Posted on 09/27/2012 5:35:47 AM PDT by IBD editorial writer
Industrial Policy: This week, the world's largest carmaker said electric cars are a joke, and a congressional report said federal subsidies are a waste. You'd think that would shock President Obama out of his electric car fantasy .
Back in March 2009, Obama announced plans to pour billions of taxpayer dollars into the development of electric cars in the form of grants, federal loans and tax credits. "This investment will not only reduce our dependence on foreign oil, it will put Americans back to work," Obama promised.
"It positions American manufacturers on the cutting edge of innovation and solving our energy challenges." Plus, it would help meet Obama's goal of getting a million plug-in cars on the road by 2015.
Fast forward to this week, and take a look at how Obama's grand vision is paying off.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.investors.com ...
With a battery life no better than that of the battery for the first electric car in 1898 it is no wonder it’s going nowhere.
I get a kick out of the fact that Toyota is non-union.
As far as the CBO goes, when has idiot boy ever listened to them anyway?
I don’t even have an electric toaster.
He has no idea where money comes from. Like a lot of our leaders, he thinks tax money is “free”.
The article had some interesting things to say, particularly about the high average fuel mileage quotas forced on the automotive industry.
When I read it, my first thought was of Cuba and South America, where the only vehicles available are several years old, held together only by the ingenuity of their owners and the availability of scrap wire and baling twine.
So if the mileage standards aren’t met, will the car makers be forced out of business?
Our pretend president suffers from the disease common among narcissists .... anything is possible if you don't know what you're talking about.
Anything that has to be plugged in, when many people do not have an accessible plug for a car, is unusable and therefore a total DUD!!!!
—physics wins again—
Let’s assume for the moment that Obama gets everything he wants (gag). Now, we have
1. Widespread use of electric cars
2. Reduced production of fossil fuels
3. Closing of many, if not most, coal-fired power plants
Seems to me that there’s a problem here. If we have millions of people plugging in their electric cars, and less capability to produce electricity, what’s going to happen to the power grid? Yeah, I know, wind and solar, wind and solar. Of course, it’s not a problem that wind and solar can’t come anywhere close to meeting our power demand WITHOUT the widespread use of electric vehicles. Sure, the power generating capability will just magically appear once people start buying electric cars, right?
That’s probably why Obama went after Toyota immediately after the government took over GM
\Obama did not have to take over the entire auto industry all at one- just one company. then use the power of tax dollars to price the cars so low it would drive the others out of business
I saw an add on a local TV for a BRAND NEW CAR lease for $129 a month- they cannot possible make any profit on that.
Business decisions made by self aggrandizing narcissistic politicians make for failure.
She MFed, and co##suc#e^ me and told me to perform all kind of acts on myself.
I caught her at the next light and told her that I'd had called the complaint into the state police and I would see her in court {I didn't call it in}.
I always carry so I wasn't concerned about road rage, but I've not seen anyone so mad for a long time.
I didn't know there were that many curse words and coming from a tolerant, environmental savior like her, well, I was shocked, just shocked.
Yeah, but the electricity comes out of the power lines. Ax any lefty driving a rechargeable car. Then argue with them that there is a power plant on the other end......
As usual, liberals never let a little thing like total and utter failure get in their way. Especially if they are not personally on the receiving end of said failure.
To be fair, Arrowhead, the efficiency of an electric car is vastly superior to that of a combustion engine, even after issues of transmission, storage, etc., are taken into account. Ironically, however, what electric cars promise is what environmentalists hate most: a nuclear-powered transportation system.
If you look at he efficiency of an electric motor, you ‘may” be correct.
But if you look at efficiency from the mine or the gas well all the way through the transmission lines to the end result, moving the car from A to B, I doubt it.
Ultimately, if a gasoline engine were more efficient, it would cost less to drive 200 miles on a tank of gas, then to charge up your car to drive 200 miles. True, the batteries’ extremely high cost should be taken into consideration, IN PART, but a huge part of the cost of the batteries has to do with economies of scale. (Where Toyota’s CEO is bashing electric cars, I suspect, is that he doesn’t believe costs will collapse with improved economies of scale. In one respect, he’s correct: lithium will become/remain scarce. OTOH, as with so many resources, we will do more with less.)
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