Originally Posted By tashajilek After TT i hate how you exit to a showroom with sales people milling around. Have they really made any sales off of people exiting TT?
Originally Posted By mrkthompsn <Gasoline, or oil, is a limited resource.> Same with coal. So if we're going to burn them, we need to make the maximum efficient use of them, right? Electric cars don't seem to do that. Think about where electric charge comes from and how it gets from the natural resource to the car's motor. Gasoline or natural gas engine cars seem to be way more efficient than electric - hybrid or not. The biggest laugh I get is when I see the "Zero-Emmisions" signs on the buses in San Fran. Point to the electric power plant out there that is not creating emmissions. And no, the windmills out there are not charging the bus lines.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip <<After TT i hate how you exit to a showroom with sales people milling around. Have they really made any sales off of people exiting TT?>> They aren't sales people. They will NEVER approach you... they are there to answer your questions if you have any. If you are interested you can ask to receive mail about the model you are interested in. I did that once when the new Camaro was first introduced. They wouldn't SELL you a car there even if you pulled out a wad of 100's and counted out the list price on the spot!
Originally Posted By Kennesaw Tom My whole point is that GM should be wowing everyone. Showing me the same cars I can see at an GM dealership anywhere in the country isn't wowing me. Showing me the future trends, concept cars, fuel cell, hybrid and electric cars would wow me. Being able to sit down and travel on a fuel cell bus would wow me. And realistically speaking I can't drop 40-50K on an electric car.... but I sure would like to sit in one. And I can always dream of owning a Tesla!
Originally Posted By dshyates I want one of these: <a href="http://www.fiskerautomotive.com/en-us" target="_blank">http://www.fiskerautomotive.com/en-us</a>
Originally Posted By mrkthompsn That looks cool! It even has a mustache. Too bad it's an inefficient coal-burner though.
Originally Posted By Kennesaw Tom I guess that all depends on how your local electricity is being generated. If you live in an area where electricity is predomantly generated by a renewable resource like wind or hydroelectric then owning an electric car is a good thing. Becides, electric cars have a small impact on ground level ozone since their electric motors have the ability to "shut off" when not moving. Unlike the internal conbustion engine vehicles that contributing to ground level ozone while "idling".
Originally Posted By mrkthompsn Tru dat. I think of it like this: Digging coal out of the ground, energy expended. Train-shipping coal to a plant, energy expended. Conveying coal to burners, energy expended. Burning coal, energy loss. Conveying away burnt coal, energy expended. Heating water to steam, energy loss. Steam pushing turbines, energy loss. Turbines converting mechanical energy into electric current by magnets, energy loss. Voltage loss transmitting power to nearby transformer, energy loss. Converting voltage across transformer, energy loss. Charging car battery, energy loss. Applying battery charge to car electric motors, energy loss. (I won't count energy loss from the motor, to the transmission, to the wheels). With gasoline, crude oil is hydraulically released from the ground with far less expended energy than extracting coal. It's transfer to refineries is generally by pipelines which expends far less energy that mechanical conveyance. Out of the refinery by pipeline is also less energy by conveyance. Gasoline's energy is expended directly at the point of use - in the car. All the transmission energy loss is conceivably far less than energy loss from coal to electric motor. If we can just eliminate the need to transfer oil using ships over the ocean every day (drill here in other words), then using gasoline would be far more efficient than otherwise. I agree about hydraulic and wind. If anyone lives on a hydraulic grid, turning OFF your light wastes energy. Wind is terrific, but there's still the electric transmission from source-to-car energy loss to deal with. It's even more convoluted with batteries at the wind turbines with their losses to consider. Still, wind is good. I agree wind source should be increased
Originally Posted By Kennesaw Tom When it comes to our nations transportation needs I like to keep an open mind. I find the technology involved in electric cars and hybrids fascinating. Obviously, how our nation generates electricity would benefit from improvements. I wouldn't fault electric and hybrid car technology for our nations power grid misgivings.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh dshyates, you might want to rethink that fisker - <a href="http://www.autoweek.com/article/20120508/CARNEWS/120509860" target="_blank">http://www.autoweek.com/articl...20509860</a>
Originally Posted By mrkthompsn Hybrid is a much more reasonable solution. It uses energy production at the point-of-use, and applies it very efficiently. Electric on the other hand is a power plant hog. I remember the famous photo of the pile of coal it takes to illuminate a light bulb for a year. I wouldn't be surprised if it takes that same pile to push a single electric car per day. I would't fault electric cars yet... until they significantly increase in quantity.
Originally Posted By Liberty Belle It looks great, but sounds like I'll miss out on seeing it for my October trip.
Originally Posted By EPCOT Explorer Haven't read the whole thread, but I gotta agree on the title. It's about time we had some EPCOT Center aesthetics back in EPCOT. This is VERY welcome.
