The Issue with going all Electric

Discussion in 'Electric Propulsion' started by jehardiman, Sep 5, 2022.

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  1. fallguy
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    fallguy Senior Member

    Sean, you really don't understand.

    I'm not sure Gonzo's word choices making living conditions better fails is intended.

    If you want to reduce CO2 output; the way forward is through innovation, or via offsets. If you consider the chemistry, a simple plant offsets CO2.

    The goal to make people suffer is truly horrid. Even fossil fuel producers have never held that as a goal. You ought to consider your words because you sound worse than an Exxon executive.
     
  2. portacruise
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    portacruise Senior Member

    From Sean, "I haven't managed to fully form an opinion on electric hydrofoil boats. They generally use 20% of the energy of a non-foiling boat. What other issues do they have?"

    Collision or entanglement of the foils with floating debris ( or sea animals) can easily be fatal while flying, immobilizing when not, depending on the nature and size of the debris. It doesn't have to be very big debris to cause injury, by some accounts previously posted in the archives. WIG or hovercraft avoid most of the Collision issues, but may not be as efficient.
     
  3. seandepagnier
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    seandepagnier Senior Member

    You are afraid rich people will suffer... except they wont really suffer, they will just have to lower their living standards by not being able to drive cars, fly, or use power boats (including engines in sailboats). so "truly horrid" that suggesting this makes me worse than an exxon executive: lol

    The way forward is to stop wasting so much energy: this is obvious. This was mentioned previously in this thread by others. Relying on innovations to appear in a narrow time window that will likely never materialize will lead to a most likely outcome of failure. First get CO2 levels stable. Once the situation is under control, now then there can be plenty of time to find innovations. You would try to rebuild a house while it is burning down using bricks to fireproof it without putting the fire out first?

    Again, those in europe are using half the energy compared to those in america and have a higher standard of living and live longer. How? Why should americans be allowed to continue to live the way they do when their pollution spreads throughout the world? What good would that do? What purpose does it serve? How is it good to waste energy? I have visited people living without fossil fuels and in those places they were very friendly and nice people, but they were also very disgusted by capitalism and money explaining to me how it corrupted anyone who tried (in this case to export copra to the french for cosmetics) and made them into a selfish person. You can continue the discussion, but I am at the point of simply agreeing to disagree with most of you here and move on. Defending the richest people in the world who basically caused the whole problem for what seems like a hurt ego.


    Back to electric hydrofoil boats... we know they are fast, relatively efficient and have long ranges (at least 60 miles at 20 knots). This is an example of "innovation" but as past innovations do they create new problems?

    Do the foils kill fish or injure other marine life? It seems based on physics that anything moving 20 knots made of carbon fiber silently like that has significant potential to harm living creatures. We already know propellers harm marine life, and the hydrofoils are much larger, so are they more likely to make contact? There are some bad pictures of people hit by foil boards. Will this just be a questionable amount of destruction similarly to wind turbines striking birds? Can the boats be equipped with sonar or some way to mitigate it? Can the foils "break off" minimizing damaging impacts? What species are most at risk? manatees, turtles, sunfish?

    Will these high-speed electric boats lead to more human fatalities? Can they be affordable? I was trying to calculate the cost of building material for a foil boat. Perhaps it could be cheaper since the main hull could be a skin frame as it is mostly in the air anyway. The electric boat in the video I linked has a quite high energy consumption per mile compared to other electric boats moving at much slower speeds.
     
  4. fallguy
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    fallguy Senior Member

    People will starve. People in northern climates depend on gasoline vehicles for food in winter.

    People will freeze to death. They depend on affordable electric for heat. There are laws that energy providers cannot shut people off for non-payment Oct-April and you propose increasing costs 50 fold.

    And you pretend the tradeoff is worthwhile and fail to mention offsets because of your pathology. You are bent on the belief that resource consumption needs to be equitable. And then you wonder why people are against the Paris Accord.

    Do you understand people in the northern climates welcome 'global warming'?

    The Exxon executive is out to make a buck. He generally does not want people to perish because it costs him money, but it sounds like you are willing to accept that. So, until you recognize the problems with your 'solution', you are not helping.

    Consider vehicle designs that use less fuel. By your standards, even those deserve to be punished because they are not equitable to the poor.

    It is fine to end the discussion. I don't fancy people dyin for your cause.
     
