Thoughts on heating
 

As my wife and I start to plan a house I was considering some options for heating. With rising energy costs I had an idea and was wondering what you guys thought.

Our apartment currently has electronic base board heat. It can easily make our rooms to warm, and our utility bills are not that bad.

Something I was thinking of is if natural gas and electric prices trade places from year to year as which one will be more expensive, why not install base board heat and a forced air NG furnace so you can use which ever is most cost effective that year.

Of course this would be supplementing what ever solar heating I incorporate.

Welcome to ER, Brian:)

One of the upsides of the hybrid heating system you propose is that the NG system could keep the house at a minimal temperature, while the electric baseboards would kick in only in those rooms and only when extra heat is needed.

But since you are still in the planning phase, you can take into account more options. For example, one of the most efficient ways of heating (when passive solar isn't enough) is to use hydronic floor heating with a heat accumulator. The heat accumulator would be charged by solar panels and a heat pump. AC_Hacker has an excellent thread which shows how easy and cheap it is to make your own ground source heat pump.

You might want to use an air source heat pump if you are going to have NG also. A ground source unit could be pretty expensive to install and an air source unit will still give you decent efficiency. It's efficiency would actually be plain great when it's a little warmer. Imagine you have a 97% efficient gas furnace, but under the right conditions an ASHP would be more than 100% efficient.

In Buffalo at least, natural gas is currently a third the price of electricity. From a cost perspective, it's pretty clear that the right approach is to go with a furnace alone. Here, you'd be crazy to consider electric resistive heating.

If electric and gas were equally priced, with 30kWh costing the same as 1 Therm, I'd go with gas for environmental reasons. A bean counter would go for electric alone, to avoid having to spend thousands on having a furnace installed.

With your mild weather and expensive gas, a heat pump would be a great choice. It does the same job as an electric resistive heater, on half as much electricity. It also provides A/C functionality.

thanks for the input guys.

This isn't my first time here...I can't remember my old login because it has been along time since I last logged in. :D

I keep hearing about people in New England complaining about the cost of heating oil...heck convert to a NG furnace and it will pay for it self in savings over just one winter.

Seems like NG, heat pump, and radiant water system is the way to go.

I know its a good bit of money up front but it seems like all these things combined with DIY solar is the way to go to have option.

My furnace is LP which is very expensive, so I heat with wood...is that an option for you, is wood considered eco here?

I have an air source HP with electric furnace back up and a woodstove. I run the woodstove as much as is convenient and always when it gets so cold outside the electric furnace will be kicking on. Soon I hope to get solar hotwater heating going and would like to run a few loops of pex for radiant heating under the bedroom floors at night.

I hate your gas company so I wouldn't do it here but if you are already going to have gas I'd look for an air source heat pump with gas furnace backup.

My old HS Tarm boiler will take a gas burner. Plug-n-play.. ;) (Or, I could toss in some wood or coal).
http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f1...HSTARMOT35.jpg http://www.georgebowker.com/images/o...gas_burner.jpg

But, there is a problem.. No gas pipes on my street!! :(
My daughter has gas heat and it's not bad at all. I kinda like it.

We are using a Sanyo mini-split (Ductless) ASHP ($2,500) unit for most of our heating.(And all of our cooling).
The cost is peanuts compared to oil.. Even at the old prices.

Now it's heading for $4/gallon. Humm, $2,500 / $4 = 625 gallons..
That's only a few visits from the oil truck..

ASHPs pay for themselfs pretty fast these Gadhafi days.. :rolleyes:

I must apologize that I have not spent the time reading all the post on here as I'm so busy as well as on most extra little minutes of free time.

Radiant Heat
 

Radiant Heat seems like the way to go because I don't see water prices changing much and it is a very efficient system. Electric and gas prices vary widely around the nation so you have to consider local prices when choosing one. If nothing else get the opinion of local contractors and some free estimates and some local opinions. Also have you ever consulted a contractor on Angie's List for something like this?

my parents have radiant with an electric boiler. Very comfortable system and reasonably inexpensive since electric is dirt cheap here. If I was building new I'd be seriously looking at radiant drawing from a tank heated by solar with some form of heat pump for the backup.

