GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site

Along with pricing and ordering information, GM recently announced that fact that premium fuel will be required for the Volt. Although the engine-generator may be used on few or no occasions, it is designed for maximum efficiency.  According to vehicle line director Tony Posawatz premium fuel allows the 4-cylinder engine to operate most efficiently, adding 10 to 15% more fuel economy than if regular gas were used.  He notes that the additional cost of premium fuel would be almost exactly offset by the improvement in fuel economy.

Posawatz also explained that premium fuel would last longer before going stale, and issue for an engine that is rarely used.

A more recent report on Autoblog citing GM spokesperson Tom Read exposed that fact the the Volt’s engine also comes equipped with a knock sensor.  The Volt’s 1.4L engine is calibrated for use with premium fuel meaning it uses extra spark advance to optimize effiecy.  If, however, regular fuel is used, the knock sensor will detect it and adjust the spark advance to avoid engine damage.  Thus in a pinch, though sub-optimal, the Volt could run opn regular gasoline.

“Premium fuel is required,” says GM spokesperson Rob Peterson.  ”However, it will operate on regular gasoline in an emergency situation.”

Source (Autoblog)

Earlier this week GM released the 2011 Chevrolet Volt ordering guide for dealers to use. Included in the description about the gasoline generator were the words “requires premium fuel.” This led to specualtion and surprise from fans and skeptics as to why in the world the car would require premium gas.

According to Volt vehicle line director Tony Posawatz, there are two main reasons.

“The Volt is all about efficiency,” he said. “Premium fuel offers the opportunity to have a little bit more spark.”

“Ninety one octane fuel also offers the opportunity to be a little more efficient, he added. “So technically its a five to ten percent fuel economy improvement the few times that most people will run the range extender.”

Posawatz also claimed the increase is cost will be offset by the efficiency gains.

“Based on our calculations the fuel economy and efficiency gains you get will effectively compensate for the extra cost of premium fuel,” he said

Additionally, premium fuel is apparently slower to go stale.

If people are not using the extended range capability a lot, the premium fuel does last a little longer,” he said

“There will be a few that will have their gas go bad,” he added. “We have ways to address that as well.”

The AAA Fuel Gauge Report shows the current national average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline is $2.74. The national average for a gallon of premium gasoline is $3.01.

A simple question that GM has always refused to answer publicly since the beginning is what the size of the Chevrolet Volt’s gas tank will be.

Long ago, then vehicle line director Frank Weber told me it would be between 6 and 10 gallons but would not be more specific.  One reason often given for the lack of specificity was that engineers were still refining what the car’s total range would be and would trade off size and weight of the full gas tank to acheive it.  Though never admitted, clearly fuel economy in range-extended mode has also been a critical variable.

A few weeks ago I received an email from Eric Evarts of Consumer Reports.  Eric wanted to know if I could help get them a test drive.  I provided him with one of the Volt communications people’s contacts, and last week two nearly fininalized Volt prototypes built off the DHAM line were driven 750 miles up to the CR test track in Connecticut to be put through some paces.

In his report, Evarts writes that the Volt’s tank would be nine gallons in size, allowing the car to achieve “well above,” the planned 300 miles of extended range, after the first 40 electric miles are depleted.

GM had always said they were aiming for a total of 340 or 350 miles of range.  The presence of a nine gallon tank either means the range will be nearly 500 miles, well above previous promises, or that mpg in extended range is only in the low 30s.  These facts remain to be disclosed.

I did confirm with Mr. Evarts the nine gallon number he published.  ”That’s what they tell us,” he said. “I imagine it’s rounded.”

Below is the CR video review.  It fair to say it was very glowing; the car is silent, handles nicely, and looks good are some things the reviewer said.  He also said it has a lot of torque and was surprsiging powerful, and that he found it roomly and comfortable as well.

The reviewer claimed the car will sell at around $40,000 before the $7500 tax break brings it to the low 30s.

We’ll see.

Generally we only cover topics related to electric cars, but the buzz this week has been so intense, its worth a look at something new called the Bloom Box.

More specifically the Bloom Energy Server was first unveiled last week to the world.

The device is a scalable fuel cell stack.  It receives natural gas or biofuel and electrochemically combines it with oxygen producing electricity as a result, in a clean non-combustive process.

The device operates at extremely high temperatures (800 degrees) and uses solid oxide fuel cells made of low cost ceramic materials. This is in significant distinction to older technology fuel cells that rely on expensive precious metals such as platinum.

