(this is a picture of all the electric vehicles GM crushed to cover up their electric car)I read this article this morning in the Wall Street Journal online. It talks about how auto-makers are touting the fact that they are starting to make more fuel efficient cars & trucks and how hydrogen is "just around the corner" (just like it has been for the last 10 years). You know you have seen the ads. Everyone these days wants to sound like they are green and trying to help the environment. The auto-makers would like us to believe they are committed to this, but in truth they are fighting tooth and nail for the exact opposite.
As noted in the Wall Street Journal website, "They're definitely saying one thing to Congress and one thing to consumers," says Phyllis Cuttino, director of the Pew Campaign for Fuel Efficiency, an environmental group lobbying for tougher fuel-efficiency rules. Just last week, an alliance of environmental groups took on Toyota Motor Corp., which often is praised for its gas-electric hybrid technology, in a full-page ad in USA Today for opposing the mileage proposal.
The thing that really gets me upset is that Auto-Companies go around claiming that "it is too strict" and "it would be too hard to make our cars this fuel efficient". Yet almost 100 years ago there were far more electric vehicles on the road than there were gas powered cars. In 1990, GM created a totally electric car called the EV-1 that had ZERO emissions. Yes, ZERO emissions cars are in fact easy for the auto-companies to make. If you haven't already seen it, visit the website and rent the documentary that details the exact timeline and culprits of how this happened. You will be surprised who really is to blame.
We as consumers are really the people to blame though. It is us that really have the power to change this paradigm by demanding that governments enforce stronger restrictions on fuel emissions and perhaps even switch to 100% electric engines by a certain date in the future. Say 2050 or something like that...
What do you think? Do you think that a company like GM with annual PROFITS of over 2 billion dollars is really in such a bad position? Do they really lack the intelligence to switch to an electric car economy?
4 comments:
Intelligence, no they lack foresight, most of the people reaping the benefits of todays fuel guzzling economy (car, fuel CEOs etc) will be dead by 2050 so what do they care. Their only concern is keeping huge profits rolling in. The real intelligence needs to be a moral one. To paraphrase a Native American chief (i forget who) We must consider the next seven generations in our every deliberation.
I couldn't have said it better myself. It makes one think what the TRUE definition of an advanced civilization really means. Technology is great, but when it comes at the cost of hurting the majority of our population... We as investors & consumers need to stop living our double standard of wanting cheap prices, great returns AND global well being.
Exactly very well said. We the consumer have the real power when it comes to change. By voting with our dollars or more appropriately not spending we can all make a much bigger impact on what happens in our lives. You only get to vote every couple years, but you have more of a choice when it comes to what you consume or choose not to consume. Keep on the look out for supposed "green" companies that actually don't do any good. Such as planting a tree to off set your carbon footprint. It takes roughly 117,000 meters squared worth of trees, broad leaf trees, to off set Americans carbon footprint, there is about 30,000 square meters worth of land per American. Or "clean" diesel. I could go on and on about all the scams out there, but I digress. It is up to you as an individual to effect change and to make the right choices. Look into the numbers for yourself and go out and do what you can!
I thought this was the Idaho rocks blog, not the "what is wrong with the world blog".
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