The -Electric- Motor City

[JRB]

There are many issues facing Detroit-agreed.

The bold vision in this thread is not the whole answer, but it does create a vision for the long term and is timely.

It'd be great to hear from those more knowledgeable on any specifics that are needed for a movement towards large scale electric vehicle use. What is required and in what order?

Leave money out of it at this stage in this exercise.

Let's just dialogue on how it could happen. Technically and in terms of public buy-in and then political buy-in. It makes sense that something like this that is truly pushing the limits and hopefully moving our society on a new path could be part of Detroit's solution, setting an example for the continent and the world.

Maybe collectively through this dialogue a realistic plan can be developed that can lead to some seed funds and then more detailed plans.

[DETGES]

So the vision is about making Detroit the first major northern city to enable widespread use of electric cars and that the best time now for Detroit to ‘rise up’.

I am currently working with a climate scientist that has 1) inspired me to make the first step in solving this problem, and 2) showing me the issues that the city faces when it comes to the electric [[and green) future.
He says that in fact the problem is not the entire electric grid, but what we need to do is revamp the local aspect of the grid and not the transmission lines from power plants. So that would mean implementing high voltage DC electric lines.
But feasibility studies are needed first to see where the major hurdles are and what such a future would look like. That is where funds are needed first.

I'm glad you set this forum a bit more on track. This is what I had in mind.

[ndavies]

The only things missing for the electrification of the vehicle infrastructure are:
1 Better Vehicles people will actually buy
2 more electric generation capacity [[could be Solar, wind, nuclear, natural gas, coal, or some new undiscovered power source.)
3 higher capacity electric lines strung to the places where car charging is to take place. [[DC Vs AC is completely irrelevant to the discussion.)

All technical problems that will only be solved by spending money on technical people that are creating solutions. [[Hence the governments big push in getting people into STEM education and careers.)

[DETGES]

1) I think that innovations in electric vehicles will follow an upgraded local electrical grid. "The big three" will end up following suit, its something that they need to say relevant.
2) There is an option to have wind and solar panels placed out of state [[in a place where there is more wind and sun) and have high voltage DC lines [[yes, DC) that come into Detroit and that is how we will meet our green needs.
3) So yes, and upgraded grid would mean that we install higher voltage lines for car charging, that is correct.

It might be a good idea to get support for a study to be done? Would anyone support that?

[Gpwrangler]

1) I think that innovations in electric vehicles will follow an upgraded local electrical grid. "The big three" will end up following suit, its something that they need to say relevant.
2) There is an option to have wind and solar panels placed out of state [[in a place where there is more wind and sun) and have high voltage DC lines [[yes, DC) that come into Detroit and that is how we will meet our green needs.
3) So yes, and upgraded grid would mean that we install higher voltage lines for car charging, that is correct.

It might be a good idea to get support for a study to be done? Would anyone support that?

why DC? AC is more efficient to transmit and can be rectified at the charging stations.

[DETGES]

DC looses less power over long distances. AC would be used for local, but DC would be used in transferring energy across states.

[Islandman]

DC looses less power over long distances. AC would be used for local, but DC would be used in transferring energy across states.

You know this is backwards right? AC helps with long distances. DC works for short [[local) distances. DC loses more power over distance than AC.

[Wesley Mouch]

...3) So yes, and upgraded grid would mean that we install higher voltage lines for car charging, that is correct.

Not necessarily. AFAIK, car charging is a 240v or even 120v game. The Volt can charge on a standard outlet.

As to the need more for power infrastructure -- maybe. Most car charging occurs at night when power is almost free. It'll be mostly a policy question.

But for now, I don't think we need to do anything to handle electric cars -- but we'll need to keep an eye on system load as it grows over the years.

[DETGES]

Well what I am looking at now is finding away to induce the innovation required for electric cars to take off. I honesty think that they meet peoples needs really well right now, but electric cars don't get enough good PR for people to know that.