Does Nissan Get It?

Cnet reports "Nissan bets on electric cars, not biofuels."
Minoru Shinohara, senior vice president and general manager of the Technology Development Division at Nissan says making a car run on biofuels is, of course, easy, but the benefit of easily available, affordable electric fuel, will trump ethanol or biodiesel, at least for city cars. "The most important thing is availability of fuel," Shinohara said.

Interestingly, he says Nissan is not so excited about plug-in hybrids. An all-electric car is certainly technically much simpler than a PHEV, and perhaps ultimately less expensive to produce.

VW Coming Up PHEV? Why Not UP EV?

VW's announced "Up Concept" city cars could have a Plug-in Hybrid version. Autoblog and Left Lane News are reporting VW will be showing a PHEV UP at the LA Auto Show.

Small enough to be labeled "tiny" in DailyTech.com's headline. Only 18 inches longer and one inch wider than my beloved 53 mile range Th!nk City that Ford confiscated in 2004.

Sure would make a sweet all-electric city car! I say 75 mile range sub-$25K and they've got an urban green dream machine. Easy parking and super cheap to refill.

Ethanol Boom Busting

Check out today's NY Times story Ethanol’s Boom Stalling as Glut Depresses Price.

...the ethanol market is suddenly plagued by a glut, in part because the means to distribute it have not kept pace. The average national ethanol price on the spot market has plunged 30 percent since May...And if the bust becomes worse, candidates for president could be put on the spot to pledge even more federal support for the industry...

The ethanol boom was set off when Congress enacted an energy law in 2005 that included a national mandate for the use of renewable fuel in gasoline...Already, ethanol producers are poised to outpace that mandate...As ethanol supply increases over the next 12 months, the challenge will be to find a home for it,”...Because ethanol is corrosive and soaks up water and impurities, it cannot be shipped through the country’s fuel pipeline network. So it must be transported by train, truck and barge, a more expensive transportation network that is suddenly finding it hard to keep up with the surge in ethanol production....Gasoline wholesale marketers have been slow to gear up ethanol blending terminals, in part because they had to invest simultaneously in equipment to manage low sulfur diesel and tougher product specifications.

Even "overproduction" will never result in enough ethanol to fuel a significant portion of America's cars. California still has only one, yes one, E100 station. Hundreds of state fleet flex-fuel vehicles now use more gasoline and cause more emissions than the gasoline-only vehicles they replaced. (We can thank Arnold for that "green" purchase.)

And blending ethanol into gasoline is complicated, and ultimately merely perpetuates our petroleum addiction.

Tesla - Longer Range, Later Delivery

CNet is reporting some good and some not so welcome news about the Tesla Roadster. Seems the batteries are performing better than expected, and range is back up to about 250 mile per charge. But another delivery delay has been announced. Cars will not hit the road until early next year. Personally I'd trade range for earlier delivery, but of course it doesn't work that way.

Simply getting on the waiting list for the car once cost $50,000. Now, for only $5,000 you can tell your friends you're waiting for one. But don't expect to receive your car for at least a year.

Someone videotaped me

A few months ago I attended an eco-event in Fairfax, CA with my electric car. Someone seems to have videotaped me and posted it on youtube.

Co-op America Really Gets It! - Plug-ins YES; Ethanol NO!

Co-op America has cut through the hype and hyperbole about "clean" cars. They did an excellent issue of their magazine analysing the pros and cons of hybrids, plug-ins, electrics, bio-fuels of all types and hydrogen with a Consumer Reports type objectivity. They found

"the truth is, not all of the "new" fuels are created equal. In fact, some are nearly as bad as gasoline in their environmental impacts, and others can't be scaled up in a meaningful way without creating other problems.

Not surprising to us, electricity came out on top - cleanest, cheapest, most infrastructure-ready. Now they are taking their findings one step further. They are mounting a campaign to move the automakers away from ethanol and toward plug-ins.

Read about it:

Plug-in Hybrids 'Yes,' Ethanol 'No:' Largest-Ever Push Mounted to Drive GM, Ford to Shift From Ethanol to Plug-in Hybrids

Take Action:

Tell Ford and GM: Ethanol is Not the Answer!

Dissipating Doubt

From the pricey ads in national magazines devoting serious space to the Volt to today's announcement about the plug-in hybrid Saturn Vue, GM is compelling me to take their expressed interest in plug-in cars seriously. As announced in Frankfort and reported in Detroit, GM hopes for a 2009 release of the first Saturn Vue plug-in hybrid SUV. Leaving wiggle room, "2009-ish" brand general manager Jill Lajdziak said Thursday.

While GM is looking to achieve 40 miles all electric range with the Volt toward the end of 2010, the Vue is meant to have 10 miles all electric range. Seems piddling, but if it goes on sale in less than 2 years it will be an historical turning point.

Worst Cars Ever: TIME and Dan Neil Trash EV1

Along with a host of the filthy, the ugly and the dangerous, Time and Dan Neil declare the EV1 one of the 50 worst cars ever. Had they wanted to include a crappy electric car, they had plenty to choose from. But no, they picked what might have been the best electric car ever, and said even it sucked.

Dan Neil, the LA Times writer who naively blames consumers for the lack of electric cars in the market in the film Who Killed the Electric Car?, knows better now. He knows we need to move toward plug-in cars, and he knows the "perfect" electric car won't drop down from heaven one day. Had the EV1s been sold to consumers rather than leased, confiscated, and destroyed, they'd be very in demand.

If we are very lucky, some company will come out with a car with the decade-old EV1 specs considered unmarketable in this peculiar smackdown - 140 mile range without gasoline, miata-sized, fast. Does anyone out there truly believe this car couldn't sell for $50,000 or more now?

Coal Into Cars: The Good, the Bad, the Ugly

The Ugly

Coal sucks, there's really no two ways about it. Extracting it is ruinous of the landscape and burning it has disastrous environmental consequences. It should be perhaps our last fuel of choice regardless of how it's used. But not all use of coal is alike.

The Good

About half our electricity comes from coal, and that will change, at best, slowly as we move to renewables. But we need to keep in mind that when we're talking about cars, even coal-generated electricity results in lower greenhouse gas emissions compared with petroleum. The EPRI-NRDC Plug-in Hybrid Study makes clear that under every scenario studied, every region will yield reductions in greenhouse gases as we increase the number of plug-in cars. That includes the worst, most coal dependent areas. Of course as our efforts to green the grid take effect, and that's happening already, plug-in cars yield even greater reductions in GHGs. And ultimately, you can get no cleaner car than an electric car using wind or solar generated electricity.

The Bad

There is a major push at the federal level to subsidize the coal industry to produce liquid coal as a replacement for petroleum. It is touted as part of a move toward independence from foreign oil. Support knows no party. Like subsidies for ethanol, it's a regional matter. As a replacement for gasoline, there is probably no worse choice than coal-generated liquid fuel. As the Scientific American editorial "Worse Than Gasoline" states:

"...the polluting properties of coal - starting with mining and lasting long after burning - and the large amounts of energy required to liquefy it mean that liquid coal produces more than twice the global warming emissions as regular gasoline.....driving a Prius on liquid coal makes it as dirty as a Hummer on regular gasoline."

Lessons

There's a lesson here we can apply to our choices regarding biofuels, too. The energy required to make biological matter into liquid fuel certainly tips the balance against ethanol, just as it does with liquid coal. However, as the Environmental Entrepreneurs report on Costa Rica recommends, biomass crops into electricity is a beneficial strategy.

We can make electricity many ways, some better than others. But in the end, there is no further pollution using the electricity, whether in iPods, toasters, light rail, or cars. If we must use coal, make electricity, don't turn it into a liquid fuel we still have to burn. If we find it advantageous to use biomass or even corn for energy, make electricity with it.

It bears repeating again and again - the worst electricity is better than petroleum. And only electricity offers us the possibility of truly zero emission transport.

It's the plug, stupid.

EV Briefs, and Black Rock City & EVs

A few items before I head out to Black Rock City for two weeks. Out in the desert as part of Burning Man, our encampment, Snow Koan Solar, is setting up a solar photovoltaic EV Charging Station (at 7:30 and Desert) for electric scooters, golf carts, sofas and barstools. We'll also be taking Burning Man art projects off petroleum generators by switching them to solar electricity.

Although Black Rock City probably has the worst air in the west during its brief annual existence, it is where I had my first electric transport epiphany. The electric sofas and scooters were so much cooler - and quieter - than the gasoline powered stinkers that predominate. As Burning Man attempts to go green, here's to hoping they become the first American City to ban the internal combustion engine within its borders. We may need ICE vehicles to get there (gas cars will serve for long distance travel even as EVs come to market, I believe) but they should be parked and forgotten. Feet, pedals and electric motors only will make for a much more pleasant and greener event. Back after Labor Day.

