It’s interesting that the car That Makes Sense – economically and functionally – gets almost no press while cars that don’t (like the Tesla and other electric cars) do.
Elio Motors (company website here) had a near-production-ready car on display at the New York Auto Show last week. Company founder Paul Elio gave a presentation to reporters and took questions.
Bet you didn’t hear a thing about it.
This is downright Weird.
You’d think the media would be champing at the bit to let the public know that there is a car on the verge of production (with 41,000 of them already spoken for via cash-down reservations) that – according to Paul Elio – will cost well under $10,000 (under $8,000 is the target) and go well over 80 miles on a gallon of gasoline.
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Ah, but it’s not electric – and so the Elio gets no love (much less coverage) from the media.
Electric cars (and other such cars) do because they lack the thing the media finds abhorrent – an internal combustion engine.
As long as it has batteries or fuel cells or solar panels or some other form of motive power – no matter how functionally impaired or expensive these may be – the media will spasm on the floor in ecstasy like a labrador retriever pup with a new chew toy. They will write stories more like love sonnets about the magnificence of whatever it is, provided it doesn’t use “old” and “dirty” technology.
That is, burn gas.
Well, the Elio does – but very little.
It is powered by a 900 cc three-cylinder engine – about the same size as a typical motorcycle’s engine. Which is possible because the Elio weighs not much more than a motorcycle (about 1,250 pounds) and that is what makes 80-plus MPG possible.
Now, ponder that.
A car that can go 80-plus miles on a gallon of fuel is using very little fuel. The less fuel burned, the less exhaust produced and – here it comes! – the lower the emissions. The Elio’s emissions (it will comply with all of Uncle’s requirements) will be a fraction of those produced by any other currently available car simply by dint of the fact that it has a tiny engine that burns a fraction of the fuel.
No Magic (or elaborate/expensive technology) necessary.
Just simplicity – and light weight.
Which the media apparently doesn’t find attractive and therefore not worth reporting.
Meanwhile, endless fawning over the Tesla – the rich man’s toy subsidized by the working and middle-class taxpayers who can look but never touch. They are fleeced by Uncle, so that Elon Musk – the Crony Capitalist King – can manufacturer $40,000-to-start (and from there to six figures) electric cars that are certainly sexy and Ferrari quick but which make as much sense as transportation as a thong does as clothing.
In Antarctica.
You have to be affluent – rich – to even contemplate the purchase (heavily subsidized by Uncle) of a Telsa. In which case, consideration of economy are an irrelevance. And if the economy is irrelevant, what is the justification? Sexiness? Speed? Well, why not pay the rich to purchase Porsches, too?
Ah, but the Tesla is electric – and “zero emissions.”
Well, yes – it is electric. But “zero emissions”?
Sure, as far as the tailpipe (which, being electric, it hasn’t got). But electricity does not spontaneously appear out of the Void. It must be generated – and that requires (well, mostly involves) the burning of coal and oil, which produces emissions … just elsewhere.
Probably, more of them than the little Elio produces.
Certainly, this will be the case once the cars are mass-produced. Because people – not just rich people – will be able to afford the Elio.
Lots of people.
Unless Musk can reduce the cost of his Toy by at least 50 percent, it will never be other than a low-production rich man’s indulgence. But the Elio will cost about 50 percent less than a current economy car.
Almost anyone will be able to afford it.
