Cars should plug-in to a new future  

The WWF has released a report noting that we need to dramatically increase the use of plug-in electric and hybrid cars to deal with both global warming and declining oil supplies.

Dramatically expanded use of plug-in electric and hybrid vehicles would be a way to a transport future that doesn't risk climate catastrophe, a major new WWF analysis has found. Such a move would also reduce the risk of conflict over less oil more and more concentrated in relatively unstable areas of the world.

"Plugged In: The End of the Oil Age" considers the future of a transport sector now 95 per cent dependent on liquid hydrocarbon fuels and examines the impacts and practicalities of electric, coal-to-liquid, gas-to-liquid, natural gas and hydrogen powered transport for the future .It finds that vehicles running solely or partly on grid-connected electricity are more efficient and less greenhouse gas intensive than all alternatives, even with most power now being generated using fossil fuels.

The report also finds that cleaner power generation and more use of renewable fuels in power generation will make it certain that the comparative efficiency and pollution advantages of plug-in transport will improve into the future, while the future of liquid fuels is one of increasing resort to dirtier sources that will take more energy to turn into fuels.

“We should all be relying more on walking and biking, on buses and trains, to get to where we need to go. But cars will inevitably remain a major part of the transport equation," said James Leape, Director General of WWF International. "The cars of the future must be much more efficient -- smaller, lighter, more aerodynamic -- and they should, increasingly, be powered by electricity,”

As oil becomes more difficult to access, techniques to create liquid fuels from coal are now being vigorously pursued in the US, China, India, Australia and South Africa. “Coal-to-liquid fuels are costly, energy intensive and extremely polluting, and have previously only been used on any significant scale in countries facing a state of emergency,” said report author Dr Gary Kendall.

Technology Review has an interesting article on "Heating Plug-in Hybrids", noting "Heating and air-conditioning systems that use thermoelectrics could make plug-in hybrids more practical".

The potential of plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles to curb petroleum use has grabbed a lot of attention lately. But there is still a big obstacle to clear before such cars can become the dominant vehicles on the road: automakers will need to find an efficient way to supply them with heat and air conditioning. That's because conventional heating and cooling systems either don't work or are inefficient in such vehicles, significantly lowering their range in hot and cold weather.

One of the leading candidates for an alternative system is based on thermoelectrics, semiconductor devices that can provide either heat or cooling, depending on the direction the electric current is flowing. Major automakers, such as GM and Ford, are now developing systems based on existing thermoelectric semiconductors, and experimental materials that use nanotechnology promise to make such systems even more appealing.

The first plug-in hybrids--cars that can be recharged by plugging them into an electrical socket, but have small gasoline engines to extend their range--will make use of electric heaters. When they start appearing from major automakers near the end of 2010, they'll cost thousands more than conventional cars, so automakers are looking for ways to make them less expensive to broaden their appeal. One way to do so is to find more-efficient systems of heating and cooling, which make it possible to use smaller, less expensive batteries. As a result, thermoelectric systems could start appearing in cars in 2012.

Technology Review also has a post on improving lithium ion battery technology, with energy storage capacity increasing 30% and battery lifetime doubling - Longer-Lasting Batteries for Laptops. Presumably this will also impact hybrid / electric manufacturers pursuing lithium ion based energy storage options.