History Questions Not Worth Their Own Thread VIII

[danjuno]

EVs were fairly common in early 1900's before being pushed off the market by ICE vehicles. What if it went the other way, and electric motors developed faster than ICEs at the turn of the century?

 

[Cutlass]

EVs were fairly common in early 1900's before being pushed off the market by ICE vehicles. What if it went the other way, and electric motors developed faster than ICEs at the turn of the century?

The energy density of gasoline is extremely greater than that of batteries. And only now, well over 100 years after those early cars, are batteries starting to catch up.

What this means is that the range, the power, the utility, of motor vehicles would have been drastically lower. Now while that would have had environmental benefits, the human race would be far poorer today. As cheap energy has driven the growth of the economy.

 

[danjuno]

The energy density of gasoline is extremely greater than that of batteries. And only now, well over 100 years after those early cars, are batteries starting to catch up.

Wouldn't battery development have gone further if EVs aren't pushed off the market for almost a century?

 

[Lexicus]

The energy density of gasoline is extremely greater than that of batteries. And only now, well over 100 years after those early cars, are batteries starting to catch up.

What this means is that the range, the power, the utility, of motor vehicles would have been drastically lower. Now while that would have had environmental benefits, the human race would be far poorer today. As cheap energy has driven the growth of the economy.

The west would be poorer. Without a fuller accounting of the harms caused by fossil fuels we can't say whether the "human race" would be.

 

[Cutlass]

Wouldn't battery development have gone further if EVs aren't pushed off the market for almost a century?

Thing is, there still was a very large push to develop better batteries. Many things besides cars use them. Submarines, radios, flashlights, the list is a very long one. And there was no shortage of money behind the efforts.

 

[Birdjaguar]

More power and even more money was behind the ICE and the path to to "better", cheaper transportation was clearer and shorter.