Ford Gets Smart with Battery Charging Technology

Earlier this week, Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F) unveiled its new smart charging system for its up-coming all electric and electric hybrid vehicles - a battery electric Transit Connect commercial van in 2010, a battery electric Focus compact car in 2011, and a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle and next-generation hybrid electric vehicle in 2012.

The smart charging system, allows for communication between the vehicle and the electric grid for optimal recharging. Owners can set parameters such as charge duration and utility rate in order to maximize charging during off-peak energy hours or even during hours when the grid is using renewable energy.

When plugged in, the battery systems of these specially equipped plug-in hybrids communicate directly with the electrical grid via smart meters provided by utility companies through wireless networking. The owner uses the vehicle’s touch screen navigation interface and an in-dash computer to choose when the vehicle should recharge, for how long and at what utility rate.

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“We are designing what plug-in hybrids and battery electric vehicles will be capable of in the future,” said Greg Frenette, manager of Ford’s Battery Electric Vehicle Applications. “Direct communication between vehicles and the grid can only be accomplished through collaboration between automakers and utility companies, which Ford and its partners are demonstrating with this technology.”

http://www.energyboom.com/transportation/ford-gets-smart-battery-charging-technology

Oh I know.

The wall socket, right?

Well, for you, perhaps - if you live in a city that uses nuclear.

For me, a solar array on my roof. I work at home, so my car can charge during the day.

See, that's the cool thing about these cars, you actually do have choice as to where the power comes from.

I will believe it when I see it. The whole smart grid thing is too pie in the sky for me. Just give me a friggin plug in hybrid first and I'll be happy. All you need is a timer in the car so you can select when it charges.

with a mini-turbine manufacturer. My understanding was the turbine would be a source of on-board electricity to power the vehicle requiring a much smaller amount of fossil fuel to drive the turbine than to power an internal combustion standard engine. If I remember correctly they were speculating about 80+ MPG.

Anyone know anything about this?

they could design one that ran at a set speed and that would allow them to design it to be more efficient. I'm excited about seeing where our personal transportation is going to go in these next few years.

It's exciting times I must say

of the vehicle was controlled by the belt driven transmission. The model was a Civic HF or HX something like that. The car never really took off. I'm not sure the fuel savings were that good and the set speed technology was never fully exploited.

the variable speed tranny that that car would be using is an energy hog I would suspect, lots of heat being produced. Where as with a setup where you had for propulsion an electric motor and batteries with regenerative braking it could be way more efficient.

http://www.shelbysupercars.com/news-012209.php


150-200 mile range EV with a 10 minute recharge time, top speed 208 MPH.... cost.....lol, don't ask

The sky is the limit as to what we'll see in the near future. Many will ask who can afford that and to that I say who could make that from scratch and sell it any cheaper than what they'll have too. With sales comes production which makes for less expense to make, in time we'll be all driving EV's in one shape or form, hybrid or not.

replacement of the internal combustion engine. We have designed our society around a transportation system that will be nearly impossible to change in it's basic concept (individual modes of transport). IMO the only obtainable answer in the short term (20 years or so) is to replace todays engines with a type of engine that requires no fossil fuels. No easy thing, both technically and politically as the forces of big oil and their brother corporations will fight any real "threat" with everything they have....and they have a lot. Almost as troubling, our other problems (health care, education, employment, etc) are so overwhelming it's easy for the government to delay action on issues that are deemed to be anything less than an emergency or that they are paid to address by their corporate masters.

While I see these developments as exciting and worthwhile the process (from IC to EV or other propulsion) if left to industry alone will be slow and costly. I would love to see our government turn it's war machine into a whole new venture to find scientific answers to the world's problems and make life on this planet sustainable. Unfortunately with our current capitalistic system that may not be possible. As long as we view working for the common good and programs for the betterment of society as a function of a parasitic government we will have an industrial sector that produces "trinkets" of little value at a very high cost to the planet.

the solution is almost inevitably a simpler system, rather than an even more complex system.

