11 Responses

1. If natural gas should become cheap enough it may be powering internal combustion engines, or it may be powering fuel cell vehicles.

   !0 years out might be about enough time to build a lot of nuclear electric plants, but it may then take another 10 years to switch to electric cars.

   We could be powering 5% of our cars from solar panels, wind turbines. it does not take that much time to get that in place for only 5%. That is a very modest target.

2. Forget your question: When you say us, you show ignorance! It is U.S. It is so sad that so many Americans cannot even spell correctly or speak like an American! It irritates me to see that so many of my fellow-Americans are so stupid! And stupid is the correct expression.

3. I think people absolutely will, it will have to be cost effective. Stick with it, come 2010. Chrysler will have three new cars and gm will have the volt. Not to mention the many small car companies that will be up and running.

4. It will be take long for most Americans to be convinced that an alternative fuel is viable. After that it will take 5-8 years to get an infrastructure in place. 15 years, minimum before 5% of Americans are driving cars that don’t use petroleum.

5. what is alternative energy? Yes there should could be 5% on Electric. There will be .0005% on H2 because its not a fuel. Heck since the gasoline pool has about 3% ethanol today, its at a peak we won’t see much more. We are already shutting down bio diesel plants that are receiving a 20% subsidy, so bio diesel is maxed out.

   Natural Gas IS NOT AN ALTERNATIVE FUEL. Since we import a huge amount of natural gas, we are no dependent on foreign countries for natural gas, what’s the difference, import oil or import natural gas.

6. Today about 2.5% of all car sales are gas-electric hybrids. They aren’t powered by an alternative power, but considering that 3 years ago it was at 1% and 3 years before that nearly zero with a lot of negative press about the viability of hybrids, it shows that things can change rather quickly with the right market conditions.

   There’s a lot of interest in electric cars, and a lot of big name manufacturers are looking at introducing pure electric cars in the next couple years – BMW, Mercedes Benz, Renault, Nissan, Chrysler, Mitsubishi. If we really are at about peak oil (at least at the end of cheap oil), there will be strong market forces to change things soon. We can handle overnight charging of 5% EVs on our current electric grid.

   Hydrogen will still be experimental in ten years. Natural gas should be making inroads, and since we produce over 80% of our own natural gas, and much of the rest comes from Canada, I consider it a viable alternative to petroleum. There’s a few other possibilities, like compressed air to store energy (the Tata car) and ultra-caps, but like battery-electrics, they’re powered by power plants or personal solar panels, etc. One thing is certain – the future will be more diverse!

7. NO !!!

8. Hmm interesting and difficult question to answer.

   First right off the bat for hydrogen the answer is no. It’s still at least a few decades away from being a viable technology on a large scale, if ever.
   http://greenhome.huddler.com/wiki/hydrogen-cars

   Natural gas has many of the same problems. Now electric, there you’ve got a shot. Let’s examine the numbers.

   Americans replace close to 10% of the car fleet each year with new vehicles. To get 5% of the fleet in 10 years on alternative fuels, you need 0.5% per year, which is 5% of the 10% of the car fleet being replaced each year.

   So to sum up, over the next 10 years, you’d need 5% of new car sales to be electric cars (or some other alternative fuel). As has been mentioned, right now 2-3% of new car sales are hybrids, which is an established technology.

   A couple other factors might make this goal possible –

   1) Gas prices. If they continue to rise, which many people are predicting, a lot of people will be looking for alternative fuels.

   2) Auto manufacturers. For the most part the auto manufacturers are really focusing on plug-in hybrids and electric cars. If the major auto companies can get a good selection of these alternative fuel cars on the market, more people will be willing to buy them.

   I’m pretty optimistic, so if I had to guess I’d say yes, 5% of Americans will drive an alternative fuel car (mostly plug-in hybrids and fully electric cars) within 10 years.

9. Definitely. I’ll bet it will even be higher.

10. Let’s hope it’s more than that. I already drive cars that run on natural gas instead of gasoline, and am saving a lot of money by doing it. It’s also cleaner for the environment. I’m paying 87 cents a gallon here in Utah, by the way. There aren’t a lot of these cars available, but they can be found on eBay and Craigslist. More will be made as soon as more filling stations are put in around the country. That seems to be a problem in some states, but if people would put some pressure on their local government officials to provide incentives, then maybe it will get done. Check out my sources below and see if one would work for you in your area. They’re awesome cars to have!

11. in 5 years i think 5% is a bit high, but not far off. however in 10 years i would not be surprised if 20-30% of the vehicles on the road are powered by alternative fuel sources. i disagree with dana though on hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, i think we are much closer than he thinks to having hydrogen fuel cell vehicles on the road. honda is about to put a limited number of hydrogen powered vehicles on the road in the US in the next couple of years. cng is likely to be the next fuel source as it is easy to convert todays cars over, and the infrastructure can be built at a reasonably moderate cost, but that will take more than 5 years to do.