It certainly is the dawning of a new era in automotive technology when the tiger in your tank becomes a moldy relic of bygone ad campaigns while the humble leftovers from harvested wheat get awards for new sustainable thinking. A. Schulman, Inc.’s AgriPlas wheat straw fiber has just been named a Blue Ribbon Finalist in Environmental Innovation by the Automotive Division of the Society of Plastics Engineers, for its application in the Ford Flex crossover vehicle.
AgriPlas’s contribution to the Flex is an injection-molded storage bin and inner lid made of polypropylene and a bio-filler made of wheat straw. Though the application is modest in scope, a spokesperson for Ford’s Plastics Research division sees it as a litmus test of things to come, in terms of increasing fuel efficiency by decreasing vehicle weight.
Editor’s Note: This is a guest contribution by Mary Fraser, BASF, American Chemistry Council - Plastics Division Automotive Team
Despite all of the challenges facing the automotive industry today, this is a time of great innovation.
Electric vehicles are just months away from entering the U.S. market and evolving engine technology is consistently improving fuel efficiency. Auto manufacturers are taking big steps to reduce emissions and hybrid cars are becoming mainstream. While powertrain technology has significantly improved fuel efficiency in recent history, the materials used in production of automobiles are increasingly playing a key role in making vehicles more sustainable. One group of materials, in particular, that is opening new doors to auto design and fuel economy is plastics. Read the rest of this entry »
Electric transport and infrastructure company ECOtality has made a move to expand its manufacturing and distribution operations for electric vehicle charging systems in China by entering into a joint venture with the Chinese firm Shenzhen Goch Investment to establish a manufacturing base in China.
In return for a $10 million investment, Shenzhen Goch Investment will have exclusive sale and distribution rights for ECOtality’s charging stations in China.
The Chinese government has instituted incentives designed to leapfrog the gasoline-based car industry. The state electricity grid has been ordered to set up electric car charging stations in Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin, and government research subsidies for electric car designs are increasing rapidly in China.
And an interagency panel is planning tax credits for consumers who buy alternative energy vehicles. Already the Chinese government is offering subsidies of up to $8,800 to taxi fleets and local government agencies in 13 Chinese cities for each electric (or hybrid) vehicle they purchase. Shah Agassi’s Better Place is also moving into the potential tipping point Chinese EV charging market.
The New York Times noted a report by McKinsey & Company last fall estimated that replacing a gasoline-powered car with a similar-size electric car in China would reduce greenhouse emissions by “only 19 percent” (since the country gets three quarters of its electricity from coal).
But 19 percent is actually a pretty sizable reduction in carbon emissions. And there is always the chance; (by adding more wind and solar on a massive scale) of being able to increasingly green the grid in the future.
I like old stuff. Sure new stuff is nice, and nobody wants to eat moldy old bread. But I am always impressed by the ingenuity and gusto of inventors who didn’t have the benefit of the Internet, telephones, and sometimes couldn’t even read. They just had an idea, and made it work with their own two hands. Now it wouldn’t be fair for me to accuse today’s engineers and inventors of lacking in good ideas, but too often it seems like a new idea means a complicated idea. So I am going to try and keep a weekly column on old ideas that never really took off, but to me still seem like there might be some merit to them.
Thus I present you a brief history of the steam car.
A new hydrogen-powered car, whose designs will be “open source” and posted for free use on the web, was unveiled today in London. The company behind the Riversimple urban car claim the new model proves hydrogen automotive technology is ready for roll-out now rather than in 10 years’ time.
The open-source approach means entrepreneurs around the world could download the designs and manufacture the two-seater prototype locally for free.
The car, which drove in to the launch event, is capable of a 50mph top speed, 0-30mph acceleration in 5.5 seconds, and has a 240 mile range. The car’s backers say it has greenhouse gas emissions of 30g/km CO2, less than a third of the latest hybrid petrol cars such as the Toyota Prius and Honda Insight.
