that's kinda scary too because of the carbon foot print the production of batteries is big

http://science.howstuffworks.com/sci...d-benefits.htm

The obvious problem with completely electric cars is range. And it's worse in cold weather. I looked at some electric cars before buying the Smart car and at a 24 mile one way drive to the office it was going to be iffy whether I could make it both ways in January in Wisconsin. If you live in a city with short commutes it's a great option.

Hydrogen power is the only real longterm solution. The most abundant element in the universe with zero emissions.

Let's assume it's all true, and it's really scary! What would you do? Regulate the free market to stop the production of electric cars, so that they aren't doing it anymore? Have Government get involved in the private industries to make them stop this scary stuff right away?

So you think that we can just magically create a battery operated car for the masses with zero investment and then sell them for $20k a pop? Um, that's what we are selling cars for now using technology we've had for the past one hundred years...

And don't give me no shit about a teen who build a battery operated car. Anyone can build a stripped down battery operated car. But to build a real car with all of the safety gear that will last 100k miles is another story.

So according to you we shouldn't be investing in battery operated cars, hyrbrids are bad, batteries have a big carbon foot print, but your bitching about us not drilling enough oil?

Seriously?

Seriously Rochard?
We, do I get a choice in this matter? Do I get to say if my tax dollars are spent on a pipe dream?
When is enough, enough?

The following headlines demonstrate the irresponsibility of politicians like Obama who could care less how much money gets spent, what the hell, its not his money, why should he care?

Michigan Taxpayers Writing Check to Second Electric Car Battery Maker for $100 Million
Cost to Revive Economy With Battery Plant Subsidies: $5 Trillion
Video Shows President Obama, Top Politicians Praising Failed Green Company
Subsidized Green Energy Company Struggles, Lays Off Workers — Rewards Top Executives
Green Eyeshadow On Red Ink: 'Green' Jobs Fail To Live Up To the Hype
Chevy Volt Costing Taxpayers Up to $250K Per Vehicle
Rosy Solar Jobs Projections Fail To Live Up To the Hype
Trash Collectors Equal 'Green'-Jobs? President's Campaign Ad ClaimsGreen Energy' Job Growth From Criticized Study
Sun Not Shining on State Solar Subsidies

5 trillion? You really that seriously. I wonder if u feel the same way about those gov dollars that help create the Internet and the hi speed net infrastructure ?

We spent money to create the Internet? I thought Al Gore took care of that.

Your right. Clearly we shouldn't invest any money new technology at all. Instead, let's continue to drill for oil, suck out our natural resources, and in the mean time we'll just allow the Middle East to bitch smack us around. Our entire defense policy for the nation is based on our supply of oil - how is that been working out for us?

Gas in some parts of California is now more than $5 a gallon. It costs me $100 to fill up a tank. Isn't that a bit much?

Nah. Let's just keep drilling.

Yep without gov funding it wouldn't of happened

I did? I said we are doing it wrong, why should the taxpayers fund a car they will never be able to afford? Battery power is low tech, you do realize that submarines during WWII were battery powered right?
I am bitching about not drilling enough, we have more oil than any other place on earth, yet we send our money to other countries, why?

Dependency of foreign oil was 10% in 1970, it was 65% in 2004 and is starting to drop, not because of policy, because of recession. it's around 50% now. Jimmy Carter started the DOE to help keep that number down, didn't work very well

You're complaining about $5 dollars a gallon?
Wait 'til the collapse of the PetroDollar which could happen within the next year very easily, you'll be looking at probably double that. We have our own oil we don't need to be buying it from other countries.

And I have no problem investing in alternative energy sources but let's let private industry do it.

Private industry won't.

If battery powered cars is so easy, why don't we all have one? Why isn't the private sector making them? They should sell like fucking pancakes.

And if we importing 65% of our oil in 2004 and now we are only importing 50%, we are moving in the right direction. We are issuing more permits, drilling more, and our dependency on foreign oil is less.... That's idea.

If it's economically feasible and there's a market for it they will.

