More Loss to American Taxpayers through Bankruptcy of Battery Makers

This is a continuing saga of one bankruptcy event after another involving loss of tremendous sums by the American taxpayer through government grants to support a non-workable system.

The latest report by Marc Reisch in the October 22 issue of Chemical and Engineering News says that A123 Systems, a lithium-ion battery maker, has gone bust. Its remaining assets were sold to Johnson Controls, another lithium-ion battery maker. We will see how long Johnson Controls can last.

A123 Systems received $249 million of federal taxpayer funds from the Department of Energy and $125 billion of Michigan taxpayers funds from that state.  

A123 Systems has flirted with bankruptcy for the past year as the large market it had envisioned for electronic vehicles never materialized. No matter how much the federal government may be in love with electronic vehicles, they are not well accepted by the American public to the extent that the normal automobile buyer will lay out his cash.