Absolutely it does. But the car is estimated to cost Honda $200,000 per to make. http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/reviews/healey/2008-09-04-honda-fcx-clarity_N.htm Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! So even if they cut the cost in 1/4th it will STILL be a very expensive car. Using a very expensive fuel (~$4.00 per kg (without highway taxes) and it only gets 60 miles per kg of H2) Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! So in real life this is looking at a Prius type mileage car, but at a huge price premium and limited range and limited fuel availability. This car has been available since 2008 and they can't get enough people to lease the few hundred they planned to make available due to the limitations. (You aren't allowed to drive it outside of Southern California (while you agree to that stipulation in the lease, it hardly matters, it only has a range of 240 miles and if you go that far you won't find any place to refuel it anyway) http://www.afdc.energy.gov/afdc/progs/ind_state.php/CA/HY http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-clarity/refueling.aspx
Capitalism and the Free Market And when the technology to manufacture a million of them is sufficient, they will considerably less to make. The apps that run on my iPhone are too big to run on my first desktop computer, an Atari 800. Hell, the JPG my daughter just sent me from the airport is too big to display on one of those old machines (I would need sixty-one of them). And in raw dollars, my iPhone costs less to buy than a single A800; even adjusting for inflation, the contract price for the iPhone is less than the A800. Economies of scale not only pertain to the final product, but also the components. I suppose the government could step in, and try to speed up the development of hydrogen fuel-cell cars, but in the meantime, it's not Honda that says, "Up yours, hydrogen!" but capitalism. You know, the free market? That's the way it works.
The reason I used this company, BMW also makes a hydrogen powered car, was to show that there are alternatives that could be DEVELOPED over time to replace a gas powered society. That is something that society needs to do soon and the sooner the better for everyones sake. Indeed, with hydrogen, the BMW does almost as water vapour. As there is more carbon in the fuel, CO2 emissions should even be zero, but with the possible drop of oil that can pass through the exhaust, we limit ourselves to write that they are reduced more than 99%. The same is true for all toxic pollutants, including nitrogen oxides (NOx), as BMW is super champion to optimize the burning of its engines, and the latter takes place upstream where temperatures are formed NOx. Therefore, the near-perfect, with the only drawback of having to refuel every 200 km. The BMW 760 Li is not a small car journalist, and this even less Hydrogen 7 is a car big boss who will only have to ask his driver to go refuel when needed. And seated in the rear, the big boss will have the satisfaction not pollute during his travels, while continuing to benefit from an auto highest level. Neither Mercedes or Lexus can offer him that. The BMW Hydrogen 7 is the world's first production-ready hydrogen vehicle. It's already proving itself in the real world too: we're putting 100 of them to the test as loan cars for leading figures from the worlds of culture, politics, business and the media, including Oscar-winning film director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck and Erich Sixt, chairman of rental car company Sixt AG. Real-world experience shows that switching to hydrogen can go hand in hand with the comfort, dynamics and safety you'd expect from a BMW. http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...Nyebb9eOAFTsX5bCg&sig2=up7XsXg-WTW3VSP_a3eJPw Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Except that they are HUGELY subsidizing the cost to make just these 200 cars. They can't afford to subsidize even HALF the current cost to make even 10,000 of them, which would be about $1 Billion dollars, and you could never sell 10,000 of them at $100,000 each. So talking about 100 times as many cars as that is ludicrous. More to the point, you are presuming that the production cost is related just to numbers in production but other costs, like the Platinum in the required Catalyst and Lithium in the batteries aren't subject to any economies of scale. Other materials, like the PEM membrane are already being made in decent volumes for other uses besides cars and so they won't go down nearly so much even if car volume goes up. In short, yes it's a $200,000 car now, but even if they reduce the cost of the Fuel Cell by 80% (which is a huge reduction), there are many other expensive parts to the car as they still have the high cost of H2 storage and the required LI-Ion battery (Fuel Cells aren't responsive enough to use for direct drive, so they charge the battery which is used to drive the car) such that it's not likely to ever be an inexpensive car. Which brings us to the fuel. It's going for $5 per kg and H2 is indeed already produced in huge quantities (So Cal has a pipeline just for H2) and so no expected reduction in price there, but it also has a big drawback, in that the energy density of H2 is low (that's why I posted the picture of the H2 tank size) which limits it's range quite a bit, which is why they are only being sold in SC and why you can't drive it out of the area. The range on the snazzy BMW, which burns the H2 instead of using it in a fuel cell is even less, because even though the trunk is consumed by the H2 tank, the range is but 124 miles. Which makes it nice to look at but pretty useless in reality.
