Electric cars are becoming more of a concept

Recently we witnessed the completion of the VOLTA by the GM, Fiat 500 and now the Venturi Voltage concept car presented at the NAIAS 2010 (image below).

All these cars have in common the use of more or less efficient batteries to power the electric motor.
I think the real revolution will happen when you do not think only to accumulate energy, but also how to produce it. A car can increase its autonomy in a much greater than the average current only if it is equipped with systems of energy production. Examples could be producing energy from the sun, the use of air currents that are formed during the movement of the car itself and the conversion into electricity of heat developed by electric motors.

I believe that technological innovation in this sector is just beginning and maybe this could lead to something completely innovative rethinking the concept of mobility.

Thanks for reading and leave your comments.

Check the obvious

Today each of us use to put in Stand-by almost all the devices commonly used at home.
This mechanism doesn't mean that the corresponding device doesn't consume power; the device will consume anyway lower energy, but will do.

Make an experiment: turn off all the devices that normally should stay turned on (like the fridge) and leave in Stand-by all the others (Hi-Fi, TV, DVD Player...).
Now go to your electricity counter and measure the time interval (in seconds) between two flashes of the red led. The electricity counter measure utilized electricity in Kwh. Divide 3600 per time you measured before; this result is the Kw that your devices use for Stand-by. You will be surprised that this number will not be so small as you believed.

To reduce drastically the electricity consumption you should use sockets with a switch that will interrupt the electric circuit between the device plugged into the socket and the electric network. The consumption of that device will be null.


Thanks for reading :-)