ozgood writes in to let us know about Toshiba's announcement that it has developed a new type of rechargeable battery dubbed the Super Charge ion Battery, or SCiB. Toshiba claims the new battery will mainly target the industrial market, though they hint the technology may eventually find a home in electric vehicles. The SCiB can recharge to 90% of total capacity in under five minutes, and has a life span of over 10 years. "Toshiba also says the battery has excellent safety with the new negative electrode material having a high level of thermal stability and a high flash point. The battery is also said to be structurally resistant to internal short-circuiting and thermal runaway."
Awesome, I would get one of these. I hate sitting in an airport recharging my laptop battery for eons at a time. 10 minutes to get 90% of the charge back eh? I want one now!::jumps up and down::... Now if only my cell phone could do this too... and my Digital camera, and camcorder too... I like how they point out that it has more safety features too. Although, I am wondering if we will still see these batteries exploding at the most inopportune time... like a presentation on how awesome it is...?
by Anonymous Coward
on Thursday December 13 2007, @12:48PM (#21685909)
good luck lugging around the power cord you'll need to charge these things
it won't be that small travel charger and 5A cord
these things will need power cords roughly the size of the ones you use to connect to a generator or dryer (100A+) to move that many joules of energy that quickly without melting the cord itself. And the AC/DC transformer won't be a little travel wart either.
God, if the laptops from Sony and Apple were blowing up and melting because of defective batteries, imagine a "Super Charge" Battery malfunctioning and melting your ass to the chair!
So the random laptop battery I have handy is rated 10.8V, 4.8Ah -- 52Wh. 5 minutes for 80% charge (from 10% to 90%, you're unlikely to let it go all the way to zero) is just shy of 500 watts. Your average wall outlet is easily capable of that (12A at 115V is a nice, conservative estimate). The power brick to handle that won't be huge -- think about a 500W computer power supply, and then remember that this will be noticeably smaller and more efficient because it only has to provide one output voltage instead of the mess your average computer wants. It'll need some cooling (even at a mildly aggressive but reasonable 95% efficiency, that's 25W of waste heat), but the fan will still be reasonable.
At first glance it would appear that the cable from power brick to laptop would be huge and awkward, but that can be solved fairly easily by having the connection be more like a docking station cradle. That would also let the charger supply additional airflow for the battery with a larger fan that you'd find on the laptop itself -- the battery will get rather warm during this process, and battery heating is probably one of the limiting factors on charge rates for something like this.
TFA says it can take 50 amps. It is a lithium cell, therefore 3.6 volts.
That is 1.6 amps at 120volts. Not a big deal (and yes, I didn't account for conversion losses so say 2 amps max at 120v). Now this is for your cell phone or PDA.
So, while your wall wart will grow some and will probably end up close to the unit being charged instead of being plugged into the wall, the power cord is fine and you won't be blowing any house breakers.
Now for your laptop at 20volts which is 5 or 6 cells, you will need 8.8 amps at 120v so say 10 amps total. Still not a deal breaker but you may need 18 ga wire in the power supply to wall connection instead of 20 or 22 ga. The thing that gets big here is the wire ga to the unit itself. Now THAT could be a problem so we will probably not see a full 50 amps into the unit itself. The physical space for the leads inside the cell phone, computer, etc, get a bit large.
It's not lithium - according to the Toshiba Press Release [toshiba.co.jp], they completely changed almost every substance in the battery. They also say it has a nominal cell voltage of 2.4V.
I'd think anytime that you have an unscheduled explosion would be the most inopportune time.
Well, some times are more inopportune than others.
Having the battery explode while the computer is sitting on a desk and you're having a beer watching the game is inopportune. Having the battery explode while you're working on the computer and it's in your lap, that's most inopportune.
ROFL... who can actually PUT a laptop on their lap nowadays? I can cook eggs on my laptop most of the time. An explosion might make my lobster red legs feel better, hey ya never know?
Do you have a P4 based laptop or something, or are you running Linux with no power management and doing compiles? Most of my laptops draw 45W peak and the majority of that is for the LCD backlight, the CPU doesn't draw enough power to heat much of anything.