We had built a new house in 1998 and had installed in-floor (concrete slab) heat fuel by a oil fired hot water tank. Very very comfortable. Our winters here in the Ontario countryside can be cold and windy. The house is well insulated and the oil fired system at the time seemed economical. But as the price of fuel oil sky rocketed and all the mess that burning oil made, the time for a change was here. I had investigated geo-thermal when I was building but it seemed costly, looking back I had paid many times more for oil than what a Geo-thermal unit may have cost.
Now with the Geo thermal unit and in-floor heating we are extremely happy. The really interesting thing is the addition of solar hot water. We had installed 6 flat panels and with full sun the floor is warmed for the day, the geo-thermal is off. Heating with the sun, Who would have thought!!! In fact since April we have not paid for any domesitic hot water. With the exception with the 2-3 cloudy days we had needed back-up. It is now Oct.
If you have sun avalible you can harvest a lot of heat for your home. And use Geo or AirSourceHeatPump or Natural Gas for the back-up.

Randen

If the balloon deflated when the oil burner came on, it would help a lot.. :o

The fireplace flue has a pretty tight damper.. (Screw operated type).

http://oikos.com/library/airsealing/.../fireplace.jpg

Breaking new ground with solar
 

Some images of a nice fire burning in the fireplace and cozy'd up close seems very traditional and nice but here where winters are cold, step away from the fires glow and the room is COLD. I grew up collecting, splitting wood and feeding fireplaces and wood burning stoves and the warmth of the fire was never a remedy for the assembly of the wood pile. Maybe its green,renewable and seemingly in-expensive but there's got to be a better way. Solar hot water, ground source heat (heat pumps), infloor heat and solar photo voltaic panels are old tech and new tech. These things have been around for many years and the conventional methods have had there strong hold on us for years but technology is winning over. There has been many demonstrations of net zero energy homes. For me, I'm still amazed for the amount of heat we gain with the solar hot water collection. Everyday that I see the little green LED indicating the circulation pump is on, replacing $6-$8 worth of electrical energy to run the heat pump. Wow. The next step would be a hybrid of solar and wind to power the heat-pump. When the winter has gripped the area the wind is just howling out side and the heat-pump humming away. hmm, How much is a wind turbine.?? We try to justify the return of investment for capital expenditures with todays dollar but in 10 yrs. when I'm thinking about retirement will that heat-pump cost me double to operate or more. Yes you bet, the solar hot-water will still be a freebee. The wind turbine and solar panel (PV) Still making power by harvesting energy for free. As far as other energies NG and fuel oil these have always been at the whim of speculation. If one is thinking of ground up construction the options for living comfortably and cost of operation very low are many. Forget the fireplace, chimney and the ongoing premium cost of fire insurance, consider solar. Check out some of these net zero homes. (Solar harvest house Boulder Co.) The cost of constructing a net zero home is closing in on the cost of traditional construction. Just imagine the family pet unable to choose the traditionally warmest area in the house to curl up and sleep.

Randen

@randen, I don't know what wood stove you might have had but I use one and it is great.
Heats up the house fairly quickly and saves me a ton of money. I do not buy firewood, there are plenty of people that giveaway wood all year long.

Check my posts here: http://ecorenovator.org/forum/applia....html#poststop

Knowing where we are heading on energy cost, it's really weird to see new houses
going up around here.

In Lexington, (the town next door) the people get old or dead and the house is sold
to a developer (300k to 600k, bases on lot size), and he sends in the demo guys.

Then a new jumbo sized basement is dug. On top, they build a three decker.
Priced above 1 million, it has gas heat and at least 3 large heat pumps for cooling.
Of course, thousands of sq feet of glass..

A family of three or four move in and live in their brand new 20 room house..
The other thing that I find is a little weird, most these people aren't locals.
Most come from Canada, Asia, South America & Europe. (mostly eastern Europe).

You can walk down the main street where the rebels first stood up to King George,
and hear the new townies walking by and speaking to their children in a dozen diffident languages.

I guess my point is, these new folks just don't seem to care much about being green.
None of the million+ dollar homes have a Prius in their 3 or 4 car garage either.
I do see a bunch of Prius cars at the houses under 800k.. :D

~~
Note:
On the gas heat. All the new houses that I've seen go up have gas heat..
But oddly, I have seen at least two where a giant fuel oil tank was buried.
One such tank buried in the front yard, looked like what you would find under the local gas station.
It was at least 20 feet long and 10 or 12 feet in diameter..
Really strange, since it's illegal to use heating oil in diesel cars.. :rolleyes:

I work for a local gasoline distributor and couldn't help but fix on this comment you made, so I looked up a tank in the neighborhood of the size you mentioned here just to get a feel for the capacity. A 120" diameter tank, 21' long would hold 12,000 gallons of fuel.

