Electric cars?

[sptrawler]

Volvo (Geely) plans to build its own electric drive trains inhouse.

Volvo Invests Over $100 Million To Make Electric Motors In-house

The car maker hopes to have in-house electric motor production by 2025.

www.drive.com.au

 

[moXJO]

I heard gasoline was originally an unwanted by-product that was pretty much pumped into rivers. That was until cars that ran on it came along. I'm not even sure if the above is true?

Once EVs take over will their be a glut of gas considering we will still need jet fuel etc?

 

[sptrawler]

I heard gasoline was originally an unwanted by-product that was pretty much pumped into rivers. That was until cars that ran on it came along. I'm not even sure if the above is true?

Once EVs take over will their be a glut of gas considering we will still need jet fuel etc?

There will certainly be a glut of refineries, there will be a requirement for diesel for a long time yet IMO, but petrol?
I suppose it will be like everything else, as the demand drops the price rises, a bit like kero.
Forty years ago everyone had a kero space heater and they were pretty cheap to run, now kero is expensive and thankfully no one uses them, they stank.

 

[moXJO]

I think from a barrel of oil it was something like 47% gasoline, 23% diesel, 10% jet fuel and some others.

So air travel possibly to get more expensive or a change?

Otherwise there looks like a glut.
Or we won't see a fast enough transition away from oil for climate targets.
Or we run out of oil.

Something has to give.

More just a question out of interest. Always looking for a chance to make a buck.

 

[Value Collector]

I think from a barrel of oil it was something like 47% gasoline, 23% diesel, 10% jet fuel and some others.

So air travel possibly to get more expensive or a change?

Otherwise there looks like a glut.
Or we won't see a fast enough transition away from oil for climate targets.
Or we run out of oil.

Something has to give.

More just a question out of interest. Always looking for a chance to make a buck.

refineries have been getting better at cracking and reforming hydrocarbon molecules into heavier or lighter fuels depending on demand.

Also, The Unused portion of the oil barrel can be used as energy inside the refinery itself, eg burned for heat or electrical generation.

 

[moXJO]

refineries have been getting better at cracking and reforming hydrocarbon molecules into heavier or lighter fuels depending on demand.

Also, The Unused portion of the oil barrel can be used as energy inside the refinery itself, eg burned for heat or electrical generation.

So obviously price of oil would have to go up for it to be viable?

 

[Smurf1976]

I heard gasoline was originally an unwanted by-product that was pretty much pumped into rivers. That was until cars that ran on it came along. I'm not even sure if the above is true?

Once EVs take over will their be a glut of gas considering we will still need jet fuel etc?

First efforts at refining crude oil involved a simple distillation process and tapping off liquids which boiled at different temperatures. How much petrol, kerosene or anything else was produced was a function of the composition of the crude oil and not of demand.

At first kerosene was the only wanted product, the rest was waste and, since nobody really thought about the environment back then, was a best burned off in the open and at worst dumped in the nearest river.

In due course though the refineries have come up with some pretty clever chemistry and processes to turn one thing into another. It's not quite lead into gold sort of clever but it's really only one step below that. They can and do get far more petrol out of a barrel of oil than the oil naturally contains and they likewise get far less heavy fuel oil than is naturally present.

There's also the issue of specification overlap. Eg there's some overlap between what counts as "petrol" and what counts as "kerosene" and there's overlap between kero and diesel (no overlap between diesel and petrol though). That does not mean they can put some actual kerosene into petrol, but it does mean that some of the hydrocarbon molecules (but not the lot) can go into either stream.

At present, with the lack of demand for jet fuel, it's no secret that the heavier components are ending up in diesel, the lightest components are ending up in petrol, and that leaves a much tighter range in the middle still coming out as jet fuel. Even that's too much however and in short the solution is the surplus is being "dumped" into heavy fuel oil and so on. Gets rid of it and puts it to some use albeit a low value one.

Downstream of refining, the petrochemical industry and some industrial uses do have the ability to switch products as another means of balancing demand. Eg plastics manufacture switching between propane and diesel is one such example. Gas turbine power generators able to run pretty much any mix of diesel, heating oil, jet fuel, lighting kero etc is another and they'll gladly take anything that's cheap since all they need it to do is burn which it does.

At the more extreme end, one thing that surprises many is just how much oil Saudi Arabia imports. They export a lot of crude oil certainly, but they also import a lot of heavy residual fuel oil for power generation - so long as the fuel oil's priced lower than the crude from which it came, and that's often the case, then economically it stacks up.

So in short, there's considerable flexibility but in the short term it's not unlimited, it only goes so far.

PS - I won't name them but there's a power station in Australia that's got quite a bit of jet fuel sitting there at the moment. It'll be burned for generation when required. They got it cheap yes and having it sitting there is no problem, it won't deteriorate enough to be a problem given it's only being used in a power station on the ground it's not going to be put into any aircraft. The plant in question is used for peak loads and backup, hence why they haven't burned it already.

