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This topic came up on the recent Joe Rogan with Elon Musk. Elon said they considered it, but in the end it is just not worth it. He said there is just not enoug

by 40four 6y ago

This topic came up on the recent Joe Rogan with Elon Musk. Elon said they considered it, but in the end it is just not worth it. He said there is just not enough surface area on a car to contribute a worthwhile amount of electricity. The numbers quoted for this particular vehicle are very optimistic I think. If you’re lucky, you might get 5 miles a day out of it. What happens if it’s cloudy or rainy for a week? Or you park in a garage? There are so many variables, and the return on investment will be highly variable. Tesla decided it’s just not worth the extra cost and complexity, for such a small return. I agree the idea sounds nice, but I’m afraid these companies that are doing are this, are mostly just getting a nice PR boost. There is just no way around the technical limitations of solar panels in the amount of energy they can convert, and the surface area of a car. Vans or RVs that could fold out a larger array when parked might be another story. I will say, it looks like they have some real innovations in the design and engineering of integrating the panels in the body. Looks pretty cool, so that’s not nothing:)

agumonkey 6y ago
He didn't mention the semi ? The large flat area, long time under the sun, difference of market (no need to integrate it pretty, a simple flatbed on top would do)
- mbreese 6y ago
  Semi trucks and trailers are two different components. Most trailers have a large flat area, but these can get swapped often. And even within the same company you won’t always have the solar trailer hooked up to the electric semi. The swappable nature of the load is part of the appeal of semis. I guess what I’m saying is, even if you had a solar trailer, you would lose a lot of the load flexibility of using a semi truck. And you wouldn’t want to plan a load where you needed the solar power. So either way, you’re planning for charging at fixed intervals. Solar might help a little here, but not very much.
  - RandallBrown 6y ago
    Couldn't it make the cost of shipping cheaper if the the load is able to contribute some energy to the truck? You'd need some sort of standard for the trailer to provide electricity to a hybrid/electric truck but ignoring that (major) issue it seems like a pretty great idea.
    - rtkwe 6y ago
      But it makes the trailers significantly more expensive and the shipping cost more variable because the amount contributed by the trailer will be extremely variable. On top of that to cut down on cost you'd want the inverters to be on the tractor instead of the trailer but now you have truckers working around and having to plug and unplug live HV DC connectors as they connect and disconnect. Plus now the trailers are a hazard to worry about when they're just sitting around because there's all those solar cells creating big DC volatages just waiting for a circuit to be made.
  - agumonkey 6y ago
    I see, unless there's an army of solar trailers it's not useful.
  - hourislate 6y ago
    Trailer manufacturers could make all trailers solar (panels on the roof of the trailer) and have a battery pack somewhere in the area a refer unit would sit. This way you could power the refer if there was one or the the Truck if there was no refer unit and the Truck was electric. They become a energy storage unit while not in use (sitting in lots). I think this is what we'll see when there will be more Electric Semi's on the road.
    - Erlich_Bachman 6y ago
      In a fantasy world unrestricted by physics and market and costs and raw materials, - yes, they could.
      - 6y ago
- sneak 6y ago
  Semis use immensely more power than passenger cars, way more, proportionately, than is made up in increased surface area for solar. It still doesn't work.
- jandrese 6y ago
  The only reason it might kind of work on a car is because it is only driven a handful of miles per week. Long haul trucks don't even make much sense to electrify with current technology. Delivery trucks make a little more sense, but they still have the problem of being in motion for a large chunk of the day. Basically you're just slightly increasing your watt mileage/range on sunny days.
JKCalhoun 6y ago
A cheap, easy to set up solar car port in the driveway would make more sense for suburban dwellers. Guessing HOA's would lose their shit though.
- orthecreedence 6y ago
  > Guessing HOA's would lose their shit though. Perhaps there should be legal escape hatches from HOA rules specifically for energy efficiency upgrades. I don't generally advocate for centralization of power (ie, a state imposing its will on a community), but in the case of climate change I'll happily make exceptions.
  - dheera 6y ago
    Honestly I don't see why we can't just outlaw HOAs. If you own something you should be able to do whatever you want with it. It seems like a simple constitutional right to me.
    - crooked-v 6y ago
