I recall gas at 19 cents a gallon when I was in high school, and you could buy 100 octane plus. I recall the gas crisis era, when you could not buy on Sunday, but everyone said when it got to a dollar a gallon the problem would be fixed. And it was. A friend's dad was laid off at the time by Chevron in California, he ran a crew that cleaned the storage tanks between cycles. All the tanks were full to the brim, waiting for the price to go up and scared that they could not get any more. The spot price is manipulated by fear of many factors. At some point we'll get to other alternatives, but not by just spending a billion on infrastructure for charging stations. GM already dropped a billion plus on their battery only electric S-10 and Saturn cars years ago, they only leased them unless you were a government buyer, and when they went off lease they were stacked up in the desert, you can Google pictures of them. Electric hybrids with short "cheap operation" range are also seen by some politicians as a way to "herd" people back into the cities, no one will be able to afford the cost and problems of living far out. We can't all drive golf carts. Cheaper gas has allowed the major expansion of the suburbs and the commuter towns, just like the new technology of the railroads once did.

So government support also has a social engineering side. But it is also that same government support, from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) and other groups that fund basic research into things that will create new fuels, methods, etc. It will always be changing.

 

well the reason the EV1's were pull back by GM and the Rangers were pulled back by Ford was George W Bush decided we was going to put 1.6 Billion dollar up for grabs for Hydrogen power technology.
So are you going to spend your money developing electric powered cars or are you going to suck of the Goverment tit for share of the 1.6 billion, thats right you go for the 1.6 billion in funds.
The Average US worker commutes 29 miles a day, even the early ****ting EVI with the ac-Delco lead acid batterys got 60 miles a charge.
With the new battery technogy I'm sure you would be closer to 200 miles per charge today, but will never know.
Califonia spent over 1.3 million dollars in the early 2000 setting up charging stations along the PCH, and now they will never be used because Ford, Honda and GM recalled and cushed all the vechicles.
I meen why would you want a vehicle that uses no gas, has no oil changes, no transmission, clutch, radiator, plug, wires coil.

 

It's gonna take more than a billion or so. Hell, we spend more than that on some ships, etc. Either make the investment to do it, or go the ethanol route and put more crop acres toward fuel production and less toward feeding the rest of the world. At the same time develop the solar, geothermal, and tidal generation so we can retire the coal burning plants, etc. Drill a damn deep hole at every nuke plant and convert it to geothermal steam. But have a coordinated plan on lots of pathways, in case some just don't pan out. And quit having a fractured plan split up by partisan lawmakers each funded by special interest groups with what is best for their little corner of their state. And build up the battery technology, certainly in the area of something that can be "re-cored" or renewed at a certain point so you don't have $10K replacement hanging out there. Hydrogen should be worked on as well. We are basically with energy where the industrial age was in the 1900's. We know the basics, we just have not worked out the details. Kind of like a water powered knitting loom vs today and a robot assembly line.

 

Let's say that we perfect the electric cars technology, and 5 years from now 50% of Americans have one parked in their garage. Are we ALL going to plug in our cars at night and expect a geothermal plant to keep up with the needs? We already have problems when it's hot and everyone cranks up the air conditioning! Can you see "rolling brown-outs" year round? If so, then what? Government subsidies for everyone to put solar panels on their roofs? Where does that money come from? It seems to me that we would only be shifting the problem...

I fully agree that something needs to change. Cheaper gas to dump into my (beloved) 78 Bronco is not the long term answer, but I personally don't think that over-sized golf carts are it either. For every Civic, Focus, Fart or Queef that is sold in this country there is someone buying a Mustang, Camaro, F-350 or Suburban. The latter half of that equation is NOT going to want a Volt.

Now to go make my morning coffee...

 

Prices on new technology will never drop unless we develop and refine it.
Remember how much your first VCR cost? Or your first CD player? DVD player? Blu-Ray player?
My parents first VCR was a Zenith 4 head mono, it was the size of a full sized stereo receiver and cost $800.
Now you cant give away a VCR and Blu Ray players are under $100.
Alternative energy is the same way, unless we invest in the future will are damned to repeat the past.