Hydrogen is a cool fuel. It's very clean when used and is very light for the amount of energy. On the down side, it's hard to store (doesn't compress well) and isn't very safe - it leaks through most materials and is combustible over a very wide range of mixtures. These problems could be overcome with some significant (i.e. expensive) engineering. But the biggest problem with hydrogen is that we don't have any. We can't drill a hydrogen well. We can make it, but if we use (for example) natural gas to make it we might as well just use the natural gas to begin with. It would be cleaner overall. Any time you claim a source of energy is "clean" you have to justify that by figuring out how you will get it. D batteries are 100% clean sources of energy - if you ignore making them and assume recycling of everything.
It doesn't help that several bills are in the works to prevent Obama from being allowed to tap into the strategic oil reserve unless a certain transient oil pipeline project is approved without changes or additions... in other words, some members of the GOP are attempting to hold the US Citizens hostage in order to further their own agendas... surprise surprise. As for environmentally "green" cars... the Nissan Leaf is the best bet at the moment - a pure electric car with a reasonable range, a relatively small footprint in terms of manufacture, plans for recycle and reuse of salvageable materials for its batteries... the only hump with it is the initial generation of the electric power to charge it, and that can be somewhat offset with solar and wind systems if so desired (in fact, IIRC, a solar panel set is available for it that is able to trickle-charge it in moderate sun to about 50% charge in one day... granted, that only gives you 50 miles off of pure solar energy... but it's a START)
How is anyone being held hostage? Obama isn't releasing any of the SRs anyway. Oh, there is nothing "transient" about that pipeline. It's needed now and it will be here for some time. Pipelines are FAR preferable to trucking the oil over our highways, which is what we have to do without the pipeline. Well not offset very much, since solar and wind only generate ~2% of our electricity. http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/annual/pdf/sec8_17.pdf Well no, you don't recall correctly. Indeed you are not even close. To start with, 50% charge of a Leaf is only 36 miles. But it takes ~14 kW hours to do that charging. A 200 watt PV panel is about 5'x4' and you would need about 15 of the panels in a sun friendly location all day to charge the Leaf to about half charge. But the average cost of PV systems installed in 2010 that were less than 10 kW ranged from $6.30/W to $8.40/W Which would put the cost, on the low end, to charge your Leaf for 36 miles per day (but only on totally sunny days) at $18,000. (my guess is you could probably get it done for a bit cheaper, assuming you had that much space properly oriented on your roof, but most people don't) And of course most peoples cars aren't sitting in their garage all day. http://www.motherearthnews.com/rene...stallation-cost-ze0z11zbon.aspx#ixzz1oGOrLBmD There is nothing TRICKLE about it. It's a lot of power. Indeed, to fully charge the Leaf each day, at ~28 kWhs takes a bit less then an average US house uses for all it's electrical needs.
I can't believe this: After the detailed explanation with links to the EIA that I gave to Tiassa he posts this in another thread: Really Tiassa? Did you not bother to read the article you are referring to? It does NOT say we are a NET EXPORTER OF OIL as you are claiming. http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=2910835&postcount=10 ABSURD The article does point out though that we import over 8 million Barrels of oil each day, about 3 million barrels per day more than we produce. So, NO Tiassa, we are NOT a net exporter of OIL. http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=2911296&postcount=14
That contract price for the iPhone is also less than it costs to produce an iPhone. So, not a great example in this context. There are massive subsidies built into that contract price - Verizon and Sprint them are currently posting huge losses due to the avalanche of iPhone sign-ups.
Post it notes are popping up at gas stations regarding this issue: Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! & Grocery Stores: Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
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Really, all people are doing with those notes is giving fair warning that they have low IQ's. The lower one is talking about a quote from candidate Obama, talking about his cap and trade plan, which has been dead in the water for quite some time. Emphasis added. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...claims-obama-said-energy-costs-will-skyrocke/ Sure, let's dredge up a quote from years ago talking about legislation that has no chance of going anywhere, and has nothing to do with our present situation in order to... do what now?