I hadn't read this thread until this morning. I noted from a comment by fellyB, a Yahoo reference where the typical 2009 annual electric bill was $2200, ~ $183 per month. Also from fellyB, if you clicked on the link "More Builders Building Net Zero Homes" two posts back, you find the 11,496 kWh for the average home energy consumption, or roughly 958 per month. {Thanks fellyB}

I'll turn 54 this month {funny, I don't feel that old :rolleyes:} and have been retirement planning for the last several years. No, not the traditional "jam all the money I can get into a mutual fund and hope some ponzi scheme doesn't rob me into the poor house." I have been trying to make my home net zero, to include producing enough electricity to run an EV. I figure with all the efficiency measures I'm taking, it's possible. The way I see it, I expect 6.8 kW of solar panels will produce about 875 kWh monthly on average. My home doesn't use nearly that much {last month 271 kWh}. If I estimate 500 kWh reserved for an EV, I'll have a bit more than 16 kW of energy to use on an average day. We plant a garden and get a modest amount of food from it, so that can't hurt either. As my mother says, the garden even gives me vitamin D by my absorbing some sunlight working in it.

Typical 2009 annual electric bill was $2200 or $183 per month? OMFG!

My trailing 12 months of electricity was about 2400kwh or 200kwh/month. Standby months that don't use heating and cooling have been between 115 and 140kwh and last year I made a mistake with a dehumidifier on the second hottest month and burned over 550kwh when would otherwise have used 100kwh less.

2400kwh is $264 of electricity including all taxes but without the $10.50 of fixed fees a month.

I wouldn't use the averages as your numbers to put up solar panels. Usually people use 4kwh of PV panels to break even. Add more for an electric car. An average electric car at 250wh/mile would be about 2000 miles for your 500kwh reserve, YMMV depending on your driving style and what car you drive.

Gasstingy

I like your plan. If the aproximate power consumption/production is off and you are running short of power you can add more panels. Just like adding more money to your mutual funds. In our calculations we forget, in say 7 years the cost of energy could double and if then you look back to your hay-days of 54yrs old you may say what a great investment. The electric car I think is a steller idea. Charging at home for free.!! Let me think!! do you mean its possible that you can drive on free sunshine. Drive back and forth from home by the gas-station and never have to reach deep into your pocket for gas money. Who could shoot a hole in that. Just for fun take the odometer reading of the well used familly vehicle and calculate how much fuel has it used over the yrs. Now a good estimate of the cost. For our family that equates more than twice the original cost of the vehicle.

Randen

Yowee! The Red Rocket, my wifes 1990 Buick Century Custom Coupe now at 186,000 miles, averages about 23 mpg. At todays local pricing of $3.69/gal, those 8087 gallons add up to $29,841. We paid $15,900 for it......

About to fit your description of double real soon

Just dreaming;

Do you think one day when the new technology in automotive is main stream like electric cars that the petro industry will give you a car just to buy their gasoline much like the cell phone companys giving you a phone for the selling us the air time??

Randen

Nice dream but I think that it will take a long time for the general public to pick up on electric cars. In Europe, where fuel costs are higher, they seem to be taking hold of electric cars more than we are. They also have less of the 'but I want to go 800 miles to a charge and only stop for 5 minutes' thoughts too. In Europe, Japan, and the UK you can get on a train and go somewhere. Here we have the expense of a plane, which cannot effectively be flown electrically, and we don't have trains covering our country in a way effective for decent time and cost efficient travel. With that being said, I'm still going to be driving an electric car, hopefully sometime next year.

Right now people who like the idea are waiting until they perceive that the bugs have been worked out. With hybrids this took almost a decade to happen. Not many people bought the 1st Gen Insight, the Prius, or the first Honda Civic or Accord hybrid. After the 2nd Gen Prius came out, it got noticed and now I see tons of the newest Prius on the road.

I think it will take about a decade before people who think they would be workable for them decide to 'flood the dealerships' to get one. To most people there are too many unknowns and gas prices and high initial cost of electric cars are a large part of it, each will turn their own favor.

There will be people buying gasoline on a gas price balance and utility need. There will always be people needing to drive long distances like sales drivers, mobile technicians, and cross country drivers. I've been all three of these and have commonly driven 150-200 miles in a day, lots of daily time in a car. Taxis, delivery, and couriers drive well over that. Oddly enough, the people who need to drive the farthest are at the biggest disadvantage, while the person who has a 120 mile range car with an 80 mile round trip commute is at the best advantage to owning an electric car based on the cost of driving.

