Weaknesses of the Malaysian Low Carbon Mobility Footprint Blueprint

 

Weaknesses of the Malaysian Low Carbon Mobility Footprint Blueprint

I read about the Malaysian Low Carbon Mobility Footprint Blueprint from paultan.org in its article Malaysia’s EV roadmap – 10,000 CBU full electric cars tax free, 7,000 AC/500 DC charging points proposed (https://paultan.org/2021/04/19/malaysias-ev-roadmap-proposes-7000-ac-and-500-dc-charging-points-10000-units-of-cbu-full-evs-tax-free/) .

 In the article, A Review of the Measurement Method, Analysis and Implementation Policy of Carbon Dioxide Emission from Transportation, published on 21 July, 2020, it references the article at:

https://www.greentechmalaysia.my/our-services/low-carbon-mobility/ (accessed on 24 January 2020), but this article is not available.

It also refers the launching of the Low-Carbon Mobility Blueprint and Action Plan (LCMB) but no reference is provided for this blueprint. Similarly, for the paultan.org article.

So, there is no tracing of the source of this statement from paultan.org, “The rest will then come with the formation of private EV charging operators. A public tender for a national fast charging network is planned, and the study also proposes that tax incentives will be provided under Green Income Tax Exemption (GITE) for such services until 2030. In areas not serviced by private operators, it calls for the installation of a fast charger for every 100 km and at every R&R stop along major highways, commencing from next year until 2025.”

The only source is from this link: https://www.mgtc.gov.my/our-services/low-carbon-mobility/, assessed today, on 21 April 2021. Under this service, there is data for charging stations as at Dec 2018. There are 250 charging stations throughout Malaysia. Of course, as usual, Sabah and Sarawak were never considered as Malaysia. To be fair, Perlis, Terengganu and Kelantan were also missing. These are the poorest states in Malaysia.

Please note that these charging stations are subsidised, with the savings of  RM49,920 in ten years (“This is a great stride in the right direction, given that low carbon mobility solutions have the potential to provide over RM 49,920 worth of savings for owners across ten years.”).

The most accurate description of this blueprint could be from Focus Malaysia at https://focusmalaysia.my/business/msia-embarks-on-a-blueprint-towards-automotive-electrification/ in the article “M’sia embarks on a blueprint towards automotive electrification”, by Cheah Chor Sooi, published on 20 April 2021, and https://www.nst.com.my/business/2021/04/683754/low-carbon-mobility-blueprint-drive-larger-participation-ev-players by Ayisy Yusof - April 20, 2021. In the article, they mentioned the blueprint as “Low Carbon Mobility Blueprint 2021-2030” subject to final Cabinet approval.

1         Charging Stations

The article in the NST is more detailed:

“On charging infrastructure, he said a national target of 7,000 AC charging points and 500 DC charging points had been set with government funding.

Initially, 2,000AC charging points and 200 DC charging points will be set up as an immediate phase between 2020 and 2021.”

This is good, but if National, it means only the richer states, excluding Sabah and Sarawak, the poorest states in Malaysia, it will be a waste of resources. Tesla superchargers were initially distributed not to satisfy local demands, but to satisfy long distance users. Users are supposed to charge at home, using the charging stations only for long distance travels.

Without clarifying these details, the expenditure on the charging stations will not be optimum, and the poorer states still need to subsidise the richer states in providing charging stations that are wastefully used.

Judging from the long-range travels of Malaysians, most of them are to travel back to the poorer states. If there are insufficient charging stations along the way, it will retard the sales of electric vehicles. These charging stations will be used for local transportation withing the richer states although they can charge at home, to take advantage of the subsidies provided at the charging stations.

There should be disincentives for local users. Charging stations are only for those who want to travel long distances. Better still, remove all subsidies from these charging stations. Use the money to finance more charging stations.

2         Hybrid Vehicles

“He said PHEV qualifications would be established based on electric range per charge and with no engine charging; set at more than 30km (2020-2021), rising to 55km (2022-2024), 75km (2025-2027) and 100km (2028-2030).”

