An old-fashioned hardback book often still beats the internet, doesn’t it? When you can get hold of one. Right now, there’s one, in a package with my name on it, stuck somewhere between a second-hand bookshop in Portland, Oregon, and the UK: the only published biography – that I can find – of Thomas Midgley Jr.
Once a figure of celebrated repute, Midgley is now just the answer to an increasingly obscure pub quiz question. He was primarily responsible for mixing lead with petrol in the 1920s; and then, in one of the 20th-century’s most environmentally ruinous encores, for putting chlorofluorocarbons in refrigerators and air-conditioning systems in the 1930s. Imagine having both on your CV – and still making president of the American Chemical Society.
I’ve been particularly interested lately in the circumstances and context that gave rise to two of the most infamous chemical innovations of the past 100 years or so. Might there be parallels with those surrounding research into battery technology and synthetic fuels right now?
Could the car be due another Midgley moment? Well, having reflected a bit on the subject, I’m relieved to have concluded that no, probably not.
The pressures on electric vehicles – specifically in terms of battery technology, energy density and cost – seem, at first, to be comparable to those that gave rise to leaded petrol. The world has long forgotten what an obstacle to progress irregular combustion – engine knock – once was. The once burning issue prevented petrol engines from being small, powerful, efficient or reliable.
According to an article written by Mark Bernstein, Midgley experimented with more than 100 fuel additives in total. Iodine worked quite well. Aniline even better. But tetraethyl lead worked best of all – and that meant it could be dosed in petrol both efficiently and cheaply.
When ‘ethyl’ petrol appeared on US forecourts in 1923, it added only three cents to the cost of a gallon. It allowed petrol engines to run smoothly and reliably at then unprecedented compression ratios, and from there on out, not least with its impact on aircraft (fun fact: avgas aircraft fuel still widely has tetraethyl lead in it), it helped to shape the history of the 20th century.
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What I take from this story is that industry will do whatever it takes to get a system to market and working and as soon as they find something better, the powers that be are ready to screw you over for buying their old shite in the first place like petrol engines that could not run on unleaded petrol. My next car is likely to be an Ubercab.
How about the tech being made cheaper?, so that cars can be made and sold closer to whatever part of the world they are sold?
What a pointless article. Quick fact check for some more cheery news, a current Tesla Model 3 long range will cover 436 miles between charges. Panasonic and Tesla are launching a battery in less than two years that has an additional 25% power density, so 545 mile range for about £40k with a sub 5 second 0-60. Tesla have also developed a 200+ bhp motor that costs under £800 and contains no rare earths, so prices will come down a lot. Meanwhile Toyota EVs come with a 15 year battery warranty. All seems positive, clean and 99% of technical, environmental and cost challenges have been overcome. As a petrolhead I see internal combustion engines as "something for the weekend".