tags:
The question that is playing on all our minds, who killed the electric car in the US ? A proven technology that weens us off fossil fuels and in some ways performs better than over complex reciprocating petroleum engines and transmissions. Did OPEC apply it's influence on car makers in the US ? What do you think =, after watching this report about the most famous electric car of all, GM's EV-1. Comments  who voted for this video bl968
- Farhad2000
- gwaan
- bluecliff
- cryptographrix
- Enzoblue
- choggie
- deputydog
- statueofmike
- thesnipe
- pyrex
- lurgee
- effin98
- papple
- qruel
- ant
- Sketch
- Memorare
- gluonium
- raddishs
- karaidl
- cybrbeast
- BoneyD
- joedirt
- pho3n1x
- bamdrew
- eric3579
- viewer_999
- don_vicente
- Grimm
- coreburn
- firedoggod
- drattus
- swampgirl
- caled
- Fred_Chopin
- chikngreez
- pipp3355
- werthless
- Constitutional_Patriot
- Zifnab
- jwray
- oxdottir
- MrFisk
- schmawy
who has this post bookmarked Constitutional_Patriot
- firedoggod
EV-1 : Who Killed The Electric Car ? OPEC ? US Govt ? Related Videos
Top New Videos by Vote  Subscribe Top 15 Sifters of All Time Top 15 Sifters of the Past Week VideoSift Links |
Stumble This
http://www.videosift.com/video/Who-Killed-the-Electric-Car
It's just the trailer, but I believe there video is floating around in the tubes.
It required very highly-trained specialists to do even routine maintenance on it (because 1 mistake in its innards would get you electrocuted).
Because of this risk of electrocution, GM was scared to death of being sued if anything went wrong.
The batteries had to be air-conditioned in very hot conditions and heated even in merely cool conditions (which is why the lease program was only available in California and Arizona).
As soon as somebody invents a way to transport electricity that works better than the crappy rechargeable batteries that are the best we can do right now, the electric car will take off. Until then....
My main problem is that the EV-1 was never marketed well at all, the people who leased them weren't even allowed to buy their leased vehicle. GM basically confiscated everything, shut up and went on to produce SUV and suburbans. Finding it self in the same position as the other Big 3, lagging behind innovative technologies from east Asian companies like Toyota.
The fact is that any new technology that comes out is imperfect and requires refinement, remember the first cars? Hell the first MP3 players? This is where economics of scale come in. GM had a golden opportunity, especially with emission laws California was pushing at the time and has started to only implement now.
The question should really be "Is profit of a few companies, a good enough reason to squander our environment?"
Anyone who thinks they don't have the tech to make an affordable car that runs for days on one charge is simply an idiot. They've had the technology for 20 years now.
Marconi did not invent radio...Edison was not the father of anything but a fucking East coast, DC fire hazard, and of everything you think you know as fiction, the truth is even stranger.......Solar, wind, and nuclear energy is a schoolkid's Heath kit experiment, compared to what is out there that we don't get-Some day perhaps. But for now, keep voting, paying your taxes, and other such self-destructive and anti-evolutionary activities.........
That statement is utterly stupid. Your forklift doesn't have to go faster then a brisk walk on mostly flat surfaces, and the hydraulics use very little power. There are so many differences between the two, that it is less then worthless as a comparison.
Battery powered public transportation is a no-brainer, though; except for requiring specialized mechanics, battery buses should be everywhere by now... with friggin solar panels all on the roof of the bus depot.
jeez Sofa, so vitriolic. a simple "i disagree, here's why;..." probably would have worked. but to each his own.
Wasn't it video that killed the electrical car? Or was that radio star?
Our government needs to require the car companies to produce a workable affordable vehicle starting NOW to get out from under the need for Middle Eastern oil which is ruining the environment. It is a absurd situation we are in.
I do wonder what our world would be like if the inventions of Nicola Tesla were allowed to be developed. Wireless free energy is quite a concept. He had hundreds of patents for his numerous inventions---a true genius. It is a shame that his competitor, Edison, resorted to Mafioso thuggery to stamp out the ideas of any competitor he viewed as a threat (including Tesla). It is hard to fathom the fact that the man who developed + invented the electric light bulb as well as the "recording arts" of 35 mm film movies (around 1888) and audio recording had a group of thugs sent out to stop his competition. Edison was inspired by the work of Muybridge in 1888 who made some rudimentary "movies" which had some very beautiful nude+natural females in them as the very first movie actresses. Edison went on to invent 35 mm film and the first Movie Production Studio. He was an enigma who had genius none the less.
It is also an amazing fact that Edison actually developed+produced Electric Cars from 1907 to 1915--the Bailey-Edison Electric Phaeton Cars which ran on electricity A CENTURY AGO ! They could go 100 miles on a single charge purportedly. Amazing, isn't it ?
Who killed the electric car a century ago ?
We are still using the same excuse a century later about how much more cheaper the combustion engine is. I'm aware of the multi-billion dollar oil industry and the politics that keep solar and electric development "on the back burner". A century ago we were un-aware of the the disasterous effects emissions would have on our health and planet. We know better now and need to get beyond fossil fuels before it's too late.
Corporations will always keep it in their best interest to keep things as they are, adaptation for the benefit of society as a whole is not something built into the corporate structure, rather it is the expansion of profits at any cost. Remember it took Ralph Nader going to the Supreme Court to argue for basic safety features to be implemented in vehicles. The Tobacco industry for years denied any connection between smoking and various health ailments, even though their own internal research showed that it did. And now we have various corporate interest groups arguing against climate change for one reason only, because it would mean cutting down on the SUV market that they have created. American auto companies don't want stricter environmental laws because all they see in that is costs to them.
The oil companies of course argue against it because really who the hell wants to stop making billion dollar profits for simply pumping something out of the ground and transporting it? Energy markets is the most lucrative in the world, if all of a sudden that disappears through new sources of energy where would that leave Exxon, BP and Shell? No they would rather wait until it is them providing the technology, at a cost, with probable parts or components you would need to buy on a weekly basis.
Widespread hydrogen-powered vehicle adoption would be accompanied by a large increase in air pollution. It would just be coming from the hydrogen plants instead of the cars.
If transportation (private,public,service) were battery powered from grid-electricity, the focus would then be towards cleaner, more efficient power plants (mainly through legislation and friggin' incentives). Strickly regulating power plant carbon output and focusing money and prestige on the development of related technolgies at the level of electricity supplier could be more productive than building a new fueling infrastructure.
The idea, which I'm sure you're aware of, is that there are multiple ways to get electricity, while there is one widely accepted way to move a car/truck/bus/semi and hardly a strong challenger in sight. Hydrogen-powered vehicles being 'cleaner' relies on the prediction that there will be breakthroughs in the process of hydrogen fuel manufacturing (which I agree is faulty logic).
Your right about Edison.