Does anyone wonder why the price of lead has sky rocketed over the past few years? It has jumped from $.30/lb to $1.80. That means a 2,000 lb lead acid battery's raw material went from $600 to $3600. My conspiracy theory is that this is an intentional market manipulation to make Hydrogen fuel cells more economically competitive. (Is it the American government who see the development of Hydrogen for the lift truck industry as an interm step toward Hydrogen taking over from oil?)