The Futility of Hybrid Cars
"The more time you spend looking at the economics of the hybrids, the less comfortable you get...Each one becomes a free pass for its manufacturer to sell a few extra gas guzzlers...Instead of simply saving gas when you buy a hybrid, you're giving somebody else the right to use it...The hybrid, then, is just about the perfect example of what's wrong with our energy policy...But that, sadly, is what a lot of well-meaning hybrid owners are driving: an expensive symbol that they're worried about our planet, rather than a true solution."
Hybrid cars are just an expensive symbol, not a true solution to our energy problems, argues David Leonhardt.
"The more time you spend looking at the economics of the hybrids, the less comfortable you get...Each one becomes a free pass for its manufacturer to sell a few extra gas guzzlers...Instead of simply saving gas when you buy a hybrid, you're giving somebody else the right to use it...The hybrid, then, is just about the perfect example of what's wrong with our energy policy...But that, sadly, is what a lot of well-meaning hybrid owners are driving: an expensive symbol that they're worried about our planet, rather than a true solution."
- Login or register to post comments
- Email this page
Related News Stories
1/3 Fewer Auto Deaths, Thanks to Rising Gas Prices - Jul 19, 2008
Oil Market Accomplishes What CAFE Regulations Intended - Jul 09, 2008
Amtrak Struggles To Meet Skyrocketing Demand - Jun 28, 2008
Rural U.S. Hit Hardest By Gas Prices - Jun 11, 2008
Now That People Are Using Transit, Improve It - Jun 09, 2008
Futility is the wrong word
The article mentions that hybrids efficiency makes way for auto manufactures to build gas guzzlers as their total fleet gas milage gets skewed by the hybrids. But what he article fails to see that, because of the high gas prices, the guzzlers are going out of fashion AND not because the hybrids are the rage. If gas prices were low nobody would touch hybrids barring the sierra club. So I don't think hybrids are overrated but its just the economics of energy in the world today that have made them the present favorite.
This does not take away that the US policies on gas milage standards shouldn't be overhauled. Bottom line everyone should pay the true cost gas (inclusive of the environmental cost). If that happens, you'd see hybrid hummers, mustangs, chargers and even Rolls running around.
Hybrids are a threat to corporate power...
Hybrids, particularly the next generation Plug-in Hybrids, have a long list of advantages which corporate interests wish to keep to themselves. Hybrids will prove to be the safest, most long-lasting vehicles. Imagine the facial worry lines as statistics show a downward curve of new car sales when the number of useful years and total mileage of hybrids double expected from today's pollute-mobiles. An even greater worry for corporate executives is the homepower energy supply with the larger battery packs of the Plug-in Hybrid. Why, if enough households erect rooftop photovoltiac systems, public power will surely follow. Would executives no longer be able to reap the delicious benefits of price gouging Aunt Millie and millions of her neighbors? And what would happen if Plug-in Hybrid owners chose to drive only the fewer miles (10-20) of battery power alone? Wouldn't this support for local economies expose the fallicy of the glorius global economy? Why, if local economies were to grow, more destinations become accessable without having to drive. People would walk or bicycle or, Lord Exxon forbid, be able to construct practical mass transit systems.
These "faux articles" ridicule or condemn hybrids because they are a threat to corporate power. Imagine having a backup power supply during an emergency. Imagine how homepower systems may give education on household energy use. Imagine zero-emission driving in urban neighborhoods and districts, and low emission high mileage on longer freeway trips. Corporate executives have imagined it and find hybrids a threat to their power and profit. After all, he who dies with the most money wins, right?