Autos Part 1: Making Green Mainstream

  • Fisker Automotive plans to sell 16,000 of its Karma plug-in hybrid sports cars beginning in 2009. (Photo courtesy of Fisker Automotive)

For a lot of people, the words “hybrid vehicle” bring to mind dinky little
commuter cars that would get creamed in the fast lane. But red-blooded
horsepower fans might soon be able to get speed, performance, and fuel
efficiency in the same car. In the first of a two-part series on green cars, Sarah Hulett brings us this story about the marriage of
mean and green:

Transcript

For a lot of people, the words “hybrid vehicle” bring to mind dinky little
commuter cars that would get creamed in the fast lane. But red-blooded
horsepower fans might soon be able to get speed, performance, and fuel
efficiency in the same car. In the first of a two-part series on green cars, Sarah Hulett brings us this story about the marriage of
mean and green:


Tougher fuel economy standards are on the horizon, and record oil prices are
already here. So it’s no surprise to hear auto executives talking up the green
virtues of their products.


(Montage:) “GM will continue to drive the development of electrically-
driven vehicles…It’s Chrysler’s mission more environmentally responsible…plug-in hybrid…Saturn has a green
heritage…more fuel efficient, more environmentally-friendly vehicles.”


But typically, performance has taken a back seat to fuel efficiency, and vice
versa.


David Cole is president of the Center for Automotive Research. He says in
the past, the auto industry has taken a bipolar view of the car-buying public:


“One pole was fun, people want to have fun in a car, and another pole was
green, and if you’re green you’re probably not going to have a lot of fun. But
I think what we’ve seen is that they’ve come together.”


(Eric Merkle:) “That was the most unusual thing I saw at this year’s auto show: a biofuel
Ferrari, a Ferrari that runs on corn.”


Erich Merkle is an auto analyst with IRN. That’s a car industry consulting
firm. Merkle is talking about the recent Detroit auto show where Ferrari
showed an F430 Spider with a biofuel engine:


“It just seems so… odd, I guess, to see a vehicle like an F430 running on
ethanol. But Ferrari’s trying to put their hat in, throw their hat into the ring
too, and trying to do their part.”


Ferrari officials say the biofuel sports car is part of the company’s effort to
cut its emissions by 40% over the next five years, and Ferrari’s not the only
luxury performance car company offering wealthy car buyers a greener
option.


Fisker Automotive has a plug-in hybrid it plans to put on the market by the
end of next year. The Karma sports car has batteries that can power the car
for 50 miles. It also has a high-performance, four-cylinder engine for
backup:


“This re-defines performance. It’s performance that doesn’t hurt the
environment.”


Vic Doolan is the former president of BMW North America, and he now sits
on the board at Fisker. He says the Karma can do zero to 60 in under six
seconds:


“The person buying this car will want to drive a nice car, want to be seen in
the right circles, but on the other hand, they want to do something that not
only feels good to drive, but feels good to the heart. It’s to my mind a car
with a conscience, and I think it’s for people with a conscience – about the
environment, at least.”


A Fisker Karma could be yours for 80,000 dollars.


But analyst Erich Merkle says he’s not overly optimistic about the greening
of the luxury, high-performance car market:


“I still don’t think it’s the customer that’s really asking for that. And the other
thing you have to ask yourself is what kind of a difference can a company
like Fisker actually make. Sure, it’s nice, it’s something to see, and
something to kind of ooh and aah over. But at the end of the day, it’s still a very,
very low-volume vehicle, if it even makes it to market.”


Fisker plans to make 16,000 of the sports cars. That’s not a lot of volume.
But the big companies are also looking to sell efficient performance vehicles
to the masses.


Chrysler design chief Trevor Creed says the company had a certain customer
in mind when it created its Dodge concept sports wagon:


“They want to be environmentally responsible, but they also have a need for
speed. We can meet all of those needs, by combining our shared electric
motor with a lightweight aluminum structure to create a future performance
vehicle like this. Ladies and gentlemen: the Dodge ZEO.”


