The project's name is a dead giveaway: FreedomCAR. It's part of the total "Freedom" package, a word meaning, in Repug doublespeak,the freedom to exploit, the freedom to avoid taxes, and the freedom to pack heat. The freedom to bomb the poor is a recent connotation that may become part of the accepted Repug jargon as US "freedom bombs" continue to liberate the wretched of the earth from their earthly bonds.
I digress. So here's the Freedom Car story. GM just revealed its first concept car.
==================================== http://www.autonews.com/printStory.cms?newsId=1310 Feds, Big 3 plan fuel-cell program By Richard Truett and Dale Jewett Automotive News / January 09, 2002
DETROIT - The Big 3 automakers and the federal government will begin putting money and effort into accelerating the development of fuel cell technology.
The FreedomCAR program will use money from the government to try and speed up the development of fuel cells for use in autos. The money will go to university and government research labs. DaimlerChrysler AG, Ford Motor Co. and General Motors engineers will gain access to the research, on a pre-competitive basis, to use to create fuel-cell vehicles. Each of the Big 3 has said previously that they would have small numbers of fuel-cell vehicles in production by 2004. ====================================
The cheapest source of hydrogen is not, alas, H2O, of which global warming is sending more and more in our way. It's - you guessed it - CH4, alias methane, a.k.a. natural gas, as in Turkmenistan. Yes, US bovines, the object of the next great US addiction after oil, i.e. steaks, are also a major producer of methane and global warming, and maybe they're part of the Freedom plan too. No press releases on that yet. To get back to hydrogen-from-methane: Known processes for extracting H2 from CH4 produce not water vapor or Oxygen, but our trust pals CO2 and CO http://www.cheresources.com/hydrogenzz.shtml. So the FreedomCAR will continue to do its patriotic duty warming up the earth, albeit to a lesser and less obvious extent.
OK so what's with Turkmenistan? Read all about it:
====================================
http://www.middleeastwire.com/iran/business/stories/20011022_2_meno.shtml Posted Monday October 22, 2001 - 10:54:05 AM EDT
(...) Steven Mann, special advisor to U.S. president and secretary of state for Caspian energy diplomacy, told a press conference Saturday that the prospects for Turkmenistan to export its oil and gas were "limited," and that Washington would seek new solutions which bypassed Iran. (...) Turkmenistan has exported several billion cubic meters of gas to Iran in recent years, to the chagrin of Washington which is seeking to limit Tehran's influence in the Caspian Sea region. (...) Washington has in the past attempted to convince Turkmenistan to build a gas pipeline to Turkey via the Caspian Sea, Azerbaijan and Georgia, a route which would also avoid Russia.
But the trans-Caspian pipeline project, which would be more than 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) long and cost some $2 billion has been hampered by various problems and events, notably the discovery two years ago of the Shah Deniz gas field in Azerbaijan, which is closer to Turkey [see: http://resources.net.az/d/cog1001.htm#04 ].
Mann said it would be a "tragedy" if the Central Asian nation did not go ahead with the pipeline. He said Niyazov is interested in exporting gas north to Russia, east toward China and south to Pakistan and India [also see: http://resources.net.az/d/cog1001.htm#07 ].
Mann's Ashkhabad visit revived U.S.-Turkmenistan dialogue on energy resources after a two-year gap [2 years ago is also when Clinton broke off US-Taliban negotiations - H.A.]. With known gas reserves of more than 3,000 billion square meters, Turkmenistan is the world's fourth biggest natural gas producer.
====================================
To sum it up: Turkmen gas is now safe behind a ring of US bases. Niyazov's dictatorship has nothing more to fear from the Russian- and Qaeda-backed islamic terrorists that were blowing things up everywhere, threatening to so with any future pipelines as well. Now it's time to think about where the pipeline is going to go without going to Iran. Obviously, if compliant and stable governments are available southwards, this shorter route will prevail.
The P2 lodge tried to take over Italy but they got their chemistry wrong (should have been P4). The H2 lodge has got it right, and it wants to rule the world.
Hakki