[BrianG]

I just don't get why our leader invested so heavily in some green technologies. Solar seems like a good idea because it is "free". But initial setup and maintenance costs are high, while today's solar cells are not efficient enough to be a viable alternative to fossil fuels. Solar can work for charging your cellphone, or maybe even to supplement home energy usage (albeit expensive), but it just doesn't scale well for the energy needs of something like a town or city. It's like this administration just listened to these company's sales pitches without any real knowledge how they really work or how realistically viable they would be.

I think we all know and realize the use of fossil fuels is not going to last forever, but we need to take "baby steps" to get to a place where we are not reliant on FF. Electric/battery may be viable for transportation needs, and motors and controllers have reached high efficiency levels and are relatively cheap to produce, but battery tech still doesn't have the energy density and light weight we need. Home heating is very inefficient when done electrically, so I don't think FF is going away anytime soon for that usage.

Personally, I don't think taking the immediate large leap from FF to electric is the way to go. Instead, let's tweak our engines to run on a more alcohol-based fuel. There are quite efficient ways to obtain different forms of alcohol for this (like algae farms). Then that would give us some time to perfect battery tech. Even then, I see a hybrid setup of battery (or maybe just capacitors) and fuel cells as being a more viable solution to providing energy for transportation than relying on batteries.

What I liked about A123 was their safe and robust batteries. What I didn't like was the weight and energy density. Anyone with a brain could have seen that it would have taken some VERY huge leaps in development to be able to effectively use any kind of battery in a vehicle.

I don't think hybrids are the solution either; having both electric and FF system increases complexity (more things to go wrong) and initial cost, and what do you get? Marginally better gas mileage, but I doubt the fuel savings compensate for the higher initial cost and the cost to replace the battery bank once they get "worn" in a relatively short time.

I do like the trend of auto-makers using smaller engines with a turbo, and I'm not talking about performance cars, but the daily driver. The smaller engine is better on gas, is lighter, and has more than enough power especially for highway usage. But the turbo provides the added power during take-offs and acceleration most notably in city driving. No need to lug around extra cylinders when fewer will do the job just as effectively in most cases. I get the same or better gas mileage and better performance in my mid-size 2.0L turbo Kia Optima than I did in my old 2.5L N/A Mazda 3 which was smaller and lighter. Those are the kinds of ideas we need to implement since there isn't a easy/fast "magic" solution to all this.

Hmm, I seem to have gotten off track there. I guess my point is that I agree with you; there is no immediate and simple fix to the problem, but there are ways to get there eventually with a little thought and planning.