La nouvelle donne de l’électromobilité

Article rédigé pour un dossier spécial automobile, publié courant 2014 dans différentes revues des écoles Centrale. 

 

Entre 2008 et 2014, l’Alliance Renault-Nissan a investi 4 milliards d’Euros pour développer sa technologie “zéro émission” et a commercialisé 6 modèles (Leaf, Kangoo, Fluence, Twizy, Zoé, e-NV200). De l’autre côté de l’At-lantique, Tesla fabrique le model S après le succès de son Roadster et prépare déjà le model X. De nombreux constructeurs rejoignent le mouvement, notamment BMW, VW, Hyundai… Pourquoi ?

Au tout début de l’automobile, c’est une voiture électrique, la “jamais contente”, qui la première a dépassé le 100 km/h, mais ces véhicules restèrent cantonnés aux véhicules niches au profit des véhicules à moteur à combustion interne – les voitures à pétrole – apportant une meilleur autonomie, une plus faible masse, un coût réduit. Ce n’est qu’à la fin du vingtième siècle, à la suite du Protocole de Kyoto, que Toyota propose avec sa Prius une motorisation hybride thermique électrique.

L’objectif premier de l’hybridation est de maximiser le rendement énergétique du moteur à explosion en le faisant fonctionner à son optimum, stockant le surplus d’énergie obtenu en dehors des phases d’accélération et le libérant à la demande du conducteur. Ces véhicules ne sont pas zéro émission mais permettent de réduire ponctuellement les émissions. Sur ces véhicules, les batteries sont dix à vingt fois plus petites que sur un véhicule tout électrique, mais contribuent, avec la présence de deux groupes motopropulseurs, à alourdir le véhicule et à renchérir son coût.

Depuis, les travaux sur les batteries ont permis d’envisager la commercialisation de véhicules hybrides plug-in – permettant d’assurer une autonomie électrique de plus de 25km – et surtout des véhicules 100 % électriques. Ces derniers emportant plusieurs kilowattheures de batteries franchissent la barre des 200 km d’autonomie zéro émission. Malgré ces progrès, l’appréhension des clients sur cette faible autonomie – la “range anxiety” – constitue le principal frein à l’adoption de l’électromobilité même si l’expérience montre que dans la pratique, les clients du véhicule électrique s’accommodent très bien de cette autonomie réduite.

Néanmoins, certains véhicules sont équipés d’un “range extender”, groupe électrogène embarqué permettant d’étendre l’autonomie en générant de l’électricité à partir de carburant, ce qui place ces véhicules dans la catégorie des véhicules hybrides série. Une start-up Française, EP Tender, étudie la possibilité de loger ce range extender dans une remorque en location que le véhicule électrique tracterait en cas de trajet exceptionnellement long, évitant de transporter cette masse inutile lors des trajets quotidiens.

Cette autonomie limitée crée une attente forte sur les solutions de recharge publiques et privées qui constituent une partie importante de l’écosystème du véhicule électrique, par analogie avec les stations-service pour les véhicules thermiques.

Le véhicule électrique devient le premier objet nomade avec une puissance de charge élevée, connectable en tout lieu avec des exigences de sécurité sans commune mesure avec celles que nous connaissons par exemple avec les smartphones. Cette distribution possible au domicile, sur la voie publique, dans des centres commerciaux, au bureau… introduit une nouvelle donne à coupler avec une production d’électricité non carbonée : hydroélectrique, nucléaire, renouvelable.

La batterie et le groupe moto-propulseur de ZOE (Renault 2013)

 

La puissance disponible dépend du type de point de charge, une faible puissance pour une charge lente, au domicile, au bureau ou offerte dans le cas de centre commerciaux ou de restaurants qui veulent attirer les clients chez eux, et une forte puissance pour une charge rapide payante dans le cas d’une recharge nécessaire au cours d’un trajet. Les pouvoirs publiques ont un rôle majeur dans le déploiement de cette infrastructure publique visible pour rassurer les clients et favoriser le marché du VE.

