One question that immediately comes to mind with overhead electric trucks is how is the grounding sorted out in the case of an electrical fault making the truck body live? I think a lot of the train systems ground through the tracks all the time, so the pantograph connects to live wires only - this won't work for a rubber tyred truck, so both live and ground need to be overhead, giving the pantograph a more difficult job, as it has to connect properly to 2 wires at all times and cannot be allowed to short them out. Oversize loads shorting these wires would be another risk, since this is on public roads.
The overhead highway system could be great , but how do you control how many trucks at a time are allowed to connect to a section of line .. ? Even a phev style artic could be a great improvement on a conventional truck , , maybe just an electric style truck with a smaller battery and a diesel electric generator running optimally ..
@@JeremyHamaoui I think you might be right. Rail\line like systems here usually run into billions just for crossing a country in europe for example. And what do you need a rail for when trucks drive themselves? It probably is better to invest that into batteries indeed. You could argue less rare earth materials used in rail systems like this. But I also doubt that considering battery advancements and the huge amount of materials needed for these lines as well.
I don't comment much on your videos since your success has vastly exceeded the need for my encouragement, but I never miss your postings and appreciate your ability to fill in the gaps in my understanding of technological developments to arrest an increasingly uncomfortable future (if I might appropriate a little British understatement). Thanks Dave.
I think that Amazon's relatively huge order of EV vans from Rivian deserved a mention, as did a rapidly growing offering of battery electric light commercial vehicles in Europe.
yep, if Amazon is doing something big then you know it's a good idea. They would also be supporting a big charging grid around the country, and hopefully done with some sort of sustainable power source rather than just grid
@@williamgoode9114 I grow bull beard and use old fashioned manual toothbrushes, so I can't compare, but the efficiency of the latest resonant wireless charging circuits is at least 80%.
only 35% of class 8 trucks are used for long distance trucking. 65% are used for short range {100 to 250 miles a day} use, and are parked in the same place every night. They also are not loaded to the full weight capacity so they could use smaller batteries that would recharge faster. You forgot to mention that Kenworth is taking orders for class 8 battery electric trucks now in the United states.
We are decades away from self driving trucks....here in the USA we have road construction companies controlled by Democrats, as well as the union workers....the roads are made to fall apart, and to be rebuilt every few years...
We can't really talk about energy efficiency without addressing Jevon's Paradox.... As we become more efficient, historically, we just consume more, unless we completely change the incentive structures of our economies.... As of now, there's little effort at de-growth by corporations and the wealthy, who use most of the resources.... They are much more likely to use limits as austerity measures for the poor, so we should really be clear about how to reduce impact while also providing for the working class.... It's crazy to think technology could fix this predicament without us having to change our ways, which makes this political and much more difficult... We all need to evolve our ideas around what we consider environmental justice, as well as social justice (this is already so contentious, so nuance and compassion are needed).... Thanks for sharing this content, it's the most important topic in the world for us to have a think about....
@NEAR TERM EXTINCTION - HUMAN I agree! I feel I've been bashing my head against this wall for decades, trying to understand how the human animal can both call itself sapiens and be so incredibly ignorant to its own detriment, even extinction.... The defense mechanisms that have been implanted into our minds since childhood run so deep, that denial seems to be the most common response to the dread that addressing climate change requires.... We can't even have a realistic conversation yet, and the recent censorship rounds indicate even more apathy in the works.... Environmentalists are already considered terrorists by the sick ruling class
Dave has discussed Jevon's Paradox in an earlier episode, can't remember which one though. I fully agree that technologic innovation is nice, but a true revolution of our society is needed to really changes things around. Have you read Noami Klein's "This Changes Everything"?
A few points: 1) Put the container on an electric train for the long distances. This removes the need for moving the big battery too. 2) Nicola Motors appears to be a scam. 3) For short range, an electric truck costs less to run. 4) In most places the 1st investment should be in the electric grid.
Your 4th point should be no.1 and in bold capitals. If we had massive investment in green energy production, lowering the cost dramatically, there'd be no need for legislation as switching to electric would be a no-brainer. Money talks.
NIKOLA - So why is the recent deal with GM, not involve using either the NIKOLA fuel cell or battery? And why did they recently admit filming the NIKOLA One truck rolling down a hill and not under it’s own power? And why are they currently being investigated by both the SEC and the Department of Justice for fraud and deception. I would be careful what you say about NIKOLA!
@@alexthetrucker8168 That's just a baseless conspiracy theory. Trevor Milton is behind the Nikola fraud, Nikola isn't even his first scam, he is a shady con artist, a snake-oil salesman, and he belongs in prison.
It's lovely. Tesla has dragged all these vehicle manufacturers kicking and screaming into the modern world. How many would now be developing electric vehicles of all types if Tesla had not threatened their market share.
@@darrennewmanuk I am highly skeptical Darren. The best we have seen from legacy vehicle manufacturers are compliance vehicles which in most case have left a lot to be desired. Tesla has proven that EV's can out perform ICE vehicles in almost every category that counts. Range and simplicity of refueling are almost fully addressed but all others have been fully surpassed. It is those successes that have made others recognize the potential of EV's...you may be right that the change would come eventually but I suspect the planet would be uninhabitable long before that would happen...and it still may be.
NISSAN LEAF WAS ONE OF THE FIRST ELECTRIC CARS,I THINK BEFORE TESLA OR AT THE SAME TIME,AND NISSAN IS A CONVENTIONAL ICE CAR MAKER,ALSO RENAULT HAD ELECTRIC CARS A LONG TIME AGO,LIKE THE MEGANE ELECTRIC WITH AN BETTERY CHANGING SYSTEM ,THAT ALOWED TO CHANGE AN EMPTY BATERRY FOR A FULL CHARGED BATTERY AT A SPECIAL CHARGING STATION TESLA ON THE OTHER HAND HAS AN HUGE PR AND MARKETING SYSTEM
@@dovstruzer7887 If you want people to read what you write, please remember to un-caps lock it. Caps locking just make people skip your comment altogether. (Indeed, I have no idea what you wrote.)
Tesla is no sizeable threat, they are only a niche manufacturer that has yet turn a annual profit. Most auto manufacturers have single vehicle lines that make more vehicles than all of Tesla's production, Ford F-series is only sold in North America and out sells Tesla 3 to 1.
Electric road system. Croydon had "trolly busses" Using this system up to the early 1960's when the wires were taken down and diesel busses took their place. Not convinced by battery powered trucks as the battery weights seriously reduce cargo capacity or will increase road loadings.
Hoping battery cost continue to fall, not a big fan of over head power cables everywhere, gives me the heebies! plus a clear sky is always a good thing for peace of mind.
Will not need government regulation to go to trucking. The cost savings will be so enormous that all tracking companies will want to go there to save a significant amount of money.
Exactly. What we are beginning to see is our move from fossil fuels being driven by the economics that favor renewable energy and battery storage. Governments did the necessary job of helping renewable energy and battery technology move out of the lab and to point where they became cost competitive. Now economics are starting to take over. Because climate change is upon us and the cost so enormous it would be wise for governments to serve as catalysts and assist the economic forces in getting us off fossil fuels as quickly as possible. We need more cities announcing the end of ICEV operation inside city limits. We need a price on carbon. We need targeted subsidies to get regional solar and wind infrastructure in place.
@@0xszander0 "The economic and health costs of air pollution from burning fossil fuels totaled $2.9 trillion in 2018, calculated in the form of work absences, years of life lost, and premature deaths, according to a new report by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA). The cost represents 3.3 percent of global GDP, or about $8 billion per day." If we spent a few trillion, globally, for a very few years we could quickly leave fossil fuels behind and then save that $2.9 trillion per year for many years. Wise investment stuff.
The government involvement is needed to install the charging infrastructure. Charging infrastructure for semis is a totally different ball game than for model 3s and leafs. Need government leadership for a nationwide charging network and to plug all the holes the private sector would leave if left up to them.
@@paulmcewen7384 Tesla is installing chargers for their semis. Other semi manufacturers could do the same or buy into Tesla's system. Tesla has offered access to their Supercharger system to other car manufacturers, I assume they'd be open to letting other semi manufacturers use their truck chargers as long as the other manufacturers paid a fair share of the cost.
Re: those electric roadways. I'm not sure how feasible or desirable that would be across all the highways of the world, BUT, it would provide handy infrastructure for the installation of A LOT of PV panels. I wish we'd see more "two birds with one stone" thinking when it comes to these projects.
The roads with it can be a selective few initially. The cost per mile would be much much lower making that route gain demand and the desire to expand the network. It is one of those things that hits a tipping point and then suddenly everyone is doing it.
Solar panel "road roofs" shed water and snow so it's a three-birder. However, it could make for some interesting accidents when somebody plows through a support or two. Of course, nobody will be driving by then, so no worries?
@@richardcaldwell6159 heh, yeah I don't know about a whole roof. Was thinking of a 3-6 panels on each support pole. But when we get into electrified rail, then I think PV covered tunnels could unlock some major potential. That said, for roads and city streets I've long been enamoured with the idea of heating them to get the benefit of not having to plow them, not having to use corrosive salt, and also greatly reducing or even eliminating potholes from seasonal temperature variation. It seems challenging but doable on city streets and arterial roads in urban areas, but thousands of miles of highway? I dunno if it would ever happen.
Bigger batteries means more weight, more weight less load capacity. Best alternative I have seen recently available is a hydrogen/diesel dual fuel system.
As a truck driver I wish it could happen quicker! In the meantime lowering HGV speed limits from the 90km/h they are at the minute, at least in most of the EU and the UK, to 80 km/h could be a very quick and easy way to reduce emissions and increase fuel economy. I don’t know what exact effect on emissions it would have but you would certainly have at least a ten percent decrease in fuel usage.
The conversion from ICE to EVs is now being driven by technology and economics more than mandates. As battery costs move under $100/kWh, the unsubsidized initial purchase price of EVs will approach then surpass that of ICEs. Lifetime ownership costs of unsubidized EVs already beat ICEs. The transition will be rapid. The signs are already becoming apparent; Tesla won't lease a car to you with a buy out option, they want the EV back. Next look for the subtle elimination of long term leases on ICE. Also the petroleum distribution system does not collapse when EVs = 100%, the process of collapse begins as EVs rise as a percentage of all vehicles. There will be a point in the disruption S-curve when petroleum will get cheaper as petroleum scrambles to salvage the last bit of revenue before obsolesence. But another causality of rapid ICE collapse will be the nature of production. Automotive industrial consultant Sandy Munro explains this well; you can't run a transmission plant on one shift per day.
I don’t believe that the need for petroleum will go away any time soon, while it might not be in combustion, it will still be in everything from the tires that the trucks run on, to the containers that the truck ships. So that s-curve might not move in the direction you seem to expect, although it might keep us in plastics and rubber longer.
Great video again, Dave. I think electrification of commercial vehicles will be the most important step siin making EV's mainstream. The savings haulage companies will make is a no-brainer for them.
I'd add that at least in nations like the US and Australia, a lot of those truck stops for long-haul trucks are in areas colloquially known as "the middle of nowhere" with typically inexpensive land nearby, so connecting on-site storage to solar and wind to further reduce the impact on the grid would make a lot of sense.
The first step should, obviously, be rational, integrated intermodal transport where long-distance freight is done by rail, which is vastly more energy efficient and lower-carbon even when not electrified from sustainable sources. A good example is Switzerland where trucks in transit are obliged to pass as rail cargo. Hydrogen from electrolysis, while not very energy-efficient, is a very good use of intermittently excess wind and solar power capacity, vastly better than curtailment.
