SVreX wrote:
People thought Edison was an idiot when he promoted the electric light bulb because there was no infrastructure in place.
Edison was an idiot, who just had powerful friends. Remember, this is the guy that wanted DC substations and DC power lines going to every single house and business. Apparently he couldn't even wrap his head around current drop. Had he not slung mud at Tesla at every single opportunity, wireless flouro and wireless energy would have prevailed with no need for ugly copper wire infrastructure. But why give something so valuable away for free when you can charge out the ass for it?
I make that statement, for a thought regarding actual and modern EVs. We know Tesla's wireless electricity worked. There is no disputing that, it worked, and it covered a large area. Still works, still covers large areas, but now we have the tech to make it REALLY big. Had this technology been allowed to evolve into the real world instead of being relegated to labs and college classes, it makes sense that the EV would have evolved well beyond where it is today.
Think about it. There would be an infrastructure of repeaters already, much like our electrical substations today. If the cars didn't have to ...mate... with the power grid to recharge, the range could be potentially endless, stopping this whole fueling station/battery swap crap that companies are trying to make work today.
I'll even take this half a step further thanks to some news I saw from Vegas in the last few weeks. Las Vegas is beginning to look at kinetic energy charging for street lights and signs and crap. Gathering energy from people just walking on the sidewalk. This tech is still in it's infancy for now, as there was no real need or means of doing so in the past. I'll argue this same tech could be scaled to make use of cars on roads/highways. In my head, big moving metal cars would produce much more kinetic power than foot traffic, as the cars themselves potentially create far more energy moving about than any amount of people. I'm sure there is something with electrical and magnetic fields being affected by the cars I'm too rusty and out of touch with to explain properly, but the gist of it is that the cars going down the highway by the generation points could shed wasted power back into the grid system. Essentially making them low loss, possibly no loss, electric vehicles as the cycle goes.
But what do I know, I'm not a banker with millions of dollars invested in the wrong thing in the early 1900's and a friend who owns a newspaper. Funny how that combination of things has picked the wrong thing pretty much every time cough Anslinger cough
As far as hydrogen powered cars go, that whole line is a bust. BUT, hydrogen powered space ships should not be ruled out. It is the most abundant element in the universe right behind human stupidity, and is widely available everywhere beyond our planet. It is worth looking into to get off this rock, but doesn't really have a purpose as long as we're still stuck here.
