‘Cash for clunkers’ became popular before all the rules were final. For the past few weeks there’s been a growing backlog of orders at dealerships.
(Photo by Samara Freemark)
Today is the first official day of the cash for clunkers program. The government program offers you up to $4500 to trade in your gas guzzling car for a more fuel efficient new car. Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
Today is the first official day of the cash for clunkers program. The government program offers you up to $4500 to trade in your gas guzzling car for a more fuel efficient new car. Lester Graham reports:
The goal is to clean up the environment and give sagging new car sales a boost.
‘Cash for clunkers’ became popular before all the rules were final. For the past few weeks there’s been a growing backlog of orders at dealerships.
At Varsity Ford in Ann Arbor, Michigan, people have been seeing if their clunkers qualify, and picking out a new car that they’ll finally be able to drive off the lot today.
Matt Stanford sells cars there. He says as far as he’s concerned, ‘cash for clunkers’ is already a success.
“We’re going to sell new cars. We’re going to get cars that don’t really need to be on the road off the road.”
The National Autobmobile Dealers Association says some dealerships have been holding off until they learned more about the rules of ‘cash for clunkers’ which were just cleared up last Friday.
The clunkers will be scrapped. The cash ends when the one-billion dollars in government money runs out.
Cars stacked up and waiting to be shredded at United Iron and Metal in Baltimore, MD. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
The scrap heap, what's left of hundreds of cars and other metal waste after they go through a shredder. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
Engines in storage at All Foreign Auto Parts. This is the one piece of the car that absolutely can't be resold under the Cash for Clunkers program. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
The federal Cash for Clunkers
program kicked off this weekend,
and dealerships were pushing it
hard to sell new cars. The program
was created by Congress last month
to give a boost to the struggling
auto industry while helping the
environment. The idea is to get
older polluting cars off the road
for good and replace them with
new more-efficient ones. Tamara Keith has this report
on what will happen to all the
clunkers:
Transcript
The federal Cash for Clunkers program kicked off this weekend, and dealerships
were pushing it hard to sell new cars. The program was created by Congress last
month to give a boost to the struggling auto industry while helping the environment.
The idea is to get older polluting cars off the road for good and replace them with
new more-efficient ones. Tamara Keith has this report on what will happen to all the
clunkers:
Car dealers suddenly have a whole bunch of cars on their lots they have absolutely
no use for. The clunkers cannot be re-sold. That would defeat the whole green goal
of the program.
So all those old trucks and sagging sedans, they’re headed to places like M and M
Auto Parts in Stafford, Virginia. Most of us would call it a junk yard. But don’t tell
that to owner Rick Morrow.
“Long before green was popular, this kind of operation, even though a lot of people
said, ‘Oh junk yard.’ But they were actually recycling cars. They were making use of
what the component was built for in the first place.”
His company’s logo prominently features a large green recycling symbol.
“This is the dismantling area where after the cars come are inventoried and then take
them apart.”
Morrow’s business is all about re-use. A fender, or a tail light, or maybe an alternator
from this car will live to see another day in a car that needs a replacement part.
You’d think Morrow would be totally excited about Cash for Clunkers. But he’s not.
Because the one component from the clunkers that absolutely cannot be re-sold is
the engine – pretty much the most valuable thing in the car.
“If we do a few dozen cars and it looks like it’s costing us more money than it’s worth,
we’ll say, ‘sorry.’”
From an environmental perspective, it absolutely makes sense to prevent those
engines from ever polluting again. But, from a business perspective it’s a real
problem for the nation’s auto recyclers.
“It will make it extremely hard to make money on a car.”
Scotty Davis is the vice president of All Foreign Auto Parts in Fredericksburg
Virginia. He says it costs him $1800 in labor to take apart a car.
“It’s going to cost me money to do this. It’s one of these things. I have to bring the
car in. I have to get rid of the tires. I have to get rid of all the fluids, the freon,
process it – just to crush the vehicle.”
Davis specializes in newer foreign vehicles. Parts from a clunker won’t help stock
his shelves. But he feels like he has to take the cars to stay in the good graces of
the auto dealers he sells parts to.
“And I’ll be very honest with you. A couple of them I do a lot of business with, I said,
‘I will take your cars.’ And they said, ‘what are you going to do with them?’ I’m going
to crush ‘em. I mean they’re not of any value.”
(sound of a shredder yard)
Once all the usable parts are removed, and the toxic chemicals cleaned out, most
cars will end up at a scrap yard like United Iron and Metal in Baltimore.
“Right now you can see the tail end of a car coming on the conveyor belt down into
the shredder.”
“A tremendous amount of friction is going on as these hammers are pulverizing that
car into small pieces.”
