Micro Hybrids

The term micro hybrid is not familiar to the general public but a high proportion of next year's cars will be micro hybrids. If people buy them because they want to respond to Al Gore's exhortation to buy a hybrid and help to save the planet, it will be a shame because these are conventional vehicles portrayed as hybrid electric vehicles when they are nothing more than stop start vehicles. By this we mean vehicles that automatically switch off the engine when brought to a halt and automatically start when the accelerator is pushed again. They save a modest amount of pollution and gasoline. In Europe, that means they help car companies lacking a full lineup of electric vehicles to meet the new more stringent pollution laws, buying them time as they develop real electric vehicles.

 

Some European vehicles have been using the technology for several years, including about 3.6 million vehicles in 2010. Another 5 million vehicles are expected to be added in the next few years, with production of 16 million stop start vehicles projected by 2015. In India, Mahindra and Mahindra has sold 50,000 micro hybrids. An electronic controller keeps a careful eye on everything and refuses to stop the motor if the air conditioning is still needed or if the battery is running short on charge. Fuel economy / mileage gains from this technology are typically in the range of 5 to 10 percent. For an economical full hybrid, KPIT Cummins of India has just announced an affordable conversion kit.

 

 

 

Actually, modifying a conventional vehicle to perform in this way brings a number of problems because the conventional battery and electronics are not up to the job, particularly for a great deal of stopping and starting, in heat or in cold. At minimum, the conventional lead acid battery will wear out earlier because it is not like some of the newer lithium batteries in having a calendar life rather than life dependent on use. Supercapacitors ie "ultra capacitors" are often needed to manage fast charge-discharge duty cycles. Afs Trinity Power Corporation is a leader in such power managements for real hybrids. As for micro hybrids, it has been reported that some cars will have the electronics call you in prematurely for a service if the battery is in trouble as a result of stop start but this will give the brand a very bad name.

It has been estimated that micro hybrids could cost only $300 to $400 more than conventional vehicles, yet this small additional investment could yield up to a 15% improvement in fuel economy. However, it is, as yet, uncertain what problems it will bring in its train when universally applied, particularly with lead acid batteries in hostile climates. Anyway, some micro hybrids require the driver to put the brake on, switch to neutral and wait ten seconds before the car switches off. By contrast, a genuine hybrid vehicle calls for no change in driver behaviour.

 

A number of forms of assistance are being developed to ease the situation. One model has a lithium battery but it needs water cooling and it is much more expensive. Many brands will have regenerative braking to keep the battery topped up. Lead acid batteries are being improved to cope with the punishment. For instance, Johnson Controls Inc. is working to expand use of advanced lead-acid batteries - an alternative technology that fits between the traditional lead car battery and the lithium-ion battery technology it is developing in collaboration with SAFT for hybrid and electric vehicles.

 

 

Between 2010 and 2020, the market for the start-and-stop batteries is expected to expand from about $100 million to $2.1 billion, the company forecasts. The lead acid people think they will be lead acid and you can guess what the lithium battery people think. The market for genuine hybrid electric vehicle batteries is expected to be at least six times that size.

The technology is better suited to Europe because the start-and-stop technology is more easily configured to work with manual transmissions than automatic transmissions. Automakers see it as a good fit for vehicles that are already more fuel-efficient than North American cars because they run on diesel, said Kim Metcalf-Kupres, Johnson Controls Sales and Marketing Vice President. In addition, China is now considering whether to require all new conventional cars to be microhybrids.

 

Adoption of the advanced lead batteries faces hurdles in the United States because of driver expectations, the prevalence of automatic transmissions and cars tending to be heavier. Indeed, American drivers will need convincing that it is worthwhile to have the air conditioning system shut down temporarily while the vehicle switches itself off eg at traffic lights or in traffic jams.

 

 

"The willingness of consumers here versus Europe to accept that as a compromise in exchange for efficiency is questionable," says Craig Rigby, Vice President of Global Product Engineering for Power Solutions. "We see that as a barrier."

 

Nonetheless, the company expects the technology will still be deployed at some point beyond Europe, in both Asia and North America.

As part of an expansion that is increasing the size of the battery technology laboratory and testing center in Glendale, Johnson Controls is incorporating space for developing more R&D in its advanced-lead acid batteries as well as next-generation hybrid batteries. The Johnson SAFT traction battery joint venture gained the largest tranche of the Obama grants for such work.

 

For more attend Future of Electric Vehicles which uniquely covers the whole electric vehicle market - land, sea, air whether hybrid or pure EV - with emphasis on future breakthroughs.