
An impending black swan for electric cars - egb
http://www.cringely.com/2014/03/19/impending-black-swan-electric-cars/
======
revelation
Such a great buildup, only to completely miss the point. The adoption of
computers at a large-scale didn't happen through some magic invention and
science breakthrough right before the "revolution". The magic part was the
invention of the transistor, everything after that was diligent and relentless
steady work to morph it into an affordable piece of consumer gear.

That's exactly what the battery factory will do. That is what Tesla is doing:
they are going the long way, not dismissing the technology while waiting for a
black swan to appear at the end of a rainbow that will save them. Because
there won't be one.

~~~
abruzzi
I think more to the point, the computer explosion came from them being useful
to the vast majority of people, not just technical people. My old apple 2 or
Amiga was not that. Electric cars will explode when they are as useful as gas
cars for equivalent costs. If they retain tradeoffs, like range, they will
have to be tradeoffs that impact very few people.

I do think that people in metro areas like NY, LA, SF, don't realize what it's
like to like in the more sparsely populated parts of the country, and that is
still the biggest limitation in my part of the world. 150 miles might be
barely adequate _IF_ there were near instant recharges. If I want to test
drive a new Ducati, I have to drive 500 miles round trip (and have done it in
a single day multiple times)

~~~
ams6110
The computer explosion happened not because of computers per-se but because of
the internet. Email and the web, and later Facebook, Twitter, etc. made
computers able to do useful things. If that had never happened, the majority
of the public would have little use for computers.

So you're right, the electric car will become practical for people not because
of any capability of the car itself, they are already more than adequate in
that regard. It's the batteries. When we have some way to get similar range
and speed and ease of recharging as pumping 10 or 20 gallons of gasoline, they
will be practical for most people. Not really before and until that happens.

~~~
epicgon
The PC revolution was still occurring even for people who didn't have Internet
Access.

------
kylec

        A $95K Tesla Model S has plenty of range to qualify as a single car solution
        but it just costs too darned much money.
    

Even assuming I can get the advertised 265 miles from the Tesla, it's still
too short, especially considering the long recharge times and the rarity of
the supercharging stations. My parents are a 4-hour car drive away, and I
probably drive up and visit them a half a dozen times per year. I wouldn't
want to have to give that up, or to have to arrange alternate transportation.
(There are no superchargers along the route, and even if there were I still
wouldn't want to have to add an additional 30-45 minutes each way)

Maybe this is an edge case, but I suspect that a non-trivial number of people
have edge cases like these. An electric car might serve well as an everyday
vehicle, but it can't truly be a single-car solution at the current time.

The article does mention a hypothetical battery that's twice the capacity and
10x the recharge rate. If that comes out, and if there is a significant
buildout in the supercharger network, I could probably switch. However,
battery technology has never increased at an exponential rate, and I suspect
that it will be a lot longer than 2 years before we see cars that have those
properties.

~~~
sukuriant
How far away is 4 hours?

~~~
kylec
Interestingly, it's about 270 miles, just outside the quoted range. I might be
able to make it by hypermiling, but I fear that Tesla's numbers are under
ideal conditions. If it were cold out, or if I were going faster than 55 mph,
I probably wouldn't make it, and I'd be stuck in the middle of nowhere, so I'd
probably have to proactively find a place to charge it about halfway.

~~~
sukuriant
Yeah. That's getting in the scary "I don't want to run out of juice" range,
especially if there's any range of problems. I actually thought the range of
the Tesla was 300 miles and 265 for 'real' driving; but, again, all it'd take
is for you to have too much fun for a little bit of the drive, and you're out
of range 10 miles before you get home. A bit of a bummer.

Grabbing a meal halfway through there (if there were a supercharger more than
100 miles into the trip) and back might not be /that/ bad. That's an
individual preference, though.

Actually, if they're not charging from flat, it might not even be 30-45
minutes.

------
rdl
Right...because we haven't wanted better batteries for the past 30+ years, and
it's just our lack of desire which is keeping it from happening.

SpaceX didn't do any new _science_ in building their rockets, really. They
took functional technology and a lot of great engineering and made it work. I
don't think it would be responsible to bet Tesla's success on a battery
technology which doesn't exist yet; 50% cheaper Lithium-Ion through
Tesla/SpaceX style vertical integration and awesomeness is good enough.

