How the Chevy Volt Could Get 100mpg
November 23, 2008 · Print This Article
GM vice chairman Bob Lutz boldly proclaimed at the 2007 Detroit auto show that the new Chevy Volt would get up to 150mpg based on a variety of driving conditions. Now that the model is headed for production, Lutz’s claim will have to stand up to government-approved ratings. The process of deciding exactly how to rate a new generation of hybrid-powered cars is still being worked out.
From The New York Times:
Often criticized as the killer of kilowatt cars, G.M. is now the champion of their revival. The Volt, which the company plans to begin selling in November 2010, should easily double the fuel economy rating of today’s mileage hero, the Toyota Prius. The Prius, which carries a 46 m.p.g. rating in combined city and highway driving, is a conventional hybrid that uses modest amounts of electricity to minimize the fuel consumed by its gasoline engine.
The Volt takes the opposite approach, relying mainly on electric power, with its gasoline engine running only when needed to stretch the driving range. The 100 m.p.g. automobile, which once seemed an impossible dream, will become an official E.P.A.-rated reality with the Volt’s arrival.
G.M. calls the car an extended-range electric vehicle, or E-REV. For the first 40 miles after leaving home with a fully charged battery, the Volt will consume no gas at all, according to G.M.; when the gas engine does fire up, it will only drive a generator — the engine is not connected to the wheels. Owners will recharge the battery overnight from a wall socket, which brings the Volt into the category of plug-in hybrids.
Since the Volt does consume gas on trips longer than 40 miles, it’ll have to have a guide to gas consumption on the window sticker. But it will be hard to determine a meaningful mileage rating on a car capable of going through the government test cycle without using any gas at all. The New York Times called the EPA’s task of helping automakers determine these mileage figures as “a job only slightly less daunting than weather forecasting.”
The way the EPA calculates these numbers has changed a bit lately to reflect compensating factors. A good example is the Tesla Roadster, which never consumes petroleum while driving. Its EPA-required window sticker lists the energy consumed in kilowatt-hours of electricity, which are 32kwh per 100 miles in town and 33 on the highway. Translated to the more familiar miles per gallon using a textbook conversion factor, you get 105 mpg city and 102 highway. But use the adjustment factor devised by the Energy Department, which takes factors like scarcity of fuel and production and distribution efficiency into account, and you get a staggering 256mpg city and 249 highway.
So, it will be interesting to see just how far over 100mpg the Chevy Volt actually ends up getting. GM hopes to separate the Volt from ordinary hybrids, defining its mileage in a new way. We’ll find out when it debuts next year!
Link [The New York Times]
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I agree the positive side to electric vehicles is lower emissions.
But what about the law of unintended consequences?
If I drive 40 miles a day and recharge at night how much will my electric bill go up? Since in California they charge sales tax on gasoline they will have to start charging sales tax on electricity. Likewise for the feds. They are going to need their highway taxes. So who can explain the cost benefit to going electric.
Today a service station owner might sell an average of 12 gallons of gas per transaction, if that drops to 5 gallons he will either have to charge a lot more for gas or go out of business. If he does you may need the 40 miles to find a service station to buy your 5 gallons of gas. So if the service station owner goes out of business he can get another business, recycling batteries maybe. I would bet that the auto makers will have a lock on that business. This also means that the generation it will take to turnover the domestic fleet the older cars will be paying through the nose for fuel. The greens will say “good, an incentive to buy an electric vehicle.” The poor will say “I can’t afford to buy one.”
In my opinion this will only work if electricity can be generated extremely cheaply, cleanly and quickly. The greens will say “Not so fast we need to study the environment for the next 10 years.”
I am sure that I am not the only person thinking about this but I have zero confidence in Washington. They never think beyond the next election.
Unless they fast track the building of alternative fule power plants in parallel with electric car development it is doomed to failure.
(Lots of negativity in that previous post.)
I feel really positive about this. This is truly an amazing car that could use the usual supply+demand dynamics for great purposes — which are ignored by the previous post.