It’s transportation acronym time. ICE | EV | HEV | PHEV | BEV | FCEV | HPV First, let’s start with ICE – the Internal Combustion Engine. Modern-day ICEs are marvels of engineering. Fossil fuel is detonated inside a complex machine of hundreds of parts moving at fantastic speeds – an intricate dance of stress, […]
Read more "BEVS and FCEVSThe age of the electric vehicle has arrived. The Road Electric offers unique news and a fresh perspective on electric cars and alternative energy. Follow The Road. Are there really EVs in Paradise? Who is ELEKTRA? Get your NANOTUBE ready. Would you go on The Barton Park Adventure? Tiny is HUGE The Barcelona Double Wow […]
Read more "Follow the Road"When I ran across a Honda Clarity tucked quietly away in the upper South Hall at CES last January, I was introduced to Honda’s concept of generating hydrogen on-site in a stand-alone fueling station. It turns out that Honda had more than a Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle in mind with the Clarity. Just announced are […]
Read more "3X the Clarity"Consumer Electronics Show / Las Vegas, Nevada Tucked away off to the side, on the upper floor of the South Hall at the Las Vegas Convention Center, the booth seemed out of place. Instead of sprouting gadgets and accessories for cell phones as found in surrounding booths, it contained a solitary white car next to […]
Read more "PROVIDING CLARITY"Creating electricity with a hydrogen fuel cell is a beautiful concept. Hydrogen and oxygen react in an electrochemical process to produce a flow of electrons, and the only byproduct is a small amount of the combined element: dihydrogen oxide (H2O). It’s very clean. The engineers at Toyota believe this is the future of electric vehicles, […]
Read more "Hydrogen (Bomb?)"When I was a kid, building an electric vehicle that would go farther than a few miles seemed like such a simple thing: just put a generator on board. When the batteries needed charging, fire up the generator et voilà: just keep on driving. It was a simple-minded solution at the time. Weight, energy density, […]
Read more "The More Things Change"Which makes more sense: recharging a plug-in electric vehicle using the established electrical grid, or building a massive infrastructure to dispense hydrogen for fuel cell-powered vehicles? I remember back in 2000 when everyone was suggesting it was the latter. Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells were all the rage, and I was watching one company in […]
Read more "Care to Exchange A Proton or Two?"