FKAGobucks877;1166618; said:
The problem isn't that the car makers don't think we want it, the problem is that the oil industry has its hands in everything, and they don't want us to want it. Nor do they want any type of "progress" made that takes away from the use of gas (therefore the use of oil, and therefore their profit). The technology is there without question.
i can believe this to a point. however, the mere existence of this tech in other countries tells me that public demand is also very important and isn't stopping innovation. further, when car companies found their consumers were using biodiesel in their diesel trucks (this requires fuel lines to be changed as biodiesel is very corrosive), they almost immediately changed the type of fuel lines they used to become biodiesel friendly. they of course don't endorse the use and im pretty sure it will void your warranty. but then, that only makes sense. i wouldn't want to fulfill warranty obligations when my customer is "brewing" his own fuel in his garage with no official oversight involved.
But alternative fuel sources aren't seriously being investigated...it wouldn't be a problem to power a vehicle using electricity or a million other things...but until they are forced to do it, car manufacturers won't do it, because it costs money to change things, and until the government can segregate itself from the oil conglomerates, it won't happen.
i have to disagree here. ive been on the lookout for a new truck for the last 3 years. specifically i am interested in a mid range turbo diesel v6 with good gas mileage. reason im interested in diesel is because of the power it produces, reliability, and the wide array of fuels it can support. at the time i was specifically interested in biodiesel. in researching biodiesel i started researching a wide array of alternative fuel sources.
what i found is simply put, they all pretty much suck to some degree. none of them are nearly as affective as fossil fuels. none of them are nearly as adaptive, efficient, or as easily obtainable and some are guilty of being all the above. which is why fossil fuels likely won out in the first place.
electric - power is largely produced by burning fossil fuels or coal. net gain - 0. in fact, my understanding of the fuel problem is that our cars amount to roughly 30% of america's fossil fuel demands. the other 70% goes to industry. if we all went to electric only cars our fossil fuel consumption as a country would likely go up, not down.
hydrogen - about as ready for the consumer market as fission power plants. the most intelligent of the ideas with the most impact both performance and environment wise. but as of the last time i researched it, the only cost effective way to produce hydrogen was... you guessed it, from fossil fuels.
e85 -
pretty much the joke of alternative fuels. unless you live in the corn belt anyway. if we planted corn in every field in the US including your back yard, we still wouldn't be able to produce enough e85 to meet our fuel demands.
biodiesel - largely ineffective in cold climates. some very interesting work has been done to address this issue. however, none of it is currently recommended by any reputable community nor has it gone through anything resembling a long term study as the people doing the testing are largely back yard mechanics. no official organization recommends using blends above 20% biodiesel and anything above that will void the hell out of any warranty you have. biodiesel, while imo the most interesting and plausible of the group is very much an "at your own risk" endeavor at present. for the average 9 to 5 schmo its a rather daunting concept.
