Creativity thrives in times of chaos and transition. Dada was born in World War I. Punk Rock arrived in the strife-torn streets of 1970s New York City. Automotive engineering– the art of bringing order to chaos– also fits this template. German automakers did some of their most innovative work in the turbulent years immediately after WWII. And now that environmental regulations and changing business conditions have upset the international automotive applecart, we’re looking at another explosion of engineering creativity. Ground zero for some of this work: the alternative propulsion experiments of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) collegiate branches. 

The name of this game is Challenge X – Crossover to Sustainable Mobility. The contest challenges fledgling engineers from 17 American universities to design, build and test a hybrid vehicle architecture based on a 2005 Chevrolet Equinox. They must utilize alternative fuels to reduce the vehicle's energy consumption while maintaining standard-issue performance, utility and safety.

The Challenge X’ timeline is modeled after GM’s development cycle. SAE students have four years to turn Chevy’s hunk of charcoal (sorry Equinox lovers) into an eco-friendly gem. For those readers who suffer from ADD, here are the Challenge X Cliff Notes:

Year one: teams devise theories, build models and create simulations for a new, more mpg-friendly Equinox powertrain. Year two: the judges determine which teams get the keys. The teams take delivery of their high tech kit, and attempt to install it into their prototype. Years three and four: they refine their handiwork and restore their eco-modded Equinox to “near showroom quality.”

If you think the Chevy Equinox is another forgettable CUV, you may be right. But you haven’t driven the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Challenge X variant, christened Moovada. A Movado watch for bovines? Hey, they’re engineers (they probably don't know what I'm talking about). Speaking of which… Geek alert! If you’re not technically inclined, you might want to skip the next two paragraphs.

The Moovada is a split-parallel hybrid holstering a GM 110 kW 1.9-liter CIDI engine (found in the Fiat Punto-D) coupled to a GM F40 six-speed manual transmission. The rear axle is powered by a Ballard induction motor/gearbox powerlimited to 59 kW by the 44-module (317 volts nominal) Johnson Controls’ nickel-metal hydride hybrid battery pack. The vehicle is fueled by B20, which has a lower GHGI impact than conventional diesel fuel.

The hybrid controller is a Motorola MPC555 based Powertrain Control Module (PCM) embedded controller with 38 inputs, 28 outputs and dual CAN bus capability specifically designed for automotive applications. Wisconsin is utilizing ANSI C language for code development and MotoTron development tools for programming the controller.

Simply put, the team’s five groups (each responsible for a different vehicle system) have engineered a new powertrain package for the Equinox that delivers both fuel efficiency and entertainment. That’s right: it’s fun to drive.

Forget about the 36mpg and super-duper clean emissions. The Challenge X Equinox from the “Eat Cheese or Die” state delivers smooth and seamless power that combines golf cart-like torque with the progressive power of a diesel mill. The shifter is as wonderfully flickable as the clutch is progressive. Using Challenge X-specific Michelin tires, the Equinox not only corners with precision, it provides a quiet and comfortable ride. 

Aside from the electric motor’s straight-cut cogs doing their best impression of an M-22 Rockcrusher running down the dragstrip, the Equinox behaves as well as any CUV, with a much more enjoyable powerband. Ladies and gentlemen, The University of Wisconsin-Madison team nailed it.

And now they’re perfecting it. The team is rebuilding the Moovado’s exhaust system, refining the controls system and repackaging the batteries. They’re modifying both Equinox’ interior and exterior to reflect a more "consumer acceptable" vehicle. And then, of course, there’s more testing and calibration, to assure the Moovado's performance, economy and ride quality.

Ten years ago, I was in their shoes. Back then, my team was fitting a Chrysler minivan with propane propulsion. Looking into the team members' eyes brought it all back, and puts everything in perspective. They work as a team for a common goal under a common budget. They believe in their product and their eco-friendly mission: take what GM builds and improve it for the environment– without sacrificing comfort, convenience or credibility.

Just think what these manager/creator/mentors could do at GM if the people who make cars got to “make” cars. It could happen. In these desperate days, when GM has finally realized that plug-in hybrids and other new tech could be their last, best hope for survival, GM’s engineers may once again assume their rightful place at the head of the development table.

Meanwhile, the kids are alright.

As president and CEO of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, representing BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Ford, General Motors, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Porsche, Toyota and Volkswagen, I can speak firsthand about the radical transformation that has been taking place within this global industry. For starters, let me be especially clear on this particular item: automakers support increasing Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards. In fact, today’s auto industry is currently advocating for the largest CAFE increase in U.S. history.

The Alliance supports an unprecedented 30 percent to 40 percent CAFE increase over the next 15 years. We believe it’s time to end the debate. We urge Congress to act now, so we can continue with the hard work needed to further our efforts to improve fuel economy. To find the basis for an argument that the auto industry feels otherwise, one would have to dig pretty deep into the archives.

You’d have to go back further than July 3 of this year. That’s the date the Associated Press first reported that we supported the Hill-Terry Bill (H.R. 2927), which calls for that historic CAFE average increase to 32mpg to 35mpg. This aggressive, but responsible bill currently has more than 120 cosponsors just two weeks after its introduction.

You’d have to go back further than March – that’s when the CEOs of four of our member companies testified before a House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee and pledged to support tough laws to combat global warming. True to our word, we have openly and aggressively supported CAFE legislation that serves both the environment and consumers.

You’d have to go back further than the late 1990s, when we were hard at work designing and engineering the 60 models of Alternative Fuel Automobiles (AFAs) on sale today – a 500 percent increase over the number of models available in 2000. AFAs run on power other than petroleum, and just a few years ago many consumers didn’t know what hybrids, biodiesels and E85 vehicles were.  Today they’re buying them in record numbers.

In fact, to find the basis of Mr. Webber’s arguments [see; below], you would have to stretch all the way back to archives of the 1970s – when many of today’s auto industry leaders were still in college. The fact of the matter is that many of the people featured in those old black and white television clips and the now-yellowed newspaper clippings detailing the debates of the 1970s are no longer even in the auto manufacturing business.

Today’s auto industry is a new industry. Today’s automakers are committed to producing vehicles that use less fuel and meet our consumers’ diverse needs; whether our consumers run a small business and need a pick-up truck, have a large family and want, say, a minivan, or whether they want a small two-door coupe for themselves. Our job is to serve them all.

Transforming an entire industry and adapting to dramatic new CAFE standards takes planning. That’s why lead time is so important. Keep in mind that the cars and light trucks our engineers are working on today won’t be on sales floors until 2014 or later.

That’s how long it takes to coordinate the 3,000 different parts that go into a single vehicle. Or to enhance and refine the approximately 50 prototypes that lead to the production of just a single model.  It’s hard to anticipate consumer trends that far out.

But anticipating consumer trends is essential to CAFE because one of the program’s least-understood aspects is that it’s based on vehicles sold, not vehicles produced. And American consumers for five straight years have chosen light trucks over passenger cars.

To remain viable for our employees, communities and customers, auto companies have to make decisions years in advance based on cold, hard business facts. We cannot turn a blind eye to the laws of economy that apply to virtually every free-market industry in the world: customers rule. 

The cost of new technology cannot exceed what consumers are willing to pay. Sometimes cars that are designed well, built well, test well, marketed well and priced well, still – despite our best efforts – do not sell well.  And when that happens, it’s the auto manufacturers alone that have to absorb the losses and make tough decisions.

For now, the decision we as an industry have made is this: we are transforming automobiles and the fuels that power them. We want consumers, including Mr. Webber, to be are aware of is this. Our companies have evolved as much as our products have. This industry has suppliers in every single state, and our products draw upon technology developed around the world.

Mr. Webber’s column asks why opposition to higher fuel economy makes sense. On behalf of this industry, let me say that it doesn’t make sense. That’s why we’re not doing it. We support increased CAFE standards and stand ready to continue the hard work of getting the job done.  

