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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tejek who wrote (387124)	5/29/2008 12:23:56 AM
From: i-node	Respond to of 1576364

Fuel oil provided 3.0 percent of the generation mix. It depends on whom you ask, but suffice it to say, whether it is 1%, 2%, or 3%, it is not a problem for us to do without it given the renewables coming online in the next few years. en.wikipedia.org so electric cars are a real boon assuming we can keep use of oil in electricity generation to 3%. It is far more important than this. The efficiency of a gasoline powered engine is about 30% when used on the highway (and zero when idling in traffic). Electric motors are more like 90% and some of the energy can be recovered via braking, while idling in traffic is nominal. Thus, using electricity provides a huge savings just in the way it is used. One other thing that is happening -- albeit slowly -- is the development of LED lighting (e.g., CREE) which has potential to drop power demand by 15% over lighting that is currently in use. As LED becomes more cost effective, widespread adoption is likely. This savings will contribute significantly to the power generation for electric vehicles. This is a huge, impending revolution that leaves OPEC without the grip it has on the rest of the world. And frankly, I think the transition will be much quicker than people expect. The biggest problem is the limited range, of course -- but even a hundred miles or two will provide enough range to make a significant dent in oil consumption. I have great confidence that smart engineers will be able to develop storage systems that allow electric vehicles to quickly become a huge part of the solution. Just a 15-20% drop in demand will force OPEC to reconsider its own situation.