NPR - Plugin Hybrids story today

Indeed, Dave. Raw data is raw data, it allows for any extra analysis that the analyst wants to perform.

Going one step further however, in better conditions the analyst needs to be involved in the design of the data collection methods as well.

My suggestion is not to collect 5 $ instead of 1 $ because there are far less than 11 k active users on PC, but rather to have Toyota involved...

The strategy I see does involve Toyota... I get to that later... Meanwhile...

The research design I see is roughly around these lines:

1. use 20 cars for at least half a year

2. spread the cars geographically by typical weather, road and hilly conditions in that area

3. divide the drivers' group as well as possible with this small number across gender and age

4. divide the cars between being garaged or not at night

5. distribute the average daily commutes of test drivers from 5 miles through 60 miles, ensuring also that the test-Prii get a plug in parking spot at the workplace of the 60 miles drivers, and of course the recharge time for 60 miles range is less than 8 hours, with some leeway there, to ensure safe return home at given range.

6. equip all 20 cars with a Toyota certified readout/upload device (such as CAN View and internet enabled cell phone), plus programming for daily uploads to a dedicated data collecting central website, by automatic preprogrammed authentification. (This needs to be easy/automatic and geekness-free to the proverbial old lady driving her Prius to the grocery store--let's not forget she has driven the US and not only auto industry predilection for selling vehicles with automatic transmissions...)

7. upload daily ALL pertinent data to a dedicated server via wireless uplink. On this, the experimental Prii may need extra sensors, but not those many, like say temperature in the cabin hourly (while a standard car would be actually off, thus no read-out). Be all-inclusive on what data may need collecting. Let's just think that we rarely keep our laptops' Li-Ion batteries in below freezing temperatures, as you'd probably have even inside the car a few months a year in Wisconsin... One needs to take into account and control for those external variables too...

8. have the 20 plug in vehicles be "matched" by geographic and driving styles/conditions with other 20 normal Prii, similarly equiped for extra data collection and uplinking, representing a control group. Uplink data should be the exact same for this group of vehicles, minus things that cannot be measured for this group because they don't exist (such as time and levels of charge at night).

9. the "large" numbers coming out of the daily data collection across 20 vehicles and thus ability to analyze statistically almost any influences on the batteries, charge thus range variance etc. would lend the analysis strong statistically

10. and so on... I am a bit tired now to think this through...

The core part though is involving Toyota through securing a grant they may want to award, out of their environmental studies/awareness funds.

One idea is of course to use the experiment as driving "billboards", marking the experimental cars visibly...

Then an analysis of stakeholders interested in delaying or even blocking such trend would be necessary as well.

For this part of the analysis though, the issue is slightly more complex than solely a technology/marketing study. It involves analyzing the environmental impact of PHEV vehicles in time, as they catch on seriously in market size.

Just my two cents...

S.

 

Hi Snowflake,

According to several sources, Toyota are already doing this with their own PHEVs (though of course we are not getting the data!). It has been leaked by some of the Priusplus group that Toyota are already beta-testing 60-mile AER (all-electric-range) vehicles in Japan.

In fact they're so interested in PHEVs they flew over one of Prof Andy Frank's (UC Davis) plug-in hybrids so that 250 engineers of their Tier 1 suppliers could pore over them.... 3 years ago. That's long enough to come up with a good PHEV parts supply!

 

i think the PHEV AER 60 mile Prius is getting long winded in name...oh wait, that isnt what i was gonna say. i meant to say that i think the technology is inevitable. the reduction in polution would be HUGE and many places like Japan have to address that issue as vigorously as alternative fuels.

plus the PHEV i think will the the kick in the pants, the world will need to get serious about solar, wind and wave.

 

Thanks Clett.

There are a few things I know and many I don't, so thanks for the info, I'll look it up, albeit I know about some of the UC Davis work.

The problem though is not solely one of engineering and feasability, but also one of marketability, and market readiness for embracing a product. Sure enough, a few enthusiasts (thousands is idealistic, maybe tens of thousands at the dream level) are there, but does that make a market? I was thinking of a plan that would have a dual scope:

1. Japan is not the US in many many ways. Driving in Japan and in any town anywhere across the US N to S and E to W are two very different things for a vehicle. US roads are built with an American powertrain in mind, whereby 30 degrees inclined roads have to be climbable at 55-70 mph or over...

2. Get the word out by marking the cars and analyzing and reporting constantly on progress

3. MI, my somewhat home state of past, and traditionally along with TX (my current home state) known "drags" in moving forward on alternative energy technologies is right now moving ahead on that... in part seizing the moment on federal policy declarations on US competitiveness...

An experiment of this nature HELD IN THE US would get more people on board and build public pressure to both private and public actors involved.... After all we have decent traffic laws in this country on drinking and driving due to a lady having created M.A.D.D., we have decent safety measures in our vehicles basically due to the pressure that a sole person like Ralph Nader has helped build over time...

There is much power in numbers, when there is also organization in those numbers... Otherwise, history will have it that 450 or so PC members did not more than a "told you so!"

It was just my 2 cents... thanks...

S.

 

We said that in the mid 70s...

then we said it again in the mid 80s...

we are saying it yet again now...

... while we do nothing about it...

let's see... how many TX architects design and build "solar" smart? Maybe one or two? That's what, one in ten thousand?

And we're not talking PV panels here, just be smart and not expose too much to greenhouse effect which you'll have to AC later to compensate...

Same in reverse: I know about two SE MI architectural firms that take advantage of design techniques to reduce energy consumption, both Summer and Winter...

Indeed, we need to get serious here... before we can save, let's just not waste that much...

Just my 2 cents,

S.