Johnson Controls Focuses on Electric Vehicles
Alex Molinaroli, president of Johnson Controls’ Power Solutions business, echoes one of TTAC’s ongoing beefs with the U.S. auto industry: Attention Deficit Disorder. Molinaroli tells Automotive News [sub] that “automobile manufacturers are not going to be able to afford to keep investing in all these different technologies,” referring to the “gas-friendly to gas-free” approach to alternative energy vehicles. Molinaroli’s got a prescription for companies who can’t decide whether hydrogen, biofuel, compressed-air, electric or hybrid cars will be the future: hybrid and electric, baby. “You see the long-term r&d effort focused on the electric car. That’s where the real strategic efforts are. People talk about fuel cells, but I don’t really see the kind of energy and effort around that that I see around the electric power train.” Of course it makes sense that Molinaroli would Molina-roll that way; his firm is currently developing Mercedes-Benz’s hybrid S-Class. Stil, pop those Adderalls boys, the future’s electric.
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It is for short range and medium range daily drivers anyhow. I don't expect to see large vehicles or long distance vehicles go away any time soon. All this talk about how a person would drive 500 miles in an EV is just dumb. Why go through all the wear and tear on an electric when you could go in a V-6 minivan with a gas tank? However for those of us with a commute under 40 miles, a 130 mile EV would be excellent. It's already been done. Detroit tries hard to ignore it. The Asians have done it but chevron said no more and sued them into submission (chevron owns the NiMH battery tech). I'm ready for one or two EVs at our house. We're maneuvering our careers so we can carpool and eliminate one daily driver entirely. Would make it easier to swallow the early adopter price penalty that the first owners will have to pay.
Huh, don't you need an electric powertrain when your fuelcell powered. And a (smallish) battery/ultracapacitor are also obvious features in a fuelcell car. ps. If EV would become popular than highways with an electric rail are an obvious development and in that case 95% of the people only need a car that can do 100 miles on battery. (scenic route driving isn't a need and should anyway be done in an convertable)
I'm putting my (proverbial) money on biofuel-electric hybrids mostly because it can be done on existing infrastructure. Recharge at night for your daily commute, biofuel stations for longer trips. Hydrogen is too finicky to be a large scale energy source.