What is Gore's stance on Electric alternative energy?

[Bullet1987]

Battery Electric Vehicles HAVE been created, and at one point existed. Maybe I don't know as much about this form of alternative energy as some others, but it seems to me many people are dragging their feet and making excuses in regard to alternative fuel.

[Double T]

1. When you've got big oil and big vehicle subverting efforts............

to put large quantities of small, energy efficient and alternative energy vehicles on the road, it will take a strong president to change the course of the enabling congress. The Smart Car is a perfect example of american big oil and big vehicle taking a high mileage vehicle with a great track record, then altering it so that the energy efficiency is reduced, then drastically slowing the importation of the vehicle to the USA. Electric cars are NOT the short term answer; small, high mileage gasoline powered vehicles is the immediate answer to reduce consumption and emissions.

[FogerRox]

4. Double T.... there is an advantage to electric cars

The economy of scale in large electric generating plants that end up feeding the electic cars. The emissions from the generating plants are quite competitive to the emissions of small high mileage gasoline powered vehicles. Its far cheaper & easier to scrub emissions from large gen plants than from 10 million cars. Advantage: the electric car.
Solar & wind generated power can completely change that equation by 2020. IF IEC fusion pans out in the next 3 to 5 yrs, then all bets are off at that point, you will see the partial abandonment of liquid fuels by 2025.

Thats not to say that personal 50+mpg cars should not be a national goal over the next 2-3 yrs. But your ruling out of electric cars as an answer to reduce consumption and emissions is just not based on science or fact.

[Double T]

5. Electric vehicles have limited range and there are problems........

in colder climates with reduced battery capacity due to temperature. Relatively short distance commuting is suited to the utilization of electric powered vehicles, while smaller, high mileage combustion engine powered vehicles will be necessary for longer distances. Hydrogen powered vehicles are ideal and this nation should be concentrating its efforts in R & D in this area; the current cost of this technology is the killer.

[FogerRox]

6. Hydrogen? Yeah sure. Whatever. Ideal ? bullshit.

Figure what to do with the carbon then come back and push the H2. And if your EROI is better than coal or Nukes or wind or solar, I will kiss your ass.

Hint, google IEC or polywell fusion.

[Double T]

15. I'll take water vapor emissions over anything else all day long.

[FogerRox]

16. And as soon as you figure out how to power the production of H2 on a significant scale

let me know, I'll kiss your ass. Untill then you can kiss my ass.

[scubadude]

8. Obviously you haven't seen "Who Killed the Electric Car".

The issues you have listed have been solved. Hydrogen powered vehicles are a bait and switch tactic used
to drive a steak into the heart of the electric car. Hydrogen technology is far from being viable.

Get the documentary and check it out. The duplicity of the big auto companies in the demise of the
electric car is sickening. At one point an inventor creates the Lithium Ion battery, which if used in
the EV1 (GM's electric car) would increase it's range to the required 300 mile range. So what does GM do? They buy out the battery company and shut it down....

Scuba

[Bullet1987]

13. You get that off wikipedia?

[Double T]

14. No. From my brain to the board.

Why do you ask??

[FogerRox]

19. You seem to be ignorant of the laws of Thermodynamics

1st law:

The increase in the internal energy of a thermodynamic system is equal to the amount of heat energy added to the system minus the work done by the system on the surroundings.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_law_of_thermodynamics

The 1st law applies to H2 fuelcells like this

This is the "work": A unit of energy (electricity) is used to break the nuclear bonds of H20, resulting in H2 & O. minus the work done by the system. Take the H2, use it in the fuelcell car. Rsults: fuelcell car travels 1000 miles.

Now if we take the above mentioned work out of the equation, and just use the electricity in an electric car, said car will travel (i'm guessing) 1400 miles.

Lets take this issue a step further.

The amount of emissions using a large coal fired electrical generating plant to power an electrcic car 1000 miles, will be less than the emissions by a high milage small gas or diesel car 2 1000miles.

Why you ask?

