More on $300M Battery Proposal

McCain: $300 million for battery - DetNews.com - link from the X PRIZE Foundation news widget - This article has more details than the ones I skimmed over yesterday. Some excerpts:

The battery will have to deliver the necessary power at 30 percent of current costs. Final details of the plan are not yet available, but Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a senior McCain economic adviser, told The Detroit News that any company worldwide could qualify for the $300 million as long as they planned to sell in the United States -- meaning U.S. taxpayers could end up paying a battery maker from Asia, where most research is being conducted.

Holtz-Eakin said the winner would have to produce "more than one" battery and demonstrate it could be produced in large quantities. But he acknowledged the campaign hasn't written the technical specifications for the prize.

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Andrew Frank, a professor at the University of California-Davis and an expert on plug-in battery technology, said McCain's prize could spur a breakthrough.

"The auto industry is putting a toe in the water," he said. "This could get them over the hump."

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"It's a bogus solution to a major problem," Obama economic adviser Jason Furman said of McCain's plan.