Re: Toyota developing solar powered green car


"Conscience" <nobama@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:gjjp0p$kfh$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
On 2009-01-01 16:41:58 -0800, "Sharx35" <sharx35@xxxxxxxxxxx> said:



"Cathy F." <clfr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:E-qdnaS6zOklw8DUnZ2dnUVZ_gCdnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"JoeSpareBedroom" <dishborealis@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:OSc7l.29093$hr3.11616@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"dbu'" <nospam@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:nospam-37BDBD.11013501012009@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In article
<1f04f237-7671-490c-b3fb-fc9e3b63a451@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
ransley <Mark_Ransley@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Jan 1, 3:06 am, dbu' <nos...@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D95E6O680&show_article=1>

"TOKYO (AP) - Toyota Motor Corp. is secretly developing a vehicle >
that
will be powered solely by solar energy in an effort to turn around
> its
struggling business with a futuristic ecological car, a top
business
daily reported Thursday.
The Nikkei newspaper, however, said it will be years before the >
planned
vehicle will be available on the market. Toyota's offices were
closed
Thursday and officials were not immediately available for comment.
According to The Nikkei, Toyota is working on an electric vehicle >
that
will get some of its power from solar cells equipped on the
vehicle, > and
that can be recharged with electricity generated from solar panels
on
the roofs of homes. The automaker later hopes to develop a model >
totally
powered by solar cells on the vehicle, the newspaper said without >
citing
sources.
The solar car is part of efforts by Japan's top automaker to grow >
during
hard times, The Nikkei said.
In December, Toyota stunned the nation by announcing it will slip >
into
its first operating loss in 70 years, as it gets battered by a
global
slump, especially in the key U.S. market. The surging yen has also
> hurt
the earnings of Japanese automakers.
Still, Toyota is a leader in green technology and executives have
stressed they won't cut back on environmental research despite its
troubles.
Toyota, the manufacturer of the Lexus luxury car and Camry sedan,
has
already begun using solar panels at its Tsutsumi plant in central >
Japan
to produce some of its own electricity.
The solar panels on the roofs add up in size to the equivalent of
60
tennis courts and produce enough electricity to power 500 homes,
according to Toyota. That reduces 740 tons a year of carbon dioxide
emissions and is equal to using 1,500 barrels of crude oil.
Toyota is also likely to indirectly gain expertise in solar energy
> when
its partner in developing and producing hybrid batteries, Panasonic
Corp., takes over Japanese rival Sanyo Electric Co., a leader in >
solar
energy, early next year."
--

"It's deja vu all over again"
Yogi Berra

Wake up,

You talking to me or Toyota? I didn't write the piece.

Besides, to be a pessimist and claim it can't be done is backward.
History has numerous examples of that attitude being dead wrong.

They're working on it, what's wrong with trying?


Amazing. We agree on something. Didn't Edison's electric light bulbs
fail something like hundreds of times before he found a winner?

Yeah, for one thing, he (or perhaps one of his minions?? - don't know)
had to figure out what sort of gas needed to be inside the bulb - so it
would support the burning of the filament, but not so much that the
filament burned out immediately.

Cathy


Is it a combination of nitrogen and argon?

It's a vacuum. No gas at all.

http://rabi.phys.virginia.edu/HTW/incandescent_light_bulbs.html

pertinent excerpt:
"971. What types of gas are used in light bulbs and how do their effects
differ? -- SF, Westfield, NJ
The glass envelope of an incandescent bulb can't contain air because
tungsten is flammable when hot and would burn up if there were oxygen
present around it. One of Thomas Edison's main contributions to the
development of such bulbs was learning how to extract all the air from the
bulb. But a bulb that contains no gas won't work well because tungsten
sublimes at high temperatures--its atoms evaporate directly from solid to
gas. If there were no gas in the bulb, every tungsten atom that left the
filament would fly unimpeded all the way to the glass wall of the bulb and
then stick there forever. While there are some incandescent bulbs that
operate with a vacuum inside, most common incandescent lamps contain a small
amount of argon and nitrogen gases.

Argon and nitrogen are chemically inert, so that the tungsten filament can't
burn in the argon and nitrogen, and each argon atom or nitrogen molecule is
massive enough that when a tungsten atom that's trying to leave the filament
hits it, that tungsten atom may rebound back onto the filament. The argon
and nitrogen gases thus prolong the life of the filament. Unfortunately,
these gases also convey heat away from the filament via convection. You can
see evidence of this convection as a dark spot of tungsten atoms that
accumulate at the top of the bulb. That black smudge consists of tungsten
atoms that didn't return to the filament and were swept upward as the hot
argon and nitrogen gases rose.

However, some premium light bulbs contain krypton gas rather than argon gas.
Like argon, krypton is chemically inert. But a krypton atom is more massive
than an argon atom, making it more effective at bouncing tungsten atoms back
toward the filament after they sublime. Krypton gas is also a poorer
conductor of heat than argon gas, so that it allows the filament to convert
its power more efficiently into visible light. Unfortunately, krypton is a
rare constituent of our atmosphere and very expensive. That's why it's only
used in premium light bulbs, together with some nitrogen gas.

Incidentally, the filament in many incandescent bulbs is treated with a
small amount of a phosphorus-based "getter" that reacts with any residual
oxygen that may be in the bulb the first time the filament becomes hot.
That's how the manufacturer ensures that there will be no oxygen in the bulb
for the tungsten filament to react with."

Cathy


.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: light bulb explosion
    ... > I stumbled across the explanation under a Britannica entry for Argon. ... > But sometimes an arc will strike across the broken filament ends. ... > the argon pressure in the bulb to skyrocket. ...
    (sci.electronics.basics)
  • Re: Filaments ..Wave break
    ... You can say with certainty if a bulb was ... filament and would not have a significant wave shape from manufacture. ... Incandescent lamps designed for high vibration environments, ... This means that tungsten at the operating temperature is ...
    (sci.engr.lighting)
  • Re: Filaments ..Wave break
    ... You can say with certainty if a bulb was ... filament and would not have a significant wave shape from manufacture. ... Incandescent lamps designed for high vibration environments, ... This means that tungsten at the operating temperature is ...
    (sci.engr.lighting)
  • Re: Filaments ..Wave break
    ... You can say with certainty if a bulb was ... filament and would not have a significant wave shape from manufacture. ... Incandescent lamps designed for high vibration environments, ... This means that tungsten at the operating temperature is ...
    (sci.engr.lighting)
  • Re: Filaments ..Wave break
    ... You can say with certainty if a bulb was ... the lamp was broken during the accident. ... filament and would not have a significant wave shape from manufacture. ... Incandescent lamps designed for high vibration environments, ...
    (sci.engr.lighting)
Loading