Unfortunately, fresh water usage in electrolysis is a serious problem in many places. Many locales are having enough problems finding fresh water for drinking water, let alone for use in electrolysis for vehicles. Hydrogen is just not a good solution in many areas of the world. And honestly, I liked the liquid air batteries the best for storing excess grid energy. It looks like a better solution. At least you don’t have to deal with the corrosiveness of hydrogen. Dave had a show on JHAT a while ago on liquid air batteries.
@@jdhwpbmbca Liquid air, compressed air, molten salt, flow batteries, second-life LiIon batteries, not to mention pumped hydro, all have their place. One size does not fit all. But here we are looking at the solution for long range trucking (and perhaps even medium haul airliners). It would be interesting to see how far efficiency drops if one factors in reverse osmosis to produce fresh water on off-shore wind farms.
@@bazoo513 Both a valid concern with fresh water becoming harder to come by and more of it being wasted through pollution and degradation. At some point we will need to engineer a solution to rebuild the Polar IceCaps. At that point, I think we will be very ready to explore Mars and begin the process of re engineering it for life- but to do it there, we will start with a planet father from the Solar energy source and a dead core. the challenges on Earth will only set the stage for later and larger ones. Like mining the nickle- iron asteroids and other materials floating around in the asteroid belt.
@@fredericrike5974 You recon, we first have to terraform Earth before attempting Mars :o) Yup. For the obvious choice - nuclear energy - on Mars the challenge is cooling. Here on Earth fresh water is not a problem as long as we have enough energy - there are many solutions for desalination, all of them pretty energy intensive, but some can use excess heat from other processes. There is _one_ feasible solution for "rebuilding polar ice caps" - stop CO2 emissions. Forget geoengineering - all those schemes are orders of magnitude more difficult, expensive and risky than weaning ourselves from 19th century energy technology.
One of the main problems/arguments about the problem of producing renewable energy is not consistent or is at a peak when demand is low could be solved by production of H from water and using it as a fuel. This is basically the best alternative to storing the energy without batteries and the closest to fuel while having no waste.
One word of warning regarding using H2 as fuel. If the H2 is sourced from H20 all is well. However if the H2 is sourced from hydrocarbons then there is more CO2 put into the atmosphere. Not surprisingly it is the hydrocarbon industry lobbyists who are spruking H2 from hydrocarbons. The hydrocarbon industry is either addicted to the product of their industry or they are just lazy bastards who are not willing to change their ways.
I had dreamed up an inflatable tail for the truck trailers, that can be deflated and automatically tucked away when backing up to a loading dock. In my dream the tail was bright 🍊🌞, but any colour would do.🌴🌎
I'm pretty sure I've seen similar tails on semi's, I believe in America. They looked to be made of fiberglass or plastic. I have no idea how they are retracted. I'm surprised at the efficiency gains stated in the video.
@Alex Craig Thanks! I think I was just looking at the wind tunnel images, and the balloon idea just fit the color enhanced image. Might need some extended taillights in the inflatable tail, but it could also cushion any rear end collisions... 🚚💦🚌
Exceptions include EVs that charged exclusively on coal power, which has a 25% efficiency at the power plant, compared to the 35% of ICE car engines and the 70% of natural gas based electricity (meaning in most places, yes, EVs are more efficient)
@@specialopsdave well your numbers are not right, best modern ICE engines have an efficiency of around 30-35% for gasoline and 40-45% for diesel. There are engines that can go up to 50% with both fuels but are not used in cars due to the price. Steam turbines have a top efficiency of 50%, older turbines have less. Due to the fact that these turbines are used for decades before being replaced there are a lot of turbines in use that are less than 50% efficiency. It is true that not all the cars on the road have the best and the latest engines so it's a close match situation. In fact when you factor in transportation losses for the electricity, charging losses and the efficiency of the conversion of electrical energy into mechanical energy you will see that ev's have less efficiency than a modern car especially the diesel ones. The production of the batteries also leads to high CO2 emissions and we still do not recycle them (well grinding them and recycling the copper cannot be considered a success). Some people will say that also the extraction of the oil has emissions. It is true but you see, we only use 30-40% of the oil as fuel, the rest is used for the petrochemical industry which produces plastics, rubber, adhesives, pesticides, asphalt and so on, stuff we will need even if all the cars are electric, in fact electric cars need stuff made from oil so, we will continue to extract oil even if we use only electric cars but batteries are used only for electric cars.
@@specialopsdave well, it's just one number, the other ones are not "literally" the same. Maybe you have short attention and are unable to read more than 20 words before losing focus.
You completely forgot the option of moving freight from trucks to rail. Your chart at 1:57 shows that rail contributes only 1% of global CO2 emissions from transport. In the USA, According to Popular Science, in 2013 "Rail moves 40 percent of freight as measured in ton-miles but is responsible for only 8 percent of freight transportation carbon emissions" and "Trucks move 29 percent of the freight ton-miles, but are responsible for 77 percent of the sector’s emissions." This is despite, most if not all freight trains in the USA use the same diesel fuel as trucks. This just shows how inefficient trucks are compared to trains. In Europe, according to eurostat, in 2018 "road transport accounted for three-quarters (75.3 %) of the total inland freight transport (based on tonne-kilometres performed)" and "Rail transport accounted for 18.7 % of the EU total." This is abysmally poor and given so many lines in Europe are electrified, carbon reductions could be even more substantial than they are in the USA. see: www.popsci.com/power-trip-excerpt/ and ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Freight_transport_statistics#Rail_transport
Some of the extra cost for trucks is the last mile cost where trucks have to deal with traffic congestion and multi stop routes in places where there will never be a financial payback to building a rail line, but your point remains extremely valid, especially for the EU in terms of room for improvement. US rail freight benefits from having vast distances across the country where there are almost no large population centers, so the trains can run long distance (As well as being kms long) without changing speed, giving the best possible efficiency per ton of cargo carried. The more uniformly distributed population in Europe means it can't hit the US figures using the same methods, but Europe has been building rail infrastructure a lot longer than the US, and they have more of it. Trucks are also effectively subsidised by the governments of every country because they get to use the roads, which are government funded, without paying in proportion to the damage they do to them. For trains, the train company has to build the infrastructure as well as run the trains, so it's not even a fair competition, which is why truck freight has grown so much.
@@JustHaveaThink Thanks Dave. I know the episode was about road freight. It just seems to me that the best way to reduce the emissions from trucks is to use a significantly more efficient method of transport and while you may not have had time to go into details, not even mentioning it seemed to be an oversight. One resource to look at when doing your video on Rail Freight is www.freightwaves.com/news/why-is-europe-so-absurdly-backward-compared-to-the-u-s-in-rail-freight-transport
He is a NWO guy and thinks it is only science and nefarious plans do not exist. Cognitive dissonance. Watch some of the Drs, Scientists speak up recently when realizing what is coming for a bad flu. They say nothing to the flu, but the lockdowns and social distancing and the Astrozeneca vaccine are very worried as as they say from 40 years in the immunology, testing, psychology world and well respected people. The science being pushed right now does not add up and has no purpose but to scare, fear people into a deadly unknown dehumanising experiment for some that is bad flu
I wonder about the maps of the world. Crimea, Tibet, Southern Mongolia (inner Mongolia), and many more areas are arguable. Let's not even start on the South China sea.
Great content as always. Thank you. I very much like the diagrams that show the context of the subject you're discussing and the scale of it's impact. I find that I'm pausing the video to examine them more closely. Perhaps you could make this a regular repeating graphic as you add content. Big picture info is invaluable when discussing these concepts with friends.
Yes. I own a Tesla car in North America, and would give up their proprietory plug in an instant. CCS is comparatively clumsy but could be the world standard we need.
@@TheDoomWizard I could design you the part in a car that would work on either. Power MOSFETs are now good enough at prices mere mortals can afford. The first step in most AC systems is to make a high and very ripply DC voltage. Getting DC through that stage is easy(ish) On AC systems, the next step is a thing called "Power factor correction". This ensures that the current stays in step with the voltage and doesn't jump around wildly. When DC comes in, part of that circuit is switched out but the jumps in current part still works. Next is the part that does the conversion to the battery voltage. That runs from the DC out of the "power factor correction" so it is the same.
@@lubricatedgoat CCS? Gack. How about other cars adopt Tesla's design? Didn't Elon offer patents to other car makers for free? I don't know if that included the charging interface or not.
Oh! A fancy new Just Have a Pessimistic Rainy Mood Think title! ;) According to Tesla, the range of its BEV trucks fully loaded will be over 550 miles. If you can add 300 (or was it 400?) miles of range with a 30 minutes supercharging session, that's a 800+ miles long haul right there, no need to even consider hydrogen fuel cells. Now, other mainstream truck companies may not have such efficient designs and battery cells, so they may think they need to dive into liquid hydrogen, but I think it's really short term thinking. Both production and distribution at the scale required would be hugely expensive too. Hydrogen from cheap natural gas is already much more expensive than diesel, it would take years for green hydrogen to reach that level, and it still wouldn't be competitive-enough for businesses to switch over if there is no subsidy to cover that difference. Transportation has very tight margins, so they can't switch just for the sake of the planet and the people, as sad as it is. Only BEV trucks allow them to save money, both on "fuel" and maintenance, especially the more they drive. There will be more efficient-enough battery cells by the next couple years, including tabless 4680 cells by regular cell manufacturers, and supercharging would make even a 2-driver day-and-night crew from Tierra del Fuego to Anchorage work fine. Assuming they manage to link the TransAmazonian to Panama one day... If LFP lithium-ion battery cell tech keeps progressing as fast as it has been lately, it would actually be the best tech for trucks, because it allows to discharge down to 0% and supercharge up to 100% with barely any degradation of battery cell life expectancy. Right now, it's less energy-dense as cobalt/nickel-based lithium-ion cells, but you can't supercharge these up to 100% of battery capacity without degradation, so you can't achieve the range allowed by this energy density anyway. LFP is cheaper and uses less controversial minerals too. These are really interesting years for people like us who get more excited by battery cells than cute boys or girls.
LFP Tesla trucks with pantograph charge points, sections, with redox grid substation charge hubs, all this makes Giga Berlin very interesting, very interesting indeed, as their trucks will meet high speed Chinese trains coming along the silk road (BRI). Now we just need to freeze the design and get on with it, (that means no political or economic interference)
@@williamgoode9114 We should indeed bury as much stuff as we can underground. The ground is too precious to waste as a parking lot or big stacks of batteries. So far, cities have been developing only horizontally and vertically in one direction, from ground to sky. I guess we won't see much underground development before a century or two, but we could get started with new buildings, such as charging stations or at least their battery stacks.
@@Chimel31 so the embedded energy in removing the volume of soil to build your house, rather than the same volume of air, not mention moisture in soil, agreed some places have basements, but its called TrumpTowers for a reason, not Trump Basements. Its like Elon with his mile of boring tunnel rather than Flyover Rail.
@@williamgoode9114 Rather the opposite, dwellings should be above ground. But inevitably, in some centuries, there will be a conflict between pouring concrete on good fertile flat land, and the increase in farming needed for a growing population. It's already a concern now. As far as public transportation is concerned, I live in a city with both (automated) underground and street tram networks, and while the tram is great for short distances for leisure activities like going to the movies (if your movie theater is on the same tram line), it is painfully slow for any daily commute or longer trips like going to the airport. Now for intercity transportation, an underground network does not make sense, except for inland megalopolises, or maybe countries that didn't build an extensive railways network and it would now cost an arm and a leg to buy the properties required for one.
