Another one to add to the list

I have a new hobby. It's not one that is going to get me out of the house much, it probably won't help me make new friends and it's certainly not very relaxing. But it is strangely compelling.
My new pastime is tracking down initiatives used by overseas governments to stimulate a hi-tech low-carbon economy, which Gordon Brown has trumpeted as our saviour from the current grinding fiscal gloom.
Once identified, I then start my mental stopwatch to measure the time that elapses before our government finally catches up and takes similar steps.
And if I were blessed with a mathematical brain I would work out a complex algorithm to show how far behind the low-carbon curve the UK will be when we eventually emerge from recession.
Last week another of these measures was brought to my attention.
In an interview with Modec, the Coventry-based makers of electric commercial vehicles, the company's chairman Lord Borwick spoke of Modec's bulging order book - virtually all of which is destined for export or for overseas firms present in the UK.
Why, when we have such a great example of Midland innovation and engineering right here on our doorstep, is all of it going abroad?
Of course exporting our knowhow is a great thing and should be applauded in its own right and granted, the scale of Modec's production is tiny compared to other big-name vehicle makers in the region.
But it would surely be best if Modec could sell to both the UK and overseas markets and as well as helping our balance of trade, Modec's products could push us some way towards meeting the UK's ambitious target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent on 1990 levels by 2050.
The reason most of Modec's production goes abroad is that other countries have introduced tax breaks for companies investing in electric vehicles.
For example in Ireland businesses which purchase electric vehicles are able to write off 100 per cent of the cost against tax. France, Germany and the US all have similar schemes. Even in Republican Texas, the spiritual home of fossil fuel, a $5,000 subsidy is being considered for people investing in electric hybrid cars.
As Lord Borwick put it: "If you look at America there is an urgency about doing something that was never there before.
"But in Britain we always had the idea about green things but others are surpassing us by actually doing something."
Last week on this blog, I compared the government's slowness to act on vehicle scrappage schemes to its decade-long reluctance to introduce another demand-stimulating green measure - feed-in tariffs.
I am now officially adding tax breaks for electric commercial vehicles to that list of things that let the grass grow under our feet while engineering jobs are slowly disappearing into the ether.
Ssshh - can you hear that stopwatch? Tick tick tick.