 

[Value Collector]

So obviously price of oil would have to go up for it to be viable?

high oil price is better for people producing barrels off oil.

low oil price is better for the people that refine it.

 

[sptrawler]

First efforts at refining crude oil involved a simple distillation process and tapping off liquids which boiled at different temperatures. How much petrol, kerosene or anything else was produced was a function of the composition of the crude oil and not of demand.

At first kerosene was the only wanted product, the rest was waste and, since nobody really thought about the environment back then, was a best burned off in the open and at worst dumped in the nearest river.

In due course though the refineries have come up with some pretty clever chemistry and processes to turn one thing into another. It's not quite lead into gold sort of clever but it's really only one step below that. They can and do get far more petrol out of a barrel of oil than the oil naturally contains and they likewise get far less heavy fuel oil than is naturally present.

There's also the issue of specification overlap. Eg there's some overlap between what counts as "petrol" and what counts as "kerosene" and there's overlap between kero and diesel (no overlap between diesel and petrol though). That does not mean they can put some actual kerosene into petrol, but it does mean that some of the hydrocarbon molecules (but not the lot) can go into either stream.

At present, with the lack of demand for jet fuel, it's no secret that the heavier components are ending up in diesel, the lightest components are ending up in petrol, and that leaves a much tighter range in the middle still coming out as jet fuel. Even that's too much however and in short the solution is the surplus is being "dumped" into heavy fuel oil and so on. Gets rid of it and puts it to some use albeit a low value one.

Downstream of refining, the petrochemical industry and some industrial uses do have the ability to switch products as another means of balancing demand. Eg plastics manufacture switching between propane and diesel is one such example. Gas turbine power generators able to run pretty much any mix of diesel, heating oil, jet fuel, lighting kero etc is another and they'll gladly take anything that's cheap since all they need it to do is burn which it does.

At the more extreme end, one thing that surprises many is just how much oil Saudi Arabia imports. They export a lot of crude oil certainly, but they also import a lot of heavy residual fuel oil for power generation - so long as the fuel oil's priced lower than the crude from which it came, and that's often the case, then economically it stacks up.

So in short, there's considerable flexibility but in the short term it's not unlimited, it only goes so far.

PS - I won't name them but there's a power station in Australia that's got quite a bit of jet fuel sitting there at the moment. It'll be burned for generation when required. They got it cheap yes and having it sitting there is no problem, it won't deteriorate enough to be a problem given it's only being used in a power station on the ground it's not going to be put into any aircraft. The plant in question is used for peak loads and backup, hence why they haven't burned it already.

I wish I could be bothered with the long winded answer, god knows what we would do without you smurf, your a diamond.
You do know you should give up your job and get into teaching, don't you.

 

[Smurf1976]

smurf, your a diamond.

Diamonds are something that will need to still be made from carbon long after we stop burning the stuff to run cars.....

Some diamonds are natural and mined in that form but the rest are man-made, especially those used industrially.

 

[sptrawler]

Diamonds are something that will need to still be made from carbon long after we stop burning the stuff to run cars.....

Some diamonds are natural and mined as such but the rest are man-made, especially those used industrially.

I wasn't joking about the teaching gig, my oldest son is really great at what he does and earns heaps doing it, but he really wants to back off and become a TAFE lecturer.
I just hope he can, he has so much to offer and the students would benefit a lot, but there are always two factors in an equation.

It reminds me of when I was an apprentice, one teacher knew everything, but couldn't teach for $hit boring as watching grass grow, the other made you interested in learning and didn't have to know everything.

I think that is the whole problem with teaching today, the teacher gets a rubber stamp for finishing a course and the students plus Australia suffer for the rest of their lives.
Just my opinion.

 

[qldfrog]

I wasn't joking about the teaching gig, my oldest son is really great at what he does and earns heaps doing it, but he really wants to back off and become a TAFE lecturer.
I just hope he can, he has so much to offer and the students would benefit a lot, but there are always two factors in an equation.

It reminds me of when I was an apprentice, one teacher knew everything, but couldn't teach for $hit boring as watching grass grow, the other made you interested in learning and didn't have to know everything.

I think that is the whole problem with teaching today, the teacher gets a rubber stamp for finishing a course and the students plus Australia suffer for the rest of their lives.
Just my opinion.

adding to your rant, I think the problem is more that you do not need to know much to become a teacher if you look at the ranking for course admission, and teaching is the only option left for some of the less gifted..So no surprise;
You do not need to be Einstein for teaching, but you should know some stuff;
I hate teaching as a profession, not the people but the work as I come from that microcosm.The first thing I wanted not to do was teaching;
A profession where loosers mix with enlighted people with a passion , and the lot managed like a soviet camp by the worst of the bureaucracy
Good teaching is a (I will say irrational) sacrifice.To be admired..from far..This was my ode to the few good teachers

 

