--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, off_world_beings <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
[snip] > > US Oil companies killed the electric car: > One person sums it up like this: > > ""Oil companies killed the EV car. > Chevron had inherited control of the worldwide patent rights for the > NiMH EV-95 battery when it merged with Texaco, which had purchased > them from General Motors. Chevron's unit won a $30,000,000 settlement > from Toyota and Panasonic, and the production line for the large NiMH > batteries was closed down and dismantled. Only smaller NiMH > batteries, incapable of powering an electric vehicle or plugging in, > are currently allowed by Chevron-Texaco. "" What killed the EV was its inability to drive more than the range of its battery. I could be wrong on the exact figure but I think on one charge it could go about 100 miles and that's all. Approximately 80% of the U.S. population drive 50 miles a day or less. Great. The EV would have taken care of 80% of all of our driving. But what do you do on days when you want to go MORE than 100 miles, say a trip to the country for a day? That would be, say, 200 miles total for the day. Well, you simply couldn't do such a day-trip in an EV. Why? Because after you drove its battery's range, you'd have to recharge it, which would take about 6 hours. Do you expect the EV owner to sit around for 6 hours and wait for the battery to charge? Unless you're really rich, no one is going to buy an EV when they would need a second car to do the longer trips. Those longer trips may only constitute 20% or less of the days when we need more than 100 miles to drive but, hell, a second car is expensive. No one's going to do that unless, like I say, you are a rich elite, like the people who got the EVs in the movie "Who killed the electric car?" who were, for the most part, multimillionnaires, celebrities, or rich lesbians. That's why if you see the documentary "Who killed the electric car" that in the last 5 minutes of the movie the director specifically comes to the conclusion that it is the PLUG-IN HYBRID that is the solution, NOT the 100% electric (and he really goes into it at length in the extras). With a plub-in hybrid, you are able to do it all: 1) you plug it in at night to get a full charge on the, say, 100-mile- a-charge batter; 2) on those days when you drive MORE than the battery's range, YOU SIMPLY SWITCH OVER TO THE HYBRID mode, which lets you drive MORE than the 100 miles. 3) you go home that night and plug the thing in again. The director of "Who killed the electric car?" is making a follow-up documentary which, as I understand it, is going to be ALl about the plug-in hybrid and NOT about the electric car because he, too, realizes its limitations. Indeed, the impression I got is that he set out making the first movie in support of the EV and in the course of doing the movie realized that it DESERVED to die! So, who killed the electric car? Not Dick Cheney, not the oil companies, and certainly not GM or the car companies. YOU DID, OffWorld. You, the American consumer, who wants his cake and eat it, too, killed the electric car. Why? Because you want your car to do everything: putz around town, go into the country at a whim, go across the country and put 5,000 miles on the odometer in two weeks...all things you CANNOT do with an EV. But you can with a plug-in hybrid. Now, the 100% electric car certainly may have a future. It depends upon the technologies currently being developed. Rick Archer provided us with a link several days ago about an incredible ceramic battery technology in the works in Texas which one may be able to charge in about 5 minutes and will have a range of 500 miles! Well, if THAT thing becomes a reality, the EV will come off the shelf and, believe me, GM will be cranking them out like jelly beans. Until then, the plug-in hybrid is the way to go. Now, if you want to shit upon Bush and Company, this is where you can do that. Bush has put his eggs in two utterly useless concepts that are NOT the direction to go in: 1) Hydrogen cars. Unlike the plug-in hybrid which ALREADY has an existing distribution network (the nation's electricity grid), hydrogen would require an entirely new distribution structure tha wouldn't cost billions but 100s of billions. 2) corn ethanol. I am LOATHE to say I agree with Fidel Castro but on this he was right: it's taking money and food out of the pockets and mouths of the world's poor. Terrible policy. But, of course, although Bush should take some of the blame the REAL blame should lie at the feet of the horrible eco-terrorists like Al Gore and company who for years have been discouraging development of oil in the U.S. and scaring us with unfounded global warming bullshit. The plug-in hybrid technology is here TODAY, its distribution system is here TODAY. Everything is in place and until some other technology comes along that is better, that is where we should put our full attention. The miles-per-gallon equivalency of the PIH is about 175 miles-per-gallon when gas is selling at about $3.50 at the pump. The money stays in the U.S. as the electricity is generated here by fossil fuels or nuclear or hydro that originates in this country. What amazes me is that so few know about it. I went to a fair a few months ago here and the local electric utility had one of those PR kiosks set up. So I started to talk with one of the representatives there about the Plug-in Hybrid. And you know what? It dawned on me after about 10 minutes into the conversation that she didn't know the difference between a hybrid and a plug-in-hybrid...all along she thought I was talking about just the hybrid!!!! If this is what a supposed expert and representative of an electric utility knows about the field -- and who more than an electric utility will benefit from the plug-in hybrid, what hope is there for the rest of society???? The Dodge Volt -- the first production line PIH -- is coming out next year. This is incredibly exciting. > http://youtube.com/comment_servlet?all_comments&v=peW8kl- > jpHc&fromurl=/watch%3Fv%3DpeW8kl-jpHc%26feature%3DPlayList%26p% > 3D333C19B1D3664253%26index%3D4 > > > > > > Why isn't there wide spread communication about projects like this? > >> > > Because Cheney, Bush, et al, won't make as much money. > > OffWorld >
