China’s car are cheap because they have good robotics. This is hand placing and wiring batteries into a good looking car, but the body may have a lot of manual labour too.
US or Europe could manufacture a car with these specs for $20k. Even with more expensive batteries.
Though the US/EU being slow at making $20k or $30k cars does mean there is this market opportunity for this in MX.
It is the right strategy to use Chinese batteries and motors, but their operation is very labour intensive. Even at low Mexico wage rates, a US manufacturer car can likely beat on price/quality/features.
What is price of their car?
Solar deployments around mines can be far enough from the dusty areas. Today, tanks could bring a bunch of briefcase solar panels and when the tank is not moving and firing, its not that dusty. Cleaning is pretty easy for 20-50 panels too.
Fuel cells are the actual technology that require special designs to deal with dust.
For sure, field charging of tanks should be through DC. But H2 is the solution for energy abundance that is 100% renewables based. To have enough energy every day from renewables needs surpluses on most days, and H2 production is the best use of those surpluses because it is transportable/exportable energy that happens to be cheaper than electric transmission.
It will. Including for military applications, H2 can be produced more securely and distributed from energy independent renewables than from large refineries blown up the first day of war, that also require import supply chains.
Dust is indeed an issue for fuel cells. It is a solved issue with air filters though. FCEVs brag about making the air cleaner than without them. Industrial equipment in ultra dusty environments also work on FCs. It does require regular filter changes compared to BEV though. An industrial equipment alternative is an FC setup away from the dusty environment to recharge batteries overnight and during breaks.
H2 is much safer than gasoline. Gasoline with explode as a bomb. A leak will make everything around it super flamable. An H2 tank that both is ruptured and on fire will shoot a flare into the air, instead of blowing up and killing everyone in the vehicle.
It is less so. Also safer if tank ruptured.
energy density of lithium batteries is higher than for hydrogen storage.
opposite is true by a large margin. You’d still want a hybrid power train, and a charging from solar or BEV option never hurts, but H2’s advantage is quick refueling with battery charging on the go.
Drones also seem to be good anti-tank and anti-ship weapons.
Range of tanks is not super important other than blitzkrieg strategy where refueling infrastructure catches up. Even under blietzkrieg, tanks eventually get into a siege position and solar can be enough to sustain their position indefinitely. H2 is the best quick refueling method for electric heavy vehicles. A dispenser can be hidden 1 mile or so behind the front lines. Production facilities can be portable and moved forward
H2 tanks are safer than diesel. It would make a superior tank to diesel in most ways. Quiet, electronics power, portable solar charging in forward position, H2 production in solar rear stations. In war, having all of your large oil refineries and port handling blown up the first day is common, and decentralized and portable H2 production is an important asset.
ROK while leading on H2, is way behind on both solar transition projects/roadpath and have abandoned solar technology themselves. Government does serve its industrial champions but also serves US master. US wants to subjugate colonies to its NG. Industrial champion needs clean energy independence.
China’s overall refining volumes are down significantly since middle of year as EVs are surpassing 50% market share there. Also while NG use for electricity is down, they are converting a lot of heavy transport to use LNG. In the future this will transition to H2.
This is a year of major climate progress, and even the west is inching forward.
While LH2 is about 1/3 the density of gasoline as heat energy, and 3/4 the density for electric energy, it is about 2kwh-electric per liter. Lithium batteries are under 1/4 of that.