Tesla inclut dans son offre l’accès gratuit et illimité à son réseau de super chargeurs qui, associé au sur dimensionnement de la capacité des batteries, permet de relier les grandes villes des Etats Unis au moyen d’arrêts d’une heure tous les 250km, ce qui suppose la disponibilité immédiate d’une borne de recharge au moment où se présente le véhicule ou, mieux, la capacité à réserver cette borne à distance. En Europe, des corridors équipés de stations de charge rapide tous les 50km sont installés, la principale question restant celle de l’exploitation et de la rentabilité de ces infrastructures.

Un concept particulier d’infrastructure a été mis en place par la société Better Place, celui du “Quickdrop” ou “Battery swap”, qui consiste à échanger en quelques minutes sa batterie vide par une batterie pleine, rechargée en temps masqué dans des stations automatiques. Il a été testé en Israël et au Danemark, avec succès, recueillant un fort niveau de satisfaction de la part des clients qui pouvaient traverser le pays sans arrêt prolongé. Le concept a été repris par Tesla, et se développe également en Chine, notamment sur des autobus. En 2013, l’échec financier de Better Place a mis un terme à leur application, gourmande en investissements, et il sera intéressant de vérifier si cette technologie sera maintenue dans d’autres projets futurs.

Le véhicule électrique est également connecté afin d’aider le conducteur à gérer son parcours en liaison avec son autonomie résiduelle, à trouver et réserver une borne de recharge, à suivre sa charge à distance, à commander le pré-chauffage de son véhicule, à suivre ses résultats en éco-conduite… La connectivité du véhicule électrique favorise aussi le développement de nouveaux services, en l’intégrant

naturellement aux services de mobilité en location courte durée ou en auto-partage, mais aussi aux prestations énergétiques dont nous reparlerons plus loin.

La télématique permet aussi de suivre l’état de santé de la batterie de traction que plusieurs constructeurs proposent à la location. Si cette idée de location est surprenante au premier abord pour un client attaché à la propriété de son automobile, elle permet de mutualiser le risque technique et de rassurer l’acheteur du véhicule d’occasion sur ce risque technique, contribuant ainsi à soutenir la valeur du véhicule. Sur le plan du discours commercial, ce système permet de comparer plus facilement le coût d’usage du véhicule électrique à celui du véhicule thermique, en rapportant le montant du loyer batterie et de l’électricité consommée au coût mensuel du carburant pour des prestations équivalentes.

Pour réduire encore le coût des batteries sur toute leur durée de vie, les constructeurs travaillent également à les valoriser au-delà de leur «vie automobile», où leur performance dégradée répond encore à un besoin dans des applications moins exigeantes, telles que le stockage distribué, qui consiste à stocker l’énergie pour lisser les pics de puissance. On parle alors de “seconde vie” des batteries.

Le véhicule électrique a également un impact sur le réseau électrique. Le premier challenge est de faire en sorte qu’il n’aggrave pas les pics de consommation, généralement très carbonés, en provenance des centrales électriques à fioul, gaz, à charbon, ce qui obligerait les énergéticiens à investir dans de nouvelles installations pour répondre à la demande. Pour cela, le véhicule électrique devient un acteur à part entière de la gestion intelligente de l’énergie. La première étape consiste à gérer efficacement le besoin de mobilité du client et à y répondre tout en repoussant au maximum la charge dans les heures nocturnes où l’électricité est la plus abondante, la moins onéreuse et la moins carbonée. Dans un second temps, le stockage d’énergie dans le véhicule est mis à contribution pour gérer intelligemment l’intermittence des modes de production d’énergie renouvelable, à l’échelle de la maison (“vehicle-to-home”), de l’immeuble ou du quartier (“vehicle-to-grid”) et équilibrer au mieux l’offre et la demande d’énergie. Les difficultés sont bien sûr techniques, mais surtout économiques. Construire une chaîne de valeur qui permette le partage des économies du système, la rémunération de l’utilisation des différents composants entre les différents acteurs (énergéticiens, constructeurs automobiles, gestionnaires de parc immobilier et client final) fera l’objet de délicates négociations. Les systèmes d’information et la connectivité du véhicule sont des parties prenantes essentielles de ce nouveau système de gestion d’énergie électrique construit sur les smart-grids.

