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https://preview.redd.it/6jholwdvrp0c1.png?width=349&format=png&auto=webp&s=da33635381e7e9e4e2607b4c97b595f84e3e7581
***Photo Above*** *- French carmaker Renault announced this $22,000 electric vehicle will be available soon. Will it come to America? Possibly . . . Renault is a member of the Nissan/Infinity/Renault consortium.*
In last week’s episode, we watched Ford Motor Company cancel its planned EV battery plant in Kentucky. Actually, Ford cancelled TWO plants, including a second $3.5 billion facility in Michigan. This was in response to the cost of that new UAW contract, after President Biden joined the union picket lines to pressure Ford Management into signing. Evidently we can have affordable electric cars, or pricey UAW contracts, but we can’t have both?
**Breaking news**: The US Department of Energy – BY COMPLETE COINCIDENCE – yesterday announced its own $3.5 billion battery plant. Here’s an excerpt from their press release: “*This investment, which includes a focus on retaining and creating good-paying union jobs in the manufacturing workforce, is administered by DOE’s Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains (MESC).“ (link at bottom).* This is the same DOE which recently punted on a bunch of offshore wind turbine farms, and is fiddling around with experimental hydrogen “depots”, right?
What the DOE press release DOESN’T say is where their own battery plant will be built. Will it be on the bones of either of the cancelled Ford factories, in Michigan or Kentucky? I’m going to guess Michigan, because the DOE is absolutely SCREAMING *“good paying union jobs”*, over and over, in their press release. Kentucky doesn’t fit that profile, Michigan does.
The DOE also doesn’t say which companies will build the battery factories, or the actual batteries. Skeptic/cynic that I am, I interpret this means they haven’t actually picked the contractors yet. Or if they have, it’s a secret. Maybe this will be another “no bid” contract boondoggle larded with waste, fraud and abuse? The kind that rewards corporate contributors to someone’s re-election campaign?
I know . . . I’m a really cynical person. When anything smells fishy, my immediate thought is “*cui bono*” . . who benefits? And when the identity of who will benefit isn’t revealed in the DOE press release, and the program administrators are bureaucrats and politicians, my scam-dar starts beeping like crazy.
Please don’t hate the DOE. They’re just playing the game by the rules. They didn’t fly to Detroit for a photo op walking the UAW picket lines. They didn’t cause the Ford factory cancellations. However, we (taxpayers) now find our money going to build DOE factories. DId any president or senator run on this platform – government ownership of car battery factories? Like in China? I don’t recall seeing any campaign ads promising this. If I had, I would probably have voted for the other guy.
**I don’t hate electric vehicles. I LOVE them**. And I plan on getting one, just as soon as the electric grid is stabilized (no more blackouts during snowstorms, heat waves, and brush fires). And when I stop seeing news articles about public chargers in short supply, or which are broken, or cost 3X the electric rate I pay at home. And when electric cars become affordable. Having the federal government stick its finger in the pie usually doesn’t make things more affordable. Our government never makes ANYTHING on the cheap – not B2 bombers, not public-school education, not Amtrak. That’s why we have a $33 trillion national debt.
**In the meantime, Renault just announced a $22,000 electric car.** See picture at top. Cool, eh? And it didn’t need a French government battery factory. This is going to be just like the VW Beetle, all over again. The original Beetle cost $2,300 in 1968, which is about $20K in today’s inflation adjusted world.
I’m just sayin’ . . .
[**Biden-Harris Administration Announces $3.5 Billion to Strengthen Domestic Battery Manufacturing | Department of Energy**](https://www.energy.gov/articles/biden-harris-administration-announces-35-billion-strengthen-domestic-battery-manufacturing)
by baltimore-aureole