Fisker Moters

There is a little known electric car made by Fisker Motors. It is hybrid and gets about 50 miles on the electric engine and another 270 miles on the gas engine. The cost is $100,000 but scheduled to come down as more are sold. The government has financed most of the development of this venture. I have no objection to developing electric cars but to do so under the auspices of reducing carbon emissions is misleading at best and out right lying at worst. The US gets 46% of its electricity from coal and 24% from natural gas both are hydrocarbons and both emit carbon dioxide. The most likely source of non-carbon producing power plants is nuclear but the last nuke plant approved was in 1973 and it is scheduled for completion this year. A reactor currently under construction at Watts Bar, Tennessee was begun in 1973 and may be completed in 2012. Other ideas currently in vogue are using corn or algae and they only make fuels that add carbon dioxide to the air. The one fuel that does not do that is hydrogen whose only by-product is water. There are two methods to make hydrogen. The first is steam reforming of methane and that produces one part carbon dioxide for each part hydrogen. The second method is electrolysis which takes large amounts of electricity. Like any process the energy going in exceeds the energy going out due to heat loss. Other methods to produce electricity without adding carbon dioxide to the air are solar and wind along with water falls. Water falls are ideal but not that easy to create. Wind and solar, are burdened by lack of wind and lack of sun. Someday in the future hydrocarbons will no longer be needed for cars and power plants but that day is a long way off and during this transition period they are needed to keep the world going. As far as planes go there is nothing even on the horizon to fly without hydrocarbons but some day rockets may replace jets and rockets can use hydrogen.