I like it when gas goes up. The higher the cost of gas, the less people drive, so the less traffic I have to worry about. On top of that, it's the dumb losers who can't afford the gas that takes the worst drivers off the road.

I work from home so I'm good.

But that's just it - We've had the technology for years now. Vendzilla is kind enough to remind us that submarines have been using battery power since WWII. But private industry isn't doing it.

We need to push the issue. Better for the environment, better for national security, more cost effective.

Private industry isn't doing it.

list of electric cars
http://www.itiselectric.com/ Canada did it for 19k

http://www.codaautomotive.com/ for 30k after tax breaks

http://www.zeromotorcycles.com these are pretty cool

http://www.commutercars.com/ and this company is hoping to get the price down to $10k per unit

Once again there would of been no net with out gov funding. There was no market for it when the gov was putting dollars in.

The private sector is making them
No, we are not, the recession has caused a drop in demand

Problem is that it drives up the cost of EVERYTHING. Including food.

Everything that has to be transported from point A to point B. Which hurts the poor and people barely getting by the most.

It's not all just about you and I getting in our car and driving. It's about food, clothing, building supplies, household staples, etc.
Basically driving up the cost of everything our society uses and helping to destroy our economy.

It isn't like they haven't invented the hybrid, go buy one! ($40 to fill up once or every other week!)

Yep, and guess what, Jobs are going to start to be cut. Foreclosures are at an all time low right now, not in a few months (if gas stays this high), either pay the mortgage or buy food and drive to work!

The solution is simple. This is why Government needs to step in and regulate the free market sector, and put a stop to this electric car stuff like Vendzilla said. It's SCARY!

A couple of things:

1. It's expensive to produce so it'll never bring gas prices down that much.
2. It will be sold to the highest bidder, not neccecssarily America.
3. The resource is large but the aperture is small - production will be low and slow compared to a large conventional structure.
4. Even with the bakken America will still have to import oil.
5. It's being developed about as fast as possible (although the GFC slowed things down)
6. It could be more, it could be less, we're not talking proved reserves here.*

Basically, it's being developed pretty quickly and it will be a very important energy source but it isn't any kind of magic bullet and the higher the price of oil the faster it will be developed further embedding the economic stasis the price of gas will likely continue to be in.

*This isn't a big deal it's just that most people don't understand how prospective oil is measured. Until it's "proved" it's given a statistical chance of being there. There might be a lot more, there might be a lot less. I say this mainly as another poster thought companies could see the oil under the gound! You only ever get hints based on geological shapes and DHI's. The Bakken is a little different though being a shale (basically they tend to be HC bearing throughout it's extent), and the unproved numbers are now actually much higher than 3.5B.

Foreclosures are at a low because of Obama, he won't let the banks do it. You watch what happens after the election. Bookmark my post and call me out if there aren't a shit-ton of more foreclosures.

Personally I know of 5 people who haven't paid on their mortgage for the last year. I also know of 3 people who do home flips, and also research on my own real estate and the inventory is so low right now its sick.

Biden is laughing , ARE YOU!?
http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2h58...hing%20404x298

The fix for the Western economies will cost you more. Maybe in food prices, less income and higher taxes.

The constant theme I see from these posts is.

LET SOMEONE ELSE SUFFER.

Imported oil is cheap at the pump. Imported goods are cheap at the point of sale. Outsourced labour is cheaper than home based labour.

Investing in future technologies will cost money, some will work some will not.

Keeping people working in the US will cost money.

No one tells the voters the truth. Until the pain is being inflicted. In fact some bring up red herrings.

The Right's target is those who sponge off the system and they should be made to work. It will cut Government spending by such a tiny amount it wont amount to taxing the rich proportionately as others pay.

Things like this make my blood boil.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...-dont-job.html

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage...taxpayers.html

Yet let's get it into perspective. http://www.crimestoppers-uk.org/frau.../benefit-fraud

$2.25 even if you multiply it by 10. It's still peanuts against the size of the problem and even though it should be stopped. It won't rescue the system. And the only way to stop it is to employ more people to administer the system. My solution would be to get those genuinely claiming to work at reporting those cheating or working in the offices checking paperwork.