Google Guys Th!nk it Over

Recently I posted about how Google.org gets it. Their Rechargeit.org campaign really makes the connections between renewable power and plug-in cars. The founders of Google have made personal investments in Tesla as befits dotcom billionaires, and they're converting Priuses to plug-in hybrids for the company fleet with battery maker A123. Now the relationship with EVs may be going further still. A number of websites (webpronews.com, pandia.com) are reporting that Google may be getting more involved with Th!nk Global, the reinvigorated Norwegian electric car maker. Google founder Sergey Brin drove one of the 2001 Th!nk City cars when Ford brought them to California to meet its ZEV Mandate obligation. I did, too, until Ford confiscated the cars and sold the company.

I believe Google would find Th!nk City electric cars a great fit with Google.org’s intentions. The plug-in Priuses are almost doubling the fuel efficiency of Google standard Prius fleet, getting 74 MPG rather than 41 MPG. That's great, but because most driving down Silicon Valley way is on the freeway for rather short distances, the plug-ins don’t do much all-electric driving and the MPG isn't approaching the much touted 100MPG. The Th!nk City could do the 20 – 50 mile round-trips without petroleum, using only the power from Google’s solar array. I hope Google is realizing that their plug-in hybrid fleet could probably mostly be all-electric cars. And with Google's clout, they could make the cars a reality

GM Getting Lots of PHEV Ink; Rolls Out 100 H2 FCVs – Huh?

GM has been getting a lot of attention with its plug-in intentions. Contracts for lithium batteries for the plug-in hybrid Saturn Vue and the Chevrolet Volt have received much press. Still no truly firm date for either car, but GM has been stoking the expectation fire.

At the same time, they are looking for 100 consumers to take on a $1 million hydrogen fuel cell vehicle. They will join the one Honda Fuel Cell car currently in private hands in Southern California. The participants in Project Driveway will have to be located in Westchester, NY, Washington DC or Orange County, CA, places with hydrogen fueling stations. If drivers have to pay for fuel, this may become Project Permanently Parked in the Driveway, as the price of H2 is about four times that of gasoline.

If GM truly believes what it’s saying about the electrification of cars and the future of plug-in technology, it ought to announce the shelving of its fuel cell program for the time being. GM hasn’t got the resources or good will banked to do both plug-in and fuel cell roll-outs, and it knows only one of those has a near term prospect for success. We’ve all got electricity at home and work right now, and we’d like to use it for our cars.


Toyota’s first Plug-in Prius to Use NiMH

Toyota is postponing its Lithium Priuses and rolling out a few NiMH plug-in Priuses for testing purposes. Hard to say what the Lithium issues are, as GM and A123 are reporting Lithium batteries all but ready to go. Perhaps Toyota’s battery division is having problems. Perhaps Toyota, as hybrid leader, doesn’t want to get too far out front. It’s hard to believe Toyota will allow GM to be the plug-in leader. Of course, the Volt remains a desire at this point, not yet a reality. I hope to drive the Toyota built plug-in Prius coming to nearby UC Berkeley, and will give a full report. But let's be clear: Toyota could have NiMH plug-in cars on the road in large numbers already - both all-electric and plug-in hybrid - but has chosen not to. My RAV4 EV with NiMH batteries is going strong after more than 5 years and over 50,000 miles. Hundreds of thousands of Priuses with NiMH batteries are on the road without battery issues.

EPRI-NRDC Study Out; Electricity Better, If You Want It To Be

The oft-postponed EPRI-NRDC plug-in hybrid study was unambiguous – moving to electricity for cars would yield a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. And in most places other toxic emissions would be lower as well. But the study managed to find a few places were a few people might be exposed to slightly higher levels of one toxin or another, and thus refused to make the bold statement required to help move environmentalists toward a sane position on plug-in cars. See for yourself at www.epri-reports.org/

Vectrix - Awesome ZEV Maxi-Scooter Available Now

The Vectrix made its debut in San Francsico. Using NiMH batteries, it provides the range and the zip missing from most electric scooters. At a price, of course, but a state rebate of $2000 for Zero Emission Vehicles will apply.

Imagine the Volt

Seventeen years ago GM could imagine, and then produce, an electric car. Check out this 13 minute GM video on the car that became the EV1. Commenting on its technological achievements, John Zwerner, GM Advanced Product Engineering, says "we wanted to drive a stake in the ground....as to what a contemporary produceable electric vehicle would look like and how it would perform if we were to build such a vehicle." Instead, as we know, GM drove a stake in its heart. Literally. Right through the controller after they confiscated each EV1 from consumers. The video makes quite plain the societal and personal benefits of electric cars, and how GM actually met the challenge. GM hasn't got another 17 years to make this real.

By the way, that's Alec Brooks in the still of the video. He's now working at Tesla.



Tip of the Hat to Stefano Paris

Is GM Playing Games with the Volt?

As I've blogged previously, I want to believe as much as the next guy that the Volt - GM's announced plug-in hybrid - is real. I believe enviros have spent way too much time pushing for higher CAFE standards and ignored alternative methods of getting clean cars on the road. The enviros gave up on electric cars, let the automakers and California off the hook just as the cars were proving themselves viable and popular. Sierra Club, UCS and NRDC should have been indicted along with CARB and Big Oil in the film Who Killed the Electric Car? The ZEV mandate offered a way to get plug-in cars - zero-emission, zero-petroleum, zero-carbon producing cars - on the road outside the CAFE protocol.

Now the shoe is on the other foot. GM wants us to believe they are serious about the Volt, but continue to fight over CAFE. They tell us they will produce the Volt in serious volume. Serious volume is enough to significantly effect their fleet average. If they are serious about the Volt, they've got no reason to fight efforts to raise CAFE. Edmunds Inside Line reports Chevrolet Volt Goes to Washington To Underline GM's Anti-CAFE-Increase Argument.

Joe Romm asks the question on Grist Is the Chevy Volt just more GM greenwashing?.

I'd like to see enviros point out that CAFE can be achieved with plug-in cars.

Top Climate Scientist on Lessons Not Learned from Electric Car Debacle

Dr James Hansen is perhaps the top climate scientist in the country. From his post at NASA he warned Congress and us what's up with global warming long ago. There are some lessons we need to learn as we are inundated with adverts about "clean coal," if we are not to get snookered as enviros did over the electric car.

California had a regulation that would have required automobile manufacturers to produce a small percentage of cars without emissions by such-and-such date, and a larger percentage later. Automakers despised this rule, and decided that they had enough clout to ignore it, arguing that it was impractical. Environmentalists seemed to conclude that they were overmatched. Rather than go to the mat, they decided to play ball with the automakers, to try to work with them, accepting promises that the automakers would do everything that they could to improve vehicle efficiencies and reduce emissions. [emphasis added]

The glee with which the automakers tracked down the trial electric cars that they had produced, and crushed the cars into small cubes, must have been palpable. Profit margins on large SUVs were much bigger. Automakers soon forgot their promises about better gas mileage, instead using technical efficiency improvements to make vehicles bigger and accelerate faster.

Read the full email at Joe Romm's blog Climate Progress.

Let My People Convert! - The A123 Challenge

Les Goldman wants you to convert (your hybrid.) Easy as 123. So he proposed at the California Air Resources Board ZEV workshop on Tuesday.

An ARB ZEV meeting is ordinarily a predictable affair. What began as a simple program requiring an ever increasing percentage of Zero Emission vehicles (read electric cars), has become mired in cumbersome bureaucratic complications. Acronymphia is not a sexual disease. (Look it up.) ZEV, SULEV, PZEV, ATPZEV, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Type I, II, III, and on and on. Tuesday's workshop was not so different. They are contemplating Silver+ and Type IV ZEVs. Uggh.

Unfortunately, everyone recognizes that there is no coming down from this byzantine construction. Simplify is the mantra, but unachievable. Now, to add some further complication, everyone's got religion on plug-in hybrids. Many, including electric advocates, some enviros and ARB staff, (even some cars makers, it would seem) want to figure new ways to use the regs to bring plug-in hybrids to market quickly due to their near term benefits, commercialisability and pathways plug-ins offer to true ZEV. (Add more batteries as they become cheaper and more energy-dense, dump the engine; or, for the more fantasy-minded and those receiving compensation, add hydrogen fuel cell and drop the engine.)

