CNNMoney.com has an interesting feature on 11 companies with 11 ideas that will drastically alter the way we live our lives and could potentially hurt some majoy corporations. All eleven are quite interesting. One of the ideas that caught my brain and got me thinking was an automobile power source that:
- Uses no gasoline
- Uses electricity, but is not a battery
- Will use $9 worth of electricity to drive 500 miles
- It will charge completely in 5 minutes
- Power will cost the eqivalent of $.45 a gallon
Lots of promise here, but the technology is so top-secret they can’t disclose information about how this not-battery works. The thing that caught my eye was the fact that it claims it can go 500 miles for $9. My question is: what will happen to the price of electricity when it is used to power automobiles? Sure, it’s equivalent to $.45 a gallon now, but what about when the demand goes up? Do we have enough coal to produce all this power? Are we willing to create nuclear powerplants to keep up with demand? And, as with any alternative fuels, how easily will we be able to change the infrastructure already in place to refuel our automobiles?
Just a few thoughts. I hope this works out, though.