Il est difficile d’aborder l’électromobilité sans évoquer les piles à combustibles, où l’on remplace les lourdes batteries par un réservoir d’hydrogène et son générateur électrique, permettant à la fois d’augmenter l’autonomie et de réduire le temps de recharge en se rapprochant des performances des véhicules thermiques. Actuellement les bilans masse, volume et coûts restent défavorables. Pour en faire une alternative efficace et économique, les questions de la production et de la distribution de l’hydrogène, maîtrisant les émissions de gaz à effet de serre restent ouvertes. L’enjeu n’est pas de rivaliser avec les véhicules à batterie pour les petits trajets, mais d’apporter une solution décarbonée fiable, à impact environnemental réduit, sans contrainte forte pour le client, aux longs trajets.

Nous avons vu que le véhicule électrique apporte son lot d’innovation et modifie le paysage technique et les pratiques des clients, mais il apporte également un nouvelle donne parmi les constructeurs. Alors que la complexité technologique, en particulier sur les moteurs à explosion poussés au perpétuel raffinement par les réglementations anti-pollution, représente une barrière à l’entrée pour de nouveaux compétiteurs, la transition vers l’électromobilité voit l’apparition de nouveaux acteurs industriels comme Tesla, Fisker, Bolloré, Mia, Pariss…

Le véhicule électrique semble particulièrement adapté au système de véhicule autonome, avec ses nouveaux usages, ses nouveaux marchés et ses nouveaux protagonistes, tels Apple, Google… La compétition pour l’intégration des systèmes d’exploitation, de géo localisation et de navigation des véhicules, de facturation de l’énergie prépare une prochaine révolution des systèmes de transport, même s’il faudra encore du temps pour maîtriser les problèmes de sécurité, procéder aux ajustements réglementaires, adapter les comportements. Néanmoins le mode de propulsion électrique, respectueux de l’environnement local, et la connectivité en continuité avec la domotique et de nouvelles pratiques, prépare l’ouverture à de nouveaux usages.

Le véhicule électrique est un premier pas vers une automobile “servicielle”, partagée, sûre, moins coûteuse, moins consommatrice de l’espace public et plus respectueuse de l’environnement. Il devrait être un acteur incontournable des évolutions de nos sociétés.

 

FD

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Frederic Delrieu

Frédéric DELRIEU (ECLi 95)

RENAULT – Business Development des Véhicules Electriques

Il a commencé sa carrière à la Direction de la Recherche de Renault, auteur de plusieurs innovations dans le domaine du comportement routier et de la sécurité active; rejoint en 2000 la Direction de l’Ingénierie Véhicules chargé des développements et de l’industrialisation d’équipements et systèmes du châssis. Ensuite chef de projet châssis de la L38/SM3 en Corée du Sud chez Renault Samsung Motors, il rejoint en 2011 le Programme Véhicules Electriques et son équipe de Business Développement, en particulier sur les sujets de batteries de traction et d’infrastructure de charge.

http://www.linkedin.com/in/fredericdelrieu/

 

 

Work on solutions to non-collaboration in your team

Some organizations unfortunately tend to inhibe collaboration.

But let’s look at some solutions and alternatives to non-collaboration in work teams. That means, what are the best environments to stimulate collaboration ? And what can be done to develop the culture of collaboration ?

First, here are 5 key principles to help you to setup collaboration in your team culture.

1. Define a common mission…

and take care to interdependances between people in order to break the expertise walls built sometimes betweendifferent parts of your company or team.

Make also sure to push common projects and contacts to bring exchanges between groups.