You’re probably not going to see the electric-only ZEO in your local Dodge
dealer lot any time soon, but another big car company is making
turbocharged engines that’ll be available in some cars as soon as this year.
Ford’s EcoBoost powertrain promises 20% better fuel economy, without
sacrificing performance. So Ford says its new cars will be fast, and efficient.


And if you’re looking for a cool, green car for your mid-life crisis but the
Ferarri’s out of your reach, the sporty plug-in Chevy Volt is expected to be
available in 2010.


For the Environment Report, I’m Sarah Hulett.

Related Links

Epa Cites Improved Fuel Economy

The Environmental Protection Agency says cars and trucks are starting to get better gas
mileage. That comes after a long period of worsening fuel economy.
Dustin Dwyer reports:

Transcript

The Environmental Protection Agency says cars and trucks are starting to get better gas
mileage. That comes after a long period of worsening fuel economy.
Dustin Dwyer reports:


The EPA says over the past three years, average vehicle fuel economy has improved by
about five percent, but that’s a small reversal after 20 years in which gas mileage only got
worse.


Jim Kliesch is with the Union of Concerned Scientists. He says the problem is that
getting more miles per gallon has not been a priority for automakers:


“The industry has been improving their vehicles for years. It’s just that they’ve been
applying their technical innovations to performance and not to fuel economy.”


Automakers say they’re now working to make cars more fuel efficient. In part that’s
because they have to under new fuel economy rules for trucks. And lawmakers in
Washington are debating new rules that could force even higher fuel efficiency.


For the Environment Report, I’m Dustin Dwyer.

Related Links

New 2008 Fuel Economy Stickers

  • A look at the new window sticker that will be seen on all 2008 models. (Photo courtesy of the EPA)

Starting this year you’ll see new fuel economy window stickers on cars and trucks. And as Mark Brush reports – the gas mileage displayed on these stickers will be closer to the actual mileage you’ll experience:

Transcript

Starting this year you’ll see new fuel economy window stickers on cars and trucks. And as Mark Brush reports – the gas mileage displayed on these stickers will be closer to the actual mileage you’ll experience:


The EPA gas mileage stickers will appear on all 2008 cars and trucks. And the Environmental Protection Agency says these stickers are more accurate. No more inflated gas mileage claims. Mileage estimates have been based on old tests that don’t reflect how we drive today.


David Friedman is with the Union of Concerned Scientists. He says car buyers might get sticker shock:

“Well what they will see is no matter what the car or truck they get they will see lower numbers. In fact, depending on the size class they are dealing with, the new window sticker numbers are anywhere from 10 percent to 15 percent lower on a combined basis than the old numbers.”


Consumers won’t just see the lower miles per gallon numbers. They’ll also see a bar graph that compares each vehicle’s gas mileage to others in its class.


For the Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

Flex-Fuel Economy Questioned

If you plan to buy a new car or truck this
year, you might find some showrooms filled with
vehicles that run largely on ethanol instead of
gasoline. Car companies are pushing these corn-fueled vehicles as environmentally friendly.
Julie Grant takes a look at those claims:

Transcript

If you plan to buy a new car or truck this
year, you might find some showrooms filled with
vehicles that run largely on ethanol instead of
gasoline. Car companies are pushing these corn-fueled vehicles as environmentally friendly.
Julie Grant takes a look at those claims:


More people are considering buying cleaner, more fuel-efficient
cars now that gas prices and global temperatures are on the rise. The gas-
electric hybrids made by Toyota and Honda are becoming popular. And
American car companies are also jumping on board and offering alternative-
powered vehicles.


General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner has put much of his company’s stock in
ethanol:


“At GM, we believe that the bio-fuel with the greatest potential to
displace petroleum-based fuels in the US is ethanol, and so we have
made a major commitment here to vehicles that can run on E85 ethanol.”