Because of the economies of scale. utilities build electrical generating plants in the 1000 MW scale because it is the most efficient way to generate 1000 MW of electricity. Utilities dont use car engines (120hp 4 cylinder) to generate electricity because its very inefficient.

SO like I said when you or some one else develops a work around to the 1 st law of thermodynamics, I will kiss your ass, or their ass. Untill then you can kiss my ass.



David Talbot writes

Nobody has made this point more clearly than Joseph Romm does in Hell and High Water. Romm is an MIT-trained physicist who managed energy-efficiency programs in the U.S. Department of Energy during President Clinton's administration and now runs a consultancy called the Center for Energy and Climate Solutions. His book provides an accurate summary of what is known about global warming and climate change, a sensible agenda for technology and policy, and a primer on how political disinformation has undermined climate science. In his view, the rhetoric of "technology breakthroughs"--including the emphasis by President Bush and some in the auto industry on a future hydrogen economy--provides little more than official cover for near-term inaction.

a 2004 National Academy of Sciences study predicted that fossil fuels would be the main source of hydrogen for "several decades." The other way is to split water molecules using electricity.

According to Romm's analysis, the math for hydrogen cars simply doesn't work out. .

about Joseph Romm

About the Author

Joseph Romm, Ph.D. is executive director and founder of the Center for Energy and Climate Solutions and a senior fellow at the Center
for American Progress, the premier progressive think tank. During the Clinton administration, Romm was Assistant Secretary at the Department of Energy, where he headed the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. He is the author of "The Hype about Hydrogen:
Fact and Fiction in the Race to Save the Climate" and stars in the documentary film "Who Killed the Electric Car." Dr. Romm holds a Ph.D. in physics from MIT.

From Wiki

Hydrogen does not come as a pre-existing source of energy like fossil fuels, but rather as a carrier, much like a battery. It can be made from both renewable and non-renewable energy sources. A potential advantage of hydrogen is that it could be produced and consumed continuously, using solar, water, wind and nuclear power for electrolysis. Currently, however, hydrogen vehicles utilizing hydrogen produced using hydrocarbons, produce more pollution than vehicles consuming gasoline, diesel, or methane in a modern internal combustion engine, and far more than plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.<1> This is because, although hydrogen fuel cells generate less CO2 than conventional internal combustion engines, production of the hydrogen creates additional emissions.<4> While methods of hydrogen production that do not use fossil fuel would be more sustainable,<5> currently such production is not economically feasible, and diversion of renewable energy (which represents only 2% of energy generated) to the production of hydrogen for transportation applications is inadvisable.

Chemically pure hydrogen is derived from a feed stock. The energy to drive this conversion can be produced from fossil fuels, or renewable energy sources etc. Thus, hydrogen is not a harvestable energy source comparable to fossil fuels, solar energy, and wind energy. The conversions to produce hydrogen will have inherent losses of energy that make hydrogen less advantageous as an energy carrier. Additionally, there are economic and energy penalties associated with packaging, distribution, storage and transfer of hydrogen. Current technologies use between 165% to 212% of the higher heating value to produce the hydrogen.

[FogerRox]

23. no comment?

[FogerRox]

18. Please see my post 17 & 19, its a slam dunk.

This person has ignored much basic science. And this person asks you to join in the ignorance of science.

>sigh< hopefully its just a bit of INGNORANCE.

[youngdem]

7. In regions with ample nuclear, hydro or wind power, electric cars are the future

Electric cars in this situation are indeed zero emission, and for the large percentage of drivers who only drive to and from work, they could be a perfect car for at least one person in the household.

If widely adopted, THAT would seriously reduce air pollution and foreign oil consumption.

[FogerRox]

17. Probably a troll....

Breaking the nuclear bond on H2O to make H2 means using x amount of energy to make the H2. Using the H2 in a fuel cell or burning the H2 in a motor releases less energy than it took to make the H2, so just where does Double T think we'll get the energy to start? From Double T's ass hole?

Which is why many dont consider H2 as a fuel, but a storage system. Like a battery.

