If Congress really wants to prove that they are serious about oil independence, they will move fast to make deals such as this one illegal.

It's not about whether there is conspiratorial intent--the big conspiracy is the effort to make the issue out to be you can either prove malfeasance or there's nothing you can argue about. It's a false dichotomy. Most likely, the people involved don't see anything wrong, but the organization just works out to be amazingly unproductive at undercutting its owners and selling its product or patents because the enthusiasm just isn't there as nobody senses a future in it.

In short, the issue is conflict of interest--of history-making scale. Just as we need to enforce anti-monopoly laws, we need anti-technopoly laws to address this sort of problem. And oil dependence is at the core of America's biggest problems today.

When I asked a DOE representative recently after his presentation on the DOE's projections of NiMH and lithium battery progress how can you make projections when there's nothing to stop the oil companies from buying up lithium technology and then causing it to languish, just as they did with the NiMH, he laughed.

ChevronTexaco-Unocal-Cobasys has some 10% of the oil market. If they can sell a battery pack for $2K, that will be because in 3 years (per DOE) it will save the consumer $2K in oil. In 12 years, it'll be $8K. On that pack, they'll be struggling to make much profit. The oil they replace is hugely profitable as long as alternatives are kept at bay--which the battery is the key bottleneck to, as all the best alternatives go through electrification. Planting seeds of change now will cost many more than ten times as much for the oil industry in the near future, so Chevron's stockholders would not be benefitted by an "admired" innovator. Sorry to belabor the obvious but it seems needed.

If I were an auto exec and I learned that the battery technology I needed was acquired by Big Oil, I would consider it my legal fiduciary obligation to dissolve the EV development because the prognosis is too poor for making profits and not losses. This is exactly what they all did after Cobasys bought up the only battery technology that had been invested in to maturity (courtesy that monopoly USABC) a few years ago. Today, A123's is the only battery of today's generation that is about ready for prime time.

Such investments by oil companies would be fine if Congress strictly limited the power that they have to throw around weight with their patents, but they don't and won't. Barring ownership of key reform technology patentholder firms or patent rights by corporations who would have the reverse midas touch is our only hope.

Patent reform is definitely needed in many areas, this is yet another illustration of that. If I were an auto company executive, I would be tired of the oil companies messing with our business. I would try to find a way to make sure that we have a secure strategy going forward. If you did not, you could look forward to more dependance and uncertainty.

Allen Z,

A123 received a $15 million grant from USABC, a battery consortium by the US auto mfg's. This means already that A123 has already gotten a close relationship with the US automakers.
Whereas, Cobasys is related to oil industry, which has a vested interest AGAINST BEV and PHEV, as P Schager has posted: selling one $2000K battery pack and forgoing $8000 of oil revenue in the future. It would make them think twice about making auto battery cost-effective so that they can replace petroleum, except in small numbers as token effort.

Chevron owns 50% of Cobasys, and the new venture is btw Cobasys and A123. Sounds like Chevron is the odd firm out here, and has no majority control, maybe 25% (half of half), so claims that they are calling the shots here are wrong.

I don't know about A123, but the folks at ECD have been working on clean energy for a long time and have made significant contributions to the science behind it. They are not out to restrict production; the Ohio plant has capacity for 1.2 million battery packs per year. Where is the case for oil firms causing NiMH to languish? Media reports? Court Cases? Anyone try to license from ECD and got turned down?

To me, this is all good - battery firms get contract from major auto firm. The news here is that GM is trying to get in the game, not that an oil firm subsidairy is a minority partner in GM's supplier.