[This article was written in response to a USA Today editorial "What are the Dinosaurs of Detroit thinking?" by Alan M. Webber. USA Today declined to run this rebuttal.]

The United States operates special courts to deal with taxes and bankruptcies. The issues are considered too complex and specialized for regular courts to adjudicate. So if the judiciary accommodates its own intellectual shortcomings, why can’t Congress do the same? The branch of the government with the lowest approval ratings (a whopping 25 percent according to this week’s Newsweek poll) spent this week contemplating an issue it does not, cannot fully comprehend: CAFE standards.

The U.S. Senate is allegedly the “smarter” chamber of Congress. Last Thursday, by a 65-27 vote, this august body passed a piece of automotive-related legislation fit only for a press release: “We love the environment!” In so doing, they raised the CAFE requirement from 22.7 miles per gallon to a seemingly stratospheric 35 miles per gallon.

This sounds good, if like most members of Congress, your knowledge of automobiles is restricted to driving them into bodies of water (Ted Kennedy D-MA) or barricades (Patrick Kennedy D-RI), being indicted for stealing them (Darrell Issa, R-CA) or careening into utility poles (John Sweeney, R-NY).  For anyone who knows anything about cars, the CAFE legislation is at best meaningless; at worst, it’s God awful. 

The new legislation represents the first raise of the CAFE standards since 1989. That would make it 18 years, if it went into effect today. But it doesn’t. Under the bill’s supposedly strict provisions, the 35 mpg standard kicks-in in 2020.

Of course, the thirteen year delay gives the automakers, car manufacturers, lobbyists, legislators and presidents thirteen years to put the issue on the back-burner, to find a new hot issue in need of “reform,” over which our elected representatives can posture, preen and prevaricate. The story may not even make news in 2014, when a clever page slips the postponement into a defense contract adopted at 3AM.

But the legislation’s failure isn’t related to the headline mpg provisions. As always, the devil’s in the details.

As this website has mentioned before, the agency in charge of the law’s implementation has changed the official formula used to establish a manufacturer’s light truck (pickups, SUVs) fleet averages. Instead of the current calculations (a simple fleet average), the mpg requirement will soon be based on an average spread across a number of vehicles, based on each model’s “footprint” (wheelbase x track width/144 = square footage), combined in whatever way the manufacturer sees fit, provided the combined average reaches the required overall number.

Like I said, it's a tax code on wheels. But basically, manufacturers can now create their own formula to arrive at the mandated overall average. Even more basically, if The Big 2.8 builds more big fuel-efficient pickup trucks and SUVs, they don’t have to sell a bunch of smaller fuel efficient pickup trucks and SUVs. Vehicles they’re not particularly good at making. Vehicles they can’t sell.

What’s wrong with that? Cheating. More specifically, the legislation maintains the E85 loophole that credits vehicles that can run on the ethanol blend with higher mpg— even though the vast majority of these SUV’s can’t access an E85 pump and get FEWER mpg when they do so.

And now the kicker: according The National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration (NHTSA) website, “The agency is seeking information in anticipation of obtaining statutory authority to reform the passenger car CAFE program and to set standards under that [footprint] structure for MY 2010 – 2017 passenger cars.”

What’s the bet they’ll get that authority? What’s the bet the manufacturers will E85 their way to compliance, and find other ways to play the system? Meanwhile, the new legislation contains another Detroit-friendly provision: the elimination of the “two fleet” rule.

Under current regulations, manufacturers’ fleets are separated into two distinct groups: imported and domestic vehicles. So Chevrolet can’t use frugal Korean-made Aveos to “average out” less-fuel efficient American and Canadian-made Corvettes and Impalas. If the legislation becomes law, they can.

This is a huge change: a mitzvah for Detroit and a calamity for the United Auto Workers (UAW). Simply put, you can kiss American small car production goodbye. Given The Big 2.8’s UAW labor costs, there is no way on God’s green Earth Ford, GM or Chryslerberus will continue building low-margin small cars on U.S. soil. They will import them from Korea, China, India or any other low-cost country they can find.

Needless to say, this is madness. At the risk of agreeing with GM Car Czar Maximum Bob Lutz, the CAFE law is designed to force Americans into fuel efficient cars they’ve proven time and time again they don’t want (50k Prii month? Big whoop.) While that idea may prove no impediment to many legislators, the more important truth is that it simply doesn’t work.

If you accept the goal, the only fair and effective way to get Americans to choose more fuel efficient automobiles, and thusly “incentivize” manufacturers to build them, is to raise the price of fuel. 

The Toyota Prius hybrid has been the high-mileage low-emissions darling of the chattering classes and their Hollywood pals for some time. Now, suddenly, sales have shot up, and it seems that the Prius is about to become a mainstream motor. While the little eco-warrior that could still doesn't account for a significant fraction of Ford F-150 sales, the question remains: is the Prius' recent sales surge a fluke?

In May '06, Toyota's North American operations sold 8103 Prii. That summer, the hybrid sedan's sales spiked in tandem with rising gas prices. In July and August, dealers sold over 11k units per month. In September, sales dropped back down to 10,492.

For the next four months, Prius sales retreated to the eights and nines. In truth, these fluctuations were minor variations on a basic trend: the Toyota Prius had flat-lined.  

In February, Toyota took action. They rolled-out a raft of special deals. New York customers could lease a Prius for as little as $219 a month. In Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky, shoppers could finance the hybrid for 3.9 percent for 36 months.

ToMoCo also gambled that the increased incentives would yield sales. They ramped up production in Japan and eliminated dealer backlog.

The afterburners were lit.

In February, the Prius beat its previous year's high water mark by 1050 units (12,227 vs. 11,177). In March sales took off. Some 19,156 Prii found new owners, up 6929 units from the previous month's total.

In April, Toyota seized the day. They launched their first national ad campaign for the Prius and offered $600 to $2k cash back on specific option packages. The result: 13,056 units. In May, the Prius finally achieved low earth orbit: 24,009 sales.

To put these numbers into context, consider the fate of the Toyota Highlander Hybrid. In both relative and absolute terms, the gas-electric soft-roader has done– and continues to do– nothing. This year's sales have yet to top the results achieved last April and May (3768 and 3755).

By the same token, last July and August, the Toyota Camry hybrid's sales peaked at 5023 (in lockstep with the Prius' fortunes). And then… niente. Although the Camry hybrid also experienced a record-setting surge in May (5144), it was nothing to write home about.

The Ford Escape hybrid peaked last April, at 3039. It's been downhill from there. January was a representative low point, accounting for just 1039 units. In May– just as the Prius hit its attention-getting 24k+ mark– Ford struggled to offload 2680 Escape Hybrids.

The Honda Civic hybrids' sales parallel the Escape hybrid's fate. The gas-electric Civic has yet to beat its April '06 peak of 3087 units. As for the the soon-to-be-discontinued Honda Accord Hybrid, the model never sold more than 783 units per month.

The easy analysis: rising gas prices and lowered sticker prices released a wave of pent-up demand for Toyota's gas-electric model. While there's more than a modicum of truth to that conclusion, it's also clear the Prius' recent success wasn't a case of a rising tide lifting all hybrid-powered boats.

In retrospect, it's obvious that the Prius' achievement is a branding-related success. When gas prices spiked, America's fuel efficiency-challenged drivers didn't want "a" hybrid; they wanted "the" hybrid. On the downside, this may mean that some of the Prius' sales gains were fashion-related. 

Many of May's $20k-ish Prii may also have been purchased as a third car for a two-car family. If it's a large chunk of the total, that could bode badly for the gas-electric automobile's longer term prospects; there are only so many families wealthy enough to park a spare gas guzzler on their driveway. 

That said, it's unlikely that the Prius is about to fall back into its previous sales torpor. For one thing, the model has passed a crucial price/image-related tipping point. For another, Toyota has learned a valuable lesson: even a PC "halo car" isn't immune from the market-driven price calculations affecting its other models.

In other words, anything will sell at the right price. No matter how hot the demand for the new, even more fuel efficient Prius, there's no way Toyota's going to under-produce and over-price Prius v3. Look for the sales surge to continue.

In 1993, Toyota began developing a radical gas-electric hybrid vehicle called the Prius. With gasoline at historic lows, internal company documents gave the concept a five percent chance of commercial success. In May 2007, the Prius was America's sixth best selling passenger car, with 24k units. Toyota also just passed the one-million-hybrids-sold milestone. Toyota deserves a raspberry for the worst internal forecasting ever, and an award for one of the most successful new-car launches in automotive history.

Needless to say, the Prius' success is not without controversy. The Japanese hybrid has a more polarizing influence on pistonhead opinion than any other vehicle made save its philosophic nemesis, the Hummer H2. Compare the gas-swilling in-your-face Hummer's rumored demise with the Prius' rise up the sales charts, and there you have it: a snapshot of American's shifting priorities.  

You also get a glimpse of Toyota's branding expertise. While the Japanese automaker continues its assault on the domestic pickup truck and SUV market (creating much of the animus alluded to above), the Prius is still a perfectly defined product within Toyota's existing brand identity: reliable frugality.

The Prius is such hit that it's now a household name; consumers interchange the word "Prius" with "hybrid" in the same way that they ask for a Kleenex. The last automotive product to pull that off was the Jeep– some fifty years ago.

Toyota's 80 percent share of the total U.S. hybrid market has had the Xerox effect on its competitors. Their hybrids are either flying beneath the radar (Nissan Altima hybrid), eating crumbs off Toyota's table (Ford Escape and Mercury Mariner hybrid) or retreating from the field of battle (Honda Accord hybrid).    

Honda's move comes despite the fact that the company's Insight hybrid was first to market in 1999. While Honda will continue to fight for gas-electric market share with their "mild" hybrid Civic, they're putting their high-efficiency eggs in two new baskets: a new Fit-class hybrid and clean diesel engines for their existing model range.  

Pundits often argue that Toyota stole a march on its competitors by creating a hybrid with unique sheetmetal (as opposed to hybrid-powered versions of existing products). Well, the Prius has had such a dramatic halo effect that consumers now associate the technology with Toyota's entire lineup. Hybrid Camrys are currently outselling hybrid Civics by 50 percent.

Toyota's success with the technology has forced all the other global players to put their nose to the hybrid-powered grindstone. Mercedes and BMW bought into GM's sophisticated (read: expensive) two-mode hybrid drive. Buyer's remorse may be setting in; the Germans are now focusing on developing their own mild-hybrid technology.

The shift reflects a realization that competing with Toyota mano-a-mano with full hybrids is a sucker's bet– especially as the Prius v3 looms. (Toyota is targeting a 20 percent efficiency gain.) The other factor is simple cost-effectiveness. Mild hybrids yield a greater return on investment.

Whereas a full hybrid demands a [ballpark] $2500 production premium, micro and mild hybrids start at $700. When combined with other technologies such as direct injection and full valve control, the mild hybrid seems a far safer proposition. BMW's revised 1-Series– complete with start-stop engine management, valve control and direct injection– shows a 20 percent fuel efficiency improvement over its predecessor.

In short, Toyota's competitors are hedging their bets, looking for less risky across-the-board fuel efficiency solutions.

The market is bi-furcating: "real" hybrids (which the market increasingly interprets as Prius/Toyota) and micro/mild hybrids (traditional models sold on their over-all moderate efficiency gains, rather than "gee whiz" technology).

And where does this shifting market leave Toyota? Dual propulsion, full-speed ahead!

Despite the fact that Highlander Hybrid sales are down 23 percent year-to-date (just over 3k units in May), the company has publicly stated that every one of their models will have optional Hybrid Synergy Drive within a few years. They've also committed the company's vast technological resources and production expertise to reducing the cost of their hybrid system by some 50 percent.

Toyota is playing a powerful hand. If they can achieve their cost-reduction target, they'll be selling more sophisticated (and more efficient) full hybrids at roughly the same price as the rest of the industry's mild hybrids. And if Prius v3 is significantly more efficient than its predecessor, the model will maintain its role as Toyota's hybrid halo-bearer.

In any case, the Prius is now a fully fledged four-wheeled corporate emblem. And Toyota has announced a family of Prii, including a station wagon and a smaller city car. The hybrid pro-con arguments can go on endlessly in their (internet) vacuum. Toyota took a huge gamble with the Prius. It's paid off at the bottom line, and looks set to do so for many years to come.

On Tuesday, Detroit's top execs made another pilgrimage to Washington, D.C. The Detroit News reported that the troubled troika all arrived at Capitol Hill in fuel-efficient vehicles as a "symbolic gesture." Mulally belted across the Beltway in a Ford Escape hybrid. Wagoner wheeled up in a hybrid Saturn Aura. And LaSorda made the scene in a flex-fuel Town & Country minivan. Of course, none of these vehicles are their makers' most frugal cars. However, we can't have America's automotive aristocrats getting off their fuel-sucking private corporate jets and jumping into a run-of-the-mill Aveo, Focus or Caliber, now can we?

The hypocrisy is stunning. Lest we forget, when the Toyota Prius first whirred into view, Detroit dismissed the gas-electric hybrid vehicle as a meaningless PR stunt. And now, two out of three American automotive magnates cloak themselves in hybrid hype to convince Washington they're down with the whole hi-tech gas-saving thing. You know; now that they want some help competing on a "level playing field" with those tricky transplants. Again. Still.

Of course, this kind of running-on-empty automotive gesture is hardly restricted to Michigan's golden parachute-clad corporate con artists. No Hollywood star worth his or her Oprah confessional would dare show up at a red carpet event in a gas guzzler. They leave their multi-thousand-square-foot homes, heated pools and garaged exotics to make the scene in the latest hybrid or electric trendmobile- just in case anyone questions their environmental credentials. 

Likewise, politicians. Last month, Senator Barak Obama harangued the Detroit Economic Club with a scathing condemnation of the U.S. auto industry. The Democratic Presidential hopeful accused The Big 2.8 of unconscionable foot-dragging on CAFE standards. According to the man who would be President, Detroit's "spending millions to prevent the very reform that could've saved their industry" and "spending their time investing in bigger, faster cars." 

Almost as soon as Obama's anti-Detroit bombshell hit the PR newswires, hometown reporters revealed the inconvenient truth about the pol's garage, filled as it was with a Chrysler 300C. The Senator duly ditched his Hemified whip for a Ford Escape Hybrid.

No surprise there. The Missouri-made Escape Hybrid and its corporate clone (the Mercury Mariner Hybrid) are the politicos' gesturemobiles du jour. When she's not being ferried about in an armored Cadillac or Chevy Suburban, Hillary Clinton (well, actually, hubby Bill) drives a refrigerator-equipped Mariner Hybrid. John Edwards and Al Gore both keep the planet cool (warm?) with their Escape Hybrids. 

At least that's what their PR folks say. One wonders how much time our democratically-elected leaders spend in these cramped hybrids in lieu of the limos, SUVs and staff cars that transport these prodigious pork barrel purveyors around town, and block the streets around Capitol Hill.

And onto those storied streets drove Rick, Alan, and Tom, trying to neuter legislation designed to force them to build more fuel-efficient vehicles, like the ones they were driving. The heads of GM, Ford and Chryslerberus know they can't stop increases in the fuel economy standards. All they can do is minimize the federal minimum so they can keep selling more profitable gas guzzling trucks and SUVs have the time they need to engineer more fuel-efficient vehicles, like the ones they were driving. 

Rick Wagoner more or less admitted that the mandatory fuel economy gig was up. The GM lifer told long-suffering GM stockholders that it was time to move on to the other bulges in the Gordian knot strangling The General. "It looks like… it's very likely there will be increases in CAFE… Let's make sure that we also fix the real problems while we're doing that."

By "real problems," Rick was alluding to his company's [self-inflicted] unsustainable cost structure and ongoing failure to maintain domestic market share- problems shared by his friends indeed.

So… bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do? More specifically, what the Hell are you doing in DC when you should at home figuring out how to build products consumers want to buy at a price that makes you enough money so you can sort this out yourself?

Of course, Detroit's corporate lions prefer maintaining the status quo and jetting to Washington on someone else's dime. They're old pros at pressing the flesh at the center of an enormous bureaucracy; a bureacracy that sees nothing wrong with running-up massive debts, mortgaging their constituents' future to protect their own short term interests.

If CEOs Rick Wagoner, Alan Mulally and Tom LaSorda wanted to make an effective symbolic gesture, they should have driven from Detroit to Washington and back in an Aveo, Focus, or Caliber.

By enduring 1000 miles in those noisy, cramped, cheap cars– byproducts of their bean-counted design and engineering processes– they'd tell the world that their very best fuel-sipping products are good enough for government work. How appropriate is that?

In January, Gary “Mr. Roadshow” Richards of the San Jose Mercury News argued that hybrid cars with one occupant should be allowed in California carpool lanes because they reduce congestion, gasoline usage and smog. Richards was deploying the exact same argument used to justify the passage of California statute AB 2628 which allowed “solo-carpools” in the first place. Here’s a simple question about the logic employed: was the California Assembly on peyote when they cooked up this crap?

It’s certainly true that an average hybrid-powered vehicle uses less gasoline per mile than a “normal” (i.e. gas only) car. But it’s also true that putting two passengers into any car makes it roughly twice as efficient– in terms of mpg per person– as the same vehicle with only one passenger. So even if a solo hybrid is 40% more efficient than a solo car, it’s 60% less efficient that the comparative non-hybrid with two passengers. Put a third passenger aboard the non-hybrid and it’s game over– by a very large margin indeed.

Bottom line: solo-carpools increase congestion, rather than prevent it. To suggest otherwise indicates a failure to grasp elementary mathematics, and common sense. I mean, how do you reduce congestion without reducing the actual number of cars on the road? Answer: you can’t.

And yet AB 2628 incentivizes drivers to buy hybrids and use the carpool lane without human companionship. If they can drive solo, what reason do they have to go even a mile out of their way to pick up someone to carpool (in the previous, coherent sense of the word)? NONE. 

It’s a question that would be well worth asking California’s 85k (at last count) carpool stickered hybrid drivers (more than half of whom live in the Bay Area).

Meanwhile, the 2008 Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released its revised fuel economy ratings. The Toyota Prius’ combined 2008 numbers drop to 46mpg. The Honda Civic hybrid sinks to 42mpg, while the conventionally (though frugally) powered Honda Fit scores 31mpg. At the other end of the scale, the Chevrolet Suburban sinks to 17mpg and the Rolls Royce Phantom plunges to 14mpg.

Returning to our “passenger-miles per gallon” (PMPG) calculations, a Fit with two people on board gets 62 PMPG. A Suburban with a trio seems positively green at 51 PMPG– especially compared to a solo gas-electric Civic (42 PMPG). In fact, a chauffeur-driven Phantom with a brace of Grey Poupon sharers drains resources at the same rate as the hybrid Civic. Truth be told, a wide variety of luxury cars and SUVs with “real” carpools trounce solo hybrids daily.

What’s more, hybrid batteries lose their ability to hold an electric charge over time. In 2006, the Department of Energy conducted static battery testing on several end-of-life (160,000 miles) hybrids. They reported that two first gen Prii had “remaining battery capacities of about 39%.” [TTAC contacted Toyota PR about this study. They declined to comment.] In other words, the more you “carpool” your hybrid, the worse your mileage.

In terms of emissions, hybrids may have a relatively small “carbon footprint” compared to non-hybrids, but a stampede is still a stampede.

A Suburban driving three-up produces nine percent fewer greenhouse emissions than a solo driver in a Civic Hybrid. Two people in a Honda Fit produces 28 percent lower emissions per person than the gas-electric Honda. Hell, a run-of-the-mill Accord with a party of two achieves 14 percent lower emissions than a solo Civic hybrid. Where’s the bumper sticker for Hummer carpools saving the Earth?

Once again, we’re talking about new cars. As a hybrid’s batteries age, its emissions numbers will increase (the engine must run longer and more often to compensate). In fact, if you think about it, hybrids should never be allowed in the carpool lane regardless of the head count. After all, all hybrid cars produce lower emissions and consume less gasoline per mile in stop-and-go traffic than travelling unhindered in the carpool lane.

Anyway, as previously stated by this website, California’s solo-carpool caveat is a complete violation of the spirit of the entire carpooling concept. Even Mr. Roadshow admits that the inclusion of solo hybrids pisses on an idea designed to “get more solo drivers out of their cars.” “The law allowing solo drivers in hybrids that get 45 mpg or better to use carpool lanes doesn't help here,” Richard concedes.

But Richards and the California legislature are happy to clock hybrid vehicles’ EPA numbers and SULEV (super ultra low emission vehicle) status and back the pro-hybrid policy– without bothering to think through the implications of their PC posturing.

When you do the math, there’s no logical reason whatsoever for California’s solo-carpool stickers. It’s time for California to revoke the hybrids solo-carpool free ride and return the carpool lane to its original, effective form.

Current Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards dictate that U.S. automobile manufacturers must produce vehicles whose overall average achieves 27.5 mpg (for cars) and/or 22.2 mpg (for trucks). The regulation’s stated goal: “encourage” manufacturers to build more fuel-efficient vehicles and, therefore, somehow, eventually, “lead” American consumers into buying same. Yeah right.

Generally speaking, people don’t buy what’s good for them. Whether it's cigarettes or SUV’s, people buy the products they want and then rationalize their purchases afterwards (if they can be bothered). CAFE’s underlying principle– forcing manufacturers to build products people don’t want– is a very special kind of lunacy, normally reserved for “planned economies.” And it’s about as effective as it sounds.

By the same token, trying to force consumers to buy something they don’t want (for their own and the planet’s good, for example) instead of something they do want (even though some supposedly smarter person says they shouldn’t) is about as sensible as herding cats. Social pressures and “education” will only take you so far, and no further.

In practice, CAFE regs are even worse than they are in theory. Raising mpg average numbers seems noble enough– until you devil into the details. Even a brief examination shows that the manufacturers have used their political clout to rig the system.

The end result: Honda, Toyota, Nissan, etc. have all figured out how to create fuel-efficient cars that people willingly buy and drive, while the Big 2.5 ain’t got game. The CAFE regs failed to force them to do so.

Gasoline prices, however, have focused Detroit’s mind wonderfully. Thanks to pump price escalation, Detroit must now listen to the U.S. automotive market and build what it demands– or go belly-up. Again, this new reality has nothing to do with previous, existing or future CAFE legislation.

In fact, let’s imagine a CAFE-free world. With gas heading up past three bucks a gallon, it’s easy to suppose that a large number of people would voluntarily choose to abandon their luxobarges in favor of a more frugal set of wheels.

While those who can afford five dollar a gallon gas and/or depend on driving a HD truck or SUV for their livelihood would stay with their big rigs, the rest of us would transfer to rides that conserve our cash.

But what if gas prices crash? There’s an accepted legislative methodology for discouraging the consumption of products judged injurious to society: sin taxes.

Hiking up the cost of alcohol, cigarettes, gas guzzlers, etc. through taxation [supposedly] prices consumers out of the forbidden fruit market. Considering the power of addiction, it’s a policy that tends to be more revenue than results positive. But it’s about as good as it gets.

