By Mother Nature Network | Forbes
Mon, Aug 29, 2011
Jim Motavalli
http://news.yahoo.com/top-10-electric-cars-most-likely-succeed-182102846.html
The crystal ball is still cloudy on electric and plug-in hybrid cars. They’re still being made in limited numbers, and delivered to very specific test markets. And half the really exciting ones aren’t even here yet. Still, it’s time to make some predictions about what will succeed and what will fail in the marketplace. Here are my top 10 leading candidates, in descending order:
1. Chevy Volt: GM’s $41,000 plug-in hybrid, soon to have a sister car in the more upscale Cadillac ELR (first seen on the auto show circuit as the Converj in 2009). GM has sold 3,200 so far, but the number doesn’t have much to do with demand — production’s been shut down as the company gears up for a capacity of 60,000 a year by 2012.
2. Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid: With an all-electric range of nine to 13 miles, after which it’s a regular Prius, this car should find a lot of fans.
3. Nissan Leaf: Some 4,000 have been sold so far in the U.S., and East Coast customers are still waiting patiently. The price is going up for 2012 — to $38,000 for the SL trim that most customers will want.
4. Tesla Model S: Due next year, this $49,990 electric sedan is half the price of the exotic Roadster, but it has far more utility. On the same platform, Tesla will also offer a Model X crossover that should sell really well.
5. Ford C-Max Energi plug-in hybrid: There is now downside to plug-in hybrids, except maybe their price. This one is headed for the market in 2012, and with 500 miles of range it should be a really practical, fun-to-own car.
6. Ford Focus electric/Toyota RAV4 electric (tie): Take your pick. The 2012 Focus (pictured at top) is an electric version of the redesigned Focus small car, best used as a city car with an 80-mile range. It should offer good performance — celebrities raced them on Jay Leno’s show! The RAV4 is being built with Tesla, and it continues the electric career of the popular crossover (which was briefly on the market around the turn of the millennium as a competitor for the GM EV1).
7. Fisker Karma: After many delays, the Karma (at right) is finally on the market, or at least the first set of keys has been handed to Leonardo DiCaprio, with Colin Powell and Al Gore in the wings. The Karma is a $100,000 plug-in hybrid with Italian supercar good looks (though the BMW veteran designer is actually a Dane). This car has serious glamor going for it, but it has to perform up to the hype.
8. Honda Fit/Toyota iQ city electrics (tie): I love subcompacts, and they make great bases for inexpensive electric cars. These two (both headed for production in 2012) should be evenly matched, and go head to head. I’m really hoping for low prices on these two cars — under $30,000 would be nice, even if it means a smaller battery pack and less than 100 miles of range.
9. BMW i3 Megacity Vehicle: BMW was an early player in the space with its lively Mini-based electric vehicles, and its successor, a plug-in version of the 1-Series. The 2013 BMW i3 is the company’s first all-electric platform, and it’s headed for the road in the world’s super-crowded cities (hence the name). The concept makes sense, since that’s where the world’s population is headed, but only if the price is kept low enough so the middle class (instead of just the super-rich) can afford it.
10. Porsche 918 Spyder plug-in hybrid: Speaking of the super-rich, this car will cost $845,000. Porsche will build just 918 of them when it debuts on Sept. 18, 2013. (They’re into numerology at Porsche.) But even if they sell only a few of them, at that price the company will make money — and reap acres of publicity and the cover of every car magazine.
This list is subject to periodic updates, of course, but this is how I see it now. I predict both the Chevy Volt and the Nissan Leaf will sell in sufficient numbers to make them, if not runaway hits, at least modest successes. They have the greatest consumer awareness, the most utility, the best pricing and are supported by solid dealer and promotional bases. The Fisker Karma and the Tesla Model S are also likely to do well, though both will need to meet high quality and performance standards to stay afloat.
Showing posts with label Chevy Volt. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chevy Volt. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Chevy Volt Review
From Salon.com:
An hour's drive north of Warren, in Flint, is an abandoned GM auto plant called Buick City. In the 1970s, Buick City employed 28,000 autoworkers. Today, it's America's biggest brownfield, anchoring a neighborhood that also features a boarded-up tavern, a defunct United Auto Workers hall and an out-of-business party store. The land around Buick City is so worthless that a patriotic couple bought several corner lots, for $200 apiece, and built a memorial to American soldiers killed on 9/11.
Buick City and so many other factories are industrial waste sites because General Motors hasn't had an original idea since it put a V-8 engine in the Oldsmobile. In the 1970s, when the Arab Oil Embargo began a small-car craze, Honda was already building the Civic. Toyota was building the Corolla. GM responded with -- the Chevette. Named one of the 50 Worst Cars of All Time by Time magazine, the Chevette turned an entire generation of Americans onto Japanese cars. It was the first car I ever owned. My mechanic diagnosed the hole under the pedals as "Chevette Floor Cancer." He pounded a sheet of tin over the opening, but my shoes still got wet whenever I drove through a puddle.
And then, in the 2000s, there was GM Chairman Robert Lutz's reaction to the Prius: "Hybrids are an interesting curiosity and we will do some, but do they make sense at $1.50 a gallon? No, they do not." They do make sense at $4 a gallon, but Toyota dominates the market now.
That's why I was so excited about the Volt. Like any Michigander who grew up seeing "Assholes Buy Jap Cars" spray-painted on overpasses, I've been conditioned to root for the home team. Now, for once in my life, stodgy old Papa Jimmy was going to be first at something. As Toyota was the hybrid company, Chevy would be the electric company.
"I want that brand right here on top of my forehead," Farah said, pointing at the space above his safety glasses.
Farah worked on GM's first, failed attempt: the EV1, subject of the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?" Its problem: the battery weighed 1,200 pounds. To wring 40 miles out of a single charge, the EV1 was a two-seater, with no trunk.
"You had to build the car around the battery," he said.
The lithium-ion battery pack weighs a third of that. The Volt is an "extended-range" vehicle. Once the charge runs down, a gasoline engine takes over. But it doesn't power a drive train, as on a traditional vehicle. It powers the electrical system that runs the car.
The energy required to drive 40 miles on battery power is equivalent to "well under a gallon" of gasoline, Farah told me, because running an electrical system is 50 percent more efficient than running a drive train. Fueling the Volt costs 2 cents a mile. At $4 a gallon, a gasoline-powered car costs 13 cents a mile.
On electric power, the Volt emits no exhaust. Drawing electricity from a coal-powered grid may produce more greenhouse gases than a gasoline-powered car. But coal produces only half America's energy, and that percentage is declining as utilities switch to cleaner fuels. The Volt can draw power "from the wind, from the sun," Farah said. "You don't have to burn fossil fuels." As a plug-in hybrid, the Volt would be a compromise between the Prius, which has a 4-cylinder gasoline engine, and the all-electric Nissan Leaf.
The Volt is finally out this year. It was named 2011 Motor Trend Car of the Year. When I heard that the Volt rides were the No. 1 attraction at last month's Chicago Auto Show, I was more excited than the moment I first laid eyes on the Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point. I'd been waiting years to sit inside the salvation of the American auto industry.
When I got to the Auto Show, little pod-shaped cars were circling a go-kart-sized track, landscaped with real grass and real shrubs. The foliage would die indoors, but from lack of sunlight, not air pollution. When a Volt finally stopped, I climbed into the passenger seat. My first reaction?
"Wow, this is even more cramped than my old Dodge Neon." The engine was silent, but I couldn't tell whether that was because we were only going five miles an hour.
"How much is this going to cost?" I asked the driver.
"They start at $41,000," he said, "although there is a $7,500 tax credit for buying an electric car."
I looked at the back seat. Two American-sized people could squeeze in there. The driver tried to focus my attention on a computer screen displaying the remaining charge.
"Are they ever going to make a bigger version?" I asked.
"There's going to be a family-sized SUV, eventually."
Eventually. I stepped outside and watched the silent rodeo of cars. The Volt is a $20,000 car, for twice the money. Even if I could afford to replace my Ford Focus hatchback with a Volt, I wouldn't do it. It's too small for my cross-country skis and my camping equipment.
