>>12702552Yes, it is possible but the efficiency is low. So for an increasing expense in machinery there is a diminishing return.
The simplest would be to add a steam machine to normal combustion engines to recover heat from the cooling circuit and the exhaust, where 2/3 of the chemical energy is expelled. OK, so let's do some numbers:
We have a modern fairly efficient engine in a car, that also is optimised for weight/size, not just raw efficiency. Efficiency is 30% near enough. So a 100 hp engine expels 200 hp in heat. That heat has a low temperature so you can extract 10 % of the energy, which is 20 hp, so now you lose "only" 180 hp in heat. And those added 20 hp cost you a lot in complexity, especially as you have to find a way to use it, say in a generator, which means you have to decouple the normal generator connected to the crankshaft, adding more complexity and also weight.
Now car manufacturers have been more busy with emission measurement defeat mechanism and cartels than real tech development, so you would first need to imprison most of the current management before anything here will be implemented. In other words: never.
And this is why Tesla has done well: they worked on tech rather than crime.
