Une conférence intitulée "Demain la voiture servicielle" a été organisée par Chronos, Le Monde et TNS-Sofres le jeudi 19 novembre. Ci-dessous en partage, quelques pistes de réflexion autour de ce concept :
Le dossier spécial du Monde : Voiture, la révolution des usages
>> Retrouvez le chat organisé avec les internautes du Monde.fr : "Pétrole cher, pollution, bouchons : comment circulerons-nous demain?"
Les entretiens vidéo et les articles du Journal de l'Innovation
>> Consultez les articles dédiés à la conférence : "Mobilité des modèles à inventer" ; "Vers un marché unique des déplacements" ; "Du temps pour changer la donne" ;
jeudi 26 novembre 2009
mercredi 25 novembre 2009
Carnegie Mellon Converts Gas-Powered Cars to Electricity
Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University aren’t waiting for big car companies to bring affordable electric vehicles to the market. They’re proving that with some tinkering, today’s gas-powered models can be rigged to save as much as 80% in energy costs.
Project ChargeCar, led by the school’s Robotics Institute, is a holistic approach to automotive over-consumption. Here are the basics…
- A supercapacitor, which can store and quickly release large amounts of electricity, is installed between a car's battery and motor. The supercapacitor's stored energy can be used instead of the battery's, cutting the charge/discharge cycle that shortens battery life. It also makes the car more responsive.
- Vehicle architecture, dubbed smart power management, uses artificial intelligence to manage the flow of electricity among the battery, supercapacitor, and engine. It decides whether to pull electricity from the battery or the supercapacitor and where to store the power gained from regenerative braking.
- Researchers say intelligent electric car control could recapture 48% of the energy used during braking, reduce the load on batteries by 56%, and reduce battery heat by 53%.
- People upload GPS data from their commute to ChargeCar.org, which uses an algorithm to figure the energy costs of gasoline vs. electricity for their route, and how much wear and tear on a battery could be saved by using a supercapacitor.
Researchers think that converting gas-powered cars to electrics with supercapacitors could spur the economy, too. ChargeCar just received a grant from Heinz (HNZ) in the "hundreds of thousands of dollars" to train local Pittsburgh-area mechanics in the craft. They think conversions will cost commuters around $8,000—much less than a brand new electric vehicle typically priced at some $50,000.
I spoke with the project's leader, Professor Illah Nourbakhsh, on the phone today. He told me that if the Web site, ChargeCar.org, catches on, they hope to use the crowdsourced commuter data to create custom conversion kits tailored to individual vehicles and routes. Some 3,000 miles worth of commutes have been uploaded so far from drivers around the country.
Professor Nourbakhsh also clued me in to something the university hasn't yet announced: ChargeCar will host a national competition to improve the algorithm on its Web site. You might remember a similar competition from Netflix (NFLX). The winner will receive a brand new electric car.
Check out some of the other fascinating projects Nourbakhsh and the rest of the robotics team at Carnegie Mellon are working on here.
Below is the Toyota (TM) Scion xB Carnegie Mellon's team converted into an electric to conduct its testing.
Giffgaff MVNO Taps Into Crowd-Sourcing
Launched on Nov. 25, British wireless service provider Giffgaff is focused on costs, and it plans to use its customers to slash them. The company, which uses O2’s network, awards customers points for answering customer service calls, suggesting ways to grow revenues, and creating marketing materials. Currently, the MVNO is searching for people to impersonate Humphrey Bogart and to shoot and upload the video ads promoting the service to YouTube, for example. The points can be used toward calls.
It remains to be seen whether this approach works; it just might. Customers who are that involved in a service are likely to be very loyal, and that’s an asset in any business, and especially in pay-as-you-go wireless services.
Telcos like T-Mobile already use the approach, called crowd-sourcing. GetSatisfaction.com, for example, lets telcos connect with their consumers that are having problems with the service, or to get the customers’ take on how to solve a particular problem. It also supports direct customer-to-customer help. So Giffgaff isn’t exactly reinventing the wheel, it’s just pushing it forward.
Source : Business Week, 25/11/09
L'internaute en essaim affine la recherche
L'université d'Oviedo travaille sur une sous-couche logicielle qui reclasse en permanence les résultats en fonction du parcours des autres internautes. Le but est d'améliorer la pertinence des résultats.
