In the past few weeks, I've had an opportunity to experience the cutting edge in plug-in electric vehicle technology. In some cases, you'd think you're just driving a regular car.
The bulk of production plug-in electric vehicles available now are either utility trucks, small cars that top out at 25 miles per hour, or the pricey Tesla Roadster sports car. Now automakers are building plug-in sedans and SUVs with lithium ion batteries designed for the mass market.
Judging from the cars I've driven, automakers are trying to strike a balance between enticing consumers with new technology but not asking them to make sacrifices. So even though electrification is shaking up the auto industry, the biggest learning curve for owners may be around fueling rather than driving. And if the goal is to make plug-ins mainstream, that's probably a good thing.
Consider the electric Ford Focus which is due out in 2011. It runs entirely on batteries for a range of about 100 miles and will be manufactured side-by-side with the gasoline edition.
During my drive two weeks ago, I was eager to feel the acceleration. Vehicles that run off electric motors have "instant torque," which means you get the car's top acceleration at all speeds. The Focus was indeed zippy and responsive, but when I asked if it was better than the gasoline Focus, Ford's director of global electrification Nancy Gioia told me that it'd be the same--on purpose.
Ford dialed back the potential acceleration of the electric Focus so drivers can expect the same from the gasoline and electric versions. The same is true for braking.
"That makes the technology less scary and more familiar--and, actually, safer. Because if you jump from an (electric car) to a regular car, you don't want to have to remember very different (conditions)," she said. Limiting the maximum available acceleration also saves the batteries to help deliver on expected range.
Electric drive
Another car in the all-electric category is the Think City, made by Think of Norway, which I got a chance to drive last week. From a design point of view, it's almost the polar opposite of the high-end Tesla Roadster. The Think City can go about 100 miles on its batteries and it's highway capable with a top speed of 60 miles per hour. In its first iteration, it only has two seats in the front and a hatchback.
Once again, I found the acceleration pretty good and responsive during my quick loop around a parking lot roof. But don't expect sports car-caliber handling. It struck me as a car simply designed to get you from one place to the next, but on electric charge. The company expects to start selling the Think City in Europe later this year and build a plant for the U.S. market next year.
Nissan, Tesla Motors, and Coda Automotive are among the other automakers betting on all-electric sedans. The thinking is that the limited range is acceptable for people who would rather fuel up on electricity than oil for their daily commutes. GM executives, for example, project that more than 90 percent of drivers could do 90 percent of their driving in electric mode.
If you drive 50 miles a day, all-electric cars probably aren't the best fit for your primary car. That said, a 100-mile range with daily charging can meet a lot of Americans' daily driving needs and rental cars are always available for long road trips.
Auto industry executives say it will be substantially cheaper to drive on an electric charge, but the high cost of batteries and power electronics raise the upfront cost. Ford's electric Focus, for example, will cost more than the gasoline version, although it should be eligible for a tax credit for plug-ins. The Chevy Volt is said to cost about $40,000, and Nissan's Leaf is said to cost in the $25,000 to $35,000 range, although the company is looking at options, such as battery leasing, to lower that upfront cost.
Plug-in hybrids
Analysts project electrics to be a very small slice of the overall market for hybrids and electric vehicles in the next five years because of the limitations on range and the anticipated higher cost associated with the new technology.
Sales of hybrids, meanwhile, are projected to grow. But what remains to be seen is how much traction plug-in hybrids will get. Toyota, Ford, and General Motors are preparing plug-in hybrids, which will start arriving in showrooms over the next two or three years. Initially, plug-in hybrids are being tested with fleet operators.
After taking the Focus for a ride, I took a spin in a prototype of a plug-in hybrid Ford Escape SUV being tested by utilities gauging the impact of plug-ins on the grid. The driving, again, was familiar; acceleration, handling, and the interior is all what I'd expect in an SUV. What was different is that I was quickly drawn to the fuel-efficiency feedback system.
In this case, the Escape drives mostly on its 10 kilowatt-hour battery (compared to a 1.5 kilowatt-hour battery in a regular hybrid) for the first 30 miles or so. But when you need an extra boost of power, the gasoline engine will kick in, which you can hear and see on the in-car display.
The big advantage of gas-electric vehicles, of course, is that you can fuel up away from an electrical socket. Overall, fuel economy will improve the more often you can charge up. In a test of its fleet of converted plug-in Priuses, Idaho National Labs found that its average mileage was 55 miles per gallon, but fuel economy dropped significantly if cars were not charged every day.
The technological twist on the plug-in hybrids is the extended-range electric vehicle or a series hybrid--an approach being used by the Chevy Volt and Fisker Automotive luxury sedans. In this case, it's the electric motor that moves the car all the time and the gas engine is used to run a generator for the motor. When I was taken for a drive in the Volt by a GM auto engineer this summer, I found the Volt had a lot of pep and handled turns well.
Having driven a number of plug-in vehicle variants over the past year, it's clear that these cars will work just fine for everyday driving. The technology of lithium ion batteries leaves plenty of room for both utilitarian and performance cars. Nobody can say how much more the average consumer will be willing to pay for fuel efficiency from the new technology, but the biggest change to daily habits may come when drivers fuel up by plugging in rather than filling 'er up.
Automakers are expected to agree this week to use the SAE J1772 five-pin charging system and coupler as the standard connection for plug-in vehicles.
