Electric Cars? When will they start to be driven?

Question

Hiya! I am in this leadership class at school, and we are doing an enviornmental project, and I am doing this diarama about today's world with gasoline-runned cars, and then what the world would be like in some time when most cars will be electric or oil-runned. However, I need an estimated time of how many years until most cars will be ran on veggie oil or electricity. Also, any other info on veggie oil cars would be great!

Answer 1

Veggie oil cars are just diesel cars.  Minor modifications are needed to run veggie oil, but a high school shop class could do that.    There's also biodiesel which modifies the veggie oil so it'll work in any diesel straight.  Converting veggie oil to biodiesel is fairly simple and low-energy, a high school chemistry class could do that.

There were a bunch of electric cars in the 1990s.  Some are still around.  Look up the General Motors EV1, which did 100 miles and charged in 90 minutes.  It used battery technology and electronic controls that existed 10 years ago, and now they have better for both.

Also keep an eye on the Chevy Volt, due in 2010, which is a hybrid/electric.  It will have a gas or diesel engine, but it can run the first 40 miles on batteries alone that you charged at home.  That means most people will hardly ever use the gas engine, and it will effectively be an electric car that can go unlimited distance.

The "Smart car" is also being imported into the USA this year.  http://smartusa.com/  They're only bringing in the gasoline model, but Smart also makes an electric.

New cars have about a 5 year lead time from concept to dealer showroom, so if it's not already in the pipeline, it's not coming soon.  I'm unaware of any fuel cell cars expected to market.

LOTS of diesels are coming to market in 2007-2009.  Any of them can run 100% biodiesel and all are certified for 20% biodiesel.  Cold weather starting can be a problem for biodiesel, so in northern climates in winter they might need to blend with kerosene or use aviation fuel additives.

Thousands of people have converted their own cars to electric.  Those run fine.

Answer 2

Technically electric cars could be avaialble today.

the first car to exceed 100kph was electric http://www.speedace.info , henry ford made electric cars

the major manufacturers have withdrawn their electric cars, in teh case of GM actually crushing them, despite users satisfaction & unfulfilled demand,

people are making thier own conversions

http://batteryvehiclesociety.org.uk/word... because electric cars are much more pleasent to drive, or their are a few low volume producers like Tesla http://www.teslamotors.com

So if the cars are avaialabl, they are cheaper to mass produce & run, they are much more pleasent to drive, smmoth, quiet, high torque ...

what is stopping us having them now? this is definitly a political/leadership question - and the answer must be something to do with vested ineterests and old power structures

Answer 3

around 40 to 50 yrs from now, the car companeys wont come out with any thing till they have to, besides they all have stock in the oil companeys,

Answer 4

You can run any diesel car on biodiesel.  However, we can't rely on this fuel too heavily, because the more land we use to grow biofuel crops, the less we have for growing food crops, and the higher the price of food goes.

There are some really cool electric cars and plug-in hybrids coming in about a year:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

But if you need to know when most cars on the road will be alternative fueled vehicles, well it will be a while yet before that happens.  Hybrids are a well-established technology, and yet only 1% of car sales in the USA right now are hybrids.  It takes people a long time to accept a new technology, and cars last a pretty long time.

I would guess it will be a few decades yet before the majority of the cars on the road are alternative fueled vehicles.  Probably at least 20 years.

Answer 5

Electric care are already being sold today in Europe and Asia. Ethanol is being used as petrol additive today.

In next 15 years or so world would have most cars on Electric or bio-fuels or both.

Answer 6

Electric only will be quite a few years away.  Probably 15 years yet.  Hybrid technology though will be quite popular in the next 5 years as prices come down and people embrace the technology.

Currently fuel companies are already moving towards making gas with ethanol mix available across the country.  There are different mixtures but it is a growing thing and will be readily available in another 2 years.  This will reduce gasoline demand over time as they move towards e85 (85% ethanol mix gas).  Bio diesel will take a little longer as there are some problems in the northern areas due to gelling in the cold winter months.

GM did produce an all electric car several years ago the EV1 which was sold to users.

Now the move is to fuel cell technology.  Unfortunately the timetable for this type of fuel has been moved back so look for it to come out more in the next 5 years with it taking off probably in 7-8 years.

It could happen a little sooner but I don't think so.