SemantiFind propose déjà aux internautes de qualifier l'intérêt des sites indiqués en résultat, afin de rendre plus pertinentes les recherches à suivre. L’université d’Oviedo s'engage sur la même voie, mais automatise cette sélection : elle travaille sur un moteur qui réorganise les résultats en temps réel en fonction de ceux qui ont été le plus fréquemment choisis par différents utilisateurs. Ce, en réponse à une requête particulière. Un procédé que ses responsables rapprochent du fonctionnement en essaim de certains insectes. "Actuellement, l'utilisateur effectue une recherche et examine les résultats de manière isolée", explique à L’Atelier Daniel Gayo-Avello, un des responsables du projet. "Alors que la plupart des requêtes sont effectuées par plusieurs utilisateurs et que certains des résultats ont déjà été explorés dans le passé".
Une couche logicielle adaptable aux moteurs existants
D’où la métaphore entomologique : l’internaute agit comme une fourmi qui suivrait les traces laissées par ses congénères. Le système se présente sous la forme d’une couche intermédiaire entre l’utilisateur et le moteur de recherche. "De cette manière nous pouvons capturer les données relatives aux recherches effectuées et aux clics. Puis pondérer les résultats en fonction du nombre de clics associés aux mots-clefs", explique Daniel Gayo-Avello. Le système est donc tout à fait adaptable aux moteurs de recherche existants. "Le processus pourrait également s’appliquer en fonction de l’historique des recherches d’un utilisateur ou de sa localisation géographique", poursuit le chercheur espagnol.
Protéger le système des utilisateurs malveillants
Dans ce cas, les résultats seraient très différents d’un internaute à un autre. Les chercheurs s’emploient actuellement à développer un prototype complètement fonctionnel. Leurs travaux s’orientent en particulier sur la protection de leur système contre les attaques malveillantes. "Comme tous les outils d’intelligence collective, notre architecture est vulnérable à des attaques de ce type", justifie le chercheur. "Nous voulons voir comment le système réagira quand des utilisateurs chercheront à promouvoir des contenus non pertinents". Pour rappel, les fourmis ont déjà inspiré des méthodes de tactique militaire ou de sécurité informatique.
Source: L'Atelier
mardi 24 novembre 2009
The Electric Car Will Usher in Smart Grid 2.0
The electric car will facilitate the smart grid and a renewable energy charging infrastructure. The electric car will help make the smart grid relevant to consumers. Right now most cars use inefficient engines fueled with gasoline or diesel. In the coming decades, many cars will use electricity. With a smart grid, renewable energy will do much of the charging.
New electric cars from Nissan (NSANY), Toyota (TM), GM, Ford (F) and others will use a charging standard J1772. The new charging units at home and work will include a smart meter chip. When a driver plugs-in, charging will follow preferences pre-established by the car owner. Many will prefer to save money and charge at night when rates are cheaper.
States with the earliest adopters of electric cars are also states where utilities face big renewable portfolio standards (RPS). The lowest cost renewable per megawatt is wind, but much of the wind turbine power is delivered at night when winds are most constant. With a smart grid and price incentives, electric cars will be charged off-peak using renewables.
The promise of smart grid electric vehicle charging was discussed at the GreenBeat 2009 conference last week by technology leaders such as Google (GOOG) and Cisco (CSCO), and utility leaders such as Duke Energy (DUK) and Southern California Edison. Al Gore presented smart grid and super grid findings from his comprehensive new book about climate solutions – Our Choice.
The current Smart Grid 1.0 is frankly boring. Smart Grid 2.0 promises to make our life better with less use of damaging coal power emissions.
With Smart Grid 1.0, new electric meters are being installed. Utilities save because they no longer need to send people out to read meters. Services can start and stop without rolling trucks to make manual connects and disconnects. Utilities are saving while the consumers pay for the new meters with rate hikes.
Electric utility industry has shifted from years of falling costs to rising costs. Utilities need to shift energy use and vehicle charging off-peak to avoid unnecessary investments in expensive peaking power plants. A smart grid is needed to fully utilize renewable energy and moderate fossil fuel emissions.
Smart Grid 2.0 could help some people over $1,000 per year by automating their preferences in heating, cooling, running smart appliances, and even doing jobs like running the dishwasher when excess renewable energy is available. Energy efficiency and demand management is already saving some enterprises millions per year. Most state public utility commissions (PUC) are afraid of implementing consumer time-of-use (TOU) pricing to give people the incentive to use energy when it is plentiful not scarce. The latest class action lawsuit hardly encourages PUCs to act more boldly.
Public utility commissions are more willing to allow pricing incentives for vehicle charging. Electric cars will help move us to Smart Grid 2.0. Through web browsers, smartphones, and vehicle displays, drivers will select smart charging preferences and get feedback on how to use less electricity and save money. Early electric cars will cost more than their gasoline counterparts, but their electric charging will cost a fraction of the cost of gasoline fill-ups.