I love this topic, most goes straight over my head but I am just so please it is receiving the attention of industry and the public, it urgently needs to!
Why do we need long haul trucks when there are already extensive rail networks in many countries? Instead of electrifying the highways, invest in electric railroads. Point to point transport is overrated with smaller trucks or vans better suited for distributions.
@@rockon7848 Tesla have to withdraw beta 3, so beta 4 is at best, a correction. NTSB said Full self driving is misleading and irresponsible. And they are right, you still have to monitor and make corrections, it’s only level two autonomy and nowhere close to robotaxi ‘drive by itself and make you tons of money’ good.
@@madsam0320 Do you know what "Beta test" means? Of course it's still rated level 2 at Tesla's request while the beta test is running, that is the point.
The electrification of trucking does seem to offer a great opportunity for grid balancing using V2G technology. The size of the batteries involved and the high usage factors make it interesting for trucking companies to participate in what for car owners is a marginal benefit.
5:35 That chart looks wrong. Fossil diesel has 1.0x written next to it. However the CO2 is not just from the exhaust, all the crude oil need to be processed to get fossil diesel. According to the Fully Charged youtube channel it takes 5.5 times more CO2 emissions to process fossil fuels compared to the CO2 that comes out of the exhaust. If you take into account the emissions in processing the fossil fuel you will not have 1.0x written there.
I expect they've taken that into account, since the chart is about fuel production, not tailpipe emissions. The "1.0x" simply implies a baseline. _[Edit]_ Having scanned through the report I can confirm that the numbers are based upon a full life cycle assessment (LCA) of each fuel. In the case of fossil fuels that includes extraction, transport, refining and distribution. The authors seem to have gone to great lengths to ensure the accuracy of their models and are open about its shortcomings. Some factors that cannot be accurately ascertained will add to the overall GHG emissions for both fossil fuels and biodiesel/bioethanol. The results are still pretty conclusive that certain fuels, such as palm oil, are terrible for the environment.
Good point. What about the C02 produced extracting the crude, shipping it, refining it into diesel then shipping it again to the filling station? We know biofuels are not the answer but I do wonder if the full energy cost of FF before they get to the vehicle are taken into account
@@kiae-nirodiaries1279 It specifically says in the small print that it's a lifecycle analysis of fuel *production.* It's about the impact of land use change to produce biodiesel compared to fossil fuel production, *not* the CO2 released by burning fuel. Here's the original article: www.transportenvironment.org/press/biodiesel’s-impact-emissions-extra-12m-cars-our-roads-latest-figures-show
Hi Janosh. Here's the link. I'll also add it in the description section. www.transportenvironment.org/press/biodiesel%E2%80%99s-impact-emissions-extra-12m-cars-our-roads-latest-figures-show All the best. Dave
on line shopping is not as bad as people think if you look at the bigger picture if a delivery truck is delivering 20 items that is effectively 19 cars not on the road as those people have not had to go out to get their items
Reminds me of Rowan Atkinson's "We love trucking". Joking aside, we should have pantographs to help trucks and buses recharge during travelling. My country, Brazil, has almost no rails anymore and relies on trucks.
Aah, remember when America's EPA was on the leadership team of the world's collective thinking on these important issues. All they needed was a president with a brain. Fortunately they'll have one on Jan 20th. Sorry, Dave, everybody to bring that excretafest of a situation up here, and on a Sunday evening too, but America has been sneezing while we talk climate issues for the last four years. Hopefully the new guy can make a difference. Peace & Love y'all.
unfortunately he's going to be hamstrung by lack of control in the Senate who will of course block anything and everything that Biden and team will try to do - I fear it's still going to be a looong 4 years and yet more inaction on climate change..
You missed the part where buying locally would have the largest and quickest impact on emissions, not likely to happen when it's much cheaper from another country.
Preface: I am a political science student studying on the issues and effectiveness of various methods of regulation/deregulation on environmental politics so take what I say with a grain of salt as I am actively researching this topic but not omnipotent. The EPA the Obama administration, while a great push towards a green future, came with the loss of numerous jobs especially in industries such as coal. Additionally the amount of regulation pushed away companies from pushing beyond the minimum. This issue is known as "the race to the bottom" as companies all try to do the minimum they can to meet regulations. Without regulation we see companies such as Microsoft and Amazon and Delta making pushes to become carbon neutral or even carbon negative. The issue with this is while companies like Microsoft are looking to reduce emissions and recapture carbon (aiming to be carbon negative in the next few years) companies like Delta are buying carbon offsets and then using said existing offset (a plot of land in the woods for example) and tearing it down after its done being considered an offset for other purposes. This is driven by investors including a major one (who I forgot the name of atm, if interested just comment and I will respond for anybody interested.) who after sending letters to invested companies, the companies made more of a push to environmental caution and protection. This isnt to say that we need no regulation but the amount of regulation such as that during the Obama administration hurt jobs and led a lot of companies strive to do the minimum rather than push beyond due to a lack of gain from going beyond. Additionally some regulations such as those on nuclear reactors make nuclear energy, a cleaner form of energy than most current forms of energy (excluding mining and construction emissions which are also there in solar and wind energy) much less viable. Some reactors are needing to be entirely redesigned due to updated methods to preserve safety are being shut down putting more reliance on coal and oil overall hurting the environment given that the reactors themselves are still in safe conditions. If we want to make a push for better regulations of emissions it would be better to set a minimum regulation, increase carbon/emission tax, and add tax breaks to companies that go beyond minimum to incentivize more being done. Additionally the introduction of micro-reactors, water pump batteries, and other more renewable tech would be a great stride to environmental protections. That and the alteration of current construction methods as concrete is one of the largest co2 emitting industries, and most construction equipment burning a lot of fuel to function. Greenspaces, public gardens, incorporating fruit trees into public spaces, and a push towards bamboo replacing trees in most paper products also can help although this is more of a city scale than the EPA creating regulations. Overall this is just a few things that can help out and I hope this provides some insight into pros and cons of regulation.
@@jaydenwiener4899 absolutely correct, it's obvious than using a stick won't work - companies will just do the bare minimum and that's all. They need to be incentivized to do things better, and done in such a way that doesn't hurt the economy whilst making the swing across to sustainable technologies. Perhaps the death of traditional manufacturing in 1st world countries isn't such a bad thing, as now we have a perfect opportunity to re-tool towards sustainable and renewable tech instead. (and reduce the reliance on certain other countries who seek to capitalize)
See the sky properly for the first time in decades? Must be nice. This half of the US has been on fire for the past few (several?) months, so whatever reduction in pollution there has been, it's been more than offset by the wildfire smoke.
Wildfire smoke is renewable energy after a forest burns it eventually grows back recapturing the carbon from the fire, a natural cycler process. But not so natural or nice for the poor people who build their houses near the forest!
@@stevetaylor2818 No one is getting usable energy from wildfire smoke. It is in no way renewable energy. There is a natural cycle of forest fires here, and it's true that the regrowth of these forests will eventually recapture the carbon released in the flames, if they manage to grow back to the same extent. I wasn't thinking about co2 in my comment though. That doesn't affect visibility. It's the particulate matter that causes the haze and loss in visibility.
Imagine that...driving your rig back from a delivery out near a regional wind farm/solarfarm and charging up, then heading back down hill to the big smoke to stabilise the grid...bonus income for the truckers i recon! Incentivise that for Australia please!
Improving technology and efficiency is a great thing and happens mostly in the wealthiest countries. I like the idea of electric road systems at 11:30 into this video, but I wouldn't say I like the look of all those cables and lines (hideous). Sweeden has a system where the electricity is on the road itself and looks much better. th-cam.com/video/YjAlsxUOGzQ/w-d-xo.html. At 8.03 you talk about China leading the way, but you should also point out that China produces 55 -58%% plus energy from coal power ( world leaders in coal) and to add to that it has ongoing future consents/plans that exceed the whole of the USA. It seems to like all energy, including significant investments in Nuclear etc. I think it is fair to say that China is not too concerned about the climate more about pollution and expanding its lead in world manufacturing. China is on track to be the world leaders by 2025, and with that will they will be able to dominate more of their way. ( Which is very different from most democratic countries ) Meanwhile, the righteous/dogmatic believers like yourself who want to return to a simplistic village isolated lifestyle will go down that track. If you get enough followers, you will end up in a country that will have much less of a say and worse off. Ask, and you will receive, so it's quite simple you ask for more not less.
We can have trains instead of trucks, right? And batteries are good enough; we don't need cables when truck drivers are forced to take breaks. But self-driving? That may overhead cables.
Regarding the turbulence at the rear of the trailer acting as a brake. I was told decades ago that this turbulence adds a negligible amount to the drag of the truck. I would pay more attention to the gap between the tractor and the trailer. Here the turbulence adds significantly to the drag on the vehicle. It should be a simple thing to reduce the drag at this point on the truck.
Those things you see standing up on the tractor are to stop the energy going into the air between tractor and trailer. With that reduced, almost all the air drag ends up being the high pressure in front and the low pressure behind. The fancy fold out thing does a 10% reduction in total air drag which is not peanuts. BTW: There is a design for one of those that folds out due to the force creating the drag. There need not be motors. Also under the trailer, they are adding things that hang down to stop turbulence there.
@@kensmith5694 Exactly the opposite way round is more viable actually Stationary electric unless you need really high heat industrial processes is best to electrify. Storage can be in Power to hydrogen to power though. Always good to have a green long term backup
The problem with this discussion is that it begs the questions of what freight trucks should be used for. Ideally, all long distance freight will be by rail. Trucks should be used only for short distance work such as delivering products from the train station to their delivery destination.
Mixed review: good to call attention to this issue, but Nikola section was already outdated and hydrogen issues are far more substantial than those you mentioned.
Trying to discredit claims against Nikola by only pointing to one person, and saying they have a short position...and just broadly mentioning the shit show that is their advertising as "some troubles"...reeks of dishonesty. Y'know.... Considering the class action law suits going on about deceptive advertising to investors. First and foremost, a clip of the video shown here was the major culprit... Looks like a truck driving down a road, yeah? Well...it was actually towed to the top of a hill and let go. "We never said it was driving. We said it was in motion! We were never falsely advertising! Yeah, I took tens of millions of dollars from the company to buy a new mansion, without ever producing anything, but I wasn't falsely advertising anything. " "I don't care if I have a history of scamming investors. It's their fault they don't look into my history."
@@ptonpc I mean, this guy's always been something of a loon. But I do enjoy following him. He's a really good source of "Hey, there's something interesting going on in the Green space, go check it out."
There's a new peer reviewed article stating this.... Even if we went to zero emissions tomorrow, the catastrophic heat levels are coming.... The only hope in my opinion is MEER reflection project (along with de-growth), which Guy McPherson has been sharing about recently.... We can use mirrors to reflect sunlight locally on a massive scale to buy us time.... This is one form of geoengineering that isn't more dangerous than doing nothing...
Improving truck efficiency is certainly a worthwhile goal. But I suspect that freight trucks are getting a bum rap because they are more visible . I would love to see a comparison of the green house gas (GHG) production for a chair or desk delivered to a home by UPS compared with the GHG production of driving for 45 minutes (to get a great price) and hauling the load back home in a family vehicle (such as an SUV).
The first step is a new power grid. You need huge amounts of electrical power to make hydrogen. Adding an automatic spinnaker system to cargo ships would help a lot too. Many of them already try to sail down wind as much as they can. A fairly simple system could provide most of the energy needed for each crossing of the ocean.