  5. Alan Cattelliot
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    Alan Cattelliot Senior Member

    And the money, that's why some countries are delaying the application of Paris Agreement, and also why already in-place power plants have been put into service again, or their shutdown postponed. The issue, for us, in going all electric, at short-term and middle-term, is a great increase of prices in general. Everything is linked. Let's take, for instance, the chicken meat, the most eaten meat in the world. Hike of the prices occurs due to different factors : avian flue, feed disponibility, and energy prices are the main factors in general, although their relative contribution is very depend on local economies. Let's take the distribution given in this article : Operators warned about ‘significantly higher poultry costs for foreseeable’ https://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/Article/2022/03/15/chicken-prices-increasing-for-pubs.
    41% of the hike is attributed to energy bill. In 12 months, the price per kilo of the chicken breast vacuum packed has increased from 5.80€/kg to 6.80€/kg, gaining 1€/kg. If the price of electricity needed for the industrial incubators is multiplied by 25, which is the proposition of Seandepagnier, and neglecting the consequent increase of the other cost items, ie minimizing the calculated prize due to hike of energy prices -, the price per kilo of the chicken breast vaccum packed would be at least 10.84€/kg.... Let's say the prices would double. What about the buying power of populations ? Would their wages also double ? How could governements support this ?
     
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  6. Ad Hoc
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    Ad Hoc Naval Architect

    Really?
    How so...how are these "innovative"..??
     
  7. Alan Cattelliot
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    Alan Cattelliot Senior Member

    So many interesting questions ! Like you, I haven't any opinions on these boats. There is also a important lack of true knowledge about the leisure craft "industry", which makes great boats sold at high prices without nothing than "s..t and water", as my grand-mother used to say. There is also questions about the impact and the utility of racing boats !!! Answers that are given are very driven by communication, and I find very difficult to apprehend true facts about this sector. Instantaneously, since the debate about energy transition has begun, leisure crafts have become "greener", without them, in my opinion, giving any sensible proofs besides nice pictures and small talks.

    Here are my thoughts :

    -Foils against marine life : As I have worked since many years on racing boats, a very recurrent debate comes, from time to time, about marine life being disoriented by vibrations caused by rudders, elongated keels, daggerboards, foils.... About the harm of marine life, being cut, crushed, disturbed .... As for the Paris to Dakar, I found very easy for journalists to get a "free title" out of any major activity, especially during highly mediatized events. Is there any true issues ? I don't know.

    - Cost of building materials : I wish I can have figures on this. The lighter are the boats, the greater it is, when talking about foilers. Unless using very very expensive metals and production techniques, small boats shall be made out of wood or resin-fiber materials, that required at least a controled ambiant temperature and moisture level. Again, energy is needed, just to manufacture these materials. Also, traditionnal resins and fibers systems are highly linked to petrol prices, that may increase in the future. What will be the evolution of small craft costs due to the hike of prices of the energy ? What will be the evolution of these costs if companies do implement, in Europe, all the requirements regarding the emissions levels of these industries ? For now, as there is hardly no control of the market by authorities, so most of the boatyard of small crafts still maintain their practices. How long will it last ? One remark about : "Perhaps it could be cheaper since the main hull could be a skin frame as it is mostly in the air anyway". Airborn boats do exist, but are marginal, because, for a boat to be used traditionnaly, it has to be waterborn first. Foiling is seen as a "mode of navigation". The structural integrity of the boat should be assure also in "hydrostatic mode", and additional reinforcements should be made to take into account greater slamming impacts, compared with non-foiling boats (archimedian).

    - Cost of navigation in foiling mode : It may be a too much simple view on this subject, but buyoancy holds archimedian boats. The vertical force that allows these boats to float is free, compare to the vertical force needed to maintain foilers out of the water, that depends on the speed of the foiler, and thus, on the power required. Misunderstandings about foils is very common, as they have different usage. On IMOCA boats, for instance, foils are mainly used to create an additionnal righting moment, allowing the boat to be more powerfull. Their foil also create a vertical force, that "discharge" the hull a little bit, and improve her slenderness. We can also consider the ORMA trimarans. In racing conditions, these boats weighted around 6T. Many tries has been made to optimize their foil usage, including totally lifting the boats. But, as their maximum righting moment was obtained by their beam, the solutions found by all the teams converged towards foils that pushed a maximum of 1T vertically. Again, only to "discharge" the floats and improve their slenderness. So, my point of view if that there is no real gain in making a boat totally fly, except having a new selling point, as required to maintain the image of a dynamic & ecologic leisure craft market. It would be perhaps more profitable to use them as additionnal control surfaces, "dynamic" fences, trying to decrease, a little more, the boat power required.

