What do plug-in hybrids, fuel cell vehicles, battery electric vehicles and extended-range vehicles all have in common? They use little or no gasoline.
What do Exxon, Shell, Husky, Irving, BP et al have in common? They all make their money selling gasoline.
So why are they so quiet?
I remember a few decades back when conspiracy theorists were determined that someone had invented a car that would get 100 miles to the gallon, but the oil companies had squashed it. It was out there, all right, but the oil barons would never let it get to market, and so they spent enough money and threw around enough weight to ensure that the only person who could sit in one was Jimmy Hoffa.
Now, instead of just a whisper of a high-mileage car, we've seen them, and some people are actually out there driving them.
It's not a rhetorical question. I'm actually befuddled -- why is this happening so smoothly? Or do the oil companies really know that, deep down, that it's all window dressing, and the few thousand alternative fuel vehicles that will actually be sold aren't going to make any kind of a dent?