@@kensmith5694 I see huge potential with Australia and Saudi Arabia in the production of Green Hydrogen. Australia has the political will. Saudi doesn't. We need production of hydrogen at all the major sea routes. Australia is building a huge solar power plant which will produce electricity for Singapore. Need collective action to overcome this hurdle. Use of solar , wind , tidal energy to produce electricity for the production of hydrogen is needed which is where Australia wins.
Or we could use depressurized tunnels which could transport people and cargo at 700+ MPH using modest amounts of renewable energy. It's not clear that we can make that technology work (economically) but it looks possible. And we should know within five years. It's all about tunneling costs, the rest is demonstrated. -------- The English Channel has a maximum depth of 571 feet and a length of 31 miles. The Bering Strait has a maximum depth of 164 feet and is 53 miles wide. Imagine traveling and shipping freight between Europe/Asia and North America non-stop at over 700 MPH. We would need no planes except for rapid travel to islands. And we would need ships only for very large items, maybe.
Utah State University is testing an autonomous bus that drives over chargers built into a track. The idea is to eventually have a truck able to drive from San Francisco to New York non-stop.
I guess we’ll have a better indication of ‘the real Nikola’ from the 1st Dec onwards. It’s very pleasing seeing the likes of BYD, Volvo, Scania, Mercedes, and of course Tesla, addressing electric transport.
it's amazing of how people seriously underestimate hydrogen as fuel even for this type of transportation, somehow people put the category of electrolysis of water on the same level with nuclear fusion
They seem to come from the Elon-Telsa echo chamber, they are fool cells after all. A bunch of simpletons who don't see their arguing points are the same ones the oil industry used against the first EV's.
Storing hydrogen in liquid or gas form is very difficult on a mobile platform. Also, processing hydrogen isn't economically and energy beneficially viable from electrolysis right now. hydrogen is currently sourced from crude rather than water.
@@instanoodles Nonsense. Most of the arguments are closer to the initial arguments against combustion cars, but even that's not truly accurate. The point is economical in nature. Why use expensive hydrogen when you would have to rebuild the entire current-day oil infrastructure to make the switch, only even more expensive since hydrogen is so hard to store, when you can (for the most part) just tap into the existing electricity network at much higher efficiency and much lower cost? What little additional infrastructure is needed is much cheaper than having to build hydrogen fueling stations, plus it's just plain the superior technology.
Electric and hydrogen both have promise. Will there be a place for nuclear energy in all this? Been hearing a bit about nuclear and modular reactors. Climate change is a thing we should address. However I think it's a bit political. The alarm and near panic is not wise. At least not to the extent some seem to want. I do like the idea of more delivery instead of shopping requiring vehicles to get to stores. Not to mention being stuck in traffic. I drove trucks before retiring. Most traffic jams were cars. Delivery would go a long way. Work from home will benefit society not only due to less traffic, but also from less stress being stuck in traffic.I enjoy your videos. Informative and put it terms easy to digest. Good work.
Tesla has the complete solution. Emulating that, and scaling that, is all we need to proceed with. Hydrogen is woefully inefficient in terms of electrolysis. Making hydrogen is a waste of electricity.
You missed Hyliion. While they have an electric truck in competition with Tesla and Nikola, they also have a power train system on the market internationally. That retrofits existing fleets so they can drastically reduce emissions, while being able to save money against the nosebleed costs for operators of jumping into full electric prices. They already sell internationally and Ark investments selected them 2 years ago as the only company to allocate their blank check fund, tortoise holding co, to merge with. They're an international player in the hand off to full electric that keeps transportation going and in the right direction
Love your solid information & clear presentation, free of hype & excessive bias. We've seen how gullible we humans can be over the last decade, and there's a real need for overviews untainted by personal or group interest. The broader the vision the better. May your contribution to the wellbeing of humanity be a source of blessing to us all. Cheers.
Getting a mass moving from a standing start is where the most energy is used so if trucks could use electric, Hybrid obviously, as an interim solution, at least this may reduce pollution, especially around towns and built up areas.
I am still surprised there isn't already utility and cargo vans available to the public. Many contract workers whether in courier or trades would jump on these things. I know Ford will be making a transit for around $45000 for US/Canada soon, but I think a smaller vehicle in the 25-35 range would do very well.
Winter, don't confuse this discussion with hard facts. This reminds me of a discussion with a highly intelligent co-worker about solar power. I asked, "What do you do when the sun goes down and the machines still need power?" He said, "that's a problem but the future may take care of that." I was looking at a wall wishing to pound my head.
Perhaps what we could do with on long distance freight routes is to have all of the trailers to be connected together and have just one engine at the front?
If truck movements were at night ,then the batteries banks can be charged during the day via solar . For linehaul we can have rapid swap out battery packs . Linehaul is suited to autonomous vehicles ,which in turn could mean we could swap tractor units at staging posts every few hundred miles or so. This way the weight of batteries and quantity needed overall could be reduced, with less wear and tear on roading networks. Linehaul should be moved to rail of some description though ,imo, which infrastructure can easily be incorporated to a power distribution network.
Great video. Would be great if you could do a deeper dive into road freight solutions being implemented today at scale, like BEV truck survey. Lots of companies working on BEV trucks.
Hydrogen fuel is not zero-emission... It produces water vapor. As water vapor is a green house gaz, will water vapor from hydrogen fuel cell could increase global warming? Should we worry trading one problem with another problem?
the panto graph system would be a good idea however, again, this would take time to install the infrastructure and possibly cause disruption on the roads, whereas battery and or hydrogen can be installed away from the road system
There is a catch with buying local though. If you live in Scotland and you buy a apple grown in a greenhouse heated by burning coal, the CO2 footprint, is far higher than growing it in a outdoor orchard in a warmer climate and shipping it to Scotland.
The truck system with overhead power lines running along the road looks very like an electric railway system. How much difference would there be in the cost of electrifying all of the rail system and this road based system? The rail system is already there and in many parts of Europe there are abandoned railway routes that could be brought back into service.
I am a truck driver and I remember last year when I was working in Sweden I've seen the Scania trucks on a closed bit of highway testing the trucks. It is a very smart idea to fit the highway with such a sistem, this way the most amount of time you don't use the batteries so you don't need them to be as big and it also solves the need for huge batteries that have to give the range a truck would drive in a day. Hidrogen seem interesting but in the end we have to find better ways to produce elclectron juice otherwise zero emmission my ass
Certainly electric makes sense in inner city and this will help ease demand on diesel and extend our supply until realistic solutions can be provided for longer distances. Slow adoption is important but even more so they should not distract from passenger cars.
Yes...in part.The answer also certainly also includes photo voltaic panels to charge the batteries. You now have a complete zero co2 emission cycle for all our power needs. Something the third richest american has been hard at work at for many years. He alone is causing havoc with big oil. He runs Tesla. And pv panel efficiency is improving daily, and it's price is plummeting daily. There is hope. We must boycott the bad corporate capitalist consumerist guys, and change our ways of consumption toward quality existence and not quantity existence.
@@davidkreimer2970 I live in Scotland next to a 100 acre field, so its home made wind turbines and batteries. We have access to cheaper and better tech than Tesla. ICE manufacturers are getting desperate.... Ford Transit launch is fake.... and they won't make it. I am trying to get Shell as an alternative energy supplier of UK TV.
I'd never heard of that "electric road system" for e-trucks before, but it makes so much sense! Thanks Dave!
Electric trains are more efficient.
No it doesn't, it has a huge cost of implementation for no gain compared to getting improvements into Li-Ion batteries.
One question that immediately comes to mind with overhead electric trucks is how is the grounding sorted out in the case of an electrical fault making the truck body live? I think a lot of the train systems ground through the tracks all the time, so the pantograph connects to live wires only - this won't work for a rubber tyred truck, so both live and ground need to be overhead, giving the pantograph a more difficult job, as it has to connect properly to 2 wires at all times and cannot be allowed to short them out. Oversize loads shorting these wires would be another risk, since this is on public roads.
The overhead highway system could be great , but how do you control how many trucks at a time are allowed to connect to a section of line .. ?
Even a phev style artic could be a great improvement on a conventional truck , , maybe just an electric style truck with a smaller battery and a diesel electric generator running optimally ..
@@JeremyHamaoui I think you might be right. Rail\line like systems here usually run into billions just for crossing a country in europe for example. And what do you need a rail for when trucks drive themselves? It probably is better to invest that into batteries indeed. You could argue less rare earth materials used in rail systems like this. But I also doubt that considering battery advancements and the huge amount of materials needed for these lines as well.
I don't comment much on your videos since your success has vastly exceeded the need for my encouragement, but I never miss your postings and appreciate your ability to fill in the gaps in my understanding of technological developments to arrest an increasingly uncomfortable future (if I might appropriate a little British understatement). Thanks Dave.
Cheers Tom. Thanks for your support and feedback. Very much appreciated. All the best. Dave
I think that Amazon's relatively huge order of EV vans from Rivian deserved a mention, as did a rapidly growing offering of battery electric light commercial vehicles in Europe.
yep, if Amazon is doing something big then you know it's a good idea. They would also be supporting a big charging grid around the country, and hopefully done with some sort of sustainable power source rather than just grid
I watched huge lines of dock trucks in Yokohama, all diesel ticking over very sad
@@williamgoode9114 Well, _that_ would be a perfect use case for road-embedded inductive charging.
@@bazoo513 except there is thousand fold energy transfer metal to metal than air gapped, compare charging your toothbrush to your shaver
@@williamgoode9114 I grow bull beard and use old fashioned manual toothbrushes, so I can't compare, but the efficiency of the latest resonant wireless charging circuits is at least 80%.
only 35% of class 8 trucks are used for long distance trucking. 65% are used for short range {100 to 250 miles a day} use, and are parked in the same place every night. They also are not loaded to the full weight capacity so they could use smaller batteries that would recharge faster. You forgot to mention that Kenworth is taking orders for class 8 battery electric trucks now in the United states.
As a truck driver I would love to see these changes happen rapidly. It would be awesome to be apart of.
That is very selfless of you, given that no next-generation truck will have a human driver while the truck is on the highway.
@@richardcaldwell6159 that's coming either way so hopefully at least the benefit to the planet for my grandchildren will give me some comfort
We are decades away from self driving trucks....here in the USA we have road construction companies controlled by Democrats, as well as the union workers....the roads are made to fall apart, and to be rebuilt every few years...
I just had a think, "just have a think" is the best channel on youtube!!!! Great video as always!!!!
We can't really talk about energy efficiency without addressing Jevon's Paradox....
As we become more efficient, historically, we just consume more, unless we completely change the incentive structures of our economies....
As of now, there's little effort at de-growth by corporations and the wealthy, who use most of the resources....
They are much more likely to use limits as austerity measures for the poor, so we should really be clear about how to reduce impact while also providing for the working class....
It's crazy to think technology could fix this predicament without us having to change our ways, which makes this political and much more difficult...
We all need to evolve our ideas around what we consider environmental justice, as well as social justice (this is already so contentious, so nuance and compassion are needed)....
Thanks for sharing this content, it's the most important topic in the world for us to have a think about....
@NEAR TERM EXTINCTION - HUMAN
I agree!
I feel I've been bashing my head against this wall for decades, trying to understand how the human animal can both call itself sapiens and be so incredibly ignorant to its own detriment, even extinction....
The defense mechanisms that have been implanted into our minds since childhood run so deep, that denial seems to be the most common response to the dread that addressing climate change requires....
