Re: More Google Irresponsible Stupidity.

That would only be important if you have a high density of users, at which point permanent infrastructure becomes more practical. The idea is to provide coverage to areas where few people can afford the kit, and there may be one or two shared devices per village.

Re: Air traffic?

RTFA. They fly at around 60,000 feet. Very few aircraft are capable of even reaching 60,000 feet and even then these things aren't invisible to RADAR, it shouldn't be hard to route around them.

Re: So

And you think they can't produce technical evidence to back their case up? It's unlikely they'd make the claim if they couldn't prove it.

Re: Puzzled

Sometimes settling out of court is cheaper than going through the whole legal process, even if you believe that you're innocent. If nothing else it can damage your sales and reputation pending the verdict.

Re: will have to take care of themselves

Yes, mobile does need 800 MHz. We still don't have full 3G coverage because of the cost and number of base stations needed at 2.1 GHz, never mind the new 2.6 GHz band for 4G. They've cheated a little in Scotland and provided some limited 3G on the 2G 900 MHz band.

At 800 MHz with current LTE systems we should be able to get 20-40 Mbit/sec out of each of the allocated frequency blocks, which is FAR better than the limited 2G data network that otherwise covers rural areas.

Re: Do you know ANYTHING about digital broadcast technology?

Yes, we all know that rural people can't receive digital TV signals and wind turbine blades are made from metal, not non radio-reflecting carbon fibre. That and the entire countryside is littered with turbines. Or maybe not.

Re: How about "Haswell" on LGA 1156 instead of another new socket?

The new CPU moves voltage regulation on chip as part of its drive towards lower power and less support components. You'd pretty much HAVE to have a new socket if you do that.

Re: Ultrabook debacle

You seem not to know the difference between a net book and an Ultrabook. Intel will be upset. No, they are not even slightly similar.

Re: Musk obviously has staff to pay his bills and thus never actually sees them ...

@YARR - tell you what, run your car engine for a while, then open the radiator cap. If you still have your eyebrows (or face) left then try telling us again that they don't produce much waste heat. You can finish off by holding the exhaust pipe if you like.

Re: Musk obviously has staff to pay his bills and thus never actually sees them ...

@naughtyhorse - you're not getting any better or any brighter.

It doesn't matter when you run out of power, only that MOST cars recharge off peak. There's no need to wait in the unlikely event that you need a mid-day recharge.

DC power systems have been getting progressively cheaper and smaller scale. The latest models are all solid state and are economical over distances of 10's of kilometres. Go look up HVDC Light and HVDC PLUS.

If feeding power back into the grid will doom us then we're already doomed. As others (and myself) have already pointed out FIT systems (like PV) are already doing this. You've also totally failed to explain WHY this will doom us.

Half that number

The Roadster battery cost $36,000 today and has a projected 7 year life span, so if nothing changes and you stick that money under your mattress (rather than somewhere that pays interest) that's a tad over $5k per year. You can however pretty much guarantee that in 7 years time there will be cheaper replacements. You also need to remember that your petrol car needs replacement parts (of which it has many more, and needs more servicing) and depreciates also.

I've no idea where you got that second number from.

Re: Musk obviously has staff to pay his bills and thus never actually sees them ...

@YARR - no it isn't

IC engines run at about 30% efficiency. A fixed power plant burning the same fuel can run at better than 80% efficiency. Even allowing for charging and transmissions losses then you come out in front by using electric power. Also you remove the problem of emissions in urban areas, which are a significant problem.

Re: Musk obviously has staff to pay his bills and thus never actually sees them ...

@Naughtyhorse - you seem to be majoring in stupid yourself, and providing no evidence to the contrary. The difference in power draw between peak and off peak is well documented at over 50,000MWh, using 1/3rd of that for 8 hours per day (overnight, off peak) would be enough to drive over 30% of the cars in the country.

DC power lines have been in use since the 1930's when the Swedes worked out how to do what Edison couldn't. There's nothing new or magical about them, we use them to transfer power between France and the UK, and between the UK and Ireland.

Feeding power back in to the grid is also a well known technology, it is used by owners of PV panels for example. The idea of EV drivers setting an amount of power they can afford to return to the grid and getting a higher rate for that is far from fanciful.

Re: This guy

MOST of SpaceX's funding has come from NASA progress payments. They have a $1.6Bn contract to supply the International Space Station, and a proven method of fulfilling that. As for the launch contracts, they have taken DEPOSITS, not full payments so they can still cover their costs when they have to provide the promised launches. Their management doesn't seem to have done a bad job here.

As for aircraft maintenance and parts, I guess you've never had anything to do with the aviation industry. Mechanics have to be certified by the FAA and all parts have to be built to standard, be traceable and identifiable. The result is that maintenance is anything BUT cheap and done by Chinese workers.

