Quote:
Originally Posted by Larry Jacks
The sticking point for electric cars is battery technology. Even though battery technology is reportedly improving by up to 30% a year, it still takes a lot of batteries to store the same amount of energy as a gallon of gasoline that weighs only 6 pounds.
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There is a good reason for this; gasoline produces energy when combusted with oxygen, but on this planet oxygen is free and doesn't have to be carried around inside the car. That saves on mass.
A battery generally has to carry all the chemicals it needs to store the energy it retains; except for batteries that use oxygen out of the air (such as fuel cells), a battery will always hold lower energy per kilogram than gasoline or hydrogen. Unless you can start running cars on nuclear power or antimatter, there is a real limit to how much energy you can pack in a given mass of motor vehicle.
Perhaps one might think that a
nuclear-powered car is a good idea; but the need for heavy anti-radiation shielding and safe waste disposal seems to suggest that fission cars are not recommended. Fusion power is still fifty years away, so they say, and small car-sized fusion plants seem unlikely in any case. Antimatter would be a great fuel but is probably the most expensive material currently produced on Earth. So I really don't hold out much hope for phenomenal improvements in motor car fuel technology for the foreseeable future.