    ###edit### Small calculations based on the hydrodynamic calculations I made of a 56' motor trimaran designed @23T (not her final weight in the end... as usual) : @16kts, the total hydrodynamic resistance of the hulls is 2.7T. If this boat would have to be lift on foils, the 23T of lift force would create a 2.3T of drag (flat plate approximation) . @13kts, the total hydrodynamic drag of the hulls would be approximatively equal to these 2.3T of drag. @speeds below 13kts, the total hydrodynamic resistance of hulls is below 2.3T.
    For this boat, the use of hydrofoils below 13kts would not be profitable, regarding power consumption. @16kts, we would save 15% of power. I just cannot see on the curve where we would reach 80% of energy saving, as announced by CANDELA CEO, in this article Candela, Polestar Forge Battery Pact https://www.tradeonlytoday.com/industry-news/candela-polestar-forge-battery-pact (if we talk only about savings due to hydrodynamics)
    upload_2022-9-14_10-56-57.png
    In these quiet and wonderfull places that we see in the video, there is nothing better than a nice sail, avoiding carefully places where wild animals use to live.
     
    Last edited: Sep 14, 2022
  8. Alan Cattelliot
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    Alan Cattelliot Senior Member

    One issue with 100% electric : leaves the doors open to such charlatan ! Taken on the CANDELA website, -for which i refuse to publish any link for obvious reasons -, these informations are found on the GNAGNAGNA12 - I refuse also to make abundant the name of the company -, a 12PAX passengers vessels.
    With one fourth of 600kW, everybody can power a 45T hull @8tks.
    Solution to this issue : share, amplify, oppose anything to the developpment of this company.

    upload_2022-9-14_12-51-15.png
     
  9. Flotation
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    Flotation Senior Member

    "Most of the technical solutions to our problems already exist. What's missing is the will to implement them."

    The Third Stanford study in post #26 describes in great detail how switching to renewable sources would reduce our electricity bill in surprisingly short notice. It would take an investment but making such investments is exactly what responsible governments should be all about.

    Political will existed to "invest" trillions in wars in the middle east to protect oil interests. During the financial crises banks were bailed out without demanding a substantial change in the financial system in return. Currently fossil fuel companies are making billions of extra revenue because of the energy price crisis.

    Money is not the problem, lack of political will to invest money wisely is.
     
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  10. fallguy
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    fallguy Senior Member

    Forcing investment doesn't always work either. Remember the disaster(s) for Obama with Solyndra or A123? A123 was a techno failure. Solyndra, not sure if that wasn't more of a ponzi..
     
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  11. Flotation
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    Flotation Senior Member

    That's why i specifically mentioned "responsible governments" and "political will to invest money wisely".

    And like with any investment there will always be the ones that don't work out. There is no reason not to spread investments among many potentially profitable renewable energy projects.
     
  12. seasquirt
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    seasquirt Senior Member

    So it seems so far, The [main] Issue(S) with going all Electric, are:
    political will.
    Lack of vehicle and other distribution facilities for eventual needs.
    Lack of generating capacity already.
    Environmental damage for metals mining increasing.
    Inefficient storage of excess electricity.
    Consumer reluctance due to expense and disadvantages.

    Politicians want to keep their 'jobs', so lobby, protest, write / email, tell them why you're not voting for them unless, make them doubt their position . . .
    Distribution: Look at different distribution means, including liquid and gas fuel electric hybrid systems to get things started. Fuel stations can pump ethanol now.
    Generation: Solar panels on cars and busses and trains; also eg. solar hot water thermal mass in buildings. Many other ways to harvest natural energy. Waste to energy generators.
    Mining: Not many ways to replace metals as conductors, unless with carbon fibre conductors, or some new inventions. Mining is an environmentally damaging obstacle difficult to avoid.
    Storage: Batteries seem to be the biggest problem. No hollywood spacecraft ran on batteries, they had mysterious power supplies that made appropriate noises, or massive rocket like outlets that roared, even in silent space. My point being that since I was a child, batteries haven't really changed much since the old 'Eveready' cells, until lithiums with a management chip built in. There's nothing space aged about the lump that goes into the back of my transistor radio.
    Consumer reluctance: expensive equipment, possibly requiring trained technicians and diagnostic facilities when broken down, not just a box of mechanic's tools or 'road side service'. For 4X4 off road use away from the grid, not so convenient. I'd wait for battle tested success before relying on one very far.

