Solar Powered Cars.?

Question

What effect will having solar powered cars rather then petrol cars?

Answer 1

Solar powered cars will never become a mainstream option because the government cannot tax solar power ;)

Answer 2

There is a lot of hype about how much solar energy hits the earth a year. But if broken down it is only about 200w/square foot per hour. Even if you could have 100% efficiency it would take 6 square feet of solar cells to power one hair dryer. Yikes! A 10'x20' car with 33% windows would have about 132 square feet of surface you could cover with cells. With 746watts to each horsepower even at 100% efficiency that is about 32 horse power. That is about half the horse power of a brand new Ford Festive. That is if solar cells were 100 efficient. The reality is about 12% efficient. That means a 4 horsepower car. That would be about half the power of a motor scooter pushing a full sized car frame.

Answer 3

Although there would be signifigantly less pollution, solar powered cars are very expensive to manufacture.  To produce enough solar energy to power a car, the entire car would have to be the solar panels.  The expense far exceeds the benefit.

Answer 4

Solar powered cars are being worked on, but mainly by colleges.  For solar cars to become more of a reality in everyday use, solar panel technology needs to improve in energy efficiency and battery technology would also need to improve.  Just powering the solar powered cars that are aero dynamic and very light is difficult.  Try converting that to a bulky, heavy car that weighs a lot more that people want to ride in comfort and have painted their favorite color.  It would be hard to translate over.

I don't see solar cars even being produced en-masse in the next quarter century.  However, the technology to making it possible may get a lot closer to reality.

I think you will first see movement in diesels, hybrids, and bio-fuels; followed by movement in plug-in hybrids then hydrogen as far as the auto industry is concerned.

I think we may even see the creation of driver-less cars (cars that can drive themselves) before solar powered ones are on the car lots.  In fact the military, is already working on driverless cars.

Answer 5

road polution,

Answer 6

Solar power will one day become an option.  If house could be converted to run on solar power even cars could be converted.  The technology is still in the early stages.  But the reality is possible.  The benefits with solar powers cars would be no emissions, no worries about fuel prices,  lower maintenance to maintaining your car and no worrying to charging your car.  Your solar powered car will always be charged no matter what.

Answer 7

No greenhouse gasses

No dependence on oil

No hazardous environmental spills

We need solar cells to become more efficient first.

Right now they are 15-25% efficent at converting sunlight to electrical energy.  As multi-layer thin film technology improves, we will see that number improve.  Give it 10 years before you can expect to choose a solar panel on your roof as an option ar the car dealer though.

Should be available right about the time the world is running out of oil.  (I hope!)

Answer 8

virtually zero air pollution. but the cost of producing one is very expensive.

however, if we can develop public transport that runs on solar power then that would be much more viable. example would be train systems connected to a grid that is powered solely by solar or buses that have solar roofs.