In reply to Michel Jullian's message of Wed, 3 May 2006 10:18:49 +0200: Hi, [snip] >My argument holds in town too Robin. It's OK not to be able to fast recharge >an electric bicycle because you can switch to another source of power (your >muscles) if your battery is empty on the street, not so for a purely >electric car, this is why the best we can have is ICE-electric hybrids until >we have fast recharge. > >We won't have "The Really Good Battery" as Chris calls it until we have fast >recharge plus other characteristics such as acceptable lifetime, cost, >weight and volume for the required kWh value. [snip] But the new Lithium batteries *do* have fast recharge capability, so a quick stopover at a roadside charging station shouldn't be a problem. Such charging stations *do* need to have heavy duty power supplies, which isn't a problem, because they are dedicated, and there are proportionally not a lot of them. Private homes don't need such heavy duty facilities because one can afford to take longer to do the recharge.
Furthermore, with the price of energy from a roadside station likely to be at a premium, most people will likely opt for home charging over night, and save. The problem you describe also existed when gasoline vehicles were first introduced, and before gas stations became ubiquitous. In fact the introduction of electric vehicles would probably be a lot less stressful than early gasoline was, because people would have the capability to recharge at home. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://users.bigpond.net.au/rvanspaa/ Competition provides the motivation, Cooperation provides the means.