    We can develop hybrid ethanol / methanol / hydrogen systems right now. Existing systems can be adapted for ethanol/methanol, ground tanks and vehicle tanks, maybe new carbys and re-tune for engines, and ethanol/methanol to hydrogen fuel cell hybrid vehicles can use the same fuel - now. Use up and make the most of the engine technology we already have, in baby steps toward complete changeover. When full electrics are more efficient and cheaper overall than crankshafts, they will be adopted en masse.
    When hover boards are invented, transport problems will be solved.

    It could help if everyone in the technological world was limited to: one efficient lap top computer each, no televisions; vehicles of equivalent power to approx. 1 litre displacement (normal car) per person, in HP or KW, or whatever, with taxed permission for more power if towing or hauling; all housing be built to insulation standards to minimise energy use; foods labelled with the energy required to produce it; discourage people living in places requiring excessive energy to survive a 'normal' season cycle. Just a couple of suggestions.

    The mega rich combined have the wherewithall to make big positive changes to save the planet we need to survive, despite the politicians, if they can stop wasting their time trying to buy up everything, or conquer space travel. But then, their profits come from contributing to the problems.

    All you experienced and practical engineers, put your heads together and invent something better than what we have available.
     
  13. seandepagnier
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    seandepagnier Senior Member

    If you want me to stop: stop twisting things around. People are already drowning in pakistan. People are already starving in somalia. Because you used gasoline, now people are actually dying for your cause. You are responsible: now it is time to take responsibility. You are arguing against climate justice. You are arguing in favor of billions of people dying to save the lifestyle of millions in rich countries for a limited time (long enough for you to die)

    Americans knew about this for 50 years and refused to do the right thing. Some amount of punishment is due. I never said anything about people starving or freezing. I only want to curb excesses. Keep emergency services, food delivery trucks and limited amounts of heat and transition those: much more achievable using EV. Let handicap people have exceptions.

    You simply want significantly more people to not only suffer but actually perish so that the more privileged ones (that you know and are familiar with) do not have to make any sacrifice and can live out their life of excess (driving, flying, powerboating)
     
  14. seandepagnier
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    seandepagnier Senior Member

    I had a skin on frame boat, not foiling. Skin on frame boats existed for a very long time (inuit kayaks and other craft), and actually can be very light weight (and low cost materials) but anything that has a draft of more than a few inches tends to have a lot of pressure (the skin bulges inwards too much) and decreases efficiency. Similarly they are flexible and lose some energy from this. So my concept that a foiling boat could have a skin hull would make sense or not? The hull being out of the water and being light weight as a big advantage. The cost of emissions for the materials similarly is much lower (no epoxy)
    These are active hydrofoils, so they are constantly being driven with a control loop. I think it makes sense this could greatly reduce energy needs through waves at least.

    Isn't it true that active (computer controlled) hydrofoils , are banned from many racing rules? Could this be the reason these boats are not able to fully realize the potential of hydrofoils?
    1) isn't there more energy saving in waves using hydrofoils than what you calculated here? The waves affect non-foiling boats much more, but its a difficult calculation since waves can come from multiple directions, have different periods and so forth.
    2) A 56' boat will not have the same savings as a 27' boat at these same speeds I dont think?
    3) As for 80% savings... perhaps at least half of this is attributed to the fact they are using a battery rather than fuel? They are directly comparing a non-foiling power boat using a conventional engine to this.
    I think you have the boats confused and the foiler is on the right?

    We need more information on this. You are suggesting that foiling boats cause more errosion/disturbance despite not making a wake? It does not seem likely. Their hull shape may not matter for these tests (if it isn't in the water)
    It would be better if these people just used sail power instead or traveled at slower speeds, that is for sure, but try convincing anyone of anything: usually impossible.
     

  15. Flotation
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    Flotation Senior Member

    Do you really expect all of us to go and shame Candela? Based only on your incoherent message and back of the envelope calculations?
     
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