The L model Core2Duo processors max at 17W so I guess if you have it and a mobile GPU maxed you would draw about 30W. That's still not enough to cook your lap =)
My cell phone charges at 1A at 5V - that's a fairly hefty load for a cheap, minuscule wall wart. To get it to recharge in 10 min would take - well - anyone care to lug around a 12-gauge extension cord to deliver the 10A it would take to deliver that much power? Alternatively, you could make your power cord really short - build the charger to plug directly into the wall without a cord. But it would still be big.
What next - I'll be asking for a 408V 1000A 3-phase industrial drop to recharge my electric car in
Bah, this is nothing. EEStor's EESU [freepatentsonline.com] ultracapcitor prototype gets charge times like this, a leakage rate of 0.1% per month, virtually no degradation over time, and has over twice the energy density of the best lithium-ion batteries on the market, with half the cost of lead-acid. The science behind it is sound (a lot of these titanates have crazy permittivity from the perspective of individual crystals, and if you can eliminate the voids traditionally left by sintering, as they appear to have done, it can't arc discharge through them when you make bulk ceramics). The economics looks sound, too (nickel electrodes aren't that expensive, nor is anything needed to produce barium titanate). The only real question is whether they can actually commercialize them rather than just make and operate them in the lab (the typical sticking factor). Their mass production facility has hit its milestone for barium titanate purity, as tested by an outside lab, but they haven't yet hit their mass produced ceramic permittivity testing milestone. The company is abnormally tight-lipped; both scammers and legit companies are typically shouting about how great they are in order to get more money, but EEStor is being so quiet that the only way you can generally get info about what's going on is to talk to the company that gets their first units, ZENN Motors.
Either way, here's to hoping.:) Something like that would basically change the world. Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Beyers (the main funders, a major investment firm famous for early buys on tech companies that made it big -- Amazon.com, AOL, Compaq, Electronic Arts, Google, Intuit, Macromedia, Netscape, Sun, etc) calls it their "highest risk, highest reward" investment. Its a shame that ZENN has the initial exclusive rights to their capacitors for electric vehicles; I find ZENN's vehicles to be the ugliest, least interesting electrics being put on the market.
The biggest bonus to plugin hybrids, though, is probably the efficient use of the power grid - people will tend charge their cars at night, when the load on the electrical grid is lowest.
No, they'll come home from work and plug in immediately, when the load on the electrical grid is highest (at least during the summer)
If you factor in oil company subsidies, cost to clean up pollution, impact of the oil industry on the areas in which oil is pumped, oil spills, etc... gas probably SHOULD cost $10 a gallon, but we're only charging ourselves 1/3 as much and leaving the rest of the costs to our children in the form of a damaged planet and unstable political world. That being said, not destroying our planet is starting to matter to a larger number of people who are willing to take on the extra cost. I know I'd pay disproportio
More critically, how clean does the charging voltage have to be?
Suppose my 45 WHr laptop battery could be charged in ten minutes. That's 240W -- say 500W, to account for conversion inefficiencies. The power cord to your hair dryer carries four times this much. That, in itself, isn't the problem.
The problem is, how much processing do we have to do to mains power to feed it in?
TFA says "The SCiB batteries can recharge with as much as 50 amperes of current", which puts a limit on how fast you can charge it. If the capacity is, say, 10 Ah, then you would need 120 A current to charge it in five minutes.
Presumably, the battery cells of say, a car, could be charged in parallel. So let's say that a recharge takes about 15-20 minutes. Seems that the "pumping station" of the future would take the Convenience Stores of today to their logical conclusion.
Instead of a few pumps, you see a small parking lot. You pull into a space and hook up the charger. Then you go inside and get a meal, some coffee for the road, or just make a pitstop. You then go to the counter to check if the charge is complete and pay for the electricity you used. Go back out to your car, disconnect the charger, and you're ready to hit the road again.
Automotive companies have repeatedly stated that in order to "meet expectations" a car needs to travel roughly 300 miles per "fueling" and the "fueling" needs to take 5-10 minutes at most.
