Chrysler Shoots Itself In The Foot … Again. Good Riddance.

I haven’t been a fan of American auto manufacturing corporations for years.  By that, I mean the executives deigned worthy enough to run the companies … right into the ground.  I fully support the hard-working men and women employed by these over-sized behemoths.  The workers are the backbone of America’s middle class and receive my full support.  It’s not their fault their corporations have been run by greedy, immoral hypocritical liars for decades.

The latest proof?  Chrysler, who announced that they were dismantling their electric vehicle engineering team.  That’s the same team and program they promised American taxpayers would be in place as the begged for millions of our tax dollars to prop up their purposefully dysfunctional wasteland of a company.

This is obviously a very stupid move.  Regulations are now in place to force Chrysler and other car manufacturers to improve fuel efficiency (a standard Chrysler and the others paid millions of dollars to fight for years).  The cost of meeting these standards are not prohibitive.  Chrysler and the others exist in the European and Asian car markets, which have had more robust standards for years.  They chose to make inefficient vehicles for American customers.  Given the price of oil and gas, guzzlers are no longer profitable to make because the American public has shifted its buying habits.  Shutting down an electric vehicle engineering team as the marketplace transitions to more fuel efficient vehicles is an absurd move to make.

But it goes further than just that.  It hurts other corporations and other workers.  A123 systems manufactures electric batteries for use in vehicles, among other things.  They could be a viable American success story: using ingenuity and entrepreneurship to exploit a market need.  They contracted with Chrysler to provide batteries earlier this spring.  What are they supposed to do?  What happens if they fail because Chrysler’s executives decided they wanted to fail?  That unnecessarily hurts the entire hybrid and electric vehicle market.

Much like the Wall St. banks who gladly accepted trillions of taxpayer bailout dollars with few strings attached, Chrysler has spit in Americans’ faces.  By doing so, they cement the company as the most likely to fail moving forward.  They have continued their crappy decision making from the 20th century too far into the 21st century.  By doing so, I say good riddance.  One less non-responsive corporation in the marketplace will do nothing but benefit consumers.

[h/t Climate Progress]

Sen. Bernie Sanders Takes On Banks “Too Big To Fail”

Excellent news from the Independent Senator in Vermont.  Sen. Sanders has introduced legislation (2 pages for whiny Cons that can’t read!) that directs the Treasury Dept. to identify institutions that pose a threat to the American economy, being classified as “too large” if their failure would cause harm to the economy, and to break them up any way the Dept. chooses to a point where they no longer constitute a threat.

Sen. Sanders has been talking about this concept for over a year now – since the economic meltdown precipitated by gambling centers masquerading as banks took hold last fall.  These institutions were bailed out by American taxpayer money to the tune of Trillions of dollars.  We saved them from their crappy gambling habits.  And we haven’t gotten anything in return except for an uneven field to play on.  These institutions were labeled as “too big to fail” by too many politicians who had relationships that many judged to be too cozy.  They “had” to be saved.  Why?  For what purpose?  What is going to stop them from making the same crappy decisions in the future since the taxpayers bailed them out against their will?  Nothing.

Nothing except legislation like this.  If the banks want to become gambling houses and be irresponsible, they don’t deserve to exist anymore.  Sen. Sander’s legislation would force them to act like banks once again.  What a concept!

h/t Turkana

Electric Car Developments in France

There’s some good news for a country that is being much more proactive about energy use and climate change than the U.S.  A nationwide electric car recharging network is going to be built in France.  An energy utility and a car maker are leading the way on the project, set to debut in just two short years.

The project will receive €400m of state backing over the next four years, which has been personally guaranteed by President Sarkozy.

To be worked out is who will be responsible for the charging station infrastructure, which is nothing to sneeze at.

The early front-runner is California-based Project Better Place, which has confirmed it is in talks about the project. The company is already building electric car recharging networks in Denmark and Israel, based on a model that sees cars quickly swap empty batteries for fully charged ones at roadside stations.