E85 is a blend that’s 85% ethanol with 15% gasoline. GM’s not the only company offering cars that run on them:


(Sound of vehicle introduction)


Angela Hines is from Green Bay, Wisconsin. She’s taking notes as she looks at one
flex fuel car. The E85 only matters to her if it’s going to save her a
few bucks:


“I drive anywhere from 80-200 miles
a day for work, so yeah, gas is important.”


Gui Derochers is looking at a Chevy Silverado pickup truck:


(Grant:) “Does it matter to you that it’s a flex fuel?”


“I think it’s a good thing… flex-fuel. Particularly, we know there are some ethanol plants in Michigan coming, right? Isn’t
that what flex fuel is? Ethanol?”


Derochers works on engines and transmissions:


“You have to remember, I work for Daimler-Chrysler. But we have flex fuel as well. It’s a good thing. It’s wonderful.”


But not everyone thinks the move toward ethanol-fueled cars is
wonderful. Tadeusz Patzek is a professor of civil and environmental
engineering at the University of California in Berkeley. He says
ethanol is not cheaper and it’s not any better for the environment than
regular gas.


Patzek says each gallon of ethanol burned might emit less greenhouse gas
into the air, but you have to burn more fuel to go the same distance:


“So, mile for mile, emissions of CO2 are exactly the same for gasoline as
they are for ethanol. Because they are proportional to the energy stored in
the fuel.”


When it comes to gas mileage, Patzek calls claims that ethanol is any
better then gasoline an imaginary economy… and he’s not alone. When
Consumer Reports magazine tested a Chevy Tahoe that runs on gas mixed
with only ten percent ethanol, the truck got 14 miles per gallon. But
it got less than 11 miles per gallon when the ethanol content was
raised to 85%, as in E85. That’s a 27% drop in fuel economy with E85.


Consumer Reports concluded that to go the same distance, you wind up paying more than a dollar
extra per gallon on E85 then on regular
gas.


Patzek says it’s not a good deal for consumers or for the environment:


“You emit less because you have oxygen but you burn more, so it comes as a wash.”


Patzek says ethanol has other environmental costs. To grow the corn needed to make it, farmers have to use more fossil fuel-based fertilizers, tractor fuel, and then more fuel to truck the fuel to gas stations.


Even so, many scientists say ethanol still provides an energy benefit over fossil fuels and some auto engineers say ethanol cars
are just a stop-gap measure until a better technology comes along, but Patzek disagrees with that logic:


“So, you’re saying the following: why don’t we have a terribly bad
solution and call it a stop-gap solution because it’s politically
convenient. I’m saying is, if I’m an engineer, I have to, essentially, if I’m honest with myself and others, do I want a
better technological solution or do I want to say, let’s do probably the worst possible solution
that delays other solutions 10-15 years into the future… while the
world is running out of time?”


Patzek says the real reason American car companies are moving toward
vehicles that run on E85 is that the federal government rewards them
for it.


GM and the others get extra credit for meeting fuel efficiency
standards just for making cars that can run on E85, even if those cars
aren’t more fuel efficient.


Patzek knows he’s become unpopular among many farmers, engineers,
scientists and politicians who want easy answers. He wants people to
start reducing their energy-use rather than waiting for technological
magic bullets.


For the Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

A Better Battery for Hybrids

A US company has a new contract to work on batteries that many people hope will power the next generation of hybrid vehicles. The GLRC’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

A US company has a new contract to work on batteries that many people hope will power
the next generation of hybrid vehicles. The GLRC’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:


Lithium-ion batteries are used in some cell phones, laptop computers and other products.
US automakers and the Energy Department have just given Johnson Controls and a
French firm a two year contract.


They want to work on getting lithium-ion batteries in hybrid vehicles. Johnson controls
will try to improve battery power in low temperatures, reduce manufacturing
costs, and boost safety. Project director Karen Bauer says the batteries hold promise:


“Lithium is gonna be overall a lighter weight solution, so improved fuel economy. And
in addition, lithium is really an enabler to the plug-in hybrid electric vehicles that are
getting a lot of press today.”


