this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2026
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[–] zurohki@aussie.zone 1 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

Combustion engines burn more fuel to charge the 12V battery, they don't just make free energy.

You can have two batteries and use one while charging the other, but you'll use up the first battery much faster. You can't get more energy by transferring energy back and forth between two batteries just like you can't get more water by pouring it back and forth between two buckets. Using an electric motor to drive a generator to make more power also doesn't work. Neither does pointing a flashlight at a solar panel.

The first two laws of thermodynamics are, more or less:

  1. You can't win.
  2. You can't break even.

See also: Perpetual motion machines

[–] LavaPlanet@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

Absolutely, but also electrical byproduct or waste can be utilised. Old incandescest light bulbs has heat as wastage. The car is in motion, that motion could be utilised for energy creation. Literally hydro electric energy is utilising the kinetic energy of the water moving to move the rotor over the stator. I don't see why the wheels can't be a rotor, the axle a stator. I assume space issue.

[–] zurohki@aussie.zone 1 points 6 hours ago

The motion of the car isn't a byproduct, it's the main thing you're using energy to produce, and harvesting that same energy means you need to spend more energy than you're getting back otherwise the car stops. That's how regenerative braking works.

You could harvest waste heat for energy generation, but it's hard and there isn't really enough of it to bother with in an EV. They do dump heat gathered from the drive unit into the A/C system to save energy on heating the cabin though.