If we want to curtail sales of gas guzzlers, we should immediately abandon all federal regulations concerning fuel economy and slap on a big old federal gas tax. That, however, would hit everyone – rich and poor alike – in their wallets. The only thing politicians hate more than missing an opportunity to regulate something is getting caught with their hands in your wallet.

Instead of focusing on nit-picking laws and regulations, what about actually solving the environmental and national security problem inherent in our gas-powered society by switching to alternative fuels? You know, launch some sort of Manhattan project that changes our automotive infrastructure from oil-based fuel to corn or sawgrass 'shine?

As this website has argued before, federal alt fuel initiatives are proof positive that you can create more pollution and political turmoil and greenhouses gasses by trying NOT to use gas than you can by using it. Government interference in the E85 industry– from CAFE credits for vehicles that will never touch a drop of corn juice to federal corn subsidies– are nothing more than lipstick on a pork barrel.

While I dream of hydrogen-powered cars, I don’t want my tax dollars poured into national hydrogen research, production and distribution. If you thought the reconstruction of Iraq was riddled with corruption, can you imagine the billions that a hydrogen-power project would waste? And for what? To shift national energy consumption from pump to plant?

The free market is the answer. If E85, plug-in hybrids or hydrogen fuel cell cars pay, they play. If manufacturers want to build jumbo SUV’s in times of high fuel prices, they’ll increase SUV fuel efficiency. If they can’t, American consumers will migrate to more efficient vehicles all on their own. If not, a tax at the tap will jolly them along. If there’s no political will for that solution, so be it. Last time I looked, it wasn’t the government’s job to impose its will on the people.

In short, there’s no need to set some arbitrary limit on the fuel economy of new vehicles. It’s time for CAFE to go.

The hybrid hype has finally reached Detroit. This fall, the gi-normous GMT900-based GMC Yukon (a.k.a. the Chevrolet Tahoe) will offer optional dual-mode hybrid engine technology. Next year, Chrysler will follow suit with a hybrid Durango/Aspen. Both automakers promise 25 percent better mileage on the highway. Chrysler is claiming a 40 percent increase in the city. GM promises a 25 percent urban gain. Happy days are here again! You’ll soon be able to have your SUV and afford to drive it too! And cool the planet! Or, you know, not.

While the idea of a full-size hybrid SUV may send California’s Governator into a muscle flexing frenzy, one doesn’t have to read too carefully between the lines to see the abject futility of this venture. Let’s crunch a few numbers.

According to our friends over at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Yukon/Tahoe twins burn gas at the non-PC pace of one gallon every 16 miles in town, and once every 21 miles on the open road. Chrysler’s most efficient V8 uses gas at a buttock-clenching 14/19 mpg. 

To fix this sales sucking situation, GMC and Chrysler have equipped their big rigs with Prius-like (though proprietary) dual-mode hybrid technology. At low speeds and light loads, the hi-tech SUV’s can move forwards (or backwards) via electric power, internal combstion or some combination thereof. At high speeds or heavy loads (i.e. drag racing with a bass boat behind), the hybrid's batteries assist the engine. Add regenerative brakes and displacement-on-demand cylinder deactivation and away you go.

Surely all this ground-breaking technology will provide significant efficiency improvements and fuel cost savings. I don’t know about you but I’m thinking, what, mid to high 20’s? That kind of improvement might even give the SUV genre a new lease (five year loan?) on life. No sir.

For those of you who haven't done the math yet, the hybridified GM and DCX SUV’s are set to eke out a paltry 19-20mpg. And that’s city driving, where hybrids typically shine.

The enemy, of course, is weight. Just as you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, you can’t turn a gas hog into silk pajamas (or something like that). Although GM is retrofitting the hybrid Yukahoe with aluminum components to compensate for 300 lbs. of batteries, it’s more or less a wash. The SUV’s will still weigh in at nearasdammit 5000 lbs. (or more depending on drivetrain).

Bottom line: a 25 percent improvement on not much ain’t a whole lot. But it is something, right?

“We have to think hard about the consumer who buys vehicles like the Dodge Durango and the Chrysler Aspen,” prevaricates Mark Chernoby, who’s just one letter away from having the world’s worst name for a VP of Advanced Vehicle Engineering. “These are people who want to have hauling capability.”

OK, but how many people who really need 8900 lbs. of towing capacity are gonna fork out a bunch more money for a vehicle offering few more mpg’s– especially when there's a lot full of heavily discounted non-hybrids lazing around?

Yes, here we go again: the “hybrid premium.” Forking out a couple of thousand bucks extra for hybrid tech has got to be pretty low on your average SUV buyer’s “to do” list. Buyers who previously owned full-sized SUV’s as status symbols (and got religion down at their local pump ‘n pay) have either left the genre already or can’t wait to do so. And any Chevy, GMC, Dodge or Chrysler dealer who thinks he’s going to see Prius drivers wheeling into his lot to trade-up to a hybrid SUV is plumb crazy.

It’s no surprise that the domestic automaker’s first serious hybrid offerings have arrived in SUV form. SUV’s are cheap to build, the factories and suppliers are already in place and they’re the automakers’ highest profit product. Besides, genuine clean sheet designs are extremely expensive and risky propositions. Better to stick with what you know. 

But American consumers will quickly see that boosting SUV gas mileage by 25 percent is nothing more than porcine lipstick application. If gas prices crest four bucks a gallon this summer, this insight will only require of femtosecond of consumer decision making. The odds that gas prices will trend downwards enough to lure large numbers of SUV buyers by the fall, when GMC unleashes their hybrids, are smaller than the Honda Fits, Nissan Versas, Toyota Yari and Chevrolet Aveos many of SUV refugees are now driving (no, really).

By the same token, Chrysler will enjoy the privilege of watching GMC fail to sell their hybrid Yukahoes before they open the gates on gas – electric Aspangos. Perhaps DCX (or whomever) will learn by example and not spend precious advertising and marketing resources on this ill-advised makeover. Maybe they’ll build a hybrid-powered 300C instead, to help revive that line’s flagging sales. Who knows? Maybe gas pigs can fly.

Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway holding group, is the world’s second-richest human. Buffett’s no stranger to the transportation sector, having mopped up profits with Geico, Forest River (RV’s), McLane Company (foodstuff distribution) and the XTRA Corporation (semi-trailer renting and leasing). Berkshire Hathaway recently took a ten percent stake in the railroad company Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. Warren Buffett’s seen the future.

The future will have fewer trucks and a lot more rail carriages. Fewer people and goods will travel by road. Cars will be smaller and cleaner. People will use them less. Diminishing oil supplies and increasing demands upon this declining resource (especially with the explosive economic growth of fomerly third world countries like China) will make it so.

And if that doesn’t do it, concerns about global warming, clean air and healthy living will. In fact, a few years from now, anyone cranking up an internal combustion engine close to children will be hauled out of the car and forced to suck his own exhaust—and then plant a tree. OK, maybe I got a little carried away there, but you get the idea: The Energy Lean Age is here.

While Americans are just waking up to the enormous implications of this shift, their European counterparts have been living it for almost a decade. For a quick look at America’s future, let’s hop over to the capital of The Land of Hope and Glory.

In February 2003, London introduced a Congestion Charge for motorists entering the heart of the City. Currently, motorists entering the Congestion Zone must pre-pay an eight pound ($16) fee. If they forget, they’ve got to pay $20 before midnight on the following day. If they miss that deadline, but pay within two weeks, it’s a $50 fine. After that, it’s $200. Remember: this is PER DAY.

London is now looking to modify the charge to change the automotive mix. To that end, Mayor  Ken Livingtone’s administration is set to introduce ”Emissions Influenced Charging.” Cars entering the City which emit up to 120g/km CO2 will pay nothing. Cars emitting 121-225g/km CO2 will stump-up the current charge. Cars emitting more than 225g/km CO2 will fork over £25.

