Post #243958 by tiki mick on Wed, Jul 19, 2006 7:13 PM

On 2006-07-18 20:09, donhonyc wrote:

On 2006-07-18 19:13, TikiTikiTavi wrote:
Haven't seen either movie but IMHO, resale price and battery cost is killing the electric car. This is from Toyota's website http://www.toyota.com/html/shop/vehicles/ravev/rav4ev_0_home/

Check out the last sentence in the third paragraph... "The cost to replace the battery is more than the value of the vehicle."

A co-worker told me (unverified) that it costs over $7,000 to replace the batteries in a Toyota Prius. What do you do with all the dead batteries? I like the concept but think there are many bugs that need to be worked out before the public will flock to electric vehicles.

I think these obstacles are created or funded, made possible or however you want to define it by powerful people who don't want this technology around. IMHO there are several environmentally friendly technological alternatives that have been developed and ready for the consumer, but are not put out on the market due to some fat-cat corporate CEO, politician, or lobbyists that feel that it will screw up the bottom line for them. So as far as the kinks that have to be worked out for the electric car, I'm not buyin' it. I'm sure that technology is ready to roll. It's electricity for chrissakes, were not talking about some new form of energy here that nobody knows about. If we can put a man on the moon, over 30 years ago yet, we can come up with a way to make a decent electric car.

That is absolutely, 100% correct. If they wanted these things to work well, they would make it so. We have the technology. The fact is, there is one major group of people who don't want it to happen, and that is the oil companies and everyone connected with them.

Yeah, we put a large, heavy spacecraft, people and a car on the moon, using 50's era technology. It's all about having a will to do something. You also have to have leadership that puts science and space exploration at the top of thier "to do" list. The man who should have been president, Al Gore, would have done 99% more in that direction, but alas, the public thought he was "stiff and wooden", so he loses. And we lose.

What's funny is that even if you could give two craps less for the enviroment, the benefits are in your pocketbook. Solar heating pays for itself in your house within 10 years. Then you have no more electric bills. A hybrid and even better, an electric vehicle, saves you more money then the Hummer does. (God, I LOVE the fact that they have to pay 85 bucks to fill up the tank each week)

Most important. If we don't need oil, we don't need the middle east, and we don 't need to be in a war right now with anyone, including even the Chinese, (who are in stiff competition with us for the stuff).

I would rather pay higher taxes for federally funded research into alternative energy, but guess what that makes me??

Anyway, I love talking politics. PM me if anyone wants to talk without worrying about offending anyone, even me.