Fossil Fuel Vehicles Will Last

Fossil Fuel Vehicles Will Last Longer Than People Think

With oil prices skyrocketing in recent years, there has been a clamor for finding alternate technologies to replace fossil fuel vehicles with more environment friendly alternatives. One of the possible alternatives to the conventional cars, which admittedly consume a major portion of the world's supply of oil, is the electric car. Some proponents of the electric car, which uses batteries as its power source, have hailed it as the answer to our future transport needs that would soon replace the fuel-guzzling conventional vehicles on our roads. On closer scrutiny of the oil-price phenomenon, and the pros and cons of the electric cars, I am afraid I have bad news for the electric-car lovers: the fossil fuel vehicles are going to last longer than was being predicted. Consider.

To begin with, it is abundantly clear now that the dooms-day scenarios of the fast approaching depletion of fossil fuels reserves from the earth were overly pessimistic. Such predictions were primarily prompted by the abnormal hike in oil price that touched a peak of $79 a barrel on August 8, 2006 (Mauger, 2006). The truth, however, is that there is no immediate threat of a serious depletion of the world's oil reserves. The abnormal rise in oil prices were mainly due to limited oil-refining capacities, political uncertainty in the oil-producing Middle East, the Iraq War, increased consumption in the rapidly growing economies of China and India, but most of all -- speculative manipulation of the prices by influential oil companies and energy traders. The recent reversal of oil prices to below $60 a barrel is indicative of the fact that the abnormal rise in oil prices in recent times was unsustainable and further decline in oil prices is on the cards. Affordable oil prices in future effectively means a further lease of life for fossil fuel vehicles.

If we take a brief look at the problems associated with the development of electric cars, it would be even clearer that the fossil fuel vehicles are going to last longer than some people would have us believe. For example, consider the weakest link in an electric car design: the battery itself, which is supposed to replace fossil fuel as the power source. The currently used batteries in electric cars are usually the lead-acid type, which are heavy and bulky. A lead-acid battery pack in a typical electric car weighs about 1000 pounds or more; it also occupies a large space as about 50 batteries each of size 6" x 8" x 6" are required for a single car (Brain, 2006). They are also expensive as a typical lead-acid battery pack for an electric car costs about $2,000. Moreover, batteries get discharged quickly and give only about a 50-mile range to a car, after which the battery-pack has to be re-charged. The re-charging process is also time-consuming and it takes between 4 to 10 hours for full charge, depending on the battery technology and the charger (Ibid). Such batteries also have a relatively short life and have to be replaced in about three to four years.