Posted on 02/22/2012 11:04:13 PM PST by Lmo56
General Motors and General Electric are two companies that have been in the political crosshairs lately. GM stands accused of “crony capitalism,” while GE is under fire for paying no Federal income taxes in 2010. The two companies share more than that though, with GE placing an order for 12,000 Chevy Volts and other hybrid vehicles.
A memo leaked to Green Car Reports lays out GE’s plans for their new fleet of Volts, and as expected, it has some people crying foul.
The memo, sent to employees of GE Healthcare Americas team explains that all sedan, crossover, and minivan purchases in 2012 will be replaced by the Chevy Volt. Only field engineers are excepted from having to drive a company Volt.
GE will offer estimates for installation Level 2 Charging Stations, though all-gas use will be allowed when there is no electric option. Any employees who opt out of the Volt program will not be compensated for their expenses. Those who do choose to drive the Volt will be reimbursed for public charging and home charging costs, in addition to gas uses.
While some people are probably put off by having to drive a Volt, GE claims to have crunched the numbers and believes that in the long term, this will save the multi-national company big bucks. More than that though, GE is positioning itself as a big player in the EV charging market. Getting employees into Volts also means getting charging stations into homes.
It’s a bold move to be sure, and it will hopefully prove to be a boon to the Volt’s flagging sales numbers. GM had hopped to sell as many as 60,000 Volts in 2012, before dropping that number to 45,000. Will they even make that number though? Hard to tell, though GE’s business will go a long way towards giving the Volt some sales momentum.
Funny, that was the one thing that really jumped out at me too.
Who was it who asked if one could install a gun rack into a Chevy Volt?
(Answer: You can’t. The Volt is too small.)
And who was it who asked why anyone would buy a car with the equivalent of one gallon of gasoline stored in it? On one charge, the Volt will carry you about the same distance as one gallon of gasoline, he said.
Sounds like Obama’s enforcers are putting the strong arm on his cronies to prop up his failed projects to juice the numbers before election day.
LOLOL!
My Harley gets 40+ seriously fun mpg.
[more than a stupid “Smart car”]
Volt can bite me.
;D
Just another Government Scam. GE makes millions from Government contracts to give to Government Motors. GM gets the Government Subsidy for each Volt. GE saves Government Taxes by using “loopholes”. If you’re part of the “in crowd” of this Administration, Life is Wonderful!!!
Bwahahahahahaaaaaaa!
That always kills me.
I have trouble with people that need their company to buy them a car - I’m grown up to buy my own car.
As far as the cost of driving goes, for the few GE people that might really put on a lot of miles for the company, they can buy a small, cheap, import and not have to put up with that crap. The rest of the people should suck it up and drive their own cars when needed.
“I’m no physicist or chemist,”
That much is obvious.
Does GE buy you a new garage when one of those suckers lights up when you’re recharging it overnight?
I’m assuming you know how to make a dollar out of fifteen cents.
I like the “we” in your post. Is that “we” as in general consumers or “we” as in field engineers?
Great picture. Will say I never noticed The One had an ego. /sarc
At least the People’s Car was a real car.
wouldn't that make it the Obamafurhers "voltswagen"?
CC
>>GE claims to have crunched the numbers and believes that in the long term, this will save the multi-national company big bucks.
B.S.
Show us the numbers. They aren’t that complicated.
This is a political payback to Obama for bailing out GE Capital.
At what point will The One decree that everyone must buy the Volt? No other vehicle will be allowed on the roadways.
—
Once SCOTUS rules ZeroCare can mandate healthcare for all, then DHHS will slip into one of the thousands of as yet unwritten parts of ZeroCare that that we all must buy ZeroCars aka Volts.
Shortly after that, most coal-fired power plants will be closed by the EPA, and rolling brown and black outs will become a national feature.
ZeroCars can only be charged on alternate days of the week - providing power demand is low on that day - and your licence plate begins with the weekly designated letter or numeral.
You can see where this goes from there.
Yesterday evening I was sitting on my patio (while quaffing some Coronas) watching a neighbor about 2 houses down mowing her lawn with an electric lawnmower.
It was was absolutely painful to watch. The grass was a little high and the piece of junk didn’t have the power to cut it. It went on for about an hour before she finally finished her small back yard. Half of the time she was busy moving the electric cord and the rest of the time she was going over already cut grass to try to mow the pieces that stuck up after her “green” lawnmower failed to cut.
If she had a battery operated mower it would have crapped out at the first dog poop she ran over in the yard.
All of this electric Eco-friendly garbage is pure speculation. It only works if you have a backpack that carries a 5KW generator for backup.
Doesn't GE build the turbines that electric plants use to generate electricity? Just sayin' ... .
Stupid, stupid headline. ALL companies “force” employees into whatever the company car is. The police department “forced” me into a Chevy Caprice (the bastards).
They didn’t force any employee to buy a Volt, they are just buying them for the fleet.
Bad decision? Maybe, maybe not. Personally, I wouldn’t buy one.
But the blogger headline was stupid, as it typical for bloggers.
“Must own stock in the coal industry.”
Very funny. Almost as funny as this bit of information I found on plugincars.com:
“Hello- I’m a GM tech who just completed some training on the LUU 1.4l engine that will be in the Volt. to Tom- I asked that same question regarding how much fuel would be burned during a fuel maintenance mode and the answer I got was that the Volt’s computer systems calculate the average age of the fuel in the tank, If the average age reaches roughly 1 year, the engine will burn the stale fuel and “prompt a refueling event” in other words, run it out or close to out of gas. That is “Fuel Mantenance” mode. If the engine goes roughly 6 weeks without starting, then it will enter “Engine maintenance mode” and run for about 10 minutes to keep everything lubricated inside the engine. Given that, I wold imagine it to be pretty rare to have the average age of the fuel in the tank be over 1 year. I’m sure all of this is subject to change, but this is how we GM techs were recently taught.”
Seems like the Volt will burn your old fuel for you even when not using it. Must buy stock in coal industry.
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