Then I got an e-mail from a retired Chevy dealer named Chuck Frank. He forwarded me an article from Automotive & Assembly Practice, which predicted that "plug-in hybrid electric vehicles and battery-only electric vehicles could account for 16 percent of overall new-car sales in New York, 9 percent in Paris and 5 percent in Shanghai by 2015."
"Are you buying a Volt?" I e-mailed back.
"I have one on order and a Leaf as well," he wrote. "I drove one recently and liked it."
Frank is the Volt's target customer: a well-to-do environmentalist. As a boy, Frank wanted to be a forest ranger. Instead, he inherited the world's largest Chevrolet dealership from his father. But Frank's love of the outdoors and his wife's struggles with asthma led him to join the Sierra Club, and he became the group's inside connection to the auto industry. As a Chevy dealer, he could talk to executives who wouldn't take an environmentalist's phone calls. For years, Frank lobbied GM to build an electric car. In 2005, frustrated that he couldn't offer his customers an alternative to the Prius, he approached Chairman Rick Wagoner at a cocktail reception.
"Why isn't GM doing anything about a hybrid?" Frank inquired.
"Hybrids don't make sense to the public," Wagoner told him. "Economically, they don't make sense."
Three months later, GM announced plans for the Volt.
Frank doesn't care that the Volt is cramped and overpriced. He has bigger Chevys in his garage, and he sold enough Corvettes to understand that when it comes to choosing a car, practicality is less important than looking badass. Otherwise, everyone would be driving an Aveo...
General Motors just announced it earned $4.7 billion last year, its first profit since 2004. It's not because of the Volt, obviously, but the Volt is another sign that GM has finally learned to do business like a 21st century auto company. It's too late to save Flint, but the Volt is coming off the assembly line in the Detroit suburb of Hamtramck.
Even though the Volt is a tiny, expensive toy, GM did the right thing by rushing it into showrooms before guys like me are ready to buy one. Eventually, lithium-ion batteries will be cheaper. Eventually, apartment buildings will install charging stations. Eventually, gas will cost $5 a gallon. When all that happens, a lot us will buy electric cars. I want to own a Volt someday. GM hopes that brand on its forehead is big enough to make you to want one of its electric cars, too.
Can an electric car save the American dream?
Edward McClellan
Saturday, Mar 12, 2011
http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/03/12/chevy_volt_can_they_pull_it_off/index.html
An hour's drive north of Warren, in Flint, is an abandoned GM auto plant called Buick City. In the 1970s, Buick City employed 28,000 autoworkers. Today, it's America's biggest brownfield, anchoring a neighborhood that also features a boarded-up tavern, a defunct United Auto Workers hall and an out-of-business party store. The land around Buick City is so worthless that a patriotic couple bought several corner lots, for $200 apiece, and built a memorial to American soldiers killed on 9/11.
Buick City and so many other factories are industrial waste sites because General Motors hasn't had an original idea since it put a V-8 engine in the Oldsmobile. In the 1970s, when the Arab Oil Embargo began a small-car craze, Honda was already building the Civic. Toyota was building the Corolla. GM responded with -- the Chevette. Named one of the 50 Worst Cars of All Time by Time magazine, the Chevette turned an entire generation of Americans onto Japanese cars. It was the first car I ever owned. My mechanic diagnosed the hole under the pedals as "Chevette Floor Cancer." He pounded a sheet of tin over the opening, but my shoes still got wet whenever I drove through a puddle.
And then, in the 2000s, there was GM Chairman Robert Lutz's reaction to the Prius: "Hybrids are an interesting curiosity and we will do some, but do they make sense at $1.50 a gallon? No, they do not." They do make sense at $4 a gallon, but Toyota dominates the market now.
That's why I was so excited about the Volt. Like any Michigander who grew up seeing "Assholes Buy Jap Cars" spray-painted on overpasses, I've been conditioned to root for the home team. Now, for once in my life, stodgy old Papa Jimmy was going to be first at something. As Toyota was the hybrid company, Chevy would be the electric company.