Currently, there are only 40,000 electric cars running in the United States. As exciting new offerings are being tested and sold, 1.5 million electric cars are expected in the U.S. by 2015 presented Sharon Allan, the Senior Executive, North American Smart Grid Practice, for Accenture.
Charging these electric cars will help transform the promise of a smart grid into a convenient cost-saving reality.
Source : Seeking alpha, 24/11/09
Norway opens world's first osmotic power plant
Norway opened on Tuesday the world's first osmotic power plant, which produces emissions-free electricity by mixing fresh water and sea water through a special membrane.
State-owned utility Statkraft's prototype plant, which for now will produce a tiny 2 kilowatts to 4 kilowatts of power or enough to run a coffee machine, will enable Statkraft to test and develop the technology needed to drive down production costs.
The plant is driven by osmosis that naturally draws fresh water across a membrane and toward the seawater side. This creates higher pressure on the sea water side, driving a turbine and producing electricity.
"While salt might not save the world alone, we believe osmotic power will be an interesting part of the renewable energy mix of the future," Statkraft Chief Executive Baard Mikkelsen told reporters.
Statkraft, Europe's largest producer of renewable energy with experience in hydropower that provides nearly all of Norway's electricity, aims to begin building commercial osmotic power plants by 2015.
Here is the company's illustration of how the plant works.
(Credit: Statkraft)The main issue is to improve the efficiency of the membrane from around 1 watt per square meter now to some 5 watts, which Statkraft says would make osmotic power costs comparable to those from other renewable sources.
The prototype, on the Oslo fjord and about 40 miles south of the Norwegian capital, has about 2,000 square meters of membrane.
Future full-scale plants producing 25 megawatts of electricity, enough to provide power for 30,000 European households, would be as large as a football stadium and require some 5 million square meters of membrane, Statkraft said.
Once new membrane "architecture" is solved, Statkraft believes the global production capacity for osmotic energy could amount to 1,600 to 1,700 terawatt hours annually, or about half of the European Union's total electricity demand.
Europe's osmotic power potential is seen at 180 terawatts, or about 5 percent of total consumption, which could help the bloc reach renewable energy goals set to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases and limit global warming.
Osmotic power, which can be located anywhere where clean fresh water runs into the sea, is seen as more reliable than more variable wind or solar energy.
Source : CNET, 24/11/09
Véhicules électriques: Better Place, Renault-Nissan et Dong Energy lancent un ambitieux projet au Danemark
http://www.bulletins-electroniques.com/actualites/61339.htm
Pour faire face aux objectifs européens de réduction des émissions dans les secteurs non soumis aux quotas, le gouvernement a présenté un plan "Transport Durable" en décembre 2008. En parallèle du développement d'un réseau de transports collectifs efficaces, le gouvernement prévoit de faire du Danemark un laboratoire technologique pour le secteur des transports. Il entend notamment attirer les investissements de partenaires étrangers désirant expérimenter de nouvelles technologies vertes.
Le producteur danois d'électricité Dong Energy et Better Place (http://france.betterplace.com/) ont annoncé le 27 mars 2008 la création d'une joint venture dont l'objectif sera de mettre en place un parc de 500.000 véhicules électriques et 50.000 stations de rechargement et d'échange au Danemark à l'horizon 2020.
Renault et Nissan ont accepté de participer à l'opération et les 4 premiers véhicules issus de ce partenariat ont été présentés par Renault au salon de Francfort. Dong Energy fournira les batteries électriques, tandis que Better Place prendra en charge l'installation et la gestion d'un réseau de stations d'échange de batterie et de recharge.
Pour les Danois, l'un des intérêts majeurs de ce projet est qu'il permettra de valoriser l'électricité produite la nuit par les parcs éoliens. Cette électricité non-stockable produite à un moment où la consommation est faible, est aujourd'hui exportée à bas prix. Les batteries des voitures électriques pourront être rechargées la nuit et contribueront ainsi à valoriser l'électricité d'origine éolienne.
Ce principe implique la mise en place de 2 réseaux distincts : des bornes de recharge d'une part et des stations d'échange de batteries d'autre part. Ces dernières devront être capables de prélever et de changer la batterie des voitures automatiquement en moins de 2 minutes. Un nombre de batteries très supérieur au nombre de véhicules sur le marché devront ainsi être produites par Dong.
La technologie Better Place au quotidien (vidéo en anglais sous-titrée en français)
Source : BE Danemark numéro 24 (24/11/2009) - Ambassade de France au Danemark / ADIT - http://www.bulletins-electroniques.com/actualites/61339.htm
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