Electric cars ... fueled by gasoline?When you think about electric cars, the phrase "Fill er up! doesn't immediately come to mind--but early in the next century it might. A government-industry team has demonstrated a gasoline-fueled system that could form the heart of a clean, fuel-efficient electric car. The system consists of a fuel processor that partially oxidizes gasoline to create hydrogen gas, which is then sent to a fuel cell that generates electric power. Members of the partnership include the Department of Energy and Arthur D. Little Arthur D. Little, Inc. is the world's first management consulting firm. Founded in 1886 by Arthur Dehon Little, an MIT chemist who discovered acetate, and co-worker Roger Griffin, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Arthur D. Little pioneered the concept of contracted technology research. of Cambridge, Mass. In tests conducted earlier this month, the prototype fuel processor generated hydrogen at a rate sufficient to produce 50 kilowatts of electric power--enough to run a midsize car, says Robert S. Weber, a senior scientist for the project at Arthur D. Little. Although the laboratory tests used gasoline and ethanol as fuels, the system can also use methanol methanol, methyl alcohol, or wood alcohol, CH3OH, a colorless, flammable liquid that is miscible with water in all proportions. Methanol is a monohydric alcohol. It melts at −97. and natural gas as sources of hydrogen. A car equipped with the system would get about twice the gas mileage Noun 1. gas mileage - the ratio of the number of miles traveled to the number of gallons of gasoline burned fuel consumption rate, gasoline mileage, mileage ratio - the relative magnitudes of two quantities (usually expressed as a quotient) of a comparable car with an internal combustion engine Internal combustion engine A prime mover, the fuel for which is burned within the engine, as contrasted to a steam engine, for example, in which fuel is burned in a separate furnace. , Weber says. Electric cars have faced two vexing problems--the need for heavy batteries that must be recharged after a few hours' use, and the lack of an infrastructure to support the recharging. One attempt to get around these difficulties has been the development of so-called hybrid electric vehicles A hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) is a vehicle which combines a conventional propulsion system with an on-board rechargeable energy storage system (RESS) to achieve better fuel economy than a conventional vehicle without being hampered by range from a charging unit like an , which use a combination of electric and gasoline power (SN: 10/7/95, p. 232). Another approach depends on fuel cells working off stored hydrogen. In May 1996, Daimler-Benz unveiled a prototype minivan that carried tanks of compressed hydrogen gas. In October 1996. Toyota announced that it had developed a hydrogen-absorbing alloy, thereby averting the need for storing large amounts of the gas at ordinary temperatures and pressures. The new system, however, needs neither large batteries nor devices to store hydrogen and would take advantage of the gasoline distribution infrastructure already in place. Fuel cell technology is just one of the initiatives that the California Air Resources Board California Air Resources Board (CARB) is the "clean air agency" of the state of California in the United States. Established originally in 1967, it is a part of the California Environmental Protection Agency, an organization which reports directly to the California has encouraged the automobile industry automobile industry, the business of producing and selling self-powered vehicles, including passenger cars, trucks, farm equipment, and other commercial vehicles. to explore, says spokesman Richard W. Varenchik. The system announced on Oct. 21, although promising, needs to be demonstrated in an automobile, he adds. "We're always looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. efficient, low-emission technologies, but when it gets down to it, we want to look at equipment in the automobile, in real-life conditions." [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion