Tag: ins

Interview: International Automakers’ Plans

  • Honda rolled out the 2010 Insight for it's world premiere (Photo courtesy of the North American International Auto Show)

Car makers are showing off new
models at the North American International
Auto Show in Detroit. Domestic automakers
are rolling out hybrids and coming plug-in
hybrids. Foreign manufacturers have a
little more experience with hybrids.
Toyota has been doing well with its hybrid,
the Prius, and the Japanese company plans
to release a plug-in version early next year.
Lester Graham talked with Julie Halpert.
She’s a reporter who’s been covering the
preview of the Detroit Auto Show (opens
Saturday January 17th). She says
Honda, which started this hybrid trend,
hasn’t done much lately, but it is now:

Transcript

Car makers are showing off new
models at the North American International
Auto Show in Detroit. Domestic automakers
are rolling out hybrids and coming plug-in
hybrids. Foreign manufacturers have a
little more experience with hybrids.
Toyota has been doing well with its hybrid,
the Prius, and the Japanese company plans
to release a plug-in version early next year.
Lester Graham talked with Julie Halpert.
She’s a reporter who’s been covering the
preview of the Detroit Auto Show (opens
Saturday January 17th). She says
Honda, which started this hybrid trend,
hasn’t done much lately, but it is now:

Lester Graham: They’re paying a lot of attention to the Detroit Auto Show this
year because of the bailout and because of the new green cars that are being
displayed. Julie Halpert’s been covering the Auto Show. Julie, there’s a lot of
talk about the domestic automakers bringing on board hybrids and plug-in
hybrids in the near future, but it appears the Japanese automakers are coming
out ahead.

Julie Halpert: What’s interesting is the Japanese automakers feel it’s more
important in the near future to focus on regular hybrids. For example, Honda is
coming out with a new version of its Insight, that is comparable in size to the
Prius. And, it’s going to be the most affordable Hybrid. Priced under $20,000,
which makes it very attractive. Their argument is, these electric cars are
interesting, but there’s a lot of work to be done on the battery, and, so they would
rather see lots of people in hybrids, near-term. They think that’s going to make a
bigger difference environmentally than coming up with these plug-in hybrids,
which are going to be more expensive, and aren’t going to be offered for the next
couple of years.

Graham: If oil prices stay low, I’m wondering if domestic automakers will stay the
course of these more energy efficient cars. It sounds like they want the
government to force consumers into that market.

Halpert: Well, the government’s obviously placing a priority on this. And what
they’re very much hoping is that the government fuels demand by creating tax
incentives for these vehicles – they have the ability to do that, Congress has the
ability to do that. I think they’ve invested so much now, there’s really no
reversing course. The problem is that customers are very fickle. If gas prices
are low, they’re going to go back to their conventional internal combustion
engines. When gas prices were high, this past summer, there was a huge cry for
these alternative, more fuel efficient vehicles. The problem is that automakers
need to plan months and months in advance to bring out these vehicles. So
now, they’re on course to do that, it would be very difficult for them to switch
course at this point.

Graham: While Honda’s coming out with this new version of the Insight, Toyota’s
coming out with a third generation of the Prius, GM’s trumpeting the Volt, Ford is
going after smaller engines with turbo power. Why are they taking that
approach?

Halpert: Well, it’s actually quite a prudent approach. They’ve got this hybrid
Ford Fusion, which gets 41 miles per gallon. And, they’ve got this super turbo-
charged engine, which can boost fuel efficiency by 20-30%. And, their argument
is, let’s use more conventional motors to do this, because it gets into an
affordability issue. They can basically provide the power of a V8 engine in a V6
engine. And, consumers still want that power. They want low costs. So, they
figure, this new technology can go quite far in getting a lot of fuel efficiency and
not requiring consumers to pay this up-front premium that other hybrids cost.

Graham: That’s Julie Halpert, who’s been covering the Detroit Auto Show.
Thanks, Julie.

Halpert: Thank you so much.

Related Links

Detroit Gets Electric

  • A new element highlighting the green future of the automotive industry has been added to the show. Attendees will be able to experience the latest in technology in a ride-and-drive format on a track built in Michigan Hall. (Photo courtesy of the North American International Auto Show)

Car makers are at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit to show-off their hybrids, and coming plug-in hybrids. Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

Car makers are at the North
American International Auto Show in
Detroit to show-off their hybrids,
and coming plug-in hybrids. Lester
Graham reports:

GM, Ford and Chrysler have all built hybrids and have plans for more – and all plan
plug-in hybrids. Those kinds of cars need good batteries.

Soon lithium ion batteries will replace what’s being used now. But, it’ll still only get
you 40 miles at best in plug ins before it runs out of juice and needs the gas-powered
engine onboard.

So making even better batteries is important to GM, Chrysler and Ford’s Executive
Chairman Bill Ford.

“I actually think the battery break-throughs will now start coming relatively quickly.”

But what if gasoline prices stay low? Will the majority of car buyers care about fuel
efficiency?