But Bauer says it might may take five years before the batteries are ready to use in cars.


For the GLRC, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

Related Links

Green Auto Plants Going Main-Stream?

  • GM will build three new crossover SUVs at the Lansing plant. Production will start this fall. (Photo by Dustin Dwyer)

A new assembly plant from one of Detroit’s Big Three car companies is getting attention for its “green” qualities. Big Three automakers may not rank at the top of most environmentalists’ list for companies of the year. But some say the new auto plant is a sign that environmentally-sensitive manufacturing has finally gone main-stream. It’s not just because building green plants is the right thing to do. Really, it comes down to a different kind of green. The GLRC’s Dustin Dwyer has the story:

Transcript

A new assembly plant from one of Detroit’s Big Three car companies is getting attention
for its “green” qualities. Big Three automakers may not rank at the top of most
environmentalists’ list for companies of the year. But some say the new auto plant is a
sign that environmentally-sensitive manufacturing has finally gone main-stream. It’s not
just because building green plants is the right thing to do. Really, it comes down to a
different kind of green. The GLRC’s Dustin Dwyer has the story:


The first thing you notice about the smell of General Motors’ newest plant is how much
you don’t notice it. The plant smells like nothing at all. Not paint, grease or even that
new car smell. GM says it specifically selected materials for its new Lansing Delta Township
Plant in Michigan to limit indoor air pollution. And there’s a lot more to not notice about the plant.
Like how much space it doesn’t use.


On a tour with reporters, GM Environmental Engineer Bridget Bernal points out that less
than half of the plant’s 1,100-acre lot has been developed. The rest is left green, including
75 acres for habitat preservation:


“And basically in that 75 acres, we have a couple of pretty large wetlands, along with
some smaller wetlands. We have a rather large wood lot. And we’ve got a significant area
that’s being developed as native prairie.”


GM says it only planted native species on the site. And it planned ditches and culverts to
help filter water as it drains into other areas. A quarter of the materials used to build the
facility was recycled. The plant uses 45 percent less total energy than a traditional plant.
And, on the day GM gave reporter tours, it rained. Even that gets used. The water is
collected in cisterns, and used for flushing. GM says the plant saves a total of more than 4
million gallons of water per year.


Put together, all these elements were enough to win GM a LEED Gold Certification from
the U.S. Green Building Council.


Kimberly Hoskin is director of the council’s new construction program. She says she’d
been traveling a lot for work when one of her colleagues asked if she’d be willing to take
a trip to an event Lansing, Michigan.


“And I said, ‘Well, who’s it for? And she said, well, General Motors.’ General Motors, a
factory, is getting a LEED Gold Certification? Yes, I’ll go. Of course I’ll go. This is really
exciting.”


GM is not the first auto company to use green elements in an auto plant design. Ford’s
Rouge Plant in Dearborn, Michigan was built earlier this decade with a 10-acre “living”
roof that helped manage storm water runoff.


But Hoskin says, out of about 560 buildings in the nation that have been certified by the
Green Building Council, only five are manufacturing facilities, and GM says the Lansing
facility is the first auto assembly plant to get Gold, the agency’s top rating.


But for GM, the green elements of the Lansing Delta Assembly Plant aren’t just about the
environment. They’re about cold, hard cash. The lower energy use alone will save GM a
million dollars a year. That gives people like Hoskin comfort that the plant isn’t just a
public relations move by GM and it increases the chances that we’ll see more green plants
in the future.


Sean McAlinden is Chief Economist with the Center for Automotive Research:


“As we slowly replace our old big 3 plants, many of which are very elderly, they’re all
going to look like this. They’re all going to be green plants. In fact, some of them will
keep getting greener.”


That’s good news for places where there’s a lot of auto manufacturing, but many people
are not ready to absolve GM of all of its environmental sins.


