Tuesday, October 10, 2017

"Amazon Energy? Amazon Looks To Deploy Drones To Recharge Electric Cars And Other Vehicles" (AMZN)

This is approaching "Bored Elon Musk" levels of silliness. (see also below)

The amount of electricity the drones would be able to transmit is so trivial that the idea is approaching onionesqe levels. More on that tomorrow.

From CB Insights:
Amazon has patented a way for drones to provide "in-flight refuel" to vehicles — which might help resolve the charging-infrastructure challenge facing EVs.

As our vehicles become more automated and battery powered, we’ll spend less time at the fuel pump and less money on gas. But even electric cars — or bikes, or boats for that matter — can run out of juice, and charging stations aren’t widely available yet.

UAV rendering from patent
With a newly granted patent, Amazon could use the drones from its Prime Air fleet to keep you and your Tesla from getting stranded if you cruise too far out of town.

The e-commerce giant just won approval for an invention that would allow it to use its drone fleet to deliver energy to vehicles, both at rest and while they move — just like fighter jets refuel large aircraft in flight.

As electric vehicles (EVs) get cheaper, they’re growing increasingly appealing to American consumers: US sales of EVs were up 37% in 2016 compared to the year prior, according to data from InsideEVs.

At-home charging is often touted as a benefit for EVs over gasoline cars, but access to charging stations limits their mobility on longer trips: even the most energy-efficient EVs on the market can only go around 200 miles on a full charge, but the US has only around 16,000 public electric vehicle charging stations (compared to ~112,000 gas stations, as of 2015).

Those factors converge into a problematic scenario: Sales of EVs are accelerating so rapidly that sources like Bloomberg New Energy Finance have warned the US will hit an “infrastructure cap” in the mid-2030s due to a lack of charging stations.

With its new drone fuel-delivery patent, Amazon could help solve the charging problem for EV automakers … and potentially create a highly valuable product for the owners of the ~130,000 new EVs that hit the road last year.

Stranded no more
Knowing that vehicle-power depletion “may result in an adverse user experience,” Amazon patented a way to deploy its drone fleet to rescue vehicles with draining energy reserves: US patent 9778653 details a method whereby “uncrewed autonomous vehicles,” or UAVs, can:
  • locate energy-deficient vehicles based on transmitted data signals
  • dock with energy-depleting vehicles (while stationary or while they move)
  • and transfer energy to re-up depleting vehicle power.
The patent envisions UAVs attaching to vehicles via a docking mechanism comprised of various connectors. The patent illustrations show the docking mechanism affixed to the roof of the vehicle, but the patent says the dock could be located elsewhere (such as on a door or trailer hitch)
As with most patents, the filing makes no mention of offering the drone-refueling invention as a saleable product, so it’s possible that this tech could be used exclusively inside Amazon’s logistics operation. Yet the patent also claims a wide variety of applications for the technology, signaling that Amazon recognizes the commercial potential for on-demand energy delivery.
For one, the patent makes clear that the drone-refueling concept is not limited to EVs, pointing out that UAVs could transfer many forms of energy — including traditional fuels — to any “mobile machine that uses energy to move from one location to another.” (In addition to cars and trucks, the patent notes that a UAV could be used to refuel a bus, motorcycle, boat, aircraft, or even another UAV.)

Charging electric cars, however, provides the clearest use case for the invention.

As detailed in the illustration below, the systems that manage and monitor an EV’s energy use (and reserves) would communicate with a server to request and receive energy. The vehicle’s system would determine whether the amount of energy stored in its rechargeable battery is sufficient to get the vehicle to its desired destination, and if not, the vehicle’s technology would send up an “energy request” to a server....MORE
Previously in Amazon patents:

Airborne Alexa? Amazon Patent Reveals A Delivery Drone That Will Talk To You"
https://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/amazon_airborne_fulfillment_center_patent.png?w=738

A new patent indicates that the ‘intermodal vehicles’ could be used to meet consumer demand 

 https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/iPgX9nUEp-v7dgxcaiZm3wWJ7Vo=/0x0:1006x674/920x613/filters:focal(299x223:459x383)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/56074039/Screen_Shot_2017_08_06_at_9.07.58_AM.0.png
Just in Time For The Whole Foods Announcement, Amazon Gets A Patent on In-Store Anti-Price-Comparison Technology (AMZN)

Walmart-Amazon Battle of the Blimps (AMZN; WMT)

"Amazon Wants to Build a Network of Mobile Drone Maintenance and Delivery Platforms" (AMZN)

...I do like the steampunk-retro Montgolfier Bros/Henri Giffard stylings of the the Amazon airships:


And many more.

And, from BEM: