Question of the Month: Which technology will power automobiles in 20 years?

I think it will be a combination between electric and hydrogen. Both are priced too high right now for mass adoption. Hydrogen is probably in a more tenuous situation. But I've read that Germany is heavily investing in hydrogen. They feel there is room for both technologies. I'm seeing an issue with electric in the long run battery disposal, which is hazardous material. In the US we are way, way behind EV refueling infrastructure, which will impede growth. 

It's been five years since I used a private car or taxis to get around. In my city everything is very accessible on foot or by bicycle, I hope for a future with fewer cars.

Can you imagine going back to Steam in some way? Some people may immediately think of shovelling coal into your vehicle, but using some other heat source would be wild.

Synthetic fuel (which might be hydrogen or a mix of hydrogen, diesel, petrol and methane). The world has over 1 billion petrol and diesel vehicles and the infrastructure to get liquid fuel into them.

Making fuel from air, water and sunshine (or other energy) isn't that efficient at the point of manufacture but wins out in distribution. Biofuels count and may be significant.

Hydrogen is interesting (and could be counted as synthetic fuel) but it won't work in existing vehicles and may not work out too well with existing gas (petrol or natural gas) distribution networks.

In the UK there is a vague plan to use electric heating in homes and electric vehicles - the grid is completely incapable of supplying the electricity, we don't have the means to generate it and the cost of upgrading the grid is measured in £trillions.

MK

I'll cop out and say solar will power more than 50% of our infrastructure. Probably most hydrogen will come from solar. I suppose you could even say fossil fuels come from solar, but I'm not counting that.... 

I guessed Hybrid as in Gas/Electric.  I recognize that currently all signs lean towards things going fully electric.  I think, however, a breaking point will be reached in many regions where all of a sudden electric cars will cause a real strain on the electric grid.  Keep in mind that there are a number of countries that schedule brown outs in order to prioritize distribution of electricity.  Also not every method of electricity generation is clean.  For these reasons I think the tide will change in favor of hybrids.  Looking beyond 20 years though I have no idea.

That sounds great.  Europe is much better at creating walkable cities.

I sense a fellow fan of Steam Punk.

I recommend this video, which explains why hydrogen won't save us. Currently made mainly from fossil fuels, very complicated for storage and building the infrastructure.

Edit media

Dimensions x Small Medium Large Custom

Subject (required) Brief Description Tags (separated by comma) Video visibility in search results Visible Hidden

Parent content

RE: Question of the Month: Which technology will power automobiles in 20 years?

Poster

Upload Preview

Ok

Cancel

I think it will be Hybrid. Infrastructure for electric needs to be developed.