We can't even have a realistic conversation yet, and the recent censorship rounds indicate even more apathy in the works....
Environmentalists are already considered terrorists by the sick ruling class
Dave has discussed Jevon's Paradox in an earlier episode, can't remember which one though. I fully agree that technologic innovation is nice, but a true revolution of our society is needed to really changes things around. Have you read Noami Klein's "This Changes Everything"?
Facts. I came to same conclusion my channel. The ogliarchs only see profit.
@NEAR TERM EXTINCTION - HUMAN You're a deluded fantasist.
Read Shellenberger's 'Apocalypse Never' and engage with reality.
The capitalistic system will be our downfall.
Another well rounded video, thanks!
A few points:
1) Put the container on an electric train for the long distances. This removes the need for moving the big battery too.
2) Nicola Motors appears to be a scam.
3) For short range, an electric truck costs less to run.
4) In most places the 1st investment should be in the electric grid.
Good points 👍
Your 4th point should be no.1 and in bold capitals. If we had massive investment in green energy production, lowering the cost dramatically, there'd be no need for legislation as switching to electric would be a no-brainer. Money talks.
..another inspiring roundup of news thanks Dave. J
Great video, amazing research and brilliantly presented.
Thanks Frederick. I really appreciate that feedback.
I really enjoy the content and your extremely pleasant delivery. Liked and subscribed. 👍
So we are re-inventing the electric train which goes across Europe in any directions. We just need to have small trucks to do the final deliveries
Good video! Brings more clarity to the questions involved!
A critical area that has been shunted aside for a long time; thanks for covering this topic Dave!
Thanks, Dave! Very informative and interesting, as always. Keep it up!
NIKOLA - So why is the recent deal with GM, not involve using either the NIKOLA fuel cell or battery?
And why did they recently admit filming the NIKOLA One truck rolling down a hill and not under it’s own power?
And why are they currently being investigated by both the SEC and the Department of Justice for fraud and deception.
I would be careful what you say about NIKOLA!
I know man......the mother of all scams nikola....my theory is big oil/auto is behind nikola...
@@alexthetrucker8168 That's just a baseless conspiracy theory. Trevor Milton is behind the Nikola fraud, Nikola isn't even his first scam, he is a shady con artist, a snake-oil salesman, and he belongs in prison.
@@sharefactor i dunno....he must be backed up...
Snake-oil salesman ... so ... small oil rather than big oil?
Excellent channel. Love your in depth analysis of upcoming new Tech.
Your new titles are fancy indeed!
You've put alot of research into that!! I very much enjoyed! Thank you.
It's lovely. Tesla has dragged all these vehicle manufacturers kicking and screaming into the modern world. How many would now be developing electric vehicles of all types if Tesla had not threatened their market share.
Umm all of them actually. Blockbuster don't make trucks - nor does Tesla yet.
@@darrennewmanuk I am highly skeptical Darren. The best we have seen from legacy vehicle manufacturers are compliance vehicles which in most case have left a lot to be desired. Tesla has proven that EV's can out perform ICE vehicles in almost every category that counts. Range and simplicity of refueling are almost fully addressed but all others have been fully surpassed. It is those successes that have made others recognize the potential of EV's...you may be right that the change would come eventually but I suspect the planet would be uninhabitable long before that would happen...and it still may be.
NISSAN LEAF WAS ONE OF THE FIRST ELECTRIC CARS,I THINK BEFORE TESLA OR AT THE SAME TIME,AND NISSAN IS A CONVENTIONAL ICE CAR MAKER,ALSO RENAULT HAD ELECTRIC CARS A LONG TIME AGO,LIKE THE MEGANE ELECTRIC WITH AN BETTERY CHANGING SYSTEM ,THAT ALOWED TO CHANGE AN EMPTY BATERRY FOR A FULL CHARGED BATTERY AT A SPECIAL CHARGING STATION
TESLA ON THE OTHER HAND HAS AN HUGE PR AND MARKETING SYSTEM
@@dovstruzer7887 If you want people to read what you write, please remember to un-caps lock it. Caps locking just make people skip your comment altogether. (Indeed, I have no idea what you wrote.)
Tesla is no sizeable threat, they are only a niche manufacturer that has yet turn a annual profit. Most auto manufacturers have single vehicle lines that make more vehicles than all of Tesla's production, Ford F-series is only sold in North America and out sells Tesla 3 to 1.
Electric road system. Croydon had "trolly busses" Using this system up to the early 1960's when the wires were taken down and diesel busses took their place. Not convinced by battery powered trucks as the battery weights seriously reduce cargo capacity or will increase road loadings.
Hoping battery cost continue to fall, not a big fan of over head power cables everywhere, gives me the heebies! plus a clear sky is always a good thing for peace of mind.
Thank you so much for your contributions! :D
Will not need government regulation to go to trucking. The cost savings will be so enormous that all tracking companies will want to go there to save a significant amount of money.
Exactly. What we are beginning to see is our move from fossil fuels being driven by the economics that favor renewable energy and battery storage. Governments did the necessary job of helping renewable energy and battery technology move out of the lab and to point where they became cost competitive. Now economics are starting to take over.
Because climate change is upon us and the cost so enormous it would be wise for governments to serve as catalysts and assist the economic forces in getting us off fossil fuels as quickly as possible.
We need more cities announcing the end of ICEV operation inside city limits. We need a price on carbon. We need targeted subsidies to get regional solar and wind infrastructure in place.
This is the beautiful part of our world going green. It will be much cheaper as well, automatically sucking up all investment eventually.
@@0xszander0
"The economic and health costs of air pollution from burning fossil fuels totaled $2.9 trillion in 2018, calculated in the form of work absences, years of life lost, and premature deaths, according to a new report by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA). The cost represents 3.3 percent of global GDP, or about $8 billion per day."
If we spent a few trillion, globally, for a very few years we could quickly leave fossil fuels behind and then save that $2.9 trillion per year for many years. Wise investment stuff.
The government involvement is needed to install the charging infrastructure. Charging infrastructure for semis is a totally different ball game than for model 3s and leafs. Need government leadership for a nationwide charging network and to plug all the holes the private sector would leave if left up to them.
@@paulmcewen7384 Tesla is installing chargers for their semis. Other semi manufacturers could do the same or buy into Tesla's system. Tesla has offered access to their Supercharger system to other car manufacturers, I assume they'd be open to letting other semi manufacturers use their truck chargers as long as the other manufacturers paid a fair share of the cost.
So many developments and projects I wasn't aware of, Dave! I'll comment in Patreon when this episode appears there.
Re: those electric roadways. I'm not sure how feasible or desirable that would be across all the highways of the world, BUT, it would provide handy infrastructure for the installation of A LOT of PV panels. I wish we'd see more "two birds with one stone" thinking when it comes to these projects.
The roads with it can be a selective few initially.
The cost per mile would be much much lower making that route gain demand and the desire to expand the network.
It is one of those things that hits a tipping point and then suddenly everyone is doing it.
@@kensmith5694 absolutely.
They got planning permisson a while for a test build on the Autobahn for recharging while driving
Solar panel "road roofs" shed water and snow so it's a three-birder. However, it could make for some interesting accidents when somebody plows through a support or two. Of course, nobody will be driving by then, so no worries?
@@richardcaldwell6159 heh, yeah I don't know about a whole roof. Was thinking of a 3-6 panels on each support pole. But when we get into electrified rail, then I think PV covered tunnels could unlock some major potential. That said, for roads and city streets I've long been enamoured with the idea of heating them to get the benefit of not having to plow them, not having to use corrosive salt, and also greatly reducing or even eliminating potholes from seasonal temperature variation. It seems challenging but doable on city streets and arterial roads in urban areas, but thousands of miles of highway? I dunno if it would ever happen.
Bigger batteries means more weight, more weight less load capacity. Best alternative I have seen recently available is a hydrogen/diesel dual fuel system.
lmao
As a truck driver I wish it could happen quicker! In the meantime lowering HGV speed limits from the 90km/h they are at the minute, at least in most of the EU and the UK, to 80 km/h could be a very quick and easy way to reduce emissions and increase fuel economy. I don’t know what exact effect on emissions it would have but you would certainly have at least a ten percent decrease in fuel usage.
That's pretty dense. Truck engines are tuned to have the most efficiency with least pollution right around 90 km/hour.
Great videos, incredibly informative with dense and valuable source material compacted into an easy to conceptualize format. Keep it up!!
The conversion from ICE to EVs is now being driven by technology and economics more than mandates. As battery costs move under $100/kWh, the unsubsidized initial purchase price of EVs will approach then surpass that of ICEs. Lifetime ownership costs of unsubidized EVs already beat ICEs. The transition will be rapid. The signs are already becoming apparent; Tesla won't lease a car to you with a buy out option, they want the EV back. Next look for the subtle elimination of long term leases on ICE. Also the petroleum distribution system does not collapse when EVs = 100%, the process of collapse begins as EVs rise as a percentage of all vehicles. There will be a point in the disruption S-curve when petroleum will get cheaper as petroleum scrambles to salvage the last bit of revenue before obsolesence. But another causality of rapid ICE collapse will be the nature of production. Automotive industrial consultant Sandy Munro explains this well; you can't run a transmission plant on one shift per day.
Yet.
I don’t believe that the need for petroleum will go away any time soon, while it might not be in combustion, it will still be in everything from the tires that the trucks run on, to the containers that the truck ships. So that s-curve might not move in the direction you seem to expect, although it might keep us in plastics and rubber longer.
Wishfull thinking mate
This was an excellent item. Thank you David. I was looking for information on exactly this topic.
Wouldn't it make sense to have battery packs on the trailers as well as the rig?
They could be charged when they're being loaded / waiting for pickup.
That's what the man said, they will have them.
And how about a wind turbine on top, to help out?🤷♂️🤣
@@gedofgont1006 You could make the trailer wheels regenerate energy while being pulled, you can recharge while you drive!.
@@gedofgont1006 What's your point? The rig will have to pull battery packs, whether they're on the rig or on the trailer.
@@instanoodles Don't all electric motors regenerate energy to be stored in the batteries whenever the vehicle brakes?
Great video again, Dave. I think electrification of commercial vehicles will be the most important step siin making EV's mainstream. The savings haulage companies will make is a no-brainer for them.
I'd add that at least in nations like the US and Australia, a lot of those truck stops for long-haul trucks are in areas colloquially known as "the middle of nowhere" with typically inexpensive land nearby, so connecting on-site storage to solar and wind to further reduce the impact on the grid would make a lot of sense.
Catenary lines are awesome! I remember seeing city buses powered by these when I visited Europe ~30 years ago.
The first step should, obviously, be rational, integrated intermodal transport where long-distance freight is done by rail, which is vastly more energy efficient and lower-carbon even when not electrified from sustainable sources. A good example is Switzerland where trucks in transit are obliged to pass as rail cargo.
Hydrogen from electrolysis, while not very energy-efficient, is a very good use of intermittently excess wind and solar power capacity, vastly better than curtailment.
Implementation in the US would be a significant problem- this intermodal approach was discussed a few decades ago and the industry had a cow.
Unfortunately, fresh water usage in electrolysis is a serious problem in many places. Many locales are having enough problems finding fresh water for drinking water, let alone for use in electrolysis for vehicles. Hydrogen is just not a good solution in many areas of the world.
And honestly, I liked the liquid air batteries the best for storing excess grid energy. It looks like a better solution. At least you don’t have to deal with the corrosiveness of hydrogen. Dave had a show on JHAT a while ago on liquid air batteries.