Bruce Savage is with the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries – a trade group. It
only takes 15 seconds, and when the shredder is done with a car, it isn’t even
recognizable.
“That big pile over there is the end result. It’s just a big pile of metal pieces.”
Savage says the metal is then sold. Whether scrap recyclers will cash in on Cash
for Clunkers all depends on the commodities prices for metal in the coming months.
“What was an old car can become a new car or can become a dishwasher or siding
for a home. It depends on the materials. But everything is being reused,
reprocessed and renewed.”
So maybe a 1989 suburban can be reborn as a 2010 Ford Focus Hybrid.
Net metering is when people use rooftop solar or wind power to generate electricity, and then sell the extra back to the power companies (Photo courtesy of Sandia National Laboratories)
As a climate change bill works its way
through Congress, businesses are bracing
for change to cleaner energy. Lester Graham
reports some homeowners are thinking about
generating their own clean electricity:
Transcript
As a climate change bill works its way
through Congress, businesses are bracing
for change to cleaner energy. Lester Graham
reports some homeowners are thinking about
generating their own clean electricity:
People like the idea of using rooftop solar or wind power to generate the electricity and selling extra back to the power companies. It’s called net metering.
But some state regulations don’t allow it.
James Rose is the Senior Policy Analyst for the Network for New Energy Choices. He says these days more states are smoothing the way for net metering.
“It started out looking like a very big patchwork quilt – where some states are doing well, other states aren’t doing well, other states aren’t doing anything – to more of a regional mosaic, now where we see, like, the northeastern states in the United States to really improve their net metering. States out West such as Colorado and California are leading the way.”
Some power companies block net metering where they can.
But Rose says as lawmakers watch neighboring states implement net metering, and then embrace the idea for their own states.
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.
Under cap-and-trade, if a business can cut emissions faster, you can trade emission credits - for a price - to a business that can’t. (Photo courtesy of the US EPA)
Congress is debating a cap-and-
trade plan to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions. But a recent poll
determined most people don’t know
what cap-and-trade means. Lester
Graham reports:
Transcript
Congress is debating a cap-and-
trade plan to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions. But a recent poll
determined most people don’t know
what cap-and-trade means. Lester
Graham reports:
A poll by Rasmussen found 76% of Americans don’t know what cap-and-trade is.
Person 1: “Putting a price cap on something?”
Person 2: “Cap and trade? I have no idea.”
Person 3: “Captain Trade? I never heard of him.”
Here’s the simple version: cap greenhouse gases. The government will lower that cap over time.
Cut emissions faster, you can trade emission credits – for a price – to a business that can’t.
Overall, it’ll make fossil fuels more expensive, clean energy cheaper.
Democratic leaders in the House have agreed on a cap-and-trade plan. Republicans – and some Democrats – hate the plan. They think it’ll cost the economy too much.
The House will likely pass it. But Darren Samuelsohn with GreenWire says President Obama will have to push for it in the Senate.
“He could probably twist some arms and make some votes go his way if he really wanted it.”
And, even then, CAP and TRADE will likely only squeak through.
The lot that started Baldassari's quest to eliminate waste from his business. (Photo by Nancy Paladino of The Taylor Companies)
Wood scraps used to go to the dump - now they're used as mulch and at local farms for horse bedding. (Photo by Nancy Paladino of The Taylor Companies)
A canadian company picks up leather upholstery scraps to make wallets and purses. (Photo by Nancy Paladino of The Taylor Companies)
When you’re in the business of making things, you can wind
up with a lot of waste material. But these days more
companies are realizing trash has value. Julie Grant reports
instead of spending big bucks to dump their waste in a
landfill, these companies are making money from it:
Transcript
When you’re in the business of making things, you can wind
up with a lot of waste material. But these days more
companies are realizing trash has value. Julie Grant reports
instead of spending big bucks to dump their waste in a
landfill, these companies are making money from it:
Jeff Baldassari’s company makes sleek, upscale office
furniture.
“I would have never guessed ten years ago I’d
be the guy telling you this story right now.”
Baldassari is the CEO of The Taylor Companies.
A few years ago he started planning for a new factory. The
site where they wanted to build it was an old brownfield.
That’s a site that had been contaminated by a past
manufacturer.
Baldassari says they got grant money to clean up the land,
and it got them thinking about the environment – really for the
first time.
“‘Okay we cleaned up this brownfield – but
let’s not stop there. What else can we do for
the environment, what else can we do for our
bottom line to pay for this new facility, to
get it to pay for itself?’”
They started looking at their waste.
(sound of a factory)
On the factory floor, a worker is tracing the shape of a chair
leg onto a piece of wood. After it’s cut, the scrap wood is
tossed into a large box.
“Trees don’t grow in the shape of furniture
parts. So there is a lot of waste. Ultimately,
40% of each board ends up as scrap when it’s
all said and done – 30% to 40% will end up as
scrap.”
Baldassari says they used to pay to send all that scrap wood
to the landfill – along with huge dumpsters full of sawdust.
That cost the company.
But his team started making some calls. They found horse
farms that wanted sawdust for bedding. They found
companies that wanted wood chips for mulch.
Instead paying to have dumpsters of waste hauled away,
they found markets for the waste material.
It was the same deal with leather coverings for the chairs
and sofas. One-fourth of the leather used to end up in the
scrap heap as trash. Now a hand-bag maker in Montreal
comes to pick it up for purses and wallets.
And Baldassari is pretty happy about it. These days he’s
sending only one-eighth of the waste to the landfill as before.
That saves the company $30,000 dollars a year.
For many companies, this is the future.
Joel Makower says smart corporate leaders are finding ways
to reach zero-waste. Makower is the executive editor of
greenbiz.com.
“We’re starting to see companies think in
terms of closed loop systems. Factories
where basically there may not be any
smokestacks, drain pipes, or dumpsters.
where every waste product is turned into
some kind of raw material for another
process.”
But a lot of these companies are not necessarily cutting
waste because it’s good for the earth. Like Jeff Baldassari,
these corporate leaders often start the process as a way to
save money.
These days Baldassari says he’s the kind businessman he
never guessed he’d be: one who’s always looking for ways
to eliminate waste:
“Once I got started, I literally became
addicted to it. But it was addicted, in the
sense again, it helped our bottom line.”
Baldassari wants it clear: he’s not a tree-hugger. But, at this
point, he’s actually having fun. He’s caught up in finding
ways to save money by eliminating waste.
President Obama has outlined his plans
for the struggling auto industry. They
include restructuring GM and Chrysler
as well as help for auto workers and
communities hurt by slumping car and truck sales. Lester Graham reports lost in the details was the President’s bigger plan:
Transcript
President Obama has outlined his plans
for the struggling auto industry. They
include restructuring GM and Chrysler
as well as help for auto workers and
communities hurt by slumping car and truck sales. Lester Graham reports lost in the details was the President’s bigger plan:
In one sentence President Obama summed up his vision for the U.S. auto industry.
“I am absolutely committed to working with Congress and the auto companies to meet one goal: the United States of America will lead the world in building the next generation of clean cars.”
Some analysts say the market should decide whether consumers want fuel-efficient, clean cars. They point to headlines noting hybrid car sales fell off a cliff since gasoline prices went down.
But J.D. Power and Associates’ Michael Omotoso says yeah, hybrid sales are down – but not as much as everything else.
“Hybrid sales are actually doing well compared to overall sales.”
Hybrid sales in February were down 29% from last year, but overall light vehicle sales fell 40%.
Omotoso says hybrids are still selling because people expect gas prices will go up as the economy recovers.
One company created a website that acts as kind of a Craigslist just for reclaimed building materials (Photo courtesy of the National Centers for Environmental Prediction)
In the middle of a recession that’s
crippling the construction field,
there’s at least one sector of
industry that’s doing pretty well.
That’s “material reuse.” Taking pieces
of old buildings and using them in
new ones. Advocates say used materials
could save developers a heap of money.
Samara Freemark has the
story of one re-use company that’s both
green and in the black:
Transcript
In the middle of a recession that’s
crippling the construction field,
there’s at least one sector of
industry that’s doing pretty well.
That’s “material reuse.” Taking pieces
of old buildings and using them in
new ones. Advocates say used materials
could save developers a heap of money.
Samara Freemark has the
story of one re-use company that’s both
green and in the black:
You’ve probably heard what’s going on in the construction industry
these days.
(news montage of housing crisis)
But in middle of all that bad news, there might be one bright spot.
“We’ve actually been expanding quite a bit. I guess it’s one of the
only times I’ve heard
of where that’s the case.”
That’s architect Brad Hardin.
He got interested in reusing building materials pretty early in his career.
He likes the way
the old stuff looked. And he likes the idea of saving resources. And
he’s also kind of
horrified by the tens of millions of tons of construction waste that get
tossed into landfills
every year.
But actually getting his hands on used materials, so that he could reuse
them- that turned
out to be a real pain in the butt.
“You know you’ll be literally going out to someone’s yard and getting
rained on, or
sorting through someone’s basement– it was kind of a hit and miss
process.”
A big part of the problem was simple logistics. Imagine you’re knocking
down an old
house to build a new one. You’d like to sell off whatever pieces of the
old building you
can. But how do you find someone to buy all that stuff? Where do you store
it while you
look for a buyer? And how do you ship the materials?
Harry Giles is a professor of green architecture at the University of
Michigan.
He says most developers don’t want to bother with all that hassle. In the
end, they usually
just end up bulldozing everything. Giles says that’s because there’s no
real secondhand
market for used construction materials- not like there is in a lot of other
industries.
“If you take the car industry, a lot of it is geared around the reuse of
materials. Not just
taking the car and crushing it, but taking it apart and finding useful
components on it.”
You know, like a salvage yard.
And that was the problem Brad Hardin wanted to solve – how to create a
secondhand
market for spare building parts. He figured that if he could do that,
reusing building
materials could actually end up profitable.
So last year he started a company called Planet ReUse. The company’s
website acts as
kind of a Craigslist just for reclaimed building materials. Buyers and
sellers can find each
other on the ‘net.
And Planet ReUse tests all material to make sure it’s up to code. That
way the buyer
doesn’t end up with, say, eight tons of rotten planking. And Planet ReUse
arranges all the
shipping- trying to hook up sellers to nearby buyers. That saves money and
fuel.
By removing those basic barriers, Hardin says his buyers save about 20%
compared to
buying new. And Planet ReUse still makes a profit.
And it’s also a start to reducing those millions of tons of landfill
waste.
So, what kind of stuff does he sell on the site?
“How much time do you have? Steel, flooring…”
It turns out there’s money in just about everything you can salvage from
a building.
Harry Giles says that cash is the key to cutting down waste.
“If people see that it’s a lucrative business to actually salvage
materials, that will drive it
much faster than concern for the environment.”
And it’s not just buildings. Remember President Obama’s inauguration
stage? Well, that
got torn down, and Planet ReUse is trying to get the pieces to New Orleans.
They’ll be
used to rebuild houses damaged by Hurricane Katrina.
It’s just one more way for Planet ReUse to prove that you can do good, be
green, and
make a little money too.
Despite the decline in new car sales, Sales Manager Joe Marken expects more business on the
repair and maintenance side of of the dealership.
(Photo by Julie Grant)
The Don Joseph Toyota Dealer in Kent, Ohio is spending about 12-million dollars to
renovate its repair and maintenance facility.
(Photo by Julie Grant)
Not too many people are buying new cars these days. But that’s not all bad news for auto dealers. Julie Grant reports that more car owners are starting to spend money on repair and maintenance:
Transcript
Not too many people are buying new cars these days. But that’s not all bad news for auto dealers. Julie Grant reports that more car owners are starting to spend money on repair and maintenance:
(sound of construction)
Now there’s a sound you don’t hear every day anymore. Especially at a car dealership. It’s construction.
This Toyota Dealer in Kent, Ohio is in the midst of a 12-million dollar expansion.
Sales manager Joe Marken says they’re renovating the repair and maintenance garage. That’s where he’s starting to see the most growth.
“People are looking at, ‘do I want to encumber myself with a 60 month payment of some sort, or do I want to spend X and know that I can get a year or two more years out of whatever I’m doing?'”
Marken says lots of people don’t know if they’ll have a job in the next year or two.
The National Automobile Dealers Association expects more people to spend money on parts and service nationwide this year.
They say there’s an upside – maintenance improves gas mileage and resale value of the vehicle.
A lead detector finds over 5000 parts per million of lead in this toy. (Photo by Lisa Ann Pinkerton)
Kids consignment shops have been worried about a new law limiting lead and other chemicals in children’s products.
Julie Grant reports store owners are glad to finally have some answers from the federal government:
Transcript
Kids consignment shops have been worried about a new law limiting lead and other chemicals in children’s products.
Julie Grant reports store owners are glad to finally have some answers from the federal government:
Amanda Cingle in is manager at Once Upon a Child. It’s part of a franchise of 300 stores that sell used items for kids.
She says the owner was concerned the new law would mean they’d have to throw out their existing inventory – or spend many thousands of dollars having it all tested for chemicals.
But now the government’s Consumer Products Safety Commission says the law will only applies to new products, not those being re-sold.
“We’re so relieved. We don’t have to worry anymore. The owner’s worry was that she was going to have to close her doors and never reopen.”
Cingle says the store has an environmental mission – to reuse and recycle products – so she’s glad they don’t have to throw everything away.
But she’s also pleased that new products will be made with less harmful ingredients.
‘Cash for clunkers’ became popular before all the rules were final. For the past few weeks there’s been a growing backlog of orders at dealerships. (Photo by Samara Freemark)
