Long-Term View on the Subsidisation of Hybrids

An interesting article from McKinsey Quarterly on the long-term economic issues surrounding the subsidisation of plug-in hybrid vehicles.  Maybe City Council should look at requirements or incentives for taxis or similar commercial vehicles to be hybrid vehicles if they are serious about GHG reductions.  Colby Cash at the National Post has some interesting views on the subsidisation issue and also suggests that taxis are the area where subsidies or incentives for hybrids do make sense.

Mobile Wallet?

Here's a new service, zoompass, that is trying to implement mobile payments in Canada.  Looks interesting, but so far, no mention of being able to make payments to merchants.  Now, if you could use this to make small routine payments instead of cash it could be a winner.   Imagine being able to avoid line-ups to buy a fare at the TTC by just swiping or sending your payment by mobile phone!  What about being able to pay for your taxi cab or lunch this way as well!  There have been several trials on this type of payment system, but so far it hasn't succeeded here in Canada (remember Dexit?).  I have seen the Mastercard Paypass system, which zoompass also supports, but I have no idea on the level of adoption.  Only time will tell...