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i find it hilarious that this is a 118 year old technology! Ferdenand Porsche in 1900 presented a sportscar fitted with four electric wheel-hub motors, it was
by readhn 8y ago
i find it hilarious that this is a 118 year old technology!
Ferdenand Porsche in 1900 presented a sportscar fitted with four electric wheel-hub motors, it was the first all-wheel drive passenger vehicle.
Where is the progress? The cars should have been flying by now.
- wffurr 8y agoPhysical limitations of batteries vs air oxidized fuel. Dragging around your own oxidizer takes a lot of mass which severely limits power. The real breakthrough will be a battery that can use atmospheric oxygen, like a zinc-air battery. But it hasn't worked out in the last 100 years and it's not clear if it ever will.
- readhn 8y agoi agree a significant breakthrough in batteries (or other energy sources) is needed.
- Nasrudith 8y agoBatteries appear to be operating on a vastly slower Moore's law at least. They have been sinfully underfunded as a research field historically.
- MrEldritch 8y agoIt's not really a "Moore's law" thing at all - it's more that, like every single other technology in history that isn't specifically semiconductors, batteries don't follow an exponential improvement curve. They also evolve slower than many other technologies even on a more typical growth trajectory, because battery chemistry has way less room for easy improvement. There's only a few battery chemistries that could even theoretically offer much better density than lithium-ion, and we've been trying to make them work for a long time.
- pineaux 8y agoMy bet is on graphene capacitor batteries.
- wffurr 8y agoI would bet on biodiesel for long distance highway transport, farm equipment, and other heavy industry; and electric in a bewildering array of form factors for short distance urban transport.
- dsfyu404ed 8y agolook at industrial metalworking from ~1860-1960 or so. It was close to exponential.
- legohead 8y agowell at least one thing, the safety of modern cars is incredibly advanced.