But PHEVs are inherently the most complicated of all options. A plug-in hybrid, one could say, simply integrates electric drive into a car with internal combustion. However, there are innumerable ways to do it. Parallel, serial, blended, just for starters. Even the Prius and Civic Hybrid are quite different. ARB could spend a year in conversation with stakeholders to figure out regs and credits for new OEM plug-in hybrid cars.

A123 has an idea to cut through the difficulty of getting OEMs to make cars. Les Goldman, A123's lobbyist, presented the outline of a proposal that could be a win-win-win and get cars on the road quickly. They've been converting some cars back east, working out the kinks. Lately Goldman has been driving one around DC, meeting with policy makers and pushing for consumer incentives for hybrid conversions. (See my 7/12 post Plug-in Hybrid Bills in Congress Scare Auto Makers) With the addition of the A123 battery module, a Prius gets between 125 and 175 mpg. They are beginning to do crash testing, and will meet emission requirements, in pursuit of a fully legal, compliant vehicle. Throw the ZEV mandate into the mix, and maybe we've got something.

• Use the existing and growing base of hybrids, offer kits to authorized installers, and give ZEV credit to the original manufacturer in exchange for not killing the car's warranty.
  
• Hybrid drivers in California could finally actually get their hybrid converted.
  
• ARB could finally take some credit for cars with true ZEV miles once again on the road without depending on the ever-resistant, crusher-happy automakers.
  
• A123 gets to sell a lot of batteries without having to wait for the automakers to place orders of the magnitude they promise "once the batteries are ready."

The few automakers in the room remained poker-faced, but it must be an intriguing proposition. They get credits (and credit) and don't have to do much of anything but watch their hybrid improve on someone else's dime. Now that Toyota's got it's own 8 mile (not 6 as I previously reported, thank you sk) all-electric range NiMH Prius being openly test in Japan, and soon here in California, (see Toyota's Plug-in Prius: Out of the Pod, Into the Podcast) and virtually every auto maker making noise about eventually coming out with some sort of PHEV, this proposal could prime the pump, test the waters, prove the pudding. Or not. Let the people convert!

Toyota's Plug-in Prius: Out of the Pod, Into the Podcast

Toyota's plug-in Prius comes out of the closet. No translation needed. Take a look.

http://toyota.pod.tv/jp/tech/environment/phv/conference/driving_300.wmv

Main Specifications of Toyota Plug-in HV
Vehicle Name TOYOTA Plug-in HV
Length / Width / Height 4,445 / 1,725 / 1,490mm
Weight 1,360kg
Seating capacity 5 persons
Performance in
electric vehicle mode Cruising range 13km in the 10-15 Japanese test cycle
Maximum vehicle speed 100km/h
Engine Displacement 1,496cc
Maximum output 56kW(76PS) / 5,000rpm
Maximum torque 110N-m (11.2kg-m) / 4,000rpm
Motor Type AC synchronous motor
Maximum output 50kW(68PS) / 1,200 — 1,540rpm
Maximum torque 400N-m(40.8kg-m) / 0 — 1,200rpm
Secondary battery Type Nickel-metal hydride
Capacity 13Ah (6.5Ah x 2)
Rated voltage 202V
Overall system Maximum output* 100kW (136PS)
Voltage 202 — 500V
Battery charging Power source Household electrical power
Charging time 1 — 1.5hrs (200V), 3 — 4hrs (100V)
*Based on TMC calculations; output that the system can achieve using engine power and electric motor power (electric motor power is dependent on battery power)

Ford in the PHEV Race, too?

MSNBC and NBC News have report on plug-in hybrids, focusing on the Volt. But there's some news about Ford, too, buried within.

Ford is also in the plug-in game and could get to the finish line first. It is already testing two plug-in hybrids, [Ford's Sue] Cischke told the Chicago Tribune, and it expects to deliver the first road-ready vehicles for testing in California by 2009.

Hat tip to Earl Killian

Plug-in Hybrid Race on as Toyota Tests NiMH PHEV; A123 Challenges CARB to Authorize Conversions

From today's NY Times
Toyota to Test Plug-In Hybrid, Rivaling G.M.

Toyota said it would provide prototype versions of plug-in hybrid vehicles to researchers at the University of California, Irvine, and the University of California, Berkeley....The prototype plug-in hybrids will be powered by two oversize packs of nickel-metal hydride batteries

Yesterday, in Sacramento A123Systems, the battery manufacturer being used by GM for the Vue and Volt, challenged CARB not to wait for OEM plug-ins. It want CARB to authorize aftermarket conversions of hybrids with its Lithium batteries.

Dodd forsees federal fleet of hybrids and electric cars

YouTube Democratic Debate Mon Night at the Citadel:

QUESTION: Hi, I'm Stephanie. We're in the Bay area, in my bathroom, because this is one of the places where I use compact fluorescent light bulbs. I use these to decrease my personal energy use, and I hear politicians talking about alternative energy to delay -- to decrease our energy impact as a whole.

So my question for you is, how is the United States going to decrease its energy consumption in the first place? In other words, how will your policies influence Americans, rather than just using special light bulbs, to do this?

DODD: Anderson, there are a number of things. The 50-mile-per- gallon standard is something I've advocated by 2017, that I would push hard for. Entire fleet of federal automobiles would be hybrids or electric automobiles, so we reduce even further out consumption.

Toyota Hot and Cold on Plug-in Hybrids

A month or so ago word was Toyota was postponing the new generation Lithium Prius. That seemed to be a hint that Toyota wasn't moving too quickly on plug-ins. As if to confirm that notion, recently a Toyota spokesman in DC was denigrating plug-in hybrids as Hymotion/A123 and Rob Lowe were making a plug-in splash in Congressman Ed Markey's global warming committee. According to Autos Insider of July 12, 2007

Toyota, which has sold 1 million hybrids worldwide, including 750,000 in the United States, over the last decade, said converting a hybrid risks vehicle fires, and actually increases greenhouse gas emissions.

Now, however, we continue to see more information on Toyota's own prototype plug-in Lithium Prius. Japan's leading newspaper Asahi Shinbun reports "the company will be the first Japanese carmaker to win approval from the ministry for plug-in hybrid tests." Asahi reports:

"Electric vehicles that run only on electricity are said to be more environmentally friendly than hybrid vehicles because they have no emissions and do not use gasoline.

However, the cars can run only short distances before they run out of juice.

Toyota says plug-in hybrids offer the best of both kinds of vehicles."

Although it is clear to me there is great value in "short distance" 75 to 150 mile range all-electric cars such as my RAV4 EV, there is no doubt the market for various plug-in hybrid options would be huge. I look forward to seeing advertisements for plug-in hybrids touting the "best of both worlds" meme. Essentially an acknowledgement that a plug-in hybrid is better all around than the gasoline-dependent hybrids that you can't plug in available today. After all, grid electricity is cleaner and cheaper than gasoline. As soon as Toyota puts to bed its disingenous "and you don't have to plug it in" campaign, we'll know they're serious.

Huckabee: The electric car of the 2008 race

Election blog 2008central.net points us to an unexpected positive and apt analogy to electric cars by a Republican candidate for President. Mike Huckabee, ex-Governor of Arkansas and longshot contender, said in an interview decrying the wasteful spending of his GOP rivals:

“You will not find a more frugal operation than ours and you will also not find a more efficient, better miles per gallon,” said Huckabee, who did not single out any opponents specifically. “If anything, we’ve become the electric car of the 2008 race. We have gotten more for what we have spent.”

Although Huckabee gets it right, the blogger gets it all wrong. From his/her suggestion that the film Who Killed the Electric Car? was aimed at liberals to the comment that the electric car was a massive failure.

I responded:

First off, the film wasn’t aimed at liberals or conservatives. It was aimed at Americans. And it had many certifiable conservatives speaking about the issue, including Frank Gaffney (from the Reagan administration) and Lieberman Democrat ex-CIA director James Woolsey both supporting electric cars for the national security benefits of switching to electrons from petroleum.

Secondly, as battery electric cars are incontestably the most efficient vehicles on the road, Huckabee’s comparison of his lean campaign to an electric car seems apt.

Is Toyota taking the Plug-in Hybrid plunge?

Green Car Congress reports Toyota to Obtain Permission for Public Road Test for Plug-in Prius in Japan.

Plug-in Hybrid Study: Electricity Better

The basic question addressed, which appears on the study homepage (epri-reports.org) is this: How would air quality and greenhouse gas emissions be affected if significant numbers of Americans drove cars that were fueled by the power grid?

Simply put, the study found what advocates of electric transportation have long held to be true: as regards greenhouse gases and pollution generally speaking, the worst electricity is still better than petroleum. And the grid is getting cleaner and more renewable every year.

