Last year, there were four million fewer cars, but two million more drivers than in 2008.
(Photo by Samara Freemark)
America’s love affair with the
car skidded a bit last year.
According to data from the
US Department of Transportation,
the number of cars in the
US dropped in 2009. Lester
Graham reports that’s the first
time that’s happened since
World War II:
Transcript
America’s love affair with the
car skidded a bit last year.
According to data from the
US Department of Transportation,
the number of cars in the
US dropped in 2009. Lester
Graham reports that’s the first
time that’s happened since
World War II:
Last year there were four million fewer cars, but two million more drivers than in 2008.
Lester Brown is with the Earth Policy Institute. His group reviewed the numbers. He says the market’s saturated.
“We have more licensed vehicles than we have licensed drivers. So, we couldn’t get all our cars on the road at once if we wanted to because we don’t have enough drivers. That’s one way to define saturation.”
The Earth Policy Institute also found more people have access to mass transit, people are concerned about the impact of foreign oil, gasoline prices, and young people socialize on the internet and cell phones more than driving around in the car with their friends.
Auto industry experts say the decline of cars on the road has more to do with tight credit for auto loans than anything else.
It can take a lot of water to make ethanol.
(Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
The ethanol industry and the government
want more ethanol to be produced. They
say the homegrown biofuel is a good way
to move away from foreign oil. But a new
government report says many ethanol
refineries are putting a strain on another
natural resource – water. Mark Brush has
more:
Transcript
The ethanol industry and the government
want more ethanol to be produced. They
say the homegrown biofuel is a good way
to move away from foreign oil. But a new
government report says many ethanol
refineries are putting a strain on another
natural resource – water. Mark Brush has
more:
When you fuel up at the pump, chances are you’re putting ethanol into your car. Nearly half of the gasoline in the U.S. is blended with ethanol. And that’s likely to increase as they build more refineries.
But the Government Accountability Office says these ethanol refineries should consider local water resources before they build. It can take a lot of water to make ethanol.
Anu Mittel follows water resource issues for the Government Accountability Office:
“Many of them are being built in areas where they are relying on groundwater aquifers for their water supply and that could have a devastating effect on the local community that is also relying on that same water source for all of its other needs.”
Refineries built in those areas often rely on irrigated corn to make ethanol. So it means drawing millions of gallons of water just to make the ethanol at the refinery.
The 2010 Ford Fusion Hybrid. (Photo courtesy of Ford)
New car models are hitting the
dealers’ showroom floors. Lester
Graham reports not as many fuel
efficient cars are selling in the
wake of the government’s Cash-
for-Clunkers program:
Transcript
New car models are hitting the
dealers’ showroom floors. Lester
Graham reports not as many fuel
efficient cars are selling in the
wake of the government’s Cash-
for-Clunkers program:
It’s hard to miss the ads for new models.
(montage of car advertisements)
But in September, fuel-efficient cars didn’t sell that well.
Mark Gillies is the Executive Editor for Car and Driver magazine. He says vehicles that get good gas mileage probably won’t start selling until gasoline prices go up – just like last year.
“That’s when you saw a big move to buying more fuel efficient vehicles. And I think the obvious thing about oil prices is that long term the trend is that they’re going to go up and they’re going to stay that way.”
Fuel-efficient models did sell in August because of Cash-for Clunkers, but Gillies says people bought low-end models this time because they were cheap – not necessarily because they were fuel-efficient.
Dealers across the country are running out of new cars to sell that qualify for the program. (Photo source: IFCAR at Wikimedia Commons)
Two billion dollars is being added to
the very popular Cash for Clunkers
program. The original one billion dollars
is almost gone. But, Lester Graham
reports, there’s a shortage of new cars
that qualify for the program:
Transcript
Two billion dollars is being added to
the very popular Cash for Clunkers
program. The original one billion dollars
is almost gone. But, Lester Graham
reports, there’s a shortage of new cars
that qualify for the program:
The National Automobile Dealers Association says they’ve been hearing from dealers across the country who’ve been running out of new cars that qualify for the program.
