Detroit is now home to the country’s first chunk of road that can wirelessly charge an electric vehicle (EV), whether it’s parked or moving.
Why it matters: Wireless charging on an electrified roadway could remove one of the biggest hassles of owning an EV: the need to stop and plug in regularly.
Why occasionally plug in when you can lose roughly 50% efficiency and not. Such a boondoggle.
The point would not be to never plug in, but instead extend the drive time of an EV by using certain roads.
If on a full charge you get 250miles, but if you take a slightly alternative route and get 500 miles, you’re going to have much less resistance to EVs in any community that would be likely to use these roads.
You missed the 50% loss. Wasted energy. Means you have more infrastructure delivering electricity that isn’t utilized. Means you have more production that isn’t utilized.
And batteries already have a loss of up to 20% during charge from heating.
Sounds like the next step is to power it using renewables so that we reduce that inefficiency as low as possible
It wouldn’t reduce the inefficiency though. You still have 50% of that power being lost, which means you need 50% more renewable generation. It’s wasteful.
That’s the good thing about renewable energy, we can waste some without it being a big deal.
Efficiency was the wrong word, but I can’t find the right one.
um not really. Renewables aren’t completely free. Solar panels, turbines, etc. They have to be replaced. with 50% efficiency loss your talking about twice as much mining and manufacturing of the renewable infrastructure. That produces carbon and waste like anything else and more use of limited materials.
Baby steps friend. We try things incrementally
um. the direction we want to go is max efficiency in those baby steps though. Not worse efficiency. Its part of reduce in reduce, reuse, recycle and its first for a very big reason.
Yeah and who uses the energy that is lost? Nobody. It’s not a 50% loss to a driver, it’s all gain over the last charge stop.
As someone who did 500 miles this last week in an EV with 2 little kids, let me tell you it would be fucking worth it not to interrupt my sleeping children even if it’s not 100% efficient.
Electricity isn’t free. Convenience doesn’t make things a good idea nor economically viable. Need to charge on the go? Overhead catenary charging is a technology that’s already developed for use on vehicles and solves the efficiency issue.
You’re human, I’m human, and almost anyone buying an EV is presumably human (I hope) So I can confidently say this from experience:
In 250 miles of driving, it’s very likely you’re going to need to take a dump, a pee break, or grab a sandwich. If you have a second passenger, even doing so twice or three times.
15 mins for stops isn’t bad at all, and more people need to understand their “quick stops” that feel like 1-3 minutes are actually a lot longer.
More often than not, I’ve found my car is ready to go before I am if I am ordering a coffee or grabbing a fast food item and taking a quick pee break.
Source: owning an EV and doing 6 600mi trips and 2 250mi trips.
I actually make a yearly pilgrimage of 500 miles and apart from gas stops I go nonstop, no breaks. I find that making numerous stops wears me out and I start to fall asleep in the last couple hours. Could easily be because I’m adding hours to my drive if that’s the case though.
There is no way that is remotely safe to drive for 7-8ish hours uninterrupted but that falls into the “can” vs “should” argument.
I think the big question is if it’s more environmentally friendly to use larger batteries or accept a huge amount of wasted energy and I don’t have data to make a claim in either direction.
Truck drivers do it all the time, I’m just doing it to visit family. 😜
The wasted energy isn’t inherently a problem. If it is 100% renewable, for instance, it would be more environmentally friendly to have no battery with 99% wasted energy.
So moving forward as we move more and more to a green grid, the concern of wasted energy becomes less and less.
Sure but in the US, commercial truckers are mandated to take at least a 30 minute break after 8 hours of driving. And the EU tells personal drivers to take a break of 45 mins after 4ish hours of driving.
Realistically, if you get a weekend to burn and are feeling bored, rent a Model 3 and go on a trip. I think you’d be surprised how much of a non-issue it would be.
You’re kinda missing the forest for the trees…
Elaborate?
Most people’s driving isn’t (or shouldn’t be) a marathon sport. It’s not like this is F1.
Set your expectations realistically. This road just isn’t going to take off as a practical solution. EV makers have already seemed to decide 300 miles is about the target for a vehicle range, and there’s no incentive to beef up batteries.
Spending billions of dollars to build out roads so people can go from waiting 15 mins to charge down to 10 minutes is an insane waste of money. Most large charging operators are now partnering with locations that are designed to keep you sitting around for a bit longer than a rural interstate rest area, so there’s not much of a reason for them to throw money at this.
I’m sorry this isn’t the answer the very hopeful folks want to hear but find any manufacturer who’s taking in-motion wireless charging seriously right now 🤷♂️
Not only that but AFAIK no current EV can do wireless charging so who do they expect to use this? I should probably read the article.