A few highlights below, but the significant question that remains is whether this study will make any difference in the public policy advocated by those who shape our understanding of what's possible and most beneficial. Environmental organization and utilities have long known the benefits of electric transportation, but have been cowed by the auto makers' unwillingness to make grid-connected product. You can dig around the websites of NRDC, UCS and the Sierra Club and come to understand that an electric path would be best for all of us, but their advocacy has not reflected the science. UCS advocates relentlessly for cleaner gasoline vehicles and dismisses plug-ins of all sorts, the Sierra Club strikes deals with Ford to promote a few thousand gasoline-dependent hybrids in exchange for advertising dollars, and the NRDC jumped on the biofuels bandwagon just as the cost of corn ethanol became impossible to ignore. I truly hope we have turned a corner.

The EPRI/NRDC study is an exceedingly detailed assessment using modeling analyses of various scenarios to determine the impact of plug-in hybrids. From the two summaries:

Greenhouse Gases
Researchers drew the following conclusions from the modeling exercises:
•Annual and cumulative GHG emissions are reduced significantly across each of the nine scenario combinations.
•Annual GHG emissions reductions were significant in every scenario combination of the study, reaching a maximum reduction of 612 million metric tons in 2050 (High PHEV fleet penetration, Low electric sector CO2 intensity case).
•Cumulative GHG emissions reductions from 2010 to 2050 can range from 3.4 to 10.3 billion metric tons.
•Each region of the country will yield reductions in GHG emissions.
....
The use of electricity is an important attribute of PHEVs. Use of electricity reduces both gasoline consumption and emissions—starting emissions, refueling emissions, running emissions and even upstream refinery emissions.
......
PHEVs have lower GHG emissions in all nine cases than either the conventional or the hybridvehicles, ranging from a 40% to 65% improvement over the conventional vehicle to a 7% to 46% improvement over the hybrid electric vehicle.

Air Quality
Because of the significant reduction in emissions from gasoline and diesel fuel use and because caps are in place for some conventional pollutants for the electric power sector, the study finds that in many regions deployment of PHEVs would reduce exposures to ozone and particulate matter, and reduce deposition rates for acids, nutrients, and mercury.

Overall, the air quality benefits from PHEVs are due to a reduction of vehicle emissions below levels required by current regulation (due to their non-emitting operation in all-electric mode), and because most electricity generation emissions are constrained by existing regulatory caps. Any additional increase in the amount of all-electric vehicle miles traveled or further emissions constraints on the electric sector would tend to magnify these benefits.

EPRI/NRDC Plug-in Hybrid Enviro Assessment to be Released

The long awaited report assessing the environmental impact of plug-in hybrids undertaken by the Electric Power Research Institute and the Natural Resources Defense Council will see the light of day on Thursday morning in Washington DC. Roger Duncan from Austin Energy and Plug-in Partners is participating in the press conference, so the results must be positive. Tony Posawatz, the GM vehicle line director for the Chevrolet Volt is on the press conference line-up as well, so perhaps that's a sign GM means business with the serial hybrid announced earlier this year. I'll report on the details soon as they're available.

GM: Electric Opel by 2010

Thomson Financial reports in Forbes that General Motors Corp unit Opel plans to bring out an all-electric car at the end of 2010. GM's European chief Carl-Peter Forster is said to mention the EV in an excerpt from tomorrow's Auto Motor Sport magazine. He told the magazines that hybrid technology is too costly to use in small cars, suggesting a city car, perhaps too small to be marketed in the US.

Green Autos in the Times: Hybrid Hype, Hydrogen Hooey and Electric Dreams

A number of articles about "green cars" worth perusing in Saturday's New York Times Automotive section. Usually devoted to crass boosterism of America's largest manufacturing industry, these articles still contain a lot of that.

Especially as displayed in Adam B. Ellick and Don Sherman's moronic and facile hydrogen vehicles video shot in the New Jersey field where the Hindenberg met its firey demise. (The Future of Hydrogen: Once a Pariah, Now an Alternative.) Not a mention of where the hydrogen is meant to come from, nor problems with storage. Just a chicken and egg problem according to the makers of this little vid - not acknowledging the million dollar chicken nor the $10/gallon fossil-fuel-derived eggs. Though they do recognize commercialization is at least decades away.

Toyota comes in for a smackdown by Lawrence Ulrich (Conspicuous Consumption With Green Illusions) on it's high class hybrids. Writing about the $121,000 Lexus LS 600h L:

"th[is] hybrid may have set a new standard for automotive hyperbole. Behind its green Teflon shield, the Lexus proved to be just another overstuffed sedan that can barely top 20 miles a gallon."

The meme of the ugly green car gets its own article (Once Frumpy, Green Cars Start Showing Some Flash). Author Phil Patton derides the design of anything "green" that actually hit the market, and suggests beauty in drawing board designs that will never come to showroom. Chris Paine (Who Killed the Electric Car?) is quoted in the leadoff position to suggest even advocates of electric cars understand the product has been too ugly for the masses.

Electric cars get their own piece by Kevin Cameron, (Electric Cars Nearly Ready, but Batteries Are Less So) as the Tesla can't be ignored at this point. After all, rich dudes that read the Times from CEOs to Arnold himself have plunked down $100K. So it is a photo of the Tesla Roadster that graces this article despite its message that electrics remain not ready for prime time because GM and Toyota say so. Despite the imminent release of the Lithium powered Tesla, you have to read to paragraph #15 to find mention of the car. The first 14 paragraphs spread the confusing tale of battery types and energy densities, never mentioning NiMH 140 mile range EV1s (all crushed) or 120 mile range Toyota RAV4 EVs still on the road after over 100,000 miles. The reader is just meant to be left with the impression that Big Auto is still trying but the dang technology just isn't good enough or safe enough or cheap enough to market. The Volt remains a dream, and a new generation Prius (read plug-in) just have to wait for the perfect Lithium battery. Nickel Metal Hydride which successfully powered the great electrics of the decade past and work fine in every hybrid on the road just won't cut it. Just because they say so.

Strange Plug-in Bedfellows Rile Detroit

Big time neo-Con Frank Gaffney and Arnold supporter actor Rob Lowe took their advocacy for plug-in hybrids to Massachusetts liberal Democrat Ed Markey's House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming yesterday. Detroit and it's Congressional defenders are again suggesting that what's good for America will kill Big Auto. It is idiotic if conventional wisdom to suggest anti-corporate crusader Ralph Nader has it in for the automakers, but quite another to label Reaganaut and hardline conservative Gaffney anti-business. The Detroit Free Press story headline tells the tale:

House talk on plug-in cars erupts
Mich. lawmaker warns of demise of U.S. auto industry

Plug-in Hybrid Bills in Congress Scare Auto Makers

The Detroit News Autos Insider column today is reporting on Congressional efforts to promote plug-in hybrids and the backlash from the automakers. Toyota made the car, the Prius, that made plug-in conversions possible, and now they are trying to rein in the desires unleashed.

Neither CARB incentives nor the efforts of Plug-in Partners have moved the auto makers to produce plug-in hybrids, so conversion efforts are moving along. A123 bought Hymotion and they are producing cars for Google's RechargeIT.org effort. HybridsPlus and EDrive have converted cars. Calcars continues to work with the Electric Auto Association members to bring a do-it-yourself kit to hybrid owners with moxie.

Legislation proposed in the Senate by Senators Obama, Hatch and Cantwell to offer tax credits to convert hybrids to plug-ins now has its counterpart in Congressman Ed Markey's House bill. The Senate bill is known as the FREEDOM Act ("Fuel Reduction using Electrons to End Dependence On the Mideast Act of 2007"); the House bill the more prosaic "Plug-in Hybrid Opportunity Act of 2007."

Whatever it's called, it's got Toyota in a tizzy.

Norwegian Investors Rally to Revived Think Electric Car

The Aftenposten reports (in English) on the success Jan Olaf Willums is having at the helm of the revived Think Global. Many of Norway's tycoons and heirs are making significant investments in the company which is planning production of as many as 10,000 cars by 2009.

My first electric car was a Think City, produced when the company was owned by Ford. This "smarter than Smart" city car was a revelation to me when I leased it in 2001. By then, every other maker of a ZEV Mandated electric car had leased all their cars and were plotting their destruction rather than making any more to meet the demand. Toyota, Honda and GM were dismantling their electric efforts, but Ford seemed to be making a last stab at a viable electric program called Think Mobility. The little car demonstrated to me that electric vehicles were ready for prime time.