2. Review the team composition.

Take care not to let carreer-oriented, manipulative, competitive personalities impede collaboration by creating distrust or inspiring reproductive behavior in others.

If you are stuck with one of these personalities you cannot get rid of, an alternative would be to create a code of shared values made by the group to attract community leaders.

3. Stimulate regular meetings.

For there is no cooperation without these meetings which build a common stake, a cooperative “us”, the sense of belonging to the organization,

4. Value the team performance.

Lots of companies push the individual performance, but forget to stimulate the collective one.

In order to reinforce the group collaboration, each team chief or formal leader should monitor the team performance and maintain a balance between individual and collective performance.

5. Value the collective talent…

as much as individual talent by adding each individual skills and experience.

Each group or organization or company should follow these principles in order to establish a more collaborative culture and conducive to open discussions, marked by authenticity and desire to move forward together toward a common goal.

Here are some additional solutions to each type of non-collaborative cultures :

from http://blogue.edithluc.com/solutions-a-la-non-collaboration/

300 Years of FOSSIL FUELS in 300 Seconds

Lean your activity

The project management is invaded with the “Lean”. One reason is that major companies realized that their quality management, work processes, management methods had been reinforced in an excessive way, by recording too many informations hiding the essential and necessary information!

That’s why they invested in some light modification to focus on the main target : to hunt the risks ! The principle is simple : Setup filters to select necessary activities among the huge stack of activities written in quality procedures. These filters will take into account the nature of the risk : Innovation, new manufacturing process, or new capacity facilities.

Taking into account the level of risk of your project following this evaluation filter, you will focus on the main chapter of your quality procedure and make sure your company will not spend precious ressource in an unuseful way. Here are some additional guidelines :

• Do the risk assessment by an expert team (engineering, purchasing, manufacturing)
• Make sure each activity has a unique pilot to hunt the redundancy.

But keep in mind that if the initial goals of the quality procedures are to strengthen, consolidate, lock the development process, to apply Lean by lighten the related activity may weaken your project and make it collapse !

The E.V. in 3D – Paris Motor Show

Fons Trompenaars : Innovation comes from Combination

Here is an intervention from Fons Trompenaars giving some ideas about influence of cultural characteristics on innovation. Many intersting ideas are reported below.

Video

The failure of the bipolar thought

In western countries, the education doesn’t help to be innovative. Trompenaars identifies one specific reason to this situation : a bipolar way of thinking. Most of the time, western people consider the problems with only two opposite alternatives (something is either black or white, good or evil, conservative or progressive…). We even try to justify these choices by giving opposite reasons (either an organization is centralized to get scale savings, either it is multipolar to be flexible and close to consumers).

But the world become more and more diverse, and our technologies and education don’t help us to catch this diversity that makes the world even more different. « Innovation is a matter of combination »

For instance, one considers that a car can either be sportive and fast, either safe. That is, if you add more speed, it will be decreasing safety. This is a bipolar thought : « You cannot add values because values are not things that can be added to each other ».  The innovation will come from the sum of these values, in this case speed and safety. The art of innovation is in the combination of values that seems oposite to each other.

Use contradictions

One example applied to HR is about the prime to reward the team or the person. If you stay in this alternative you don’t solve the problem. One solution, by combinating the ideas, would be to give a prime to the team with the best individual creativity and to the person with the best team spirit… and therefore to create a spirit of coopetition.

Another interesting idea is to remember to never stay balanced, because the balance is the neutral zone of the bipolar zone, the dead zone of activity, the point zero of the combination. Always integrate rather than balance.

from : http://gestion-des-risques-interculturels.com/points-de-vue/fons-trompenaars-linnovation-art-de-la-combinaison/

Innovation management : a study on Convergence methodology named here “Orbital Management”

“Innovation Management: A Synthesis of Academic and Industrial Points of View.” (Tomala, F. and Senechal, O. , 2003) International Journal of Project Management, 22: 281-287.10. Link to this paper

Abstract: This paper synthesizes several works about innovation management. By blending both academic and industrial points of view, we hope to help those participating in innovative projects become aware of the latest thoughts of other groups involved in innovation management. Our discussion underlines the importance of innovation as well as the various problematical aspects of innovation management. Three principal points are considered: the types of actors involved in innovation, the organizational perimeters for innovation and the types of organization chosen for innovative projects. The case study of the Renault automobile company highlights a new means of managing innovation, called orbital management, which involves a new project structure specific to innovation management.