I think you hit the nail on the head - if they can get a charge down to under 10 minutes and the range up to 200+ miles, it will be quite popular.
Personally, I'd like to see some sort of inductive charger for batteries like this that I can use for a laptop. Rather than cabling everything up, you just rest your laptop on the mat within range for 10 minutes, and you're good to go.
Personally, I'd like to see some sort of inductive charger for batteries like this that I can use for a laptop. Rather than cabling everything up, you just rest your laptop on the mat within range for 10 minutes, and you're good to go.
Now things are getting interesting, with that suggestion. Take it a step further - why not embed these inductive chargers (in cities) right into traffic intersections? Give yourself a boost while you're waiting on the red. If anything, it could be used for everything from c
True for a conventional system, but it's also for a power source involving a highly flammable, even explosive, liquid that requires at least a little attention during fueling, as well as large tanks to hold it(unless you want to deal with long pipes). A cassettes/VHS tape at least used to have advantages over CD/DVDs, but CD/DVDs won despite being different.
For example, people might only be willing to wait 5-10 minutes while gassing up their car, but that's partially because it's their primary activity durin
"You then go to the counter to check if the charge is complete and pay for the electricity you used."
As long as you're setting things up from scratch, why not go a step further and put some sort of RFID system/sensor into the car/charger. Just stop anywhere, plug in your car, and electricity is automatically billed to your account.
If this type of technology were to really take off, it would quickly obsolete the need for traditional gas stations. Virtually any business that requires at least 5-10 minutes of your time and has their own parking could install charging meters. Assuming these batteries don't easily take on a memory for partial charging, widespread use of charging stations could mean you top off every time you park your vehicle if you want.
Parking garages, parking meters, grocery stores, malls, etc.
Besides long trips, I
The article makes reference to amperage, but without voltage that value is basically meaningless. Now if they were talking wattage then we would know exactly how much power these batteries produce (and consume during charging).
Whatever voltage the batteries naturally operate at is going to be close to the charging voltage. Besides, you can always do a worst case estimation. Suppose they charge at 20 volts, which would be insanely high. 50 amps * 20 volts = 1000 watts. Beefy for sure, but that's an overestimate. A residential circuit can handle 1000 watts no problem. The actual value will be less than that.
I would think one of the first uses for this type of thing would be for contractor grade cordless powertools. With current battery tech any heavily used battery lasts less than 2 years with the kind of abuse construction guys give em. Of course you're going to need one heck of an extra alternator to charge em that quickly, more likely a separate generator.
Disclaimer: IAAEVE (I am an electric vehicle engineer), so my analysis is biased toward vehicle applications.
According to the specs on their own website [toshiba.co.jp], the energy density for their modules is about 50 watthours per kilogram (24V * 4.2Ah / 2.0kg). At 50 Wh/kg they're barely competing with lead-acid batteries, and competing quite poorly with Nickel-metal batteries, which are near 100 Wh/kg and have proven safety and durability in vehicle applications.
Modern Li-ion cells (the ones that aren't even remotely pushing the safety envelope) are over 200 Wh/kg.
Where do your numbers come from? Last I heard, NiMH is limited chemically to around 75 Wh / kg at the cell level - the Prius module is closer to 45 from what I recall.
I don't know anything about the Prius battery (or other hybrid batteries); sorry. I'm referring to larger traction batteries that we've installed in high-performance EVs.
State of the art Li-ion modules [from A123] are getting just over 100 Wh / kg at the moment.
A123 cells may be state of the art, and they do indeed appear to have high power d
Clearly you're not an EV driver -- these logical mistakes are common. Allow me to clear them up. The energy density may be poor, but the fast recharge time may make up for it.
Nope, it won't. The recharge happens while you're doing other things -- like sleeping -- so the time savings are not worth trading 3/4ths of your range. 5-minute charging is also totally unrealistic -- see below.
Let's assume a pure EV using these batteries got a range of 150 miles, which is pretty lousy by most standards. The average
I calculated the energy density from Toshiba's specs for a module containing multiple cells plus some charging electronics. This works out to about twice the figure for a deep-cycle lead-acid car battery.