A Range Rover Sport entering London will cost its driver a staggering $50 a day. On the flip side, if your car is small and clean, you won’t have to pay for the privilege of using London’s roads (any more than you already do through petrol taxes). You’ll also get a Politburo-style fast-track through town during rush hour and special parking areas.

Other European cities and towns are contemplating similar moves. (As you’d imagine, Germany’s Green Party is all over this one.) Meanwhile and additionally, there’s a growing move towards emissions-based ”road pricing,” a pay-per-mile scheme that monitors driver behavior via a GPS tracking device or number plate recognition cameras. Since 2005, German trucks pay between €0.09 and €0.14 ($0.12 and $0.19) per kilometer depending on their emission levels and number of axles.

The road pricing debate is fierce; critics on the left attack it as a regressive tax, while critics on the right warn it will stifle economic growth. Even so, road pricing’s environmental component has given the concept a huge boost. It’s clear European governments are bound and determined to use dramatic (not to say drastic) measures to skew the automotive market towards smaller and more fuel efficient vehicles.

It seems highly unlikely that the widening rift between activist European governments pushing carmakers to go small and clean, and the American government’s relative tolerance for gas guzzlers, will remain forever. Whether it takes a cataclysmic economic shock, or a gradual increase in gasoline prices, or environmental concern/lobbying, the U.S. will eventually move more in line with the European model. And begin adopting European ”energy lean” solutions.

Meanwhile, Japanese and European-based automakers are busy building cars that conform to this political paradigm. You can also count on the Chinese accelerating production of the cars GM Car Czar Bob Lutz derided a few years ago, when he told the world that ”Rich people don’t care about the price of gasoline.”

Whenever Bob looks at a large car, he would do well to think of a spitoon. That’s how popular large cars with internal combustion engines will be a few years from now. And they’ll soon be just as gone as spitoons– unless they somehow manage to become Energy Lean and Air Clean large cars.

Which is why Warren Buffett’s moving his money to trains and evaluating other green energy alternatives, including electric cars. Trust me. Mr Buffett knows a sure bet. (He may even sell his shares in NetJets one day.) You better hope what’s in your garage is Energy Lean by then: the second hand value of voracious landcruisers will drop in inverse proportion to Berkshire Hathaway’s spectacular investment  history.   

The Environmental Protection Agency’s current Federal Test Procedure (FTP) for city mileage was originally designed to represent a typical trip on Los Angeles streets. The test– codenamed FTP-72– begins with a cold start from 70 degrees. It then runs for 7.5 miles at an average of 19.6 mph, with a peak speed of 56.7 mph (from a short freeway segment). The EPA Highway Fuel Economy Test (HWFET) starts with a warm engine, runs for 10.26 miles, averages 48.3 mph, and peaks at around 60 mph. Does anyone in the real world drive like that?

Obviously not. By the ‘80’s, the EPA was deluged with complaints that its gas mileage estimates were entirely unrealistic (i.e. hopelessly optimistic). In 1984, the EPA reacted by lowering estimates across the board to “more accurately reflect driving styles and conditions.” The government agency trimmed EPA window sticker stats by 10 percent for the city, 22 percent for highway. This overdue amendment helped consumers feel more confident about calculating their fuel costs (and driving skills).

Thanks in part to the huge discrepancy between the EPA’s fuel economy estimates for hybrid-powered cars and their real world mileage, test procedures have been refined again.

For ’08 model vehicles, the EPA numbers will provide “in use” figures based on a combination of the old tests and new tests. The new procedures will incorporate faster speeds (up to 80mph), greater acceleration (up to eight mph per second), warmer outside operating temperature (including air conditioner use) and colder outside operating temperatures (including heater and defroster use).

The industry fully (and rightly) expects the new testing procedures to lower EPA “in use” mileage estimates even further, especially for hybrid drive cars like the Toyota Prius that benefit from “gentle driving” in the city cycle. Meanwhile, we can still glean some interesting information from the EPA stats.

Although it’s not well known, the EPA keeps two sets of books for public perusal. Pistonheads can scan both the government’s official EPA numbers for all cars certified for the U.S. and the raw test results. But wait; there’s more! The EPA also provides a given model’s engine displacement, engine revs in top gear, inertia weight (test weight for the EPA test) and dynamometer resistance settings.

University of Michigan physics Professor Marc Ross has developed formulas that can crunch the EPA’s dynamometer resistance readings to compute the amount of drag in pounds for speeds between 45 and 55 mph. Working with his equations, a math-minded motorist can predict a vehicle’s EPA gas mileage under a variety of test and non-test conditions. 

For example, the 2007 Avalon has inertia weight of 3875 lbs. At 50 mph, with its 3.5-liter engine turning at 1555 rpm, the Avalon generates 91 pounds of drag. Bottom line: the Avalon achieves 39.6 mpg on the HWFET test– as compared to 31 mpg on the window sticker.

The 2007 Five Hundred has a 4000 lbs. inertia weight. At 50 mph, with its 3.0-liter engine turning at 1520 RPM, the soon-to-be Taurus generates 105 pounds of drag. Bottom line: 37 mpg on the HWFET test– as compared to 29 mpg on the EPA window sticker.

Theoretically, the Five Hundred achieves 35.3 mpg at 55 mph, 30.4 mpg at 65 mph, and 22.6 mpg at 85 mph. The Avalon gets 36.2 mpg at 55 mph, 32.1 mpg at 65 mph, and 24.8 mpg at 85 mph.

The Avalon’s lower-profile aerodynamic shape and bigger engine make it more frugal than the Five Hundred. (Five Hundred owners pay a price for Ford’s decision to make the Volvo-based model tall and boxy to attract SUV buyers.) With its smaller engine, the Five Hundred is also slower than the Avalon– which has been slated for not being fast off the line. Both vehicles have tall gearing to aid fuel economy.

Toyota doesn’t use pixie dust or a magic carburetor to get better mileage than the Five Hundred. Toyota achieves better fuel efficiency because of the choices its creators made between looks, room, fuel economy, acceleration and drivability.

With revised EPA testing procedures leading to lowered fuel economy figures, with revised CAFE legislation mandating higher required fleet fuel efficiency averages, the pressure is on for automakers to produce more– and more popular– higher mileage vehicles. Only there’s a loophole.

According to the official EPA website, their new “in use” stats will “not affect the CAFE calculation for purposes of determining manufacturers’ compliance with the CAFE standard.” In other words, the new CAFE averages will continue to be based on the old EPA tests. Well how about that?

Yesterday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez did something unusual: backpedal. The South American Bush basher “clarified” his opposition to an agreement between the U.S. and Brazil to promote ethanol production. Chavez claimed he objected to the development of corn-based ethanol– not Brazilian sugar cane-based ethanol. Echoing last month’s interminable diatribe by Fidel Castro, Chavez condemned America’s energy policy, declaring that "taking corn away from people and the food chain to feed automobiles is a terrible thing."

According to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, it doesn’t matter which organic source you use for ethanol production. Speaking at a two-day South American energy summit, da Silva rejected any notion of a food–fuel conflict. "The problem of food in the world now is not [a] lack of production of food. It's a lack of income for people to buy food… No one is going to stop planting rice to plant biofuels."

Perhaps. But one thing is for sure: America’s newfound love for ethanol is creating some major political and economic side effects.

Here at home, U.S. farmers are planting corn like crazy. And why not? This year’s ethanol subsidies will easily eclipse the $6b Uncle Sam doled out in ‘06. This despite the fact that corn-based ethanol take a great deal of energy to produce– from petrochemical-based fertilizers and pesticides to processing plants hooked into their local electricity grid to gasoline powered tractors and delivery trucks. In fact, it takes a lot of old-fashioned energy to create ethanol, and millions upon millions of gallons of water.

In any case, the rapid increase in American ethanol production is having a worrying impact on America’s food supply. Even though the “ethanol boom” has swelled American cornfield acreage from 78 to 90 million acres, federal ethanol mandates are still driving up prices. With corn futurologists eyeing the six billion gallons of corn-based ethanol slated for production this year, the price of corn has risen dramatically.

