Quick Notes on the Future of Transportation
Today is the 117th anniversary of Henry Ford’s first successful test drive of the automobile; his four-horsepower, 500-pound frame called the “quadricycle” (pictured here) ran on pure ethanol. Electric vehicles came along shortly thereafter as well, and enjoyed impressive market share, due largely to the fact that they did not require the driver to start the car with a hand-crank, which was physically difficult and often quite dangerous. This advantage disappeared in the 1920s with the invention of the electric starter, and so did electric vehicles.
It will be interesting to see where electric transportation steers us here in the 21st Century, and how able will we be to charge our vehicles with clean energy sources. Battery prices have fallen far faster than the industry analysts predicted, and the consumer sales proposition is becoming quite attractive.
Speaking of predicting the future, it’s fairly clear that we won’t be driving 4000-pound gasoline hogs by the time I’m getting ready to check out of here in 30 years, and, for what it’s worth, our list of clean energy investment opportunities contains a couple of solid concepts in electric transportation. But will we simply replace this current car-ownership paradigm with an electric drive-train? Or will we completely rethink the concept of personal mobility, replacing it with a network of different forms of mass-transit, micro-rentals, ride-sharing, etc.?
