Tag Archives: Tesla

The future of Sustainable Energy

Renewable energy became more popular than the diesel generator in 2017. In April, the UK enjoyed its first coal-free day. They plan on banning all petrol and diesel cars by 2040. Wind power is also growing in popularity today because it’s so inexpensive. However, it’s important to understand that this isn’t a constant supply of electricity. We must learn how to manage it properly.

The Rise of Smarter Buildings

Although it sounds as if renewable energy is only available in rural neighborhoods, cities are embracing it today as well. Smarter buildings are growing in popularity today. These are buildings that use sunlight shining on their solar panels and plant filled atriums to produce the power they need. This makes urban living greener and healthier. It’s easy to maintain as well thanks to smartphone apps that let you check up on it, control the temperature and lighting, and get advice and maintenance tips. Now you can create instead of consume energy regardless of your location.

Not only is it easy to maintain, it’s also free to do so. Sunlight is available everywhere. The more surface area that you have available, the more sunlight you can harvest. It won’t be long before whole houses are built to harvest and use this renewable energy.

Powering Smart Buildings With New Forms of Renewable Energy

We haven’t yet mastered this form of energy as new types are still in the works. Two of the most commonly discussed include:

Hydrogen is being studied in the making of Tesla’s cars. Many believe this will be the form of energy the automobile industry embraces because of its ease of use. However, this energy can also be used in homes and buildings as well.
Sea power is also being harnessed. As stores ditch plastic bags, new ones are being manufactured from seaweed. Wave energy hardware is also being built but it’s still bulky and expensive in its early stages today.

The Biggest Problem With Renewable Energy

One of the biggest problems associated with changing the type of energy we use is actually caused by natural-gas power stations themselves. People like these because they can quickly get the power they need even during times of high demand. However, some people are enjoying being paid for not consuming energy. Sometimes simply turning things off at the right time is enough to make up for this.

Installing solar panels on your roof is also another way of benefiting. Here you can sell your neighbors the power supply they need. This is beneficial in that it adds flexibility in which producers, consumers, and startups can collaborate. In doing so bills and carbon emissions are lowered.

Another issue comes in the form of connectivity threats. Energy plants, smarthomes and the grid are growing increasingly connected today. Unfortunately, this leaves them vulnerable to hackers. This is a major consideration throughout the building process. Failure to think about this will only lead to a growing number of problems. While this hasn’t happened yet, it’s only a matter of time before this infrastructure suffers an attack.

Looking to Nature for Future Renewables

Today trillions of dollars are being spend on energy infrastructure. However, nature is where the answer lies and yet it’s often overlooked. The real challenge is capturing the hydrogen to use as fuel. Until this happens we’re still somewhat limited.

At Mid Florida Diesel we’ve embraced the reality of the future of renewable energy. We look forward to watching it develop but until then we remain committed to helping you maintain your traditionally powered engines. If there’s anything we can do for you, please feel free to contact us.

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The Return of the Diesel Engine

The Return of the Diesel Engine After years of a gas-dominated landscape in the United States, it looks like the diesel engine may be making a perhaps unexpected comeback. The recent history has been especially volatile with big players including Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi leaving the market in the last two years and a number of new players including Mazda, Ford, GM, Ford, and Nissan entering. The inflow certainly seems to be greater than the outflow even with some regulatory uncertainties looming. This could mean a big year in 2018 for diesel. Public policy will play an interesting role in this emergency as well, especially if the Trump administration makes changes to allow diesel to be more competitive within the market.

The volatility in the diesel market follows a number of dramatic and high-profile events within the space. In 2015, Volkswagen came under heavy fire for a scandal involving emissions testing which has led to a big hit for the company and was followed by eventual withdrawal from this market. Even BMW and Mercedes ended up cutting their offerings in the space although there are now signals that they may slowly regrow part of that business in an iterative manner.

All of this is happening as an ongoing dispute between the EPA and Fiat-Chrysler continues over regulatory compliance. FCA is currently not selling any light vehicles which are a diesel because of this conflict. It is possible that this pullback coupled with Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes, etc. has actually lead to an open market and that is why we are seeing so many new entrants into space.

GM launched the Chevy Colorado and GMC Canyon pickups in 2015 to great reviews. They are also launching some SUVs. Ford has also joined in on the diesel pickups with the always favorite F-150. Nissan is also experiencing success in the space with its own pickup diesel, the Titan.

The reasons for the diesel emergence may also be linked to consumers who are looking for alternative energy vehicles. Hybrids still not have picked up to a major part of the market and electric vehicles are often out of the price range of many buyers today. Diesel offers good gas mileage, particularly for those who do a lot of highway travel, so they are an attractive alternative which may be competitive on price and certainly when accounting for maintenance costs. It will be interesting to see how the government feels about this and whether they change policy to help consumers gain access to these vehicles easier too as they have done with electric cars like Tesla. There is still a lot of uncertainty with those questions.

With some many diesel entrants and the older players still likely to re-enter the market in the future, the competition will be tough. It will be interesting to see who remains in the market as it becomes more competitive and what brands become mainstays. It will also be interesting to see what the broader range of offerings will mean for gas vehicles and the gas v. diesel balance. Only time will tell.