Extract :

“… Each project group is animated by a pilot group of 8–15 people, including both internal and external partners of the company. This committee meets every 2 weeks to verify the progress of the results chains described in each convergence plan. The pilot groups of each innovation project proceed in the same manner, and each one of their members is connected, via an intranet, to all the other innovation project team members.
Each innovation project is managed like a start-up, with the nomination of a project leader, the ‘‘pilot of the innovation system’’, who is seconded by the innovations project leader during the preliminary meetings. Thus, the primary manager of innovation projects […] is ultimately responsible for 15 innovative projects.
Project leaders must both master the technological complexities of the project and exhibit excellent interpersonal skills; their job is to bring together the skills and energy needed to achieve the end results the innovation project.
The galaxy in Fig. 1 […] thus makes it possible to visualize the complex grid of relationships existing between the various entities that make up the project team.

The diagram in Fig. 2 shows that the success of innovation can be achieved only at an ‘‘extended’’ company level and requires both horizontal and vertical decompartmentalization. This structure is different from the matrix structure because an innovation project manager supervises the whole project. This person must make sure that internal and external skills are in synergy: innovation is a broad collective action, requiring the collaboration of various services with the same the fixed objective. At an in-house level, this person plays the role of consultant.
The diagram in Fig. 3 presents an example of a convergence plan. In each box, the results to be obtained are specified, as are the actors who will be involved. (To make the table easier to read, a color can be associated to an actor or to a type of result.)

[…] The objective of innovative project management is to better integrate and control the risk associated with the stress that accompanies the process of innovation; it is the management of uncertainty. […] the convergence plan is central. It aims to control the process by focusing on
the desired results. It requires the careful definition of the project actors, the stakes, the problem evoked in the project and the results expected at each stage. Starting with the results desired by the customer, chains of intermediate results are constructed, all of which must converge towards the ultimate goal. Each intermediate result is a very clearly specified commitment. These results chains enable the project teams to concretely develop their technological contributions and to set up their actions in practical terms.
Using the convergence plans, the teams can see where they need to go and what resources and competences will be needed to get there. These plans formalize all the relationships that must be managed to obtain the desired final result.

[…] All of these imply learning to manage stress; management by results means dealing with uncertainty and doubt on a day-to-day basis, without taking refuge behind procedures. ”

F.D.

Contact us for an application of this methodology on your challenging project !!

The good way to use flashcards to learn vocabulary

To learn vocabulary, there are several systems, and 2 especially used in auto-learning :

• The lists (sorted or not by theme, by frequence). This is the vocabulary notebook our language teachers made us write in the secondary school, the notebook having for them the advantage that its form could be checked even though it was not learned… Because its use showed some obvious limits : The learned vocabulary and still to be learned staying at the same level, we cannot focus on the most difficult words.
• The flashcards, are these small cards with on one side the word in target language and on the other side the word in the origin language. The advantage is that once the word is known, you can remove its card to focus only on the others. Here is a more efficient method. But it is possible to do even better.

We saw that flashcards are a memorization mean through a repetition spaced in time. It happened that a German scientist, Sebastian Leitner, demonstrated in the 70’s that it was possible to maximize the system efficiency by sorting the cards in several groups corresponding to our memorization ability. This is the Leitner system and here is the functioning : We test our knowledge with the cards from one group. If we remember the meaning of the word, we put the card in another group and in the opposite case we put it in the first group. The time duration between each test increases with the groups.

