There’s a wave of fear overtaking the motoring and motorsport community. It’s emanating out of the technology labs of Japan  , a workshop in Silicon Valley and the world’s universities.

It’s the electric revolution. While I for one welcome our new electron powered overlords, others do not.

The daily commuters and the round town brigade might be hard to please. What happens when you get stuck sans electrons and you are in a hurry?

What about the issue of Australian coal- and brown coal in particular. As warm n’ fuzzy as an electric car may be, the electricity needs to come from base load. This means that while solar and wind power are nice, they won’t suffice. So we’ll burn carbon in coal powered power stations to get you on the road. Your carbon will be emitted in the country, not the city.

The performance car set are aghast. They contend that nothing can replace the guttural roar of a V8 or the amplified anger of a Formula One car. It’s going to be tough to promote electric cars as the pinnacle of motor sport when they are so god awful slow and near silent..?

Ok. Let’s go through the issues and see if we can answer these critical points.

Around town
For the commuter, the electric car will be a boon. When stuck in traffic they will go into a kind of standby mode- running aircon and radio and conserving power. (The new Prius already uses a solar panel to cool the cabin in your car while you are absent) When you brake, they will charge the battery (the hybrids all do this already). When you park, you will be able to get a power top up. You might even be able to quickly change your battery like a Swap n Go gas bottle.

A recharge that will carry you about 350 kms will cost about $5. That’s pretty easy to justify. But the coal issue does need to be addressed. If we can invent a cleaner way to burn coal, then we may just have a solution until a [Mr Fusion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeLorean_time_machine#Mr._Fusion]  is commercially available.

The Batteries
Batteries are improving, but at a slower rate than electric motor and electronic motor control systems.  A few years ago, mobile phones peaked in terms of standby times. This was not due to the battery, but rather due to working out how to get the phone to consume less power. Then smart phones came along, up went the demands on the battery and so you’re hard pressed to get a full day out of a modern phone.

Perhaps the lithium sulphur battery will replace the lithium ion, being “a battery that lasts four times as long as its lithium-ion counterparts  while also having the benefit of being "significantly safer" than today's batteries which occasionally explode after short-circuiting. “

No matter what form it takes, battery research and development will in all likelihood directly address the longevity and environment concerns to ensure that the electric car in the 21st century becomes as ubiquitous as the petrol powered car was in the 20th century.

Performance.
Electric motors have incredible torque.  Torque, broadly speaking, is the motor’s ability to impose its will no matter what the RPMs. In an electric vehicle maximum torque is achieved at zero RPM- you simply hit the switch and you get maximum torque immediately. A car has to build up to maximum torque.

The pro stock Killacycle does 0-100km/h in under a second. Check this out:




The quarter mile in 7.68 at 168 mph (270km/h)? That is faster than a Formula One car can do it. Traction control will be more precise in an electric vehicle (and harder to ban in racing) so cars may be even faster once electric. At present the F1s still seek power from hydrocarbons, so the development of the petrol engine is ongoing. But what if the huge budgets of the F1 paddock were turned to the development of an electric motor, gearbox and complimentary chassis? They could easily lap at the same speed they currently do.

Hopefully for the first time in a while, we will see a trickledown effect from F1 to the home garage.

The Sound
And here’s where electric loses. The buzz and whine of an electric motor is as sexy as nails down a blackboard. Pedestrians (the ones not already wearing ear buds) will find themselves having to look and not just listen for a car. Cities might become blissful, quiet places to be…
But by God the racing will be odd. Blokes at a race event being able to converse politely as the cars silently pass by? That will never do.
 
Tesla Roadster. Image courtesy of Jurvetson