Hybrid Cars

[Doctor Drivel]

Lord Hall, a battery is an energy carrier, or storage. It is not the energy in itself.

The total energy/weight of an IC car and full electric. The electric wins.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Don't be silly. My petrol auto BMW 5 Series will do London - Aberdeen on one tank if I keep to the speed limit. And that's 540 miles. Including crossing London.

Last series of Top Gear Clarkson drove an Audi Diesel from one end of the country to the other on one tank.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Exactly they don;t like it and its wasteful.

Thert is a difference between shutting down - going 'cold' - and going to 'standby' , A BIG difference. Some power stations take a week to bring up to speed from 'cold'. Standby means they are simply turning over, possibly not connected to the grid at all, but still with heat being generated and watsed and combustion going on.

It takes HOURS to get a steam boiler up to pressure. Only gas turbines are relatively quick.

[The Natural Philosopher]

I have factored that in elsewhere. Electrivc motirs are considerably lighter than IC engines and even more os when you strip way te unwanbted cooling and transmission.

. I was talking about a 200bhp system and a diesel to boot. 1.6 petrol engines at best might produce 100bhp.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

And you've included the efficiency of charging a battery?

[Doctor Drivel]

** snip senility from Richard Cranium **

[Doctor Drivel]

Oh my God!!! What he means is that are putting more comfy seats in.

You silly pillock, he comparing car for car.

I'll to snip it all now , as it is too painful to read

** snip senile babble ***

[Doctor Drivel]

I will have to do some more snipping as this is very painful for all to read. He is on about pillock Clarkson now. Yes he is.

** snip senile babble **

[Dave Plowman (News)]

You seem to have a problem quoting yourself so I've put it back to as it was.

What a fool you are.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Yes, subject?

[Doctor Drivel]

** snip more senility from Richard Cranium **

[Doctor Drivel]

** pathetic senilty indeed **

This nut is amazing. Archie the inventor - in pink and a kilt.

[David]

In article , The Natural Philosopher writes

My 2.2dci Espace had a 17 gallon tank and did 40 mpg on the motorway and regularly went over 600 miles between fill ups, I know because I reset the mileometer each time for the records, whether you class it as a car though...

[Pete C]

Nuclear decommissioning currently costs 2.2bn a year of which half comes directly from Treasury, ie us taxpayers:

Contrast that with the 80m a year (500m over next 6 years) spending _planned_ for renewables:

I'd expect nothing less from T Bliar...

They should spend a *lot* more on renewables and energy efficiency as well, as is being done in Germany and Japan.

However this would now require another U turn so is looking more and more unlikely.

Also we've been selling the last of our gas cheaply to the continent for years, and now we're having to buy it back at inflated prices. Absurd...

cheers, Pete.

[Matt]

100bhp from a petrol 1.6? get real.

The 100bhp mark in a 1.6 was passed many moons ago, the 100bhp per LITRE mark in production spec engines (both bike and car) was also passed quite a while ago, hell you can even get a "washing machine" Smart fortwo - 698cc that turns out 61 bhp (87bhp/litre)

But forget 200bhp, come up with a weedy "140bhp" power system using battery storage, with a range even remotely comparable to say the Passat 2 litre TDi and with similar performance (48.7 mpg combined cycle, 749 mile range, 0-62 9.8 seconds, 130mph are the figures to aim for)

Regardless of price you'd better arrange cryogenic storage for me though as it will probably take you 500 years to get anywhere near - unless on board nuclear reactors become the norm :-)

[Matt]

You effectively "box" the boilers up (no fans, all dampers closed, no oil burners, main steam valves shut, all drains shut) and the boiler pressure decays away *very* slowly, shut down past the evening peak and then around 4am before demand starts picking up next day, run the fans, kick in a few oil burners, blow down your drains and then add a mill or two, keep a close eye on the turbine clearances and vibration and you can easily go from this semi-hot state with absolutely *zero* heat input to full boiler firing and maximum generator load in around

2 hours.

The 120MW units were doing it just like this way back in the 60's, the

500's and 660's were capable (and in some cases regularly doing it) back in the 80's. Well before gas fired generation arrived it was taken as read, almost regardless of unit cost that as larger gas cooled reactors came on line two shift operation of the large coal generators would become an essential requirement. Considerable investment was made in updated instrumentation and control systems (and sometimes boiler metallurgy and combustion engineering) to facilitate that change.

The only time a power station would ever take a week to run up from cold would be after a major overhaul when there would be numerous checks to carry out. In normal operation, from room temperature ambient metal temperatures on the boiler and turbine it is perfectly feasible to reach full load in around 24-36 hours. I've seen a 500MW unit come back from an annual overhaul involving a lot of boiler retubing, with major turbine, alternator and auxiliaries work, have a boiler pressure test late Friday, do a safety valve float Saturday and be at full load 6am Monday (it was off load Tuesday with a boiler tube leak though!)

[Chris Bacon]

Why is there never any discussion of pebble bed reactors, currently under development in many parts of the world, notably China?

[Doctor Drivel]

I know what you mean Bertie. The Espace came bottom of the 170 car Top Gear survey.

[Doctor Drivel]

activities.

Will you give us an example of a proven lie please?

What U turn is this?

[Doctor Drivel]

Lord Hall, waht is the average BHP for 1600s on the market?

Lord Hall, you are clearly mad. The Prius averages 60mpg, and doesn't pollute like hell in towns.