The price of beef, pork, poultry, breakfast cereal, Coca-Cola and other corn-based products are set to rise accordingly. This situation is not about to get any better. In January, President Bush set a goal of 35 billion gallons of domestically-produced alternative fuels by 2017. While companies are spending billions to try to figure out how to produce fuel from cellulosic (plant) waste, corn is still king. If U.S. corn-based ethanol production doubles or triples, corn prices will skyrocket.

Or not. Ironically enough, at the same time that corn prices are rising, ethanol prices are declining. If the margins disappear, so will the “ethanol boom.” No wonder there’s already a federal tariff on imported sugar cane-based ethanol– which President da Silva is lobbying the Bush administration to abandon. Given the corn-growing states’ political influence in Washington, there’s not much chance of that happening anytime soon. 

Nor is there likely to be any change in the policy allowing automakers to calculate their E85-compatible vehicles’ mileage based on an entirely theoretical fuel economy (you try and find an E85 pump). Just as federal ethanol mandates inflate corn prices and distort the market, the E85 loophole inflates automakers’ CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) numbers and violates the spirit of the law. Oh, and supports the sale of gas guzzlers, which increases our dependence on foreign oil. Oh, and a Stanford University study published today suggests that increased ethanol use would harm the ozone layer. 

Meanwhile, American ethanol demand has diverted surplus (i.e. federally subsidized) corn from foreign export. The change is causing food price inflation as near as Mexico, and as far away as China and India. While you could argue that the U.S. doesn’t “owe” foreign countries a vast supply of cheap corn, the political fallout isn’t good. Castro’s theme– the Yankees care more about running their SUVs than feeding the poor– is no boon to U.S. foreign policy.

Ironically, America’s ethanol push is based on a desire to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil, to free the country from the necessity of undesirable political entanglements. American ethanol production could inadvertently alienate more of the world’s population than the war in Iraq.

In fact, the whole alternative fuels policy is full of such bizarre contradictions. Environmentalists who embraced biologically-derived ethanol as a “clean” alternative to carbon-based energy would do well to consider the enormous rainforest destruction caused by Brazil’s ethanol industry. The current rate of deforestation will have a more profound effect on greenhouse gasses than the planet’s vehicular emissions. 

The contradictions inherent in America’s ethanol production highlight the need for a comprehensive U.S. energy policy. If the U.S. is going to find a way to manage the political, environmental and economic implications of our energy production, delivery and consumption, we need to take a rational and independent look at ALL the alternatives– from Alaskan drilling to nuclear power to corn-based ethanol production. Otherwise, greed and hypocrisy will stymie any effort– however noble– to create any genuine change.

Word, Excel, Acrobat Reader, Photoshop, Powerpoint… The computer programs you depend on are filled with bloat: unused features that hog your hard disk, crowd the CPU and drain your laptop’s battery– without adding to the action on the screen. Ditto SUVs. They are extraordinarily capable vehicles whose unused features guzzle gas, add weight and drain oil from the ground. In both cases, slimming down has few downsides– save the psychological. And therein lies the tale. 

Just as there’s a cadre of computer users who know how to pip a file in CP/M, there’s a small slice of SUV/CUV/pickup owners who use their vehicles to their fullest. Clearly, obviously, most don’t. Instead they defend their vehicular choices by citing seldom-seen scenarios: towing equipment they don’t own, forging through storms they know they’ll avoid, and surviving crashes that have yet to occur.

Thankfully, drivers are wising up. Whether their change of heart’s been stimulated by the rising price of gas or environmental consciousness, they’re figuring out that sitting on several tons of metal to move a couple of humans from points A to B is silly. That’s why they’re looking for alternatives. Which is also why I’m disappointed with the Tesla Roadster.

In a world crying out for energy efficient transportation solutions, Tesla’s battery-powered sports car is a dead end. The Tesla is a toy that tries to combine the benefits of megapowered supercars with a warm ecofriendly buzz. This does not compute. The future of automobiles (self-movers) is energy-lean and speed-restrictive.

To perform adequately, all current electric vehicles (EVs) rely upon a light-weight frame. By using a featherweight Lotus as a donor and reducing its heft with carbon fiber, the Tesla Roadster attempts to maximize speed, acceleration and range. Even with no luggage or extra passenger space, it still illustrates the old saying, ”Fast, good and cheap. You can’t have all three.”

At the same time, the Roadster’s mass x velocity function makes the EV a pretty dangerous place to be should you experience sudden, involuntary deceleration (think early 1960s Formula 1 racer). Yes, Tesla is trying to work around those "challenges.” But the end result won’t change: a ludicrously expensive (if fast) EV with serious range and safety issues.

Maybe the work on the Tesla Roadster can create spin-off benefits for more energy efficient EVs. Tesla is already shopping their batteries around to other EV manufacturers (probably looking to share their high development costs). If that makes you think the future is filled with EVs zipping around silently at Roadster speeds, you can banish the thought.

There are far better ways of using stored energy than driving Hell for leather in a lithium-ion equipped Tesla Roadster powered by a consumer electric grid.

The other day the French pushed a TGV (a.k.a. bullet train) to 574 km/h (357 mph). I heard the news about the French train speed record while automobiling (self-moving) behind a tram. A poster on the rear of the tram said ”I can replace 1.5 km of cars.” We can fight for unrestricted travel as much as we want, but our assumed right to be part of that 1.5 km long line is about to be seriously restricted.

If nothing else, global warming is a political reality. Most automobile companies realize that the legislative move to reduce cars’ carbon footprint will have– is already having– a dramatic impact on what we drive, how we drive, and where we will be allowed to drive it. As the French prepare to cover Europe with TGVs, and the European Union considers legislation imposing mandatory carbon offsets for air travelers, it’s naive to believe that cars will continue to represent untrammeled freedom.

A period is coming where self-moving will again be considered a privilege, not a right. Where the cost of self-moving will have to be paid for on the spot, as a function of energy efficiency and estimated long term environmental impact. Available energy will be channeled to where it will deliver the most work per unit. You’ll be charged accordingly for less efficient energy use.

In other words, the days when you paid Southwest Airlines or Ryan Air prices to move will soon be a thing of the past. Which only makes sense. The party's over. We’re running out of oil. Both society and the individuals enjoying its protection must wake up to the throbbing skull reality of this situation, and face a new dawn.

Despite California Governor Schwarzenegger's pronouncement that "We don't have to take away the Hummers or the SUVs or anything like this," there is no Tesla-like cake-and-eat-it-too solution. Developing technology won't let you drive a fundamentally inefficient vehicle the same way you do now using alternative propulsion. Everyone in the energy food chain– from energy producers to daily commuters– must take on the challenge of using energy with the skill of rocket scientists, accounting for every calorie. The end result will be spectacular, and effective.

“A potent, new, 500-hp engine that uses less fuel.” While the newly refurbished Porsche Cayenne Turbo offers well-heeled buyers many delights, you wouldn't think fuel efficiency was the first amongst them. Yet Porsche’s print ads for the off-roader are touting their uber-SUV’s improved frugality, positioning the machine as a fun-to-drive grocery-getter for, gulp, environmentally conscious consumers. If Porsche were alone in this misplaced appeal to green values, it could be dismissed as aberrant lunacy. But they’re not so it can’t.

This month, Honda introduced their new Formula One car. As their F1 entry has no official sponsors, the car’s surface is free from the usual blizzard of sponsors’ decals. So Honda wrapped their hi-tech race car in an image of the Earth made from signatures of people who’ve pledged– via myearthdream.com– to limit their planetary “footprint.”

And so a vehicle that gets four miles to a gallon– for entertainment purposes– has been transformed into a rolling poster for corporate sponsored environmentalism.  

