Free Republic

Consumer Reports has painted an ugly picture of the Nissan Leaf, as did an early enthusiast based in Los Angeles, who described his frustrations with the heavily subsidized, all-electric car in a recent column. Now comes what must be the definitive example of the Leaf’s impracticality – this time from a (still) hard-core advocate, whose 180-mile Tennessee trek to visit family over the holidays required four lengthy stops to keep the vehicle moving. Stephen Smith, executive director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, set out from Knoxville on Monday with his wife and son, headed for the Nashville...

Duke Energy urges electric car owners to stop using charging stations after fireUpdated: 1:37 pm EST November 9, 2011 CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Duke Energy officials are asking customers who own the company's electric car charging stations to stop using the product after a house fire in Mooresville last month. A representative from the company has confirmed to Channel 9 that an email was sent to about 125 customers in North Carolina, South Carolina and Indiana who have the same type of charging station installed in their homes.

The U.S. Secret Service does more than protect Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. — the agency also pays him rent. Since April, Mr. Biden has collected more than $13,000 from the agency charged with protecting him and his family, for use of a rental cottage adjacent to the waterfront home he owns in a Wilmington, Del., neighborhood. Mr. Biden, listed not as vice president in federal purchasing documents but as “vendor,” is eligible for up to $66,000 by the time the government contract expires in the fall of 2013, the records show. Officials say the arrangement came about when...

PARIS (AFP) – Charging electric cars at night eases a smog problem caused by fossil-fuel plants which provide the power for these vehicles, researchers reported on Tuesday. Plug-in cars are viewed as a key tool in the fight for a cleaner planet as they do not emit tailpipe pollution when they run on electricity. But they contribute indirectly to pollution, as well as global warming, if their electricity comes from a power station that runs on coal, oil or gas. In a study published in a British journal, scientists in the United States simulated the local impact from "plug-in hybrid...

It’s an exceedingly normal four-door that just happens to sever the umbilical cord that tethers our cars to a region of political instability, the Middle East. Even if net emissions were the same as a gas car’s — and they’re not — I’d rather send my money to a coal miner in West Virginia than to the sultan of Brunei or to Hugo Chávez in Venezuela...

Californians may end up paying the highest electricity rates in the country to charge their electric vehicles, a new study says. The state's tiered rate system, in which customers are charged higher rates as they use more electricity, could make plug-in hybrid and battery-powered vehicles more costly to own, according to a Purdue University study. The study was unveiled as the first of the electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles are reaching consumers. Two vehicles, the all-electric Nissan Leaf and the plug-in hybrid Chevrolet Volt, started being delivered to their first customers last month. Electric-car makers and utilities said most owners...

Charge, Charge, Charge....The Market Ticker ®Sunday, June 13. 2010 Posted by Karl Denninger in Editorial at 13:38 Charge, Charge, Charge.... .... until China takes the credit card away! President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers Saturday to quickly approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to state and local governments, saying the money is needed to avoid "massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters" and to support the still-fragile economic recovery. Uh huh. Where was the restraint during the last decade on hiring those teachers, police and firefighters? Missing, that's where. How many cities, counties and states have permitted public employee unions...

NEW YORK (AFP) – With The New York Times and Rupert Murdoch poised to start charging for newspapers online, media heavyweights sparred on Thursday over whether readers will pay for news on the Web. The Times plans to require payment for full access to NYTimes.com in early 2011 and Murdoch, who already charges for The Wall Street Journal online, has pledged to begin charging Web readers of his other News Corp. newspapers. Keynote speakers and panelists at the Bloomberg BusinessWeek Media Summit here differed sharply on whether Internet users would be ready to shell out money for what they have...

WASHINGTON - Ask for a pillow and blanket to help get through a long flight and you may be out of luck. Or you may be able to buy a "comfort package" from Air Canada for $2. Like to check your luggage curbside? That could cost up to $3 a bag. Airlines are starting to charge for many services that once were free — such as assigned seating, paper tickets and blankets. Air travelers who don't fly often may be in for some unpleasant surprises when they reach the airport this summer. "They're going to be confused and they're going...

DALLAS (AP) - Blockbuster Inc., the world's largest video rental chain, said Tuesday that as of Jan. 1, 2005, the company won't charge late fees on any movie or game rental at its more than 4,500 company-operated and franchised stores in the United States. Under the ``no late fees'' program, a customer has one week to return games and two days or one week for movies. Also, Blockbuster will give customers a one-week grace period at no additional charge. After that, Blockbuster will automatically sell them the product, minus the rental fee, or customers can return the product within 30...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Grieving families in San Francisco can expect to pay $700 if they want the medical examiner to cremate a loved one's remains. Nightclub bouncers in San Diego are footing a bill of $152 apiece for new worker's permits. And stores that sell cigarettes in the state capital have started counting an extra $300 into their annual cost of doing business. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger may have strong-armed lawmakers into supporting his "no new taxes" pledge, but Californians still will be paying more for government as a result of the budget compromise struck in Sacramento this week. Legally...

Surfing the Web these days requires two hands - one to click the mouse, the other to dig into your pocket to pay fees demanded by sites that used to be free. Every day, it seems, another desperate dot-com concludes it's better to charge a smaller congregation of visitors than to lose money on a mass audience looking to get something for nothing. "The presumption has always been you would have free access to almost everything for one basic price of admission. That's probably not going to be the case any longer," said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet...