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EV Future
Future
Eliica Battery Electric Car with 370 km/h top speed and 200 km rangeThe
future of electric vehicles until recently seemed unimpressive due to their low
driving range and short lifespan of batteries. However, recent technological
advances have made electric vehicles more feasible.
The Wrightspeed X1 prototype sports car
Antares 20E[2], an electric self-launching sailplane, flies with a 42kW DC/DC
brushless motor and Li-Ion batteries and can climb up to 3000m with fully
charged cells
Improved long term energy storage
There have been several developments which could bring back electric vehicles
outside of their current fields of application, as scooters, golf cars,
neighborhood vehicles, in industrial operational yards and indoor operation.
First, advances in lithium-based battery technology, in large part driven by the
consumer electronics industry, allow full-sized, highway-capable electric
vehicles to be propelled as far on a single charge as conventional cars go on a
single tank of gasoline. Lithium batteries have been made safe, can be recharged
in minutes instead of hours, and now last longer than the typical vehicle. The
production cost of these lighter, higher-capacity lithium batteries is gradually
decreasing as the technology matures and production volumes increase.
Introduction of Battery Management and Intermediate Storage
Another improvement[5] was to decouple the electric motor from the battery
through electronic control while employing ultra-capacitors to buffer large but
short power demands and recuperable braking energy. The development of new cell
types compared with intelligent cell management improved both weak points
mentioned above. The cell management is not only able to monitor the health of
the cells but by having a redundant cell configuration (one more cell than
needed) and a sophisticated switched wiring it is possible to condition one cell
after the other while the rest are on duty.
Range extending energy converters on board
Main article: Plug-in hybrid electric vehicle
The number of US survey respondents willing to pay $4,000 more for a plug-in
hybrid car increased from 17% in 2005 to 26% in 2006.Perhaps the most important
point is that a monovalent operation (electric only) is no longer the only
possibility. Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles can use an engine for longer
trips.
The use of fuel cells instead of internal combustion engines can create
propulsion systems that are nearly emissions-free (regarding local emissions).
However, since the production of hydrogen is energy-inefficient, the net result
of hydrogen use in vehicles is increased overall emmisions, including CO2, and
therefore an increase in the rate of global warming.
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