I'd be more sympathetic towards GM, concerning the EV1, if they had simply ended the program. It's one thing to say, "These cars didn't sell well and the technology's not really there yet." It's quite a different thing to confiscate the EV1s, crush them into cubes, then melt them down to slag, then pretend the whole project never existed.

At least Toyota let their customers keep their Rav-EV trucks until they were legitimately used up.

Also, GM doesn't seem to have kept any useful data from their EV1 project. If they did, then they wouldn't be trying to force-fit the hybrid system from a diesel locomotive down into a full-size SUV (aka 2-mode). For Toyota, however, I guarantee that there is plenty of RAV-EV technology is modern day HSD systems.

Giving away free gas is just a gimmick. I agree with the GM marketer that it's no more sinister than any other kind of rebate.

I do think that they've wasted too much time and money trying to develop fuel cell technology. After all, how commercially viable can a technology be if it requires several pounds of platinum PER VEHICLE! Is there even enough platinum worldwide to allow for mass production?