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Chevy Volt Skeptics Continue to Breathe Their Last Gasps

August 21st, 2007 | Posted in: Public Opinion

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A recent syndicated article is entitled: “Critics skeptical of Buzz over GM’s latest electric car”. Ever since the Volt concept was first announced in January we’ve been inundated by these pessimistic commentaries which do little more themselves than to feed off the negative hype left behind from the EV1 era.

This latest piece starts off well and talks about many positives of the car and mentions many facts which support the idea that GM is serious about it. The first critic is named as David Friedman,”research director for the clean-vehicles program at the Union of Concerned Scientists” who’s main point was that GM is good at producing hype, and has failed to follow through before.

Critic number two is Thad Malesh, principal of Automotive Technology Research Group. He is described as being enthusiastic about the car, but thinks having a ready battery pack by 2010 is unlikely. He is quoted to say “My guess is that GM is going to miss that deadline, maybe by a year or two”.

The article closes paradoxically by mentioning the test Volts will be on the road next spring.

Basically, the article is thin is substance. The experts’ conclusions do not seem based on fact, and frankly, following the Volt as closely as we do here, seem to me to be invalid.

I thought is would be interesting to invite the critics themselves to come out here on GM-Volt and let us what they see that we can’t. I’ve sent them both and the author emails, look for their responses in the comments here.

Posted by: Lyle

2 Responses to “Chevy Volt Skeptics Continue to Breathe Their Last Gasps”


  1. kent beuchert
    Vote -1 Vote +1kent beuchert     Says:
    August 21st, 2007 at 5:06 pm

    Notice how strange it is for a “scientist”
    to provide an opinion without any buttressing arguments. That’s not the scientific method that I’m familiar with.
    It all boils down to the battery, and I think it’s fair to say that neither of these two “experts” are keeping up with the latest developments in that regard. The journalist who wrote this article certainly didn’t make much effort to get very close to the story. I suppose he already had the phone numbers of these “experts” and was pressed for time. The number of such skeptics has been reduced to such an extent
    that they are getting hard to find these days. I would love to get the email address for either one of these “experts” and have them explain allof the evidence of progress
    lately and explain why he thinks the two battery team development leaders are lying.
    He might also explain why GM is introducing all these hybrids these days, since, according to him, they never intended to build them. I’d say he’s got a lot of ’splaining to do.  

    (Quote)


  2. Mark Bartosik
    Vote -1 Vote +1Mark Bartosik     Says:
    August 21st, 2007 at 11:31 pm

    I read this article, and found it to be very light weight and devoid of evidence. Not worth my 60 seconds to read it.

    Sometimes media (print, TV, Internet) just gets padded with drivel.

    When GM made a recent announcement about the Volt and CNN reported it, a couple of presenters made off the cuff comments that they weren’t so sure that they wanted the high electric bills. As we’ve discussed here, that the increase in electric bill is much less than the decrease is gasoline bill. They completely missed the point.

    I heard another presenter (on another station) refer to a survey of why Prius owners purchased that car. Many chose the answer “I am making a statement”. The airhead presenter, thought that people meant that they we making a fashion statement (not a political or environmental statement) and dismissed them as vein. Ironically she only showed how she thought about things.

    Not everyone does a good job all the time, and not everyone has a clue, and journalists are no exception.  

    (Quote)

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