Going the Extra Mile for Planet and Detroit
First off, my disclosure, i’ve lived my whole life within 50 miles of the headquarters of each of the Big 3, now the Detroit 3, first in Michigan and now in Ontario. So, i have a vested interest in the US auto companies surviving, while at the same time, i want to solve global warming. There is an inherent conflict between the goal of saving the planet and gasoline powered cars and trucks. The only way to achieve an environmentally friendly vehicle is to create only non-emitting vehicles, most likely the electric vehicles that are starting to be launched and announced over the last year. The transition to electric vehicles is expected to take 20 years, in the mean time, governments are increasing fleet mileage requirments to help reduce emissions.
Higher mileage requirements are on the way, the state of California has legislated it, others states have joined the standard and President Obama has weighed in with his support of the same. Is it any surprise that the Detroit 3, Michigan’s govenor, senators and congressional deligation are less receptive to these tougher standards. Whenever it’s come to high mileage (translate that to small) cars, Detroit has repeatedly failed to succeed in the marketplace, so the reaction in auto country is understood. But what if we can help put Detroit in (dare i say ‘The Driver’s Seat’) an adventageous position through legislation that helps auto makers meet these standards by rewarding them for alternative energy vehicles.
My proposal is simple, reward automakers for selling rechargeable electric cars, that can run at least 40 miles without charging, whether a 100% electric or a plug-chargeable hybrid. The idea would be to take the EPA mileage rating of a plug-in hybrid on a single tank tank of gas and let automakers double it for the purpose of calculating an overall average fleet fuel mileage. Say the new Chevy volt can be charged up, filled with 10 gallons of gas and driven 500 miles for a average of 50 miles per gallon of gas, GM could add the sale of 1 car with a 100 mpg (50 miles x 2) to their overal fleet. If a car was fully electric, with no gas engine, the manufacturer could take the range of the vehicle, per charge and triple it. For a 100% electric car that had a 100 mile range, the auto manufacturer who sold it could count it as a 300 mpg vehicle. This incentivizes all auto manufactures, not only the Detroit 3, to introduce electric cars to help reach higher mileage standards, without limiting the range of hydrocarbon fueled vehicles they offer. In short, this let’s Detroit sell SUVs and Pickups, if they can sell enough green vehicles to keep their fleet averages about the government’s minimum.
Electric vehicles are inherently more efficient than the internal combustion engine, so less CO2 is generated for each mile driven. Electricity can be generated from large traditional power plants which are efficent to operate and limits the number of pollution sources compared to 100s of millions of gasoline powered vehicle. Finally electric has number sources of generation including a growing number non-emitting, renewable sources.
February 9th, 2009 at 1:27 pm
Thanks for your post, it is always nice to read posts from other people who care.
February 23rd, 2009 at 11:43 am
I think it’s great that automakers are now providing hybrid cars with electric motors, because it change was way overdue! I mean, it is 2009 and people are automakers are still pumping thousands of gas-guzzling vehicles into the market. I find it hard to believe that we can send a space craft to Mars, but we don’t possess the technology or resources to make our vehicles more fuel efficient!
I’m not so sure that electric vehicles will solve the pollution problem, or the oil problem in the US. I recently had an energy economics class where we focused most of the semester on power generation and greenhouse gas emissions. According to what I learned in class it’s a common misconception that automobiles are the main cause for air pollution. Actually, generating trillions of megawatts of electricity each year through fossil fuel power plants is the main cause of greenhouse emissions, while all automobile emissions make up less than 10% of the total CO2 emissions in the US each year.
I think that electric vehicles only shift the pollution, and could actually pollute the environment more as more stress is put on fossil fuel power plants to supply the electricity to charge these vehicles. I know that in large cities the air pollution can be pretty dense (I live about an hour from LA), but the best solution to reducing our air pollution is to free ourselves from the electricity grid. More money should be invested in renewable energy generation, and once that is established, we should focus on electric vehicles, because we will have a CLEAN electricity source to charge them from.
Now is the perfect time to install a renewable energy system in your home. There are TONS of incentives offered by the government that will virtually pay for the entire system (whether it be wind, solar or both). Installation costs are usually $2,000.00 or more, BUT, if you want to save money you could pick up a very inexpensive do-it-yourself guide to install a system for about $300.00! You can check out http://www.ournerg.com/energy-by-earth.php for more info on the guide.
Like I said before, with the incentives that the government is currently giving it is best to focus on energy independence for your home. I believe you can receive up to $5,000.00 in tax credits just for having your own renewable energy system for your home. Basically, you can set up a renewable energy system for your home for free. If many people do this then we WILL see a drastic reduction in air pollution, and people will have a CLEAN source of electricity to power their new electric vehicles.