Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

QrizB

Martyn1981 said:

Martyn1981 said:

I do like a nice bit of BEV boat news:

Can't believe I didn't go with - 'I like BEV boats and I cannot lie'
[I've let myself down, the thread down, the board down ..... so disappointed with myself    ;-)  ]

Not particularly green or ethical, but I was reading the news about Australia planning to buy nuclear submarines and suddenly wondered whether lithium battery technology will revolutionise conventional diesel-electric submarines. Diesel boats are supposedly quieter than nuculear ones when operaring on battery but their endurance is limited; on diesel they're noisy and vulnerable. Lithium batteries could improve their "quiet" range considerably.

I don't think anyone publishes the spec of modern diesel sub batteries (I guess it's secret?) but the Type VIIC of Das Boot fame had (perhaps) 124 cells of 9160Ah. Assuming 2-volt lead-acid cells, that's about 2.3MWh, enough to run the 530kW motor for 4 hours. Roughly 30x the battery capacity of a TM3 LR, and a motor 3x the power (or less than 2x if you compare to the dual motor version).

JKenH

Martyn1981 said:

And good news from Germany again, where BEV sales in August hit 15%, lifting the figure for 2021 so far to 11% and rising. And yet again, the VW's and VWG shine bright.

Plugin Electric Vehicles Get 28% Market Share In Germany In August!

The German plugin vehicle market scored over 53,000 registrations last month, with BEVs growing faster (+80% YoY) than PHEVs (+43%). As a result, last month’s plugin share ended at 28% (15% BEV). If you also consider the significant fall of the overall market (-23% YoY/year over year), that means petrol sales (-42% YoY) and even more so diesel sales (-51%) are falling off a cliff.

So, this is what disruption looks like….

Not sure if this is such good news as it might appear.

The carbon intensity of Germany’s grid is over 400g/KWh so it will be a while before these cars pay back the extra CO2 used in their manufacture. The Netherlands grid currently is similarly dirty. 

https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

The problem is that the manufacture of new electric cars is dumping a load more CO2 into the atmosphere now with the promise of payback later. With grid intensities of over 400g/kWh that later is getting pushed further away and in the meantime new ICE cars, which are the alternative, are getting cleaner and cleaner. If the current limit on new ICE cars is 95g/km and the average efficiency of electric cars (taking into account charging losses and vampire drain) is over 100g (2.5 miles/kWh = 4km/kWh) then how long will it be before the extra carbon debt of manufacturing electric cars will be repaid with Germany’s current dirty grid? (No doubt someone will point out that I am not using well to wheel figures for new ICEVs but what are the well to wheel figures for EVs? The fossil fuels burnt to produce electricity and build batteries need to be accounted for on a similar basis.)

I don’t know the answer, I am just asking the question. 

Edit: 
Germany’s grid emissions in detail.


https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

QrizB

JKenH said:

https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

Hey, the Norwegian interconnector has been switched on! That's good news, it was due "later this year" but this is the first time I've seen it in operation.

From Electric Insights it looks as though it's been operating daily since Tuesday

Martyn1981

QrizB said:

JKenH said:

https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

Hey, the Norwegian interconnector has been switched on! That's good news, it was due "later this year" but this is the first time I've seen it in operation.

From Electric Insights it looks as though it's been operating daily since Tuesday

Yep, really timely, I wonder if they accelerated the testing due to the current issues. As I mentioned back on the 9th, there are a lot of new interconnectors coming on line relatively soon:

Edit - Should have mentioned that the Norway link is currently under testing, so should be operational soon. And another 7 totalling 8.5GW are due to be commissioned between 2022 and 2025.

QrizB

I'm having some doubts about https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/GB as its carbon data doesn't align very well with either https://electricinsights.co.uk or https://electricityinfo.org/real-time-british-electricity-supply/ The carrbon intensity on electricitymap.org for the UK seems high.

The carbon data does align to a degree with electricityinfo.org but the latter site explicitly states that the headline figures "exclude embedded generation ... which includes most solar output and a significant amount of total wind output".

If you scroll down the electricityinfo.org page you get the National Grid's latest 30-minute carbon intensity figure. As I post it the instantaneous value (top of the page) is 251g/kWh excluding embedded generation, while the Nat Grid value is 199g/kWh including embedded.

orrery

Martyn1981 said:

Ford & BMW Plan To Begin Testing Solid Power Batteries In 2022

Mmm. Is this one of those "Nuclear Fusion will be available in 10 years" stories?

If I had a penny for every time I've read about a battery that doesn't use cobalt, can't catch fire, has double the capacity, charges in a couple of minutes, cost very little ...etc, I'd be able to afford a Tesla!

Martyn1981

orrery said:

Martyn1981 said:

Ford & BMW Plan To Begin Testing Solid Power Batteries In 2022

Mmm. Is this one of those "Nuclear Fusion will be available in 10 years" stories?

If I had a penny for every time I've read about a battery that doesn't use cobalt, can't catch fire, has double the capacity, charges in a couple of minutes, cost very little ...etc, I'd be able to afford a Tesla!

Yeah, personally I feel that way too. It's good to hear that most of these companies anticipate some rollout starting in 2025, but whilst I'm crossing my fingers, I certainly won't be holding my breath.

The LFP batts tackle the cobalt and fire 'problems' but of course 'fail' the capacity challenge by having a lower energy density. So it looks like we can't have everything, yet!

michaels

JKenH said:

Martyn1981 said:

And good news from Germany again, where BEV sales in August hit 15%, lifting the figure for 2021 so far to 11% and rising. And yet again, the VW's and VWG shine bright.

