It's been a long time since I wrote my last blog post because was on a business trip. It was a fun and challenging experience, meeting with different people in a totally different culture. In case you are curious, I was in Yangon, Myanmar for the "Renewable Energy Conference 2015". It's a networking event that invites industry professionals that aims to build a partnership networking through face-to-face meetings and open discussions to build and further strengthen guests' networks.
While I was in Myanmar, I did saw some electrical cars that not only looks impressive on the outside but on the inside as well. The interior design looks sophisticated and it is comfortable while driving it. I checked on the Internet and it's truly an energy efficient hardware that's worth sharing with the masses.
How To Define An Energy Efficient Vehicle?
The car which has been with us since the 19th Century, has evolved tremendously over the decades. The year 1886 is regarded as the birth year of the modern car. In that year, German inventor, Karl Benz built the Benz Patent-Motorwagen. It had been through many histories, wars and technologies era. We have seen the emerging of many brands such as Toyota, Honda, Ferrari, and many more.
So how do we define an energy efficient car or vehicle? The answer is in the term called Fuel Efficiency. Fuel efficiency is a form of thermal efficiency, meaning the efficiency of a process that converts chemical potential energy contained in a carrier fuel into kinetic energy or work. Overall fuel efficiency may vary per device, which in turn may vary per application fuel efficiency, especially fossil fuel power plants or industries dealing with combustion, such as ammonia production during the Haber process.
In the context of transport, fuel economy is the energy efficiency of a particular vehicle, given as a ratio of distance traveled per unit of fuel consumed. Fuel economy is expressed in miles per gallon (mpg) in the USA and usually also in the UK (imperial gallon). There is sometimes confusion as the imperial gallon is 20% larger than the US gallon so that mpg values are not directly comparable. In countries using the metric system, fuel economy is stated in kilometres per litre (km/L) in the Netherlands, Denmark and in several Latin American or Asian countries such as India, Japan, South Korea, or as the reciprocal ratio, "fuel consumption" in liters per 100 kilometers (L/100 km) in much of Europe, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. Litres per mil are used in Norway and Sweden.
Fuel consumption is a more accurate measure of a vehicle’s performance because it is a linear relationship while fuel economy leads to distortions in efficiency improvements. Weight-specific efficiency (efficiency per unit weight) may be stated for freight, and passenger-specific efficiency (vehicle efficiency per passenger).
Fuel efficiency is dependent on many parameters of a vehicle, including its engine parameters, aerodynamic drag, weight, and rolling resistance. There have been advances in all areas of vehicle design in recent decades.
Hybrid vehicles use two or more power sources for propulsion. In many designs, a small combustion engine is combined with electric motors. Kinetic energy which would otherwise be lost to heat during braking is recaptured as electrical power to improve fuel efficiency. Engines automatically shut off when vehicles come to a stop and start again when the accelerator is pressed preventing wasted energy from idling.
Design
Cars are the primary mode of transport with most
households having at least one. The current generation of cars emit greenhouse
gases, which contribute to climate change. For every litre of petrol used in a
motor vehicle, 2.3 kilograms of carbon dioxide (CO2) is released from the
exhaust. The new breed of efficient cars and hybrids are increasing fuel
efficiency by significant margins and with electric cars emerging onto the
market, we have cars with zero net carbon emissions.
As one of the major investments for most families, car
efficiency also means lower running costs, better insurance rates and even
green loans. The efficiency of the vehicle (design, engine, weight, etc)
determines the fuel consumption and the amount of greenhouse gases and airborne
pollution released per kilometre, so there are many factors to consider when
aiming to reduce the emissions you create. Here we shall take a look into two types of energy efficient car: Hybrid and Electrical
Hybrid - A vehicle is a hybrid if it utilizes more than one form of onboard energy to achieve propulsion. In practice, that means a hybrid will have a traditional internal-combustion engine and a fuel tank, as well as one or more electric motors and a battery pack. Hybrid cars are sometimes mistakenly confused with electric vehicles. Hybrids are most often gasoline-burning machines that utilize their electric bits to collect and reuse energy that normally goes to waste in standard cars. Theoretically, diesel-electric hybrids would be even more fuel-efficient, but hybrid systems and diesel engines both represent extra cost. So far, installing both in the same vehicle has proven to be prohibitively expensive.
Electric - also known as electric vehicle or EV, it uses energy stored in its rechargeable batteries, which are recharged by common household electricity. An electric car is powered exclusively by electricity. Historically, EVs have not been widely adopted because of limited driving range before needing to be recharged, long recharging times, and a lack of commitment by automakers to produce and market electric cars that have all the creature comforts of gas-powered cars. That has changed. As battery technology improved, simultaneously increasing energy storage and reducing cost, major automakers introduced a new generation of electric cars.
The Good, The Bad & The Not-So Ugly
With all the technology that is getting improved by the seconds, we all know that they bring more benefits than harm to the environment and living beings. However, we still need to know what is the upside and downside of using an energy efficient vehicle and it can be depicted in the table below:
Prices vs Saving
Who doesn’t want clean air, clean water, a comfortable climate and a healthy environment for today and for future generations? Although most folks agree that hybrid and electric cars contribute to all of these society blessings, if they also save us money, they’ll grab a bigger share of the market.
Each person’s green car payback will be different. The comparisons are based on an average of 15,000 miles (1 mile = 1.6 km) driven annually, with 45 percent of that on highways and 55 percent within cities. If you drive more than that in the city, you could stand to save a ton of dough by driving a hybrid or all-electric car. Stop-and-go driving and relatively slower speeds require less energy from the cars’ batteries, maximizing the already stellar energy efficiency of electric drive.
If you drive more than 15,000 miles a year (that’s about 1,250 monthly, 312 weekly or 45 daily), you’ll definitely break even sooner. Gas prices are volatile and it’s difficult to predict their roller coaster rides. But there can be no disputing that the faster gas prices rise and the higher they go, the more you’ll save. Below is a simple worksheet devised to help you calculate your own potential payback period with whichever vehicles you’d like to consider and whatever gas price you want to input. (See How to Calculate Your Own Green Car Payback). The calculations and worksheet consider only prices and gas mileage, but you should also look at the cost or savings associated with insurance, maintenance and local incentives.
The Verdict
Saving money doesn’t have to be the only determining factor when it’s time to buy a new car. People consider comfort, safety, performance, capacity, reliability, resale value, style, color and even whether a car has an iPhone dock. The bottom line is how well does a particular vehicle meet your particular needs and desires? The decision comes down to cost versus value: How much are you willing to pay for the features you want to get? What about the early adopters of the personal computer, Palm Pilot or iPad? They probably hoped those devices would serve their needs, but we’ll bet they didn’t expect those gadgets to pay for themselves. Many consumers simply enjoy the ability to invest in technologies they value.
Greener cars have been proven to be well made, durable and long-lasting and to save their owners thousands of dollars. Depending on the price of gas and what you want or need out of a good set of wheels, you may have to wait a few or even many years to realize your savings. How long will you have to wait? When it comes to green car payback, it all depends. But as they say: Patience is a virtue.
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