"GM: The battery is dead
"Automaker phases out its electric vehicles amid lack of interest, easing of emission rules
"...As California retreats from its strict pollution
regulation, GM is taking the cars off the road...scrapping them...Over the past decade, state regulators have caved
to pressure as car makers vigorously fought at hearings and in court to halt the regulation. Major automakers have
stopped production...The California Air Resources Board is poised to make changes that reflect that the cars are
a commercial failure and to promote more promising technologies that have emerged...a combination of low-polluting
gas-powered vehicles, gas-electric hybrids, and a couple of hundred fuel-cell cars down the road...The fuel cell
cars have already doubled the range of electric cars...". (AP,
Brian Melley, printed in the Orange County Register Wed, Apr. 9, 2003) |
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Who killed the EV: former ARB Chairman Alan Lloyd and
7 other members of the Air Resources Board.
GM, Ford, and the Western States Petroleum industry group put pressure on CARB and ex-Gov. Gray Davis.
Toyota had been forbidden to join the AAMA prior to 1999. In that year, it disbanded and reconstituted itself as
the Auto Manufacturers' Alliance. Toyota was allowed to join and it killed its EV program also.
Now, 5 years later, fuel cells cars are increasingly seen
as unrealistic, a hoax. Curiously, when asked
where they would get the hydrogen, it all seems to come from "renewable sources". But when charging EVs,
fuel cell folks argue that it all comes from burning coal.
Auto makers came to CARB in 2006 asking for relief from the "burden" of building Zero Emission clean
cars. In the fall of 2006, a so-called "expert panel" agreed that their 2003 fuel cell promises were
unattainable. The panel exhibited a charmingly inexpert and unscientific faith in fuel cells, but recommended a
5- or 10-year further delay in even modest production goals. And of course, no fuel cell car will ever be sold,
they are all on 3-year lease and require constant servicing.
In May, 2007, ex-Director Witherspoon and former Chair Sawyer refused to bow to auto and oil company demands, apparently
incurring the wrath of governor Schwarzenegger. Later they were fired, under questionable pretexts, by the supposedly
"environmentally friendly" Schwarzenegger.
The 2003 CARB cave-in to Big Oil allowed them to do fuel
cell research instead of building Electric cars; they were to begin either fuel cell production, or renew Electric
car production, by 2012, and really ramp-up in 2015. Thus, Electric car drivers were handed the idea that once
fuel cells were proven impossible, they would return to building cheap, clean Electric cars. But now, when fuel
cells failed, CARB is just letting them out of BOTH promises, no fuel cells and no Electric cars either.
On Mar. 27, 2008, CARB bowed to GM and Big Oil, killing the requirement for even modest production of Zero Emission
Vehicles at least through 2015. CARB voted unanimously to kill the Electric car a second time.
The enemies of Clean Air are now led by CARB Board Member
Dan Sperling, who proposed dismantling the ZEV mandate and making it only "technology forcing" for fuel
cell research.
The lungs of kids are being blasted by refinery emission of HxCx, by
auto emission of NOx
(anhydrous nitrous and nitric acid) and by diesel emission
of SOx (anhydrous sulfurous and sulfuric acid). Our wealth
is being drained away by foreign oil dictators. Our supposed leaders, such as CARB
and Schwarzenegger, are AWOL, not to be found, no help.
CARB is content to monitor lung damage
to kids from refineries,
but not do anything about it.
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