 

Unfortunately , all these technologies exist today...It's basically too many idiots pumping there own agendas.... America is number 1...?? My ***......Yes we can fly half way around the world and kill some rag head...but fix our own problems, put people to work....try to fix our ridiculously fat lazy kids, or better yet , take care of our elders.... Yea..where number 1 in only one thing.... Bulls$it....plain and simple. For christ sakes they make a diesel Lr3 in england that get 33 mpg....WTF...

Listen to Lewis....

Lewis Black on Broadway talking about how America ISN'T #1 - YouTube

 

Exactly!!

If we raise the MPG standard on pick ups (for example) do you think Ford is going to pull its #1 seller? The F-150.
Or do you think they are going to recruit some of the best minds graduating from college and offer them top paying jobs with benefits to figure out how to improve the MPG of their trucks?
If fuel prices come down do you think we will ever get clean burning diesels that get great MPG even in SUV's that we actually want to drive or are we going to be stuck driving econo boxes like the Aveo?
Remember the gas crunch of the '80's? Oldsmobile, Cadillaic, etc. offered diesels in their cars, once the crisis was over the price of gas dropped and people went back to gasoline engines.
When the same old-same old no longer works we need to make a change and hope it works, and it if does not work we need to make another change and try again, and again...

 

Please clarify if I am way off, but this is what I am gleaning from your comments....

By restricting exploration/drilling/fracking/Keystone pipeline, and allowing our energy prices to steadily rise, Obama (yes I know it is not all him, but he is the CEO of our country so the buck stops with him) is just "helping" all of us to "sacrifice for the greater good"?????? Since the private sector is too lazy and stupid to come up with the technology on it's own they need federal loans from our broke government? And you think that it's going to take the entitlement generation to get us over the hump for renewable energy?

Our government hasn't passed a budget in 3 years and we are running with a debt of $14 trillion and rising and you would like them to continue to invest in companies like Solyndra?

Ok, I'm done.

 

thats right because “We do not accept that ours will ever be a nation of haves and have-nots; we must always be a nation of haves and soon-to-haves”

Well I have been a "HAD" since clinton was in office and kind of tried of being a "soon to have again".

 

What I am saying is that if it is entirely left to the private sector we will never move forward on green energy because as long as things are cheap now we do not care about the cost of the future.
American's as a whole save less money for retirement than another developed people.
Instead we buy bigger tv's, more cars, better vacations and then we count on Social Security to save us, but if the Republicans have their way there will be no S.S. for anyone because all they want to do it cut taxes.
Yet tax rates are at a all time low, taxes have not been this low since before WWII. (talking in %)
Obama has already opened up Federal land to oil drilling, he has leased offshore property to oil companies.
The problem is not in him, it is in the oil companies, think about it, supply and demand.
We demand more, they lower the supply, the price goes up.
Just because a oil company gets a permit to drill for oil does not mean they are actually going to drill.
Are we forgetting that the oil market is a WORLD market, we do not control prices, the supply controls prices, who controls the supply? The oil companies.
Oil refineries in the US are at max capacity, they are refining oil 24/7 and they almost cannot keep up, but if they build more refineries and produce more oil...prices drop.

Why do you think the Gov has not passed a budget? Do you think it is entirely the President's fault? Do you not maybe think for one minute that the Republicans in the Congress are maybe plotting against him and trying to make him fail so they can get one of their guys in office and then have total control over everything?
Is that what you want? A Gov. with total control? No checks and balances? A bunch of friends doing a great big circle jerk and passing all kinds of laws to reduce womens rights and tax cuts for their rich friends?

As for Solyndra, again, if we do not try something new we are damned to repeat the past.
That one failed, but at least we tried.
Have you ever played sports? Have you ever lost a game? Did you just quit and go home? Or did you play another game and try again? Were you better that time? Did you eventually get good at that game?

Had George Washington given up the first time he lost a battle where would we be?

If at first you don't succeed, try and try again.

I am not saying that Obama walks on water or is the end all to beat all, what I am saying is the same-old same-old did not work and we need to try something new and keep moving forward.