Sen. McCain offers $300 million prize for new auto battery

John McCain hopes to solve the country's energy crisis with cold hard cash.

The presumed Republican nominee is proposing a $300 million government prize to whoever can develop an automobile battery that far surpasses existing technology. The bounty would equate to $1 for every man, woman and child in the country, "a small price to pay for helping to break the back of our oil dependency," McCain said in remarks prepared for delivery Monday at Fresno State University in California.

McCain said such a device should deliver power at 30 percent of current costs and have "the size, capacity, cost and power to leapfrog the commercially available plug-in hybrids or electric cars."

The Arizona senator is also proposing stiffer fines for automakers who skirt existing fuel-efficiency standards, as well as incentives to increase use of domestic and foreign alcohol-based fuels such as ethanol.

In addition, a so-called Clean Car Challenge would provide U.S. automakers with a $5,000 tax credit for every zero-carbon emissions car they develop and sell.

"In the quest for alternatives to oil, our government has thrown around enough money subsidizing special interests and excusing failure," said excerpts from McCain's prepared text. "From now on, we will encourage heroic efforts in engineering, and we will reward the greatest success."

The proposal comes as gasoline has reached a record cost of more than $4 a gallon. That has boosted the price of virtually all goods and services, sent commuters flocking to public transportation and increased tensions between the United States and its Middle Eastern oil suppliers.

Last week McCain suggested one way to ease supply concerns would be to lift a federal ban on offshore oil drilling if individual states want to allow it. His Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, opposes that idea, saying it would do nothing to address immediate price concerns.

On Sunday, Obama told a Washington audience he would strengthen government oversight of energy traders whose futures speculation he blames in large part for the skyrocketing price of oil.

In his latest speech, McCain expressed exasperation both with the federal government and the private sector.

He said rising costs during a time of stagnant wages evokes the 1970s era of "stagflation."

Without blaming his fellow Republicans in the Bush administration directly, McCain said: "It feels the same today, because the unwise policies of our government have left America's energy future in the control of others."

The pork-barrel opponent also blasted "a hodgepodge of incentives" for the purchase of fuel-efficient cars.

"Different hybrids and natural-gas cars carry different incentives, ranging from a few hundreds dollars to four grand. They're the handiwork of lobbyists, with all the inconsistency and irrationality that involves," McCain said.
Sen. McCain offers $300 million prize for new auto battery - Yahoo! News

Nice incentive.....hopefully this $300 mill. is just for U.S. businesses.

Have a good one!:s4:

Too many tax incentives for big business. Don't like it. If people cared about this issue they would just stop buying new cars until the car companies got smart and started building cars that the public wants. Free market system? Isn't that waht the repubs usually advocate?

Yeah he probably has some sort of friend who knows how to make a sufficient innovation, and he'll just give it to him. Its a pretty vague offer, don't you agree? 300 million, to "whomever can develop an automobile battery......"
Possible that its just a shitty written article, not specific in detail...or, its just some crazy thing he said.
If I were John McCain and I saw myself losing by 15 points the other day i'd say something desperate for headlines too. Quick 50 trillion to "whoever" can build me a robot dinosaur car that can fly.

The technology already largely exists, it just seems that government (at least here in North America) largely ignores it. India has recently developed a car that can run entirely on compressed air; able to go 160 miles (about that) on a single tank, up to 65 Mph. Japan has made an all-electric car running off the latest advancements in lithium-ion battery technology, with the ability to drive up to 300Kph and go several hours on a single charge. Another company, I wish I could remember which one, has recently made their first fully-functional and phenominally-effective hydrogen-powered car.

As is, there have been many, many electric cars that can match and surpass their gasoline-powered counterparts. Yet so governments and businesses continue to perpetuate the myth that an electric car can only exist as a weak and inneficient go-kart. One thing I'm sure of; bio-diesal is not the solution! Mexicans are already finding it exceedingly difficult buy corn tortilla's because of the corn shortage being put into fuel. One estimate I heard from a scientist on CNN purported that if we used all the corn in America to fuel our cars, it would cover 2% of our fuel needs.

Sugar-cane is far more effective anyway, with 3x the energy-output of corn, but unfortunately doesn't grow very well in most North American climates. Brazil has seemed to have done a fine job utilizing it to cover 85% of their car-fuel consumption, but I still don't like it because it depletes soil nutrients that should not be wasted. What we need is a fuel source that won't deplete another essential resource like food.

Without knowing the specifics, I can't really say what I think. But in general I like these kinds of incentives for innovations. It's not a straight ongoing subsidy for a favored industry, which I think usually tend to outlive their usefullness and then become a waste of money. It's a fixed-cost budget item to spur innovation and to provide the capital to develop the technology for market.