Steve Demers is the General Manager of Cueter Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Ypsilanti, Michigan, a state where Cash for clunkers has been especially popular.
“There’s virtually no vehicles available, so there are other areas in the country that may not be as – the program has not been as popular – so we’re able to pluck some of that inventory out of their states, but it’s a nation-wide problem. I mean, we’re out many, many states away, thousands of miles before we can find a vehicle that can be brought in for one of our custormers.”
Factories are shipping more cars to the dealers but can’t keep up with demand.
185,000 gas-guzzling clunkers have been turned in to be scrapped in exchange for the government incentives.
Car buyers get up to 4,500 dollars toward buying a new fuel-efficient model.
VW's Jetta TDI - a diesel that the EPA estimates at 40 miles per gallon (Photo by Julie Grant)
If you’re thinking about buying a cleaner, more fuel-efficient
car, you might think a hybrid is your best option. But some
automakers want people to look at an older technology when
they’re looking for green cars: the diesel engine. Julie Grant
reports:
Transcript
If you’re thinking about buying a cleaner, more fuel-efficient
car, you might think a hybrid is your best option. But some
automakers want people to look at an older technology when
they’re looking for green cars: the diesel engine. Julie Grant
reports:
Lots of automakers make diesel cars – BMW, Ford, General
Motors, Volkswagen. But they sell most of them in Europe,
not the U.S. Diesel engines have a bad rap here.
Just ask Jerry Doble; he used to drive a diesel truck.
“They’re noisy and they’re smelly and they’re hard to start in
the winter. And that’s about it, I guess.”
But Doble hasn’t seen the new diesel cars making their way
from Europe.
Mike Omotoso is an auto industry analyst with JD Power and
Associates.
He says diesel carmakers have lowered their tailpipe
emissions. They’ve put in extensive filtering systems. Plus,
the fuel, itself, is cleaner than it used to be.
Diesel used to have lots of stinky sulfur – up to 500 parts per
million – now it has only 15 parts per million.
But Omotoso says when most Americans think of clean cars,
diesels aren’t the first thing that come to mind.
“When people think of clean vehicles they think of the Prius
first, and then they think of Toyota and they think of Honda
as well. The manufacturers, especially the German
manufacturers, are having to do a job catching up to the
positive publicity of hybrids. So they have to persuade the
American public that diesels can be clean as well.”
That’s why you may have seen those Volkswagen
commercials on TV – where one neighbor has a Prius, and
the other a new Jetta TDI-diesel:
VW: “A TDI set a Guiness World Record – 58 miles per
gallon.”
Prius owner: “58 miles per gallon!”
VW: “But this baby hauls. It’s like errr…errr… What does
your Prius sound like?”
Prius owner: (sound of quietly exhaling)
VW: “Oh. That’s cool.”
There’s a couple of things going on in that commercial.
It’s pushing the diesel as a green car. It’s also trying to
dispel the image of diesels being slow and clunky. They’re
trying to push diesels as green, muscle cars.
At this Volkswagen dealership, salesman Aaron Heinlein
says these commercials are having some success.
He says the only people who used to buy diesels worked
with the railways, in construction, or on farms. But this
week, he sold a TDI Jetta to a dietician.
“She would be the customer that, if she came in four years
ago, I would have said, ‘wow, you want to look at a diesel?
Cool, I’ll show you one.’ Now it’s just, that’s the norm. It’s
the lawyer, it’s the dentist, it’s the traveling salesperson who
is in their car a lot and needs better fuel mileage that you
wouldn’t have seen four years ago.”
Diesels cars still makeup less than 1% of the market.
Americans want power and speed and that’s not how they
think about diesel engines. Things are different in Europe,
where gas is upwards of $8 per gallon and consumers are
focused on good gas mileage.
Auto industry analysts are expecting to see a jump in diesel
sales in the U.S. in the next few years.
