Tuesday, August 5, 2008

A Move Beyond Hybrid Cars


A recent headline regarding the "I am better than you are" campaign for presidency of the United States has Obama decrying McCain as in the pockets of the oil companies in that he does not have a wonderful energy plan that includes massive subsidies to the auto manufacturers.  I immediately thought of how ridiculous the whole premise is.  Hybrid cars are an already antiquated concept.  They still need gasoline and projections show that by the year 2025 we will be using the same amount of fossil fuel even if all vehicles are hybrid. Consequently, the claimed reduction on oil dependance that we would gain by going hybrid is really no reduction at all and the "Better Than You" platform that HObama stands upon shows itself made of polenta and built on sand.

If subsidies for big business are what one desires to propagate in order to reduce our dependance on foreign oil, then get with it and subsidize hydrogen fuel cell vehicle (HFCV) manufacturing.  These vehicles are zero emissions.  That's it. Brilliant huh?

Maybe I should run for President.

1 comment:

gmanitou said...

Hobama comment aside, I cannot agree with you more on this. Hybrid energy is a stopgap. Ultimately I don't know what the right answer will be but we really have got to be looking for it. Oft times it is serendipity that will provide the answer in a place that common wisdom has dismissed.

As much as solving the transportation issue I think we need to be rethinking our entire approach to the single family home and the diminished family lifestyle. In transitioning from multi-generational families in more centralized locales we have lost both economies in shared duties, shared implements and shared living and thus shared energy costs. While having 18 kids living in a couple of duplex units in one block somewhere is not the answer coming to terms with creating new centralized family structures perhaps not defined by blood kinship but something else is an idea we should consider.