"I want that brand right here on top of my forehead," Farah said, pointing at the space above his safety glasses.
Farah worked on GM's first, failed attempt: the EV1, subject of the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?" Its problem: the battery weighed 1,200 pounds. To wring 40 miles out of a single charge, the EV1 was a two-seater, with no trunk.
"You had to build the car around the battery," he said.
The lithium-ion battery pack weighs a third of that. The Volt is an "extended-range" vehicle. Once the charge runs down, a gasoline engine takes over. But it doesn't power a drive train, as on a traditional vehicle. It powers the electrical system that runs the car.
The energy required to drive 40 miles on battery power is equivalent to "well under a gallon" of gasoline, Farah told me, because running an electrical system is 50 percent more efficient than running a drive train. Fueling the Volt costs 2 cents a mile. At $4 a gallon, a gasoline-powered car costs 13 cents a mile.
On electric power, the Volt emits no exhaust. Drawing electricity from a coal-powered grid may produce more greenhouse gases than a gasoline-powered car. But coal produces only half America's energy, and that percentage is declining as utilities switch to cleaner fuels. The Volt can draw power "from the wind, from the sun," Farah said. "You don't have to burn fossil fuels." As a plug-in hybrid, the Volt would be a compromise between the Prius, which has a 4-cylinder gasoline engine, and the all-electric Nissan Leaf.
The Volt is finally out this year. It was named 2011 Motor Trend Car of the Year. When I heard that the Volt rides were the No. 1 attraction at last month's Chicago Auto Show, I was more excited than the moment I first laid eyes on the Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point. I'd been waiting years to sit inside the salvation of the American auto industry.
When I got to the Auto Show, little pod-shaped cars were circling a go-kart-sized track, landscaped with real grass and real shrubs. The foliage would die indoors, but from lack of sunlight, not air pollution. When a Volt finally stopped, I climbed into the passenger seat. My first reaction?
"Wow, this is even more cramped than my old Dodge Neon." The engine was silent, but I couldn't tell whether that was because we were only going five miles an hour.
"How much is this going to cost?" I asked the driver.
"They start at $41,000," he said, "although there is a $7,500 tax credit for buying an electric car."
I looked at the back seat. Two American-sized people could squeeze in there. The driver tried to focus my attention on a computer screen displaying the remaining charge.
"Are they ever going to make a bigger version?" I asked.
"There's going to be a family-sized SUV, eventually."
Eventually. I stepped outside and watched the silent rodeo of cars. The Volt is a $20,000 car, for twice the money. Even if I could afford to replace my Ford Focus hatchback with a Volt, I wouldn't do it. It's too small for my cross-country skis and my camping equipment.
Then I got an e-mail from a retired Chevy dealer named Chuck Frank. He forwarded me an article from Automotive & Assembly Practice, which predicted that "plug-in hybrid electric vehicles and battery-only electric vehicles could account for 16 percent of overall new-car sales in New York, 9 percent in Paris and 5 percent in Shanghai by 2015."
"Are you buying a Volt?" I e-mailed back.
"I have one on order and a Leaf as well," he wrote. "I drove one recently and liked it."
Frank is the Volt's target customer: a well-to-do environmentalist. As a boy, Frank wanted to be a forest ranger. Instead, he inherited the world's largest Chevrolet dealership from his father. But Frank's love of the outdoors and his wife's struggles with asthma led him to join the Sierra Club, and he became the group's inside connection to the auto industry. As a Chevy dealer, he could talk to executives who wouldn't take an environmentalist's phone calls. For years, Frank lobbied GM to build an electric car. In 2005, frustrated that he couldn't offer his customers an alternative to the Prius, he approached Chairman Rick Wagoner at a cocktail reception.
"Why isn't GM doing anything about a hybrid?" Frank inquired.
"Hybrids don't make sense to the public," Wagoner told him. "Economically, they don't make sense."
Three months later, GM announced plans for the Volt.
Frank doesn't care that the Volt is cramped and overpriced. He has bigger Chevys in his garage, and he sold enough Corvettes to understand that when it comes to choosing a car, practicality is less important than looking badass. Otherwise, everyone would be driving an Aveo...
General Motors just announced it earned $4.7 billion last year, its first profit since 2004. It's not because of the Volt, obviously, but the Volt is another sign that GM has finally learned to do business like a 21st century auto company. It's too late to save Flint, but the Volt is coming off the assembly line in the Detroit suburb of Hamtramck.
Even though the Volt is a tiny, expensive toy, GM did the right thing by rushing it into showrooms before guys like me are ready to buy one. Eventually, lithium-ion batteries will be cheaper. Eventually, apartment buildings will install charging stations. Eventually, gas will cost $5 a gallon. When all that happens, a lot us will buy electric cars. I want to own a Volt someday. GM hopes that brand on its forehead is big enough to make you to want one of its electric cars, too.
Can an electric car save the American dream?
Edward McClellan
Saturday, Mar 12, 2011
http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/03/12/chevy_volt_can_they_pull_it_off/index.html
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
The Electric Chevy Volt Wins Car of the Year
"What an interesting year for the coveted COTY! Normally, the contest pits automakers for who rolled out the nicest sheet metal, the most compelling package for car buyers. But this year, the industry's most prestigious award was driven by technology. General Motors' Volt is the first plug-in car from a major automaker -- with a backup engine to give it unlimited range."
Chevrolet Volt wins coveted North American Car of the Year
Chris Woodyard
Jan 10, 2011
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2011/01/chevrolet-volt-wins-coveted-north-american-car-of-the-year/1
Sunday, May 18, 2008
VW will sell a 200-mpg car in 2010
http://green.yahoo.com/blog/ecogeek/497/vw-will-sell-a-200-mpg-car-in-2010.html
VW will sell a 200-mpg car in 2010
By Hank Green
Wed May 7, 2008
So you're excited about the 2010 Prius with its modest mileage gains. Or maybe you really want a Chevy Volt with a 40-mile all-electric range.
2010, as we've noted, is going to be a good year for green cars.
But this is ridiculous.
VW has been talking for a long time about its L1 concept, so called because it uses a measly 1 liter of gasoline to go 100 km. For us Americans, that translates to about 230 miles per gallon.
Of course, the amazing mileage comes at a price. The car is tiny, more of a toboggan than a car. The single passenger actually sits behind the driver, like in a small airplane.
The tiny engine will only get the car up to about 75 mph and, as such, VW doesn't expect to sell a lot of these vehicles. Safety concerns might also keep the car from being a best seller. But, since it does have four wheels, it will have to meet all of the normal safety regulations for cars.
VW will continue to release details on the car, but it is firm that this vehicle will be produced by 2010. And, in terms of pure efficiency, its only real competitor will be the 300-mpg Aptera.
VW will sell a 200-mpg car in 2010
By Hank Green
Wed May 7, 2008
So you're excited about the 2010 Prius with its modest mileage gains. Or maybe you really want a Chevy Volt with a 40-mile all-electric range.
2010, as we've noted, is going to be a good year for green cars.
But this is ridiculous.
VW has been talking for a long time about its L1 concept, so called because it uses a measly 1 liter of gasoline to go 100 km. For us Americans, that translates to about 230 miles per gallon.
Of course, the amazing mileage comes at a price. The car is tiny, more of a toboggan than a car. The single passenger actually sits behind the driver, like in a small airplane.
The tiny engine will only get the car up to about 75 mph and, as such, VW doesn't expect to sell a lot of these vehicles. Safety concerns might also keep the car from being a best seller. But, since it does have four wheels, it will have to meet all of the normal safety regulations for cars.
VW will continue to release details on the car, but it is firm that this vehicle will be produced by 2010. And, in terms of pure efficiency, its only real competitor will be the 300-mpg Aptera.
Friday, February 22, 2008
Is the Hybrid Escalade an Oxymoron?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/clint-wilder/is-the-hybrid-escalade-an_b_86111.html
Clint Wilder
Is the Hybrid Escalade an Oxymoron?