Ford ultimately followed the lead of the other automakers, and began to destroy the cars in 2004. Ford had promised the cars would be returned to Norway at leases' end to be sold. Waiting lists were forming there. When California Th!nk drivers found out the cars now would be crushed, their protests revived the movement for electric cars. One such protest is documented in the film Who Killed the Electric Car? and the story is told as well in Sherry Boschert's book Plug-in Hybrids.

Nothing would please me more than seeing the Think City again on San Francisco streets.

Arnold Flexing for Flex-Fuels; Fouls Air & Guzzles More Gasoline

As I read in the San Jose Mercury News about California's flex-fuel fleet fiasco. a near silent electric trolley bus passes by my window on Haight St in San Francisco, an old technology tried, true, and spurned by the environmental "experts" of the present and recent past.

The state policy of purchasing flex-fuel cars has actually increased petroleum consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and smog in California. Alas, for better or worse, there is still only one E85 station in the state, nowhere near the bulk of the cars the Schwarzenegger administration has bought with our money.

...the flex-fuel vehicles are actually chugging out more smog and greenhouse gases than many vehicles in the state's old fleet - as much as 2,000 extra tons annually.
As a result, energy experts question whether the administration's zest to "look green" has come at the expense of real environmental progress.

Because environmental organizations have dropped the ball for so long on the actual costs and benefits of the various "green" transportation alternatives, policy makers and the public at large are at the whim of the advertising power of big auto and big oil. Go Yellow to go green, says GM. And the NRDC promotes biofuel with grain coming out of a gas pump.

It's cheap to make a car flex-fuel. So as long as it seems a green option, it's a win-win for the little green giant of the Republican party and the sclerotic giant of the auto industry. And probably for NRDC's pocketbook, too.

It seems the car makers are willing to make cars without fuel infrastructure, especially if they can get some green cred and government credits. However they still do everything to postpone the day they build cars to run on to the infrastructure we've already got for zero emission cell phones and ipods. Of course I'm speaking of electricity.

"This is nothing but self-serving propaganda," said [Tyson] Slocum, whose Washington D.C.-based group is the largest consumer advocacy group in the nation. "Government is engaging in a campaign to deliberately mislead people. They are making claims that the government is taking the lead on greening our transportation system, when in reality nothing has changed."

Scientific analysis over the years, whether by government or enviro organizations, has always shown that nothing can reduce petroleum usage or toxic emissions as much as a switch to grid electricity into battery electric and plug-in hybrid cars. Google.org understood it after a few months study. See RechargeIt.org to get a sense of a comprehensive vision of clean energy into clean cars.

ex-CARB Chair Sawyer's Open Letter to Schwarzenegger

Robert Sawyer, recently fired as Chair of the California Air Resources Board by Gov. Schwarzenegger, has handed his letter to the Governor to the press. Take a look. Among the accomplishments during his tenure, Sawyer cites "review of the Zero Emissions Vehicle program and instructions to ARB staff for modifications to encourage the production and use of electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.." What will happen to the ZEV mandate review process as the newly appointed Chair Mary Nichols comes up to speed will be watched closely. But it the critical aspects of Sawyer's letter that is drawing attention. Worldwide articles have appeared tarnishing Arnold's green luster, and this letter will not serve to stanch that loss of reputation.

• "My single regret is that is that you and I never once met during the past 18 months to discuss any of the critical air quality or global warming issues facing California."

• "Governor Schwarzenegger, your staff has interjected itself in a manner that has compromised the independence and integrity of the board."

• "Press releases from the Governor’s staff, which are contrary to reality or truth, are a disservice to you and to the people of California."

• "I urge you to hire a personal science advisor who can counsel you on the science and technology of air pollution and global warming and who understands the economics and law of these issues.

Ford and Edison set to announce plug-in hybrid venture

Ford Motor Co and Southern California Edison, provider of electricity to 13 million, are set to announce something Monday relating to plug-in vehicles. Reuters has a first report.

Despite the propaganda, waiting for plug-ins

Despite the Prius ads pushing an anti-plug-in message, many are waiting for a hybrid that can plug in to cleaner, cheaper domestic electricity.

Daily Economy Fuel Tip surveys why people don't buy hybrids now.

49% of respondents stated that hybrid cars are too expensive
29% of respondents stated that they were waiting for plug-in hybrid vehicles
11% of respondents stated that they just are not interested in buying a hybrid vehicle
9% of respondents stated that hybrid cars are too small
2% of respondents stated that they already owned a hybrid car

Freedom from oil in Brazil

International Herald Tribune reports:

Brazil stages raid against debt slavery at Amazon sugar cane-ethanol plantation

New Chair for CARB

Just as Arnold was getting some seriously negative press in England questioning his commitment to the environment, he goes and appoints Mary Nichols, environmental lawyer and Democrat, CARB Chair. Perhaps I'll be eating some crow in the upcoming months. This could be very interesting.

Schwarzenegger taps Nichols to lead Air Resources Board

Schwarzenegger's Green Cred Fading with CARB Caos

The CARB mess is taking the shine off Arnold Schwarzenegger's supposed environmentalism. The firings and their implication has gone international. Over 130 stories, from LA to the UK, are reporting on the situation. The governor and his people are contradicting each other and the recently "fired" are releasing documents and voice mails to prove their good intentions and reveal the governor's meddling in CARB's attempts to regulate diesel exhaust and greenhouse gases. No one really wants to mess with Arnold, so the recently fired blame staff and not Arnold, but in cases like this, we all know the fish stinks from the head.

The LA Times headline, Mixed messages in the air, The governor's actions often work against his tough talk on pollution tells the story. New rules contemplated by CARB are angering the construction industry.

The officials argued that the new rules, years in the making, were too tough on the construction industry — which is a major Schwarzenegger donor.

The departed air board officials said they were frustrated by administration meddling in both the diesel construction equipment crackdown and the implementation of landmark legislation the governor signed last year to curb global warming.

It is not the first time the governor has made bold promises on the environment while his administration dragged its feet behind the scenes. Schwarzenegger has vetoed bills that would put new taxes on polluters, spur the development of alternative fuels and help clean the air. He has accepted $1 million in campaign cash from the oil industry, and he had threatened to veto the global warming bill unless it was made more business-friendly.

From the San Jose Mercury News:

The executive director of the California Air Resources Board resigned Monday, saying the governor's office had made it impossible for her to do her job by interfering with the implementation of the state's landmark global warming law.
"I think they're trying to control it, and they don't have a very cogent vision for what's needed," said Catherine Witherspoon, who has managed the agency since 2003.....

She said Sawyer was fired because two top Schwarzenegger aides—Susan Kennedy, the chief of staff, and Dan Dunmoyer, the cabinet secretary—wanted him to go more slowly in implementing the global warming law.
"It's utterly mystifying," she said. "They're firing quality people who know how to do the job, emeritus people with 50 years' experience."
Adam Mendelsohn, Schwarzenegger's communications director, has said just the opposite was true and that it was Sawyer who was moving too slowly in implementing the law. He said Sawyer was unable to lead the agency and was "scrambling at the last minute" to find ways to implement AB32.
But on Monday, Sawyer released the transcript of a voicemail he said he received from Dunmoyer asking him to adopt fewer so-called early action items under the global warming law—in other words, to go more slowly in implementing it.

No longer on the administration payroll, Sawyer yesterday said:

"The fundamental difficulty is there really is no one in the [governor's] office who understands the science, the technology, the economics or even the legal aspects of air pollution control," he said. "Now is the time for the governor's staff to get out of the way and let the professionals do the job."

Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez will be holding hearings in the Assembly. But he seems to have a sense of what's happening on "I" Street.

"It's been pretty clear to me that the administration has been putting undue pressure on the leadership of the Air Resources Board," Nunez said during a Monday news conference. "The administration was tying their hands behind their back."

Additional independent reporting: Contra Costa Times (MediaNews): Nunez seeks inquiry into emissions board claim As reported here, Arnold says:

"I've heard people whining. But we've got to be extremely sensitive toward businesses here."

Assemblyman Mark DeSaulnier, who served on CARB for 10 years:

"I served for three governors," he said, "and I never saw this level of interference."

San Francisco Chronicle, page 1: Governor accused of playing politics on warming rules

"The governor has made his name across the world as the jolly green governor, and now we have the regulators saying his inner circle has pressured them to go slow because the big industries don't want us to go too quickly," said Jamie Court, president of the Foundation for Taxpayers and Consumer Rights, a consumer watchdog group.

CARB Massacres Continue

Another air board official leaves

Catherine Witherspoon, longtime Executive Director of CARB has quit. It had seemed the Governor wanted Sawyer to fire her last week. When Sawyer refused, he got canned. Now Witherspoon says the Gov's cool, but the folks around him don't care about the air. Some weird shit and machievellian games being played up in Sacto. We haven't heard the last of it.