The lightweight Smart car-size vehicle uses hydrogen in a modest 6kW fuel cell, and – in the case of this prototype – uses hydrogen converted from natural gas. Hydrogen can also be created from water using electrolysis and potentially even from bio-fuels.
Washington D.C. - On May 14, 2009, GreenlightAC, one of the pioneers in the creation of EV charging stations, launched its own infrastructure last month with the release of the Chargebar(TM). The company claims that this innovative charger is easy, safe, and, importantly, cost-effective.
The Chargebar will make charging your EV or Plug-in Hybrid easy because it charges both 120v and 240v vehicles, is simple to use and does not require membership, proprietary technologies, or specialized knowledge. It is the EV/PHEV charger for everyone. David King, a co-founder of GreenlightAC said, ”Our goal was to make it as easy and convenient to use our charging unit as it is to use a gas pump. And with our GreenlightAC ChargeBarTM we believe that we have succeeded in meeting that goal.”
The giant wing on the hood can swing and sail upright so the vehicle becomes like a windsurfing board, or it can become detached for some cool kite wind action. Then there’s an electric motor in each of the three tires, to keep things rolling.
If you spent any time as a child in the 80’s, you probably spent a more than a few afternoons longing for your own flying DeLorean, hover-board, and Marty McFly Nikes.
Unfortunately, you still can’t have any of those things (although the Nikes did appear on eBay, briefly, and sold for $1300 US), but maybe you can have something better: a real, honest-to-goodness Mr. Fusion!
The “Mr. Fusion” reactor mounted to the back of Back to the Future’s famous DeLorean hovercar produced the car’s fuel by extracting chemical energy from common household garbage. While the 1985 movie version of Mr. Fusion put out enough power to juice the good Doctor Brown’s flux capacitor all the way to the year 2015, the 2008 version will probably only get a few miles down the road.
The revolutionary new surface, created by engineers at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, uses piezoelectric crystals embedded in the asphalt to generate up to 400 kilowatts of energy from a 1 kilometer stretch, enough to run eight electric cars.
Commenting on the innovation, a spokesman from the UK Environmental Transport Association said, “Many predict a massive shift to electric cars, and it may be the roads themselves that help provide some of the power needed.”
A first-of-its-kind summit in Madison, Wisconsin later this week will bring together researchers, innovators, policy makers, entrepreneurs and other industry leaders to discuss best practices for large-scale commercialization of second generation biofuels.
The BioRefinery/BioEnergy Summit, taking place on December 11th, is hosted by Emerson Process Management, a company that specializes in analysis, measurement, and automation of industrial processes and plant operation for oil & gas and other heavy industry. Emerson’s goal is to bring to bear their experience in plant operation, process automation, and analysis for the emerging biofuel industry. By establishing best practices for the biofuel industry, large-scale commercial production becomes viable.
I had an opportunity to speak with Alan Novak, Emerson’s Director of Alternative Fuels, about the upcoming summit and the outlook for biofuel and bioenergy.
A developer, Waste Recycling Group, hopes to construct two 18-foot-deep lagoons near landfills to produce fertilizer from the leachate that oozes from the trash piles. The substance will be pumped from the dump into the lagoons where bacteria will eat away at the contaminants. The developer then hopes to use the fertilizer to grow willow coppices at the landfill for use as biofuel.
The paint fumes contain volatile organic compounds which act as greenhouse gases and pollutants. Typically, these gases would be incinerated, which while better than leaving the VOC’s alone, still produces excessive amounts of carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide. Ford has developed a much cleaner process to dispose of the gases.
High-performance diesel engines, BluePerformance, and a hybrid oh my! BMW is set to roll out the green at the Paris Auto show this year. As the European Union tightens its emissions restrictions, everyone is expected to do their share to help clean up.
Gas 2.0 digs into the viscous world of biofuels and the fast-paced transit arena, exploring the technologies and substances that are the future of transportation.
If you spent any time as a child in the 80’s, you probably spent a more than a few afternoons longing for your own flying DeLorean, hover-board, and Marty McFly Nikes.
