mattbell

In the same way that the first X Prize helped launch manned spaceflight, the *automotive* X prize is designed to encourage the development of cars that get over 100mpg.

The rules are very complex, but I saw a talk tonight by a guy who has basically read all the rules and investigated all the entrants.  The design ideas range from clever to wacky.  Have a look:

http://www.xprizecars.com/


He also mentioned that you can get far better mileage out of cars by reshaping them to get a better drag coefficient.  This guy made a 1992 Honda Civic get close to 100mpg just by adding some extra aerodynamic pieces.


It's fantastically ugly, but it's what we engineers call a "proof of concept".  Most of the gasoline at high speeds goes to fighting air friction, so if you can reduce the drag coefficient as this guy did, it makes a huge difference.

What stuns me is how little work it took to raise the mpg through the roof.  If the automakers wanted to, they could easily make high fuel efficiency vehicles.

People have been blogging about "peak oil"  -- how oil reserves are declining, and we may all be running out of oil soon.  I've decided that peak oil, if it happens, would actually be a good thing.

Basically, people use oil because it's slightly cheaper than the alternatives.  It's true there's a lot of infrastructure that's dependent on oil, but as the prices rise, the capitalist system will find ways of routing around the infrastructure issue.  Many of those other ways would involve renewable resources.  If biodiesel becomes less expensive than fossil-derived diesel, people will switch to it. 

Thus, peak oil will likely dramatically slow global warming.  By raising the price of oil as it dwindles, the capitalist system will encourage people to become more efficient and switch to renewable energy. 

There are plenty of unnecessary actions that use a lot of oil because it is cheap.  For example, we mine iron in the US, ship it to China where the labor is cheap and have them turn it into washing machines, and then ship them back to the US for sale.  Companies grow crops in South America and then fly them to the US so we can eat strawberries in January.  People buy needlessly big cars so they can feel good about themselves.  None of this represents true need.  If the price of oil goes up, the whole capitalist system will reconfigure itself.  They'll make the refrigerators in the Midwest for slightly more money, stop selling strawberries off-season, and market small cars as sexy.  Thus I don't think peak oil is the disaster people think it will be.

So how do we encourage peak oil?  Perhaps we should make more things out of plastic, as plastic is oil-derived.  I wonder if we put less CO2 into the atmosphere when we turn oil into plastic as opposed to burning it in an engine.