And with Barbara Riordan being put in charge as Chair replacing Sawyer, even if temporarily, there's no hope for a ZEV mandate with teeth. She voted to kill it four years ago and is still singing industry's tune.

CARB: Sawyer v Governator

It is looking like the Governor's contribution to global warming is a lot of hot air touting his greenness while opposing the slightest additional measure proposed by an actual clean air professional. If the governor fired Sawyer over requiring reflective auto paint, it's hard to believe he would have allowed a reinvigorated ZEV mandate that could bring plug-in hybrids and electric cars to market.

San Jose Mercury News: Air board officials blame Schwarzenegger for weakening smog regs

San Francisco Chronicle: Fired air board head says he tried to keep integrity
He says he lost job for proposing change to reduce emissions

California Progress Report:

The story is murky at best--with the Gov saying Robert Sawyer wasn’t aggressive enough and Sawyer saying it was the Gov. who sabotaged his efforts to make those first global warming regulations stronger and more expansive. I’d put my money on Sawyer’s version as we’ve seen over-and-over again this Governor talking tough but acting like a corporate shill on global warming and other environmental issues he’s supposed to be championing.

Confusion Reigns at CARB

Gov Schwarzenegger has fired Chairman Sawyer and others at CARB and it is not immediately clear why. The LA Times reports on unprecedented administration interference in the agency, seeking the firing longtime staffers. The Governor has publicly chastised the board for delaying implementation of Central Valley clean air targets, but everyone seems confused.

According to the Michael Collier's Politics Blog on SFGate.com:

Robert Sawyer, appointed by the governor in 2005, was one of three ''no'' votes last week when the board adopted three new policy changes to curb carbon dioxide and other emissions statewide. Sawyer, like several environmental groups, thought the board should have made more changes than the three that the governor sought.

Plug -in and electric car advocates felt they were getting a generally fairer shake from Sawyer than his much criticized predecessor Alan Lloyd, but recent ZEV mandate staff and board actions suggested no major changes in its implementation. Enviros and industry has been all over the map in their opinions about Sawyer's stewardship of the nation's most powerful clean air agency. The governor's appointment of a new Chair will help us understand whether it was Arnold's much ballyhooed concern for the environment or deep connections to industry that led him to fire Sawyer.

Tell Toyota to Get With the Program!

Rainforest Action Network is prodding Toyota to add plugs to their hybrids. Google is spending oodles doing it to their cars, but the rest of us need the carmakers to produce the plug-in hybrids and electric cars we want. Add your voice to the campaign by clicking here.

Of course, Toyota could do it today with larger NiMH battery packs. I'd wager there is more than one plug-in Prius hidden away at Toyota's skunkworks in Japan. Both GM and Toyota are disingenuously pushing the nonsensical notion that plug-ins need to wait for Lithium batteries to prove themselves. Of course they both already produced electric cars with over 100 mile range using the same NiMH chemistry in every hybrid , but they don't talk about that. Toyota's recent announcement postponing the switch from NiMH to Lithium batteries is meant to convince us we'll just have to wait. Tell them you won't buy a new car without a plug. A hybrid without a plug is just a gasoline car by another name.

Google Gets It - It's the Plug, Stupid

Finally an entity is stepping up and saying unambiguously it's about electricity. Google.org has launched RechargeIt.org A comprehensive vision of clean electricty, plug-in hybrid and electric cars, and vehicles as distributed energy storage devices for clean power. With Google's street cred (Wall Street and your street,) intellectual prowess and financial clout, electricity may at long last get a seat at the table. The investor class, self-interested corporations and the major environmental organization have fallen in love with biofuels and hydrogen and shoved the logic of electricity from discussions about solutions to global warming and petroleum dependency. Just as Toyota announces delays on the next-generation (read plug-in hybrid) Prius and Honda cancels its hybrid Accord, Google has thrown down the gauntlet.

Filling up a Prius vs. Plugging In a RAV4 EV

Prius: > $6 per 100 miles
RAV4 EV: 0 - $2.50 per 100 miles

Prius: Fill up at multi-national corporate outpost
RAV4 EV: Fill up at home with solar electricity or cheap, abundant, night-time power

Prius: Hang around toxic fumes while filling up
RAV4 EV: Margaritas all around





Hat tip to Darell at evnut.com

Trouble in Hydrogen Heaven

The World, a PRI/BBC radio collaboration, has a report on the problems bringing Iceland's hydrogen dream to fruition. Still only one filling station, now without any customers. The hydrogen busses have been retired to a museum. With abundant renewable electricity, if it can't happen there, it can't happen anywhere. Jori Lewis reports from Reykyavik. Have a listen.

Zero-Carbon Drive to Sacto Anti-Carbon Rally and Back

Rainforest Action Network (RAN) held a rally in Sacramento Thursday outside the lobbying offices of the Association of Automobile Manufacturers to protest their continuing lawsuit against California's greenhouse gas legislation. Dan Kalb of the Union of Concerned Scientists and Bonnie Holms-Gen of the Lung Association were there to lend their voices of protest against the auto industry's continuing legal assault on California. And I was there representing Plug In America.

What's most interesting, however, is how easy (and cheap) it is to do a carbon emission-free 200 mile day in a 100 mile range electric vehicle, my 5 year old Toyota RAV4 EV. (It's about 90 miles from my house in San Francisco to the Capitol in Sacramento.) Tom Gage of AC Propulsion was driving up in the eBox on the same day to see some folks at SMUD and CARB, so we met up for breakfast in Vacaville.

Plenty of public charging in what's come to be called Voltageville. We chose the solar-powered Park n Ride just off 80. About 55 miles from my place in San Francisco and 100 miles from Tom's on the Peninsula. After an hour or so of breakfast and conversation, we unplugged our respective vehicles and went off to our appointments in the Capitol. The EV chargers one-half block from the RAN rally at which I was to speak were charging other RAV4 EVs, so I drove to another parking garage 2 blocks away. Plenty of available chargers there.

The 11 am demonstration went off without a hitch. (See my remarks below.) Afterward, I paid a quick visit to Assemblywoman Fiona Ma's office and then unplugged at around 12.30 to begin my journey back to SF. Stopped in Vacaville on the return trip to eat lunch, charging while eating of course. Arrived back home around 3.15 with about 25% (at least 25 miles) still available in my battery after 197 miles.

Total cost: $6. Should have cost me nothing to do the trip, but I had to pay for parking in Sacramento. Sacto is meant to have free parking for ZEVs, but that parking lot didn't respect my ZEV parking decal. Zero Emission Vehicles don't pay bridge tolls during commute hours in California, so I saved about $5 each way zipping past the toll collectors. In a Prius or Civic Hybrid at 50mpg, the trip would have cost about $30 in gas, tolls and parking in Sacto.

Electric cars don't emit carbon (or anything else) as they drive, so there's one additional saving quite relevant to speaking at a rally decrying carbon emissions. At 20 lbs of carbon emissions per gallon of gasoline burned (US Energy Information Administration estimate), a Prius or Civic would have released about 80 lbs of carbon for this one round trip.

My comments at the rally:

We’re all here to demand that the auto makers stop suing California as we attempt to lower, and eventually eliminate, greenhouse gas emissions from tailpipes. We’ve seen this all before. The auto manufacturers have sued to stop progress before.

Our group, Plug In America, began as DontCrush.com, to fight the destruction of the great electric cars produced to meet the Zero Emission Vehicle Mandate of the 90s. The great zero-carbon emitting, zero-particulate emitting, zero-petroleum consuming electric cars. They sued back then, too. With our protests, we saved about 1000 Ford and Toyota electric cars, and I drove here today from San Francisco in one. If you’ve seen the film Who Killed the Electric Car?, you know what I’m talking about.

One of the great things about plug-in cars is that they offer us a pathway to true ZERO. Plugging into the California electric grid today would lower the carbon emission of cars tremendously. And due to all our efforts, the grid is getting even cleaner and more renewable. As consumers, we want to tap into that cleaner source of energy for our driving. Because plug-in cars actually get cleaner over time. We want to power our cars from non-polluting, zero carbon emitting electricity from wind and solar photovoltaic systems on our roofs. The best way to eliminate tailpipe carbon emissions is to eliminate the tailpipe.

Choice is what we want. The market for the cleanest possible cars is huge. Unfortunately, the offerings from the carmakers sparse. A few gasoline-dependent hybrids won’t placate us when we already know better alternatives with lower or zero-carbon emissions are proven and ready today –all-electric cars and plug-in hybrids that can plug into cleaner, cheaper, domestic electricity. When it comes to cars, it’s time to say No Plug? No Deal.

