They influence government policy through very powerful lobbying.

It is well known that most of the R&D in the energy industry comes from government funding and tax credits, and that also applies to the oil industry that for decades did not have to pay any corporate income taxes due to the oil depreciation allowance. Today they still get large tax credits for any money they spend on R&D -- at a time when they are showing record profits.

And at the same time, the government has refused to provide similar tax credits for companies developing alternate energy sources. But that is what you get when the oil lobby writes the government's energy policy.

Another issue is fuel efficiency standards. The government has refused in recent years to increase these nearly enough. While China has fuel efficiency standards of around 35 mpg, and the European Union has fuel efficiency standards of over 40 mpg, here in the US we are stuck at around 23 mpg. The Model-T Ford from 100 years ago got 24 mpg. That is pathetic.

My computer processor is 100 times faster than one made 15 years ago, and it uses 10 times less energy to operate. My cell phone that has a color screen and is slightly larger than a credit card with a very tiny battery, operates for 5 days on a single battery charge. My cell phone from 12 years ago was the size of a brick with a huge battery, had a one line monochrome digital display, and operated for about 8 hours on a battery charge.

Efficiency can be increased a hundred times over if they really want to. But instead we are still using the same 100-year-old internal combustion engine. It's an old technology that should have died along with the steam engine.

You also may want to watch this movie:

http://www.sonyclassics.com/whokilledtheelectriccar/