We won't get free cars but there will probably be enough gas guzzlers on the road to where they are almost free. Remember the SUV and truck glut of summer 2008? I could have sold my rusty 1995 Geo Prizm for twice what I paid for it in 2006 at that time but I would have had to own some other form of transport too and buying a more efficient car would have had more margin. ...so in a way your dream may come true, but it will be in the used car market with car dealers having trouble getting rid of the guzzler glut.

The core problem for electric cars is that the battery technology we have is simply not good enough & not scalable.

Bingo. Batteries always have and do suck. Want to see some real serious development in battery technology. I remember reading a couple years ago about technology developed at MIT which used some type of solar panel which separated the hydrogen from water so it could be stored domestically for a fuel cell. We need more ideas like that.

The problem with hydrogen is that it does not exist by itself in nature on earth. It only exists as a compound. You need to expend some other form of energy to break the compound and pull off the hydrogen.

Several years ago, I had the opportunity to visit a research facility in UK that used Hydro, wind & solar to do this. The hydrogen was they stored & reused as needed.

Problem is that it took about 3x as much primary energy to break the bond and harvest the hydrogen. Second problem was the hydrogen storage itself. We all remember the Hindenburg. It is extremely flammable, and to get any real useable amount you need to store it under pressure, which increases the potential for disaster. The facility stored the hydrogen they separated in a secured, isolated underground WW2 bunker from the Blitz. Not very practical or scalable, IMHO.

There really is no scalable alternative to gasoline/diesel. It packs alot of energy per liter, being a liquid it is easily stored & transported.

This technology I am talking about is more efficient than preforming electolysis with pv generated electricity. That's it's beauty.

Aside from the problems of transportation & storage; my point is that hydrogen (on earth) isn't an energy source, it is an energy storage medium, as you have to use some other primary energy to make it.

Virgin Air was funding the research facility I visited. Perhaps they will bring back Airship travel....that would be cool!

Oh I hear you loud and clear. The thing is most renewable power sources aren't available 24x7 in all locations. In the moments of absence we need a better way to store energy that modern batteries. I love what batteries can do but they are pretty unsophisticated technology. They are similar to contemporary automobiles in this respect.

Nickle Sodium batteries are now commercially available. They are being used for wind power storage. FIAMM Group

I saw a system in Ireland in the Wicklow mountains whereby a reservoir was built at the top of the mountain. During off peak times, spare wind/solar pumps water up the mountain to the storage reservoir. During peak demand, water is let out into a hydroelectric generating station. Pretty cool idea.

Hydro energy storage is great and very efficient. The only downside is it takes up tons of space which may or may not be an issue depending where its located.

Here is another idea for utility scale electrical storage. Problem is it, you need to have the right geology to utilize it. Compressed air energy storage - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In my mind, we need almost ALL renewable energy generation & storage schemes to replace our current dependency on fossil fuels; coupled with serious investment in energy efficiency at all levels.

Most people just don't get the enormous & unique energy storage density of gasoline, its ease of transport & how really it is impossible to replace. You can substitute for some things, but the substitutes just aren't as good. Problem is the cheap oil has already been burned....

That statement is very vague. I disagree with that. We have the technology to move a car over 350 miles on a charge. We also have a manufacturer that released an electric car that could go over 100 miles over a decade ago and another manufacturer that has a car that can go 244 miles on a charge that was released 4 years ago. Same company producing a vehicle that holds 7 people with space both in the usual rear area as well as the front where the engine usually would be that can go a similar distance, and also sedan that can go 300 miles.

You'll need to define your core problem a little better as you seem to be missing out on what battery technology currently exists, lead-acid isn't the only battery that has seen an electric car.

Any battery that must be made from materials that are not easily available in huge quantities to me is problematic & not scaleable. Lithium, Nickle & batteries using REE's fit into this category in my book. Isn't this the problem we have gotten ourselves into with oil? The jury is still out on Nano-carbon batteries when I last checked.

I am certain we would not have invaded Iraq if their primary export were wooden shoes or cheese.

When you actually cost out (life cycle cost) current (pun intended) electric cars, they are expensive. You need to buy a new battery every 4 to 7 years @ 12K to 15K a pop!

So, if you own your electric car for 12 years it will cost

40K+12K+12K = ~64K for car & batteries; not counting charging & maintenance.

