

Vinod Khosla: Hybrid-electric cars won't make a difference - brett
http://venturebeat.com/2007/09/13/vinod-khosla-hybrid-electric-cars-wont-make-a-difference/

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thingsilearned
This is a forum for unique thinkers so I'm putting this out here. The price of
cars and gas is insane. But also, the price of building and maintaining roads
is mind-blowingly high.

What if we built a track system, like a single rail roller coaster. The single
rail would be fairly cheap to make, take up minimal space, eliminate the need
for everyone to have their own cars, intersections, speed limits, snow plows,
collisions, gasoline, human drivers, traffic, etc.

I think it would be an awesome solution all around. There would probably need
to be some significant engineering behind designing that single track system
that allowed so much track hopping and to handle cars smart enough not
navigate the web. But I think its nothing we can't do with current technology.

Is this stupid? Most non-tech people seem to think so.

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irrelative
I don't think it's stupid -- I think it's the basis of every subway system in
the world. There are, however, lots of issues that would make this a very
difficult project.

First thing, and I think the largest issue, is that it's an "all or nothing"
system. Until all of the infrastructure was in place, the 'cars' would be
crippled relative to our current vehicles. Almost all large society changes
have an organic method of adoption or they don't gain any momentum. So until
you've 'paved' rural Texas, no one who has ever considered visiting rural
Texas will ever buy one. Worse still is that you'd probably have to bulldoze
existing roads for the tracks (at least in cities where space is tight).

If you could overcome that obstacle, I feel the other issues would be easy
(like how to pay for such a system, getting people to buy the cars, etc). It
would be an interesting solution, somewhere between mass transit and autos,
but a tough sell to everyone. Notice I didn't say impossible :-)

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asdflkj
A great point, but it is perhaps already economically viable on a small scale,
if done correctly.

Consider a place like Manhattan. Getting around in a car is already extremely
impractical. Because it's easy to suspend a rail in the air, compared to a
traditional road, it could be built right over the existing infrastructure.
Population density is high, so you don't have to build very much of it before
it becomes convenient. And few people in Manhattan would care that they can't
get to rural Texas in their sky-car.

Now, if you supply electricity through that rail, it makes the cars much
easier and cheaper to make. They would also be much lighter, which means the
rail itself doesn't have to be as strong and so can be cheaper to build. And
they would be more compact, which means people won't pay as much for a parking
space.

Can somebody give me half a billion dollars, I have an idea for a startup...

~~~
Caligula
More like 20 billion. Light rail is rediculously expensive to build.

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wammin
I agree that hybrids are a sorry excuse for a "green" alternative. Aside from
the fact that they currently cost more as Khosla points out -- just because a
car or SUV is a hybrid, doesn't make it truly energy efficient. Auto makers
are slapping hybrid engines in cars to appeal to the growing buzz about going
green, when in fact, many of the hybrids out there are only a very dull shade
of green.

Take the Ford Escape hybrid, for example. It's currently considered the most
efficient SUV on the market ... getting a whopping 30mpg. 30mpg! Big friggin
deal! You can get better mileage in a regular gasoline Civic.

The worst part about hybrids is that THEY STILL USE GASOLINE! Sure, maybe a
little bit less, but as long as we are driving hybrids, we're still dependent
on burning fossil fuels, contributing to CO2 in the atmosphere, and making the
oil companies richer.

Hybrids are a marginal improvement in fuel efficiency. Marginal is not good
enough to make any difference worldwide. We need to focus on orders of
magnitude of increased efficiency. I believe that one day, hydrogen will be
our answer. Solar electric is on a good path, too ... but still far from being
feasible.

What can you do right now? Save your money on the fancy-shmancy hybrid, and
buy a diesel car, and fill 'er up with biodiesel. It's carbon neutral, totally
renewable, and requires no special modification to your car.

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mhb
>Save your money on the fancy-shmancy hybrid, and buy a diesel car, and fill
'er up with biodiesel. It's carbon neutral, totally renewable, and requires no
special modification to your car.

If only it wasn't destroying the rainforests:
<http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18825265.400>

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wammin
Like anything, we have to be responsible about manufacturing processes and
renewable raw materials. Biodiesel does not have to come from rainforest
plants. Its unfortunate that some people decided to tarnish the reputation of
an excellent alternative fuel by going the cheap and irresponsible route to
raw materials.

Just like you wouldn't buy paper or wood products that came from rainforests,
don't buy biodiesel that comes from rainforests. Much of the biodiesel that's
available in the U.S. is made from domestically grown soybeans, or even
better, used restaurant oil from deep-fryers.

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stuki
If the price of gas goes high enough (i.e. global peak oil with sharp declines
like the North Sea), people will pay up front to lower gas consumption one way
or the other. Even in Mississippi. That doesn't necessarily mean buying
hybrids, but hybrids, especially plug in ones, seems like nice transition
technology while another 'supply grid' of some sort develops.

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trekker7
Maybe electric cars won't become mass market, but the Tesla Roadster is just
plain cool; perhaps it helps the global warming cause by making energy
efficiency a cooler problem to solve in the eyes of the general public.

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falsestprophet
Plug in hybrids are not far away. Will they be less expensive in the long run?

