TED演讲:一项关于电动车的大胆计划(1)

 So how would you run a whole country without oil? 怎么让一个国家在没有用石油的情况下运转？

That's the question that sort of hit me in the middle of a Davos afternoon about four years ago. 四年以前在Davos的一个下午，这个问题突然浮现在我的脑海。

It never left my brain. And I started playing with it more like a puzzle. 我永远不会忘记它。我越想越多，就像一个游戏。

The original thought I had: this must be ethanol. 一开始我想一定应该用乙醇。

So I went out and researched ethanol, and found out you need the Amazon in your backyard in every country. 所以我便开始学习研究乙醇，然后发现，每个国家必须得有个自己的亚马逊来支持。

About six months later I figured out it must be hydrogen¹, until some scientist told me the unfortunate truth, 六个月以后，我觉得答案必定是氢气，直到后来某科学家告诉我一个不幸的事实：

which is, you actually use more clean electrons² than the ones you get inside a car, if you use hydrogen. 如果在汽车里使用氢气的话，你其实用了比你所得到的更多干净的电子。

So that is not going to be the path to go. 所以这并不是一个可行的办法。

And then sort of through a process of wandering around, 然后经过反反复复的思考，

I got to the thought that actually if you could convert³ an entire country to electric cars, 我有了这样一个想法，如果你可以将整个国家转换到使用电力汽车，

in a way that is convenient and affordable⁴, you could get to a solution. 在方便和经济的前提下，那你便有了解决的方法。

Now I started this from a point of view that it has to be something that scales en masse. 我从一开始觉得我们的办法只能在一个很大的范围内可行。

Not how do you build one car, 这并不是怎么制造一辆车，

but how do you scale this so that it can become something that is used by 99 percent of the population? 而是怎么设计一个方案，可以让百分之99的人都使用这种汽车。

The thought that came to mind is that it needs to be as good as any car that you would have today. 第一个想法便是这种车必须跟现在的车一样好用。

So one, it has to be more convenient than a car. 因此，第一：它必须比一辆汽车方便。

And two, it has be more affordable than today's cars. 第二：它必须比现代的汽车便宜。

Affordable is not a 40,000 dollar sedan, right? 便宜的意思不是指一辆4万美元的轿车。对吧？

That's not something that we can finance⁵ or buy today. 那可不是我们今天可以购买的汽车。

And convenient is not something that you drive for an hour and charge for eight. 并且，方便的意思不是说你得充电8小时却只能开1小时。

1 hydrogen   

n.氢元素，氢气

参考例句：

• Water is made up of atoms of hydrogen and oxygen.水由氢和氧的原子构成。
• A chemist can isolate the oxygen from the hydrogen in water.一个化学家能把水中的氧和氢分解。

2 electrons   

n.电子( electron的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Electrons are negatively charged with electricity,protons are positively charged. 电子是带负电荷的，质子是带正电荷的。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Electrons are negatively charged with electricity. 电子带负电荷。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

3 convert   

v.（在形式、状态、用途等方面）（使）改变

参考例句：

• I must convert sorrow into strength.我要化悲痛为力量。
• At what rate does the dollar convert into pounds?美元以什么汇率兑换成英镑？

4 affordable   

adj.支付得起的，不太昂贵的

参考例句：

• The rent for the four-roomed house is affordable.四居室房屋的房租付得起。
• There are few affordable apartments in big cities.在大城市中没有几所公寓是便宜的。

5 finance   

n.财务管理，财政，金融，财源，资金

参考例句：

• She is an expert in finance.她是一名财政专家。
• A finance house made a bid to buy up the entire company.一家信贷公司出价买下了整个公司。