(Credit: SAE International)The Society of Automotive Engineers International, the organization that sets the standard for aerospace and automotive industry technology, will vote this week to make the SAE J1772 charging system and coupler the standard connection for plug-in vehicles, according to a General Motors executive.
Britta Gross, director of GM's Global Energy Systems, shared the news during a live Web chat at GM's Fastlane blog on Tuesday evening.
"As Jon Lauckner said this morning, the Volt comes with a 120-V charger and if you can find a normal outlet, you can charge the Volt," Gross said.
She went on to add that all major automakers will eventually equip cars with the same charging coupler when their respective plug-in cars in the pipeline reach the consumer market because a standard agreement was being reached.
"Yes, GM's Gery Kissel is chair of the SAE J1772 standards committee. The standard is going to a vote this week after two and a half years of work. All major automakers are expected to agree to adhere to these charging standards. All infrastructure that goes in from now on should be J1772 compliant so all plug-in vehicles can use it," Gross said.
Gross is referring to the SAE J1772 or SAE electric vehicle conductive charging cable and coupler which has five pins and can be used with 120V or 240 V single phase electrical systems.
The agreement would allow charging stations throughout the world to plug in to any standard plug-in vehicle in the same way nozzles at gas stations are standardized to fit gas- or diesel-powered vehicles, respectively.
It's not every day that you get to drive an all-electric car and a brand new gas-electric hybrid. But that's just what I did last week when I took both the Electric Mini Cooper and 2010 Ford Fusion for a spin.
The two cars represent two technical approaches to gaining fuel efficiency through bigger car batteries.
Like the Toyota Prius, the newly released Ford Fusion is a gas-electric hybrid that drives primarily on the gas engine, supplemented by a nickel-metal hydride battery. By contrast, the Mini Electric, which will start to be leased to drivers next month as part of a trial, runs entirely on lithium-ion batteries, the latest battery technology.
The trade-offs of both approaches are pretty apparent. The Fusion gets over 40 miles per gallon and it's more or less like any other car you've driven: you fill it up with gasoline and it goes.
The Mini Electric, on the other hand, sacrifices the entire back seat for its battery pack. That allows it to go 100 miles on a charge--sufficient for most daily driving. But two of its advantages are that you never go to a gas station and there are no emissions from the car itself.
Meanwhile, there's yet another technology in the mix--what General Motors calls a range-extended electric vehicle or what engineers call a series hybrid (as opposed to a parallel hybrid). In that case, an internal combustion engine does nothing but charge the batteries that propel the car.
On the road
There's a lot of focus on how lithium-ion batteries are paving the way for cars with a longer range (although cost is still a serious concern). But in both the Ford and the Electric Mini, there are a number of other fuel-saving tricks at work.
The big one is regenerative braking, where the battery charges when the driver presses the brake. The Ford Fusion didn't feel very different from any other automatic transmission car. But the regenerative braking in the Electric Mini was different. When I took my foot of the accelerator, the car slowed significantly. It's noticeable but something that I got used within a few minutes of riding.
Automakers say a key component to mainstream electric car adoption is an in-board feedback system that lets drivers know how to maximize their efficiency. This is probably old hat to Prius drivers looking for ways to save on gas. But it becomes particularly important in all-electric cars, as automakers don't want drivers getting stuck with an empty battery and no place to charge.
The Ford's dashboard LCD shows when you're using the gas motor and when you're running on battery. The way to optimize for efficiency is to get to cruising speed and then tap the brakes to charge the battery, I was told. The car also has an on-dash rating system that displays a plant sprout. More leaves distinguishes the hypermilers from the lead-foots.
The Electric Mini feedback system is pretty simple: how much juice you have left is on the front dash while another meter shows whether you're drawing from or charging the battery.
How did these autos drive? For somebody with admittedly pedestrian taste in cars, I thought they both were great to drive.
If I had to pick, I'd say the Mini is more fun simply because it's a small car with a lot of pep. But then again, without a back seat to speak of, you're not going to bring your Saint Bernard to the beach in an Electric Mini.
Representatives from Ford and BMW were kind enough to hold the video camera while I drove these cars around the block in California last week and to answer my questions about what's under the hood. You can see the Ford Fusion video here and the Electric Mini video here.
It's a common question when projecting the impact of electric vehicles: can today's creaky power grid handle millions of juice-hungry car batteries?
The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory on Thursday said it has developed a smart charger controller designed specifically for charging cars at off-peak times to get the lowest price and ease strain on the grid.
(Credit:
Pacific Northwest National Laboratories.)
A raft of plug-in electric cars are scheduled to come out in 2011, which should deliver a jump in fuel efficiency. But if millions of drivers charged their electric cars during peak times, say, at 6 at night, utilities could strain to meet the demand.
The PNNL's Smart Charger Controller, like other smart-charging equipment, allows a car owner to schedule charging at say, 2 a.m., and to restart charging in case of a glitch. In places where there is time-of-day electricity pricing, the charger uses Zigbee wireless networking to get price information and decide on the lowest price for charging.
Using smart charging, a car owner could save $150 a year, said PNNL engineer Michael Kintner-Meyer, in a statement.
Researchers have projected that without smart-charging technology, utilities would need to build more power plants to meet the spike in demand from electric vehicles. GM is preparing smart-charging technology to be part of the Chevy Volt electric car due in showrooms in late 2010.
The PNNL is seeking to license the smart charger with commercial companies, a representative said.
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