All the regenerative braking hybrid fuel cell vehicle to grid systems in the world won't pry me off my bicycle - when I need to go somewhere I just hop on and ride. When I need to carry something I put it in a bag that goes over my shoulder. When it rains I put a coat on...and so forth. Simple.

internal combustion engine.........ever see "The Matrix"?

It was a complex solution that replaced a variety of simpler modes of transportation - the horse, the bicycle, and walking. The backdrop is that increases in complexity have less to do with efficiency (walking is still the most efficient means of transportation, all inputs and outputs considered) and more to do with the availability of energy. The internal combustion engine and all of the infrastructure and technology it depends on evolved to this point because it was able to harness an extremely abundant source of energy. If the energy source becomes less abundant, you can free up a bit more of it by increasing efficiency and complexity, but that's not by any means a solution.

You can test it by various models and conjectures, but I would say that if there is a decline in net energy available for transportation, the solution will be to simplify our modes of transportation rather than to make them more complex. The future will more likely be a good pair of shoes than ultra-efficient flying cars.

I don't think so.

I do, however, agree with the general proposition you are making.

You can have a basic electric motor with one moving part and just a bit of electronics to regulate, whereas internal combustion engines are inherently complex. The vehicle that motor goes in, however, is another story. Part of my perspective is from working in the automotive repair industry, where the level of technical expertise involved in keeping basic transportation on the road has become absurd, and is getting worse.

I look at it differently, however. It is often said (I think truly) by industry insiders that the largest most complex machine ever devised by humans is our electric grid. Parallel to that we have the system in place to provide energy for transportation. The reaal difference between this system and the grid isn't the level of complexity, but the fact that the grid is integrated into one unit that can accurately be described as "a machine".

From that perspective we are dramatically decreasing complexity by eliminating dependency on liquid fuels.

Additionally, at the local level you describe in your post, is the fact that an ICE propelled auto has over 10,000 parts. I suspect that using the number of parts as a benchmark, there will be both fewer parts and fewer moving parts in an electric drive auto.

In the short term we will be using series hybrids; I suggest they are more complex than current ICEs, but not by much. After all, they don't have transmissions.

All that said, I don't think it addresses your original point at all. You have an affinity for a simpler life where humans don't indulge every whim just because there is cheap energy that allows us to do so.

One of my hobbies, I guess you could call it, is to tackle jobs manually that other people never consider because of the amount of effort.

For example, making a metal knives (one a heavy knife and one a kitchen knife) is an incredible amount of effort for something that costs maybe $5 because of cheap energy.

However, instead of being a precious belonging, the $5 knife is often a meaningless piece of clutter. In a world where I had invested the effort to manually make a couple and they were all I had, their value would be vastly larger. I think that wold be a good thing.

I'm not advocating for a "return" to some past time, btw. But I do think that if I had to pay $5 for an apple it would become something to savor - a real treat because of the human time and effort involved in getting into my hungry hand. I don't think that would be an all bad development.

Frankfurt Preview: Lotus develops a range extender engine

The latest product of Lotus Engineering's ongoing development work on alternative drivetrains is a new engine custom designed for use as a range extender in electric drive vehicles. The engineers at Lotus have developed an optimized architecture using a mono-block layout that combines the cylinder head, exhaust manifold and cylinder block into a single casting. Such an architecture allows for lower weight and reduced cost which is critical to making range extended EVs or series hybrids economically viable.

Because the engine in these applications is primarily designed to provide a flow of electricity to the motor and battery with the battery providing transient power needs, the range extender can be optimized for operation under certain specific conditions. That's exactly what Lotus has done, setting up this engine to generate 20 or 47 hp at 1,500 rpm or 3,500 rpm. The engine only weighs 124 lbs and features a two valve per cylinder configuration with port fuel injection keeping the cost down.

http://green.autoblog.com/2009/09/08/frankfurt-preview-lotus-develops-a-range-extender-engine/

That's whats needed, an engine designed for the job of operating a generator rather than one converted from being designed for another job turning a generator.