Can a wind turbine on an electric vehicle help maintain battery charge?

Question

Mitsubishi released a concept car that uses wind turbines.

Answer 1

Yes. But not while the vehicle is being used. While the car is moving at any reasonable speed more energy would be required to drive the car then returned to the battery.(drag).

While the car is parked beside a busy road(slipstreams) or in a breeze the turbine would charge the battery.

In my opinion things like solar panels and wind turbines are better permanently mounted in a good location feeding into the electricity grid. This way the maximum amount of energy can be extracted from the item. There is also less energy demand to carry the extra weight.

If the car is charged off peak from the grid,(generally when the grid is the "greenest") the net result is far better in terms of pollution.

Answer 2

that's... um... absurd.  sure it will charge your battery but all the energy comes from the engine anyway so why not just install a bigger alternater?

Answer 3

Yes, and no.

The thing with this is that: yeah, you'lll have a wind turbine on a car giving some juice to the battery. But, with the wind turbine even ON the car, it will create LOADS of drag, which will take power away from the battery so it can overcome the drag. It's a nice concept, but it would be better (and much smarter) to put flexible solar modules ontop of the car so the aerodynamics stay almost the same. Hope that helped