Bloom Energy Systems is the Silicon Valley start-up company funded in part by Kleiner-Perkins that has secretively been developing these competitively prices fuel cells over the last decade and has already sold and installed 100 kw units at major corporations such as Wal Mart and Google, at a cost of $700,000 to $800,000 each. These units are powerful enough to power 100 homes 24/7 and yet take up only roughly the size of a single parking space.

These devices have already been operating nearly flawlessly for several months.  EBay is one customer that has switched on three units that now provide 15% of the company’s electricity needs.

The electricity is produced at a cost of 8 to 10 cents per kilowatt hour, which is significantly lower than rates in some parts of the country.

CEO KR Sridhar was previously a fuel cell scientist at NASA and has led the creation of these new devices using a special amped up R&D program.  Bloom Energy’s key breakthrough has been developing a commercialization process of making these solid oxide cells affordably.

Sridhar envisions the day in the next few year a Bloom Box the size of a brick, at a cost a few thousand dollars could be purchased by the public for powering their individual homes.

When the electricity is produced from natural gas, emissions of just 773 lbs/MW-hr of CO2 is created, and natural gas supply is already abundant in this country.  When running on biofuel, electricity is carbon neutral.  Furthermore, since power will be produced locally , the role of the grid is reduced and excess energy could be even sold back to power companies.  The company plans to make future generation devices also capable of storing energy.

Certainly electric cars could be charged by Bloom energy servers as well, eliminating the need for coal-buring powerplants.

So will the Bloom Box change the world over the next decade?

Your guess is as good as mine.

Source (Bloom Energy)

Tom Stephens is GM’s vice chairman for global product development and spoke Tuesday at the Renewable Fuels Association conference in Florida.

He told attendees that GM is spending $100 million each year to develop cars that are E85 (85% ethanol/15% gasoline) or “flex-fuel” capable, and that “ethanol is the best near-term solution to displace petroleum.”

He said by 2012, half of the cars GM sells will be capable of running on E85.

The problem is, as Stephens sees it, there aren’t enough E85 pumps available to drivers.

“Today’s there’s 2,200 (ethanol fuel stations) that are out there but that’s not enough,” he said. “Two-thirds of the pumps are concentrated in 10 states and those 10 states have only about 19 percent of the flex-fuel vehicles that we have on the road.”

Stephens calls this discrepancy “a big problem for us.”

“GM is spending about $100 million a year adding flex-fuel capability to our vehicles. “We can’t afford to leave this capital stranded,” he added.

Stephens called for the installation of 10,000 additional E85 stations across America to “have ethanol fuel available for every one of our customers within about two miles of where they live.”

He said government intervention will be needed to achieve this goal.

“I think it would be very helpful if we could get government assistance,” he said. “But I really want the oil industry,…the government and…us to just work together to make ethanol a reality.”

With respect to the Volt, we also learn for the first time that the initial production run of the car will not be E85 capable.

“We are finalizing some of our options and the associated timing that goes with them,” said Volt executive Tony Posawatz. “The E85 capable emission package will have its timing finalized soon.”

“It will not be available for November 2010,” he confirmed.

This actually substantiates a rumor we first reported here in August of 2007.

According to Stephens, GM does eventually plan to introduce E85 capable Chevy Volts a year or so after production begins.

The original Chevy Volt concept car was described as having twin 6 gallon gas tanks, 50 MPG in charge sustaining mode, and thus 600 miles of gasoline range.

With production, these parameters were changed.

GM has not announced the production Volt’s miles per gallon in charge sustaining mode, though the evidence suggests it will be somewhere between 30 and 50 MPG.

The size of the gas tank has also not been released yet, though in November Edmunds claimed it was 8 gallons, and went on to speculate that the Volt would thus get 38 mpg in charge sustaining mode.

“That’s interesting speculation on their part,” said Volt chief engineer Andrew Farah.  ” But I haven’t told anybody who’s asked how big it is.”

“We’re not releasing the size of the tank yet,” he added.

Previously, then Volt executive Frank Weber told GM-Volt.com that the tank would be between 6 and 10 gallons, and Farah confirms at least that it is less than 10 gallons.

But why is GM being so vague about this figure?

“The reason we’re not (announcing it yet) is we want to make sure we get over 300 miles of fuel range,” says Farah.  ”We’re going to tweak it as such and I’ve got plenty of time to do that.”

Thus it seems GM is aiming for 300 miles of gasoline range, and therefore average real world charge sustaining miles per gallon will be the principle determinant of how many gallons is needed to reach that goal.

The graphic above shows the underside of the Volt after a crash test.  The light blue object behind the battery is the fuel tank.  In the graphic below the tank can be seen from above sitting behind the T-shaped battery pack.

How big is it? You decide.