Cobasys asserted their patent rights by forbidding the manufacturing of NimH battery cell larger than 10 Ah. This will allow them to make money from NiMh battery sales and royalties, but making BEV and even PHEV impractical. The following is a posting by Paul Heath in EVworld.com

Warren Heath:
"I recall Tom Gage at AC Propulsion, tried to get a contract with Cobsys to supply NiMH batteries for a BEV, they wanted to manufacture. Cobasys flatly refused, and later on came back saying they would develop a battery, but wanted some millions in R%D funding up front - an obvious attempt to bankrupt AC Propulsion, before they could succeed at building a BEV.
04/Jan/2007
[43835] "

Another posting, by John Westlund, echoing the same sentiment:
"Where can I get high AH NiMH batteries? You see, D-cells and such aren't practical since charging NiMH in parallel will lead to dramatically reduced cycle life and other problems, not to mention the management system for such a thing would be a nightmare. There is a practical limit to the voltage that can be used in a passenger car, so you can't just have a super high voltage either. Where can I get large NiMH modules, say, > 50 AH? That is what one would need to build an EV with a NiMH battery pack and decent range. We know these batteries are possible. The EV1, EV+, RAV4 EV, Ranger EV all used them. According to UC Davis, large Automotive volume would yield $220/kWh today, and in the 1990s, former ECD Chairman Stemple quoted $150/kWh in volume for 20,000 cars per year. Li Ion? We'd need a large volume of EV production to get costs down, unless one were to fancy paying $700/kWh on up. AC Propulsion, The Center for Transportation Research at Argonne National Laboratory, and others claim $250/kWh is possible for Li Ion. But still, Li Ion only yields about 1/3 the cycle life of Panasonic's NiMH modules, increasing cost per mile. Due to lack of automotive volume for Li Ion and the consequently high cost, and oil politics relating to NiMH, lead acid is about the only affordable option available. 11/Dec/2006 [40112]
06/Jan/2007
[43942] "

More postings on this subject can be found at: http://www.evworld.com/view.cfm?page=news&newsid=13809

110 miles between stationary charging (electric power only. Check out what the French are up to on this web site (www.greencarcongress.com )under CLEANOVA and CLEANOVA Hybrid being used by the French postal service.

I have read all of these comments, but have not heard the moral of the story yet. There are two forces at work here, corporate greed, and greed for political power. If you write a policy that severly impacts oil related industry, you may trigger a recession, and no government wants that to happen on their watch, especially when your financial backing comes mainly from big oil. In truth this change will come, but the speed of change will come painfully slow for consumers, yet painfully quick for oil companies, who may be keeping other technologies at bay. The real losers are those who cannot defend themselves; the consumer, and the environment.

What conspiracy theory?
This is good old business. The oil business will not give up without a fight. It's a lot of money involved here.
Remember the tobacco industry's propaganda? That was good old business too.

The whole affair was closed with an agreement between the tobacco industry and the DOJ that individuals cannot sue the tobacco industry for damaging their health in exchange for a lump sum of money paid by the tobacco industry to the government as compensation for the damage induced by tobacco.
I see a certain similarity here. That is nobody will be able to sue the oil industry for the damage done to the environment in the long run.

I read today an interesting article today claiming the farting cows cause more damage to the atmosphere than the automobiles on the roads. It surely reminds me of the tobacco industry tactics not a long time ago.

The irony is that some day, the oil (energy) industry will claim the monopoly on batteries and renewable energy and cash on it too, and why not? It’s perfectly legal, isn’t it?

There's a new solid-state battery technology coming out this year[?] which is a joint venture between a new "stealth" EV and MIT. Apparently, the tests easily demonstrated [so far] up to 400+ wh/kg with rapid recharging time and long life cycle. I heard that within two year or sooner they could achieve a 600+wh/kg or more. The battery is made of relatively cheap materials hence keeping the cost way down. This new EV company is going to manufacture it somewhere in Central America and stay out of the price war and phony availability of all the other battery manufacturers.

I think their strategy will be a success and a another huge factor in their favor is that they don't have to buy from a third [battery] company which regardless of their financial status cannot guarantee that maybe one day they would be bought by Big Oil or by Big Detroit and nicely placed on a shelf somewhere in their vast storage facilities...hehehehe

Don't know the name yet, but I will investigate further.

FS PhD