CES 2018 – Intel Inside and Then Some

Dean Sigler Electric Powerplants, Sky Taxis, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Brian Krzanich, Intel’s CEO, took a ride in the Volocopter 2X, becoming the first human passenger on an autonomous flight of the vehicle.  The ride took place in a large enclosed space somewhere in Munich, Germany, on December 3, 2017. An Historical Sidebar It looks a little like Hanna Reitsch’s helicopter flight under the roof of the Deutschlandhalle in Berlin in 1938, a feat she repeated daily during the three-week International Automobile Exhibition.  She later test flew an early V-1 “Buzz Bomb,” her small size adaptable to the craft.  Volocopter’s 2X requires far fewer flying skills, CEO Florian Reuter claiming a five-year-old can control the 2X. Not a Flying Car Sean O’Kane, enthusiastically reporting on the 2X for The Verge, can’t refrain from calling it a “flying car,” an all-too-common error in the popular press.  Monday’s indoor flight came near the conclusion of Brian Krzanich’s keynote address to a packed house at Las Vegas’ Monte Carlo Park Theater, a 5,200-seat …

Fisker’s Plans for Cars and Patents for Solid-State Batteries

Dean Sigler Batteries, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Is there a Fisker battery in the future of electric vehicles?  The latest proclamations from Henrik Fisker indicate he is ready to launch a lovely four-seat car for CES 2018, and that it will have LG Chem batteries capable of powering the vehicle for 400 miles.  Charging the batteries for nine minutes will add 125 miles range.  That’s definitely competitive, but Fisker promises more for a future EMotion supercar. Fisker claims that machine will have newly-patented solid-state batteries that charge in a minute, have 2.5 times the energy density of currently available lithium batteries, and will be far cheaper to manufacture than today’s cells.  That’s in 2023, five years out. Five Years Out “Five years out” has been the refrain for hydrogen-powered cars for perhaps five decades, and is a useful predictive metric for innovators seeking investors, who will wait patiently (theoretically) for a return on investment.  Your editor rushed to see a prototype Fisker on display about a decade ago.  …