A new book, titled A Better Plan for a Better Place, by
Gordon Dower, looks out of the technology and engineering box and
takes to task a program known as Project Better Place, which
promotes the renting of batteries for electric vehicles as well as
supporting the need to install networks of recharging and battery
swapping stations around the globe.
The project is worthwhile because it
offers innovative solutions that overcome
the high initial cost of a battery pack that is
large enough to give an electric vehicle an
acceptable range from a consumer point-of view.
However, it does not go far enough.
Instead of calling for only the battery pack
to be rented, Project Better Place should
push forward with the idea to rent the
entire running gear, because it is vastly
simpler to exchange the motorized deck or
‘modek’, which covers such subsystems as
wheels, suspension, electric drive and the
battery unit itself.
In contrast to the elaborate underground
battery-handling equipment proposed for
the swapping system, exchanging a modek
simply requires a conventional jack to
raise the ride-on passenger compartment
(‘ridon’) by about a meter so that the
modek can be removed, thus allowing its
replacement to be slotted underneath.
The exchange is then completed by
lowering the ridon.
Just as impressive as the simplicity
of this process is that the procedure can be
undertaken with passengers remaining in
the vehicle. Batteries tend to be heavy,
delicate, and dangerous to handle, but in
the modek exchange, the battery modules
and connections are never disturbed.
Several models and three highway licensed
prototypes – Rideks I, II, and III –
amply demonstrate the feasibility
and ease of this quick-change ridek
modularization, which has been patented
in six countries.
An important advantage of renting the
modek rather than only the battery is that
the modek could have a much longer life
expectancy than the average vehicle.
Furthermore, modeks would be standardized
to fit the ridons, which then in turn gives
an economy of numbers and simplifies
servicing and the training of mechanics.
The privately owned ridon would be
relatively inexpensive to manufacture and
even customize to suit the owner’s needs.
It could even be argued that the owner
of the vehicle could have several different
ridons and change them himself, in just a
few minutes. Being able to swap the modek
under a modek exchange rental contract
would therefore eliminate all servicing and
warranty concerns.
The book describes an alternative
charging system that means the vehicle
does not need to be physically plugged into
a power source. Conducting plates
embedded in a curb are activated only
when a suitably equipped parked car makes
contact with them and supplies an
authorizing code, either wirelessly or by
direct contact. The book illustrates how this
process, known as vehicle-to-grid (V2G)
can be completely safe and so inexpensive
that every parked electric car is automatically
connected to the utility grid, enabling all
this collective energy storage capacity to
meet a highly variable demand.
But that’s not all. The book also covers
a novel means for controlling the flow
of electric energy that brings together
accelerating, braking and reversing
functions. Another chapter discusses the
challenges of a new method of steering, and
the final chapter contains philosophical
perspectives on road transportation.