I would rather live in a walkable community where I don't need a car. It is only an expense.

I see some logic in what you are saying here. However, the RAV 4 EV's from over a decade ago are still going on their original battery packs. And, as best as I can tell, most manufacturers are giving a warranty of 8 years or 100k miles.

So for a Leaf, there's $40,000 initial cost-$7500 tax credit+{hard to fill in the blank on battery replacement cost when I can't see the future and don't know if I'd even need a new battery}. What I do know is, If I drove my wifes car the same 186k miles at todays price of gasoline, I'd spend more than $29k just for gasoline. I'm going to assume the electricity from my solar array costs less than the periodic oil and filter changes, so the math to buy an EV works out ok for me. :)

I really hate quoting anything form Fox News, however...

Ford's electric car battery pack costs $12,000-$15,000 | Fox News

Today, I walked the 3 blocks to work, my daughter the 1 block to school. Gas use = zero; and I didn't need a GOV subsidy.

I apologize in advance if I seem harsh, I do not mean to be. However, I think that we tend to look for little fixes to reduce our dependency on energy when the elephant in the room is totally overlooked -- a unsustainable living arrangement.

Cities/ small town communities became popular for a reason. We have to remember why and work to get back there. We need to live in walkable communities where we can go to school, work & shop w/o the tyranny of the automobile.

I lived in a City in Holland that banned cars in the 1970's. everyone walks, takes public transit or rides bikes -- it's great. No one is fat & unhealthy, & the quality of the air is superior. You meet interesting people on your walkabouts (AKA good looking babes).

We can do it to, if we wish to. We are amer-I-Can's.

Maintenance is minimal in comparison to a car with an engine that requires oil changes, spark plugs, belts, etc that keep you replacing parts and stopping at a gas station. Charging is far less than the cost of gasoline. $12k-15k might be prices paid to a dealer to replace the battery but I don't buy your 4-7 years talk. Especially when Nissan gives the Leaf an 8 year 100k warranty. I'd take a guess that they would want a majority of their battery packs to last beyond that warranty to avoid the cost of paying for replacements so I'm pretty sure we can expect a majority of those cars getting 100k or more out of their battery.

I'm not seeing the rare element issue at all, lithium isn't a rare metal and is typically less than a small single digit percentage of the battery by weight. Lithium batteries aren't toxic either and Nickel chemistries have left out the cadmium for over a decade now so they aren't really more toxic than a steel car body at this point and there are plenty of companies ready to recycle these too.

If it makes any difference the car that I'm converting next year will cost me a sum of $15 to $20k total including the car, battery, controller, charger, wiring, etc. all combined for a total range over 100 miles. 100 miles at my electric rate and expected driving efficiency for a car that gets me 70-80 mpg on my commute today will be about $1.75 in electricity. My 750 mile tank that normally is 10 gallons and cost me $3.59/gallon yesterday cost me 2.74 times the cost of driving on what I predict the electric cost will be.

Sure, I can walk or bike but I'd prefer not to during brutal weather such as severe rain, snow, sleet, and other issues we come across in my climate so at least some point I'll be getting into a car. Where I live, the city is pretty much a high crime slum with low property values and people who you don't want to be your neighbors. Same goes for most of the US and I like living in the states. I'll find the best way to avoid sending my money to countries who hate their customers, to do that I'll be driving an electric car. It's true that I'll be buying batteries from China but they don't want to kill me like everyone who is trying to sell me oil while expressing their anger at the same time. The only truly expensive part will probably be if/when I install solar on my roof to balance all of my electricity usage out.

Back about 1967, my ship stopped in Rotterdam and we walked north about a mile before hitting farm land.
That was the only time I saw the kids who worked in the fields, with wooden shoes. :cool:

The city looked idea for bikes and mopeds. But, places are much larger here.
If I wanted to go into Boston on my bike, it's possible, but it's dangerous.
The bike trail ends half way there. Plus, it would be about 15 miles.
30 miles round trip with some good hills too.
I know people my age that do it, but they are in excellent shape.

The next time my wife and I go into Beantown, we just might be driving
a new 60 mpg car.. :)
2012 Toyota Prius C Review - Watch CNET's Video Review
The EPA mpg rating is a little low..

Anyways, it's a car made for the city..

