the best kind of superscience) and make all of our gasoline from coal. The US is sitting on a 200+ year reserve at current usage rates.

>>306244
Top Gear has never, ever embellished a test to promote its vies on automobiles and alternative energy. Never in history. Ever.

Oh wait shit I meant to say they've never NOT done that. My bad bro.

I like to walk. I live in a small college town where everything I need is within 5 miles of a given direction. Not everybody has this luxury, but it helps you get in shape and saves money if it is the case in your town.

I do hate how the doucheyMcFratFuck and sorostitute freshmen will throw shit at my wife and I or yell at us from their brand new Mustang's windows laughing that they have a car and we don't.

One time, this dude hit my daughter, who was 6 months old at the time with a fucking paper ball, so I chucked a rock at them. Needless to say, they pulled over, called the police, we both explained our side of the story and the cops sided with us and charged them with fines for littering, assault, and harassment.

Funny. I have a shitty old van that literally drinks gasoline, and I don't like wasting money on it. Meanwhile, these fuck's "mommy and daddy" pay for their brand new car, their gas money, and all other expenses. So what makes you so great that you have to harass walkers who are on the sidewalk, minding their own business? Usually, it's not even the person driving the car, it's the dude in the back seat, riding in his "friend's" car because he himself either has a shitty car or no car at all.

I just have to say, after being harassed several times, what the fuck is wrong with these kids? Their parents haven't taught them anything useful about discipline or respect, and it's always those same parents who try to sue when the police take my side. Who does this shit? Retarded people, that's who. Fucking invalid's. Partially functioning idiots who think they are the shit, better than everyone else in the world, and yet they have no worth of their own. They expect everything to be handed to them. Great job raising your children, ass hats. When your son kills my daughter and winds up dead, and the police take my side, don't even bother trying to sue, justice was already served.

>>306297
To add on...

Nobody I know and very few kids that go to my high school could actually afford a car. Their parents have to pay for insurance and serious maintenance, since it's really tough to take challenging classes and have time for work. Not worth it, actually. At minimum wage, it'd be about two hours a school day at work.

If someone was standing by the bus stop/bike rack and they handed kids $15 every time they commuted via not-car... I'd eat Fresh Pacific Swordfish
Chargrilled with citrus butter and finished with cranberry-lime relish every other night!

So kids' parents hand them $100+ every month because...? Maybe they feel like their offspring are doomed to failure without a car. I don't know. Then kids move to places/build their lives so they can't live without it, they have kids, etc etc ad nauseam.

>>306244

>Implying Top Gear promotes an unbiased view towards anything that isn't fuel powered
>Implying either of the episodes featuring the Tesla Roadster and the Leaf and the Peugeot weren't full of blatant lies about the vehicles themselves.

Keep leeching off the bullshit that's fed to you, Sir.

Electric cars aren't necessarily all that efficient once you look further upstream. A gas-powered car is relatively simple: the crude is extracted, refined and transported with maybe 5% loss from the well to the pump. From that point, a typical gasoline-powered car can make use of that fuel with about 20% efficiency, or around 30% for a typical diesel. Overall, this works out to 19% end-use efficiency for a gas car, or 28% for a typical diesel. Pretty shitty, I know, but that's the harsh nature of practical thermodynamics.

But electric cars don't USE engines, so they should be way better, right? Well, let's see: at the bottom level, we have a car that takes electricity from a battery and uses it with about 85% efficiency. Not bad, but that's not all. You see, this battery is not perfect, and actually loses about 10% of its energy (and that's on the optimistic side) from every charge-discharge cycle. That puts us at 77% so far - not so bad... But of course, the battery is charged from electricity off the grid, which is produced at power plants. Power plants which typically run at a little under 50% efficiency on average. This nets out to 38%, from the plant to the wheels.

Overall, it initially appears the electric DOES have a concrete advantage. However it is worth noting that there is considerable variation amongst internal-combustion powered cars, as well as ample room for growth left (as evidenced by many newer, efficiency-oriented cars achieving over 30% from gasoline and as high as 45% with diesels) - whereas power plants and electric cars are both pretty much tapped-out.

I'm not even gonna bring up the other issues with electric cars - I'm sure we all know plenty well about them.

