I have no problem with companies making EVs. I have issues with the feds picking and choosing winners and losers in a free market. They should stay out of it.
I agree with you 100%.
Right now the president has sunk hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars in failed solar companies, failed EV companies and failed alternative fuel companies. It isn't just Solyndra. It's companies like Bright Source, LSP Energy, Energy Conservation Devices, Sun Power, Abound Solar, Evergreen Solar, and Ecotality. All failures with BILLLIONS of tax payer money gone down the drain.
Again, I agree. Government needs to get out of the way, and let the free market work, and let innovators innovate. The mistake is that government is trying to BUY a solution that the market is not ready to accept. If they want to stimulate acceptance, they don't need to pour money into those companies, they need to invest that money in infrastructure that promotes those market choices. Instead of stimulus to corporations to make products no one wants, the stimulus (if there's going to be a stimulus at all) needs to be in the form of a rebate or some kind of subsidy to consumers to make them WANT the product. Then, when there's a demand, some manufacturer will appear with supply to meet that demand. In reality, though, it should be the manufacturer's putting this infrastructure in place, since it's their business model at risk of failing because of the lack. If someone makes an electric car and says, "Charging it is the buyer's problem," they're not going to sell many cars. Tesla has a pretty good model, with charging stations spaced strategically around areas where they sell cars (where owners can charge their cars for FREE, mind you, because that's how cheap it is, that the company can say "we'll pay for your car's energy forever"). You might be lucky to get a full tank of gas from the dealer when you buy a brand new car these days. Where government comes in is getting the manufacturers to work together on standards, so you don't have have a Tesla charging station and a Nissan charging station and a Chevy charging station...
Think of it this way: early cars were powered by coal and steam (e.g., the Stanley Steamer). Those cars had become the de facto standard, we'd all be pulling into coal and water stations instead of gas stations. If that technology had become entrenched like gasoline is today, even if someone introduced a gasoline engine, people would say, "It's great that it's better than the car I have now, but where will I get gasoline for it? There are no refineries, and no fuel transportation infrastructure for gasoline (it's all coal), and no point of sale locations for end users. I'll just stick with my coal, thanks." That is the obstacle that arguably better technology has to overcome, whether it's solar power, or EVs, or hydrogen fuel cells. If the government wants to foster those technologies, the answer isn't for them to invest in the technology (that's what entrepreneurs are for), but to invest in infrastructure that enables and creates demand for those technologies (and at the same time, it can't be so highly specific to that technology that if the technology doesn't pan out we're not stuck with a multi-billion-dollar investment in useless charging kiosks). In this case, there IS a market for EVs, but the infrastructure to support that market is under-developed. If the government wants people to buy EVs, it shouldn't fund EV manufacturers, it should fund public bonds to develop EV support infrastructure on a local/regional level where it makes sense to do so.
