According to the latest news, GM sold under 300 Chevy Volt cars in February. That's down by about 25% from the paltry amount sold in January. The volt is an electric car that GM is making at the behest of its Washington shareholders. This car was to be the wave of the future which would be an ecological breakthrough. It is heavily subsidized by the taxpayers. The only problem is that it is tiny and can go only 40 miles without needing to be charged again. Oh, and it is quite ugly. Other than that, the car is a dream. From the movie Inception!
There has to be a reason for people to buy a car. Sure, there are those who think that buying a volt is a statement supporting the green movement. Of course, many of those folks don't realize that they moved from gasoline as a fuel to coal which is the predominant fuel of the electrical generation industry in the US. Coal, of course, is far dirtier than gasoline. And the cost of the electricity is not less than the cost of the gasoline, so there is no economic incentive to switch.
I write frequently about the need for vehicles that run on natural gas. They would need to be inexpensive and there would need to be some mechanism for them to be refueled as there are insufficient filling stations at the moment that can sell natural gas. But once the cars hit the road, their fuel needs would cost the equivalent of 75 cents per gallon instead of the current $3.50 per gallon for gasoline. I think that many more people than the few hundred who bought the volt would be interested. But that's just me. I have this silly idea (which no one in Washington shares) that it might be a good idea for the car companies to provide a vehicle that actually can be used for a whole day and which actually saves the consumer money. I guess that the government will have to send me to a re-education camp.
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