To some extent yes. In other areas no.

Electricity has been with us for well over a century and we are getting to the stage in development where we have started to integrate electricity to power vehicles for transport. However, is it really the future? Only today I saw one of my colleagues turn up to work in what can only be described as an electrically powered long board. Therefore, I really think it needs to be addressed whether the future is in electricity. In this article, I will outline the main pros and cons to electrically powered transportation.

Pros – Electric Transportation is the Future

These are the main pros to having transportation powered by electricity outlined below:

• Better efficiency – Electric engines have a better efficiency of the power input to power output.
• Instantaneous torque – Torque is the term for rotational force. In general, the higher the torque the better. Whereas a car takes around 4000 rpm (for a petrol car) to get up to maximum torque, electric motors can provide instantaneous torque at any revolutions per minute.
• Regenerative braking – Electric motors can be used to power a vehicle and also be used as regenerative braking too, by taking the kinetic energy of the wheels and converting it back to electricity to store in batteries for later use. This can significantly increase the fuel consumption of hybrids especially around city driving.
• Quieter – Although not a big pro, it is still a pro. The number of parts that move inside an electric motor are far less than that of an internal combustion engine. This ultimately results in a much quieter sound during use.

Cons – Electric Transportation is the Future

Unfortunately, like with most new technology, there are a few drawbacks to electrically powered transportation:

• Batteries are heavy – The energy density of a battery is nowhere near the energy density of petrol or diesel. This means we need more batteries to provide the same range in miles (which is often why the range of full electric cars is usually below 100 miles).
• Batteries will die – Lithium batteries have a limited life span. Although the life span of them is in its several years, over time, the batteries capacity will decrease…and decrease… and decrease till the point where they are useless.
• Batteries are expensive – Once the batteries have died, it costs a lot to replace them: even thousands of dollars for electric cars.
• Electric motors can be dangerous – We have seen this with hoverboards recently that some electric motors can catch on fire under certain conditions. The main reason for this is because a current in an electrical circuit dissipates heat. When a huge current is requested, the mechanical wires and battery components heat up until they self ignite.

Ultimately, I think there is a market for electric transportation such as with trains and city driving. However, the main limitation of electric transportation comes with storing the energy in batteries. Unless we see a revolution in the battery market, I will not be surprised if the electric automotive industry is only a temporary solution for the environmentally-friendly direction we are heading, until something such as Hydrogen cars come onto the market mainstream.