@@jdhwpbmbca Liquid air, compressed air, molten salt, flow batteries, second-life LiIon batteries, not to mention pumped hydro, all have their place. One size does not fit all. But here we are looking at the solution for long range trucking (and perhaps even medium haul airliners).
It would be interesting to see how far efficiency drops if one factors in reverse osmosis to produce fresh water on off-shore wind farms.
@@bazoo513 Both a valid concern with fresh water becoming harder to come by and more of it being wasted through pollution and degradation. At some point we will need to engineer a solution to rebuild the Polar IceCaps. At that point, I think we will be very ready to explore Mars and begin the process of re engineering it for life- but to do it there, we will start with a planet father from the Solar energy source and a dead core. the challenges on Earth will only set the stage for later and larger ones. Like mining the nickle- iron asteroids and other materials floating around in the asteroid belt.
@@fredericrike5974 You recon, we first have to terraform Earth before attempting Mars :o)
Yup. For the obvious choice - nuclear energy - on Mars the challenge is cooling. Here on Earth fresh water is not a problem as long as we have enough energy - there are many solutions for desalination, all of them pretty energy intensive, but some can use excess heat from other processes.
There is _one_ feasible solution for "rebuilding polar ice caps" - stop CO2 emissions. Forget geoengineering - all those schemes are orders of magnitude more difficult, expensive and risky than weaning ourselves from 19th century energy technology.
One of the main problems/arguments about the problem of producing renewable energy is not consistent or is at a peak when demand is low could be solved by production of H from water and using it as a fuel.
This is basically the best alternative to storing the energy without batteries and the closest to fuel while having no waste.
it's plagued with engineering challenges and requires 3.3x the energy compared to battery electric vehicles but there is some potential there
One word of warning regarding using H2 as fuel. If the H2 is sourced from H20 all is well. However if the H2 is sourced from hydrocarbons then there is more CO2 put into the atmosphere. Not surprisingly it is the hydrocarbon industry lobbyists who are spruking H2 from hydrocarbons. The hydrocarbon industry is either addicted to the product of their industry or they are just lazy bastards who are not willing to change their ways.
I had dreamed up an inflatable tail for the truck trailers, that can be deflated and automatically tucked away when backing up to a loading dock. In my dream the tail was bright 🍊🌞, but any colour would do.🌴🌎
I'm pretty sure I've seen similar tails on semi's, I believe in America. They looked to be made of fiberglass or plastic. I have no idea how they are retracted. I'm surprised at the efficiency gains stated in the video.
It could be like a comet's tail. Or Nyan cat to annoy the trucker and make his daughter proud.
Interesting idea 🤔💡🌎#buzzofftoxic #nonprofitleadership
@Alex Craig Thanks! I think I was just looking at the wind tunnel images, and the balloon idea just fit the color enhanced image. Might need some extended taillights in the inflatable tail, but it could also cushion any rear end collisions... 🚚💦🚌
I like it!
I watch these videos because they make me ever less hopeful.
Your optimism is genuine, but I can't believe any of it.
EVs are considerably more efficient than ICE vehicles, even when the electricity to power them is produced by burning fossil fuels.
Exceptions include EVs that charged exclusively on coal power, which has a 25% efficiency at the power plant, compared to the 35% of ICE car engines and the 70% of natural gas based electricity (meaning in most places, yes, EVs are more efficient)
lol 35% would be the wet dream of ICE manufacturers. Better go with 12% on Gas and 16% on Diesel. Whilst big power plants go by 30-35%.
@@specialopsdave well your numbers are not right, best modern ICE engines have an efficiency of around 30-35% for gasoline and 40-45% for diesel. There are engines that can go up to 50% with both fuels but are not used in cars due to the price. Steam turbines have a top efficiency of 50%, older turbines have less. Due to the fact that these turbines are used for decades before being replaced there are a lot of turbines in use that are less than 50% efficiency. It is true that not all the cars on the road have the best and the latest engines so it's a close match situation. In fact when you factor in transportation losses for the electricity, charging losses and the efficiency of the conversion of electrical energy into mechanical energy you will see that ev's have less efficiency than a modern car especially the diesel ones. The production of the batteries also leads to high CO2 emissions and we still do not recycle them (well grinding them and recycling the copper cannot be considered a success). Some people will say that also the extraction of the oil has emissions. It is true but you see, we only use 30-40% of the oil as fuel, the rest is used for the petrochemical industry which produces plastics, rubber, adhesives, pesticides, asphalt and so on, stuff we will need even if all the cars are electric, in fact electric cars need stuff made from oil so, we will continue to extract oil even if we use only electric cars but batteries are used only for electric cars.
@@crichtonjohn1187 "Your numbers are not right"
-Literally quotes the same number
@@specialopsdave well, it's just one number, the other ones are not "literally" the same. Maybe you have short attention and are unable to read more than 20 words before losing focus.
Thanks David. 10 minutes of sanity. I like you mate!
Cheers Bykermann. I appreciate that :-)
@@JustHaveaThink 👍
You completely forgot the option of moving freight from trucks to rail. Your chart at 1:57 shows that rail contributes only 1% of global CO2 emissions from transport. In the USA, According to Popular Science, in 2013 "Rail moves 40 percent of freight as measured in ton-miles but is responsible for only 8 percent of freight transportation carbon emissions" and "Trucks move 29 percent of the freight ton-miles, but are responsible for 77 percent of the sector’s emissions." This is despite, most if not all freight trains in the USA use the same diesel fuel as trucks. This just shows how inefficient trucks are compared to trains.
In Europe, according to eurostat, in 2018 "road transport accounted for three-quarters (75.3 %) of the total inland freight transport (based on tonne-kilometres performed)" and "Rail transport accounted for 18.7 % of the EU total." This is abysmally poor and given so many lines in Europe are electrified, carbon reductions could be even more substantial than they are in the USA.
see: www.popsci.com/power-trip-excerpt/ and ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Freight_transport_statistics#Rail_transport
Yes, electric rail for any sort of distance wins big on the amount of energy to move a ton some distance.
Some of the extra cost for trucks is the last mile cost where trucks have to deal with traffic congestion and multi stop routes in places where there will never be a financial payback to building a rail line, but your point remains extremely valid, especially for the EU in terms of room for improvement. US rail freight benefits from having vast distances across the country where there are almost no large population centers, so the trains can run long distance (As well as being kms long) without changing speed, giving the best possible efficiency per ton of cargo carried. The more uniformly distributed population in Europe means it can't hit the US figures using the same methods, but Europe has been building rail infrastructure a lot longer than the US, and they have more of it.
Trucks are also effectively subsidised by the governments of every country because they get to use the roads, which are government funded, without paying in proportion to the damage they do to them. For trains, the train company has to build the infrastructure as well as run the trains, so it's not even a fair competition, which is why truck freight has grown so much.
Hi Roger. I didn't forget rail. This episode was about road frieght. Iwill look at rail in a future programme. All the best. Dave
@@JustHaveaThink Thanks Dave. I know the episode was about road freight. It just seems to me that the best way to reduce the emissions from trucks is to use a significantly more efficient method of transport and while you may not have had time to go into details, not even mentioning it seemed to be an oversight.
One resource to look at when doing your video on Rail Freight is www.freightwaves.com/news/why-is-europe-so-absurdly-backward-compared-to-the-u-s-in-rail-freight-transport
An outstanding video this week - job very well done!
I like this channel, but please never again use a map of china that claims Taiwan to be part of its territory.
I doubt that was on purpose. But good catch we all do need to keep an eye on that!
Didn't they trouble with that South Carolina map at one time?
He is a NWO guy and thinks it is only science and nefarious plans do not exist. Cognitive dissonance. Watch some of the Drs, Scientists speak up recently when realizing what is coming for a bad flu. They say nothing to the flu, but the lockdowns and social distancing and the Astrozeneca vaccine are very worried as as they say from 40 years in the immunology, testing, psychology world and well respected people. The science being pushed right now does not add up and has no purpose but to scare, fear people into a deadly unknown dehumanising experiment for some that is bad flu
I wonder about the maps of the world. Crimea, Tibet, Southern Mongolia (inner Mongolia), and many more areas are arguable. Let's not even start on the South China sea.
@@ohsomiso everyone get your forks, moko is serving up a big plate of word salad
Great content as always. Thank you. I very much like the diagrams that show the context of the subject you're discussing and the scale of it's impact. I find that I'm pausing the video to examine them more closely. Perhaps you could make this a regular repeating graphic as you add content. Big picture info is invaluable when discussing these concepts with friends.
Thanks Jim. I appreciate that feedback. I will take it on board. Cheers. Dave
Countries have to agree on charger cable standards.
Lol we never agreed on DC and AC so..
Yes. I own a Tesla car in North America, and would give up their proprietory plug in an instant. CCS is comparatively clumsy but could be the world standard we need.
@@TheDoomWizard
I could design you the part in a car that would work on either.
Power MOSFETs are now good enough at prices mere mortals can afford.
The first step in most AC systems is to make a high and very ripply DC voltage.
Getting DC through that stage is easy(ish)
On AC systems, the next step is a thing called "Power factor correction".
This ensures that the current stays in step with the voltage and doesn't jump around wildly.
When DC comes in, part of that circuit is switched out but the jumps in current part still works.
Next is the part that does the conversion to the battery voltage.
That runs from the DC out of the "power factor correction" so it is the same.
@@lubricatedgoat CCS? Gack. How about other cars adopt Tesla's design? Didn't Elon offer patents to other car makers for free? I don't know if that included the charging interface or not.
Exciting Stuff ! I Love This Channel
Oh! A fancy new Just Have a Pessimistic Rainy Mood Think title! ;)
According to Tesla, the range of its BEV trucks fully loaded will be over 550 miles. If you can add 300 (or was it 400?) miles of range with a 30 minutes supercharging session, that's a 800+ miles long haul right there, no need to even consider hydrogen fuel cells.
Now, other mainstream truck companies may not have such efficient designs and battery cells, so they may think they need to dive into liquid hydrogen, but I think it's really short term thinking. Both production and distribution at the scale required would be hugely expensive too. Hydrogen from cheap natural gas is already much more expensive than diesel, it would take years for green hydrogen to reach that level, and it still wouldn't be competitive-enough for businesses to switch over if there is no subsidy to cover that difference. Transportation has very tight margins, so they can't switch just for the sake of the planet and the people, as sad as it is. Only BEV trucks allow them to save money, both on "fuel" and maintenance, especially the more they drive.
There will be more efficient-enough battery cells by the next couple years, including tabless 4680 cells by regular cell manufacturers, and supercharging would make even a 2-driver day-and-night crew from Tierra del Fuego to Anchorage work fine. Assuming they manage to link the TransAmazonian to Panama one day...
If LFP lithium-ion battery cell tech keeps progressing as fast as it has been lately, it would actually be the best tech for trucks, because it allows to discharge down to 0% and supercharge up to 100% with barely any degradation of battery cell life expectancy. Right now, it's less energy-dense as cobalt/nickel-based lithium-ion cells, but you can't supercharge these up to 100% of battery capacity without degradation, so you can't achieve the range allowed by this energy density anyway. LFP is cheaper and uses less controversial minerals too. These are really interesting years for people like us who get more excited by battery cells than cute boys or girls.
Glad you liked the titles anyway ;-)
LFP Tesla trucks with pantograph charge points, sections, with redox grid substation charge hubs, all this makes Giga Berlin very interesting, very interesting indeed, as their trucks will meet high speed Chinese trains coming along the silk road (BRI).