>>306309
all true, but electrical input from hydro and wind power changes your heat rate calculations for grid power.

financially electricity has great advantages over IC fuel: off peak power is very cheap or even free in some circumstances. since car charging is done almost entirely in the owners driveway, at night, negotiation for absorbing surplus electric power is possible, whereas the price of gasoline has no such opportunities.

>>306309
>Power plants which typically run at a little under 50% efficiency on average.

The most current designs are only have a 35% thermodynamic efficiency You also forgot line losses which is around 10%

I also think your math is a bit off
Start off with %100 of the energy in the fuel
Get %35 out as power
After line losses(10%) you have %31.5 of that original energy
Battery losses bring it down to %28.35
End up with %24 of the power going from the fuel to the wheels.

There is some hope through. A few modifications in power plant design can up their thermodynamic efficiency to 45% and an improved electrical grid can reduce the line losses to 5%. Assuming there is no improvements in battery and motor technology you end up with 32.7% of the energy going to the wheels.

>>306302
>>306297
It's frat boys, man.

Nobody likes them. They'd be just as big of jerks even if they didn't have a car.

>>306333
the grid marginal heat rate is around 8900 btu/kwhr 3413/8900 = 38.3%
the GTCC plants built in the last decade such as ABB GT24s and Siemens 501Gs routinely operate near 7150 btu/kwhr = 47.7%

>>306246
At the current rate, gasoline will be pretty well depleted within 60 years. As to coal, what will we do when that runs out? Go back to wood-fired trains moving at about the speed of a pedal-powered bike like in the 1830's.

just set up a dyson sphere and be done with it already

Ever since the industrial revolution we have been raping our mother earth while degenerating our societies into states of amoral chaos. Natural living is a concept long in the past for these selfish, spoiled brats.
They will inherit the earth but the earth will swallow them.

>>306343
Combined cycle is nice, but they are not too common. Most power plants in the US are still coal fired.

>>306348
>As to coal, what will we do when that runs out?

Coal based fuels are intended to be a stop-gap solution, not a permanent one. You can buy your self another 25-50 years with coal based fuels. That gives another 25-50 years to transition over to "green" energy. The coal based fuels will cost as much if not a bit more than gasoline. When the green tech becomes cheaper than fossil fuels everyone will switch over to save money.

>>306373
>>Combined cycle is nice, but they are not too common. Most power plants in the US are still coal fired.
pretty common. 23% gas, 50% coal.
this chart is entire nation. in some regions gas is much larger than coal.

>>306373
>>306384
Well my point was, steam-turbine plants - which represent both coal AND nuclear plants, as well as a few types of renewable plant - typically achieve only 35-40%, and combined cycle power plants achieve 50-60% efficiency. I tried to be lenient to pre-empt any bitching from the electric car fanboys over my numbers, so 50% is what I used.

But when it comes down to it, you can have a power plant somewhere converting raw energy into usable energy and sending it through an electrical grid and then putting it through a lossy charge-discharge cycle and losing a little bit more of that energy from the motor itself, or you could just put a much smaller (and somewhat less efficient) power plant under the hood and call it good. The difference is not nearly as major as it appears.

Just use this perpetual motion machine. Problem, fuelfags?

>>306454
lame

>>306384
We must have different definitions of what combined cycle is.

Combined cycle is a gas/oil fired turbine in combination with an energy recovery system to take the heat out of the exhaust to run a steam turbine.

There are designs that do it with coal. You can even get more ambitious and add on carbon capture and storage and have a near zero emission power plant. None have been built yet because of costs and "hurr durr clean coal does not exist" environmentalists.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_gasification_combined_cycle

>>306478
>implying clean coal exists.

>>306478
>carbon capture and storage
You're killing me, man.

>>306309
>A gas-powered car is relatively simple: the crude is extracted, refined and transported with maybe 5% loss from the well to the pump.
>etc.

This is what the average Joe actually believes.

>>306512
Then enlighten us, oh informed one.

>>306246

Keep in mind that the key factor that makes the next 10 years hard to predict is the Great Recession, which causes people to make important decisions that would not otherwise have happened in a normal, more prosperous economic climate and will likely end up fundamentally shaping the next 50 years. If the high unemployment rate continues for a few more years, as many economists are predicting, the chances for a post-car society to succeed, or even a more sustainable car society begin to fade.