For example, the proposed time durations being only proposals : We have 4 groups. The group 1 includes the words we hardly remember, the group 4 including the words we easily remember. We will check the words of the group 1 every day, the one of the group 2 every 3 days, the one of the group 3 every week and the one of the group 4 every month. If we success on the vocabulary of the group 1, the words we know are put into the group 2 and will be tested a few days later; the known words of group 2 will go to group 3, the ones of group 3 in the group 4 and the one of the group 4 will be considered as definitely known. On the opposite, the words of group 2, 3 and 4 we don’t remember would go directly in the group 1.

Thus you spend more time on the difficult words, you train your memory on the short term but also on the long term. The result is a more efficient memorization activity.

Original article : http://www.entre-france-et-coree.com/2008/05/12/du-bon-usage-des-flashcards-pour-le-vocabulaire/

More information on Leitner’s system : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system

Vocabulary memorization innovative project (1) : memorization technics

In a serie of articles on our current innovative project on memorization of vocabulary in foreign languages, here are some interesting materials  and thoughts which guided our development.

How to… Learn a Foreign Language

Using the tools :

Foreign languages are the ideal subject area for the use of memory techniques. Learning vocabulary is often a matter of associating a meaningless collection of syllables with a word in your own language.

Traditionally people have associated these words by repetition – by saying the word in their own language and the foreign language time and time and time and time again. You can improve on this tedious way of learning by using three good techniques:

1. Using Mnemonics to link words

This is a simple extension of the link method. Here you are using images to link a word in your own language with a word in a foreign language.

For example, in learning English/French vocabulary:

• English: rug/carpet – French: tapis – imagine an ornate oriental carpet with a tap as the central design woven in chrome thread
• English: grumpy – French: grognon – a grumpy man groaning with irritation
• English: to tease – French: taquiner – a woman teasing her husband as she takes in the washing.

This technique was formalized by Dr. Michael Gruneberg, and is known as the ‘LinkWord’ technique. He has produced language books (an example is German by Association) in many language pairs to help students acquire the basic vocabulary needed to get by in the language (usually about 1000 words). It is claimed that using this technique this basic vocabulary can be learned in just 10 hours.

2. The town language Mnemonic

This is a very elegant, effective mnemonic that fuses a sophisticated variant of the Roman Room system with the system described above.

This depends on the fact that the basic vocabulary of a language relates to everyday things: things that you can usually find in a city, town or village. To use the technique, choose a town that you are very familiar with. Use objects within that place as the cues to recall the images that link to foreign words.

Nouns in the town:
Nouns should be associated to the most relevant locations: for example, the image coding the foreign word for book could be associated with a book on a shelf in the library. You could associate the word for bread with an image of a loaf in a baker’s shop. Words for vegetables could be associated with parts of a display outside a greengrocer’s. Perhaps there is a farm just outside the town that allows all the animal name associations to be made.

Adjectives in the park:
Adjectives can be associated with a garden or park within the town: words such as green, smelly, bright, small, cold, etc. can be easily related to objects in a park. Perhaps there is a pond there, or a small wood, or perhaps people with different characteristics are walking around.

Verbs in the sports center:
Verbs can most easily be associated with a sports center or playing field. This allows us all the associations of lifting, running, walking, hitting, eating, swimming, driving, etc.

Remembering Genders
In a language where gender is important, a very good method of remembering this is to divide your town into two main zones. In one zone you code information on masculine gender nouns, while in the other zone you code information on feminine nouns. Where the language has a neutral gender, then use three zones. You can separate these areas with busy roads, rivers, etc. To fix the gender of a noun, simply associate its image with a place in the correct part of town. This makes remembering genders easy!

Many Languages, many towns
Another elegant spin-off of the technique comes when learning several languages: normally this can cause confusion. With the town mnemonic, all you need do is choose a different city, town or village for each language to be learned. Ideally this might be in the relevant country. Practically, however, you might just decide to use a local town with the appropriate foreign flavor.