I’ve been a fan of Better Place ever since I heard about them, about a year ago now.  I checked their plans out, which seem relatively well-developed for a new company.  They have been very aggressive about putting themselves at the fore of the electric car wave that is slowly (for now) building momentum.  The article actually skips over a number of cities that are also in contact with Better Place – including a couple in the U.S. that are planning on building out electric car charging stations.  It’s just unfortunate that it’s only a small handful of mayors and governors in America that recognize what the dominant form of transportation will soon be.  It makes sense that a national approach, such as Israel’s, Denmark’s and now France’s, should be pursued.

Interestingly, after fighting higher mileage standards quite vociferously for years in the U.S., Chrysler is among the competitors trying to get a foothold in the France electric car market.  But they can’t build their U.S. fleet to meet higher efficiency standards, they told Congress.  Nobody would buy the cars.  Uh-huh.  Their European fleet meets Europe’s standards, which are much more aggressive than the U.S.’.  After stupidly fighting a U.S. mandate, I wasn’t sorry to see their survival in question last year into this year.  They’ve done what they could to destroy the U.S. middle class.  They found out how untenable that approach was.  Hey, Chrysler, how about doing some fighting for this technology state-side?

Check out Better Place’s ongoing marketing approach.

Why Climate Action Is Lacking

From Paul Krugman’s Sunday op-ed [emphasis mine]:

But the larger reason we’re ignoring climate change is that Al Gore was right: This truth is just too inconvenient. Responding to climate change with the vigor that the threat deserves would not, contrary to legend, be devastating for the economy as a whole. But it would shuffle the economic deck, hurting some powerful vested interests even as it created new economic opportunities. And the industries of the past have armies of lobbyists in place right now; the industries of the future don’t.

Indeed.  The G20 summit meeting that just ended failed to come up with any kind of viable plan or steps toward establishing a plan wherein developed nations would pay for the low-carbon development and emissions reductions their actions necessitate.  The result is the continuation of an immoral failure of the U.S. and other nations.  We are not the greatest nations on Earth.  We are countries of unsustainable resource consumers hell-bent on leaving future generations a severely depleted planet.

Chevy Volt Media Blitz

I heard quite a bit about the Chevy Volt in all forms of media yesterday.  The more I heard, the more I realized that commentators and pundits that I consider trustworthy were, in this case, doing a lot of heavy lifting for Chevy in the form of free marketing.  I think the Volt will be a good vehicle and an interesting case in how the automotive sector might be shifting.  That said, there were a number of claims that I thought needed to be cleaned up.

Let’s start with this NYT article.  In the lede: GM puts Volt’s Mileage in triple digits.  Well, that’s nice.  GM also told Americans two years ago that the truck and SUV markets in the U.S. would keep them on top of the automotive world.  How did that turn out exactly?  What is the official source of mpg ratings?  The E.P.A. – and they haven’t assessed the Volt’s performance yet, mostly because the methodology to do so remains in draft form.  But GM is doing what GM should be doing: trying their hardest to build up expectations for the vehicle.

What are those expectations?  230 mpg in city driving.  Wowsa!  Doesn’t that sound awesome?  Actually, it should be 230mpg* in city driving – and that asterisk should be pretty darned big!  Drivers might get 230mpg if they drive less than 40 miles from charging station to charging station in laboratory-like conditions: no hills, no A/C or heat, etc.!  More likely, drivers in every-day conditions could see ~100mpg performance.  Now, that’s nothing to sneeze at.  I think it’s a very good half-step forward.  But here’s the thing: there are 100mpg cars available today.  Modify a factory car today with $10K or so, and 100mpg is already well within reach.  So where is the dramatic technological leap forward?

Nissan has countered that it’s upcoming hybrid, the Leaf, could get up to 367mpg.  The same limitations I described for the Volt apply here, also.  Nissan is also working with Better Place to manufacture and deploy all-electric vehicles, which wouldn’t need any gas whatsoever to drive!  Now that’s what I call progress!

Xcel Backs Off Solar Fees: Public Pressure Works

There was very good news today on the clean energy front: Xcel Energy, in the face of a justifiably upset customer base, has changed its mind about requesting a solar energy fee from the Colorado Public Utilities Commission at tomorrow’s public hearing.

