Segway's P.U.M.A.

[Jason1]

The more I look at that PUMA thing the more I think "where have I seen that before"

...oh yea...

[manasecret]

Project Better Place is the best idea so far to make electric cars work, and I believe it can. There has been much buzz about it lately. Wired magazine had a cover-story on it a few months ago.

Essentially the idea boils down to having all electric cars, that when going to a re-"fueling" station, instead of sitting there and waiting for the battery to charge, pre-charged batteries from the station are simply switched out with the one in your car. In this case, you don't really "own" the battery, although you do, because you would switch them out with pre-charged different ones all the time.

As quoted from Wikipedia (and backed up from the Wired article I read), "Better Place will build its first electric vehicle networks in Denmark, Israel and Australia^[1] where the electricity will be generated by renewable energy." They've already made a deal with the automaker Renault who will be building the electric cars.

The range of the car is about 110 miles on one battery, but the distance you can drive would only be limited by the battery station infrastructure.

It's the best idea I've heard to actually make electric cars viable.

[KillerGremlin]

Originally Posted by manasecret

Project Better Place is the best idea so far to make electric cars work, and I believe it can. There has been much buzz about it lately. Wired magazine had a cover-story on it a few months ago.

Essentially the idea boils down to having all electric cars, that when going to a re-"fueling" station, instead of sitting there and waiting for the battery to charge, pre-charged batteries from the station are simply switched out with the one in your car. In this case, you don't really "own" the battery, although you do, because you would switch them out with pre-charged different ones all the time.

As quoted from Wikipedia (and backed up from the Wired article I read), "Better Place will build its first electric vehicle networks in Denmark, Israel and Australia^[1] where the electricity will be generated by renewable energy." They've already made a deal with the automaker Renault who will be building the electric cars.

The range of the car is about 110 miles on one battery, but the distance you can drive would only be limited by the battery station infrastructure.

It's the best idea I've heard to actually make electric cars viable.

That's pretty sweet...I'd say that would be the best bet to making electric cars work. I just wonder if the costs of implementing that on a global scale would be worthwile, or if a cheaper alternate (green) fuel will be coming down the pipe soon.

[Fyacin]

I say hydrogen is far more likely to replace gas then anything. It just seems like it has the least infrastructure to overcome, and it's incredibly plentiful.

[manasecret]

Another problem is making the thing automated. The idea is to make it so that you pull in, and a machine takes out your battery and puts a new one in. All with little error.

I imagine one of those automatic mechanical car wash machines -- y'know those ones at self-wash places and gas stations that always seem to be broken? -- except they do batteries and they're even less reliable because everyone is using it.

I can't wait to get feedback from the tests in Israel and the others.

[Dylflon]

Here in glorious British Columbia, our electricity is pretty much all hydro.

Therefore we can drive electrics and still be super cool.

[Dylflon]

Oh, and you guys seem to be taking the anti-electric arguments that seem to be mysteriously popping up all over the place despite the glowing reviews from everyone who has been in test groups for electric cars.

http://www.peachygreen.com/electric-...tric-car-myths

Here is for the counter arguments.

[Professor S]

Dyflon, I hate to say it but the only "myths" involved in that article are the author's counter-arguments. Most of what the author cites are arguments based on technology that doesn't yet exist. Its a bunch of "shoulds" and "will" but there is little "does". The Volt is still at least a year away and still gets less that 40 miles per charge. It's nice that people think it will get up to 80, but thats a big "if". Even with 80 miles per charge, I still think an American car needs 100 miles per charge before it will be a true fuel replacement alternative

I'd love to see electric cars succeed. But that article did little to dispel electric car criticisms.

[Jason1]

Really the only American City I can see that working in is New York, and even then it will really only work if you stay in Manhattan all the time. I think everywhere else you at times need to go much faster than 35MPH.

[Acebot44]

I read about Better Place about a year ago and thought it sounded very neat. This thread made the idea pop back into my head and I'm glad to see that Jason knew about it too. Coincidentally, TED.com just posted Shai Agassi's talk on Project Better place for us all to enjoy.

[The Germanator]

Everybody interested in new ideas for transportation should read this week's Good magazine. You can read a lot of it here. http://www.good.is/