But JD Power and Associates doesn’t expect all this
marketing to make a huge dent in American car sales.
They’re forecasting diesel car sales at 4% to 5% of the
market by 2016.
That’s when the new federal fuel standards take effect.
It is hoped that the "Cash for Clunkers" bill will stimulate fledgling car sales (Photo by Samara Freemark)
The so-called “Cash for Clunkers” bill has passed the US House. Automakers say it could help boost sluggish sales if it passes the Senate and gets signed into law. But as Rebecca Williams reports some people think the bill isn’t very green:
Transcript
The so-called “Cash for Clunkers” bill has passed the US House. Automakers say it could help boost sluggish sales if it passes the Senate and gets signed into law. But as Rebecca Williams reports some people think the bill isn’t very green:
If you have a car or truck that gets 18 miles per gallon or less, under this bill, you’d get to trade it in for a more fuel efficient car or truck. The old car would get scrapped.
You’d get a voucher for several thousand dollars. Old gas guzzlers would get taken off the road.
But Ann Mesnikoff points out: in the House bill you could trade in an old SUV that gets, say, 14 miles per gallon… for a new SUV that gets just two miles per gallon more.
She directs Sierra Club’s Green Transportation Campaign.
“The key things to change in the cash for clunkers program are to ensure that taxpayer dollars are going to buy vehicles that have at least better than average fuel economy. Not those that can’t even meet today’s fuel economy standards.”
Congress is also going to have to figure out how to pay for the bill. It’s expected to cost about 4 billion dollars.
In order to qualify an old vehicle must get less than 18 miles per gallon.
(Photo source: IFCAR at Wikimedia Commons)
After a meeting with the White House, Members of Congress appear to be close to a deal
on a so-called “cash for clunkers” program. But Tamara Keith reports critics say the
compromise members have come up with won’t do much for the environment:
Transcript
After a meeting with the White House, Members of Congress appear to be close to a deal
on a so-called “cash for clunkers” program. But Tamara Keith reports critics say the
compromise members have come up with won’t do much for the environment:
The “cash for clunkers” program has wide support as good for the environment; good for
the ailing auto industry.
Car owners would get a voucher towards a new fuel efficient car when they scrap their
old gas guzzler. In order to qualify an old vehicle must get less than 18 miles per gallon.
But a new car that does just 4 miles per gallon better earns a $3,500 reward. A
10 MPG improvement brings $4,500.
Critics say many of the new replacement vehicles would fall well short of the
government’s average fuel economy standards.
Congressman John Dingell from Michigan says the critics are missing the point: the new
cars will be more fuel efficient than the ones that are getting junked.
“What they aught to ask is, ‘what is this going to mean in terms of increased fuel
efficiency and reduced CO2 emissions.’ The result will be substantial.”
Of course the deal isn’t really done until it is approved by Congress. If it passes, the
President is expected to sign it.
Some think that a gas tax is the only way to get consumers to buy fuel efficient cars (Photo courtesy of the US Department of State)
Some in the auto industry are proposing a hike in the gasoline tax. The idea is this: if you want people to buy small cars, make gasoline more expensive. Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
Some in the auto industry are proposing a hike in the gasoline tax. The idea is this: if you want people to buy small cars, make gasoline more expensive. Lester Graham reports:
Car dealers and manufacturers say a higher gas price is the only thing that gets people buying more fuel efficient cars. So, a tax hike makes sense.
But, a guy who has a lot of sway on the idea of a gas tax hike is not going there.
Congressman Ed Markey chairs a House subcommittee on Energy and the Environment.
At a forum at MIT he said the plan is to stick with CAFÉ — the Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards – to get better mileage cars.
“That’s the route that we’re taking rather and an increase in the gasoline tax. We’re moving towards a mandate and 35 miles per gallon is the minimum that we intend on reaching by 2020.”
And under the stimulus package, new tax credits amounting to thousands of dollars get kicked-back to anyone buying a fuel efficient car.