Plugin Electric Vehicles Get 28% Market Share In Germany In August!

The German plugin vehicle market scored over 53,000 registrations last month, with BEVs growing faster (+80% YoY) than PHEVs (+43%). As a result, last month’s plugin share ended at 28% (15% BEV). If you also consider the significant fall of the overall market (-23% YoY/year over year), that means petrol sales (-42% YoY) and even more so diesel sales (-51%) are falling off a cliff.

So, this is what disruption looks like….

Not sure if this is such good news as it might appear.

The carbon intensity of Germany’s grid is over 400g/KWh so it will be a while before these cars pay back the extra CO2 used in their manufacture. The Netherlands grid currently is similarly dirty. 

https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

The problem is that the manufacture of new electric cars is dumping a load more CO2 into the atmosphere now with the promise of payback later. With grid intensities of over 400g/kWh that later is getting pushed further away and in the meantime new ICE cars, which are the alternative, are getting cleaner and cleaner. If the current limit on new ICE cars is 95g/km and the average efficiency of electric cars (taking into account charging losses and vampire drain) is over 100g (2.5 miles/kWh = 4km/kWh) then how long will it be before the extra carbon debt of manufacturing electric cars will be repaid with Germany’s current dirty grid? (No doubt someone will point out that I am not using well to wheel figures for new ICEVs but what are the well to wheel figures for EVs? The fossil fuels burnt to produce electricity and build batteries need to be accounted for on a similar basis.)

I don’t know the answer, I am just asking the question. 

Edit: 
Germany’s grid emissions in detail.


https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

1) How do the new EV fleets and the new ice fleets compare in vehicle size?  95g average I believe includes EVs and lots of small cars whereas EVs I think are probably larger than average as there are fewer small EVs available - ie we need to look at the efficiency of the ice alternative to the EVs actually sold not the average emissions efficiency which also includes EVs!
2) Is that a grid carbon intensity snapshot or the annual average (at the times of day when EVs are mostly charged)?

JKenH

michaels said:

JKenH said:

Martyn1981 said:

And good news from Germany again, where BEV sales in August hit 15%, lifting the figure for 2021 so far to 11% and rising. And yet again, the VW's and VWG shine bright.

Plugin Electric Vehicles Get 28% Market Share In Germany In August!

The German plugin vehicle market scored over 53,000 registrations last month, with BEVs growing faster (+80% YoY) than PHEVs (+43%). As a result, last month’s plugin share ended at 28% (15% BEV). If you also consider the significant fall of the overall market (-23% YoY/year over year), that means petrol sales (-42% YoY) and even more so diesel sales (-51%) are falling off a cliff.

So, this is what disruption looks like….

Not sure if this is such good news as it might appear.

The carbon intensity of Germany’s grid is over 400g/KWh so it will be a while before these cars pay back the extra CO2 used in their manufacture. The Netherlands grid currently is similarly dirty. 

https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

The problem is that the manufacture of new electric cars is dumping a load more CO2 into the atmosphere now with the promise of payback later. With grid intensities of over 400g/kWh that later is getting pushed further away and in the meantime new ICE cars, which are the alternative, are getting cleaner and cleaner. If the current limit on new ICE cars is 95g/km and the average efficiency of electric cars (taking into account charging losses and vampire drain) is over 100g (2.5 miles/kWh = 4km/kWh) then how long will it be before the extra carbon debt of manufacturing electric cars will be repaid with Germany’s current dirty grid? (No doubt someone will point out that I am not using well to wheel figures for new ICEVs but what are the well to wheel figures for EVs? The fossil fuels burnt to produce electricity and build batteries need to be accounted for on a similar basis.)

I don’t know the answer, I am just asking the question. 

Edit: 
Germany’s grid emissions in detail.


https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE

1) How do the new EV fleets and the new ice fleets compare in vehicle size?  95g average I believe includes EVs and lots of small cars whereas EVs I think are probably larger than average as there are fewer small EVs available - ie we need to look at the efficiency of the ice alternative to the EVs actually sold not the average emissions efficiency which also includes EVs!
2) Is that a grid carbon intensity snapshot or the annual average (at the times of day when EVs are mostly charged)?

1) Fair point. If 10% of the new cars are electric then excluding them would up the average to around 105g. Yes EVs in the UK are probably displacing bigger cars but it could be those wanting an EV are having to move up in size because they want the longer range, i.e. bigger battery, which are heavier and generally less efficient.  I would have liked a small electric car but at the time there weren’t any with reasonable range I liked (40kWh Zoe, the only smallish contender at the time, didn’t have Carplay) so I went for the Leaf. The latest diesel Golf (2.0) equivalent is 108g. Probably nearer 125g is a realistic average for new ICE cars. Average CO2 was 112 in 2020 but that included plug ins. 

2) It was a snapshot. Grid intensity will vary with when the car is charged but if it was overnight, say 3am, then the German grid was still over 400g last night. 

ABrass

The German grid is around 400g/kWh normally. But it's a distraction because even at 400g/kWh EVs are cleaner than ICEs. So they're better to build than an ICE even if the grid never gets better.

But the grid will get better, so they're much better for the environment.

As has been discussed a million times and more you can't switch over from ICE to EV overnight. Pushing back EV introduction would be nuts, both ecologically and economically.