Chevron kills Mercedes-Benz hybrid car.

[Kablooie]

Mercedes-Benz U.S. International paid Cobasys $6 million to develop a battery pack for a hybrid vehicle under production, but claims the supplier ran into a funding crisis and is unable to deliver the product, putting the pressure on Mercedes to meet its June 2009 production deadline, the car company claims in Federal Court.

After Cobasys and Daimler hammered out the production costs and pricing of the battery pack, Mercedes issued a purchase order. It claims Cobasys confirmed that it could meet the expected launch date, but did not sign a confirmation of the purchase order. The plaintiff says it found out later that Cobasys refused to sign the order because its owners, Chevron and Energy Conversion Devices, had cut off funding, leaving the supplier with "no plans or ability to fund its day-to-day operations past that point, much less make the capital investments required to meet its production volume commitments to (Mercedes) and other manufacturers."


http://www.courthousenews.com/2008/07/31/Mercedes-Benz_Sues_Hybrid_Battery_Supplier.htm

This is EXACTLY what my financial adviser told me. He did not recommend investing in new energy technologies because any technology that looked promising would be bought by the oil companies and closed down.

(oops posted this in the wrong forum)

[no_hypocrisy]

1. "Who Killed The Electric Car, Parte Deux".

[ladjf]

2. The drumbeat of oil company greed goes on and on.

[Marrah_G]

3. Ugh- this sort of thing really gets under my skin

[avaistheone1]

4. A good example of economic terrorism

The executives responsible for shutting off the funds should be jailed, and the key thrown away. imo

[cliffordu]

5. Yep. Or executed in the town square en masse.

[Bread and Circus]

6. They've done this kind of thing for decades...and then we are told...

the "technology is not quite there".

The main reason is this, you can't put a meter on sunshine. If you could we'd be all solar and driving electrics for decades.