I tried to search for the US figures, didn't find anything. That is shameful and needs to be changed. But don't expect it to make and difference to your lives. Can someone here talking about it tell us please.

That kind of happens, they ran out of people that can't afford their homes

Still a lot of oil, Don't know why they don't drill in anwr, have you seen pictures of the place?

Oh, I bet you are right. I don't know all the reasons they are down right now, but I know several people who have not paid in 8+ months, and it is like nothing fast is going to happen to them.

Hydrogen was quietly killed. When I worked for mbenz in the late 80's they had one. Its like why couldnt they design a solar panel into the roof of a electric car so the battery is constantly charged if there is daylight and runs on stored energy when there isnt.

Vend do you know our biggest export is gas? Oil they pull out of the ground doesnt stay here? Oil is the free market at its best, it goes to the highest bidder.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blu...rage-11-barrel

http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/...12407420090728

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_sha...n_price_of_oil

http://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil...-Reserves.html

They will, eventually. Not that it - once again - will have a drastic impact on prices at the pump.
Anyways a bit of money to be made on emerging shale and tight gas plays in other countries as they try and play catch up and prove up their own "bakkens".

These are not cars. They are clown cars. In order for these to sell they'll have to have mass appeal.

Why is it I've never heard of these?

This is a motorcycle, not a car.

In order for this to work you have to make a real car (not a clown car) that will have mass appeal. The only one on your list that comes close is Coda Automotive, and it seems they too are having huge problems bringing them to market. You bitched about Tesla who has over one thousand cars on the road and is bringing their second model line into production, and in the mean time Coda doesn't seem to have any cars on the road. At the very same time, the car retails for $37k and looks like a cheap compact car.

I mean seriously, compare the two:

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/...a-blogSpan.jpg

http://topnews.in/files/Tesla-Model-S_0.jpg

Again, private industry isn't making it happen. We need these now, not ten years from now. In case you haven't noticed - And Brett, you should know this more than most because of your time in the Navy - a lot of the technology we have comes from the government, be it NASA, the military, or otherwise. We might as well invest directly into it.

But really, you need to stop bitching here. Permits for oil drilling are up, production is up, and dependency on foreign oil is down. In the mean time, the US government needs to invest into this technology.

You don't think Romney is going to do the same? That's all he's done his entire business history - borrow money to invest into other companies.

I don't need a hybrid or even an electric car. I work from home and don't drive much. I can live with $5 a gallon. And I can afford it. Generally speaking I usually don't pay much attention to how much I spend at the pump.

But a hybrid is only part of the problem. We should be producing full on battery powered cars by now. It's stunning that we aren't.

Keep in mind also that Romney was against bailing out the auto industry.... Brilliant.

Yeah, I know, we have a lot of gas
The thing is our dependence on foreign oil was only 10%, cars got more efficient and now it's 50%? In the 80's we had VW Diesels that got 50mpg, am I suppose to get excited when I hear about a hybrid?

LOL, that's what I have been trying to tell you, the Tesla Model S starts at $50k, how is that going to sell to the masses?

Permits are down http://www.blm.gov/pgdata/etc/medial...t/table-01.pdf

During the last three fiscal years totally under Bush, there were 9,661 "new leases" granted for federal lands. For the three most recent fiscal years (which includes a few months of Bush's administration), there were 5,568 such new leases. This works out to a 42.4% decrease.
Take the same comparable periods for drilling permits on federal lands. There were 20,479 for the last three years under Bush, then 12,821 for the most recent three including much of Obama's first term. This is a 37.4% decrease.


as for investing, it needs to invest for the good of the nation, not make cars very few can afford

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2012/10...s-false/190586

No he didn't

He wanted to wait till they went bankrupt then bail them out, instead he wanted to use the money to invest in research.

I actually did that to a trailer I had to charge the battery for a winch. There is a car out there that has one, it runs the AC when it's hot out.