I originally covered the request here and davewolfusa followed up with an outstanding call to action post.  No matter how the fees were calculated, it was simply the idea that people with new solar power systems were going to be charged extra every month to be connected to the power grid that spurred so many to action.

Gov. Ritter is smartly trying to consider the real problem Xcel is facing as the New Energy Economy moves forward:

“We appreciate Xcel’s concerns about the cost of distributing power and maintaining the electric grid, and we will work with Xcel to study these issues moving forward,” Ritter said in a statement. [...] Ritter said the GEO [Governor's Energy Office]will analyze the costs and benefits of “distributed generation,” such as rooftop solar systems installed across a wide area, so that state regulators can use that information when deciding the costs and benefits of the rapidly growing sector.

Xcel’s spokesman also sounded pretty reasonable:

“We need to sit down to discuss the most appropriate way to deal with this issue, which we see as growing in the future, and address it for all parties involved,” [Xcel spokesman Tom] Henley said.

Xcel’s announcement said it was committed to talking with solar power advocates to address the issue of costs and payments in the future.

See, that wasn’t that hard.  Let the public know what issue you’re facing and I’m sure most folks will come to the table with an open mind.  But announcing what looks like a punitive fee to clean energy advocates without a venue to discuss it with those advocates was a bad idea.  So perhaps the lesson associated with this episode is Xcel needs to work on its communication skills with its customer base.  Let’s hope that’s improved in the future.

[Update]: johne at SquareState has an interesting take on this news.

Random News Bits 8/2/09

First of all, I can hardly believe it’s August already.  What’s happened to 2009?

Onto more substantial stuff.  There are a number of items in today’s Denver Post that I wanted to bring attention to.  In “Summer of service, travel for the Obama girls” (by way of the NYT), we get a small glimpse into the lives of the President’s family.  The family has included history lessons and community service context during their travels in the past two months.  I applaud Barack and Michelle for trying to raise their children correctly in a very bright public light.  I do remember the exploits of the Bush twins.  They too traveled the world, but there was underage drinking, massive parties where drug use was reported and more than a few over-worked, under-staffed embassies that were transformed into horribly expensive babysitting services for the girls.  Having adults in the White House is a refreshing change.

The NYT writer/editor couldn’t resist using the tortured “some critics say” opener for sour-puss Sen. Chuck Grassley:

Some critics say the Obamas’ far-flung family travels are inappropriate at a time of recession. Last month, Sen. Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa, said the president had some “nerve” to be sightseeing in Paris while insisting that Congress should focus on overhauling health care.

Hey, Chuck?  Drop the cheap talking points.  You have no interest in actually working with any Democrats on reforming health care.  You’re obstructing progress, will only allow health insurance “reform” and burnishing your “bipartisanship” credentials – which are worthless.

Here’s the stupidest thing I’ve read in a while (and that’s saying something, considering all the b.s. the Cons trot out on a daily basis).  The conservative editorial board of the Post advises that:

Schools also need to continue or bolster their health education programs — even with declining budgets and accountability standards to worry about. And there must be time for recess.

So on top of everything else, schools are somehow supposed to teach kids about how to live a healthier life?  How exactly should this be achieved in an environment of those declining budgets the board acknowledges?  Two aspects of this really bug me.  The Post’s editorial board is constantly calling for less government intrusion into personal lives.  This advice is completely contrary to that oft-stated stance.

And the editorial board must be completely lacking in understanding what irony is.  That advice came in a piece calling for more personal responsibility.  Or maybe the piece was really about laying the blame of our dysfunctional health care system at the feet of obese people who drive up costs.  Yup, insurance corporations have no responsibility for either phenomenon.  Neither do fast food corporations, who sell junk food that’s cheaper than healthy food.  Guess which demographic has the biggest problems with obesity?  That’s correct: the poor.  Sheesh.