Ok, over and over again I see the same nonsense. "Lithium batteries burn because they contain lots of energy".
If this was the case a discharged battery would be safe, yet it contains just as much lithium as when it was charged, meaning it is still a fire hazard. The problem with lithium ion batteries is NOT their electrical energy density, it is the low activation energy of the chemicals they are made of.
To really put this in perspective, your cutlery and pots all contain A LOT of chemical potential energy. Burning iron in air releases vast quantities of it. Of course, because steel has a very good heat conductivity, and as the activation energy is high, you can't really set a piece of steel on fire at normal temperatures. If, on the other hand, you were to grind that iron into a fine powder, then you better make sure not to bring it close to sources of ignition as it will explode into a fireball.
Similarly, iron oxide doesn't burn in air because it is already oxidised, but if you mix it with aluminium powder, a strong reducing agent, then you got a Thermite mix which will burn at such a high temperature that it is little you can do but wait until it has completed. Even choking it doesn't work since it contains its own oxidiser.
The reason lithium ion batteries can catch fire is simply that lithium is easy to ignite. If the energy recoverable from a battery was directly related to how strongly it burns, then you would most certainly see batteries made from titanium or aluminium, and not lithium ( which releases a lot less energy when combusted than does many other metals ).
Except that Lithium Ion batteries don't actually contain metallic lithium. They contain lithium ions -- ie, the lithium is already oxidized. That's true for both the charged and discharged state. Some other metal (cobalt traditionally, I think iron and a couple others are used in newer experimental chemistries) is being oxidized and reduced. Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] has more about the relevant electrochemistry.
Non-rechargable lithium cells (most 3V coin type cells) have metallic lithium. The rechargable chemistries
I think what would make these super for cars is that they would appear able to handle any regenerative braking load placed on them. I don't believe you can say that about the current cells in use.
What about storage density?? That's the big question.
Storage density is not as relevant, when you can recharge in 5 minutes.
If you're traveling somewhere you won't be able to recharge, then use an older, higher capacity battery. Otherwise, who cares if you're recharging every 2 hours (or whatever) if it only takes 5 minutes to do so?
But the PP point is that these are going to be applied to hybrid vehicles. It would do us no good to have to stop every 2 hours of driving to charge for 5 mins. Your case works well for conventional Li-on battery uses. Their point is about proposed rapid charging for future uses. In their case, yeah, storage makes a large difference
It doesn't work that way; cars are limited by weight and space considerations. If it matches current Li-ion batteries, the max range will probably be 150-200 miles.
On long cross country trips, my partner and I switch drivers every two hours or so. And usually take the time to open up a new juice box or water, etc. Doesn't sound that inconvenient to me. And let's do some math, shall we? Gasoline prices of $3/gal, with a car that gets 30 mpg (average consumer vehicle on the road is just under 20, thanks to old cars, SUVs, RVs, guzzling pickups, etc). That's ten cents per mile. An electric car with a range of 175mi that gets about 150Wh/mi (about average for the crop
Hmm, what kind of device are you using that puts batteries next to your crotch?...
WAIT A MINUTE!
Boys, we have a woman posted among us! Oh, dear Slashdot...
awesome! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:awesome! (Score:5, Insightful)
it won't be that small travel charger and 5A cord
these things will need power cords roughly the size of the ones you use to connect to a generator or dryer (100A+) to move that many joules of energy that quickly without melting the cord itself. And the AC/DC transformer won't be a little travel wart either.
in other words, don't hold your breath
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:awesome! (Score:5, Insightful)
So the random laptop battery I have handy is rated 10.8V, 4.8Ah -- 52Wh. 5 minutes for 80% charge (from 10% to 90%, you're unlikely to let it go all the way to zero) is just shy of 500 watts. Your average wall outlet is easily capable of that (12A at 115V is a nice, conservative estimate). The power brick to handle that won't be huge -- think about a 500W computer power supply, and then remember that this will be noticeably smaller and more efficient because it only has to provide one output voltage instead of the mess your average computer wants. It'll need some cooling (even at a mildly aggressive but reasonable 95% efficiency, that's 25W of waste heat), but the fan will still be reasonable.