GM’s Rick Wagoner bets as the economy improves, gas prices will go back up.

“In general we’d expect oil prices to resume an increase. Hopefully a more gradual
one than we saw last year.”

And the automakers hope the government continues to encourage sales of fuel
efficient cars with tax credits.

For The Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

Power Plant Pollution From Plug-Ins?

  • Some people get a little concerned about more electrics and electric-hybrid cars. That’s because 50% of electric power in the U.S. comes from coal-burning power plants. And, just about every state wants to build more power plants to meet peak demand. (Photo by Ed Edahl, courtesy of FEMA)

The big automakers are working on
coming up with plug in hybrids. By the
end of 2010, G-M and Toyota plan to have
cars you can plug in to charge up batteries,
backed up with small gas powered engines.
Lester Graham reports there are concerns
about whether pollution from power plants
will be any better than pollution from tailpipes:

Transcript

The big automakers are working on
coming up with plug in hybrids. By the
end of 2010, G-M and Toyota plan to have
cars you can plug in to charge up batteries,
backed up with small gas powered engines.
Lester Graham reports there are concerns
about whether pollution from power plants
will be any better than pollution from tailpipes:


I was out the other day with a guy who converted his Saturn four-door into an all electric
vehicle. Did it all himself.

His name’s Bob Gurk. He’s one of a lot of people who think there’s a better way, and
they want you to see for yourself.

Bob Gurk: “Here are the keys.”

Lester Graham: “I’m drivin’?”

Guys like Bob Gurk think the big automakers should have come up with electrics and
plug-in hybrids a long time ago.

Lester Graham: “Unplug here?”

Bob Gurk: “Yeah.”

(sounds of driving)

Bob Gurk says, sure, he spent a lot converting his car to electric. And there are some
sacrifices: no air conditioning, he can only go just a little over 50 miles without a charge,
but then, he’s not paying close to four-bucks a gallon for gasoline now.

Bob Gurk: “I figure it’s about three cents a mile.”

Lester Graham: “Three cents a mile?”

Bob Gurk: “Yeah.”

Lester Graham: “As opposed to gasoline, which is?”

Bob Gurk: “Ten cents a mile, I’d say. At least.”

Some people get a little concerned about more electrics and electric-hybrids. That’s
because 50% of electric power in the U.S. comes from coal-burning power plants. And,
just about every state wants to build more power plants to meet peak demand.

A guy who’s supposed to know something about electric cars is Andy Frank. He’s at
the University of California Davis. Some call him the father of the plug-in-hybrid. Andy
Frank says we don’t use all the power that’s available right now.

“What a lot of people don’t realize is that the grid actually has excess capacity. The
reason why is there has to be enough capacity to satisfy the peak draw in the middle of
the day. But, at night everybody turns off their lights and that draw goes down to about
anywhere between a half and two-thirds of what is required during the peak of the day.”

So, the idea is you could plug in your plug-in hybrid overnight.

“And then the question is how many cars could you charge with that idle capacity on our
existing grid? About 75 to 80% of cars in our entire fleet in the U.S. could be charged
with that excess capacity that we currently have.”

That’s assuming most people would only plug in at night, during the off-peak hours. If
most of them did, that would be a lot of cars that would not be emitting pollution from the
tailpipes.

But that also means some power plants will be burning more coal at night, billowing out
pollution, including greenhouse gasses.

Dustin Dwyer reports on automotive issues for Michigan Radio and he’s covered this
issue.

“One of the benefits, the power companies will tell you, is that if you have millions of
tailpipes out there spewing emissions, it’s much more difficult to capture those emissions
or manage those emissions than it is to manage coming out of one smokestack at the
power plant.”

But, you do end up shifting some pollution upstream to the power plants. And that
would pollute rural areas more, because that’s where they build the power plants.

The experts say that’s why we ought to start building parking lots with car ports covered
in solar panels, put up more wind turbines, and find other ways to use energy better – to
power all those electric and plug-in hybrids that are coming.

For The Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

Canadian Boaters Run Into Permit Problems

Pleasure boaters from Canada will find getting permits to enter Great Lakes ports across the border a little more demanding since the terrorist attacks on the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

Pleasure boaters from Canada will find getting permits to enter Great Lakes
ports across the border a little more demanding since the terrorist attacks
on the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

It used to be… a Canadian boater simply had to send in an application for
what’s known as an I-68 permit to the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization
Service and once it was received, they could freely travel back and forth.
Kimberly Weissman is with the INS office. She explains, since September
11th, the new rules first require Canadians to go to a port of entry.

“Going in for an inspection… it’s no longer done by mail. You
have an interview and you take a photograph and have fingerprints. Once all
of this is complete, you know, you’ll be given your one year permit and then
you will no longer be required to go to a port of entry for any other
further inspections.”

Weissman says the U.S. government didn’t want to hurt the marina and
tourist-based businesses in the Great Lakes, but felt the new stricter
program was necessary for the security of the country.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.