Systems Thinking and the Electric Car Stewart Gebbie 20070924 Why should we use electric cars? Your immediate response might well be to expect yet another article about the environmental virtues of electric cars. This certainly is a strong motivation. However, there is another deeper reason that comes from systems thinking. Before giving this concept a name and describing it from a theoretical stand point lets look at some examples: 1. The AA battery: what makes this so successful? They operate at a standard of ~1.5V for around 800mAh. You can be fairly sure that if you buy any make of AA battery and put them into your electronic device - things will work. 2. The Internet Protocol: what makes this so successful? Basically all information passed around the Internet is encapsulated in an IP packet. The packets sent out by your computer when you request a web page, can be passed on by a large number of routers using a varied mix of proprietary operating systems or commodity OSes such as Linux, or MS Windows. However, in the end, as many as 30 of these devices chat seamlessly to each other, all within a fraction of a second as your request is routed around the world. 3. The food we eat: what makes this so remarkable? Different people from around the world all eat completely different types of food. I might eat cereal in the morning, bread and jam for lunch and mashed potato with chicken for super. Somebody else might eat fish with rice. Yet another person my generally eat pasta and mince. Yet we are all able to derive our daily needs of energy and protein from these completely different sources. Notice that each different type of AA battery might be based on a completely different chemical reaction, e.g: it might use Zinc and Carbon, or it might be a rechargeable battery using Nickel and Cadmium. That is, the means of production of energy is decoupled from the chemical process, and further, my electronic device really has no knowledge of how to produce energy, only the mechanism to consume it. Reciprocally, because all AA batteries adhere to basic dimensions and power specifications I can use any compliant battery, so the battery might be used in any number of different electronic devices, e.g: it might drive a music player, a camera or a clock. Similarly, because all devices connected to the Internet, communicate using the Internet Protocol none of the devices needs be based on any specific implementation details. One device might be a compact cell phone sending IP via GPRS where as another might be a high-end multi-processor computer communicating over gigabit Ethernet. In the same vein, people around the world rely on completely different sources of food. However, if on my travels I go from Spain, to France to Thailand I will always be able to find a good meal (even if I'm not used to the taste). The common pattern here can be summarised via the concepts of decoupling and separation of concerns. These terms have gained ground in the computer software development sector, but they are equally applicable to any complex system. That is, we see systems that have either evolved or have been designed such that different aspects are neatly separated and decoupled from each other. The method of energy production in an AA battery is decoupled from the type of mechanisms of the device needing the power. The protocol for communicating on the Internet is decoupled from the electronics and software creating the content for the messages. The need for energy and protein in the human body is decoupled from the sources of food. So coming back to the car, the implication is that we should decouple the source of the automotive energy, from the currency for supplying that energy to the cars that need to use it. You could argue that this has already been done since cars use petrol and not coal, or crude oil. However, while this is true, there is still a strong dependency between petrol and fossil fuels and obviously a dependency on carbon based fuel sources in general. That is, with the current situation we can never escape burning carbon and we can not move over to multiple different energy sources. Rather we should look at elevating the role of electricity in the automotive industry. Electricity is one of the best known ways of successfully decoupling the energy production from the energy consumption. Why is this so important? Decoupling and separation of concerns are fundamental to the progress of any complex system. More specifically, if there is a clean decoupling between two aspects of a system, then each separate part can specialise in its own way. To put this more bluntly, if cars are provided with energy in the form of electricity then both sides can easily specialise: - The production of energy for cars could specialise the energy source: - the electricity could come from coal, oil, bio-fuels or any other myriad of carbon based fuels (be they fossil fuels or not) - the electricity could come from wind, hydro, geothermal, wave power or any other suitable earth system. - the electricity could come from solar power - the electricity could come from nuclear power - The storage of the energy in the cars could specialise to use: - traditional chemical batteries - fuel cells - hydrogen conversion - utlra-capacitors - The drive chain of the car could specialise to use: - traditional electric motors - rare earth metal based magnets - multiple wheel mounted motors - regenerative breaking - with or without a gear box Even more important are all the novel specialisations that have not yet been discovered or have not yet had the opportunity to be explored. Additionally, by creating a decoupling at the right point in the system we enable ongoing exploration and specialisation. For example, if at the moment the most effective source of energy is nuclear fission we could go ahead and use it as a means of producing power for transport. However, this does not need to inhibit our research into the cleaner and more abundant form of nuclear energy - fusion. Once fusion power is in fact ready for large scale commercial production of electrical power, there will need to be absolutely no change to the automotive industry. Simply start feeding fusion generated electrical power into the power grid. Thus, by making this one simple change to how our civilisation manages its power for transportation we open up a host of opportunities. These would be opportunities for the both the environmental and economic well begin of our society. That is, the specialisation afforded by this decoupling will most likely spark growth in a number of different economic areas. It will also provide far more options on how to create environmentally friendly and aware energy solutions. However, the implication of any decoupling is always a loss of power and control for the currently interested parties. This is certainly not a problem for society at large. In fact it is incredibly beneficial since it enables more people to be involved in the important areas of our economy and society. Unfortunately, it is seen as a threat by those currently in control. Because decoupling enables differentiation and specialisation, completely different companies might be part of the economic sector related to automotive power. No longer will this be the domain of only the petro-chemical industry and combustion engines. Thus, the current industry giants tend to inhibit the decoupling by whatever means available. Yet this resistance is inhibiting the healthy growth and adaptation of our civilisation. To try and counter this it is fundamentally important to the well being of our global environment and global economy that more people support initiatives to create appropriate decoupling in various large scale complex systems of which we are a part. For the automotive industry, this should be in the way of strong support of the electric car.