The National Academy of Science studied plug in hybrid electric cars National-Academies.org | Newsroom and these findings Costs to manufacture plug-in hybrid electric vehicles in 2010 are estimated to be as much as $18,000 more than for an equivalent conventional vehicle. Although a mile driven on electricity is cheaper than one driven on gasoline, it will likely take several decades before the upfront costs decline enough to be offset by lifetime fuel savings.

According to page 1 of Garrett's HANDBOOK OF LITHIUM & NATURAL CALCIUM CHLORIDE (2004) Lithium is a comparatively rare element, although it is found in many rocks and some brines, but always in very low concentrations. The average amount in the earth’s upper crust has been estimated to be about 20 ppm by Vine (1980), although others have quoted values as low as 7 ppm (Bach et al., 1967; igneous rocks 6 ppm, sedimentary rocks 11.5 ppm) and as high as 60 ppm (Deberitz, 1993; 27th in rank of elemental abundance). Even with these small numbers, however, there are a fairly large number of both lithium mineral and brine deposits, but only comparatively a few of them are of actual or potential commercial value. Many are very small, others are too low in grade or located in remote areas, or too expensive to recover and process.

My core contention still remains that electric (and nat Gas) vehicles are not scaleable. With 1 billion vehicles already on the roads, and annual global sales above 35 Million units, we have neither the battery materials, electric grids, nor a network of charging stations equipped to handle the situation. Remember, it has taken 90 years to build out the network of gas stations we how have in the USA. Most of all we don't have the capital to afford it.
Also, what do you think would be the affect of the price of Electricity if the GOV mandated all new cars must be electric? Where would all the new generation come from? The transmission infrastructure? What would it cost?
Who is paying for it? Remember a tax credit to me is higher taxes for someone else. There is no FREE LUNCH.

Recently, I took the time to figure out the current investment here in the USA in gasoline powered engines. The number I came up with was $13 Trillion. Where would the money come from to change over from Gasoline to Electric or Nat Gas?

As we have run out of inexpensive oil, and the cost of change over to some other energy system for transportation fuel is beyond our capabilities; the obvious conclusion is that out lifestyles will change to meet the realities imposed upon us. The rich will always have access to personal transportation, but the average person will increasingly find it more difficult to afford. check out the Hirsch Report, done for the Department of Energy describing what it will take to transition away from gasoline. Summary here: http://www.acus.org/docs/051007-Hirs...Production.pdf
It findings & implications are life changing.

A more elegant solution is to do what our grandparents & great grandparents did who lived before the Automobile age -- live where you work.
You will find your transportation costs drop dramatically when you don't have to pay for a car. Here in Philadelphia, we have good mass transit & car rental programs, like ZIP car, for when you need to go somewhere off the mass transit grid.

I & my family's daily commute costs remain free everyday. It might only be inclement weather 3-4 days a month. We can handle that.

I lived in Groningen, in the north. Holland, like most of W Europe has builtout an extensive network of high speed rail to get from city to city. Within the city is standard mass transit (buses, trollies), plus many cities have free bikes.

In Groningen, about every block is a bike stand with 3 speed 36" wheel ugly grey bikes. When you want to ride, just grab one, ride to your destination & put it in the bike stand at your destination. It is that simple. Yes sometimes idiots throw them in the canal, but that is a rarity.

It is a totally different experience when you live in a place with no cars. You children can play in the street without fear of getting run over. The bike lanes are separated from pedestrian sidewalks which are separated from the few access streets where autos are permitted. They sometimes have "jersey" barriers segregating the bike traffic from the pedestrians.

You don't feel afraid to bike because the bikes & cars & people are always separated. Here are some pix 15 Things I Loved about Living & Bicycling in Groningen (the Netherlands) +25 Pictures

All it takes is a little positive planning.

Gasstingy Wrote;
I see some logic in what you are saying here. However, the RAV 4 EV's from over a decade ago are still going on their original battery packs. And, as best as I can tell, most manufacturers are giving a warranty of 8 years or 100k miles.

My recent acquistion a 1998 Chev S-10 EV. that has the famous Ovonic Nimh. battery pack from the EV 1 (who killed the electric car doc.) has been charged and load tested and is still viable. The batteries are marked 2000. so that makes them 12 yrs old. The new lithium chemistries are showing even better promise.

It seems strange the automotive powerplant has been through so much development over the last 100 yrs. and the lowely battery even though its shown some great improvments and promise still gets shelved and by comparison little development.

For me I can't wait to get the little truck on the road and just like how the Geo-thermal and solar heating helped me with saving some bucks and keeping us comfortable. I hope the little electric truck will do the same.

Randen