Now we just need to freeze the design and get on with it, (that means no political or economic interference)
@@williamgoode9114 We should indeed bury as much stuff as we can underground. The ground is too precious to waste as a parking lot or big stacks of batteries. So far, cities have been developing only horizontally and vertically in one direction, from ground to sky. I guess we won't see much underground development before a century or two, but we could get started with new buildings, such as charging stations or at least their battery stacks.
@@Chimel31 so the embedded energy in removing the volume of soil to build your house, rather than the same volume of air, not mention moisture in soil, agreed some places have basements, but its called TrumpTowers for a reason, not Trump Basements.
Its like Elon with his mile of boring tunnel rather than Flyover Rail.
@@williamgoode9114 Rather the opposite, dwellings should be above ground. But inevitably, in some centuries, there will be a conflict between pouring concrete on good fertile flat land, and the increase in farming needed for a growing population. It's already a concern now.
As far as public transportation is concerned, I live in a city with both (automated) underground and street tram networks, and while the tram is great for short distances for leisure activities like going to the movies (if your movie theater is on the same tram line), it is painfully slow for any daily commute or longer trips like going to the airport.
Now for intercity transportation, an underground network does not make sense, except for inland megalopolises, or maybe countries that didn't build an extensive railways network and it would now cost an arm and a leg to buy the properties required for one.
I love this topic, most goes straight over my head but I am just so please it is receiving the attention of industry and the public, it urgently needs to!
"Trolley-trucks" ? Well, why not?
SEA Electric in Australia are producing battery electric trucks with gross vehicle mass range from 4.5 tonne to 25 tonnes.
Why do we need long haul trucks when there are already extensive rail networks in many countries?
Instead of electrifying the highways, invest in electric railroads. Point to point transport is overrated with smaller trucks or vans better suited for distributions.
Autonomous Semi convoys will put the railroads out of business.
@@rockon7848 they have been talking about it for years, Elon said robo taxi will be ready next year.. in 2018!
@@madsam0320 have you watched any videos of FSD Beta 10.3.1?
I think 10.4 is coming out tonight,11/5.
They are getting damn close.
@@rockon7848 Tesla have to withdraw beta 3, so beta 4 is at best, a correction. NTSB said Full self driving is misleading and irresponsible. And they are right, you still have to monitor and make corrections, it’s only level two autonomy and nowhere close to robotaxi ‘drive by itself and make you tons of money’ good.
@@madsam0320 Do you know what "Beta test" means?
Of course it's still rated level 2 at Tesla's request while the beta test is running, that is the point.
The electrification of trucking does seem to offer a great opportunity for grid balancing using V2G technology. The size of the batteries involved and the high usage factors make it interesting for trucking companies to participate in what for car owners is a marginal benefit.
5:35 That chart looks wrong.
Fossil diesel has 1.0x written next to it. However the CO2 is not just from the exhaust, all the crude oil need to be processed to get fossil diesel.
According to the Fully Charged youtube channel it takes 5.5 times more CO2 emissions to process fossil fuels compared to the CO2 that comes out of the exhaust.
If you take into account the emissions in processing the fossil fuel you will not have 1.0x written there.
Can anyone provide a link to the source of that chart?
I expect they've taken that into account, since the chart is about fuel production, not tailpipe emissions. The "1.0x" simply implies a baseline.
_[Edit]_ Having scanned through the report I can confirm that the numbers are based upon a full life cycle assessment (LCA) of each fuel. In the case of fossil fuels that includes extraction, transport, refining and distribution. The authors seem to have gone to great lengths to ensure the accuracy of their models and are open about its shortcomings. Some factors that cannot be accurately ascertained will add to the overall GHG emissions for both fossil fuels and biodiesel/bioethanol. The results are still pretty conclusive that certain fuels, such as palm oil, are terrible for the environment.
Good point. What about the C02 produced extracting the crude, shipping it, refining it into diesel then shipping it again to the filling station? We know biofuels are not the answer but I do wonder if the full energy cost of FF before they get to the vehicle are taken into account
@@kiae-nirodiaries1279 It specifically says in the small print that it's a lifecycle analysis of fuel *production.* It's about the impact of land use change to produce biodiesel compared to fossil fuel production, *not* the CO2 released by burning fuel. Here's the original article: www.transportenvironment.org/press/biodiesel’s-impact-emissions-extra-12m-cars-our-roads-latest-figures-show
Hi Janosh. Here's the link. I'll also add it in the description section.
www.transportenvironment.org/press/biodiesel%E2%80%99s-impact-emissions-extra-12m-cars-our-roads-latest-figures-show
All the best. Dave
on line shopping is not as bad as people think if you look at the bigger picture if a delivery truck is delivering 20 items that is effectively 19 cars not on the road as those people have not had to go out to get their items
"Logistical challenges" - i see what you did there....
Reminds me of Rowan Atkinson's "We love trucking".
Joking aside, we should have pantographs to help trucks and buses recharge during travelling. My country, Brazil, has almost no rails anymore and relies on trucks.
Or just go all the way. Catenary wires over all roads. External power.
Aah, remember when America's EPA was on the leadership team of the world's collective thinking on these important issues. All they needed was a president with a brain. Fortunately they'll have one on Jan 20th. Sorry, Dave, everybody to bring that excretafest of a situation up here, and on a Sunday evening too, but America has been sneezing while we talk climate issues for the last four years. Hopefully the new guy can make a difference. Peace & Love y'all.
unfortunately he's going to be hamstrung by lack of control in the Senate who will of course block anything and everything that Biden and team will try to do - I fear it's still going to be a looong 4 years and yet more inaction on climate change..
You missed the part where buying locally would have the largest and quickest impact on emissions, not likely to happen when it's much cheaper from another country.
Preface: I am a political science student studying on the issues and effectiveness of various methods of regulation/deregulation on environmental politics so take what I say with a grain of salt as I am actively researching this topic but not omnipotent.
The EPA the Obama administration, while a great push towards a green future, came with the loss of numerous jobs especially in industries such as coal. Additionally the amount of regulation pushed away companies from pushing beyond the minimum. This issue is known as "the race to the bottom" as companies all try to do the minimum they can to meet regulations. Without regulation we see companies such as Microsoft and Amazon and Delta making pushes to become carbon neutral or even carbon negative. The issue with this is while companies like Microsoft are looking to reduce emissions and recapture carbon (aiming to be carbon negative in the next few years) companies like Delta are buying carbon offsets and then using said existing offset (a plot of land in the woods for example) and tearing it down after its done being considered an offset for other purposes. This is driven by investors including a major one (who I forgot the name of atm, if interested just comment and I will respond for anybody interested.) who after sending letters to invested companies, the companies made more of a push to environmental caution and protection.
This isnt to say that we need no regulation but the amount of regulation such as that during the Obama administration hurt jobs and led a lot of companies strive to do the minimum rather than push beyond due to a lack of gain from going beyond. Additionally some regulations such as those on nuclear reactors make nuclear energy, a cleaner form of energy than most current forms of energy (excluding mining and construction emissions which are also there in solar and wind energy) much less viable. Some reactors are needing to be entirely redesigned due to updated methods to preserve safety are being shut down putting more reliance on coal and oil overall hurting the environment given that the reactors themselves are still in safe conditions.
If we want to make a push for better regulations of emissions it would be better to set a minimum regulation, increase carbon/emission tax, and add tax breaks to companies that go beyond minimum to incentivize more being done. Additionally the introduction of micro-reactors, water pump batteries, and other more renewable tech would be a great stride to environmental protections. That and the alteration of current construction methods as concrete is one of the largest co2 emitting industries, and most construction equipment burning a lot of fuel to function. Greenspaces, public gardens, incorporating fruit trees into public spaces, and a push towards bamboo replacing trees in most paper products also can help although this is more of a city scale than the EPA creating regulations.
Overall this is just a few things that can help out and I hope this provides some insight into pros and cons of regulation.
@@jaydenwiener4899 absolutely correct, it's obvious than using a stick won't work - companies will just do the bare minimum and that's all. They need to be incentivized to do things better, and done in such a way that doesn't hurt the economy whilst making the swing across to sustainable technologies. Perhaps the death of traditional manufacturing in 1st world countries isn't such a bad thing, as now we have a perfect opportunity to re-tool towards sustainable and renewable tech instead. (and reduce the reliance on certain other countries who seek to capitalize)
@@ShawnDickens well the way America is pissing off China you may need the option to buy local sooner than you think.
See the sky properly for the first time in decades?
Must be nice. This half of the US has been on fire for the past few (several?) months, so whatever reduction in pollution there has been, it's been more than offset by the wildfire smoke.
Wildfire smoke is renewable energy after a forest burns it eventually grows back recapturing the carbon from the fire, a natural cycler process. But not so natural or nice for the poor people who build their houses near the forest!
@@stevetaylor2818
No one is getting usable energy from wildfire smoke. It is in no way renewable energy.
There is a natural cycle of forest fires here, and it's true that the regrowth of these forests will eventually recapture the carbon released in the flames, if they manage to grow back to the same extent.
I wasn't thinking about co2 in my comment though. That doesn't affect visibility. It's the particulate matter that causes the haze and loss in visibility.
Shouldn’t it be zero emission “lorries” in the UK?
Asking for a friend (LOL).
Or wagons.
Yes; I know because I'm British
Yes. It should. Sorry old bean ;-)
Imagine that...driving your rig back from a delivery out near a regional wind farm/solarfarm and charging up, then heading back down hill to the big smoke to stabilise the grid...bonus income for the truckers i recon! Incentivise that for Australia please!
Improving technology and efficiency is a great thing and happens mostly in the wealthiest countries. I like the idea of electric road systems at 11:30 into this video, but I wouldn't say I like the look of all those cables and lines (hideous). Sweeden has a system where the electricity is on the road itself and looks much better. th-cam.com/video/YjAlsxUOGzQ/w-d-xo.html. At 8.03 you talk about China leading the way, but you should also point out that China produces 55 -58%% plus energy from coal power ( world leaders in coal) and to add to that it has ongoing future consents/plans that exceed the whole of the USA. It seems to like all energy, including significant investments in Nuclear etc. I think it is fair to say that China is not too concerned about the climate more about pollution and expanding its lead in world manufacturing.
China is on track to be the world leaders by 2025, and with that will they will be able to dominate more of their way. ( Which is very different from most democratic countries ) Meanwhile, the righteous/dogmatic believers like yourself who want to return to a simplistic village isolated lifestyle will go down that track. If you get enough followers, you will end up in a country that will have much less of a say and worse off.
Ask, and you will receive, so it's quite simple you ask for more not less.
We can have trains instead of trucks, right? And batteries are good enough; we don't need cables when truck drivers are forced to take breaks. But self-driving? That may overhead cables.
Regarding the turbulence at the rear of the trailer acting as a brake. I was told decades ago that this turbulence adds a negligible amount to the drag of the truck.
I would pay more attention to the gap between the tractor and the trailer. Here the turbulence adds significantly to the drag on the vehicle. It should be a simple thing to reduce the drag at this point on the truck.
Those things you see standing up on the tractor are to stop the energy going into the air between tractor and trailer. With that reduced, almost all the air drag ends up being the high pressure in front and the low pressure behind. The fancy fold out thing does a 10% reduction in total air drag which is not peanuts.
BTW: There is a design for one of those that folds out due to the force creating the drag. There need not be motors.
Also under the trailer, they are adding things that hang down to stop turbulence there.
If you look at the Tesla truck, they are addressing every part of the drag efficiently they can, removing the Gap, coving wheels, body shape etc.....!
