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Weekly UpdatesNEW ORLEANS m The Obama administration has a goal of putting one million plug-in hybrid electric vehicles on U.S. roads by 2015.
If that sounds like a lot, it both is and isn't, said Patrick Davis, program manager of the Department of Energy's office of vehicle technology program.
That's a lot because there are "basically zero" out there today. It isn't when one thinks about how many cars and trucks are in use in the nation today--some 240 million, he said. So if the goal is to reduce the dependence on foreign oil, lower greenhouse gas emissions and improve U.S. security by no longer shipping hard currency for oil to unstable regions, then one million won't have a large impact.
"We can't have expectations that it is going to change our energy situation over night," he said.
The Recovery Act will pump $2.7 billion into plug-in hybrid technology, he said. Much of this money will go toward vehicle batteries, the electric drive and other components. If successful, the Defense Department should be able to leverage the Energy Department's work for use in its own vehicles, he said.
"Reaching this goal is difficult," Davis said. "With modeling you can get to one million but a lot of good things have to happen and one of those good things is the availability of battery technology."
It takes about 15 years to introduce a new technology to the automotive market. It's then another 20 years to turn over the existing vehicle population, so it will take almost 30 to 40 years to receive full benefits of introducing plug-in hybrid electric or batteryonly technology into the automotive market.
And that's if the technological hurdles can be overcome. Reducing the cost and increasing the lifespan of the lithium ion batteries that would power the vehicles is the main barrier, he said.
"So we're very excited, but we also feel compelled to swiftly get those contracts in place to build those facilities."
Most lithium ion manufacturers are overseas. This is a critical issue, he said. It would limit the production of hybrid vehicles because the automobile industry would not be the primary customer and it would be at the mercy of the suppliers.
President Obama in March announced $2 billion in Recovery Act funding to boost domestic battery manufacturing.
However, "We don't want to build facilities that have no customers," Davis said.
About 70 percent of Americans drive 40 miles or less per day. A plug-in would run on the electrical power until it reached the 40 mile limit, then switch over to gas or perhaps another combustion fuel.
Plug-in batteries now cost about $1,000 per kilowatt hour to produce. They will need about 11 kilowatt hours of battery power to reach that 40 mile per day goal.
"Most people will not go out and spend an extra $11,000 for a vehicle in hopes of getting it back through fuel savings in the course of 15 years," Davis said.
It would not be overly ambitious though to reduce that down to $500 over the next four to five years. Lower than $300 would be extremely difficult considering the price of raw materials needed to manufacture the batteries, he added.
The vision is to charge the batteries mostly at night. That brings up concerns about the power grid and whether it can handle a future with millions of recharging vehicles.
"The interaction with utilities is essential if we're to be successful in putting millions of these vehicles on the road," he said.
A $30 million demonstration project is under way with General Motors, Ford, Chrysler and General Electric to explore how the plugins will affect the power grid, he said.
There are also concerns about the lithium element needed to produce these batteries. Most of it is produced overseas. Some wonder if the United States will trade one dependency for another--oil for lithium.
There are hundreds of years of supply of lithium in the world, Davis countered, but "granted it's not here." Chile and Bolivia have about 75 percent of the world's supply.
"There's more of it in U.S. than you might think, we just don't exploit it," Davis asserted. The Salton Sea in California and geothermal springs in other states are potential sources, he added.
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