>People drive less, switch to smaller cars/motorcycles.

This is already happening, mostly because people have less money to spend on both fuel and cars, which will both become more expensive over time. But there will be other factors that will cause people to drive less, regardless of the size of vehicle that people choose. As the population continues to increase and more cars fill up the already overwhelmed road infrastructure, more and more people will get frustrated of waiting in traffic and choose to not drive whenever possible. To accommodate the projected demand would require hundreds of billions that Americans are not willing to spend, and so those who are able to will opt to telecommute instead. In response, public officials will probably have no choice but to take measures that will make people drive less. The most likely are the elimination of free parking and the introduction of usage fees that vary based on total demand and how frequently one uses the roads. A car's odometer could be checked every year at the time of its annual smog check and a fee would be levied based on how many miles the car traveled in that year. Those who drive more pay more, and those who drive less give less of a free ride to those who use roads more.

>>306246 contd'

>lithium production fairly toxic

Lithium is scraped up from salt beds, is processed rather efortlessly and on-site and as such is far less toxic to the environment than if we satisfied our energy needs as we do today with coal and oil. This will be true if we switch to green power in the future.

>make gasoline from coal

This is retarded on multiple levels and I don't see this happening ever, even with Republicans in charge. The only place stupid or desperate enough to do this would be China, who would import American coal for conversion to gas.

>>306481
1. coal power plants with carbon capture
2. Nuclear power plants
3. live without electricity

Choose 1

>>306527
>Lithium is scraped up from salt beds, is processed rather efortlessly and on-site and as such is far less toxic to the environment than if we satisfied our energy needs as we do today with coal and oil. This will be true if we switch to green power in the future.

You dodged the questions about the production of the rare earth metals that are used in the batteries and motors.

>This is retarded on multiple levels and I don't see this happening ever, even with Republicans in charge. The only place stupid or desperate enough to do this would be China, who would import American coal for conversion to gas.

Sasol in South Africa does it and makes a decent buck doing it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasol

CTL plants are the most profitable and valuable portion of the company.

>>306527
Different guy here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Production
>There are widespread hopes of using lithium ion batteries in electric vehicles, but one study concluded that "realistically achievable lithium carbonate production will be sufficient for only a small fraction of future PHEV and EV global market requirements", that "demand from the portable electronics sector will absorb much of the planned production increases in the next decade", and that "mass production of lithium carbonate is not environmentally sound, it will cause irreparable ecological damage to ecosystems that should be protected and that LiIon propulsion is incompatible with the notion of the 'Green Car'".

So yeah, have fun with your pipedream, bro.

In the mean time, coal liquefaction is a very real process.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal-to-liquids
And since having coal-fuelled cars is obviously not viable, such processes are potentially VERY valuable for the future of not only automotive travel but indeed the ENTIRE transportation industry.

>>306530
>rare-earth metals in Li-ion batteries
Seriously, what the fuck are you on about? You lost all credibility with me about three or four posts ago.

>>306454

I spent the last 4 hours machining that out of aluminum, with brass bushings for the arm-pivots and a jeweled bearing from an old watch for the center of rotation.It doesn't work unless I continuously blow on it. :(

>>306562
Here, I've got a perpetual motion machine for you that actually WORKS.

>>305725
You have no fucking clue what you're talking about, and to help you on your way the "dark ages" is a largely perpetuated misconception. There were no "dark ages", people were awesome as fuck back then but morons still say they weren't and teach it in schools.

Furthermore, *WE* didn't do shit. Our ancestors did. I'd just love to see you try and go the rest of your life without any of the precious technology you're used to, you'd die like a fucking pig.

>>306570
It's drinking the water!

>>306570
>>306606
One day, the entire industrial world will be powered by dippy birds.

>>306570
How do you like this perpetual motion machine from the wild wild west.

>>306022
Wait, what about trams? Metro?
Im czechfag and we have here even electric bus.
If troll. 8\10

>>306646
American here. How are Czech trams, buses, and metro powered? Batteries? Overhead wires? Cable cars?

>>306600
>you'd die like a fucking pig.

Id like to take a moment to point out that pigs are actually really tenacious and are a horribly invasive species more or less every place they have ever been introduced. Also this thread was a lot more interesting when /sci/ did it.