[qldfrog]

adding to your rant, I think the problem is more that you do not need to know much to become a teacher if you look at the ranking for course admission, and teaching is the only option left for some of the less gifted..So no surprise;
You do not need to be Einstein for teaching, but you should know some stuff;
I hate teaching as a profession, not the people but the work as I come from that microcosm.The first thing I wanted not to do was teaching;
A profession where loosers mix with enlighted people with a passion , and the lot managed like a soviet camp by the worst of the bureaucracy
Good teaching is a (I will say irrational) sacrifice.To be admired..from far..This was my ode to the few good teachers

far from EV.....not to say very irrelevant in that thread....:-(

 

[sptrawler]

adding to your rant, I think the problem is more that you do not need to know much to become a teacher if you look at the ranking for course admission, and teaching is the only option left for some of the less gifted..So no surprise;
You do not need to be Einstein for teaching, but you should know some stuff;
I hate teaching as a profession, not the people but the work as I come from that microcosm.The first thing I wanted not to do was teaching;
A profession where loosers mix with enlighted people with a passion , and the lot managed like a soviet camp by the worst of the bureaucracy
Good teaching is a (I will say irrational) sacrifice.To be admired..from far..This was my ode to the few good teachers

The problem is frog, teaching thirty years ago wasn't a profession, it was a calling, teachers applied to teachers training colleges not universities.
The first thing teacher training colleges did, was work out if the applicant was suitable.
That is the critical part that has gone missing, when it was moved to a university degree, the degree afforded better wages.
However IMO it lost the integrity and credibility, in the search for higher wages, now it is forever lost in the name of discrimination IMO.
Of course there are still great teachers and always will be, but the filter has been removed, that removed those less suited to the profession.
Also, it isn't a problem only associated to teaching, nursing has suffered the same issues IMO.
They are both professions, that are as much about personalities, as they are about academic ability.
Both are as important, but both don't carry the same weighting, in the selection.
Just my opinion.
Anyway, way off topic, my apologies.
Jeez this is about electric cars FFS, too many reds.

 

[sptrawler]

Thanks for the heads up frog, I realised too late.

 

[JamesBrown89]

I love cars, I love internal combustion engines, I don't want them to go away, but the hardcore anti-EV people are just silly. EVs are awesome too. They're just different, and that's fine. EVs are great for short trips, city driving, and occasionally for having fun. ICE vehicles make sweet noises, are fun to drive (and work on), and are pretty much unlimited in the range given how easy it is to find fuel and fill up the tank. But yes, they are worse for the environment. They just are. We have to accept reality.

 

[Value Collector]

I love cars, I love internal combustion engines, I don't want them to go away, but the hardcore anti-EV people are just silly. EVs are awesome too. They're just different, and that's fine. EVs are great for short trips, city driving, and occasionally for having fun. ICE vehicles make sweet noises, are fun to drive (and work on), and are pretty much unlimited in the range given how easy it is to find fuel and fill up the tank. But yes, they are worse for the environment. They just are. We have to accept reality.

some people love horses, horses haven’t gone away, just like some people have horses for fun, you will still be able to have an internal combustion car for fun, but it will be an expensive luxury.

Ev’s with decent range such as Tesla’s are actually much better for road trips than internal combustion engines, as I have explained many times it’s a myth that filling with petrol is more convenient than charging.

Once you actually have an Ev with decent range, you will realise that not having to go to the petrol station every week, and instead just plugging in at home is actually a great luxury.

And on road trips just plugging in and walking away to use the bathroom or grab something to eat is again a luxury, and the charge time is about the same as you would normally spend filling your car, paying, moving car, then going to the bathroom etc, except it’s better because you just park the ev plug it in, and walk away for 15mins.

 

[moXJO]

high oil price is better for people producing barrels off oil.

low oil price is better for the people that refine it.

I think min viability is around the $47 mark. Taking out the gas component means a hit to refineries. Surely costs at scale would be forced up by suppliers to stay up and running.

 

[Value Collector]

I think min viability is around the $47 mark. Taking out the gas component means a hit to refineries. Surely costs at scale would be forced up by suppliers to stay up and running.

viability for who? The drillers or the refiners?

only the oil drillers care about the oil price, the refiners care about the retail price.

think about it, if you owned an oil refinery and were in the business of buying oil to make and sell petrel and other products you would love it if oil was $1 per barrel or even better free, the price of oil wouldn’t stop you making the products and selling them to the market.

 

[moXJO]

viability for who? The drillers or the refiners?

only the oil drillers care about the oil price, the refiners care about the retail price.

think about it, if you owned an oil refinery and were in the business of buying oil to make and sell petrel and other products you would love it if oil was $1 per barrel or even better free, the price of oil wouldn’t stop you making the products and selling them to the market.

Drillers. They have a minimum at what they need to sell it at. And that price is a select few. So if refiners no longer needed the quantity that they needed it at now, price would go up for refiners?