David Friedman is with the Union of Concerned Scientists. He says a green plant is nice,
but the real problem is still the product:


“Over eight times the impact on the environment when it comes to global warming is
once that vehicle leaves that plant. That’s the biggest step that we need automakers to
take and to improve the fuel economy of all of their cars and trucks.”


GM, and other automakers, say they are working to make cars cleaner. High gas prices
may force even more changes as sales of big pickups and SUVs drop off. Ultimately, car
makers’ profits could depend on building cleaner cars, just as keeping manufacturing
costs down will depend on having cleaner plants.


That could change the way auto companies think about environmental improvements
because going green will be about more than just doing the right thing, or protecting the
brand image. It will be about protecting the bottom line. What’s sustainable for the
environment will also be sustainable for the business, and both will show a lot more
green.


For the GLRC, I’m Dustin Dwyer.

Related Links

Feasting on Backyard Weeds

  • Peter Gail holds his favorite weed: the spinach-like lamb's quarters.

Your barbeque grill isn’t the only place to find food in your backyard. There are lots of plants out there to eat, but most of us call
them weeds. The GLRC’s Julie Grant reports:

Transcript

Your barbeque grill isn’t the only place to find food in your backyard.
There are lots of plants out there to eat, but most of us call
them weeds. The GLRC’s Julie Grant reports:


Peter Gail of Cleveland loves food. He’s got a lot of meat on his bones.


“Gee, you can’t get me to stop. I start eating this stuff and I can’t stop. It’s terrible, it’s terrible, it’s addictive (laughs).”


But his favorite foods grow right in his backyard, and probably yours. Gail is what’s
known as an ethno-botanist. He’s on a mission to teach more people about how to eat the
plants growing all around their houses. His latest converts are a troop of boy scouts:


“My grandson was one of the boys in this Boy Scout troop. And when I got over to his
house three days after we got back from scout camp, he grabbed the bag, the plastic bag
of weeds that his mother weeded out of the yard that day and dragged it over to me on the
patio and said find the edible plants in here and show me them.”


Gail says the yard becomes more exciting to most kids when they can sit down and
munch. His own love of the backyard snack started when he was just a boy. His family
faced some tough times. They were saved by a common weed known as lamb’s quarters.


“My dad died and left the family with no money. A friend told my mother we could live
off lamb’s quarters. For six months we went out and every day my brother and I would
gather the young tops of lamb’s quarters and then bring them into the house and my
mother would make them into every kind of spinach dish imaginable, until she learned
how to make a living. And then after that she still, we still liked the plant so we still ate it a lot.”


These days you could pay a lot for lamb’s quarters in a gourmet food store. They’re sold
as Belgium spinach. Or, Gail says, you could just take a quick look around your yard.


Today we’re walking around a backyard in suburban Cleveland. We find lamb’s quarters
at the base of a tree. Some say you can recognize the leaves because they look like the
hindquarters of a lamb. Gail thinks they look more like the silhouette of a Christmas tree:


“You’ll notice it has, when you’re looking down on it, it looks like somebody spilled a
little bit of talcum powder on the very top. It has that little dusting of white that is right on the top and on the underside of the leaves you see the same dusting, but taste one leaf, taste a leaf of that.”


And it does taste like spinach, but the USDA reports it’s even more nutritious than
Popeye’s favorite treat.


“It doesn’t take any cooking. It can be eaten raw, or it can be cooked. It will interfere, if you eat too much raw, with the assimilation of both iron and calcium, so you usually want to cook it. It makes a great addition to omelets, great cooked green, great quiches. Any recipe you use spinach in, you can use lamb’s quarters.”


There’s a lot more than just lamb’s quarters in the yard to eat. This time of year, Peter Gail also recommends sautiing the buds or petals from orange and yellow daylilies. He’s also a big fan of dandelions. He suggests looking for the young, tender leaves because they’re less bitter. Gail says he believes dandelions were brought to America by Italian
immigrants. They’re used in lots of Italian recipes:


“80 percent of the things we call weeds were vegetables brought here by immigrants.
That’s one of the reasons most of the things we call weeds in our backyards aren’t
indigenous plants. They aren’t plants that were from America. They’re plants that are
from Europe and Asia and from South America.”