Speaking of irony or perhaps just not paying attention to what was just written, right-winger extraordinaire John Andrews penned a piece in today’s Post.  See if this makes sense to you:

Can Dems really believe picking our pockets is the right remedy in hard times?

Annual car registrations would be capped at $10, vehicle ownership and sales taxes would phase down, state income tax would drop from 4.63 percent to 4.5 percent with further cuts in fat economic times, and telecom taxes of all sorts would end. Colorado Tax Reform is the sponsoring group. I was an early signer.

So is Andrews against taxes in recessions or against taxes in good economic times?  The answer is all of the above!  Andrews and other tax-ideologues think they’re against taxes all the time.  Basic economic theory dictates that governments should collect more taxes at some point in economic cycles.  That’s why Andrews isn’t an economist.  He’s foolishly anti-taxes.

Or is he?  Let’s think this through.  He’s also foolishly anti-schools, anti-bridges and anti-roads.  Extending that a little further, he’s anti-clean water, anti-police, anti-firefighter, anti-clean air, etc.  Taxes are investments in our communities.  But I seriously doubt Andrews is really anti-tax.  If he were, he would remove himself from any developed portion of America and truly go it alone.  He wouldn’t drive on any road that the government paid for with tax dollars.  He wouldn’t drink clean water provided by any municipality.  He wouldn’t draw power from any large-scale utility corporation – they receive billions in dollars in corporate welfare that comes from … you guessed it, our tax dollars.  He wouldn’t accept help from any police or firefighters since they’re funded with taxes.  He wouldn’t support anything the military does since they’re funded with taxes.

So no, Andrews isn’t truly anti-tax.  He just doesn’t want everybody to enjoy the same services and protections he himself enjoys.  Andrews is a sniveling snob – one who employs tired talking points to rail against anything government does.  He doesn’t come up with useful suggestions that would move this country forward.  He only criticizes.  The unfortunate part is, he has too many ways to spread his hate-filled message.

Remember all the times that defenders of Detroit’s back-assward decisions to sell high-profit gas guzzlers kept trying to convince the rest of us that nobody wanted fuel efficient vehicles?  Yeah, that was funny.  The cash for clunkers program basically ran out of $1 billion in less than one week.  Too bad there’s no demand for efficient cars, eh?

I recommend this piece about what happens to ranchers when oil and gas booms go bust.  Hint: even though the corporations promised the boom would last 50, 70 or even 100 years, the ranchers are left picking up the dirty pieces after only a handful of years.  Unemployment and disturbed landscapes are all the dirty fuel industry ever leaves behind.

Energy and Envrionmental Tidbits 7/26/09

Two items caught my eye today.  The first, Xcel plans backup fee for solar, demonstrates how out-of-touch and greedy Xcel continues to be.  Xcel wants to charge their customers who have solar panels to provide electricity when they demand more than what their solar systems provide.  Those customers are already hooked up to the grid, of course, which immediately raises the question, “Why?!”.  Here are the details:

Xcel is proposing a 2.6 cents per kilowatt hour fee to provide electricity from the grid.  That fee would be tacked onto the electricity rate that Xcel charges every customer.  So those with solar panels would be charged more per kilowatt hour than those without solar panels.  That’s also on top of the $7 or $8 “service fee” that Xcel charges to cover meter reading and billing.  The only spot of good news from this proposal is that existing solar customers would be grandfathered in – not subject to Xcel’s new fees.

If a person’s house is already hooked up to the grid and has been drawing power from dirty energy for any length of time, what justification could Xcel have to charge that person more per kilowatt hour if they install clean energy and reduce overall demand from our antiquated and overused energy transmission system?  Moreover, solar panels can easily generate more power than an owner uses while collecting the energy.  Customers are credited for that excess energy because it is used by the rest of Xcel’s grid.  Thus, Xcel’s transmission and generation costs are actually lowered by these customers.  So future customers will be penalized for that service?  Do Xcel customer’s have the ability to go to the PUC and demand that the energy they sell to Xcel should match the highest rate they have to pay Xcel?  If they don’t, then energy producers don’t have equitable access to the energy market, do they.

