Sweet Willy
Rookie
- May 20, 2009
- 2,637
- 180
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- Banned
- #81
I don't agree...there will come a day when a non -petroleum fired vehicle will be invented that is superior to the internal combustion engine. It will, thru natural market pressures, supplant the gasoline engine because it it better, just as surely as gasoline engines supplanted steam engines. People will buy it because it is better, not because the government foists it on them. To force the evolution before the technology is viable is foolishness.
While I don't disagree with the premise of this, the government absolutely plays a pivotal role in directing the course of the nation.
The Government was instrumental in the development of the railroad. Private enterprise was backed by the government in order to establish this important standard of transportation.
The development of the electric grid was wholly dependant upon the government for it's implementation.
Any substantial movement towards a specific type of energy and transportation system will have to be endorsed, incentived, promoted and invested in by the Government. It is leadership in it's pure form. We can head in all kinds of directions but until the government gets behind an infrastructure plan to support a particular direction, we will have a mish mash of electrics, hybrids, fuel cells, pure hydrogen, etc. Electric has only reached it's current level because electricity is already in place, not because it is better than gasoline or diesel. Hydrogen and ethanol both can replace gasoline on the merits of performance and certainly relieve us from ME oil dependance. The problem is there is no infrastructure or united effort to get behind either. If you could buy a hydrogen vehicle today, one much better than your gasoline car, you wouldn't. You wouldn't be able to fuel it. No infrastructure to support it.
Complete reliance on private industry won't get it done. Before the government got behind power transmission lines, how many light bulbs do you think were sold? We had light bulbs. We had electricity. But no one is going to buy a light bulb if they don't have power. Private industry alone could NEVER have supplied the infrastucture to give everyone lights. Government couldn't do it alone either. It was a CO-OPERATION. It took the government to clear the way for power lines, the infrastucture. And so it will take the government to get behind whatever fuel we chose to replace gasoline. It will have to be incentived. First for suppliers and industry. Tax breaks for UPS and Fed EX to go to hydrogen or ethanol. Incentives for suppliers to invest in the infrastuctuire. The rest falls in place.
Before anyone loses their minds, I'm not endorsing hydrogen or ethanol. They may or may not be the choice. But something will be. And when it becomes a little more clear, the government should LEAD. That is their job.