Toyota is Trying to Figure Out How to Make a Car Run Forever:
Put together the best solar panels money can buy, super-efficient batteries and decades of car-making know-how and, theoretically, a vehicle might run forever.
That's the audacious motivation behind a project by Toyota Motor Corp., Sharp Corp. and New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization of Japan, or NEDO, to test a Prius that could revolutionize transportation.
"The solar car's advantage is that — while it can't drive for a long range — it's really independent of charging facilities," said Koji Makino, a project manager at Toyota.
[...] But the current forecast is only partly sunny because there's still some work left to reach that level of efficiency.
"This is not a technology we are going to see widely used in the next decades," said Takeshi Miyao, an auto analyst at consultancy Carnorama. "It's going to take a long time."
[...] Toyota has been testing a new solar-powered Prius since July, though it acknowledges that cars running nonstop without connecting to a hose or plug are still far away. Even so, the Toyota City-based company said the research will pay off in other ways.
Indeed, there have been some breakthroughs, mainly due to advancements by Sharp. The prototype's solar panel converts sunlight at an efficiency level of more than 34%, compared with about 20% for current panels on the market.
[...] If the car is driven four days a week for a maximum of 50 kilometers a day, there's no need to plug into an outlet, NEDO's Yamazaki said.
Or only drive it on weekends.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday September 13 2019, @07:09PM (2 children)
They already acknowledge the limitations in that it's as forever as, say, the Mars rovers which require good sunlight, no obscuration of the panels, run days and time based on how much charge was gotten. And to be able to supplement from the mains, even better. Yet nothing lasts forever, as sooner or later those batteries the solar is charging will no longer take a charge.
It's time for me to stretch around a little and see what the current lifetime on electric vehicle batteries are. More economical fill-ups are one thing, but in a gasoline burner one usually doesn't have to replace the gas tank, fuel lines, and exhaust system every 2-3 years either. (OK technically one doesn't necessarily replace the electrical wires in an EV either... but the batts are expensive enough).
This sig for rent.
(Score: 5, Informative) by KilroySmith on Friday September 13 2019, @08:12PM (1 child)
It's kinda hard to get information on EV battery lifetimes, but crowd-sourced data indicates that it's as long or longer than a gas engine:
https://electrek.co/2018/04/14/tesla-battery-degradation-data/ [electrek.co]
EV battery packs don't die due to longevity in the sense of "It worked yesterday, but it's dead as a doornail today". That can happen in the case of a mechanical failure (broken wire or connector, magic smoke leaves the electronics, etc), but doesn't happen just because the car rolled up 200,000 miles. Instead, the capacity of the cells (as measured by the distance the car can drive) gradually diminishes until it's so short that people get annoyed. As an industry standard, that threshold seems to be about 80% - when the pack only has 80% of the original capacity, it's considered worn-out. The current Tesla warranty, on the other hand, only guarantees 70% capacity at 100,000 miles. The Tesla Model S data linked above shows an interesting curve to it - there's an initial rapid degradation to about 95% over the first 50,000 miles, then it levels out. There really isn't enough publicly available information yet to extrapolate to 80% lifetime, but some comments by Elon Musk and others have suggested that might occur around 250,000 to 300,000 miles nominally.
Frankly, when my Tesla Model 3 gets to 250,000 miles and only has 250 miles of range (still more than any current EV except the Hyundai Kona https://evrater.com/evs [evrater.com] ), I expect it'll still have an excellent resale value because it'll still be an excellent vehicle with excellent range.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Monday September 16 2019, @02:51PM
That is really interesting and informative, thank you!
I wonder when one gets to that point how replaceable the batteries are / equivalent to an engine change if one feels the need and if so how affordable that would be. (I've done that with one care I owned). Not saying one could do this, but if one could get 20 years out of the vehicle with one pack change (let's say $60,000 over 20 years) that would be equivalent to two $30,000 cars that would last ten years. Wonder what kind of financing options I could do....
