Quote:
Originally Posted by octothorp
The idea discussed in the article of treating batteries like exchangeable propane tanks is an interesting idea. Imagine if Shell, for example, has their own brand of batteries for all the major models of electric cars: you pull into a station, pop the hood, drop off your empty batteries, put in the new ones, pay, and hit the road again. Probably takes less time than fuelling up, if cars are built with this process in mind. You don't own the batteries, Shell does, you just pay for the energy Shell loads onto them, and when you have time, you can plug the car in and refill them yourself.
From the station's perspective, they're charging you for the power loaded on the battery, and maybe a small fee for swapping out the batteries. They charge up the batteries and put them in their supply to resell to the next person. The stations make their profit from a handling fee which is small from the consumer's perspective, but potentially offers a greater profit-margin to the retailer than gasoline sales.
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Battery technology still needs to improve greatly for this to work, but once that happens, it definately would be possible. Right now, the battery size to have enough power to travel several hundred kilometers is fairly large, and thus, the batteries tend to be squeezed in wherever they can be fit in, plus tend to be in more inaccessible places where they aren't in the way. Plus they are heavy, and bulky. Right now, even if the batteries were put in accessible places, you'd pretty much need a forklift (or something like an engine lift) to change out the batteries.
Not too mention the space required at stations to store the batteries that were charging.