[HN Gopher] Porsche Working on Synthetic Fuel to Make ICE Cars a...
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Porsche Working on Synthetic Fuel to Make ICE Cars as Clean as EVs
Author : monkeydust
Score : 26 points
Date : 2021-12-22 15:52 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.caranddriver.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.caranddriver.com)
| elromulous wrote:
| I've been following this for a little while. I can't help but
| feel like it's too little too late. Don't get me wrong - I'm
| rooting for it. But EVs already have so much momentum. And unlike
| EVs, which in the worse case can be charged at home (thus not
| requiring any infrastructure / supply), this solution necessarily
| requires supply.
| r_hoods_ghost wrote:
| I'm guessing (literally, I have no idea if this is true) that
| if these synthetic fuels can be stored and transported in the
| same way as normal petrol then you wouldn't have to build that
| much more distribution infrastructure. Instead you could just
| repurpose what's already there. Obviously you still have to
| make the stuff, which involves capital investment, but so does
| building gigafactories, the power plants necessary to generate
| the extra electricity and upgrading the grid.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Like Toyota, it is an attempt to not invest in battery R&D and
| shifting manufacturing to EVs. They're holding on to their ICE
| investments until the bitter end.
| [deleted]
| klokwork wrote:
| I think that's not entirely fair. There are several viable
| reasons why an investment into something like this makes a
| lot of sense.
|
| Firstly, Porsche is a manufacturer that caters to enthusiasts
| and many of those customers are very much wedded to ICE
| engines, manual gearboxes etc. Those customers will continue
| to buy new cars that utilise existing ICE engine designs, but
| more importantly Porsche has many customers who keep their
| cars for decades and this will allow them to continue to run
| them without changing the cars character.
|
| Secondly, Porsche (or more accurately, VAG) are very much
| investing into EV's - arguably they could have done it faster
| and earlier, but the investment is very much there now.
| Having technology like this diversifies what they can offer
| and in the case of some sort of global component shortage for
| batteries for instance, they can continue to scale.
|
| As a bit of an enthusiast myself, if I can continue to run
| the cars I already own at a similar environmental impact to a
| new EV, frankly I would be delighted, even if the cost of the
| fuel is significantly higher.
| Mikeb85 wrote:
| Porsche literally already makes EVs... And a pretty good one.
|
| It's more like battery advances aren't happening without a
| major breakthrough in chemistry.
| b3morales wrote:
| Your comment seems to take it as a given that this is a bad
| thing -- can you explain why you think so?
|
| The only problem with ICEs, as far as I understand, is their
| use of petrol and the contents of the exhaust that creates.
| Assuming we can eliminate that problem, is there a remaining
| reason that ICEs should be deprecated in favor of electric
| engines?
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| AtlasBarfed's comment in this thread sums it up well.
|
| "It also smells like a lot of the forced hydrogen hype, a
| FUD, delay/distraction, undermining of EV popular support,
| etc by the oil industry that once they get a crack they'll
| drive a truck through."
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29653177
| listenallyall wrote:
| Porsche already makes popular EVs. They also recognize that
| ICE cars (by all manufacturers) sold today, and for the last
| few years, are likely to be on the road in 2030, probably
| even 2040. Seems that the introduction of a new hydro-fuel
| with significant CO2 reduction would be a massive
| environmental win, for Porsche drivers and for everybody
| else. I don't think you are doing the world any good by
| painting Porsche's efforts in a negative light.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Porsche is currently facing a possible scandal about their
| Taycan batteries. Also, it's clear their battery
| engineering is poor based on the battery warranty
| requirements [1]. Legacy automakers have made very little
| effort to move to EVs or work towards climate friendly
| goals, so no, I do not assume positive intent. I see their
| efforts (just like Toyota's hydrogen fuel cell engineering)
| as attempts to maintain the status quo at the lowest cost
| possible until proven otherwise. If this fuel is truly
| carbon neutral (which corn and sugar sourced ethanol fail
| on), does not emit harmful particulate or other emissions,
| and can be scaled up to support existing engines cost
| effectively, I will eat my words (Mercedes, in this
| article, says these fuels are a dead end and is pushing
| electrification, so I don't believe this position is
| without merit).
