One of my favorite green car sites, AutoBlogGreen, took a ride in a Chevy Volt mule. There are some interesting highlights from the write up and the video they posted.
The article and accompanying video are a good read, and a few things stuck out at me.
First is that GM seems pretty insistent that the battery pack will last as long as it should, and wont need to be replaced. This is in contrast to whats expected by people following the development of the car. GM states that the batteries will last the entire 10 year, 150,000 mile target, but also be suitable to be re-used in a climate controlled environment after their time in the Volt is up. This would be idea for utilities to backup intermittent power like solar and wind. If GM makes 200,000 Volts in the first four years, that’s 3.2GW of batteries that will need recycling after that 10 years is up. Even if you derate their capacity by 25%, that’s still 2.4GW of storage. The average home uses around 11kW, so that 2.4GW of energy storage could store solar power and disperse it to power 30,000 homes over the course of six hours (say, from 6PM to midnight).
Next is GM’s generation 1 model production targets. They said in the video that all first generation Volts will be eligible for the $7,500 tax credit. GM’s limit is 200,000 (which is why I used that figure above), so I would expect a four year first generation run (20K units for year 1, 60K for years 2, 3 and 4), and we would see a generation 2 Volt sometime around the end of 2014. Its fun to think what kind of additional features GM could bring to the table in the second generation – a full sized sedan with a bigger motor and better batteries with a depth of discharge of 80% rather than 50%, and higher watt-hour to weight and volume ratios.
GM also doesn’t seem to have the range extender ready to go. Granted, we’re still a ways away from the official production time, but the test drives GM has offered recently have been electric only. Another point that I liked was that the author indicated that the whine associated with the electric traction motor was non-existent. That will be a huge plus from the user experience standpoint.
No one knows for sure if GM will be able to deliver on time, we wont get a better idea until their 75 integration vehicles are out on the road and they can guage real Volt handling and performance.
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