Gail says over time those traditional foods escaped from gardens into the wild. After
World War II, things changed. Most people started buying food at the grocery store and foraging became unpopular. He says only the poor searched the yard for food:


“One by one, as generations went by, the kids didn’t learn as much the second generation,
the third generation they knew nothing. And by the time we reach where we are now,
almost everybody can walk right by the most nutritious plant going, the most commonly eaten
plant back in the 30s and 40s, and not even have a clue what it is.”


Gail is trying to change that. He wants people to become reacquainted with these plants
so we don’t recklessly destroy them. He travels around the country giving workshops,
taking people on neighborhood forages, and teaching cooking classes. Gail believes we
might need these plants again someday.


For the GLRC, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

Epa Report: Fuel Economy Remains Stalled

Today’s cars and trucks are the heaviest, fastest and most powerful vehicles on the road in a generation, but according to a new report from the Environmental Protection Agency, these vehicles have stalled when it comes to fuel economy. The GLRC’s Dustin Dwyer has the story:

Transcript

Today’s cars and trucks are the heaviest, fastest and most powerful vehicles on the road in
a generation, but according to a new report from the Environmental Protection Agency,
these vehicles have stalled when it comes to fuel economy. The GLRC’s Dustin Dwyer
has the story:


The EPA report says carmakers made big progress on fuel economy from the mid-70s to
mid-80s. But since then, average fuel economy numbers have actually gotten worse.
That’s mostly because cars and trucks are getting bigger. By 2005, the EPA says SUVs
alone made up a quarter of all vehicle sales in the U.S.


Daniel Becker of the Sierra Club says auto companies are to blame:


“Americans are being fed this diet of these vehicles with TV ads, but then they end up
paying at the gas pump, and they end up paying with more global warming, pollution and
more oil addiction.”


Auto companies say they’ve only made bigger cars because that’s what consumers
wanted to buy, but for now, high gas prices seem to have put a halt on demand.


Truck sales for the entire auto industry were down nearly 20 percent this June compared
to a year ago.


For the GLRC, I’m Dustin Dwyer.

Related Links

States Slow to Pump Up Ethanol

  • As the price of gasoline rises, many states are looking for alternatives. One of those alternatives is the ethanol blend, E-85. But, some states (like Ohio) are not keeping up with the trend. (Photo by Lester Graham)

The federal government is focusing new attention on research and development of ethanol. Some states – especially those in the corn belt – are getting into the act too. The GLRCs Karen Kasler reports:

Transcript

The federal government is focusing new attention on research and
development of ethanol. Some states – especially those in the corn belt –
are getting into the act too. The GLRC’s Karen Kasler reports:


Now that gasoline is near or above three dollars a gallon, ethanol seems
to be everywhere. The Renewable Fuels Association says more than a
third of the gasoline in the U.S is blended with ethanol, an alcohol based
fuel made with the sugar found in corn and other grains. A 10 percent
ethanol/gasoline blend can be used in every vehicle on the road, but
many politicians and consumers are very interested in the 85 percent
ethanol blend – E-85 – as an alternative fuel for cars and trucks. But
getting E-85 to drivers who have cars which can use it isn’t that easy.


Tadd Nicholson with the Ohio Corn Growers Association, says part of
the problem is the big oil companies have banned E-85 pumps under the
canopies at branded stations.


“Oil companies don’t own ethanol production. They own oil refining,
and so that’s their profit center and that’s where they get their fuel and so
they have a lot of control over that. They don’t own ethanol. I don’t
know why. They should, but they aren’t in the ethanol ownership
business yet. I say ‘yet’.”