      Eliminate HOAs and you've destroyed the basic mechanism that makes common maintenance practical for high-density non-rental housing.
      - dheera 6y ago
        It seems to me HOAs aren't mostly about maintainence, they're mostly about old farts yelling at you for installing a fence or planting the wrong type of flower or using the wrong color of paint. None of that stuff affects maintainence. Those farts shouldn't even be allowed to step on land they don't own. The stuff that actually affects maintainence, I can understand, but participation should be optional by law. If you want discount maintainence, don't mess with your water pipes and electrical conduits. But hey if you're okay with finding your own maintainence, you should be entitled to do whatever you want as long as it's legal per fire/building code.
iso1631 6y ago
Musk is building cars for a mainly american style market - long drives and private parking. topping up 5 miles a day means that a full battery will last me and the 1.8 million UK cars that do under 2000 miles a year, months between having to plug in and recharge.
- hnuser123456 6y ago
  I'm in the US but have a 2 mile commute each way, and I don't drive to work every day (pre-covid). Uncommon but I'm not alone. - For me, 5 miles a day would keep the battery topped off and I wouldn't have to visit a charger except on longer trips. - Would also be much more palatable to limit the full-charge voltage to something a little lower, prolonging the battery's useful life, knowing it'll passively recharge daily. - Would also enable more connected vehicle features. - Given a choice between a car that slowly loses a bit of charge daily, or one that gains charge, everyone would pick one that gains. - Would also lessen the fear of running out of charge a mile away from a charger and needing a tow truck, just wait a few hours if it's sunny, or at least charge enough to park somewhere safe and phone a friend to pick you up and leave it for a day. - Could go on camping trips a bit further away and let it charge for a week, or use the AC/heater occasionally. - If the car is covered in snow it can warm up the panels and melt some snow. Teslas can already do this but it's even more practical with PV on the roof. As long as people understand this doesn't mean they can drive nonstop in the sun or that they'll get any significant short-term range boost, it's still extremely sensible.
  - ogre_codes 6y ago
    > Given a choice between a car that slowly loses a bit of charge daily, or one that gains charge, everyone would pick one that gains. I suspect most people would choose the one which is $2000 less and looks nicer. > Could go on camping trips a bit further away and let it charge for a week, or use the AC/heater occasionally. Totally agree here, but I’m not buying a car based on what I do a half dozen weekends a year either. More important is to ensure you have bigger battery capacity. Buying the Model Y Long range, I paid $8k 80 miles more range. That’s going to be far more useful than the 5 miles per day you might get out of this. This is all around something I might pay for as an upgrade, but certainly not an important part of the purchase decision.
Gravityloss 6y ago
All Tesla models use still a lot of energy per kilometer so a solar panel is almost useless. A bicycle uses 3 kWh/100 km, while a Tesla uses maybe 20. If you want more kilometers per day from the solar panel, it makes sense to optimize the car. More streamlining, lightweight composites, narrower tyres, wheel fairings, smaller battery etc. For example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightyear_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightyear_One
m463 6y ago
I think where it might help is that time when the notch of power consumption matches the peak of power production: the middle of the day. That is the time when a car parked in the hot sun causes the internal A/C to run to keep the car cooler. Telsa cars will run the A/C when the internal temperatures reach 105°F (configurable) This might be a good time to counterbalance the battery loss with the solar power peak.
osacial 6y ago
My understanding is that owners of Tesla do not have to pay for electricity to charge cars. It might be similar to other companies, where their electricity used for charging is currently subsidized also by government. That might change in future and sooner than we realize, especially when current trend is about self-sustainability. Switching all cars to run on electricity does not mean, that in future there will suddenly be more electricity(that will mainly be green), than we have now, so owners of current Teslas in future might be slapped with extra tax, because they are not self-charging. Future Teslas might have solar panels installed, but hardly that will be concern of Elon Musk, as his main income is not related to Tesla Inc, where he now owns only 18% shares and he earns more from space by ripping off NASA.
- dexterdog 6y ago
  > My understanding is that owners of Tesla do not have to pay for electricity to charge cars. Your understanding is incorrect.