If better battery chemistries come out, then sure Tesla could use them, but
the planning for the next car needs to work even if they don't.

~~~
rdw
I think that there _wasn 't_ as much demand for batteries in the past as there
has been this decade. Think of all the things that need batteries now that
didn't exist in quite as large numbers 10 years ago. Laptops, phones, tablets,
household devices, cars, power utility energy balancing, UPSes, personal
sensors. Usage of these things in a battery-powered context has grown by
several orders of magnitude, a really truly huge amount, and that level of
demand is driving battery research forward. There also seems to be a shift
from disposable to rechargeable.

It's also the other way around, too, of course. I would have thought it
ludicrous in the 90s to have my primary vacuum cleaner be battery powered. But
this year, I didn't even think twice about it.

------
bicknergseng
"The better approach would be to abandon lithium-ion for a superior battery
technology."

There have been dozens or hundreds or thousands of companies and teams and
people working on alternatives to li-ion for 20 years. We're arguably not much
closer to a "breakthrough" in energy storage. I'm mildly convinced saying 10x
batteries are around the corner is analogous to saying a universal cure for
AIDS is coming next week. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, but I can pretty much
promise you that no company is going to get that tech, design, produce, scale,
and sell enough cars a month from now to be a "black swan" for Tesla.

------
pkulak
I agree. It's closer than a lot of people think. It's hard to describe an
electric car driving experience, but the best way is to say that the
accelerator is exactly the opposite of the brake. In that, the more you push
it, the more force pushes you into the back of your seat, exactly proportional
and instant at all times. There's no lurching from downshifts, or waiting for
RPMs for climb, then fall off, then downshift.

It's a neat experience, and everyone I know prefers it, but it's too damn
expensive to get it. I don't think for long, though. And I don't think it's
going to take some great battery breakthrough either. I'd say you need about
50 kWh in a sedan, minimum, for it to work well for trips (plus a bit of
charging infrastructure). If you want to sell a car for $40,000 (which would
be $33,000 after rebates, less in California), that means you probably can't
have a pack that costs more than $20,000 (since you can buy a decent gas car
for that, and that's before you remove all the gassy bits).

So, $20,000 for a 50 kWh pack == $400 per kWh, which is totally doable. I
think when the Leaf first came out, the estimates were that it cost Nissan
about $500 per kWh, but if they don't have it down below $400 by now I'll eat
my hat. And Tesla probably already has the cost below $300, what with using
commodity cells. I think they only reason Tesla doesn't put out a $40,000
sedan is because they know the demand would outstrip their battery supply by a
factor of 200 (and murder demand for the Model S), so they have to wait until
they build their own factory.

But! Nissan already has their own battery factory. Their batteries are not
nearly as energy-dense as Teslas, so fitting 50 kWh worth in the Leaf may be
their biggest issue right now. But there's a lot of wasted space in that car.
I think they can do it just fine. And when they do, if gas has just tipped
north of $4 by then, they are going to make a lot of noise.

They sent me a survey a couple months ago, and one of the questions asked how
much extra I'd pay for EPA-rated 150 miles range (instead of the current 75).
I was about to drag the little slider up to about $12,000, but it stopped at
$5,000 (or $208 per kWh). That may just be a random question with no basis on
their current engineering, but I think they're up to something.

~~~
mncolinlee
As a LEAF owner, I know exactly what they're up to. Nissan has been promising
for years that they'd switch to Lithium NMC (LiNiMnCo) chemistry batteries for
175% of current density per kg at 125% cost per kg. It's taken them awhile to
get the new technology to production, but it's expected to grow their margin
and their sales considerably.

[http://insideevs.com/nissan-ceo-carlos-ghosn-second-
generati...](http://insideevs.com/nissan-ceo-carlos-ghosn-second-generation-
battery-is-coming-online-now/)

TLDR: New lithium ion battery chemistry may add up to 60 miles more range to
the current LEAF for only about $2000 marginal cost to Nissan while adding no
more weight.

~~~
pkulak
Wow, that would be awesome. That article is two years old though. I hope they
have been working on it this whole time and haven't just abandoned it.

------
sukuriant
I have to concur with this article. I was musing about what kind of electric
car I would want if I had tons and tons of money. It wasn't a Tesla S, sadly.
As much as I love Teslas and think they're amazing and awesome cars, they also
say "I have money" quite loudly. No, I want similar range and performance,
except in a sleeper car. There's 2 alternatives: the Leaf and the Chevy Volt,
from my research.

The Leaf is a very ugly car, to me, for a young man (though I do know people
who pull it off perfectly).

The Volt is almost there, except that its range on battery is about 40 miles
(afterward it switches to gas, which defeats my idea). I want a car that can
go 140+ (preferably 300+) on a single charge (or have super-fast, and still
infrequent, charges) that I can charge at night, and has the prestige of
anything less than or equal to a BMW.

There is a particular beauty, to me, in the idea of plugging in my vehicle at
night and, the next day, having a new 300ish mile range to be able to use.
It's has a beautiful feel to it. The inconvenience of getting gas, gone
forever, and replaced by a considerable reduction in price. I love it.

The day that comes, be it in a Tesla family sedan or in a Leaf or BMW electric
car or whatever other company ends up making the >= 50k, I will seriously
consider and even actively decide that I no longer need a gasoline powered car
as my everyday commuter and city and nearby attraction car.

