Advocate describes anti-electric car conspiracy

In an interview with the Orange County Weekly, electric car advocate Doug Korthof explains how oil companies have prevented the development and sale of entirely electric cars by restricting the availability of high capacity batteries. Korthof says General Motors first bought the rights to NiMH batteries from Toyota and Panasonic, then sold those patents to oil giant Texaco, which then merged with Chevron. According to Korthof, Chevron then used its the patent to kill Toyota's RAV4-EV program.





A similar program -- for a car called the EV1 -- was also underway at GM. Clean cars from the automaker could have been sold for $25,000 each, Korthof says. Instead, GM "crushed and then shredded them, sending the remains to the foundry."

"General Motors execs crushed their own future when they crushed the EV1," he said.

Chevron's patent rights are believed to expire in 2014. But Korthof isn't wasting any time. He is advocating plug-in hybrids as the next best option for the time being. He said the aim is for production electric plug-in hybrids that can drive 120 miles in electric-only mode, then switch to a small 40 horsepower gas engine to charge the batteries.

Korthof maintains that current hybrids represent a flawed approach. "The Prius, for example, and all current hybrid cars, have the gas engine embedded in the power train, which is the least efficient way of running an EV. These hybrids are all gas cars, because all of their energy, ultimately, comes from the gasoline pump," he said.

But oil companies aren't the only ones who want to keep plug-in electric cars from gaining traction. According to Korthof, EVs would require far less maintenance and repairs than gasoline vehicles. "EVs threaten not just the oil companies, but dealer service and parts functions, muffler shops, smog shops, brake shops, radiator shops, tune-up shops, engine specialty shops, gas stations, and so on," he said. "Unions are afraid of change, and afraid of learning new things, and so on."

Korthof currently operates EV1.org, HondaEV.org and DrivingTheFuture.com.