|
| > An apparent hint of Porsche's challenges with the
| Taycan's battery could be seen in the warranty for the all-
| electric sports car, which happens to be one of the lowest
| on the market with just 60,000 km or three years if
| following conditions (Porsche Warranty Requirements) are
| not met:
|
| > Vehicles standing longer than two weeks supposed to be
| connected to a charger
|
| * Customers must assure that the Taycan's state of charge
| remains between 20% - 50%
|
| * Customers must make sure that their Taycan is not exposed
| to continuous sunlight
|
| > Vehicles standing longer than two weeks not connected to
| a charger
|
| * Customers must charge the Taycan's battery before to 50%
|
| * Customers must check every three months and assure SoC
| remains at or above 20%
|
| * Customers must assure that their vehicle's temperature is
| between 0C - 20C
|
| Compare to Tesla's battery warranty (8 years across all
| models, and between 100k and 150k miles, depending on
| model):
|
| https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty
|
| You can even park in continuous sunlight.
|
| [1] https://www.teslarati.com/porsche-whistleblower-taycan-
| batte...
| listenallyall wrote:
| You left out
|
| > it is my duty to inform the public with this article
| while I don't have hard evidence and therefore can't
| confirm the information to be right.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| "Facing a _possible_ scandal" from my quote you replied
| to. The battery warranty I quoted is public information
| and documented. The scandal may be nothing, but the
| subpar battery storage engineering is evident from the
| warranty terms.
|
| Regardless, upvoted for transparency.
| listenallyall wrote:
| No, the battery warranty you quoted is NOT public NOR
| documented. You've offered no proof it is real. Perhaps
| Porsche makes recommendations, to help preserve optimal
| performance, but you have ZERO evidence that those terms
| are disclaimers written into the actual warranty, nor of
| any warranty service denied due to failing to meet such
| terms.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| I will have an investigative reporter I work with reach
| out to Porsche for comment on the whistleblower's claims
| and let them know a Taycan pack will be provided to an
| industry tear down expert for public stress testing. I'll
| also have them contact the NHTSA to see if there's an
| open investigation in the matter (separate from their
| investigation earlier in the year on the vehicle's sudden
| power loss events). I appreciate you keeping me honest,
| and I'll come back to HN with additional documentation
| when I have it. I'm either wrong or Porsche will need to
| make their EV owners whole.
|
| Seems pretty straightforward to clear up if there's any
| truth to the matter, and no one should be purposely or
| inadvertently spreading misinformation, including myself.
| reitzensteinm wrote:
| Would you mind keeping me updated with their response?
| Email in the profile.
|
| It reads to me like standard FUD - and I dare say if it
| were about Tesla you'd be the first to insist on more
| evidence.
|
| But if it turns out to be true it will be shocking.
| Especially damaging coming from the leader of the pack of
| ICE companies ramping up BEVs.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Absolutely, happy to. FUD in all forms against any party
| is unacceptable.
| exabrial wrote:
| Phew.
|
| > In a similar vein, E85, a non-carbon neutral gasoline
| substitute made from 85 percent corn-based ethanol
|
| Ethanol is not:
|
| 1. A clean fuel
|
| 2. A carbon neutral fuel
|
| 3. A carbon negative fuel
|
| 4. A cheap fuel
|
| 5. An effective fuel
|
| 6. A responsible fuel
|
| It takes a tremendous amount of fossil fuel to make ethanol.
| We're better off just burning the fossil fuel.
| barbazoo wrote:
| Let those dinosaurs that can't let ICE go, fail, who cares.
| idiotsecant wrote:
| That's frankly an irresponsible and short sighted viewpoint.
| Fossil fuels will be around for decades at least, maybe
| centuries. Why would you not want them to be cleaner?
| surfingdino wrote:
| It's good to have options.
| aaroninsf wrote:
| In an ideal world I'd love our car (and everyone else's) to be
| pure EV;
|
| in the current one, we opted for a plug-in hybrid with a decent
| EV range (~40+ miles) because it allows us to be 100% EV in
| local driving, but not worry about charging
| schedule/availability on longer trips. We're a single-car
| household in the US and we do a lot of camping and wilderness
| trips; for those there is currently no good EV option. Even if
| you stage a full charge at the bottom of a mountain, vertical
| climbs kill your range... and you end up in locations getting a
| drive-in emergency recharge may be entirely infeasible.
