Dreamliner Problems? Obama's Fault, Because Commie Green Energy!!!!

[hatrack]

Critics of green energy are taking glee in the battery woes of Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner. Some have even tried to tie the Dreamliner’s problems to President Barack Obama’s clean-tech initiatives, although those programs had nothing to do with Boeing’s decision to go with the flagship jet’s novel, fuel-saving design.

The grounding of the entire fleet of Dreamliners earlier this month was “another black eye” to Obama’s energy programs, Richard Pollock, a reporter for the Washington Examiner’s Watchdog Team, wrote in an article last week.

Paul Chesser, an associate fellow at the conservative National Legal and Policy Center, also blamed the incidents on the federal government for encouraging lithium-ion batteries as a way to increase energy efficiency.

“The ‘green’ Dreamliner was supposed to be about big savings via fuel efficiency, new technologies and construction materials, all which were supposed to be made to magically appear, thanks to billions of dollars in government incentives, primarily to fight the cause of global warming,” he wrote earlier this week. Chesser, Pollock and others were also quick to connect Boeing’s problems with the future of electric cars. Electric-car advocates are trying to stay out of the fray.

EDIT

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/02/dreamliners-woes-hearten-green-energys-foes-87026.html

[cantbeserious]

1. Those Of Little Minds Have Little Thoughts

eom

[wtmusic]

2. I knew a jetliner that ran on batteries would never work

[gtar100]

3. How cynical one has to be to be against green energy.

For some, every issue is about political power. Just goes to show how narrow minded these conservatives really are.

[stuntcat]

6. +1

you have to be totally hopeless to not want to change from fossil fuels.

[unhappycamper]

4. Boeing's decision to outsource plane parts probably is a large portion of the problem.

AFAIK, this is the first time the US has given wing technology to a foreign nation. (Boeing tried the Airbus approach to building a complicated machine.)

[hatrack]

5. On that note, consider the 3/11 Japanese earthquake

The trailing edge, wing and forward fuselage fabrication and assembly were all in Nagoya.

Problem is, the CNC machines that actually do the fabrication have to be reset and recalibrated any time there's an earthquake of (IIRC) 5.0 or higher. It takes about 24-36 hours to run an emergency shutdown, recalibrate and prepare the systems to start work again.

Now, if you take a look at the YouTube video I've attached here, you'll see why submitting your production plans to the geological whim of life in a very different country might not always be a good idea:

It's more effective with the sound turned up, FYI. It's not just the string-of-firecrackers effect you'll see from 3/11 on, it's the fact that the quakes seem to increase in frequency hundreds of kilometers from the Pacific Plate subduction zone - even in areas like Nagoya.