“The people who work in F1 and the F1 viewers are probably the most difficult people to turn around into making a difference,” proclaimed Jenson Button to the London Times. ”So this campaign is important.” Honda’s F1 driver was clear about his “other” mission. “The idea is to raise awareness of global issues that we have and hopefully it’s going to make a difference.”

Honda’s left its supporters’ difference-making methodology suitably vague. Of course, turned around F1 fans can choose from Honda’s wide range of high[er] mpg vehicles, buy one its hybrid Accords or wait for models powered by the automaker’s clean diesel technology. It’s what marketing mavens call a “virtuous circle” or “a very clever angle.”

Honda’s inherently ludicrous “Save the Planet” F1 car proves that global warming is the new marketing hot button (so to speak). Of course, Honda’s a bit late to this morality play. Toyota’s Prius hybrid set the pace for automobile manufacturers everywhere, giving the Japanese automaker enough green cred to withstand the heat generated by its efforts to build The Mother of All Full-Size ‘Merican Pickup Trucks.

Although the high-mpg low-carbon Prius has not exactly set the sales charts on fire, the distinctively shaped vehicle success vis-à-vis its standard bodied hybrid competition (e.g. the hybrid Accord) has taught the automotive industry an important lesson: it’s not enough to do good for the planet. You have to be seen to be doing good.

That’s why nearly every major automaker at this year’s 77th International Auto Show paid homage to the environment. Honda, Lexus and Toyota brought hybrid concept cars to the Land of Milk and Chocolate. Mercedes flaunted a new C220 sedan equipped with the latest clean-running BLUETEC diesel. Ze new C will produce nine tons less CO2 over its lifetime – from assembly line to junkyard – than the old version! Even supercar maker Koenigsegg presented an E85 powered version of their bonkers CCXR.

And no wonder. Throughout Europe, global warming has replaced the Soviet Empire as the invisible– though real– enemy. It’s got to the point where the European Union has “asked” Germany to consider putting speed limits on formerly sacrosanct derestricted sections of the autobahn. A Stern magazine survey claims 60 percent of Germans now favor autobahn speed limits to cut emissions, while 38 percent oppose them.

America’s response to global warming lags well behind that of our European allies. While there’s been a lot of talk (and an Oscar-winning movie) about reducing greenhouse gas emissions, policy changes have been illusory. Despite tax credits, hybrid sales are still paltry compared to CO2 belching full-sized pickups.

While environmentalists decry federal “foot dragging,” the free market is not insensitive to the issue. As petrol powered pistonheads have pointed out, even with gas at $3 a gallon, it’s hard to justify the “hybrid premium”: the difference in purchase price between a gas and gas – electric car based on fuel savings.

And yet more and more US car buyers are willing to pay a bit extra for a bit more mileage. Why? Representative Michael Burgess of Texas put it best, when discussing his personal Prius. “It gives me a good deal of moral superiority when I drive.”

This fact has not escaped the fine folks down in marketing and product planning. GM, Ford, Porsche, Mercedes, BMW, Honda and others are realizing a large proportion of their target market– both princes and paupers– are starting to watch their tailpipes. Low carbon and high mileage cars, trucks and yes, SUV’s are continuing to creep to the top of the average buyer’s wish list.

As the Cayenne Turbo ads prove, this development has created endless opportunities for deceptive and self-righteous hypocrisy. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. If green becomes the automotive industry’s new black, the resulting pretense can be seen as a case of no harm, no foul.

Mention the word “hybrid” on an automotive internet site and commentators clump into two camps. It’s either “I save the planet while getting 97.467 mpg driving my Prius up Pikes Peak” or “I search and destroy hippy trust-fund Prius drivers with my jacked-up diesel F-350”. Despite this ongoing socio-political clash over mixed propulsion, hybrid sales have brought the technology into the mainstream. Which puts us in a better place to answer the obvious question: what’s the future beyond the hype?

In the automobile’s infancy, battery electric vehicles (BEV’s) outsold and, in many famous cases, outperformed cars powered by internal combustion engines. But lead-acid batteries limited the BEV’s range, dooming them to obsolescence. In 1902, Ferdinand Porsche attempted to forestall the inevitable by developing the first gas – electric hybrid. Needless to say, Herr Porsche had better luck with gas-powered tanks and sports cars.

A hundred years later, Toyota had the guts, vision and cash to develop their groundbreaking series/parallel hybrid drive (gas engine and electric motor alternately or simultaneously propelling the car) using NiMH batteries. Despite its success, Toyota’s Synergy Drive has generally been seen as a transitional technology.

GM’s highly touted Volt concept (which follows Porsche’s principles closely) supposedly represents The Next Big Thing. It’s a serial hybrid– an internal combustion engine runs a generator that charges batteries that power the electric drive motor. Conceptually, it's the most efficient arrangement.  

Why the century-long wait? Lead acid batteries are simply too heavy and inefficient to git er done (e.g. GM’s EV1). Suitable alternatives are just now arising. Toyota has announced that Prius III will use lithium-ion cells. As will the Tesla and GM’s Volt. The industry is searching for (and closing in on) the new Holy Grail: a small, safe, powerful, fast-recharging, affordable battery.

Meanwhile, the industry is mad about hybrids. Even the highly diesel-dependent Germans are getting into the game. DCX and BMW have a joint venture with GM to share a sophisticated dual-mode full-hybrid drive. Mercedes and BMW (hmmm) just announced a partnership to develop a second, cheaper, mild-hybrid system. And VW and Porsche are hoping that hybridizing the Touareg and Cayenne will save their SUV’s.

And no wonder. A full hybrid system can boost real world mileage by some 35 percent; that’s as great an efficiency increase (over gas power) as a diesel. Diesel fuel’s higher cost stateside (seven to 15 percent) substantially reduces any pocket-book savings. What’s more, the cost of manufacturing clean diesels is roughly equivalent to gas – electric hybrids. Hybrid components are becoming cheaper; diesels are already highly evolved.

So why not build a diesel hybrid, doubling the efficiency gain? It’s an expensive proposition, and the efficiency differential isn’t there. The Atkinson-cycle gas engine (as used in parallel hybrids) already closes the gas vs. diesel efficiency gap considerably. Improvements in valve control, direct injection and upcoming HCCI (Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition) technology will narrow the gap further. And diesels have lost some efficiency with the latest emission controls, while the gas engine is poised for continuing economy gains.

Even if you’re not the pious Prius type, hybrid technology is already sneaking into your ride. Electric driven power steering, air-conditioning compressors and water pumps are all the fruit of hybrid technology, and spreading fast. Car builders love them; their use yields measurable fuel savings (up to 10% combined), allows quicker engine heat-up and disconnects the engine from other peripherals, making it micro-hybrid ready [see: below].

BMW just updated their 1 Series with these goodies. They also added brake energy regenerative system (iGR) that controls the alternator to charge the battery (as needed) when the engine is in over-run or going downhill. For good measure, an automatic-start-stop program kills the engine whenever neutral is engaged. Combined with improved Bi-Vanos valve control and lean-burn direct injection, the model’s efficiency has increased by 24 percent.

Prius purists may scorn, but “micro-hybrids” like the Saturn Aura Green Line are cheap ($1700 retail premium) and effective. The model’s belt driven motor/generator system yields roughly a 15 percent efficiency gain. With higher CAFE numbers on the horizon, look for more creative bundling of various degrees and forms of hybrid and related technologies. It’s not just about trying to catch or keep up with the Prius’ standard-setting full-hybrid approach.

Looking forward, plug-in hybrids like the [theoretical] Chevy Volt are inevitable. The DOE has said the US grid can recharge up to 185 million plug-in cars at night. Lithium for batteries is recyclable. Improvements in CO and other emissions are easier to deal with at the power plant source than in each car.

So if you’re in the “Prius search and destroy” camp, be prepared to keep your current battle tank going for a long time. The hybrid virus is regenerating and mutating quickly; it’ll be hard not to catch it.