The governors of Wisconsin and Minnesota have asked the big oil
companies to change their E-85 policy, and some states have been
encouraging independent gasoline dealers to put in E-85 pumps for a few
years.


But others, such as Ohio, have been lagging behind in the trend. Only
recently has Ohio launched a new energy action plan that sounds
ambitious, when it comes to providing access to ethanol to drivers.


LeeAnn Mizer is with the Ohio Department of Agriculture.


“The goal is to triple the amount of E-85 pumps available to Ohio
consumers by the end of 2006.”


That sounds like a lot – but it’s not, says Dwayne Seikman heads up the
Ohio Corn Growers Association.


“Tripling’s a nice start. There’s six… that would go to 18. But with over
150,000 vehicles in the state of Ohio, that’s not enough to cover the
effort.”


Since corn is Ohio’s top crop… it would seem to make sense. But unlike
other states in the corn belt, there are no ethanol plants in operation in
Ohio, though there are at least three under construction, and ethanol
supporters say the state is way behind its neighbors when it comes to
getting ethanol pumps at service stations.


Sam Spofforth is executive director of Clean Fuels Ohio.


“I’ll be honest, we’d like to see a lot more and we think a lot more is
certainly very possible. Indiana, they’re up to about 25 to 30 stations.
Illinois has over a hundred. Minnesota has almost 200 at this point.
Even places like Arizona are putting in E-85. They don’t make any corn
in Arizona. We think Ohio can do a lot more.”


Some critical studies have found that ethanol has a high energy cost with
low benefits – ethanol supporters say that’s been debunked. Whether
ethanol makes economic or ecological sense or not is still not certain.
But one thing is certain – cars using ethanol blends need to fill up more
than those using regular unleaded gasoline.


Robert White with the National Ethanol Vehicle Coalition says that’s
offset because typically ethanol-blended fuels cost less than regular
unleaded gas.


“Well, no doubt the fuel economy is the only negative with E-85, and we
tell folks that is where the price differential hopefully is there to make
E-85 use a wash.”


Part of the reason the price is lower is because the ethanol industry is
heavily subsidized by the government. Those lower costs would quickly
disappear if the subsidies were removed. Because ethanol is cleaner
burning, many support further development and use of the renewable
fuel.


General Motors is increasing the number of vehicles it produces that can
burn ethanol. Ford already produces E-85 burning cars and trucks.
However, many believe for ethanol production to be truly efficient,
farmers will have to start growing crops such as switch grass for ethanol
because corn requires too much fossil fuel based fertilizer and other
inputs to make it a permanent solution.


For GLRC, I’m Karen Kasler.

Related Links

Ford Prods Customers to Buy Carbon Offsets

Several Internet companies offer ways for drivers to offset the impact of their car’s greenhouse gas emissions by investing in clean energy. Now, one of the Big Three automakers wants to sign up its customers. The GLRC’s Rebecca Williams has more:

Transcript

Several Internet companies offer ways for drivers to offset the impact of
their car’s greenhouse gas emissions by investing in clean energy. Now,
one of the Big Three automakers wants to sign up its customers. The
GLRC’s Rebecca Williams has more:


It’s sort of like getting your sins forgiven… if you feel guilty for driving
an SUV.


It’s called carbon offsetting. What happens is… you spend anywhere
from 30 to 80 bucks for a carbon offset. The money gets invested in
cleaner energy projects – like wind farms – that don’t produce greenhouse
gasses.


Ford Motor Company is teaming up with a carbon offset company called
Terrapass… to promote carbon offsets to Ford customers.


Tom Arnold is a founder of Terrapass. He says Ford’s been criticized for
its poor fuel economy record… and for opposing California’s greenhouse
gas regulations on cars.


“It’s a question of helping Ford take steps in the right direction. Here’s
something that can help the organization better communicate to green
customers.”


Arnold points out there are also some free ways to cut down on carbon
dioxide emissions… such as driving less or buying a more fuel efficient
car.


For the GLRC, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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