I can envision this doing one of two things.  The first is it puts a crimp on the future growth of solar panels in Colorado.  Why would people, especially in a severe recession, pay thousands of dollars to put in solar panels and then be charged more per kilowatt hour for the same electricity that their neighbor would be charged?  It’s easy: solar panels are less desirable in such a market, ensuring that we remain stuck on dirty energy longer, thereby raising the cost of future climate change mitigation.  The second is it drives people to go off the grid.  If people can generate and store the energy they produce, what use would they have for an energy corporation whose primary purpose is to generate a profit?  And before this second scenario is dismissed out of hand, realize that energy storage technologies will continue to advance.  Add in upgrading a home’s energy efficiencies, ability to generate its own power and store excess energy, and the Xcel way of business doesn’t seem so stable or profitable.

The second item was an announcement from Gov. Ritter’s office:

Gov. Bill Ritter said today [July 23] he will oppose the federal government if it moves ahead with a proposal to ship thousands of tons of mercury to a waste storage site south of Grand Junction.

Well, that certainly is good news.  Here’s the reasoning:

The risks to ground and surface water are too great. The risks to our air quality are too great. The risks of transporting elemental mercury over long distances and on routes that run adjacent to or cross major water sources, such as the Colorado River, are too great.

That sounds really great too.  Um, Gov. Ritter, I have a question: if you’re willing to refuse mercury storage, why hasn’t the state done more to stop toxic chemicals from being forced underground in order to drill out gas and oil?  I realize there are some differences in the two cases (government vs. corporations being one), but shouldn’t the quality of our ground and surface water be fought for, regardless of who could potentially foul it?

Thanks go out to Brahman Colorado, whom I met for the first time yesterday.  Fracing was the topic of a very good discussion, and this mercury announcement put it into even further context for me.

Cross-posted at SquareState.

China Corners Its Renewable Energy Market; US Won’t Do The Same

China has taken enormous strides in developing its renewable energy sector, recognizing in ways the U.S. has so far failed to do, that renewable energy is of strategic importance.  As one piece of evidence, China passed the U.S. this year as the world’s largest market for wind energy, despite the massive imbalance in per capita energy utilization.  China has already achieved the status of having the world’s largest solar panel manufacturing industry.  All of this comes with massive government support for the renewable energy industry.  China, unlike the U.S., is protecting their domestic industries, thereby laying the foundation to be the dominant market forces when they’re mature.

Contrast that with the insane approach we’re taking in the U.S. up until this year: force the nascent renewable energy industry to fight uphill battles against mature, dirty energy industries.  Renewables in the U.S. have been purposefully kept immature for as long as possible so that the established industries can continue to enjoy their record profits.  There was a way those dirty industries got there though: through government interference!  Decades of subsidies and tax breaks and incentives helped grow those industries – the same kinds of activities that have been denied renewable energy industries in the U.S., but not in China.

Here’s what’s going to happen without a fundamental change in the way we fund research in the U.S.: the dirty energy industry is going to get its wish and remain the dominant player for a long time to come.  In the meantime, the Chinese renewable energy industry will become more adept and mature.  Once it is, it will be able to compete for projects here in the U.S. as it become more and more obvious that renewables are the way to power our country.  Since their industries will have more efficient economies of scale to work with, Chinese industries will win contracts in the U.S.  U.S. companies will not be able to compete either in China (due to their protectionist policies) or here in the U.S.  We’ll send billions of more U.S. dollars overseas, growing the Chinese economy instead of the U.S. economy.  All because the U.S. looks at energy as a monthly profit engine, not strategically important.  Yay for us.

Polis’ Progressive Stances; Salazar Progressive on a Lot Less

After I heard two national, supposedly progressive, media shows try to take Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO-02) to task over his vote and press releases about H.R. 3200 in committee; after receiving e-mails from various groups encouraging me to tell Rep. Polis to stand up for “true” health care reform (what the heck is that, exactly?!), after I’ve seen cheap shot after cheap shot from national bloggers, I decided to push back in my very small way.  While the vote may not be the most defendable from a progressive standpoint (I’m actually having some difficulty fully understanding what the issue really is), I think the situation has gotten completely blown out of proportion.  I think there are plenty of other folks who say they’re Democrats but who have a much longer and much less impressive voting record on final bills.  So I’m writing this to try to put things into better perspective.

