The Electric Dream.

Did you guys know that the electric vehicle was mainstream even before the IC engine started powering the vehicle? Owing to the low top speeds, range and cost, they faded away as the IC engine took over and ruled the passenger vehicle market since the mid 19th century till the very early 21st century. These past two centuries, the IC engine saw unprecedented advancements. Combustion chamber optimisation, afterburning techniques, direct injection techniques. There's still a lot to be done in the IC engine to achieve higher efficiency. But we don't have a lot of time to make those changes.

Tesla Model 3

When I make these remarks, I don't propose a complete ban on IC engines. They're still going to be very relevant in the off-road industry, the heavy machinery and load carrying vehicles. It's just that it's completely ridiculous to power a vehicle with fossil fuels when more than half of it's energy is getting wasted away.

The average speeds in an urban setup are no more than 25 kmph and that speed goes even lower when you drive in peak traffic conditions. How many times do you stop and start your vehicle before you reach your destination? A lot, right. Did you know, that the highest emissions are spewed out of your vehicle during this phase? Just today I read an article that a Public Health Emergency has been imposed in the Delhi - NCR region. Now you may ask this is due to bursting crackers or the crop burning in the neighboring states, but ask yourself. Your container doesn't overflow if it wasn't being constantly filled with a steady flow of emissions from passenger vehicles everyday.

I've gone way too deep into the environmental aspect of it and I'll touch back on the technical part now. For an average speed of 25 kmph, if you're driving a vehicle whose top speed is 200 kmph or above, don't you think it's like asking a lawyer to run a convenience store? I'm not discouraging the need to satisfy your high speed car chase rush, but do you really want to do that while you're wearing an oxygen mask?

If we really want to bring about a significant difference, at least in the urban side, we need to replace this setup completely and this is where the electric vehicles come in. There's this misconception that we're just replacing the area where the pollution is occurring, from the roads to the thermal power plants. This is completely misled. An electric vehicle converts about 59-62% of the electrical energy from the grid to power the wheels. In contrast to this a conventional petrol vehicle only convert about 17%–21% of the energy stored in gasoline to power at the wheels. Which in technical terms is called Well to Wheel efficiency. So in a nutshell, electric vehicles pollute 3 times lesser than an IC engine powered vehicle.

The electric vehicle will also cost you way less on maintenance owing to the fact that it has lesser moving parts than it's fuel consuming counterpart. The only major weight that the electric vehicle has is the battery pack.

Well, you may ask me, you're an automotive engineer, figure something out, make the combustion process more efficient. Fair point, but here's my counter point. Even if we made the combustion process more efficient than it already is, there will still be emissions on roads. And the current urban setup CANNOT take it. So yeah, electric vehicles are here and they are here to stay.