by Rich Sabatini

Created on: February 10, 2010   Last Updated: February 11, 2010

OK everybody - time to don our "thinking caps." We shall attempt to solve the classic chicken vs. the egg problem - here goes: If every car went electric tomorrow, where would we plug them all in? How would all that juice be produced?  Would you be willing to pay the equivalent of $15 dollars for a gallon of gas (to fund the cost of solar cells, plus wind towers and all the electric infrastructure) to keep them all charged? No? Well then, why all this stupid talk about ELECTRIC CARS? Who's crazy idea is this anyway?

Of course, it's the liberals! Led by that great Whitehouse chieftain of green, Barack el-Bama! But where is his electric-powered, custom-designed, presidential stretch limo?  Last time we checked, el-Presidente was seen being ferried about DC in one that still relied on the infernal-combustion, pollution-spewing, earth-warming GASOLINE engine! Horrors! Such hypocrisy!

And while were on the subject, let's pose yet another spellbinding enigma: what would we do with all the infernal, electric car batteries, once they WEAR OUT? Sell 'em on eBay? Donate them to the St. Vincent De Paul Society?
Face it: ANY worn-out battery poses a waste problem: it's the ECOLOGY stupid! Old batteies - no matter their size (or type) - eventually leach their high-toxicity content somewhere.  This begs the obvious question - WHERE do we dispose 'em all? Yucca Mountain? The Dead Sea? Lake Okachobee? Should not all the green-energy, anti-oil environmentalists be concerned?  A battery is a battery!

Be it nickel-hydride, lithium-ion, or lead-acid, it's still the same basic electro-chemical reaction, that produces a positive-negative ionic charge - originally dicovered by Alessandro Volta, the Italian Physicist, back in 1799. That's correct; today's modern electric cars are no greater than the 18th century technology that lies under the hood (or the seats). Quality control poses yet another enormous problem for electric-car manufacturers: dozens of interlaced, standard car batteries, comprised of hundreds of cells - each the size of a cigarette pack - must charge and discharge with exact precision. A battery works only as well as its worst cell - which means, of course, electric car batteries quickly go dead, and MUST be discarded.

Are you paying attention, Mr. O'Bomba? Superfund clean-up, anyone?
The President makes it all sound so easy: Build electric cars, plug 'em in and go!   Sure: if only it were that simple.

On a national scale,

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