Supercar maker Ferrari says no to making electric cars

[Archean]

The chairman of Ferrari says he does not believe in electric cars and that his company will never make one. Luca di Montezemolo's comments will anger many who say electric cars offer the only environmentally-friendly future for the industry.

I agree with him mainly because many people don't realize this, but the fact is power generation involves lots of unfriendly practices towards environment, so if one think that by charging their car from the socket eliminate CO2 from the equation are mistaken, because they are simply shifting from one source of pollution to another.

 

[Benny26]

Electric cars are just a big no no, in my opinion. The hybrid (Hydrogen+Petrol) looks far more promising for the future.

Obviously they have to figure out how to mass bottle hydrogen first though.

 

[SNGX1275]

I agree with him mainly because many people don't realize this, but the fact is power generation involves lots of unfriendly practices towards environment, so if one think that by charging their car from the socket eliminate CO2 from the equation are mistaken, because they are simply shifting from one source of pollution to another.

Thats kind of true, but its not that simple. You get a slightly higher efficiency out of a coal fired power plant than you do a car's internal combustion engine. I thought it was something like 10%, but after some very hasty googling I found its much closer to 5% or less (although, searching some academic papers may again shift that upward..). And thats considering that all of the power to charge the batteries comes from CO2 emitting power plants (opposed to hydro, wind, solar).

I think the current hybrids should have been made "plug-in". I really don't see much of a point considering a Prius/Honda Fit get barely better fuel mileage than something like a Honda Civic or a VW Jetta. And you have to added complexity of a 2 'engine' system, where one engine has to be ran to charge up the other.

 

[Archean]

Fairenough SNG, as I work in Civil Engineering sector organization, I can assure you there are huge environmental issues with large Dams* / Hydroelectric projects (to slightly lesser extent), in a nutshell nothing comes without an environmental cost.

Also note that electric cars have very limited range, and then you will have to charge them for hours and hours. This means they are unfit for any long distance traveling, leaving them viable (to some extent) for urban traveling.

* When you store huge amount of water behind a very heavy wall, it can increase the risk of induced seismicity. A good example on this is the Zipingpu Dam which is believed to have fluctuated the pressure of the fault 1,650 feet (503 m) away; this pressure probably increased the power of the earthquake and accelerated the rate of movement for the fault. Resultant earthquake killed over 69,000 people in the affected area.

 

[captaincranky]

* When you store huge amount of water behind a very heavy wall, it can increase the risk of induced seismicity. A good example on this is the Zipingpu Dam which is believed to have fluctuated the pressure of the fault 1,650 feet (503 m) away; this pressure probably increased the power of the earthquake and accelerated the rate of movement for the fault. Resultant earthquake killed over 69,000 people in the affected area.

Apparently the natural gas extraction technique called, "frakking" causes the same issues.: http://www.truth-out.org/fracking-operations-cause-thousands-earthquakes-arkansas/1311877041

 

[Archean]

Makes lots of sense, it is a bad idea to do any heavy drilling near a fault line anyway.

 

[glmattox]

The glith...!

Getting the power on the road is not the problem, however. To date, no one has created a lightweight, compact battery capable of covering average driving distances without recharging from a stationary source. In plainer words an electric car can do the job but it won't get you far...!
but on the contrary,
hybrid combines a gasoline engine and an electric motor to provide adequate power with minimal fuel usage and low emissions. Hybrids do not need to be plugged into an electric outlet in order to be recharged. They charge themselves by using energy normally lost during coasting and braking, and can also be charged by the car's gasoline engine.

 

[bababoo]

You save emmisions due to no idling in traffic jams