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What's your benchmark for cheap and simple? There's a system being tested in Sweden that uses electrified rails embedded in slots in the road surface. Cars or

by elihu 4y ago

What's your benchmark for cheap and simple? There's a system being tested in Sweden that uses electrified rails embedded in slots in the road surface. Cars or trucks can have devices that drop into the slots and make electrical contact. It's not terribly complicated, though I don't know the specific details of how well it's performing. There are also systems with overhead lines that are about half the cost of slots in the road, but they're only really usable by trucks because the cables have to be high enough for a truck to pass under. The cost of petroleum fuels plus the environmental costs of CO2 emissions are themselves huge costs and drags on our economy and quality of life. Our options are: keep burning fossil fuels until they run out, transition to electric vehicles in a reasonably scalable way, or do away with cars entirely. Transitioning to EVs seems like the best available option to me, and appropriate infrastructure will make that transition much easier. If we can cut the average battery size in half by having electrified highways, then that's probably worth it.

ryukafalz 4y ago
Getting the technology working is not the hard part. As with EVs in general, the difficulty is in the deployment. And if you thought rolling out a charging network was difficult... here's just a few things you need to consider: - How many such systems are there? Are they compatible, or will cars sold in one state/region not be able to charge in another? - Can it be retrofitted onto existing cars or would people need to buy entirely new cars to make use of this? - What happens when construction crews need to work on the roadway? Lanes are often shifted with cones or temporary paint, which won't follow the tracks. - How expensive is it to install and maintain? We already have so much infrastructure that we have trouble keeping it going, and this adds extra costs on top of that. See how many bridges we have in poor condition. And what happens when it's not maintained? - Who owns the technology behind it? Will they still support it 10 years from now? 20? 50? Sure, it could work - but I think you're underestimating the logistics of actually rolling something like this out. The battery supply chain is a problem, but I don't think it's enough of a problem that electrifying highways would be simpler. > Our options are: keep burning fossil fuels until they run out, transition to electric vehicles in a reasonably scalable way, or do away with cars entirely. This is a false dichotomy. We can reduce our dependence on cars without fully eliminating them. (Oh, and smaller EV batteries are more practical if the places you're going are closer together anyway, even if they're not quite within walking or biking distance.)

by elihu 4y ago

ryukafalz 4y ago

Getting the technology working is not the hard part. As with EVs in general, the difficulty is in the deployment. And if you thought rolling out a charging network was difficult... here's just a few things you need to consider: - How many such systems are there? Are they compatible, or will cars sold in one state/region not be able to charge in another? - Can it be retrofitted onto existing cars or would people need to buy entirely new cars to make use of this? - What happens when construction crews need to work on the roadway? Lanes are often shifted with cones or temporary paint, which won't follow the tracks. - How expensive is it to install and maintain? We already have so much infrastructure that we have trouble keeping it going, and this adds extra costs on top of that. See how many bridges we have in poor condition. And what happens when it's not maintained? - Who owns the technology behind it? Will they still support it 10 years from now? 20? 50? Sure, it could work - but I think you're underestimating the logistics of actually rolling something like this out. The battery supply chain is a problem, but I don't think it's enough of a problem that electrifying highways would be simpler. > Our options are: keep burning fossil fuels until they run out, transition to electric vehicles in a reasonably scalable way, or do away with cars entirely. This is a false dichotomy. We can reduce our dependence on cars without fully eliminating them. (Oh, and smaller EV batteries are more practical if the places you're going are closer together anyway, even if they're not quite within walking or biking distance.)