3. The 100 most common words

Tony Buzan, in his book ‘Using your Memory’, points out that just 100 words comprise 50% of all words used in conversation in a language. Learning this core 100 words gets you a long way towards being able to speak in that language, albeit at a basic level. The 100 basic words used in conversation are shown below:

1. A/an	2. After	3. Again	4. All	5. Almost
6. Also	7. Always	8. And	9. Because	10. Before
11. Big	12. But	13. (I) can	14. (I) come	15. Either/or
16. (I) find	17. First	18. For	19. Friend	20. From
21. (I) go	22. Good	23. Good-bye	24. Happy	25. (I) have
26. He	27. Hello	28. Here	29. How	30. I
31. (I) am	32. If	33. In	34. (I) know	35. Last
36. (I) like	37. Little	38. (I) love	39. (I) make	40. Many
41. One	42. More	43. Most	44. Much	45. My
46. New	47. No	48. Not	49. Now	50. Of
51. Often	52. On	53. One	54. Only	55. Or
56. Other	57. Our	58. Out	59. Over	60. People
61. Place	62. Please	63. Same	64. (I) see	65. She
66. So	67. Some	68. Sometimes	69. Still	70. Such
71. (I) tell	72. Thank you	73. That	74. The	75. Their
76. Them	77. Then	78. There is	79. They	80. Thing
81. (I) think	82. This	83. Time	84. To	85. Under
86. Up	87. Us	88. (I) use	89. Very	90. We
91. What	92. When	93. Where	94. Which	95. Who
96. Why	97. With	98. Yes	99. You	100. Your

(Extract reproduced from Use Your Memory by Tony Buzan with the permission of BBC Worldwide Limited, © Tony Buzan)

Summary

The three approaches to learning foreign languages shown here can be very effective. They help to:

• Point out the most important words to learn
• Show how to link words in your own language to words in a foreign language, and
• Show how to structure recall of the language through use of the town mnemonic.

Original Posted on MindTools.com : http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTIM_10.htm

The EV as “disruptive” technology

An article in the current issue of The Economist asks: “After many false starts, battery-powered cars seem here to stay. Are they just an interesting niche product, or will they turn motoring upside down?”

Read the full article here.

” In 1995 Joseph Bower and Clayton Christensen, two researchers at the Harvard Business School, invented a new term: “disruptive technology.” This is an innovation that fulfills the requirements of some, but not most, consumers better than the incumbent does. That gives it a toehold, which allows room for improvement and, eventually, dominance. The risk for incumbent firms is that of the proverbial boiling frog. They may not know when to switch from old to new until it is too late.

The example Dr. Bower and Dr. Christensen used was a nerdy one: computer hard-drives. But unbeknown to them a more familiar one was in the making. The first digital cameras were coming on sale. These were more expensive than film cameras and had lower resolution. But they brought two advantages. A user could look at a picture immediately after he had taken it. And he could download it onto his computer and send it to his friends.

Fourteen years on, you would struggle to buy a new camera that uses film. Some of the leading camera-makers, such as Panasonic, are firms that had little interest in photography when Dr. Bower and Dr. Christensen published. And an entire industry, the manufacturing and processing of film, is rapidly disappearing.

Substitute “car” for “camera” and you have a story that should concern thoughtful bosses in the motor and oil industries. Internal-combustion engines have dominated mechanized road transport for a century, but the past year or so has seen the arrival of a dribble of vehicles driven by electric motors. That these are the products of small, new firms, or of established non-carmaking companies, supports the Bower-Christensen thesis. But next year the big boys, encouraged by legislative pressure to produce low-emission vehicles, will leap out of the boiling water and join in. ”

Note from the author : I remember an article of Shai Agassi (Better Place) explaining that the Electric Vehicle could be compared to e-mail, and Internal Combustion Engined cars compared to traditional written letters sent by Post-office… and that Hybrid Vehicles are like fax ! A mixed combination of both technologies … with all disadvantages !

FD

From http://blogs.edmunds.com/greencaradvisor/2009/09/the-electric-fuel-trade-acid-test-not-simply-another-plug-for-evs.html