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Killing the Electric Car
by Andrew McCaskey
Slashdot Review Podcast
I hate to spoil the party and a good film at the same time, but I have a posting linked on the site that you might find interesting, given the launch of the new movie “Who Killed the Electric Car” . The movie concerns the GM EV1, produced in very limited quantities and leased to customers in California in the late 1990′s. These cars had “no trouble accelerating and keeping up in California traffic, and once they went from lead-acid to NiMH Nickel Metal Hydride batteries, the range between charging was 130 miles. The movie examines who and why the cars were bought up and sent to the crusher.
It’s from Doug Wickstrom and he adds a few inconvenient truths of his own to the story. It seems he was in the R&D section at Hughes where the car was produced. Among the claims in his posting he says that the “The range of 130 miles is bogus. None of them ever achieved that under normal driving conditions. Running the air conditioning or heater could halve that range. Even running the headlights reduced it by 10%.”
Servicing had to be done by technicians from Hughes, since the battery packs packed some pretty high voltages and the liability of a shadetree mechanic getting fried was significant. He continues, saying that “General Motors lost two billion dollars on the project, and lostmoney on every single EV1 produced. NiMH batteries that had lasted up to three years in testing were failing after six months in service. There was no way to keep them from overheating without doubling the size of the battery pack. Lead-acid batteries were superior to NiMH in actual daily use.
The leases didn’t even cover the costs of servicing them.” Futhermore, “Lessees were complaining that their electric bills had increased to the point that they’d rather be using gasoline.”
It is just so inconvenient that the physics and chemistry get in the way of a good story. I find it distressing that my belief in a free lunch is destroyed yet one more time.
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