Nov
2
WRITTEN BY:
SuperUser Account
11/2/2007 8:33 AM
Over the last 12 months I have been paying careful attention to the media and trying to get the interest of politicians however I have been finding a rather surprising resistance to electric vehicles. The politicians in particular seem to be concentrating all their policies on “low emission vehicles” as opposed to “zero emission vehicles”. In fact whenever Electric Vehicles are mentioned the subject is changed and you get told how they are investing in the future by putting funds in to Hybrid vehicles and alternative fuel options such as ethanol/petrol mix and bio diesel. Occasionally one will mention hydrogen fuel cells but none seem to show any support for pure electric.
Even sections of the media appear to have a distinct anti electric slant, an example is a recent article by Silicone Chip magazine that attempted to show Electric Vehicles as producing MORE carbon than a petrol car.
This all seemed very strange so I sat down and tried to analyse why there would be such an attitude, particularly from the politicians during an election where the environment was turning in to such a popular topic.
What I came up with seemed to make perfect sense once I thought about it –
It all boils down to economics.
From the governments point of view they charge an tax on ALL fuels delivered from the bowsers whether it be Petrol, Diesel, bio diesel, ethanol/petrol mix, gas etc. They however would have a great deal of trouble trying to charge the same tax on a car that you plug in to a normal power point in your home as they have no way of telling if you are charging your car or just making a lot of toast.
From the fuel companies point of view it is fairly self explanatory. They control the petrol but they get nothing from the electricity.
So that explains why they don’t like electric but why are they pushing the Hybrid line and why shouldn’t we just be grateful that they are doing something and live with it? The answer to that is fairly simple. From a suppliers point of view they would love to supply less product but at a higher price. By going to Hybrids that use about ½ the petrol they still have us locked in and can continue the “not so slow” petrol price increases. From the governments point of view they will simply increase the tax on fuel as the current revenue drops, they even have a good excuse by saying they are increasing the prices to encourage people to move to more efficient cars. So the net result is all parties win, they get twice the revenue from the same amount of raw product while looking like they are doing the right thing by the environment.
But is this really that bad? Yes. We are still going through diminishing resources. We are still pumping CO2 in to the air, Ok it’s at a slower rate but with population growth that will soon catch up as well. We are also still locked in to the same cartel, still reliant on oil and the politics/wars it creates. In fact we are making everyone more money and more powerful. In short we are just buying ourselves some more time but not fixing the problem.
What do you think? Add your comment below.
1 COMMENTS SO FAR...
Re: Lack of support for Electric Cars.
Yeah I tend to agree, I think as long as the electric car production is in the non-immediate future no politician in power is going to promote/support the Idea. I am sure if production got fired up (which it inevitably will) they would start singing the electric cars praises but not until the public was doing that as well. I am certain that most politicians/car manufacturers/oil company boffins know that electric cars are the future, in fact that they are viable now. But by delaying the new technology they get the maximum return on the investments they have made in ICE cars, even though they could be technologically superseded. The technology is there but the motivation to keep car that break down and need servicing and expensive fuels as the norm is too great. That is where I think Tesla Motors, whether it is successful or not, is doing a great thing for electric cars because they are simply showing it can be done. I think people have a 'too good to be true meter' which means even if you convince them that the few disadvantages to electric cars aren't that big a deal, they still ask 'well if they are so good, why isn't anyone making any?' Car manufacturers will reluctantly embrace electric technology when they are forced to. Amazing hybrid sales mean that all the previously sceptical manufacturers are now producing hybrid-everythings. Hopefully once decent electric cars start being produced in one sector of the market and selling well, the manufacturers will reveal their secret models that they have been developing for the day when they have to give people cars that look after themselves and the environment. That's my 2c anyways.
BY Matt ON
11/6/2007 6:35 AM
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