by 40four 6y ago

agumonkey 6y ago

He didn't mention the semi ? The large flat area, long time under the sun, difference of market (no need to integrate it pretty, a simple flatbed on top would do)

mbreese 6y ago
Semi trucks and trailers are two different components. Most trailers have a large flat area, but these can get swapped often. And even within the same company you won’t always have the solar trailer hooked up to the electric semi. The swappable nature of the load is part of the appeal of semis. I guess what I’m saying is, even if you had a solar trailer, you would lose a lot of the load flexibility of using a semi truck. And you wouldn’t want to plan a load where you needed the solar power. So either way, you’re planning for charging at fixed intervals. Solar might help a little here, but not very much.
- RandallBrown 6y ago
  Couldn't it make the cost of shipping cheaper if the the load is able to contribute some energy to the truck? You'd need some sort of standard for the trailer to provide electricity to a hybrid/electric truck but ignoring that (major) issue it seems like a pretty great idea.
  - rtkwe 6y ago
    But it makes the trailers significantly more expensive and the shipping cost more variable because the amount contributed by the trailer will be extremely variable. On top of that to cut down on cost you'd want the inverters to be on the tractor instead of the trailer but now you have truckers working around and having to plug and unplug live HV DC connectors as they connect and disconnect. Plus now the trailers are a hazard to worry about when they're just sitting around because there's all those solar cells creating big DC volatages just waiting for a circuit to be made.
- agumonkey 6y ago
  I see, unless there's an army of solar trailers it's not useful.
- hourislate 6y ago
  Trailer manufacturers could make all trailers solar (panels on the roof of the trailer) and have a battery pack somewhere in the area a refer unit would sit. This way you could power the refer if there was one or the the Truck if there was no refer unit and the Truck was electric. They become a energy storage unit while not in use (sitting in lots). I think this is what we'll see when there will be more Electric Semi's on the road.
  - Erlich_Bachman 6y ago
    In a fantasy world unrestricted by physics and market and costs and raw materials, - yes, they could.
    - 6y ago
sneak 6y ago
Semis use immensely more power than passenger cars, way more, proportionately, than is made up in increased surface area for solar. It still doesn't work.
jandrese 6y ago
The only reason it might kind of work on a car is because it is only driven a handful of miles per week. Long haul trucks don't even make much sense to electrify with current technology. Delivery trucks make a little more sense, but they still have the problem of being in motion for a large chunk of the day. Basically you're just slightly increasing your watt mileage/range on sunny days.

JKCalhoun 6y ago

A cheap, easy to set up solar car port in the driveway would make more sense for suburban dwellers. Guessing HOA's would lose their shit though.

orthecreedence 6y ago
> Guessing HOA's would lose their shit though. Perhaps there should be legal escape hatches from HOA rules specifically for energy efficiency upgrades. I don't generally advocate for centralization of power (ie, a state imposing its will on a community), but in the case of climate change I'll happily make exceptions.
- dheera 6y ago
  Honestly I don't see why we can't just outlaw HOAs. If you own something you should be able to do whatever you want with it. It seems like a simple constitutional right to me.
  - crooked-v 6y ago
    Eliminate HOAs and you've destroyed the basic mechanism that makes common maintenance practical for high-density non-rental housing.
    - dheera 6y ago
      It seems to me HOAs aren't mostly about maintainence, they're mostly about old farts yelling at you for installing a fence or planting the wrong type of flower or using the wrong color of paint. None of that stuff affects maintainence. Those farts shouldn't even be allowed to step on land they don't own. The stuff that actually affects maintainence, I can understand, but participation should be optional by law. If you want discount maintainence, don't mess with your water pipes and electrical conduits. But hey if you're okay with finding your own maintainence, you should be entitled to do whatever you want as long as it's legal per fire/building code.

