GM Says New Volt to Get 230 MPG in City Driving

http://autos.yahoo.com/articles/aut...3MTYxNDkEc2VjA2ZwLXRvZGF5BHNsawN2b2x0LTIzMA--

this is supposed to be the "green car of the future" or whatever. yet you have to plug it in every night to charge. well, for all those tree huggers that drive hybrids or are going to drive this new volt, remember what it takes to make electricity, or at least 75% of it in the US...COAL!!!

so when you plug this "green" car in at night, more coal is burned to charge up your hybrid. i work in a power plant, and am part of the United Mine Workers Association union, and i think this whole forget coal and global warming crap is a joke.

coal fired plants may not be the most environment-friendly, but they arent that bad either. no matter what your viewpoint is, face the fact, coal is going to be out main source of electricity for years to come. it is impossible to replace millions of megawatts with windmills that may produce 2-3 megawatts.

ok, sorry for the rant. again, the volt sounds great, but dont buy it because you think you are doing the environment a favor. because at night, you plug it in and most likely more coal is burned to charge it. wait a minutes, i take that back. buy one or two and charge it frequently, help keep my job security intact!

 

X2!
The energy has to come from somewhere. Be it oil, coal, or renewable sources.

 

WOW 230 MPG! thats pretty neat tho even tho i think the car is ugly as hell

 

Most people don't even think about this. They just buy it thinking they're doing the environment a favor. If they'd only do the research.

 

exactly, when tree-hugging activists come to work to complain about us burning coal, i look at their car. if they are driving a hybrid i just ignore them because they do not know what they are doing when they plug it in each night.

 

Yep. It's a driving a prius is a placebo for them.

 

I'd wager the coal burned to charge the volt has less overall impact that the gas since many coal plants these days scrub emissions until they're damn near squeaky. I have friends who live downwind from a coal plant in Pennsylvania. Ten years ago they lived in a world of soot... everything always had a blanket of gray crap on it. But once the scrubbers went it the place is just a bit dustier than average and unless you knew a plant was down the road you'd never be able to tell.


What I want to know is what we plan to do with a few million pounds of lead/acid and lithium batteries in landfills once all the damned hybrids and electric cars start losing their oomph?????? Maybe they'll put those in Yucca Mountain since they can't actually do anything else with the damn thing!

 

Yeah I think the whole electric car thing is way too overrated. The bad thing is that every new president we get in they always have a differant view point as to what direction they think we should go. And that can sometimes stall the progress. I think we should let the free market decide or whats left of it. I kinda like the idea of hydrogen fuel cells, once they can get the cost down it could be a good direction to head in.
I saw something last week about a company coming out with a air compressed car, oh sure that's a great idea. No way in hell I'm buying an air compressed car.

 

Compressed Air!??!?!??!? The amount of energy to make, store and ship vast quantities of compressed air would be ridiculous! The efficiency of some air compressors is as low as 10%. Industrial ones are much better but just storing all that AIR would be a tremendous undertaking.

On the plus side you could do a write-up for a muffler "fart mod"!

 

I may be wrong but I think I remember reading that those batteries may only last about 8-10 years, and when you replace them it could cost about $8,000-$10,000. Not to mention you are buying something that is worth at or more than the cars value at that point. Electric cars look good or sound good on paper, but the fine print says otherwise, or at least that's what I think.

 

What we need to do is start shifting to nuclear power. It will take a quite a few years to build the plants that are needed to shift the majority of our electricity production from coal to nuclear, but IMO would be worth it in the end. This is just my opinion after all.

 

Remember, you're buying something from an industry that plans obsolescence into their product lines!

 

X2.

And I have come up with a solution for all of our waste, blast it off into space

 

Agreed!!!!! And what this guy said

All the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk.
Ronald Reagan
​

 

They were talking about the volt on the news tonight and it only gets that 230 rating if you don't drive it more then 40 miles per day because after 40 miles the batteries are depleted and then it needs gas to run

 

True.

 

i agree, or at least enough plants to keep the power demand supplied on the grid. the company i work for, american electric power, has a nuke plant in michigan and that thing runs at 99._% efficiency not to mention the 0 emissions it has. i would love to work there, but only the elite get in, and apparently im not one of them

 

I can't believe they are even thinking about these. What happens when they get in an accident? They'll literally blow up. And think about firefighters and police when they are helping to get an injured person out of an accident- it might even have a delayed explosion, putting the FF's and Police in more danger.

X2!