Many oil companies went bust in the early days

It doesn't mean that it's a bad idea, just that business model and volumes of scale aren't right at the moment.

So public charging points are entirely mythical

And it's not possible to install charging points on the street? Think more about how something could be done rather than why you personally can't do something this instant.

Re: Musk obviously has staff to pay his bills and thus never actually sees them ...

The more important question is what are you smoking?

At current prices electricity is significantly cheaper per mile than petrol. There is also substantial over capacity during off-peak periods (which is why it is offered cheaper then). The result is that EV charging can be used to smooth out peaks and troughs in demand (EVs can also feed power back to the grid at peak demand, gaining their owners cash).

Next the idea that the grid can't cope, nor that it can't be upgraded. Both are utter nonsense. There won't be a Big Bang conversion here, petrol will be around for a long time to come, and there is currently enough capacity for a significant percentage of vehicles to be electric powered. It will take many years for the current grid to be unable to handle any more EVs, and it can be upgraded perfectly well, not by boosting voltage but by adding more lines. There's also the possibility with the new lines to shift to DC transmission which results in less power loss.

Re: @ Terry Barnes et al - still not getting it

It's not YOUR battery, you haven't bought it. You are renting it, plus paying for the amount of power you load in to it. You don't care if it brand new or 5 years old, only that it stores the amount of power that you paid for. You go into the filling station and select, for example, high capacity, regular or economy batteries (where economy are getting towards the end of their life - think more like 10 years for this - and don't store as much charge). Providing you know how much power the battery holds and have only paid for that what do you care?

You honestly think that (a) petrol isn't dangerous if allowed to slop about in the open by it's self and (b) electric charging stations aren't carefully insulated and loaded down with safety devices? Pull the other one.

Re: Battery swapping also has problems

Firstly it seems you don't understand the Calor Gas model at all. You don't buy the battery, you pay a refundable deposit to use it, plus the cost of the energy for the charge. You care not a jot who had the battery before you, what condition it is in etc, only how much energy it has stored.

Secondly the demand for fuel station provided power is much reduced as you can top up at home or in public car parks. You still need significant power feeds to these stations, but they draw off peak power for their charging. Why on earth would you want to physically ship the batteries about when we have a perfectly good way of delivering electric power to wherever we want?

Re: Easy answer then

Can you say "straw man argument"? Other than the completely hypothetical premis, the argument that working out a legal way the government less tax is as bad as a sexual assault is utterly rediculous.

Re: What kind of screaming right wing loon are you?

That is rather the way the Irish are likely to feel if you invade them, rather than the Americans (who were British subjects at the time and had no way of controlling tax rates) taxing too little.

What kind of screaming right wing loon are you?

Problem: we're not raising quite as much tax as we'd like

Solution: Declare war on a neighbouring country?

You'd have to be absolutely barking mad to even contemplate that. Ignoring for a moment the cost in international relations, it would cost us vastly more in military resources, restart a republican terror campaign and the Irish are broke anyway.

Re: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

Have an upvote for the RAH reference

Re: Their power measurements

Are you including the amount of energy required to grow the creatures that a real cat eats to provide its energy? I think you'll find that, compared to the original energy input (sunlight), the output energy is tiny.

Re: Probably because - @bluenose

In the US a board of directors has two main legal responsibilities - a Duty of Care and a Duty of Loyalty. While they can get away under the Duty of Care with business decisions that work out badly (depending on how badly, and how ill-informed they were when they made them) its pretty easy to argue that a reasonable person (which is the legal test) wouldn't pay more tax than they had to, which would leave the board liable.

You also seem to have failed to spot that the Apple board first voted to restart paying dividends over two years ago, following which their share price climbed hugely, even though it has since fallen back somewhat (you'd still be ahead if you purchased back then).

Conversely maximising share price in the short term, to increase the value of the board members personal holdings, is a breach of the Duty of Loyalty. Generally the reason for a board working to keep the share price up is to prevent the company being bought out for less than its asset value (and they have extra duties in the case of the sale of the company), which is both bad for shareholders and likely to have them looking for a new job.

Not even close

1) Coal stations made up only 37% of US power last year (source http://phys.org/news/2013-04-coal-power-energy.html ) and has been falling.

2) Diesel is still toxic, even if it's a little harder to light (and yes, it still can be a fire risk). Even with the filters in place diesel engines emit more nitrogen oxides, which are bad for public health. No-one said that lithium batteries were entirely safe (ANY method of storing large amounts of energy is dangerous), just it's no more dangerous than using fossil fuels as you seem to be claiming.