At first glance it would appear that the cable from power brick to laptop would be huge and awkward, but that can be solved fairly easily by having the connection be more like a docking station cradle. That would also let the charger supply additional airflow for the battery with a larger fan that you'd find on the laptop itself -- the battery will get rather warm during this process, and battery heating is probably one of the limiting factors on charge rates for something like this.
Parent
Re:awesome! (Score:4, Informative)
TFA says it can take 50 amps. It is a lithium cell, therefore 3.6 volts.
That is 1.6 amps at 120volts. Not a big deal (and yes, I didn't account for conversion losses so say 2 amps max at 120v). Now this is for your cell phone or PDA.
So, while your wall wart will grow some and will probably end up close to the unit being charged instead of being plugged into the wall, the power cord is fine and you won't be blowing any house breakers.
Now for your laptop at 20volts which is 5 or 6 cells, you will need 8.8 amps at 120v so say 10 amps total. Still not a deal breaker but you may need 18 ga wire in the power supply to wall connection instead of 20 or 22 ga. The thing that gets big here is the wire ga to the unit itself. Now THAT could be a problem so we will probably not see a full 50 amps into the unit itself. The physical space for the leads inside the cell phone, computer, etc, get a bit large.
Parent
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Re:awesome! (Score:5, Funny)
I can't ever imagine myself saying "I think I'll have a beer, watch the game, and let the battery in my computer blow up."
Parent
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Well, some times are more inopportune than others.
Having the battery explode while the computer is sitting on a desk and you're having a beer watching the game is inopportune. Having the battery explode while you're working on the computer and it's in your lap, that's most inopportune.
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Re:awesome! (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
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Re:awesome! (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
So they have 220V 20A "dryer" outlets in airports? (Score:2)
Alternatively, you could make your power cord really short - build the charger to plug directly into the wall without a cord. But it would still be big.
What next - I'll be asking for a 408V 1000A 3-phase industrial drop to recharge my electric car in
Re:awesome! (Score:4, Interesting)
Either way, here's to hoping.
Parent
Super charge (Score:2)
Another article on SCiB (Score:4, Informative)
According to this article, hybrid cars will be the first use for these batteries.
As long as the energy density is comparable to current Lithium-ion batteries, then this will be some pretty cool tech.
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No, they'll come home from work and plug in immediately, when the load on the electrical grid is highest (at least during the summer)
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That being said, not destroying our planet is starting to matter to a larger number of people who are willing to take on the extra cost. I know I'd pay disproportio
How exactly do you get that much power IN? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Suppose my 45 WHr laptop battery could be charged in ten minutes. That's 240W -- say 500W, to account for conversion inefficiencies. The power cord to your hair dryer carries four times this much. That, in itself, isn't the problem.
The problem is, how much processing do we have to do to mains power to feed it in?
Problem: top current (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Problem: top current (Score:5, Interesting)
Instead of a few pumps, you see a small parking lot. You pull into a space and hook up the charger. Then you go inside and get a meal, some coffee for the road, or just make a pitstop. You then go to the counter to check if the charge is complete and pay for the electricity you used. Go back out to your car, disconnect the charger, and you're ready to hit the road again.
Parent
Re:Problem: top current (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you hit the nail on the head - if they can get a charge down to under 10 minutes and the range up to 200+ miles, it will be quite popular.
Personally, I'd like to see some sort of inductive charger for batteries like this that I can use for a laptop. Rather than cabling everything up, you just rest your laptop on the mat within range for 10 minutes, and you're good to go.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Now things are getting interesting, with that suggestion. Take it a step further - why not embed these inductive chargers (in cities) right into traffic intersections? Give yourself a boost while you're waiting on the red. If anything, it could be used for everything from c
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
A cassettes/VHS tape at least used to have advantages over CD/DVDs, but CD/DVDs won despite being different.
For example, people might only be willing to wait 5-10 minutes while gassing up their car, but that's partially because it's their primary activity durin
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
As long as you're setting things up from scratch, why not go a step further and put some sort of RFID system/sensor into the car/charger. Just stop anywhere, plug in your car, and electricity is automatically billed to your account.
