Utilities May Offer (Not Entirely Altruistic) Help to Auto Companies

A smart move by the utilities, who will benefit from a wholesale switchover to electric cars:

The auto industry’s quest to launch a new generation of electric cars may get a big boost from a sector with much to gain from getting advanced vehicles on the road: U.S. electric utilities.

Top executives at several utilities are mulling the possibility of ordering thousands of the vehicles — known as plug-in electric cars — as an expression of support for the technology they fear could be derailed by the auto industry’s financial traumas. The cars would run primarily on electricity, with gasoline to extend their range, and would recharge by plugging into standard electrical outlets.

Utilities stand to gain by selling the electricity needed to power the cars. Because power companies own tens of thousands of cars for their own company fleets, the idea under discussion involves putting in a substantial order to put weight behind development and, perhaps, persuade Congress to give the auto industry the assistance it needs.

“I want to say one word to you. Just one word. Plug-Ins.”

Jeffrey Leonard, CEO of the Global Environment Fund, doesn’t think much of the presidential candidates’ plans to spend heavily on domestically produced liquid fuel–whether it’s oil or ethanol. Instead, Leaonard pushes for big investments in electric cars. From his article, “The Plug-In Revolution“:

In the film The Graduate, Walter Brooks famously gives Dustin Hoffman a one-word piece of career advice: “Plastics.” At the risk of sounding similarly glib, let me nevertheless suggest a one-word answer to our multifaceted energy problems: electrification.

The basic idea is very simple. Over the next few decades, government policies should advance the aim of replacing oil and most other liquid fuels with electricity. It should also ensure that the way we generate electricity gets steadily greener and more efficient. Since about three-quarters of our oil goes into our cars, this means favoring policies that will encourage phasing out the internal combustion engine in favor of the electric engine — a direction in which many automakers are already headed.

Electrification as a rallying cry for American energy policy isn’t perfect, but in my view it’s the best and perhaps only way to get us to a clean and secure energy future.

The major automakers–like Chevy and Honda–are already racing to develop the first mass-produced (and hopefully affordable) plug-in hybrid vehicles. Now it’s time for DC to catch up with policies that keep this progress going.

(HT: Political Animal)

Pimped Out Hybrids

The new Honda Insight looks pretty sweet (and it’s affordable at $19K):

Though perhaps not as sweet as this Lamborghini:

I can’t stop drooling…

Hydrogen Car Not On Jack’s Bucket List

Looks like Jack Nicholson already had one…in 1978!

30 years later, mass-produced hydrogen fuel cell cars are still a far-off possibility. Kind of depressing, isn’t it?

(HT: TreeHugger)

Honda Ups the Ante With Zero-Emission Clarity

The dream of a hydrogen economy took one step closer to becoming reality today:

Honda’s new zero-emission, hydrogen fuel cell car rolled off a Japanese production line Monday and is headed to Southern California, where Hollywood is already abuzz over the latest splash in green motoring.

The FCX Clarity, which runs on hydrogen and electricity, emits only water and none of the noxious fumes believed to induce global warming. It is also two times more energy efficient than a gas-electric hybrid and three times that of a standard gasoline-powered car, the company says.

Unfortunately, we have a ways to go before the hydrogen fuel cell cars become the norm, mainly because of a “dearth of hydrogen fuel stations.” Honda limited sales of the Clarity to customers living in the areas of SoCal with hydrogen stations.

Even in eco-chic California, the necessary infrastructure doesn’t yet exist for fuel cells to beat out the internal combustion engine:

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has called for a statewide network of hydrogen stations, but progress has been slow.

The state has also recently relaxed a mandate for the number of zero-emission cars it aims to have on roads. By 2014, automakers must now sell 7,500 electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, a reduction of 70 percent.

Still, it’s very cool to have these zero-emissions cars on the road, even if that road doesn’t extend out of southern California.

The End of the Road for the Hummer

It looks like the Hummer may go the way of the De Lorean. From the New York Times:

Even General Motors, the steadfast champion of big sport utility vehicles and pickup trucks, is thinking small now. [...]

G.M.’s chairman and chief executive, Rick Wagoner, said G.M. will cease production at four North American assembly plants that make S.U.V.’s and pickups by 2010.

And in a humbling admission that the S.U.V. era is all but over, G.M., Detroit’s leading automaker, said it was considering selling the gas-guzzling Hummer brand it once regarded as a pillar of future growth.

Gas Nears $4 a Gallon, Driving Falls 4 Percent

It looks like $4.00 a gallon really is the point where America’s drivers really start to change their behavior. CNN reports:

At a time when gas prices are at an all-time high, Americans have curtailed their driving at a historic rate.

The Department of Transportation said figures from March show the steepest decrease in driving ever recorded.

Compared with March a year earlier, Americans drove an estimated 4.3 percent less — that’s 11 billion fewer miles, the DOT’s Federal Highway Administration said Monday, calling it “the sharpest yearly drop for any month in FHWA history.” Records have been kept since 1942.

According to AAA, for the first time since 2002, Americans said they were planning to drive less over the Memorial Day weekend than they did the year before.

UPDATE: The downward trend in driving rates is likely to continue. “More than 70 percent of Americans say they expect gasoline prices to top $5 a gallon by the end of the summer,” the Washington Times reports.

Get On Down to Your Prius Dealership Today!

Yesterday, Toyota announced a major milestone in sales of their fuel efficient Prius:

Toyota’s Prius started out a decade ago as a risky experiment in green technology. Today it is the world’s first mass-produced petrol-electric hybrid car to hit 1 million in sales. [...]

Toyota Motor Corp said yesterday 1.028 million Prius models had been sold to the end of April.

As gas prices continue to rise and consumers being to change their car buying habits, the Prius has been the one bright spot in a tough year for Toyota:

Toyota’s U.S. sales, down 3.3 percent this year through April, are heading for the first annual decrease since 1995. By contrast, Prius deliveries are up 23 percent in 2008, to 64,664 vehicles. Already the world’s best-selling hybrid, Prius was No. 9 in U.S. passenger-car sales through April, its highest ranking.

For those of you in the market for a Prius, get down to your local Toyota dealer soon as possible, since supplies of the car are at the “lowest level in two years”:

Toyota Motor Corp.’s Prius hybrid, the most fuel-efficient car sold in the U.S., is getting harder to find on dealer lots and commanding higher prices when customers do.

It can take up to two weeks to receive delivery of the hybrid-electric vehicle, said Mark Harding, general manager of Toyota of Santa Monica, in Santa Monica, California.

“We’ve got some in stock at the moment, but we’ve also got a waiting list,” he said. “Supply is very tight.”

“Right now, U.S. customers can get a Prius,” a Toyota spokesman warns.” Next month or the month after that, it’s tough to say.”