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Author: rscasny
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Seeking your Opinion: Is the Market Headed to Fully Electric Vehicles or 48V Hybrids?

Recent news that Tesla is going to produce an all electric vehicle for $35,000 didn't surprise me that much. Sooner or later Tesla would have had to produce an electric vehicle in the price range that most people could afford.

 

But what really turned my head was the $ billions that Ford plans on investing electric vehicles in the next few years. GM is also responding to the electrification trends of the day and is expanding its electric car portfolio in China. And Volvo is planning on have its entire lineup electric vehicles.

 

But wait a minute.

 

Is the global market ready for full vehicular electrification?

 

What happened to the hybrid market?

 

Specifically, 48V hybrids that offer more torque, faster acceleration, and better performance than the older generation 12V hybrids, while at the same time maintaining fuel economy and emissions standards compliance.

 

Hybrid vehicles use a high voltage DC bus to supply power to the motor. To accomplish that, 48v hybrids use a bi-directional current/voltage converter, which is needed to provide power between the 48V and 12V batteries in a hybrid vehicle (i.e., boost 12V to 48 or buck 48 to 12). Some studies say the potential market for 48V hybrid vehicles is great, yet at the same time, some countries such as India and China expect to skip hybrid and go directly to full electric. 

 

In your opinion, where do you think the market is moving towards: fully electric or 48V hybrids?

Anonymous

  • It is probably more a question of when than if the market will go all electric. Hybrid vehicles are a complex interim solution that may reduce emissions slightly depending on what fuel is used to charge the batteries.

    All electric will increase as charging infrastructure gets built and battery costs come down and battery performance improves. (or gas prices go up) Hybrids can and will get better in the short term, but so will all electric.

    I guess the question is will hybrids ever be the most common type of vehicle on the road? And if so, how long will that dominance last? I suspect they won't ever be the dominant technology on the road, but it is easy to be wrong on a prediction like that if car companies see a way to make more money on hybrids. It is obvious which option oil companies like.

    Or maybe the price of oil will go down if there is a major swing to all electric. There is a common sense theory floating around that the price of oil is intentionally being kept low enough to prevent massive investment in alternate fuels, but the proof will not even be found in the pudding.

  • It does depend somewhat on your needs - range anxiety is still a problem in a large country like Australia, where some people can travel over 300km a day just to get stuff done. Another issue boils down to the infrastructure - with a relative lack of density in terms of fast/rapid car charging infrastructure and the costs associated with installing such infrastructure (e.g. new padmount substation just to handle several 50/100kW fast chargers), I can see that the hybrid vehicle still represents the best balance of eco-friendliness and functional familiarity.

     

    That's not to say that I don't think the future is pure electric - it could well be and I would very much like it to be. The likes of Tesla have shown just how capable and practical they can be, but even if the price starts to fall and the range increases, it may be good enough for the city-dwellers and help address pollution where it is most concentrated. Perhaps maybe we need to change our habits as a society to better fit the environment ... high density living is only just starting to appear around here ... cities such as Hong Kong are easily 30-40 years ahead of us.

     

    - Gough