A proposed program would allow car owners to trade in their gas-guzzling clunkers and get a cash incentive towards a new, more efficient car. (Photo by Martin Hans, Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)
A proposed cash for clunkers program might jump start the auto industry and help the environment at the same time. Tamara Keith reports the idea is getting some traction in Washington DC:
Transcript
A proposed cash for clunkers program might jump start the auto industry and help the environment at the same time. Tamara Keith reports the idea is getting some traction in Washington DC:
The idea is: if you bring in your old gas guzzler, you’d get money to buy a new fuel-efficient car. The gas guzzler? Straight to the junk yard , getting older, smog belching vehicles off the road. John McEleney is the chairman of the national automobile dealers association. He says how much you’d get would be based on how fuel efficient the new car is. For instance, if you bought a car that gets 27 miles to the gallon:
“They might qualify for say a $3500 incentive. If they instead purchased a vehicle that was rated at 33 miles a gallon that incentive could then go to $5000.”
One big question is whether only American-made cars would qualify. That’s one of the issues congress and the white house will have to work out– Oh, along with figuring out where the money would come from. For the Environment Report, I’m Tamara Keith.
Both studies agree that we need more efficient cars (Photo by Karen Kelly)
Recently two reports on the future of automobiles came out. They looked at cars and trucks from very different perspectives, but came to some similar conclusions. Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
Recently two reports on the future of automobiles came out. They looked at cars and trucks from very different perspectives, but came to some similar conclusions. Lester Graham reports:
The first report was published in the journal, Environmental Science and Technology. It looked at what it would take to get U.S. automobiles to reduce the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, enough to lower it to 1990 levels.
Why cars? Because cars and trucks produce a third of U.S. CO2 emissions.
Greg Keoleian is one of the authors at the University of Michigan. He says there are three things that need work.
We need to drive less, burn cleaner fuels, and, within about 40 years, increase the average fuel mileage way beyond the 20-miles per gallon we’re getting now.
“That would need to increase to 136 miles per gallon to meet the carbon targets. Alternatively, if we just focused on fuels, basically we’d need about 80% cellulosic ethanol by 2050. And the third scenario is a reduction in driving. It would mean we’d have to cut our driving in half by 2050.”
It’s unlikely we can accomplish any one of them, and the study’s authors suggest it’ll probably be a combination of more efficient cars, better fuels, and driving less if we’re to reduce greenhouse gases enough to make a difference.
The second report entitled ‘Envisioning an Uncertain Future’ comes from the Boston Consulting Group. It looks at the future of the automobile from a business perspective.
One of the authors, Xavier Mosquet, says the study assumes rising oil prices will force some changes.
“And that the pressure from the consumer on the governments will be so high that the governments will have to take energy actions to develop green products and green cars.”
But the report notes green cars will cost more – as much as 15,000 dollars more for hybrids or plug-in hybrids compared to standard cars.
“The consumer will look at these cars and say, ‘well, these are more expensive than I can pay.’ And therefore they’re not going to buy them. So, what I think the government has to do if they want to go that way is to look at the cost of putting those technologies on the market and either subsidizing the car’s manufacturers and suppliers or helping the consumer with much more tax incentives. Otherwise it will not happen.”
So, from a business perspective, the Boston Consulting Group report suggests without government help, manufacturers won’t build more efficient cars at a price we can afford. But we’ll need them because of high fuel prices.
The University of Michigan report on cars and climate change agrees the government will have a major role.
Author Greg Keoleian says if we take climate change seriously and are committed to doing something about it, we’ll have to change driving habits, encourage innovative manufacturers and invest government money.
“We are capable of doing this and the cost of climate change to society is tremendous. And each sector needs to play a major role in addressing the needs to reduce.”
The studies look at the future of the automobile from very different perspectives, but both agree we need more efficient cars and that won’t happen without the government pushing a little and helping a lot.
Last year, there were four million fewer cars, but two million more drivers than in 2008. (Photo by Samara Freemark)
