299
Gel and lithium-ion tech could enable 1000-mile EV range on one charge
(interestingengineering.com)
this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2024
299 points (90.1% liked)
Technology
59201 readers
3053 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
You just need a charging station every hundred kilometres or so, that's perfectly doable even in sparsely populated areas. In fact, this kind of infrastructure is far easier to roll out than gas stations.
I'd rather not refuel in -20F weather on a single trip. Add in a trailer and a road trip becomes a charging trip with intermittent driving.
Good thing we make decisions based on something that happens for a few days out of the entire year.
This isn't like the consequences of adding a water filter means you now have to change a water filter every year, this is something that would turn a vacation into something unenjoyable. Meaning it's a decision that would make you give up that type of vacation if that's your only car. It's a sacrifice not an inconvenience.
See the math here: https://midwest.social/comment/6976296
You have to look for incredibly specific situations in North America for current EVs to not be able to make a stretch of road. So much so that many ICE cars would fail at it. We do need better charging infrastructure. Better batteries are desirable for many other reasons, but not required.
Trailers have a habit of cutting the range by 66%. Someone I know has an EV and tows their bikes to a nearby city. They have to charge mid trip in both directions. That's unacceptable to me and a lot of others. I'm fine with a vehicle with 300 miles of range. But 100 miles of range to tow a boat? I wouldn't make it back without a recharge. Probably two charges because charging stations wouldn't be anywhere near the lake in rural areas. So in that scenario I would have to give up boating for an electric vehicle because I'm not about to do that.
The towing range of an F150 Lightning is actually twice as far as its ICE cousin.
We're also not fully utilizing the possibilities of trailers yet. They can bring extra battery. We just need the hookups to make it happen. The aerodynamic cost is already paid by having a trailer, and extra weight is less meaningful for highway travel.
I'm calling bullshit on that. Here's an article from motortrend showing it has a towing range of just about 100 miles. I've seen that backed up by numerous other tests. https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/ford-f150-lightning-electric-truck-towing-test/
I've seen references to the ICE getting 9-10 with a 23 gallon tank. That's more than double the range with a refuel time being an order of magnitude faster.
Batteries in trailers would help. However now you have a battery to tow, which would still have an impact both because of stopping and going and the DOE estimates for each 100lbs extra weight in your vehicle, your MPGs gets a ~2% reduction. Additionally I would not recommend strapping a battery to a boat trailer unless you are sure it was waterproof. Even then it would make it sink into sand easier.