~~~
fossuser
There's the Fiat 500e which you can lease pretty reasonably in california -
though I think the range is pretty short (more comparable to the leaf). At
least it looks a lot better than the leaf though.

~~~
sukuriant
I assumed, being a Fiat, it wouldn't be as accessible in the States. I stand
corrected.

------
ksec
Oh, God.... 1\. Telsa isn't building the Factory themselves. It actually
Panasonic, which is currently the sole producer for Telsa Motor's battery, are
PLANNING to build a Giant factory in partnership with Telsa.

2.Mass Manufacturing will bring down battery cost? No, Batteries are ALREADY
being mass manufactured, and the margin on batteries are thin. very thin.

3.As much as everyone like Telsa and likes to fantasize the idea. Telsa are NO
expect in battery technology. Panasonic, Sony are.

4\. Batteries, due to the possible explosive nature, require a hell a lot of
safety testing before it could be put to use. So basically any new battery
invention you read now wont come into consumers hand for at least about 3-4
years. And that is already a unrealistic assumption of everything going
straight forward and smoothly.

5\. So no new battery tech coming. How about Lithium-ion? Well i can assure
you Panasonic has been pushing this tech and incremental improvement are still
on the roadmap. Just not the big 2 - 3 x improvement you would expect.

6\. Lithium, as it stands today, isn't (yet) a variable solution to EV. A lot
of articles will claim it is abundance, but that is the same as Hydrogen. It
is the process is getting it. The largest Lithium reserve in the world, in
Bolivia, while enough to sustain the EV uses, isn't producing any Lithium
simply because the cost of extraction is multiple times higher.

That is why many producers like Toyota, and Nissan, or even GM say EV isn't a
variable alternative yet. Not because they are paid by Oil Salesman as much as
you want to believe. They love alternative energy as well, be it Hydrogen or
Battery Powered Cars. It is the current battery isn't up to it. And even the
expert in the battery field dont have anything in sight they could look
forward to.

~~~
niels_olson
> Telsa are NO expect in battery technology. Panasonic, Sony are.

Here's where I think you're missing something. It pays to have a CEO with a
degree in physics. His background allows him and those around him to ask
brilliant questions that rapidly advance the state of the art. Like using lots
of small cells and firewalling the groups. This comes straight out of the most
basic understanding of thermal dynamics, but obviously that was beyond
Boeing's engineers.

It's not so much the expertise at the bottom that matters in cases of
strategic investment. It's having the expertise at the top where leadership
can guide the course toward more likely and desirable outcomes.

------
magic_haze
What happened to the Hydrogen option? A few years ago, everybody was talking
about how it would be the best possible fuel and how much better than
batteries it is, but I haven't heard much about it after.

From a distribution point of view, it seems like both batteries and hydrogen
are pretty much equally bad. Is there something holding back the powertrain
technology with hydrogen?

~~~
thedrbrian
It's energy density is pathetic. And there might be a problem marketing the
idea of driving about with hundreds of litres of hydrogen in the boot.

~~~
russell
Safer than gasoline. It just burns with a pretty blue flame.

------
bigbossman
This isn't a black swan. Cringely is using the term incorrectly.

~~~
nickff
Only someone who has not read Taleb's book could say that disruptive
innovation is the same as a black swan. The black swan is something believed
to be rare or impossible, which turns out to be more common than was
previously believed.

------
beat
The biggest problem imho is the supercharging stations required for fast
charging turnarounds. Charging a 50kwh battery in an hour requires more than
50kw of power. That's a very dangerous level of voltage and current (roughly
the power of a good-sized radio station's antenna), enough to kill from a
distance if the slightest thing goes wrong.

Maybe we'll have really safe, highly standardized supercharging stations. I
hope so. But it's a Hard Problem.

edit: The next-gen Tesla supercharger stations will be 120kw. I don't think
those can be free forever, although they're free to premium-paying Tesla
customers now.

