House of Eratosthenes

This movie says that we had some Electric Vehicles (EVs), and now we don’t have them anymore, because the auto industry didn’t want to give them to us. Actually it says more than that; it says the auto industry didn’t refrain from giving them to us, what it did was give them to us and then take them away again. American industry, therefore, perceives an intense demand for new technology, in fact technology that will make things economically rosy for manufacturers, dealers and consumers…and indulges in the capitalist/industrialist instinct which comes most naturally in a free market, which is to make sure it doesn’t happen.

Anti-capitalist bullshit, you say? Well, watch the movie. It’s pretty compelling.

Of course, to those of us who aren’t quite so quick to chow down on the maybe-roast-beef, maybe-bull-poo-poo sandwich, give our compliments to the chef, and demand seconds, questions naturally arise…questions like, why would American industry do this? Is this an oasis of deliberately-hurt-the-consumer, in a sprawling desert of give-the-consumer-what-he-wants? Or is it endemic to the auto industry, and to corporate America in general, to figure out what people want, what makes the best economic sense to produce, and then…kill it? If it’s the second of those two, how does this work exactly?

And what is to be said of all those episodes where American industry did, indeed, try to kill innovation, and was about as successful in doing so as you would be at eating chicken broth with a fork? What about all those spin-offs throughout history since the industrial revolution? Nikolai Tesla and Edison Electric…Jeff Hawkins and 3Com…Jack Tramiel and Commodore…how do these things happen? Given these David-and-Goliath anecdotes from real techno-industrial history, what is this chokehold that industry has against technology? It’s not exactly a sure thing every time, is it? How does an American industry, or company within that industry, decide technology is going to be stopped, with any assurance of success? How is that possible? When failure at such a thing is guaranteed, the instant your mega-industrial goliath is told to go fuck itself by the right entrepreneurial genius throwing his badge and pager in the trash?

And here’s another question. The trailer is put together with expert skill. It makes a lot of good points. I’m left wanting to know more. Why put a kookburger like Ralph Nader in it? I have some skeptical questions to ask, some of which have been answered by the trailer — and others of which, have not been. Nader’s presence is a forewarning that in spite of the track record thus far, a lot of my questions are going to remain unanswered, and most of the unanswered questions will have to do with this alleged corporate malice. After all, I’m starting my second quarter-century of waiting for Ralph Nader to explain to me how it is, that the evil corporations do all the evil things that evil corporations are supposed to be doing. He is known to me, and God-only-knows how many other people, as someone who doesn’t deliver.

This article expounds on the point…but not enough to answer my bothersome questions.

The major auto industries were perhaps the most influential in keeping affordable and practical EVs out of consumer hands. As it stands, they may have had the most to lose from it. Widespread adoption of BEVs would mean decreased profits over ICE vehicles due to the simplicity of one or zero moving parts in an electric motor versus thousands in an ICE. EVs need no tune-ups, no oil changes, no servicing, and very little maintenance in contrast to their IC brethren, nor do they even require most of the parts gasoline cars require. The average ICE vehicle and its engine stays in use for approximately 150,000 miles, while an electric vehicle�s motor can easily last up to 1,000,000 miles and will routinely last over 500,000 miles. Not to say that EVs aren�t profitable, as they can easily be such, as has been demonstrated in history when there were about as many battery electric cars on the roads as IC ones in the early 1900s. They are just *less* profitable than IC cars due to the fact that they are less wasteful and consumers get more out of them for less. The auto industry and their greed simply cannot have that. They want YOUR money, and they have made sure they will continue to sucker you and others out of your hard-earned dollar for the foreseeable future.

Makes perfect sense! Except…according to this logic, we have no Toyotas on the road today. No Toyotas. You see, I have a Toyota. It’s on the original engine, up way past 320,000 miles. Second clutch, second timing belt, third muffler, third radiator, third windshield, etc. Normal wear and tear. Oil changes every 3,000 miles. Gas. That’s about all I’ve put into it. For seventeen years.

My story is not unusual among Toyota owners. There is a lot of bang for the buck, when you own a Toyota.

The article is talking about TCO, or Total Cost of Ownership, something sent sinking to bargain-basement levels with Toyota sedans. The article is trying to tell me that a low TCO means a low profit for certain nefarious interests, therefore, the nefarious interests will keep me from getting to the product and this is why we have no EVs. Yet the Toyota is parked downstairs, as I write this. I had no problems getting ahold of it.

So conceptually, this doesn’t work. I’m the consumer, I want to pay next-to-nothing for repair and upkeep of a product, and that becomes the job. I want it that way. Someone will build a product that fulfills what I want. It’s proven.

That’s the case with tightasses like me…we represent, I’m going to take a wild stab at it here, maybe 30% of the car market by nose-count, and 15% by dollars-to-spend. The article and the trailer both make mention of a wide assortment of tangible benefits to be realized from owning an EV, benefits that would be of interest to, I’m guessing, 90% of the car market.

I’m being asked to believe 90% of the car consumers, cannot bring pressure to bear on the auto industry, the kind of pressure that has proven so effective at getting 30% of those consumers exactly what we have been wanting.

Therein lies the problem. I could eventually come around to believing what I have been asked to believe. But things must be explained before that happens. If Ralph Nader is helping to do the explaining, I’ll need to see even more.

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Who Killed The Electric CarSunday, July 2nd, 2006

Who Killed The Electric Car
Sunday, July 2nd, 2006