This sig for rent.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 13 2019, @07:19PM (13 children)
You guys almost caught up this time! But again, Slashdot ran it first. [slashdot.org]
(Score: 2, Informative) by nitehawk214 on Friday September 13 2019, @08:07PM (7 children)
What's Slashdot?
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 3, Touché) by RS3 on Saturday September 14 2019, @04:11AM (6 children)
It's a way for a webserver to be crashed by too many people finding and clicking a link to a page hosted on that server. But that's not important right now.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Monday September 16 2019, @02:52PM (5 children)
Didn't know that the S of RS3 stood for Shirley....
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Tuesday September 17 2019, @01:10AM (4 children)
Shirley you jest?
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Tuesday September 17 2019, @09:21AM
I don't jest, and don't call me Shirley.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Tuesday September 17 2019, @09:21AM
I don't jest, and don't call me You.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Tuesday September 17 2019, @09:22AM (1 child)
Wanted to go for the second, but couldn't resist being classic. And thanks for the tee-up - hoping you would...
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Tuesday September 17 2019, @12:57PM
I couldn't help myself, it was just sitting there waiting. :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 13 2019, @08:47PM
The comments look worse than the 2-3 real ones on here. SlashNOT.
(Score: 4, Touché) by DannyB on Friday September 13 2019, @09:05PM
Here's an idea.
Rather than post here that Slashdot ran it first, post on Slashdot that it is NOT run over here yet.
The thing about landline phones is that they never get lost. No air tag necessary.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 14 2019, @06:24AM (2 children)
Yeah you posted as AC try doing that on slashdot.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Sunday September 15 2019, @01:34AM (1 child)
I just tested that. While not logged in it asks for a captcha, but it does give me the option to post as AC.
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Tuesday September 17 2019, @01:13AM
This is speculation: I think if /. knows you (cookies? IP? MAC...?), it'll allow you to post AC.
I tried to post AC using a machine from which I've never logged in to /., and it would not let me post.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 13 2019, @07:40PM (1 child)
80s toyotas will likely last a century with minimal maintenance, as long as the body doesn't rust out. Modern toyotas, not so much.
Still, I applaud their big-vision far-sighted approach.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 14 2019, @03:01PM
There's probably a single 80's Toytota left in the world (kept in a inert gas protected environment), because the other ones have rusted out.
(Score: 3, Informative) by KilroySmith on Friday September 13 2019, @08:30PM (4 children)
So, let's see. A Prius is approx 457 cm long by 175 cm wide, making for about 8 m^2 of upward surface area. Assuming that the Prius is on an appropriate angle to maximize sun exposure, and an average solar panel output of about 125 W/m^2 with about 4 hours of usable sun a day, gives about 4 kWh of energy per day - or about 16 miles of range. As long as you're commuting in a small equatorial city, you might be able to make this work. Now, reduce this by the cosine of the angle of the sun at your latitude, and by shading, and add a fudge factor of efficiency improvements on solar cells, and...it still doesn't make it.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Friday September 13 2019, @09:09PM (2 children)
If it doesn't work, then try it at scale. Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!
But seriously, if you can average 50 km / day for 4 days into 5 days then it is 25 miles / day for 5 days. In my case, I have a super grueling commute to work that wastes ten minutes of my day! Twice a day! And it has gone from three traffic lights to five traffic lights.
Being in the midwest I suspect I could possibly get 5 commutes per week without ever plugging in.
If this were available. If I could afford it. I'm assuming it's massively expensive.
The thing about landline phones is that they never get lost. No air tag necessary.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday September 14 2019, @04:01PM (1 child)
It makes a difference which part of the mid-West. North Dakota is a lot different for solar power than Texas.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday September 16 2019, @02:18PM
Somewhere kind of in between those two extremes.
The thing about landline phones is that they never get lost. No air tag necessary.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Ron on Sunday September 15 2019, @03:08AM
Good analysis, But...