I find it more than a little disingenuous when folks like you and Mad make claims that President Obama is in some way limiting oil production in this country. Because here are the facts. Under the 8 years of the previous Republican administration, oil production in this country shrank by 15 percent. Under 3 years of the Obama administration, domestic oil production increased 14 percent. How many Tea Baggers know that little fact? I have some good money that says not a one. http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MCRFPUS1&f=A Tiassa's articles stated that the US has become a net exporter of fuel. And fuel is really the crux of the matter isn't it. When you drive into your local gas station, you don't load it up with raw crude do you? Well most people don't. So your arguement about oil import really is of little relevance here. The issue is about fuel not crude oil. And as I just pointed out, US domestic crude oil production is up 14 percent under the Obama administration as opposed to being down 15 percent under the previous Republican administration. Where were you Republicans when your guys were turnning a fiscal surplus into unprecedented deficits and debts? Where were you guys when oil production was declining at double digit rates when your guys were in office? Why are you complaining when the new guy, the Democrat comes in and starts fixing your messes?
And guess what? Higher crude prices make marginal oil fields worth working again, which will lead to further exploitation of our national reserves. I don't see how that will help lower fuel prices, the world wide market plays too large of a hand in that, but it certainly boosts economic activity in some regions. I'm no expert, but I don't see any way that gasoline will ever dip below $2.00 a gallon again in the U.S. We are going to have to learn to live with it.
True, and we haven't mentioned the huge natural gas discoveries and production in the US in recent years. Natural gas is a good alternative to gasoline. It can be used in trucks and cars, burns cleaner and more efficiently than gasoline. The US is building it's first natural gas export facility. Here is the sad part. This country is in the middle of a huge energy boom. In North Dakota (Bakken Shale) they are drilling as fast as humanly possible. But the ditto head/Tea Party faction is in total and complete ignorance. http://money.cnn.com/2012/03/14/news/economy/sabine-pass-natural-gas/index.htm This is just another example of how misinformed the ditto head crowd really is about virtually every issue.
http://www.nasdaq.com/article/exper...ions-fuel-high-gasoline-prices-20120329-01205 But continue blaming president Obama for things that are completely beyond his ability to control.
Obama shut down oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, banned offshore drilling in many areas, has been slow-walking drilling permits, increased royalties for new onshore oil and gas leases by 50%, and denied a permit for the Keystone XL pipeline. Add to that his inflationary monetary policy, and yes he does bear some responsibility for gas prices.
In that case, it sucks for you that US oil production is at a 12 year high. It makes it hard to blame others for our oil demand.
Unfortunately for you Mad, the facts just don't bear out your claims. Oil production in The United States is up by 14% in the three years President Obama has been in office as opposed to be down 15% under the previous Republican administration. Since your arguments lack honest fact and reason you have to resort to deceptions. Obama halted new oil permits in the Gulf following that little oil disaster that turned the Gulf into a giant oil spill, pending an investigation. So that we don't repeat the mistakes that caused that disaster. But even so, the bottom line is that oil production is up signficantly and not declining as it was under 8 years of Republican administration. And the president was right to deny the Key Stone permit. Because they had not finalized a route or completed the application. Further most if not all of the Keystone oil will be going to China, not the US. And as pointed out to you before, the price of US oil is dependent on global oil prices which are to a large degree controlled by an oil cartel. The only real solution to our energy problem is an alternative to oil (e.g. natural gas). In the case of the Keystone project, President Obama did not give the industry the blank check Republicans like yourself were demanding. And that was a wise and prudent measure. If Republicans want the permit, then they need to get specific like tie down the route - one of those minor details again. Two, the US president has no control over monetary policy. Monetary policy is under the control of the Federal Reserve that operates under a board chairman appointed by a Republican president. Additionally, there is no evidence that the Fed has pursued an inflationary monetary policy. Despite Republican fear mongering the issue, there is no evidence of excess inflation. Inflation to date has remained tame, very tame under the current Federal Reserve.
