This fellow T. Boone Pickens has a wonderful name but he has been
making some technical errors which detract from his claims. One thing
he has said which makes no sense to me is that large trucks cannot be
made into hybrids. Coca-Cola just announced that they have converted
327 of their large delivery trucks to hybrid vehicles, and intend to
convert the entire fleet soon. These trucks are about 30% more
efficient than conventional ones. See:
http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/coke/stories/2009/01/16/coke_hybrid_delivery.html
QUOTE: "The hybrid tractor trailers cost $95,000, compared to $68,000
for a non-hybrid. But even with today's oil prices, hybrids should
have a payback of four to five years, Brock said. . . ."
Pickens seems to think that heavy engines cannot be made hybrid.
Railroad locomotives are all hybrids and there is no heavier engine
on land than that. (Actually they are not fully hybrid in that most
of them do not recover braking energy, but the newer ones in Japan do.)
I doubt that a plug-in hybrid long haul truck would make much sense,
but hybrid technology saves a ton of money even when it is not plugged in.
Pickens also wants to run cars on compressed gas which I think is a
waste of money. We should make all cars into plug-in hybrids or pure
electric vehicles (for short ranges), run them on electricity most of
the time and use the remaining gasoline for long range
transportation. Natural gas should be used to generate electricity in
urban areas with co-generation and hybrid vehicle charging. That is
far more efficient than using it directly in automobile engines.
- Jed