Double T also infers ignoring many fundamental laws, like

1st law of thermodynamics.....

Double T is also saying small cars produce less emissions than electric cars, completely ignoring the economies of scale in large electric generating plants compared to 10 million small cars...


So I'm thinking hi levels of ignorance/stupidity/dumbness/assholeness.... or a troll.

[FogerRox]

2. Ouch, you sort of seem to be mashing terms up a bit

Alternative energy generally means ..wind .. solar... geothermal... biodiesel. Gore wants much more wind and solar generated electicity.

[AlGore-08.com]

3. I'm not sure which technology you're referring to re: the batteries

But Gore has not been a foot dragger when it comes to supporting alternate energy and green technology. Here's a good overview of Gore's PNGV program from when he was Vice President:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PNGV

Gore's position that internal combustion engines were on the way out and we needed to help them out the door faster was widely criticized during the 2000 campaign, and the MSM and too much of the Beltway often cite this as one of the reasons Gore "lost" that election.

I have a friend who worked in automobile R & D during the late 1990s, whose research was funded by the PNGV. He worked toward developing hydrogen powered vehicles (and at the time he believed they would be commercially available around 2009). Once Smirk got in, the program was dropped and my friend lost his job.

F.Y.I. here's the 10 point anti-global warming plan Gore recently offered to Congress:

http://www.algore.org/Gores_10_Point_Plan_To_Combat_Global_Warming

[RestoreGore]

12. Mr. Gore's plan goes beyond anything Congress envisions or this toxic political system will tolerate

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x485737

And this is not about political campaigns.

[RestoreGore]

9. You actually think he would be against it?

http://www.teslamotors.com/

Check this car out. The only problem I have with it is the PRICE, and that is exactly the problem we still face with alternate energy sources... either they are overpriced or not readily available to the public. If the companies making these cars really want to help solve this crisis, why make a car priced out of the range of the average working American who drives the most? So I don't think the question should be what is Al Gore's stance on it as much as what we can do as consumers to see these vehicles made available to the public without the exhorbitantly high prices and exclusivity. You would think that considering the fact that this has been catapulted into the consciousness of the public so effectively by the release of An Inconveneient Truth, that companies would be jumping at the chance to accomodate consumers with such vehicles. But then again, that means fighting the greedy oil company monster that surely does not want these cars to see the light of day. Regarding Mr. Gore however, I am sure he would be for anything that reduces CO2 emissions.

[Double T]

10. What percentage of the population will be able to afford THAT vehicle.

'WE' need affordable alternative energy powered vehicles for the masses as you mentioned. $92,000.00 TODAY and $98,000.00 thereafter, not to mention what service and parts might cost, is NOT within most peoples' budgets. There is an effort by government and corporate america to subvert the use of alternative energy vehicles.

[RestoreGore]

11. I couldn't agree with you more

And that is exactly where citizen motivation and appealing to business leaders regarding the true urgency of this crisis comes into play. Which is exactly what Mr. Gore is now doing which is the correct approach. And yes, when I saw the price of this car my mouth dropped, and I do believe it is all part of a plan by government and corporate America to do all they can to keep alternate energy vehicles from becoming too mainstream which is truly ignorant on their part. At this point in time I should be able to go down to my local station and fill up on biofuel, hydrogen, or whatever else "I" wish to fill up on to do my part to preserve this planet... but for all the talk it is nowhere near coming to the public on a mass scale, and that is not good considering the time frame we are working with. The same with solar, electric, and other forms of alternate energy. It is either too expensive, too exclusive, or I can't get it otherwise because these companies are also in part controlled by the very companies working against it, and that again will not change unless the people demand it change.

[FogerRox]

21. Read my other posts in this thread, and then see if you still agree with Double T

I smell something foul. What do you smell ?

[FogerRox]

20. Telsa just signed a contract to buy batteries to be used in their next car

Which will be.... you guessed it......... a cheap mass produced car.

[FogerRox]

22. truth kickin