GM wants a 230MPG rating from the EPA

Discussion in 'Prius, Hybrid, EV and Alt-Fuel News' started by markderail, Aug 11, 2009.

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  1. Rybold

    Rybold globally warmed member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    "GM came up with the 230-mile (370-kilometer) figure in early tests using draft guidelines from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for calculating the mileage of extended range electric vehicles, said Tony Posawatz, GM's vehicle line director for the Volt."

    GM has produced about 30 Volts so far and is making 10 a week, CEO Fritz Henderson said during a presentation of the vehicle at the company's technical center in the Detroit suburb of Warren.
    Henderson said charging the volt will cost about 40 cents a day.

    GM is nearly halfway through building about 80 Volts that will look and behave like the production model, and testing is running on schedule, Posawatz said.

    GM says new Volt to get 230 mpg in city driving - Yahoo! Finance

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    #21 Rybold, Aug 11, 2009
  2. mikepaul

    mikepaul Senior Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    But...

    IMHO, Miles Per Gallon should mean that if I drive 230 miles in that car I should find 1 gallon gone. I'd be perfectly willing to drive it around a test track and brake and start again just like in a city, but a fuel-flow meter had better only record 1 gallon (give or take a few ounces) used when I'm done or they're just liars...
     
    #22 mikepaul, Aug 11, 2009
  3. hampdenwireless

    hampdenwireless Active Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    The videos in the link show the Volt being built in pre-production mode. They are not being mass produced and its not the final version but the Volt does now exist. This is standard practice about a year before a production vehicle starts mas production.

    Video: Building The Chevrolet Volt | Autopia | Wired.com
     
    #23 hampdenwireless, Aug 11, 2009
  4. Rybold

    Rybold globally warmed member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    This helps put the "230mpg" into perspective. Let's assume that you drive 70 miles per day (round trip). If 40 miles was electric and 30 miles was 30mpg, then you would be getting 70mpg each day. If the volt actually gets 40mpg in hybrid mode (let's assume that with the regen braking, they can at least get the 40mpg that Honda gets), then you would be getting 80mpg each day. I would believe that. 230mpg is a very distant figure, though. It will be interesting to see what the EPA comes up with, and HOW they calculate their number.

    As the near future moves into PHEVs, the EPA needs to extend the their tests to 500 miles when testing PHEVs. For conventional ICE vehicles, they can use their current tests, and for EVs, they don't have an MPG number, so with the time that the EPA saves by not having to test EVs for MPG, they can use that time to extend the PHEV tests up to 500 miles. At least, that is what they should be doing.
     
    #24 Rybold, Aug 11, 2009
  5. TonyPSchaefer

    TonyPSchaefer Your Friendly Moderator
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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    Some of us were talking a while back about the EPA testing. Here were a couple tests that I thought were pretty good.

    For conventional vehicles and gas-electric hybrids, run the tank dry. To keep from wasting a whole lotta gasoline, just fill it half way. Keep repeating the cycle until the thing runs out and dies. Take the average MPG.

    For EVs, fully charge it and then run it dry just like the above test.

    For range-extending EVs, fully charge the pack and half-fill the tank. Run until dry.

    It's pretty interesting to use a testing cycle under which the vehicle being tested runs on EV the majority of the time. How would a Hymotion conversion rate? I suspect that starting on EV and then shifting to hybrid would be pretty impressive.
     
    #25 TonyPSchaefer, Aug 11, 2009
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  6. TonyPSchaefer

    TonyPSchaefer Your Friendly Moderator
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    Agreed.

    As I've said before:
    If you have a good product, sell it (Prius, Camry, Fusion).
    If you don't, market it.

    In my opinion, this is really starting to get ridiculous. With every press release, GM has the need to improve on the last one. Every one makes bigger and better promises than the one before. I believe that they are going to end up making promises that real-world drivers are simply not going to see. My fear is that the Volt may end up like the Gen2 Insight coming out with great fanfare but getting panned in the press.

    Here's another prediction:
    When it's time for car critics to review the car, GM can't allow them to all test the same vehicle on the same day. GM is going to want them to write about the great electric range and the silence of the electric motor. This means that they can't hand off the vehicle from one test drive to another. So GM will either have to stagger the reviews so they have time to fully charge the car or have a fleet of cars, all of which are fully charged. Then they will have to dictate that the test drive can't be more than 30 miles.
    Just my prediction.
     
    #26 TonyPSchaefer, Aug 11, 2009
  7. hampdenwireless

    hampdenwireless Active Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    The test factors in the amount of energy contained in the electricity. This kind of test makes electric cars get 3x to 5x the mpg of a similar gas car. The Tesla gets 135mpg on such a a test. 230mpg for the Volt? That was more then I was expecting, I was thinking it would be around 160mpg.

    I don't agree with this method, I am just explaining it as best I can.
     
