Mazda Skyactive-X compression ignition petrol

[tintin]

Originally Posted by HPsauce

I don't see much electricity in this picture, unless the Tesla is being recharged from the other 2 cars.....

Doesn't need it - I have a dedicated charger on the drive (out of shot) - one of the many advantages of living up North

[ainarssems]

All that electricity need to come from somewhere and at the moment UK electricity generation is stretched as it is. It's fine with relatively low number of electric vehicles but if the most were to switch to electric where is that energy going to come from? There are not much new power stations in the pipeline so it will either need to be imported or provided by small scale solar/wind. I don't see oil drilling to go down as we will still need it for other components like jet fuel as i don't see jumbo jets becoming electric any time soon or even ever so we will have abundant supply of diesel and petrol. it could be burned in power stations in more efficient way than ICE and also could take emissions out of cities and to remote areas. So there is massive changes needed to infrastructure.

I would be great if there was universal swap-able batteries for all cars but i don't see it happening for cars, maybe small commercial vehicles. Battery currently is also structural part of car giving it body strength. So for universal interchangeable batteries you would need to make body stronger and heavier which would reduce efficiency.

Charging should be made wireless, efficient and seamless at parking spaces and even while driving on busy roads.

I do see a large benefit in electric vehicles as a store of energy. If you have a car that can do 300 miles on full charge but only do 15 miles a day going to work and back with a help of Smart network you could have it to charge when electricity is cheap/free/ or you you even get paid and then feeding it back to grid at higher price when needed. I know in USA there are some states with large solar power generation that at times they pay neighbouring states just to take energy of them as it' cheaper than shutting down and restarting production. this would increase the wear on battery but most of battery degradation is when it's empty or near full charge. So you could set for example aluminium charge level 15% which should get you to work and back, optimal 30% and max 85%. So it would automatically keep enough energy for you to get to work and back and then charge battery if energy is cheap and possibly sell it back at higher price when needed by rest of grid. It could also act as a backup for your house in event of power outage. And if you are planning a longer journey you can just change settings on your phone/tablet/computer a day or couple before to make sure it is fully charged when needed.