Posted February 11, 2008
Read More: Cadillac Escalade, Chevy Volt, Clean Tech Revolution, Clean-Tech Investor Summit, Hybrid Escalade, Jeff Sterba, PNM Resources, Sports Utility Vehicles, Sustainability, Suvs, Tesla Roadster, Toyota Prius, Breaking Business News
Some years ago, I'm not sure when, the prize vehicles awarded to heroes of major sports events made the unfortunate transition from snazzy convertible sports cars to the biggest, hulkiest, meanest SOBs - I mean SUVs - on the block. So it was no surprise when New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning, after engineering one of the greatest upset wins in Super Bowl history 10 days ago (with a tremendous assist from his team's defense, I must add), was handed the MVP trophy and the keys to a brand-new black 2009 Cadillac Escalade.
But this is 2008, and there's a twist. It's a hybrid Escalade. And that's now officially a trend. The Super Bowl telecast also included an ad for the new GMC Yukon hybrid, and at Major League Baseball's All-Star Game last summer, I was there in person at San Francisco's AT&T Park to see game MVP Ichiro Suzuki receive a hybrid Chevy Tahoe SUV. (Full disclosure: in addition to clean energy and sustainability, I'm also passionate about sports in general and baseball in particular).
At that time, my book The Clean Tech Revolution (co-authored with Ron Pernick) had just been published, and at a bookstore appearance the next day I was happy to extol Ichiro's MVP award as a great example of clean tech having moved firmly into the consumer and cultural mainstream. I also noted that Fox Sports used biodiesel to power its satellite trucks and broadcast equipment at the game, and the related All-Star Fanfest displayed the Chevy Volt, General Motors' concept car that can be configured as an all-electric, plug-in hybrid, hydrogen fuel cell, or flex-fuel vehicle.
But now, I'm not so sure that biggest-of-the-fleet SUV hybrids are such a good thing. Yes, it's good to see the mainstreaming of hybrid technology, but are hybrid Escalades, Tahoes, and Yukons really just the "lipstick on a pig" philosophy at work - dressing up a bad thing to look a little better, ecologically speaking? GM calls it (I'm not making this up) "intelligent indulgence." GM promises that the hybrid version will improve the Escalade's city gas mileage by up to 50 percent - from its current 12 mpg all the way to 18. Yippee.
The hybrid Escalade reminds me of the 15,000 square foot McMansion with solar panels, or the coal-fired power plant with incrementally reduced CO2 emissions. Sure, it's better than its more harmful, greenhouse gas-producing predecessor, but it also carries the implication that incremental improvements in the way we've always done things - or at least the way we've done things since the 1980s when SUVs and McMansions proliferated - will get us where we need to be on carbon reduction. They won't.
Want to hazard a guess as to the average increase in American home size since the early 1980s? It's 30 percent in square footage, and a whopping 50 percent in cubic footage - the actual amount of space that needs to be heated or cooled (can you say Atrium Living Room?). I learned that useful factoid not from a granola-crunching non-profit but from Jeff Sterba, CEO of PNM Resources, the largest utility in New Mexico, who spoke at last week's Clean-Tech Investor Summit conference in Palm Springs, California (I'll be blogging about the conference next week).
I'm not suggesting that we all need to ride bicycles and live in tiny hovels with uncomfortable temperatures. I do live in the modern world, and like to think of myself as a realist. Large families need roomy vehicles, yes. But they don't have to be the largest non-commercial vehicles on the road, plugging along at 12 miles to the gallon in city driving, if that. (And what percentage of all Cadillac Escalade driving is spent carting big families around? Very little, I'd guess).
I really do believe that technology, with adequate levels of investment and policy support, is the best hope to solve the global climate and resource crisis -- not expecting millions of people to undergo a radical lifestyle change. But I'd prefer to see technology deliver true innovation and game-changing results, like the Toyota Prius or the all-electric Tesla Roadster or possibly (to be fair to GM) the Chevy Volt - not just a 6-mpg improvement for Eli Manning's trophy car. We can do a lot better than that - and pretty soon, we're going to need to.
Clint Wilder
Is the Hybrid Escalade an Oxymoron?