>>306531

>one study concluded
Stopped reading right there.

It is true that there are concerns over lithium supply in the future, but there is enough supply right now to cover the next 20 years easily. When that runs out, people will start to recycle existing batteries more agressively (billion dollar industry?) and by that point there will be other alternatives available that won't rely on lithium for batteries. The important thing is to switch from gasoline as soon as possible. I find it incredible that you deride lithium extraction as evironmentally damaging yet promote an industry that is orders of magnitude more destructive.

>coal liquefaction

Maybe for air travel, but i don't see it sustaining the car industry. The high amounts of energy used to convert the coal is better used to directly power vehicles.

>>306534
One battery in a Prius requires 33lbs of lanthanum. Future battery designs will require close to 60 lbs.

The motors need several pounds of rare earth metals for the magnets.

China currently has a near monopoly on them and they don't want to export as much as they are currently exporting.

>>306699
>The high amounts of energy used to convert the coal is better used to directly power vehicles.

It also takes a good bit of energy to extract oil and refine it into gasoline. Several of the processes in oil refining(distillation, cracking, coking, hydrotreating, reforming, ect.) involve heating feedstock to several hundred degrees Celsius.

>>306600
>There were no "dark ages", people were awesome as fuck back then but morons still say they weren't and teach it in schools.

Incorrect.

>Furthermore, *WE* didn't do shit

We was meant as reference to humanity, you ignorant fuck stick.

> I'd just love to see you RAGGEGERJEOREDJF

Yeah yeah yeah internet tough guy you're so impressive. >hemad.jpg

>>306706
>Future battery designs will require close to 60 lbs.
Li-ion =/= NiMH, dipshit. There are NO rare-earth metals in the current highest-performance battery chemistry.

bump

In the future we won't store energy in batteries.

We'll use....
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fly wheels.

bump

>>306964
>>307108
ic wat u r doin and I dont like it

>>306806
And how affordable are Li-ion batteries? How common are Li-ion batteries in hybrids?

I can spend 30 grand on one of new hybrids(dealers do sell over MSRP), or I can spend 12 grand on a small car(usually sold under MSRP) and buy 18k in gas. Even at $5/gallon I can still buy 3600 gallons of gas. Assuming my 12k car gets an average of 30mpg I can go 108,000 miles which is most of the lifespan on a new car today.

>>306965
One of the only green alternatives to batteries. The other is compressed air powered vehicles.

Other countries lie about how much oil they have.

Stop being a candy-ass, get out of your car for once, and learn to ride a motorcycle. That'll prolong the inevitable depletion of gasoline, and when it's too scare for motorcycles, ride a pedal-powered bike.

>>305556
As I said before (repeating for the benefit of latecomers to this thread): Your statement is rediculous. Autos may change form, but they will never be obsolete.

>>307480
Only if alternative fuels come along in time to save us. If they don't, we're back to the 19th century, taking trains and bikes.

>>307480
There's always an use for an autonomous vehicle. But it's not necessarily mainstream. Logistics, specialists and emergency will always use them no matter the costs, but the majority of commuters -- nope.

>>307530
Autonomous? You mean self-propelled.

No more airplanes.

>>307555
Yes. I was aiming for an allusion to the car, the auto. And failed miserably.

>>307678
Why didn't you just call it a car.

What about ethanol and biodiesel?

The first world will be completely devastated by peak oil. Only agrarian third world countries with will will remain to repopulate the world

>>308884
>ethanol
Making ethanol from food crops like corn is pants on head retarded.

However some of the new technology to making ethanol out of non-food stuff like wood chips is somewhat promising

http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/221417/20110929/wood-waste-water-motor-fuel.htm

Ethanol has a lower energy density than gasoline, but an octane rating around 115. You need a turbocharged or high compression ratio engine to get the most out of ethanol, but you can't run anything lower than 94 octane in the engine then.

>biodiesel

This is where my money is that for the fuel of the future. It has an energy density that is only slightly lower than regular diesel. Because you can make it from algae you can make it anywhere you got liquid water and sunlight. Exxon is dumping a ton of money into algae-based biodiesel.

The only issue is that the fuel gels up at lower temperatures.

>>309013
We still can't make enough.