@@stevetaylor2818 True. They should address all areas where drag in generated.
Nikola motors 😂. Hydrogen is only viable for heavy manufacturing imo. Electric is far more efficient for vehicles.
All stationary things can be wired into the grid.
@@kensmith5694 Exactly the opposite way round is more viable actually Stationary electric unless you need really high heat industrial processes is best to electrify. Storage can be in Power to hydrogen to power though. Always good to have a green long term backup
I would place my bet on self driving hydrogen that is on the road 24/7
The Daimler company thinks otherwise.
Electric for cars, hydrogen for trucks.
The problem with this discussion is that it begs the questions of what freight trucks should be used for. Ideally, all long distance freight will be by rail. Trucks should be used only for short distance work such as delivering products from the train station to their delivery destination.
Mixed review: good to call attention to this issue, but Nikola section was already outdated and hydrogen issues are far more substantial than those you mentioned.
Truck batteries ARE an energy storage solution. Charge during off-peak hours and drive during peak hours.
Trying to discredit claims against Nikola by only pointing to one person, and saying they have a short position...and just broadly mentioning the shit show that is their advertising as "some troubles"...reeks of dishonesty.
Y'know.... Considering the class action law suits going on about deceptive advertising to investors. First and foremost, a clip of the video shown here was the major culprit... Looks like a truck driving down a road, yeah? Well...it was actually towed to the top of a hill and let go.
"We never said it was driving. We said it was in motion! We were never falsely advertising! Yeah, I took tens of millions of dollars from the company to buy a new mansion, without ever producing anything, but I wasn't falsely advertising anything. "
"I don't care if I have a history of scamming investors. It's their fault they don't look into my history."
For me, this channel just blew most of its credibility defending Nikola's scam.
@@ptonpc I mean, this guy's always been something of a loon. But I do enjoy following him. He's a really good source of "Hey, there's something interesting going on in the Green space, go check it out."
@@SangoProductions213 I found him perhaps a month ago and thought he was interesting but I'll have to rethink that now.
One of your best yet fantastic
In my opinion it’s too late, we are in so much trouble, look at the Arctic. 🔥🌎
quitter
Facts. I arrived at same conclusion which I discuss on my channel ♡
There's a new peer reviewed article stating this....
Even if we went to zero emissions tomorrow, the catastrophic heat levels are coming....
The only hope in my opinion is MEER reflection project (along with de-growth), which Guy McPherson has been sharing about recently....
We can use mirrors to reflect sunlight locally on a massive scale to buy us time....
This is one form of geoengineering that isn't more dangerous than doing nothing...
So, what would you have us do? sit back and do nothing? At the very least, we can mitigate the scale of the apocalypse a little bit.
That does not mean we can simply give up. Every effort can still help minimize the innevitable damages, or at least slow them down.
Improving truck efficiency is certainly a worthwhile goal. But I suspect that freight trucks are getting a bum rap because they are more visible . I would love to see a comparison of the green house gas (GHG) production for a chair or desk delivered to a home by UPS compared with the GHG production of driving for 45 minutes (to get a great price) and hauling the load back home in a family vehicle (such as an SUV).
We need cargo ships and aeroplanes to run on hydrogen.
Or sails.
The first step is a new power grid. You need huge amounts of electrical power to make hydrogen.
Adding an automatic spinnaker system to cargo ships would help a lot too.
Many of them already try to sail down wind as much as they can.
A fairly simple system could provide most of the energy needed for each crossing of the ocean.
You can’t solve over the road transportation without trucking :( I think
@@kensmith5694 I see huge potential with Australia and Saudi Arabia in the production of Green Hydrogen. Australia has the political will. Saudi doesn't. We need production of hydrogen at all the major sea routes. Australia is building a huge solar power plant which will produce electricity for Singapore. Need collective action to overcome this hurdle.
Use of solar , wind , tidal energy to produce electricity for the production of hydrogen is needed which is where Australia wins.
Or we could use depressurized tunnels which could transport people and cargo at 700+ MPH using modest amounts of renewable energy.
It's not clear that we can make that technology work (economically) but it looks possible. And we should know within five years. It's all about tunneling costs, the rest is demonstrated.
--------
The English Channel has a maximum depth of 571 feet and a length of 31 miles.
The Bering Strait has a maximum depth of 164 feet and is 53 miles wide.
Imagine traveling and shipping freight between Europe/Asia and North America non-stop at over 700 MPH. We would need no planes except for rapid travel to islands. And we would need ships only for very large items, maybe.
Utah State University is testing an autonomous bus that drives over chargers built into a track. The idea is to eventually have a truck able to drive from San Francisco to New York non-stop.
Nikola? Really? haha
I guess we’ll have a better indication of ‘the real Nikola’ from the 1st Dec onwards.
It’s very pleasing seeing the likes of BYD, Volvo, Scania, Mercedes, and of course Tesla, addressing electric transport.
it's amazing of how people seriously underestimate hydrogen as fuel even for this type of transportation, somehow people put the category of electrolysis of water on the same level with nuclear fusion
They seem to come from the Elon-Telsa echo chamber, they are fool cells after all. A bunch of simpletons who don't see their arguing points are the same ones the oil industry used against the first EV's.
Storing hydrogen in liquid or gas form is very difficult on a mobile platform.
Also, processing hydrogen isn't economically and energy beneficially viable from electrolysis right now. hydrogen is currently sourced from crude rather than water.
Hydrogen is a very inefficient way to store energy. Nothing more.
@@instanoodles
Nonsense. Most of the arguments are closer to the initial arguments against combustion cars, but even that's not truly accurate. The point is economical in nature. Why use expensive hydrogen when you would have to rebuild the entire current-day oil infrastructure to make the switch, only even more expensive since hydrogen is so hard to store, when you can (for the most part) just tap into the existing electricity network at much higher efficiency and much lower cost? What little additional infrastructure is needed is much cheaper than having to build hydrogen fueling stations, plus it's just plain the superior technology.
Electric and hydrogen both have promise. Will there be a place for nuclear energy in all this? Been hearing a bit about nuclear and modular reactors. Climate change is a thing we should address. However I think it's a bit political. The alarm and near panic is not wise. At least not to the extent some seem to want. I do like the idea of more delivery instead of shopping requiring vehicles to get to stores. Not to mention being stuck in traffic. I drove trucks before retiring. Most traffic jams were cars. Delivery would go a long way. Work from home will benefit society not only due to less traffic, but also from less stress being stuck in traffic.I enjoy your videos. Informative and put it terms easy to digest. Good work.
Tesla has the complete solution. Emulating that, and scaling that, is all we need to proceed with. Hydrogen is woefully inefficient in terms of electrolysis. Making hydrogen is a waste of electricity.
You missed Hyliion. While they have an electric truck in competition with Tesla and Nikola, they also have a power train system on the market internationally. That retrofits existing fleets so they can drastically reduce emissions, while being able to save money against the nosebleed costs for operators of jumping into full electric prices. They already sell internationally and Ark investments selected them 2 years ago as the only company to allocate their blank check fund, tortoise holding co, to merge with. They're an international player in the hand off to full electric that keeps transportation going and in the right direction
Thanks for the heads up. I'll take a look.
@@JustHaveaThink sweet! Keep up the great show 👍
Love your solid information & clear presentation, free of hype & excessive bias. We've seen how gullible we humans can be over the last decade, and there's a real need for overviews untainted by personal or group interest. The broader the vision the better. May your contribution to the wellbeing of humanity be a source of blessing to us all. Cheers.
I think you are one of the gullible humans. There was enough hype in that report.
Getting a mass moving from a standing start is where the most energy is used so if trucks could use electric, Hybrid obviously, as an interim solution, at least this may reduce pollution, especially around towns and built up areas.
I am still surprised there isn't already utility and cargo vans available to the public. Many contract workers whether in courier or trades would jump on these things. I know Ford will be making a transit for around $45000 for US/Canada soon, but I think a smaller vehicle in the 25-35 range would do very well.
Cant be all local when its winter and nothing grows. Lots of places will die off if imports aren't daily
Winter, don't confuse this discussion with hard facts. This reminds me of a discussion with a highly intelligent co-worker about solar power. I asked, "What do you do when the sun goes down and the machines still need power?" He said, "that's a problem but the future may take care of that." I was looking at a wall wishing to pound my head.
Perhaps what we could do with on long distance freight routes is to have all of the trailers to be connected together and have just one engine at the front?
Awesome video man!
Great synopsis!
If truck movements were at night ,then the batteries banks can be charged during the day via solar . For linehaul we can have rapid swap out battery packs . Linehaul is suited to autonomous vehicles ,which in turn could mean we could swap tractor units at staging posts every few hundred miles or so. This way the weight of batteries and quantity needed overall could be reduced, with less wear and tear on roading networks. Linehaul should be moved to rail of some description though ,imo, which infrastructure can easily be incorporated to a power distribution network.
I've read that rail freight is far more efficient than road vehicles.
@Daniel Meyers rails for long haul > 150 kilometers. In theory electric trucks for the < 150 km range.
Great video. Would be great if you could do a deeper dive into road freight solutions being implemented today at scale, like BEV truck survey. Lots of companies working on BEV trucks.
Hydrogen fuel is not zero-emission... It produces water vapor. As water vapor is a green house gaz, will water vapor from hydrogen fuel cell could increase global warming? Should we worry trading one problem with another problem?
Heh! I had a dream where a Tesla Semi was rolling uphill on an interstate and was recharging a gaggle of CyberTrucks.
the panto graph system would be a good idea however, again, this would take time to install the infrastructure and possibly cause disruption on the roads, whereas battery and or hydrogen can be installed away from the road system
There is a catch with buying local though. If you live in Scotland and you buy a apple grown in a greenhouse heated by burning coal, the CO2 footprint, is far higher than growing it in a outdoor orchard in a warmer climate and shipping it to Scotland.
The truck system with overhead power lines running along the road looks very like an electric railway system. How much difference would there be in the cost of electrifying all of the rail system and this road based system? The rail system is already there and in many parts of Europe there are abandoned railway routes that could be brought back into service.
I am a truck driver and I remember last year when I was working in Sweden I've seen the Scania trucks on a closed bit of highway testing the trucks. It is a very smart idea to fit the highway with such a sistem, this way the most amount of time you don't use the batteries so you don't need them to be as big and it also solves the need for huge batteries that have to give the range a truck would drive in a day. Hidrogen seem interesting but in the end we have to find better ways to produce elclectron juice otherwise zero emmission my ass
Excellent 👍
Certainly electric makes sense in inner city and this will help ease demand on diesel and extend our supply until realistic solutions can be provided for longer distances. Slow adoption is important but even more so they should not distract from passenger cars.
ooohhw and a fancy new title it is!!
Zero emission large vehicles exist and more are in development. Re-charging coupled with large batteries on site are the answer
Yes...in part.The answer also certainly also includes photo voltaic panels to charge the batteries. You now have a complete zero co2 emission cycle for all our power needs. Something the third richest american has been hard at work at for many years. He alone is causing havoc with big oil. He runs Tesla. And pv panel efficiency is improving daily, and it's price is plummeting daily. There is hope. We must boycott the bad corporate capitalist consumerist guys, and change our ways of consumption toward quality existence and not quantity existence.
@@davidkreimer2970 I live in Scotland next to a 100 acre field, so its home made wind turbines and batteries. We have access to cheaper and better tech than Tesla. ICE manufacturers are getting desperate.... Ford Transit launch is fake.... and they won't make it. I am trying to get Shell as an alternative energy supplier of UK TV.