The automakers must stop blocking the will of California and the nation and make the zero-carbon emitting cars they’ve already proven they can build.

Israel, Jordan Moving Ahead With "Electric Peace Car"

Ynetnews.com, an Israeli news site, reports on continuing progress on the Middle East electric car front. Building on initial discussions in Davos at the World Economic Forum in January, a meeting has now been held in Jordan to move the idea forward. Renault and Toyota are reported to be involved along with Shai Agassi, ex-SAP executive.

My ZEV Mandate Public Comment

Chairman Sawyer, Members, my name is Marc Geller, and I represent the San Francisco Electric Vehicle Association. Many of our members, including myself, drove ZEV Mandate battery electric cars - GM EV1, Honda EV+, Ford Th!nk City - until they were confiscated by the automakers. A few of us still drive Toyota RAV4 EVs - a truly great car. I hope Board Members understand that we continue to use these zero-emission, zero-petroleum cars in our daily lives. Many more of our members would like the choice to be available to buy electric and plug-in hybrids cars. And want CARB to succeed with ZEVs, in the near term.

Thousands of battery ZEVs were on the road in consumers hands a few short years ago. And they have not been replaced by another ZEV technology. To get more ZEVs on the road, we support the staff interest in battery electric/fuel cell technology neutrality. As the hydrogen storage expert testified here, H2 storage is still in the R&D phase. In fact both the expert panel and staff reports make clear the entire fuel cell project is essentially an R&D project with hope for commercialization decades out. The state ought to support technology R&D, but the Board should question whether it is appropriate to the ZEV mandate.

Battery electrics ought not be penalized - as they are now - because they are closer to commercialization and infrastructure-ready. There is no good reason to extend the deadline for compliance, and we oppose staff recommendation to extend the deadline for putting 2500 fuel cell vehicles on the road from 2011 to 2020.

Technology neutrality and firm deadlines have worked, and offer automakers enough flexibility to achieve the results we, and CARB, know are possible.

We believe the Board must keep all its options open to incentivize battery electrics and plug-in hybrids. Just as Governor Schwarzenegger is keeping his personal options open. Despite his much ballyhooed hydrogen highway, he has placed an order for a $100,000 all-electric Tesla Roadster. It is up to CARB to get back on the road to ZEV success for the rest of us.

Consumers Want Plug-in Hybrids, Industry Survey Finds

Synovate Motoresearch presented some very interesting survey results at the Advanced Automotive Battery Conference in Long Beach, CA last week, as reported in MIT's Technology Review. Simply put, as the first sentence of the article states,

[W]hen consumers understand what plug-in hybrids are, they want them.

All that's needed, the survey discovered, is a dollop of education.

Of the more than 3,000 consumers asked if they would consider buying a "grid-connected hybrid," the term used for plug-in hybrids in the survey, only 24 percent said that they would, according to the survey by Synovate Motoresearch. But when they were told what such a car could do, that figure nearly tripled, to 64 percent. That's well above the percentage of people who would consider buying an ordinary hybrid, like the Toyota Prius, which doesn't have extended battery-powered range.....The results suggest that consumers like the idea of the plug-in hybrid--but that so far, car companies are doing a lousy job of getting the word out.

Wonder why? The answer is contained in another part of the survey. Motoresearch also surveyed attitudes toward flex-fuel vehicles, heavily promoted by the automakers.

These cars, which can burn either gasoline or a mixture of 85 percent ethanol, scored high on the desirability charts--that is, until consumers were told more about them...consumers thought that flex-fuel improved fuel economy, Miller said. Actually, the opposite is true. Ethanol contains much less energy than gasoline does, so miles per gallon will be significantly lower, as will range on a tank of gas. When consumers were told this, the percentage of people who would consider buying the cars dropped from 52 to 33 percent.

GM's Lutz Talks Up Volt at NPR Game Show; Sierra Club's Dan Becker Welcomes "Epiphany"

GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz took his promotion for the serial plug-in hybrid Volt to an NPR game show, "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me." The NY Times reports:

With the same enthusiasm that he has long used to describe high torque ratings and engine displacements, Mr. Lutz touted the Volt’s mileage, which he estimated will reach 151 miles per gallon, fueled by a combination of electricity and gasoline.

His comments drew a huge round of applause from the NPR audience at the Michigan Theater here.

Dan Becker, head of the global warming program at the Sierra Club, was asked his reaction to the seeming about-face of "one of Detroit’s ultimate 'car guys,' for whom no vehicle could be big enough, powerful enough or fast enough... “We take all epiphanies,” Mr. Becker said."

So do I.

Becker himself has long opposed putting any effort behind plug-in cars. When I spoke with him about Ford's confiscation of my all-electric, zero-petroleum, zero-carbon Th!nk City a few years ago, he told me the Sierra Club didn't have the resources to help save the ZEV mandate electric cars. Sierra Club chapters, however, particularly in California, have been pressuring the national to promote plug-ins. I hope he has had an epiphany of his own and the Sierra Club will become a strong voice for plug-in hybrids and electric cars.

Bush Says Farewell to Blair with Empty Rhetoric on Climate Change

Tony Blair came to DC to say farewell. And make one final pitch for American cooperation on climate change. At a Rose Garden press conference within earshot of anti-war protesters beyond the White House gate, Bush's prepared remarks included this:

And we talked, of course, about climate change. We spent a lot of time on climate change. And I agree with the Prime Minister, as I have stated publicly, this is a serious issue, and the United States takes it seriously, just like we take energy security seriously.

As reported in the Independent of London,

As Tony Blair left Washington yesterday for his last visit as Prime Minister, the Bush administration was acting to scupper international efforts to combat climate change.

Less than 24 hours earlier, Mr Blair had basked in the apparent support of President George Bush for his stated aim of avoiding catastrophic global warming. But it seems his appeals have fallen on deaf ears. While Mr Bush was eulogising his friend in the White House rose garden, the President's delegation at a United Nations meeting in Bonn was working to stop any progress on setting up a carbon trading scheme and emissions caps.

Harlan Watson, President Bush's chief climate negotiator, rejected any caps on US emissions or participation in carbon trading. "That's not our agenda," he said.....

...away from the cameras, the US delegation to Bonn was scotching any prospect of the emissions caps and carbon trading that are needed to realise the rhetoric. "We don't believe targets and timetables are important, or a global cap and trade system," he said. "It's important not to jeopardise economic growth."

After his visit to Washington, Blair paid a farewell visit to Iraq. He was welcomed with mortar attacks that rocked the British HQ in Basra minutes after his remarks to British soldiers there.

Richardson Highlights Plug-in Hybrids and Electric Cars

Governor of New Mexico and candidate for the Democratic nomination Bill Richardson Richardson has released his "Energy and Climate Policy Plan." Plug-in hybrids and electric cars are part of Goal 1:

Get low and zero petroleum plug-in cars into the marketplace, while sharply reducing the carbon emissions from our electric sector. The pure-electric vehicle offers simplicity and performance for an average daily commute in our larger metro areas, while the plug-in electric car or truck provides more range and flexibility for people who drive longer distances, as it can extend gas mileage above 100 miles per gallon.

See the full press release here.

One can only presume Tesla's presentations that resulted in siting its White Star factory in New Mexico helped expose Richardson to the benefits of plug-in cars, even if the terminology used is a bit

Automotive Class Lithium-Ion Cells from A123

The California Air Resources Board may still be living in an alternate universe where hydrogen and fuel cell vehicles are making meaningful (if glacial) progress toward commercialization, but back here on earth battery power is where it's at. A123 Systems has introduced Automotive Class Lithium-ion cells. Read the press release here.

They Don't Just Steal at the Pump

PBS' Now profiles government auditor Bobby Maxwell's attempt to get oil companies drilling on government land to pay royalties due. The corruption in the oil business isn't only in Iraq. See the video here.

What's Oil Got to Do With It?

From Saturday's New York Times story "Cheney, on Carrier, Sends Warning to Iran"

Vice President Dick Cheney used the deck of an American aircraft carrier just 150 miles off Iran’s coast as the backdrop yesterday to warn that the United States was prepared to use its naval power to keep Tehran from disrupting oil routes...

Oil seemed to be on Mr. Cheney’s mind yesterday when he told 3,500 to 4,000 members of the Stennis’s crew that Iran would not be permitted to choke off oil shipments.

A 2nd Times piece, "Billions in Oil Missing in Iraq, U.S. Study Finds" reports that hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil "is unaccounted for and could have been siphoned off through corruption or smuggling." The report reinforces suspicion that corruption in the oil sector is likely financing some of the insurgency.

