Regionalization & the electric car: facts, or fictions?

The economic crisis has broken all of the rules developed countries play by on the global market. As a result, the world is undergoing a reverse process of globalization called “regionalization.” A United States intelligence agency recently identified regionalization as a potential threat to the country’s stronghold on global markets. (http://gt2030.com). The emergence of new financial and industrial centers in developing countries is expected to rattle the status quo.

“We do not expect global growth to be much higher this year than last,” said Christine Lagarde, Head of the International Monitory Fund, who voiced her concerns on the real economy. Although business and industry is flocking to the third world, the local population hasn’t benefited, financially or by any other means. “In far too many countries,” said Lagarde, “Improvements in financial markets have not translated into improvements in the real economy—and in the lives of people.” (Economic Club of New York, New York, April 10, 2013).

We can delay regionalization by embracing revolutionary breakthroughs in science and technology like high-quality renewable energy and low-cost cargo output to Low Earth Orbit. These kinds of breakthroughs not only excite the public and ignite the imaginations of millions, they also add real value to bubbles in banking and manufacturing markets.

Sadly, we simply do not have these miraculous new technologies available today. What we do have, however, is an abundance of ambition in the automotive industry. American car companies were hit especially hard by 2008’s economic collapse. Now they’re looking to revive the market and raise quotes again. How? By tantalizing the public with promises of eco-friendly, cost-efficient, high-capacity batteries. Every year there’s another dozen commercials for the latest innovation in hybrid technology, or a new electric car that promises you’ll only have to stop for gas once a month!

But, as the past several decades have demonstrated, these “innovations” weren’t ready for mass production. They were merely marketing ploys – a way of getting the public to trust the automakers again after a pattern of gross mismanagement in the years preceding the financial crisis. Electric vehicles will never gain market share with a limited battery range and limited infrastructure of charging stations in place.

The automotive market has become saturated with hybrid vehicles. All the while, car companies have shifted focus away from concept designs and the production of prototypes. Instead of thinking long-term about staying competitive on a global scale, they’ve settled for temporarily satisfying the public’s soft-spot for cross-overs.

Following the economic crisis, most of the top managers in the western auto industry faced a dilemma: they could either file for bankruptcy, or come up with a PR-trick claiming to have made another technological breakthrough. The latter would distract investors from their ineptitude while earning government subsidies at the same time. Not a bad alternative to bankruptcy.
 
After 2008, investors and regulators began to closely monitor and trace the potential for financial bubbles in the industry. Sounds easy, but in fact it’s quite a difficult task in a real economy. Outsourcing makes it challenging for private and corporate investors to accurately analyze and predict how technical components will pan out on the market.

So where does all of this leave the electric car? Should we expect to see another PR campaign on TV? Indeed, we’re being told of a possible breakthrough relating to the incorporation of an isotropic polycrystalline generators (SH-boxes), which convert electricity from environmental heat, into a line of zero-emission vehicles. NRGLab PTE Ltd., based out of Singapore, was the first to generate energy via polycrystals in an anisotropic media with a thermoelectric merit figure of 0.8 (ZT). The resulting electrical capacity exceeded that of thermoelectric converters based on carbon nanotubes (0.02 ZT).

Let’s hope this technological breakthrough will add some REAL value to the real economy for once.