Polis voted against the bill in the Education and Labor Committee.  Okay, I get that.  He wrote a letter to Speaker Pelosi and included it on his website.  So at least he’s being up front and honest about his reasoning and is trying to engage the rest of us.  That reason may chafe at some folks, but there’s something positive to be said for his actions.

In contrast, Rep. John Salazar (D-CO-03) voted against the climate bill (which I’ve argued is a much more critical issue than health care) on the House floor, the final vote until a House/Senate compromise bill is put back before everybody.  Not only did Rep. Salazar vote to condemn Americans (actually the entire world) to multiple feet of sea level raise, Dust Bowl-drought conditions from Kansas to California and more extreme weather events, not only all of that, but after his vote, he snuck out of the House chamber so he wouldn’t be confronted by his leadership to change his vote before the time to do so closed.  He voted against his Party’s bill and was too cowardly to face them afterward.  Billions of people will be negatively affected if people like Rep. Salazar has his way.  Now I ask you: which case is worse?

Gov. Ritter ran on a platform that included health care reform at the state level.  After a year’s worth of state-wide hearings, he kicked the can up to Congress, saying it was too big a problem for Colorado to address alone.  How many Colorado-centric or nationwide blogs took Ritter to task for going back on his promise?  How many progressive national media shows even mentioned this travesty?  Let’s look at it a little differently: How many Coloradans have lost health insurance or died due to lack of care because the issue got kicked to the curb by Ritter?  Crickets from the national progressive media.

As I’ve said before, Rep. Polis has engaged the netroots and greater progressive infrastructure to a far larger degree than Rep. Salazar or Gov. Ritter (who is constantly on right-wing extremist talk-shows and not progressive talk-shows, by the way).  How many solidly progressive pieces of legislation has Rep. Polis not only voted for in his short time in the House, but co-sponsored, including H.R. 676 (single-payer, not just a public option) and the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, to name just two?

A lot of unfounded condemnation has centered around Rep. Polis “voting for the rich, people just like himself”.  Well, let’s examine another voting record from that standpoint, shall we?  Rep. Salazar: voted to extend the Bush tax cuts (in 2006), an awfully fiscally responsible vote, since the Bush tax cuts didn’t pay for themselves – talk about voting for the rich! and voted for tax breaks and incentives to oil and gas corporations (another fiscally responsible and pro-rich vote – look at Salazar rack them up!).  Where were the leading progressive blogs on those votes?  When did the progressive media shows call Rep. Salazar out?  Where were the issue groups’ condemnation of Rep. Salazar’s votes of bills that actually became law, which the health care bill hasn’t?  Oh – both those bills were the final House bills, not a committee bill that will soon be changed anyway.

On top of those two, Rep. Salazar voted against the American Clean Energy and Security Act (2009) (Polis voted for it, by the way – no kudos were issued by the hateful mobs); voted for the FISA amendment which gave retroactive immunity to telecoms’ illegal wiretapping of Americans without warrants (2007); voted to continue funding the Iraq occupation with no withdrawal date (2007), (that’s awfully fiscally responsible too, isn’t it?!); voted for the Military Commissions Act (2006); voted against a withdrawal timetable from the Iraq occupation (2006); ; voted for the undocumented worker clampdown bill with no path toward attaining legal status (2005); voted against the endangered species protection bill (2005); ; and voted for a Constitutional amendment making flag burning illegal (2005).

Get a freaking grip on reality, folks.  At this point, it’s obvious that Polis’ critics have some mysterious bone to pick with him.  This kind of day-after-day-after-day attack style is indicative of an obsession with the subject.  Rep. Salazar is by no means hurting for money.  He may not be as rich as Polis happens to be, but Polis has demonstrated stronger progressive values to this point than Salazar has.  This is all pretty revolting.