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As a former EV-1 driver, I know that electric vehicles work.  CARB
staff knows that as well, based on the many whitepapers and other
research they have produced.

Were it not for GM's decision to terminate my EV-1 lease, crush
the car and place it on a pyramid of crushed EV-1s in the desert
of Arizona, I would still be driving an EV-1.  The car was in
essentially the same condition the day it left my garage as the
day it arrived.  But again, CARB knows this too.  It knows that
the necessary electricity was clean, efficient and cheap ($1.50 to
charge the car).

Toyota RAV-4 electrics are known to have achieved 100,000 miles on
a single NiMH battery pack.  And yet, those batteries are "no
longer available" due apparently to Chevron's decision to sit on
the patent(s).  Would it not be appropriate to use an eminent
domain type action to secure the use of these patents -- and
batteries -- in this time of public need?  Society created
intellectual property rights solely to benefit the public and
encourage invention of new technologies -- it was never intended
that patents be used to prevent the public from having access to
new technologies.

Alternatively, CARB and government agencies could encourage "Open
Source" patent develop in the future.  The public funds a great
deal of research, and then magically, the patents developed always
seem be "belong" to private interests apparently unable or
unwilling to put them on the market.

In any event, as a purely political decision, CARB decided to run
with the bamboozlement of the vehicle companies by which they
assured us the future was all about fuel cells.  Of course, this
was part of the standard industry delaying tactic -- and we all
knew it.  The "grail" of better vehicles is always 10 years away. 
Better batteries are "10 years away."  Fuel cell technology is "10
years away."  Ten years away, so that in the meantime, it is
unencumbered business as usual.  

In the meantime, Hummers, luxury pickup trucks and very large SUVs
are the hardware du jour.  This is not a "good faith" industry
response -- it is laughing in the face of anyone who wishes to
improve the environment (which to some degree is the vast majority
of the public, despite their love for living-rooms on wheels).  

I understand the overall fuel mileage of the US fleet has gone
down in the past 10 years.  Simply discouraging these giant
vehicles would do more for the economy and the environment than
any of the other "just wait for fuel cells" nonsense that is used
to divert attention from the real issues.  The US need not import
any oil -- if drivers merely made sane choices.

Fuel cells, of course, never made any sense as a dodge away from
intelligently designed electric vehicles.  Why?  Because fuel cell
design is essentially a hybrid electric vehicle. It has a battery
pack and electric motor for its drive system, and adds an exotic
additional system to generate additional electricity. 
Functionally, no different then adding a small gas or diesel
powered generation system.  Even in its most wistful,
forward-looking version, no proposed fuel cell generate sufficient
"on-demand" electricity to accelerate the car, meaning that a
battery powered motive system was always intended.

Again, CARB staff knows all of this, since some of the very best
studies and literature have been produced by CARB and/or are
available from CARB.

Somewhere between the CARB staff and the CARB actual board
members, all pretense of intelligent decision-making evaporates
and we enter a spin-zone of nonsense.  Good heavens, let's get rid
of all those domestic fireplaces and California will be safe for
Hummers!  It must be astoundingly difficult to work as a CARB
staffer, knowing that your best efforts and research will go out
the window because you do not have the support of the actual Board
and the real decisions will be based on hackneyed political
maneuvering.

And, in a rather significant irony, many regulations raise the bar
for entry into the vehicle business -- which prevents any but the
established vehicle companies from offering new technologies in a
production form.

The saddest part of all this is that both the economy and the
environment are suffering the consequences of leaving
decision-making to industry "mavens" who think they (and
manipulated "market forces") should decide the course.  The short
term gains for their individual stock portfolios is now
translating into long term damage to their own companies and the
US economy in general.

Had CARB followed the path it charted in the early 90s, we would
have perhaps avoided both a few wars and the impending economic
meltdown.

But, naturally, the new argument will be, "maybe we could have
afforded these things back then -- but now it's economically
impossible!"  

CARB has adequately established the consequences of lack of vision
and constant nay-saying.  Perhaps it's time for a new dynamic.