iso1631 6y ago

Musk is building cars for a mainly american style market - long drives and private parking. topping up 5 miles a day means that a full battery will last me and the 1.8 million UK cars that do under 2000 miles a year, months between having to plug in and recharge.

hnuser123456 6y ago
I'm in the US but have a 2 mile commute each way, and I don't drive to work every day (pre-covid). Uncommon but I'm not alone. - For me, 5 miles a day would keep the battery topped off and I wouldn't have to visit a charger except on longer trips. - Would also be much more palatable to limit the full-charge voltage to something a little lower, prolonging the battery's useful life, knowing it'll passively recharge daily. - Would also enable more connected vehicle features. - Given a choice between a car that slowly loses a bit of charge daily, or one that gains charge, everyone would pick one that gains. - Would also lessen the fear of running out of charge a mile away from a charger and needing a tow truck, just wait a few hours if it's sunny, or at least charge enough to park somewhere safe and phone a friend to pick you up and leave it for a day. - Could go on camping trips a bit further away and let it charge for a week, or use the AC/heater occasionally. - If the car is covered in snow it can warm up the panels and melt some snow. Teslas can already do this but it's even more practical with PV on the roof. As long as people understand this doesn't mean they can drive nonstop in the sun or that they'll get any significant short-term range boost, it's still extremely sensible.
- ogre_codes 6y ago
  > Given a choice between a car that slowly loses a bit of charge daily, or one that gains charge, everyone would pick one that gains. I suspect most people would choose the one which is $2000 less and looks nicer. > Could go on camping trips a bit further away and let it charge for a week, or use the AC/heater occasionally. Totally agree here, but I’m not buying a car based on what I do a half dozen weekends a year either. More important is to ensure you have bigger battery capacity. Buying the Model Y Long range, I paid $8k 80 miles more range. That’s going to be far more useful than the 5 miles per day you might get out of this. This is all around something I might pay for as an upgrade, but certainly not an important part of the purchase decision.

Gravityloss 6y ago

All Tesla models use still a lot of energy per kilometer so a solar panel is almost useless. A bicycle uses 3 kWh/100 km, while a Tesla uses maybe 20. If you want more kilometers per day from the solar panel, it makes sense to optimize the car. More streamlining, lightweight composites, narrower tyres, wheel fairings, smaller battery etc. For example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightyear_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightyear_One

m463 6y ago

I think where it might help is that time when the notch of power consumption matches the peak of power production: the middle of the day. That is the time when a car parked in the hot sun causes the internal A/C to run to keep the car cooler. Telsa cars will run the A/C when the internal temperatures reach 105°F (configurable) This might be a good time to counterbalance the battery loss with the solar power peak.

osacial 6y ago

My understanding is that owners of Tesla do not have to pay for electricity to charge cars. It might be similar to other companies, where their electricity used for charging is currently subsidized also by government. That might change in future and sooner than we realize, especially when current trend is about self-sustainability. Switching all cars to run on electricity does not mean, that in future there will suddenly be more electricity(that will mainly be green), than we have now, so owners of current Teslas in future might be slapped with extra tax, because they are not self-charging. Future Teslas might have solar panels installed, but hardly that will be concern of Elon Musk, as his main income is not related to Tesla Inc, where he now owns only 18% shares and he earns more from space by ripping off NASA.

dexterdog 6y ago
> My understanding is that owners of Tesla do not have to pay for electricity to charge cars. Your understanding is incorrect.