In the past these kinds of constests have worked out really well. In the early days of aviation, there were contests paid for mostly by waatlhy individuals to spur innovation in aviation. There were prizes for thisngs like altitude records, or speed records or the first to cross the Atlantic. The money was an incentive and so ws the prestige. Recently the Ansari X prize for the first private company to send a reusable, manned vehicle into space twice spured the developmenn of Spaceship One by Burt Rutan. Without the prize it probably would not have happend by now.

I think these kinds of contests can work realy well and be a very cost effective way to promote needed inovations. How about $300 million to the company that can develop a way to make ethanol out of corn stalks, wood chips and other cellulose waste for the same cost as using corn? Or $300 million to the company that can develop a way to make solar electricity as cheap as electricity from coal? Or $300 million to the company that can develop a way to make food waste and orgainic waste that now goes to the landfill into fuel oil for less than $50 a barrel? These kinds of innovations would easily be worth the cost of the contest.

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Originally Posted by dragonrider

I think these kinds of contests can work realy well and be a very cost effective way to promote needed inovations. How about $300 million to the company that can develop a way to make ethanol out of corn stalks, wood chips and other cellulose waste for the same cost as using corn? Or $300 million to the company that can develop a way to make solar electricity as cheap as electricity from coal? Or $300 million to the company that can develop a way to make food waste and orgainic waste that now goes to the landfill into fuel oil for less than $50 a barrel? These kinds of innovations would easily be worth the cost of the contest.

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HELL YEAH, and for the big prize they can further research on this:

There is an estimated 2 trillion barrels of oil buried beneath parts of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Geologists, petroleum companies and the federal government have known about these massive deposits for nearly a century. The trouble has always been: how do you get at it?

It is believed that the shale deposits in the Green River region of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming are holding the equivalent of approximately 1.5 trillion to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil. Called â??oil shaleâ?� or â??shale oil,â?� according to scientists and petroleum companies, much of it cannot be recovered with current technology due to the costly processing involved and the depth of the deposits buried beneath the Rocky Mountains.

Still, if only half can be extracted, scientists believe the amount is nearly triple the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia.
U.S. HAS MASSIVE OIL

THIS would make us energy independent for years.

Have a good one!:s4:

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Originally Posted by Psycho4Bud

HELL YEAH, and for the big prize they can further research on this:

There is an estimated 2 trillion barrels of oil buried beneath parts of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Geologists, petroleum companies and the federal government have known about these massive deposits for nearly a century. The trouble has always been: how do you get at it?

It is believed that the shale deposits in the Green River region of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming are holding the equivalent of approximately 1.5 trillion to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil. Called â??oil shaleâ?� or â??shale oil,â?� according to scientists and petroleum companies, much of it cannot be recovered with current technology due to the costly processing involved and the depth of the deposits buried beneath the Rocky Mountains.

Still, if only half can be extracted, scientists believe the amount is nearly triple the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia.
U.S. HAS MASSIVE OIL

THIS would make us energy independent for years.

Have a good one!:s4:

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Well, that one I personally would not be in favor of, because oil shale is not a renewable resource, and it is still very polluting.

But there are probably a lot of great applications for these kinds of contests. It's one way government can work with industry without getting too involved. NASA has sponosred a few of these things, and they should do more. There is one going on right now related to a "Space Elevator" and others related to moon landers. These contests are composed of a lot of "baby step" contests. It's not like they said, here's a billion dollar prize for making a space elevator. They have one prize for innovations in making the elevator tether material of a certain strength. And another for making a certain milestone for the "climber" that goes up the tether. That way they have achievable goals that lay the groundwork for the big goal.

Its just time to do away with the internal combustion motor and move on technically. Its been around for over 120 years. Its a dinosaur.

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Originally Posted by FreshNugz

. . . Quick 50 trillion to "whoever" can build me a robot dinosaur car that can fly.

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:D how did you know??? . . . i'm working on one right now. buahahahahah :D

i read somewhere that algea is the most efficient bio-fuel, (several magnitudes more efficient than corn or sugar, etc) it is like 50% pure veg oil or something and takes nothing from the food supply. the challanges are growing it quickly and inexpensively, contolling for water evaperation getting just the right strain of algae for the conditions, etc.

i'm thinking this could be my new project, algea farming. i think we need lots of grant money to fund this kind of home grown R&D, as well as cash prizes for the winners. :rastasmoke:

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Originally Posted by boaz

i'm thinking this could be my new project, algea farming.

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I'm an algae rancher runnin' 100 billion head of free-range sprulinas in a pond out back. It's a great life, and there's nothing like takin' 'em to market on one of the great long-distance algae drives. "Yah! Get along little algaes!"