Michael C. Robinson: It is a crying shame that GM isn’t embracing the technology it has already that could help nations achieve complete petroleum independence with respect to transportation.Fuel cell technology is maturing and hydrogen storage is NOT a problem anymore.The gas Volt cannot take you 300 miles a day without burning a drop of gasoline.A Toyota FCHV adv SUV on the other hand can.And the fuel cell version of the Volt probably can as well.It is a crime that we can talk about charging stations and act like there is a limitless supply of electricity, yet we can’t discuss hydrogen.Hydrogen stored in water could be pumped between states and shipped around the world.I hate to see GM push gas/battery Volts when it can do a natural gas/battery Volt or better yet a hydrogen fuel cell/battery Volt.If hydrogen charged water spills into the ocean because your tanker sinks, there is no environmental problem like there is with OIL.

And where is this “hydrogen” coming from? It’s either made from natural gas (or other fossil fuels) or electricity (hydrolysis of water). Hydrogen storage (the mechanics of it) is more of an engineering challenge, than a problem…though you still can’t get the energy density where it needs to be without expensive storage tanks and very high pressures. The problem is the energy that must be used/wasted pressurizing it, transferring it, etc. The losses are huge and there’s no national infrastructure for it. Nor would it be practical to create one (i.e. pumping losses are much greater than NG through a pipeline). The math just doesn’t add up for hydrogen.

Electricity is a nice solution, because it can be made from many sources, some of the renewable. There is no future for hydrogen technology in automobiles, though it may be be viable in some niche applications.

IMO of course.

me> I predict 32 mpg, 36 tops, mark my words on this.

Let me qualify this by stating I meant the highway mileage. The city mileage in CS mode should actually be quite high due to the regen stuff.

Speaking of qualifying and regen, the latest Tech Center News rag (i.e. GM Tech Center) has an article about the Volt testing. I noticed this:

“Although GM has not released gas mileage statistics for the gasoline engine yet, the Volt is expected to get gas mileage better than a vehicle of its weight if running only on conventional gasoline-engine-generated power.”

Note the qualification “of its weight” however. I still predict it will be worse than the lighter Cruze on the open highway.

The other interesting item in the article was that it said they purposely ran the test Volt out of gasoline at the top of Pikes Peak and then drove back down. The regen system recharged the battery enough to allow them to drive on electric to Manitou Springs for a gasoline refill. Perhaps this was already posted here, sorry if so.

I personally hope they don’t advance the Volt launch (for sales) date. There is a lot of software involved, and software is notorious for strange bugs. A lot of examples come to mind but I won’t bore you. OK, remember the one about the F-22 fighter jets’ software crashing as they crossed the international date line in the Pacific.

No matter how much “software engineering” you do, a crapload of testing is still a good idea.

>> The next marketing shoe that will drop is CS mode mileage, I’m staking a bet on 60mpg.

Only if the Cruze gets 70 mpg. The Volt will always be worse than its cousin due to higher weight and 2 energy conversions (mechanical->electrical, then electrical->mechanical). Sorry. I predict 32 mpg, 36 tops, mark my words on this.

Amazing the amount of misinformation on this topic. On another site I saw someone stating 150 mpg in CS mode as if it were a fact. I don’t see any way that can happen without some battery juice being involved (or a long hill).

My #1 Volt concern is the lifetime of the batteries, regardless of cycles. Fifteen years sounds great, but my lithium-manganese batteries for r/c use which worked so well 3 years ago when new have definitely lost their punch for winter flying. I had to go back to newer regular lithium-cobalt batteries in their place. The good news (and I’m sure this played a part in GM’s selection) is that LiMn batteries can be punctured and won’t go up in flames like Lithium-cobalts will. They are quite safe, as batteries go.

Do all the testing and simulation you want, but the only way to truly know if a battery will last 15 years is to, er, wait 15 years. If I get a Volt I will be checking Chevy’s battery warranty very closely.