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I believe charging stations is the least of our problems: will there be enough rare earth metals to build batteries for everybody and will there be enough elect

I believe charging stations is the least of our problems: will there be enough rare earth metals to build batteries for everybody and will there be enough electricity production for all those EVs?

theshrike79 4y ago
Battery tech is still evolving. We've went from NiMH in early Prius models to Lithium-Ion to Iron-phosphate and solid state batteries are around the proverbial corner (5+ years). Meanwhile diesel and gasoline haven't changed that much in the last 100 years. Synthetic options are being developed, but the cost is still over 5x more than gasoline - even at current inflated prices.
UncleOxidant 4y ago
Newer battery chemistries are being developed which try to minimize rare earth minerals. But are we going to be able to develop these new batteries quickly enough?
- bilsbie 4y ago
  Plus there’s battery recycling.
  - theshrike79 4y ago
    I'm wagering that reuse will be a bigger thing than recycling. A 75kW EV battery that's unfit for vehicle use will still have 40-50kW of usable capacity in it. That's enough to power a house for days. Repackage it to a fancy case, sell it to a home owner with some solar panels -> €€€
Fatnino 4y ago
It's theoretically possible to use the gasoline not being burned in those cars to generate the electricity for them.
- theshrike79 4y ago
  Just powering a proper generator with gasoline or diesel to power an EV is more efficient than blowing it up thousands of times per second inside an engine. Just because combustion engines are 30% efficient at best (Prius-level tuning required, most are way under) and electric engines are 90%+ efficient.
  - yodon 4y ago
    >Just powering a proper generator with gasoline or diesel to power an EV is more efficient than blowing it up thousands of times per second inside an engine. I don't follow your point - Gasoline powered generators and Gasoline powered car engines both work by "blowing up" the gasoline in the piston(s) of the device (and neither blows it up "thousands of times per second", though at 2000-3000 rpm they both do so thousands of times per minute). It's certainly possible to keep a generator charging a battery tuned more tightly into its peak combustion efficiency zone than one can typically maintain with an ICE engine tied to a gearbox and wheels, but that is I think a different argument.
    - outworlder 4y ago
      > It's certainly possible to keep a generator charging a battery tuned more tightly into its peak combustion efficiency zone That is _exactly_ what cars like the Chevy Volt did. A much smaller gas engine running at peak efficiency and sending the power to the electric motors was more efficient than burning the gasoline directly. Electric motors are very efficient, and the transmissions losses are much smaller. There's hardly any transmission to talk about, usually it's just some reduction gears.
    - theshrike79 4y ago
      A generator always works at the optimal RPM for power generation. Cars do not. Range extenders like the Chevy Volt and the BMW i3 REX have taken advantage of this. The drivetrain is 100% electric, there's just a gas generator to charge the battery when needed. Even on the Prius the accelerator has no direct effect on the engine RPM, the car picks the optimal RPM and any extra power is fed to the batteries. Dunno why this model didn't catch up more. The current hybrid model is the worst of both worlds. You've got an electric drive train with a small battery and a full gasoline engine with all of its 2000+ moving parts that can fail.

I believe charging stations is the least of our problems: will there be enough rare earth metals to build batteries for everybody and will there be enough electricity production for all those EVs?

theshrike79 4y ago

Battery tech is still evolving. We've went from NiMH in early Prius models to Lithium-Ion to Iron-phosphate and solid state batteries are around the proverbial corner (5+ years). Meanwhile diesel and gasoline haven't changed that much in the last 100 years. Synthetic options are being developed, but the cost is still over 5x more than gasoline - even at current inflated prices.

UncleOxidant 4y ago

Newer battery chemistries are being developed which try to minimize rare earth minerals. But are we going to be able to develop these new batteries quickly enough?

bilsbie 4y ago
Plus there’s battery recycling.
- theshrike79 4y ago
  I'm wagering that reuse will be a bigger thing than recycling. A 75kW EV battery that's unfit for vehicle use will still have 40-50kW of usable capacity in it. That's enough to power a house for days. Repackage it to a fancy case, sell it to a home owner with some solar panels -> €€€

Fatnino 4y ago

It's theoretically possible to use the gasoline not being burned in those cars to generate the electricity for them.

theshrike79 4y ago
Just powering a proper generator with gasoline or diesel to power an EV is more efficient than blowing it up thousands of times per second inside an engine. Just because combustion engines are 30% efficient at best (Prius-level tuning required, most are way under) and electric engines are 90%+ efficient.
- yodon 4y ago
  >Just powering a proper generator with gasoline or diesel to power an EV is more efficient than blowing it up thousands of times per second inside an engine. I don't follow your point - Gasoline powered generators and Gasoline powered car engines both work by "blowing up" the gasoline in the piston(s) of the device (and neither blows it up "thousands of times per second", though at 2000-3000 rpm they both do so thousands of times per minute). It's certainly possible to keep a generator charging a battery tuned more tightly into its peak combustion efficiency zone than one can typically maintain with an ICE engine tied to a gearbox and wheels, but that is I think a different argument.
  - outworlder 4y ago
    > It's certainly possible to keep a generator charging a battery tuned more tightly into its peak combustion efficiency zone That is _exactly_ what cars like the Chevy Volt did. A much smaller gas engine running at peak efficiency and sending the power to the electric motors was more efficient than burning the gasoline directly. Electric motors are very efficient, and the transmissions losses are much smaller. There's hardly any transmission to talk about, usually it's just some reduction gears.
  - theshrike79 4y ago
    A generator always works at the optimal RPM for power generation. Cars do not. Range extenders like the Chevy Volt and the BMW i3 REX have taken advantage of this. The drivetrain is 100% electric, there's just a gas generator to charge the battery when needed. Even on the Prius the accelerator has no direct effect on the engine RPM, the car picks the optimal RPM and any extra power is fed to the batteries. Dunno why this model didn't catch up more. The current hybrid model is the worst of both worlds. You've got an electric drive train with a small battery and a full gasoline engine with all of its 2000+ moving parts that can fail.