Of course, a resurgent oil industry, we were told, would finance the reconstruction of the energy sector and Iraq as a whole. It hasn't turned out that way.

Adding together both civilian and military financing, the report concludes that the United States has spent $5.1 billion of the $7.4 billion in American taxpayer money set aside to rebuild the Iraqi electricity and oil sectors. The United States has also spent $3.8 billion of Iraqi money on those sectors, the report says.

Despite that investment, less electricity is being produced that before the invasion, and neither oil "exports nor production have met American goals and have also declined since last year, the report says."

Dealing with Petroleum Addiction, British Style

The British Government is attempting to strangle the electric car baby in its London cradle.

The Times Online reports the British government's Department for Transport (DfT) has conducted a safety test on the all-electric Reva G-Whiz and found it wanting. The small, 45mph zero-emission vehicles have found a ready market in London - 850 sold so far - where electrics are exempt from the stiff daily congestion charge for driving in central London.

City government under Ken Livingston has been encouraging use of such cars. But now the central government, long hostile to alternative-fueled vehicles (it has cracked down on vegetable-oil fueled cars), "decided to buy a G-Wiz and carry out its own crash test after becoming concerned by the rapid growth in sales." Concerned with the results, the DfT took the unusual step of releasing its finding early and is "urgently seeking a review of the European regulations covering the sale of the cars." The car, classified as a "quadricycle," weighing under 400kg without the battery, is fully legal under existing rules.

The world's major auto manufacturers have steadfastly refused to build electric cars. The world's governments have refused to set sufficient incentives or mandates, with the exception of California which eventually backed down. Now the stars have aligned for a successful electric city car market in Britain, and New Labour is looking for ways to shut it down.

Conservative MP Boris Johnson blogs "Banning the G-Wiz sums up Labour" in a most amusingly perverse Tory manner about the issue.

They want to ban it, of course. No, wait. It's even wetter than that. They want Brussels to ban it for them!....It's as though we have got into some weird S & M relationship with the EU, in which ministers go around asking for correction. After years of ritual humiliation at the hands of Madame de Bruxelles, the fabled dominatrix, the man in Whitehall has become addicted to discipline.

Dealing with petroleum addiction, Texas style

The Texas House of Representatives votes in favor of increased gasoline consumption.

I should add that Texas, in the form of Austin Energy's Plug-in Partners effort, shows us the right direction to head, promoting plug-in hybrids (and electric cars) to use the electrical grid to replace gasoline.

Got Hydrogen?

70 years ago today.

Hat tip to Arthur Keller.

$200,000 Google.org Grant to CalCars

Google.org is stepping up to the plate for electricity in cars. Calcars.org has received a $200,000 grant to continue its advocacy of plug-in hybrid vehicles. Founder Felix Kramer has been dogged and successful in pushing plug-ins into the national and international media. Everyday Prius owners ask me where to get their car converted to a plug-in. It is largely thanks to Felix that hybrid owners now desire something more than a gasoline-dependent car. (Bumper sticker below available here.)
All I can say is it's about time somebody put some bucks behind the plug in the ongoing altfuel debate. Ethanol and hydrogen promoters have their deep pocketed supporters (grain combines and the oil & gas industries) and receive the lion's share of the alt fuel attention. Utilities and enviro organizations ought to join Google and provide serious resources to groups like CalCars.org and Plug In America to make the case for electricity. It is, after all, the cleanest, cheapest, most infrastructure-ready alternative fuel available.

(Full disclosure: I, as an electric car driver and advocate, am an informal advisor to CalCars, and co-founder of Plug In America.)

Required Reading: Tesla Motors' Martin Eberhard Testifies

Martin Eberhard, Tesla Motors CEO, testified at the Senate Finance Committee yesterday. In a succinct presentation, he makes the case for electricity. And he suggests turning the perverse federal incentives that brought us the Hummer on their head. Read his complete testimony here.

Whither CARB?

The California Air Resources Board, one of the culprits identified in Who Killed the Electric Car?, was originally charged with reducing pollution. Now it's actions are meant to help reduce carbon emissions and petroleum usage, as well. The electric cars produced to meet the Zero Emission Vehicle mandate uniquely contribute on all three counts.

Of the transportation fuel options before us, only electricity can provide both near term mitigation of the many problems wrought by petroleum and the internal combustion engine, and a path to a truly zero-carbon, zero-emission, zero-petroleum future.

Gov. Schwarzenegger and CARB have a unique opportunity.

Proclaim the success of the ZEV mandate. Highlight the synergy of California's Solar Initiative and plug-in cars. Showcase the Toyota RAV4 EVs and RangerEVs still providing many more zero emission miles than all the hydrogen fuel cell cars touted by the car makers. Build on the success of nearly 10,000 battery electric vehicles, not the failure of a diminished ZEV fleet, an automaker-inspired failure of less than 100 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, now pleading for an extension on the minimal target they presumed they could attain.

Tens of thousands of battery electric cars could be on the road for the same expense in shorter time and everyone knows the market exists already for plug-in cars. The carmakers never fulfilled the demand they themselves unwillingly and unwittingly inspired in Californians. They are waiting to be forced to do the right thing. Their own ZEV-mandated product proved they could do it. They can do it again.

La Poste Plans to Buy 10,000 Electric Vehicles

The French Post Office, La Poste, is seeking to place 10,000 electric vehicles in service in the next five years. This week La Poste will invite manufacturers to bid to build the first 500 for delivery in 2008.

"There has never been such a big order (for electric vehicles) in the world," said French Industry Minister Francois Loos in an interview with AFP, referring to the plans for 10,000 electric vehicles.

Full story.

Biden Mentions Lithium During Debate; What's Up With the Diesel Provision?

In the Democratic debate last week, Joe Biden mentioned his legislation to prod lithium battery research for plug-in cars among the panoply of actions required to meet the global climate challenge.

We also have legislation in requiring that we invest $100 million a year the next couple of years while this president’s president in order to be able to find lithium battery technology to be able to — to power our cars.

Of course what we need now is not so much dollars for battery research (although that is useful) as incentives and mandates for plug-in cars. Yet that's exactly what the provision tucked in at the end of the bill otherwise devoted to electric transportation, including electric cars and plug-in hybrids, does for "lean burn" diesel vehicles. The legislation, S1055, would expand the availability of tax credits for diesel vehicles. In the press release on the bill, Biden does cite a specific beneficiary:

In particular, Daimler Chrysler produces a Jeep Grand Cherokee diesel that will qualify under the new requirements.

Section 3 of Biden's bill refers to IRS Code Section 30B, but 30B doesn't appear on the IRS webpage. So I can't figure out what the real import of the provision is.

SEC. 3. AVAILABILITY OF NEW ADVANCED LEAN BURN TECHNOLOGY MOTOR VEHICLE CREDIT FOR HIGH-EFFICIENCY DIESEL MOTOR VEHICLES.

(a) In General- Section 30B(c)(3)(A) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 (defining new advanced lean burn technology motor vehicle credit) is amended--
(1) by adding `and' at the end of clause (ii), and
(2) by striking clause (iv).

Upstream Costs of Gasoline

The United States uses 360 million gallons of gasoline each day. One tanker-truck load, a mere 8600 gallons of gasoline, exploded on a San Francisco Bay Area Freeway early Sunday morning, and the consequences will be felt for months. The effect of this one accident is being compared to the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, which also caused the collapse of Bay Area freeways.

Senators: It's the Electrons

Three Senators, Republican Orrin Hatch and Democrats Maria Cantwell and Barack Obama are showing signs of getting it. The Electric Drive Transportation website has the complete press release.

“We are facing a global energy crunch, and the fact that our transportation sector is around 97 percent dependent on oil is just plain dangerous,” Hatch said, “We have to act now and we have to be creative. In my view there is no solution more practical or urgent than enacting policies that would begin to shift our transportation sector away from liquid fuels and toward a greater reliance on electrons.”

“We already have the technology right here at home to power most of the cars in America,” said Cantwell. “We produce enough extra electricity right now to supply as much as 70 percent of the power needed by our cars, pickup trucks, and SUVs. More options for powering America’s vehicles will save consumers money, help get us off foreign oil, and make our country more secure.”

“One of the most immediate actions we can take to fight climate change is to dramatically reduce our oil consumption by pushing electric vehicles into the marketplace,” said Obama. “We have the technology, but we must provide incentives for consumers and manufacturers so that it is made available to the driving public. Producing electric vehicles and energy efficient technology could help the U.S. auto industry regain its competitive edge.”