The Federal Government wants you to buy an electric car. So much so that the same government will spend money it doesn’t have to encourage you to buy such a car. A $7,500 tax credit for most electrics, like the Chevy Volt.
The Energy Department did a calculation that says it costs$1.14 a gallon equivalent with electricity to drive as far as you can on a $3.63 gallon of gas. That’s based on today’s cost of electricity. Two thirds of today’s electric power costs are generated by cheap coal and natural gas.
The government is closing coal fired power plants as fast as they can. The government is fighting fracking, the technology that is creating the cheap natural gas. The government has mandates for power companies to use growing percentages of renewable energy, primarily wind and solar. The cost for this power is at least double the cost of power from coal and natural gas and in many cases triple.
This is government logic. Lock into a favored idea like electric cars. Ignore what you are doing to raise the cost of electricity while touting the cost benefits of electric cars, but hide what the future cost will be when the electric utilities are buying your mandated amounts of renewable power.
At the same time try to stop the production of cheap natural gas by outlawing fracking, or, at least, regulating it to the point where it is no longer cheap. Also ignore the fact that all that cheap natural gas could be the best fuel for cars. Far better and cleaner than electricity.
The government has been in the energy business since the early 70’s. Every decision the government has made has been wrong. Can you say Solyndra? The DOE has burned billions of taxpayer dollars over those years. Employing bureaucrats who make wrong decisions. It was to make the US self-sufficient on energy. The oil and gas industry has almost done that, despite the government. If we continue fracking, add government lands to fracking, and build the Keystone Pipeline the US will not need a drop of Middle East oil.
But you have the Sierra Club and Greenpeace running the DOE, and you must remember those Hollywood types want you to live in a cave and bike to work while they fire up their private jets to attend the Cannes Film Festival. So, there is no logic in the DOE or in any government favored energy policy.
That’s why we are being encouraged to drive electric cars for economic reasons while every effort is being made to eliminate all sources of cheap electricity. Get it?