Hybrid vehicles that have a short range of 30km is very expensive. The battery cost will be RM150/km. At 30km, the cost of the battery is RM4,500, every 2 years, because this battery need to be replaced after 30,000 km, assuming 1000 recharging cycles. There is no real savings for users of hybrid vehicles.

In contrast, a large battery BEV, with a range of 150 km, will last for 150,000 km. There is a better chance of getting savings in fuel costs if the batteries need to be replaced every 7 years. For better fuel economy, larger batteries, like Tesla cars, with a range of 400 km, or lifetime range of 400,000 km, lasting for 20 years, are even better.

However, large batteries are costly. Tesla need to spend 60,000 for its batteries. It is more economical to spend it on the 150 km range BEV, costing just 22,500, especially if you travel 10,000 km per year, in which case the lifetime of the battery should be 15 years.

Better still, use very small battery with a range of 1 km, sufficient to store the kinetic energy of the car. This technology is patented by me, assigned to Universiti Malaysia Sabah and granted by MYIPO although it is still pending in UK. The invention is called, the Optimum Hybrid Vehicle. This invention allows all vehicles to be converted to Hybrid Vehicles where the engines operate at their optimum range.

The small battery uses the alternator as its motor to drive vehicles to a speed of up to 10 kmph. Because of such low speed, the alternator can provide sufficient power for such a speed. Above 10 kmph, the internal combustion engine takes over.

Even with no aggressive regen circuit, achieving only 30% regen efficiency,  the fuel savings should be in the region of 5%. If the regen efficiency were to be increased to 60%, the savings could be up to 10% in urban areas, with lots of start-stop traffic. These savings may not look much, but the savings made by PHEV, are also in this region but at much higher costs.

The reason is that PHEV relies on their regen ability to save fuel costs. Internal combustion engine cannot have any regen ability. PHEV however, has battery capacity that is much higher than the amount of energy that the regen can recover. The regen can only recover the kinetic energy of the vehicles, which is not much. Only around 1 km of range only.

Better still, the Optimum Hybrid Vehicle invention is made by Malaysia, so Malaysia should support its locally invented technology. At least we can prove to the world that we are innovative enough to solve the global climate disaster.

3         Battery Policies

 

Battery policies are vital in making BEV and PHEV more attractive to customers. Used batteries should be recycled instead of being dumped at high costs and therefore contribute to more pollution.

The success of Tesla is due to its advanced battery technology. It is therefore vital that manufacturers of electric vehicles to also manufacture or pack batteries. There is no need for EV manufacturers to make their own batteries. Even Tesla still has not managed to manufacture its own batteries despite acquiring Maxwell (https://electrek.co/2020/01/21/tesla-acquisition-maxwell-big-impact-battery-elon-musk/).

There is no mention at all of any battery policy in the blueprint. There should be incentives towards importing battery cells, or manufacturing of battery cells in Malaysia, as well as recycling these batteries.

4         NEV and eBIKE

NEV is the term used in the USA for Neighbourhood Electric Vehicles. They are short range electric vehicles so are much cheaper to buy. Another cheaper electric vehicle is the electric bicycle. The blueprint has policies for motorcycles but none for electric bicycles. All the rich nations on earth have policies on these economical electric vehicles, except the Malaysian blueprint. Refer to the Wikipedia article first: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighborhood_Electric_Vehicle.

NEV and eBike are not as popular as mainstream BEV, but they provide an introduction to electrical propulsion technology to the customers. All the advanced and rich nations; USA, China and India have NEV and eBike policies. They encourage users to use NEV and eBike for daily uses.

To find out how useful NEV is for everyday usage, you may refer to the Indian user in the article: https://www.plugincars.com/indian-evs-await-government-support-some-owners-are-very-happy-their-cars-129145.html, by Alysha Webb · December 23, 2013.

“Kumar has taken a number of cross-country trips in his REVA to check the availability of charging. The longest trip was a 3,400 kilometer (2,113 miles), 21-day trek from Chennai to New Delhi. Though he did have problems recharging at some points, “I could charge [the] car at all times and process according to the timetable prepared,” said Kumar.”