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New Hybrid Cars With Autopilot Causing Alarm

New Hybrid Cars With Autopilot Causing Alarm Science fiction and Hollywood would show people cruising along, trouble free in these futuristic vehicles and people couldn’t wait to hear of the latest technologies that could bring these marvels into reality.

Well, that dream has become a reality but like dreams, nightmares are the dark shadows of said dreams. Case in point, the new Tesla Motors hybrid cars with autopilot. Heralded as the biggest breakthroughs in automotives in half a century, these cars were put on the road far too early without the right amount of testing and of course, according to Murphy’s Law: Anything than can go wrong, will go wrong, has proven itself out.

In May of 2016 one of these autopilot vehicles was engaged in a fatal accident. This sent shock waves through the automotive industry. Naysayers bolted up and remarked at how they had warned that putting such vehicles on the road would lead to disaster and they were right. A vehicle traveling the roads without human control is an invitation to danger and disaster. Computers are fine but they can’t make the split second decisions that a human can. Nor can computers make predictions regarding the thousands of possible outcomes that road navigation presents. Errant drivers, animals running across the road, accidents, bad weather, all these factors go into the ability to navigate a motor vehicle with expertise. Computing and automated systems just aren’t there yet.

Add to all that another accident a few months later, fortunately the passengers weren’t injured, brought heavy scrutiny on Tesla and its founder Elon Musk. The National Transportation Safety Board is now investigating Tesla with much fervor. The NTSB knows that the advent of hybrid cars with autopilot will still be pursued by tech companies, but they wan to make sure they themselves don’t miss a beat when it comes to public safety regarding these vehicles. New technologies need watch-dogging from beginning to end. Far too many times inventors and manufacturers will rush a product onto the market only to find later that injuries and even fatalities occur. This happens quite often with cars and trucks and brings about the recalls of tens of thousands of potentially dangerous vehicles.

The NTSB wants to nip this type of danger in the bud. They know Tesla is popular and has tons of money, but if they don’t put Tesla in check now, there’s no telling what other menace and mayhem could occur down the road, literally.

The public wants these vehicles for a variety of reasons. Novelty is the first one, green concerns regarding energy also. Ease of travel these vehicles could provide and that impetus is why Tesla and its competitors aren’t going to stop due to two incidents even if someone was killed.

American automotive industry historians will note how difficult it has been to get manufacturers to install safety features. Even when these safety features were statistically proven to save life and limb, it took an act of Congress just to get seat-belts as mandatory. Even air bags were tough to get installed and even then some malfunctioned causing death and severe injury. Automobiles are complex pieces of a combination of technologies and engineering. So much goes into them that today they’re like mini space ships with a thousand times the computing power that the Apollo moon missions used. Trying to provide new and improved features to beat the competition often leads to oversight problems leading to setbacks that government has to enter the fray and try to make heads or tails of.

Tesla Motors has proven themselves as innovators of several breakthrough technologies, but they’ve still a long way to go. Let’s hope that safety and level heads prevail from here on out.

Image credit: Jeff Cooper (Wikipedia)

Tesla Offers Help To Install Its New Powerwall System

It’s been a hot story for weeks now. Tesla’s new Powerwall battery is on the market and those people who want to save on energy, provide a backup system for their electrical needs, now have this device to count on.

It does need to be installed though and that’s why http://teslamotors.com Tesla itself is lending a hand.

PowerWall is basically a rechargeable lithium-ion battery. It’s main purpose is to store energy for backup power, load shifting, and self consumption of solar power generation. The system has the battery and the liquid thermal control system as well as the software. The battery comes in 10 kWh and 7 kWh. The 7 kWh version will be out in a few months.

This is all engineered for the residential usage.

One can actually run main appliances on this system including refrigeration, computers, lighting, security systems, and more. The consumer can get the full package including the batter and installation for around $7,000 or option for a prepay for a nine year batter backup service agreement. That goes for around $5,000. that would include installations, the warranty, the PowerWall unit, the hybrid solar batter inverter.

One can also double up power with two Powerwall units. In addition, SolarCity, the Tesla company helmed by Tesla’s boss Elan Musk, has a turnkey backup service. This has installation, continued maintenance, and more.

It goes without saying that the new PowerWall system will be tested by every region in the country. People will troubleshoot with their own localities and the challenges there. Consumers in the remote areas will have configurations different from the city or suburbans. As time goes on, installation and maintenance efficiency will increase.

For the storm ravaged areas like the Midwest, when power can be out for hours or days, a backup solar system is highly needed. Only time will tell if things work out here. Will there be problems in cloudy areas and other problems? Only field testing will see to all this.

As for now, getting the PowerWall system and having it installed properly is the first start. Testing the residential systems to see how well things are going is second. When a problem with power occurs like a storm or accident, then consumers will be able to gather information so that Tesla can better improve the product and service.

The world’s markets will keep an eye on the new PowerWall system as will consumer groups overall. There are similar technologies out there but not as well packaged as Tesla’s. Tesla received a huge amount of government subsidies to develop technologies like this. Engineers and environmentalists, business, and government are going to keep a sharp eye out on the application of this technology and if it proves out, more will be on the way.

Who knows what will come of all this. It’s a major news and industry experts are hovering over every piece of data they can get hold of. Will the public save money? Will there be a major overhaul of the way we do home energy? We’ll have to wait and see.

Image credit: teslamotors.com