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General Motors (GM) gets it. It gets the moment. The company recognizes that natural gas is the way of the future because we have way too much of it and because diesel is super expensive and will get more expensive, given the price of Brent and the lack of refining capacity.
Not only that, but GM has figured out that it doesn't matter how much the government subsidizes all electric cars, which are going to be losers -- and not just because of the technology problems of the Volt. Put simply, we have not developed a way to be able to make electric cars pay for themselves, because they can't go far and they can't be serviced effectively and because there is no way to dispose of the battery without developing the equivalent of Superfund sites to do so.
Meanwhile, hybrid natural gas trucks have a one-year payback even if automakers extort higher prices for the machines (meaning more than $6,000). More importantly, businesses recognize that we have no control over our energy sources under President Barack Obama, and many small-business owners believe the administration favors higher oil prices as an umbrella for alternative energy. Plus the Sierra Club, which is extremely powerful in this country and which is a very underrated force -- not unlike the NRA used to be -- has turned on natural gas. So the administration is not going to make the obvious choices when it comes to Postal Service or military trucks to go with natural gas. Without those big markets, natural gas will stay low for some time.
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With the ratio of 16-1 diesel to natural gas in terms of cost, with the possible savings of more than $2 between the two and with the avoidance of what could be gas lines in an Iran-Israel war, the Chevy truck could be a necessity for business. The electric car is a total nonstarter for those people. GM's truck, by the way, is an upfit brought to you by Fuel Systems (FSYS), if you want to play that angle. I wouldn't. The company is not good enough to be able to translate the contract into big numbers
Ford has an F-250 truck with an engine from Westport Innovations (WPRT). Navistar (NAV) is committing one-third of its output to natural gas trucks. The Europeans can turn these engines out on a dime.
The revolution is here. How fast can it evolve? It took diesel only seven years to go from minor fuel for trucks to being the only real fuel for trucks.
I think natural gas will have a similar trajectory, with or without Obama's backing.
The weak link is Exxon (XOM). It is a huge owner of natural gas, and its own intransigence and dismissal of the issue dovetail perfectly with the lack of support of natural gas at the federal level for fear that environmentalists will be upset. Exxon and the Democrats in cahoots with each other on surface fuel aversion to natural gas. Just ridiculous, if you ask me, because natural gas is cleaner, and don't believe that hogwash about how methane is worse than coal, as coal kills thousands each year in this country, which is what matters.
Natural gas is cheaper. And natural gas is divorced from OPEC. I think that if you don't embrace it in government, you will be overtaken by events. It's where we are going, and right now, because of big oil's stupid aversion to it, the game will be won by Clean Energy (CLNE), which should do a massive secondary like Westport did, to have a war chest to build out CNG and LNG gas stations everywhere.
Jim Cramer is a co-founder of TheStreet and contributes daily market commentary to the financial news network's sites. Follow his trades for Action Alerts PLUS, which Cramer co-manages as a charitable trust, and has no positions in the stocks mentioned.
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I agree that Natural Gas should be used for fuel but to rule out electric because of bogus claims is just silly. But I guess its hard to make money on something which people can produce themselves like electricity and cant be controlled by corporations or goverment.
I have driven a Volt for 6 months, Its the best car I ever owned both in driving performance and total cost to drive. But I guess OIL corporations and the people that earn a living on the massive oil industry do not like it as it wont give them payments every month.
Just like the mortgage industry and banks wants you to be a slave to them every month, the oil interest wants you to be a slave to them every month.
Electricity can be made in so many ways and we do not ever run out of it, and the batteries used to store it temporarily do not disapper after use, they can be recycled or re-conditioned for same use of other use.
So ask yourself.
Option 1.
Spend money on a resource that will eventually run out and its controlled by large corporations?
Option 2
Spend money on a resource that can be re-used and can be controlled by you personally?
When Natural gas becomes an altenative then prices will go up and we are still left paying a monthly fee to corporations.
yes, natural gas will be a huge energy source once the monopoly is in position to provide the infrastructure....not much info on the actual costs per mile to operate a vehicle powered by natural gas. We know natural gas has somewhat less energy than gasoline/diesel....what are the economics relative to comparing trucks/autos powered by natural gas vs gasoline/diesel. Performance has not been explained.......don't worry about taxation......our government will quickly adapt.....I'm also sure the consumer will pay the way.....the main benefit will be less dependency on foreign oil!....additionally this new industry will provide the jobs we need to stimulate the US economy!
Too bad our politicians have not recognized this opportunity!!
agree with you, havasu46,,,,,,
something has to be done, obama doesn't care he is set for life, whatever happened little over a year ago when they were talking about getting the trucking companies going on nat. gas, oh, thats right if they did that everything in the grocery store will have to come down. maybe we can get the farmers to use nat. gas in those big **** tractors. maybe then the economy will level out for the working class instead of the rich ****.
tax for something that doesn't have to be refined, how about 2 bucks for a 20 gal. tank full, sounds fair to me, their be more driving so their be tax coming in without hurting the working class, yeah i'll go for that. 2 for 20 gal. 1 for 10. but we would have to talk to the government and speculators first to see if it is ok. they do work together very closely
Yea right, it's all those Democrats that run the auto and oil companies that are running up the price of gasoline. Don't think so. Why not blame Israel for not finding a way to live amongst the rest of the Arabs without pissing them off all the time. Let's move Israel to a worthless piece of Africa like we did when we moved the the American Indians to the deserts in Arizona and New Mexico when we found gold and silver in Colorado, Montana and Wyoming.
The oil fields of eastern Mont. and western North Dak are being drilled 24/7, there is a glut of oil in Oklahoma all waiting to get to a seaport so the oil can be sold to the highest bidder. What makes us think that the same thing won't happen with natural gas? In the 100 plus years of the internal combustion engine, why have we stuck with the same old technology, a country that put a man on the moon, computerized the world. Why? Ask Chevron BP, Exxon and so on.
This should be a no brainer. The technology has been here for years. When I was a kid (in the fifties), a family friend had a propane powered dual fuel car, and if you run an engine in a building it must have a propane conversion kit (the gas powered buffers you see sometimes in stores, or propane powered fork lifts etc), The problem has been fueling stations.
I don't normally criticize "Bobo" (it's too easy), but some of his statements on his "Mad Money" show that aired on March 5, 2012 really annoyed me. On that show he encouraged people to invest in Monsanto because of that company's development of genetically modified corn and soy which he insinuated produced greater crop yields than regular corn and soy and would feed the growing world population. What he neglected to add however in his praise for Monsanto is that numerous studies show that Monsanto genetically modified corn and soy cause infertility, and genetic and intestinal damage in mammals. Livestock owners for example are reporting spontaneous abortions and sterility in livestock that are fed Monsanto corn on a regular basis. In fact Pigs can differentiate between the smell of regular corn and Monsanto genetically modified corn and won't eat the monsanto corn; this monsanto corn is so toxic you can actually kill cockroaches with it and this stuff is in around 80% of the processed food at your local grocery store. Even Bobo's claim that genetically modified corn soy produces greater crop yields is false.
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