Despite the REVAi getting only about 70 kilometres per charge, Kumar has managed to drive up to 3,400 kilometres.

The weakness of the blueprint is that it ignored completely the need of the poor that even the rich nations do not ignore. As a result, Malaysia has been backward in the adoption of electric vehicles.

5         Solar Powered BEV

Completely missing from the blueprint is also the important Solar Powered BEV. To show the potential of a solar powered BEV, let us consider the specifications of the Solar Powered NEV from China in Alibaba. https://electrek.co/2021/04/17/awesomely-weird-alibaba-ev-of-the-week-solar-powered-electric-family-car/

It costs US $5,800 with a 300 W solar roof. With a 5-kW motor, it has a top speed of 50 km/h with a maximum range of 120 km. With a dimension of 1540 mm x 3380 mm x 1500 mm, it is similar in size to Perodua Viva, at 1475 mm x 3575 mm x 1475 mm.

Because it is a conventional car, its electric consumption should be 100 Wh/km compared to 109 Wh/km for Tesla Model 3. For each hour of sunshine, the solar panel provides up to 3 km of additional range. For 5 hours, it should provide 15 km of additional range.

A more luxurious Lightyear One (https://lightyear.one/) has a range of 70 km on solar power per day, with the following specifications:

Exterior / Performance

• Range. 725 km (WLTP)
• Drive. All 4 independently controlled. Advanced torque vectoring.
• Energy use. 83 Wh/km (WLTP) - excluding HVAC.
• Acceleration. 0 - 100 km/h in less than 10 seconds.
• Dimensions (L x W x H) 5057 x 1898 x 1426 mm.
• Charging speeds. Amount of range in 1 hour charging.

With an average commuting range of 60 km on average, most commuters do not need to charge their car anymore, especially in a sunny place like Malaysia. Unfortunately, it will cost RM500,000.

I have a pending Design Patent, that will be called Transparent SUV. It will beat Lightyear One by being more aerodynamic and lighter because it uses small battery and remove steering wheels.

Lightyear One owes its efficiency due to the hub motors, which allows torque vectoring steering. With such torque vectoring, it does not need any mechanical steering. The front wheels can be fixed so they can be covered to reduce even more air drag.

The Transparent SUV does not even have a separate opaque bonnet to impair visibility because the upper part is made of transparent acrylic, to make it even more aerodynamic. Acrylic is up to 12 times stronger than glass although transparent and 20% stronger than steel with the same weight. 2D CFD Virtual Wind tunnel studies calculated its shape to have a CD of 0.095  compared to Lightyear One of 0.20, and Stella Vie of 0.10, a Solar World Challenge winner. Its energy use should be less, and estimated to be 50 Wh/km.

Because the upper part is made of transparent plastic, it can have more solar panel area without reducing aerodynamic drag. It should be able to get a surface area of 6 square metres compared to 5 square metres for the Lightyear One. Its solar power range should be 144 compared to 72.29 for Lightyear One for 6 hours of solar charging.

The Transparent SUV should have a battery capacity of at least 150 km range but because it is very efficient, it should require much less battery so it should cost less than RM50,000, if mass produced. Because the Transparent SUV is made of plastic, the Transparent SUV is easy to mass produce. They can be injection moulded, unlike the giant metal stamping machines that Tesla uses. Even these huge machines cannot stamp the whole body of s Tesla vehicle.

There are many other technological features of the Transparent SUV which can do an acceleration of 2 seconds from 0 to 100 km/h  but it is not supported by the blueprint. Again, solar powered vehicles are useful for poorer regions like Sabah and Sarawak that will surely have limited charging stations and reliable electric power generators.

6         Disclaimer

The views expressed here are mine alone and do not reflect the views of my employer, Universiti Malaysia Sabah. I cannot guarantee that all data are accurate so please reconfirm all the facts that I had used. This article is not a thorough analysis of the blueprint in order to make this suggestion concise. Please follow up with journals and papers that are published.

 

Associate Professor Ir. Hj. Othman bin Hj. Ahmad, ASDK,

Universiti Malaysia Sabah

21 April 2021