How much money do you think it will cost to build all those new ‘refueling stations’ and also what kind of power plant is making the energy for those refueling stations??

Its is not as easy as saying lets make an electric car.

I do realise not all of us are happy to drive an all-electric car so pls. excuse me, I never meant to imply we all have similar expectations for the future.

I think the key word is Value Proposition – we all share a set of common expectations, add to that our individual preferences, that makes up our individual Value Proposition. As gas prices go up, it is fair to say that there is a common value in switching to electricity(The problem of clean, sustainable, power generation is being solved effectively as we speak). However, until we see battery charge points in every fuel station and ultra-fast charge technology, we will also need a backup gas power source in car. I see current hybrid tech right on this roadmap. Production Plug-in hybrids & diesel hybrids are the next goal posts also in this long roadmap.

The problem with VW is that they have been very critical of Hybrid Technology for so long that after this announcement, have no credibility left. We all know that in science, we never dismiss ideas unless proven otherwise so it was very short sighted of VW not to have seen this coming. And to claim VW intend to lead the hybrid market, surely that is utter nonsense!

There is no vested interest in preserving a technology that is inferior, as you say ICE’s are. We are currently tooling up to make our own electric motors, and if everyone could afford electric cars, we would convert all our plants to making them, or go out of business.

The reason we make ICE-powered vehicles, like everyone else does, is because electric vehicles are too expensive to make it back on today’s operating costs. It’s that simple.

Well, not quite that simple. ICE vehicles can also be refueled in less than 5 minutes, so they are ideal for the road trips that many Americans like to take.

I’ve been watching automotive technology for 30 years (and researched it much further back), and I’ve learned two things well:

1) Just because something is technically possible, that doesn’t mean it’s economically viable or sensible.
2) Having a favorite technology is more of a political stance than a practical one. You tend to see its advantages and ignore the disadvantages.

The dangers of promoting a certain technology were borne out in the case of the EV1. It’s no wonder you liked your car: you got to drive it for $400/month, and it cost us $1 million to make (we spent $1 billion to make 1,000 cars). California “crammed electric cars down the carmakers’ throats,” essentially blackmailing us by saying if we didn’t make these cars (10% of sales), we couldn’t sell any cars in California.

GM was the only carmaker to take this mandate seriously, making a sleek, aerodynamic, light car to squeeze the most range from the electric battery’s limited energy. This took a very expensive aluminum body/chassis to accomplish.

We were rewarded for our efforts by
1) having the mandates weakened and dropped, so that
2) manufacturers who ignored the mandates were not penalized,
3) being remembered as somehow “killing the electric car.”

I know you’ll probably never forgive GM for taking your car back, but at some point, you need to realize that it was California that produced the situation, and that GM was the reluctant messenger.

When governments legislate technology instead of results, it puts us in a very awkward position. If we speak against the stupid legislation, it’s possible that the same irrational legislators will tighten the screws. We also risk being called naysayers and conspirators. When it’s impossible to speak the truth, we need to resort to other excuse to justify taking unprofitable lease-vehicles back (as happened in your case).

It was a no-win situation for GM.

Don’t blame GM. Blame the California legislature. THEY (and economics) killed the electric car.