Gas stations obselete? (Score:3, Insightful)
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Amps without volts (Score:5, Informative)
Dan East
Re:Amps without volts (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
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Re:Amps without volts (Score:4, Informative)
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Cordless contractor equipment (Score:3, Interesting)
Poor energy density (Score:5, Insightful)
According to the specs on their own website [toshiba.co.jp], the energy density for their modules is about 50 watthours per kilogram (24V * 4.2Ah / 2.0kg). At 50 Wh/kg they're barely competing with lead-acid batteries, and competing quite poorly with Nickel-metal batteries, which are near 100 Wh/kg and have proven safety and durability in vehicle applications.
Modern Li-ion cells (the ones that aren't even remotely pushing the safety envelope) are over 200 Wh/kg.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I don't know anything about the Prius battery (or other hybrid batteries); sorry. I'm referring to larger traction batteries that we've installed in high-performance EVs.
State of the art Li-ion modules [from A123] are getting just over 100 Wh / kg at the moment.
A123 cells may be state of the art, and they do indeed appear to have high power d
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The energy density may be poor, but the fast recharge time may make up for it.
Nope, it won't. The recharge happens while you're doing other things -- like sleeping -- so the time savings are not worth trading 3/4ths of your range. 5-minute charging is also totally unrealistic -- see below.
Let's assume a pure EV using these batteries got a range of 150 miles, which is pretty lousy by most standards. The average
Energy Density 180kJ/kg (Score:4, Informative)
Batteriy capacity is NOT why the burn (Score:5, Informative)
If this was the case a discharged battery would be safe, yet it contains just as much lithium as when it was charged, meaning it is still a fire hazard. The problem with lithium ion batteries is NOT their electrical energy density, it is the low activation energy of the chemicals they are made of.
To really put this in perspective, your cutlery and pots all contain A LOT of chemical potential energy. Burning iron in air releases vast quantities of it. Of course, because steel has a very good heat conductivity, and as the activation energy is high, you can't really set a piece of steel on fire at normal temperatures. If, on the other hand, you were to grind that iron into a fine powder, then you better make sure not to bring it close to sources of ignition as it will explode into a fireball.
Similarly, iron oxide doesn't burn in air because it is already oxidised, but if you mix it with aluminium powder, a strong reducing agent, then you got a Thermite mix which will burn at such a high temperature that it is little you can do but wait until it has completed. Even choking it doesn't work since it contains its own oxidiser.
The reason lithium ion batteries can catch fire is simply that lithium is easy to ignite. If the energy recoverable from a battery was directly related to how strongly it burns, then you would most certainly see batteries made from titanium or aluminium, and not lithium ( which releases a lot less energy when combusted than does many other metals ).
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Except that Lithium Ion batteries don't actually contain metallic lithium. They contain lithium ions -- ie, the lithium is already oxidized. That's true for both the charged and discharged state. Some other metal (cobalt traditionally, I think iron and a couple others are used in newer experimental chemistries) is being oxidized and reduced. Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] has more about the relevant electrochemistry.
Non-rechargable lithium cells (most 3V coin type cells) have metallic lithium. The rechargable chemistries
Regenerative Braking (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
What about storage density?? That's the big question.
Storage density is not as relevant, when you can recharge in 5 minutes.
If you're traveling somewhere you won't be able to recharge, then use an older, higher capacity battery. Otherwise, who cares if you're recharging every 2 hours (or whatever) if it only takes 5 minutes to do so?
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Re:Storage Density?? (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
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And let's do some math, shall we? Gasoline prices of $3/gal, with a car that gets 30 mpg (average consumer vehicle on the road is just under 20, thanks to old cars, SUVs, RVs, guzzling pickups, etc). That's ten cents per mile. An electric car with a range of 175mi that gets about 150Wh/mi (about average for the crop
Re:Reassuring to know... (Score:4, Funny)
WAIT A MINUTE!
Boys, we have a woman posted among us! Oh, dear Slashdot...
Parent