Gramaisc
Forum O. G.
Anybody keeping up with the electric car scene?
It occurred to me the other day that electric cars have a fundamental problem of practicality, even if they had adequate range, there were adequate charging points, etc. One of the bonuses of the internal combustion engine is copious amounts of waste heat which can be vented or used to heat the vehicle. An electric vehicle would have virtually no waste heat to use in this fashion and any additional heating, in the depths of a winter such as we had at the end of last year, would have to come from the battery's energy store, thus compromising the range. It seems to be a basic problem that I don't really see a way past. The vehicles could be a bit better insulated, etc., but it's hard to see today's consumers being enamoured of a comfort level that would be about the same as would have existed in a 1930s side-car..
It occurred to me the other day that electric cars have a fundamental problem of practicality, even if they had adequate range, there were adequate charging points, etc. One of the bonuses of the internal combustion engine is copious amounts of waste heat which can be vented or used to heat the vehicle. An electric vehicle would have virtually no waste heat to use in this fashion and any additional heating, in the depths of a winter such as we had at the end of last year, would have to come from the battery's energy store, thus compromising the range. It seems to be a basic problem that I don't really see a way past. The vehicles could be a bit better insulated, etc., but it's hard to see today's consumers being enamoured of a comfort level that would be about the same as would have existed in a 1930s side-car..