~~~
revelation
_Power_ isn't really an indicator of how dangerous something is. You can kill
someone on a watt. This is a solved problem, and the 120kW stations are
already deployed throughout the country, without any reports of
electrocutions.

~~~
walshemj
And they are made safe (like electric traction on railways) by not letting the
general public any where near them.

------
arjn
Silly article, I wish I hadn't wasted time reading it.

Strangely, the author thinks it's an incredible prediction that electric cars
and their associated energy-storage technologies will eventually get better,
easier to manufacture and cheaper to own. That a point will be reached where
the economics make sense for the middle class to start buying such vehicles.

"Black Swan". Really ?!

------
SixSigma
Impending ? My local ASDA (Wal-Mart) has had electric car charging points for
a year now. There are about 50 such equipped ASDA stores throughout the UK.
Looking at the map, they are less than 50 miles apart and many of them open
24hrs.

[http://your.asda.com/news-and-blogs/electric-car-drivers-
can...](http://your.asda.com/news-and-blogs/electric-car-drivers-can-now-
charge-up-at-asda)

Formula 1 is quite popular in the UK and that sport now has hybrid engine
technology with 160 horse power of electric motor waiting at the press of a
button, charged by the kinetic harvesting of the vehicle and the turbo powered
1.6 litre petrol engine. They complete the 200 mile race with only 130 litres
of fuel.

Electric cars are here and in the public eye.

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/25158104](http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/25158104)

~~~
ams6110
The public charging stations I've seen in the USA are standard mains, 240V
tops. They are not superchargers. They will give you a little top-up but won't
recharge your car while you're shopping.

The amount of energy stored, transported, and sold as liquid automobile fuel
is amazing. Current electrical infrastructure is not even close to being
prepared to replace it on a "disruptive" scale.

------
Mz
I wonder what role rising oil prices play in this. I mean, it isn't just a
matter of "electric needs to be cheaper." It needs to be cheaper/more viable
in some way than the widely available alternative which is currently gasoline.
As gas goes up, shouldn't those lines cross sooner rather than later?

------
derekp7
If battery tech doesn't improve on the price any time soon, I'd like to see a
slightly different financing option. I'd like to buy (or lease) the car, and
then lease the battery pack separately, so you pay for it by the charge.
Currently, it cost about $6 to "fill up" a 300-mile range battery, vs. $50-$70
for gas. So as long as the electric cost plus battery lease per charge costs
than the cost of a tank of gas, I believe that would go a long way to solving
the up-front vehicle cost issues.

~~~
qbrass
Renault is doing that with monthly leases on the battery in the Zoe.

People started getting worked up about it because they can remotely disable
the battery if you don't make the lease payments.

~~~
derekp7
I'd actually like to see a communications link between the battery and the
charger -- when you charge it in your garage, you swipe your credit card and
get billed for that charge. As long as it is, say, half the price of a tank of
gas, then all is good.

But, I just ran the numbers -- a Tesla battery costs about 30 grand. If it
lasts 10 years (120,000 miles), and gets 300 miles per charge, that is 400
charge cycles -- or about $75 a fill up. Adding in electric cost ($5 at the
cheaper rates), and gasoline price of $3.60 per gallon, then you are looking
at getting a car with the equivalent of 22 miles per gallon.

------
ZenoArrow
This is such a lazy article. The central premise is we're due a big
breakthrough in battery technology in the next few years because there are
many groups working on it. Using the same logic you could say we can expect a
big breakthrough in cancer treatment in a similar time frame.

There are promising battery technologies being worked on, but there tends to
be a big difference between lab research and what makes it as a viable
product. Let's make the most of what we have now instead of waiting for a
magic bullet.

------
trhway
the way for electric cars to get higher range and lower cost is obviously
battery improvement. The metal-air (specifically zinc/air and Al/air)
batteries sound like a natural way of doing so. These batteries can be thought
as fuel cells "burning" zinc(or Al) instead of gasoline. Having lower cost and
size than Li-ion they would be also good candidates for battery swapping
stations. If only we as society were able to build such an infrastructure...

------
powera
"With dozens of groups working on the problem and an eventual market worth
probably $1 trillion I have no doubt there will be a solution within the next
couple of years." \- people have been saying effectively the same thing about
fusion for 50 years, and it still hasn't happened. Just because something
would be nice doesn't make it possible or likely it will happen soon.

------
jbattle
If i were to place a bet on how the game gets changed for EV it is a battery
swapping model like that explored by Better Place.
[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place)

They went belly up but there is something intuitive and compelling about the
model.