Here in South Texas we easily get 8 hours of usable solar-panel quality sunlight per day, on average. The optimal exposure angle makes a minor difference, but what makes a much bigger difference is the fact that a lot of our cars sit for days at a time before they get used. Not everyone drives every day. I work at home, my kids actually walk to school (less than one mile) and we buy groceries in bulk. I've gone weeks at a time without firing up the old automobile. The car can be recharging all those days, then I can use it for my weekend grocery run once a month or the odd days we eat out or go to a movie. This kind of car would be glorious for my lifestyle, especially if it came with an optional generator on a trailer I could use for really long trips. Make that ginny a propane rig and let it charge on the fly while driving and I'm all over that, times two.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Bot on Friday September 13 2019, @10:02PM
-Wait for a sysadmin to die (an optional step, technically)
-cremate the body and put in jar (which is a bit ironic for who dealt with Java)
-tie jar to the transmission
-instead of the gas pedal whisper "systemd"
-jar spins and car jumps forward. Remember to have a good set of brakes. Use "lennart will die one day and you will be the senior down there" to shut down.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by deadstick on Friday September 13 2019, @10:09PM (1 child)
Have you heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay,
That was built in such a logical way
It ran a hundred years to a day,
And then, of a sudden, it — ah, but stay,
I’ll tell you what happened without delay,
Scaring the parson into fits,
Frightening people out of their wits, —
Have you ever heard of that, I say?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 14 2019, @03:24AM
Good one--my father (from small town Maine) introduced me to the one-hoss shay as a kid, wonderful poem/story.
More recently (1973) a somewhat similar attempt was made by Porsche with their Long Life Automobile project -- designed to last in the worst salt/corrosive environments for at least 30 years:
https://www.hemmings.com/blog/2013/10/31/cars-of-futures-past-porsche-fla-long-life-study/ [hemmings.com]
(Score: 2) by legont on Saturday September 14 2019, @12:47AM
Are you guys taking this seriously? Toyota wants to build a car that never needs a replacement? Come on, be adults...
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday September 14 2019, @12:50AM
That's 31 miles. That won't get me to the nearest hospital. It will get me to the nearest grocery, so I may not starve or dehydrate while waiting for my car to recharge.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 14 2019, @03:18AM
It's simple, all they need is a perpetual motion machine...problem solved! ;-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 14 2019, @06:12AM
So do they know if time has an end? Also does it have a beginning? Maybe it is cyclical in which case i guess you could claim that cars already run forever. If time does last forever then said car could be thing that causes heat death of the universe. Anyway good luck to them i hear the printer manufacturer cartel have already hired multiple hitmen.
(Score: 2) by Rich on Saturday September 14 2019, @11:38AM (1 child)
First, if panels-on-a-car would only charge a percentage of total consumption, it would still be a welcome reduction in external energy required. So unless the panels come with an extra penalty (like being super heavy), they'll turn out to be some sort of gain. I'd assume Toyota researches into the direction of them becoming part of composite bodywork. There might be recycling issues, but that would be part of the research.
Second, possibly more important, is that the on-board charging would at least maintain the battery charge. If, in extreme weather conditions, the battery has to be cooled or heated, it will not only drain itself pretty quickly, but might end up not only discharged, but broken. The panels would allow the car to sit outside, unattended, for a few weeks (polar circle inhabitants might experience intermittent service in winter).
Third, with extreme weather being an increasingly hot (pun intended...) topic, autonomous energy generation might provide cooling or heating while the car sits in the sun or the cold without affecting range. I'm generally not too keen on naff extras, but that, in combination with, say, electrically tinted windows, would be something I approve of in summer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 14 2019, @01:33PM
> The panels would allow the car to sit outside, unattended, for a few weeks
Yeah, this is a common problem for cars driven to airports and left in the parking lot/garage for a couple of weeks. Newer cars draw enough current (alarm, computers, clocks, etc) that they drain the battery and the car won't start. Calling AAA (auto club) for a jump start means that your 12V battery gets a very quick charge from dead--possibly reducing the battery life(??)
Solution looks easy (I haven't tried this) -- https://www.lifewire.com/do-car-solar-battery-chargers-work-534771 [lifewire.com]
All of a sudden, the top deck of the parking structure (or the long term lot) looks a lot more attractive, although the walk to the terminal will be longer.