    #27 hampdenwireless, Aug 11, 2009
  8. JimboPalmer

    JimboPalmer Tsar of all the Rushers

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    Then they are being inadvertently honest with the logo with 23 and an electric plug. 23 is very close to 22.3
     
    #28 JimboPalmer, Aug 11, 2009
  9. usbseawolf2000

    usbseawolf2000 HSD PhD

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    25kWh/100 miles mean it takes 250Wh per mile. To get 40 miles range, you need 10kWh battery pack. Volt has 16kWh pack but only with 8kWh usable energy. So it will get only 32 miles range if you drive mix city/highway.
     
    #29 usbseawolf2000, Aug 11, 2009
  10. warpedhifi

    warpedhifi Junior Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    Personally, I will believe it when I see it.
     
    #30 warpedhifi, Aug 11, 2009
  11. Rest

    Rest Active Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    GM has been talking about building a Hybrid for longer than two years, must be over 10 years now. All they do is talk. Their workers are over paid and their products are junk, well except the Corvette. :)
     
    #31 Rest, Aug 11, 2009
  12. bestmapman

    bestmapman 04, 07 ,08, 09, 10, 16, 21 Prime

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    230 mpg is a meaningless figure becase it is an electric vehicle. What should be given is the Mile per KW MPK or something like that.

    In city driving most of the energy is in the Volt is not coming from the gasoline, whereas the Prius, all of the energy is coming from the gasoline.

    So where is the MPKW or something like that for the volt. An MPG number is both meaningless and misleading.
     
    #32 bestmapman, Aug 11, 2009
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  13. Winston

    Winston Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    I would like to see a few ratings for a plug-in hybrid.
    1. KW required to charge a discharged battery.
    2. MPG for a 50, 100 and 200 mile trip. (Starting with a full charge)
    Those numbers would give me a pretty good idea of the performance of the car.
     
    #33 Winston, Aug 11, 2009
  14. Rybold

    Rybold globally warmed member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    Very good point. I agree with you. But saying "230 MPG" gets the attention of the general public a lot better. You say "electric" to the general public and 40% of the people think "whatever. who cares," but when you say "230 MPG," everyone stops in their tracks and looks.
     
    #34 Rybold, Aug 11, 2009
  15. Winston

    Winston Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    Those "integration vehicles" are a lot uglier than their concept cars. A LOT! uglier. Typical GM.
     
    #35 Winston, Aug 11, 2009
  16. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    Kudos for the press release! So now we can forget about GM's earlier announcements that the first year production would be 10,000 and they'd be priced at $40k/each. So half of July's Prius sales at twice the price ... I can hardly wait ... but expect to wait.

    I remember when the two-mode hybrids came out, you had to pre-order them because the dealer was not going to have one in stock. There was not going to be a test drive. Then there is the integration and test of first units ...

    Bob Wilson
     
    #36 bwilson4web, Aug 11, 2009
  17. rfruth

    rfruth Member

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    #37 rfruth, Aug 11, 2009
  18. ksstathead

    ksstathead Active Member

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    For EREVs and PHEVs and EVs, I want to see the following on the sticker, where applicable:

    AER --All electric range, city and highway.
    kwh/mile --energy to move the car, over the same city and highway cycles used for gas cars
    MPG-depleted --After the SOC is down to its normal lower limit, what FE does the ICE deliver.

    Basically, we need to change from mpg mindset to consumption mindset, like L/100km or kwh/100km. The point of the sticker is to allow comparison of cars. 230mpg for the volt is an utter distortion of its efficiency, EVEN for those who drive it 44 miles/day. You need to know the AER and the MPG-depleted to intuit how efficient this car is in YOUR typical driving.

    Saying things like "40 cents /day to recharge" is also without meaning: It depends on cost of electricity and KWHs needed to charge. Is he saying I get 40 miles for 40 cents? Or is he saying the average driver uses 4 or 8 or 20 miles per day at 10, 5, or 2 cents per kwh?
     
    #38 ksstathead, Aug 11, 2009
  19. TheForce

    TheForce Stop War! Lets Rave! Make Love!

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    This is nothing. I got 299MPG over 2500 miles.

    Now if you also calculate in the kWh usage it comes out to about 117MPGe I think. Someone else did the calculations.

    I'm guessing the volt will get about 80-90MPGe after the kWh is added to the numbers.
     
    #39 TheForce, Aug 11, 2009
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  20. joewein

    joewein Driving in Japan

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    Re: Chevy Volt - 230MPG EPA City?

    I agree that MPG is a meaningless metric for plug-in hybrids that run mostly on electric.

    As for electric energy usage, that's measured in kWh, not kW (which measures power, not energy). A power (as in horse power) of 1 kW sustained over a period of one hour equals 1 kWh of energy (as in electricity bill). It's amazing how many people who write about energy, including journalists of major newspapers and wire services, frequently confuse these two units.
     
    #40 joewein, Aug 11, 2009
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