Electric Vehicles - Dave's Midwestern Ohio Memories

Series of Guest Blogs by an out-of-state Fish Report reader originally from this area about fond memories of growing up in Midwestern Ohio during the 50’s & 60’s

Electric Vehicles

As an automotive engineer, friends and family often ask me about electric vehicles (EVs); wondering whether they make sense or are just hype. Before Tesla, my response was pessimistic, but once they made the first commercially successful EV, I quickly responded much more positively. By essentially designing a vehicle akin to an iPhone, Tesla made their vehicles aspirational, meaning people desired to own one just as Apple did with the iPhone. That took EV’s from a regulatory contrivance to a mainstream product drivers loved.

Speaking of mainstream, the recently introduced Ford F Series Lightening and Mustang Mach E electric vehicles also are hits, based on advanced orders and initial sales. As a Ford retiree, I was please they were one of the fastest followers, but disappointed they couldn’t have come up with the Tesla-type design first. But back in the day, Henry Ford wasn’t the inventor of the automobile; instead he put the world on wheels by developing an affordable vehicle. Hopefully, the company can do it again with EVs.

The first EVs came along more than a century ago. Thomas Edison pictured above with BFF Henry Ford was a big proponent of EVs. No doubt the conversations between Edison and Ford were interesting about the pros and cons of electric versus internal combustion engine-powered vehicles. Here’s an excerpt written by Paul Israel, the director and general editor of the Edison Papers, from his biography Edison: A Life of Invention:

"Edison knew in order to compete with the gasoline-powered car, the electric car would require a storage battery that was rechargeable, had a longer life than those currently available, produced sufficient power to allow the vehicle to travel long distances without recharging, and was light enough so that all of the electric power wasn’t used up in simply moving the battery. A nickel-alkaline battery that was much more durable and far less hazardous than the lead-acid battery was developed. Unfortunately, the new battery was also larger and more expensive than the conventional lead battery. Since most consumers could better understand the initial price of a vehicle than they could the long-term cost of operating it, automobile manufacturers were not willing to increase the initial price of their cars in order to use the more efficient Edison battery. The timing of Edison’s battery invention was also unfortunate. Henry Ford introduced the inexpensive, high-quality, low-cost, gasoline-powered Model T in 1908, just one year after Edison had perfected his battery and some two-years before Edison was ready to manufacture it on a large scale. The Model T captured the imagination of the American public and ushered in the age of the internal combustion engine. By 1912, the development of the electric starter for gasoline cars, which replaced the crank, removed the one serious advantage—ease of start—that electric cars had over gasoline-powered cars, at least in the eyes of the consumer”.

Today’s EVs carry a premium price, because of the high cost of batteries. But those costs are coming down rapidly. For example, battery cost efficiency is measured in $’s per kilowatt hour ($\kWh), and as indicated on the above chart, costs have fallen dramatically but have a way to go for more affordable EVs to become commercially viable in about 2030. Assuming the battery trend occurs, EVs are here to stay because of their simplicity, flexibility and performance compared to vehicles with internal combustion engines (ICE). For example, take a look at the simplicity of this EV platform nicknamed "skateboard” when compared to a typical ICE platform.

Each wheel has its own integrated electric motor totally eliminating the drivetrain to allow more room for a larger battery.

The platform facilitates autonomous driving, braking, and steering by wire and has the flexibility for any number of so called "top hats”, or vehicle body styles to be readily mounted on the skateboard providing maximum interior space, low step heights, extended range, fantastic acceleration and better reliability all at a lower cost (once the battery costs come down). And to top those benefits, the Ford F150 Lightening can even power your house for several days during an electrical outage, or save a wedding reception as described in this article It’s for all of these reasons, I feel EVs are the vehicle of the future. Check out this short video to see the skateboard in autonomous action.

That all being said, there are more obstacles to overcome before EVs really take off, way beyond just battery cost. For example, a dramatically more comprehensive charging infrastructure must be installed that also has significantly faster charging times to minimize range anxiety; that feeling you get when about to run out of power in the middle of nowhere. One interesting development on the horizon is wireless charging similar to how your phone can be re-energized without actually connecting a charging line. A connected pad can be simply laid on your garage floor to automatically charge your EV overnight while parked.

Another EV challenge is making sure the electrical grid can handle the extra load. Since most electrical power plants are underutilized at night, during the period when most EV charging will take place, power plants can likely handle the added load; however, the local grid right in your neighborhood could be compromised if every garage has a couple EVs charging overnight full blast. That’s why smart charging is under development to balance the load and sequence the charging to avoid overtaxing the local infrastructure. The power companies will have to replace neighborhood transformers with higher capacity solid state units having integrated smart power management and bidirectional active power flow capabilities. Speaking of power plants, converting totally to wind and solar could derail the EV revolution; however, recent breakthrough research showed individual EV charging stations could be efficiently and cleanly powered via solar and wind (not the irony of a gas powered generator as pictured below!)

Recycling of the batteries is also a challenge, in that rare earth elements making up EV batteries are not only scarce, but very difficult to extract efficiently from a depleted battery. Longer term, solid state, silicon-based batteries could provide easy recycling, much faster charging, lower fire risk and lighter weight at a much lower cost.

The good news about EV’s is their low operating cost. At current economics, the average cost per mile for an EV is 3.3 cents per mile versus 15.9 cents per mile for ICE. For reference, a hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) with an ICE supplemented by a battery and electric motor comes in at 7.8 cents per mile.

Notice that little or no mention was made of regulatory efforts to drive EV sales, such as zero emission requirements, financial incentives, government purchasing, EV standards, etc. Politics is the biggest influencer of such efforts rather than scientific analysis and customer driven initiatives discussed in this blog. Regulating green house gas (GHG) emissions is the most widely used driver to expand EV use; however, the GHG’s to manufacture EVs are more than double ICE, primarily due to the battery. Over the course of the life of the vehicle on the other hand, emissions are significantly lower for EVs as indicated in the chart above. So that provides a long term advantage for EV’s.

Hope this provides a quick primer on EV’s. For the record, we have a hybrid and like it because of its 42mpg fuel economy, but will be holding off on buying an EV until the wireless charging via a garage floor pad is available. And only for my wife’s vehicle used primarily around town rather than mine we use for longer trips, this avoiding range anxiety, that is until the faster charging infrastructure becomes more widespread. Then we’ll pull the trigger to be an all EV family; oops, except for our classic Thunderbird!

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