CARS GET 250 MPG!

Backyard mechanics have been able to retrofit existing hybrid technologies to get up to 250 mpg, by using innovative battery technologies and "plugging in" to precharge the batteries. These people were able to develop these cars using modest personal budgets and commercially available parts.

From the Associated Press:

CORTE MADERA, Calif. (AP) -- Politicians and automakers say a car that can both reduce greenhouse gases and free America from its reliance on foreign oil is years or even decades away. Ron Gremban says such a car is parked in his garage.

It looks like a typical Toyota Prius hybrid, but in the trunk sits an 80-miles-per-gallon secret - a stack of 18 brick-sized batteries that boosts the car's high mileage with an extra electrical charge so it can burn even less fuel.

Gremban, an electrical engineer and committed environmentalist, spent several months and $3,000 tinkering with his car.

The real question is, why can't Detroit develop or EMBRACE this innovation? The cold reality is presented in the final paragraphs:

Instead, Frank said, automakers promise hydrogen-powered vehicles hailed by President Bush and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, even though hydrogen's backers acknowledge the cars won't be widely available for years and would require a vast infrastructure of new fueling stations.

"They'd rather work on something that won't be in their lifetime, and that's this hydrogen economy stuff," Frank said. "They pick this kind of target to get the public off their back, essentially."

IMHO, the real reason behind the obvious anti-hybrid slant is that Bush and his oil baron buddies know full well that oil will be a dying business in the very near future. Their next energy monopoly: hydrogen gas stations. It would be way too easy for the American consumer to plug their car into a standard household outlet, that has power provided by a regulated industry. Instead, complex hydrogen distribution systems built on the infrastructure of the major refineries will be slowly rolled out, most likely with tax incentives paid for by the consumer and double-dipped with higher oil prices today.

What do you think is going on? What can be done about it? Speak the TRUTH USA!