Posted February 11, 2008
Read More: Cadillac Escalade, Chevy Volt, Clean Tech Revolution, Clean-Tech Investor Summit, Hybrid Escalade, Jeff Sterba, PNM Resources, Sports Utility Vehicles, Sustainability, Suvs, Tesla Roadster, Toyota Prius, Breaking Business News
Some years ago, I'm not sure when, the prize vehicles awarded to heroes of major sports events made the unfortunate transition from snazzy convertible sports cars to the biggest, hulkiest, meanest SOBs - I mean SUVs - on the block. So it was no surprise when New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning, after engineering one of the greatest upset wins in Super Bowl history 10 days ago (with a tremendous assist from his team's defense, I must add), was handed the MVP trophy and the keys to a brand-new black 2009 Cadillac Escalade.
But this is 2008, and there's a twist. It's a hybrid Escalade. And that's now officially a trend. The Super Bowl telecast also included an ad for the new GMC Yukon hybrid, and at Major League Baseball's All-Star Game last summer, I was there in person at San Francisco's AT&T Park to see game MVP Ichiro Suzuki receive a hybrid Chevy Tahoe SUV. (Full disclosure: in addition to clean energy and sustainability, I'm also passionate about sports in general and baseball in particular).
At that time, my book The Clean Tech Revolution (co-authored with Ron Pernick) had just been published, and at a bookstore appearance the next day I was happy to extol Ichiro's MVP award as a great example of clean tech having moved firmly into the consumer and cultural mainstream. I also noted that Fox Sports used biodiesel to power its satellite trucks and broadcast equipment at the game, and the related All-Star Fanfest displayed the Chevy Volt, General Motors' concept car that can be configured as an all-electric, plug-in hybrid, hydrogen fuel cell, or flex-fuel vehicle.
But now, I'm not so sure that biggest-of-the-fleet SUV hybrids are such a good thing. Yes, it's good to see the mainstreaming of hybrid technology, but are hybrid Escalades, Tahoes, and Yukons really just the "lipstick on a pig" philosophy at work - dressing up a bad thing to look a little better, ecologically speaking? GM calls it (I'm not making this up) "intelligent indulgence." GM promises that the hybrid version will improve the Escalade's city gas mileage by up to 50 percent - from its current 12 mpg all the way to 18. Yippee.
The hybrid Escalade reminds me of the 15,000 square foot McMansion with solar panels, or the coal-fired power plant with incrementally reduced CO2 emissions. Sure, it's better than its more harmful, greenhouse gas-producing predecessor, but it also carries the implication that incremental improvements in the way we've always done things - or at least the way we've done things since the 1980s when SUVs and McMansions proliferated - will get us where we need to be on carbon reduction. They won't.
Want to hazard a guess as to the average increase in American home size since the early 1980s? It's 30 percent in square footage, and a whopping 50 percent in cubic footage - the actual amount of space that needs to be heated or cooled (can you say Atrium Living Room?). I learned that useful factoid not from a granola-crunching non-profit but from Jeff Sterba, CEO of PNM Resources, the largest utility in New Mexico, who spoke at last week's Clean-Tech Investor Summit conference in Palm Springs, California (I'll be blogging about the conference next week).
I'm not suggesting that we all need to ride bicycles and live in tiny hovels with uncomfortable temperatures. I do live in the modern world, and like to think of myself as a realist. Large families need roomy vehicles, yes. But they don't have to be the largest non-commercial vehicles on the road, plugging along at 12 miles to the gallon in city driving, if that. (And what percentage of all Cadillac Escalade driving is spent carting big families around? Very little, I'd guess).
I really do believe that technology, with adequate levels of investment and policy support, is the best hope to solve the global climate and resource crisis -- not expecting millions of people to undergo a radical lifestyle change. But I'd prefer to see technology deliver true innovation and game-changing results, like the Toyota Prius or the all-electric Tesla Roadster or possibly (to be fair to GM) the Chevy Volt - not just a 6-mpg improvement for Eli Manning's trophy car. We can do a lot better than that - and pretty soon, we're going to need to.
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