[rrrrrrrrrrrryan]

We're like a couple years away from having the tech to just give all autonomous electric vehicles the leftmost lane on the interstates from 10pm-6am, then raise the speed limit to 90 or 100 mph. Let trucking companies drive these vehicles a few feet apart from each other for aerodynamics. If you could book a sleeper taxi in New York and be in Chicago in the morning, or San Francisco to Seattle, for cheaper than a flight, without destroying the environment, would you do it?

[mceachen]

I don't know who you've talked to about this, but just because it's electric and robo-driven doesn't mean they get to skip aerodynamic drag. Air resistance increases at the square of velocity. 4 miles/kWh at 55 becomes < 2 mi/kWh at 85. 100 mph and you're measuring in kWh/mile.

[kccqzy]

If you double the speed, the air resistance gets quadrupled. Power output needed for constant speed travel is octupled (P=Fv). Now you need a higher-power motor and more expensive batteries that can sustain this kind of power output. The typical electric vehicle available today can't sustain a speed of 100 mph without thermal throttling kicking in.

Sure making the electric motor more powerful isn't that big of a problem: just look at electric trains. But making the batteries more powerful will require significant more research.

[earthling8118]

That sounds lovely. Of course, you'll never achieve that with automobiles, so we'll be needing the trains to make it possible. No tires and significantly less chances of a collision that will kill you.

[etrautmann]

This is roughly equivalent to flying if the car is ICE

[tidbits]

And if the car is not ICE then you still have the problem of tire particle pollution. Trains are better.