|
| I am sad about the complexity of our car. Lift the hood and
| laugh out loud. But as long as it's reasonably reliable, I
| would happily pay a serious premium for carbon-neutral gas for
| the ICE part. 2-3x even. Because then I would sleep easier; and
| we have the luxury of only burning that in the 5% case.
|
| All for the YES-AND.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| I think there are huge quality of life and health improvements
| that come along with EV: the air pollution death numbers are
| likely understated, and I suspect there are carcinogenic and
| micropollution effects from ICE emissions that are being hidden
| by our addiction to gasoline and industry-sponsored denialism
| and suppression.
|
| It also smells like a lot of the forced hydrogen hype, a FUD,
| delay/distraction, undermining of EV popular support, etc by
| the oil industry that once they get a crack they'll drive a
| truck through.
|
| Hopefully EVs and solar/wind/battery continue their price curve
| improvements, to make all these distraction projects
| ludicrously economically infeasible.
|
| It is a triumph, dare I say miracle, of modern technology and
| (sigh, I hate praising economics) economics that we now have a
| switchover path from dinosaur heroin to something that is EVEN
| CHEAPER.
| civilized wrote:
| I'll wait to celebrate until a credible source estimates total
| emissions impact of this fuel.
|
| Sadly, there's a lot of "green cons" going on right now. For
| years, America has been cutting down its own mature hardwood
| forests to feed power plants in the UK and Europe on the
| extremely questionable theory that these forests qualify as a
| renewable energy source.
|
| Con men administrators and officials are wrecking our environment
| and society to pad their CVs with wins on fake metrics. It's
| happening everywhere and we need to get wise.
| errcorrectcode wrote:
| Greenwashing. For another example, "Biodegradable" plastics
| were mostly a big con.
| boppo1 wrote:
| I was just trying to dig up a bookmark on your example but
| couldn't find it. You don't have an article handy, do you?
| eloff wrote:
| I'm sure many engineers would recoil at the inefficiency of
| producing hydrocarbon fuel from water, CO2, and electricity, only
| to then transport it all over the place, before finally burning
| it in a small, inefficient engine to get water and CO2 again.
| Hugely wasteful. Elon Musk would rightly scoff at it (actually,
| I'm sure he already has.)
|
| But if they could do it at an economically viable level - which
| will almost certainly require government subsidies - it's a great
| thing for the world. Climate change is a big, big problem without
| a single solution. We need all hands on deck. Making existing
| vehicles green could be a massive help. Outlaw crypto at the same
| time and you could even get the energy free...
| Reichhardt wrote:
| Synthetic Fuel is not going to be for the masses, it will be
| for the elite driving Porsches (hence the research funding), as
| part of a giant green-washing scheme.
|
| What's sad is that the EU will throw subsidy money at it,
| instead of just doing the sensible thing and adopting EVs at
| all levels - simply to maintain the corporate legacy of soon-
| obsolete German automakers.
| eloff wrote:
| Fuel is fuel. Porsche doesn't own gasoline stations. If they
| sell this fuel, it will be for any car with the technology to
| burn it.
| samwillis wrote:
| I think it's worth noting that this is a much bigger play than
| being just for Porches own cars. Porsche own VW Group, they are
| the largest car manufacturer in the world, they are also a
| literal bank. They have the capital to invest in a "moonshot"
| type project.
|
| So firstly, this is obviously important as a hedge for them -
| more options for the industry moving forward (we absolutely
| should not only be working on BEVs) / what if there is ever a
| lithium or mineral shortage due to geopolitical conflict.
|
| Secondly, air flight! Battery's will never have the energy
| density for longer than regional flight at a long shot. Most
| people agree that battery airplanes will only be successful for
| metropolitan flights <20km. A green, high energy density fuel is
| the only long term option for medium/long hall flight. Porsche
| want to own as much IP on that as possible and have the cash to
| invest.
| arethuza wrote:
| I believe that Porsche SE are a holding company that own a
| majority share of VW Group who then own the Porsche company
| that makes cars - it is probably the latter who are making this
| fuel.
| samwillis wrote:
| True, although they are mostly a cohesive operation sharing
| expertise and technology. For example the Porsche Taycan and
| Audi E-Tron GT are built on the same platform and are almost
| the same car. It's main development was lead by Porsche but
| it's technology will be used by the whole group.
|
| This may be being developed within the Porsche cars group but
| the plan is bigger than that. It's just the PR that's focused
| at the Porsche use case right now.
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