Green Options

Editor’s Note: This is San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s second post on electric vehicles for Gas 2.0. It’s a direct response to Portland Mayor Sam Adams, who announced that his city would be the first to develop the charging infrastructure to support full-scale electric vehicle deployment. We expect to hear back from Mayor Adam’s later today - don’t miss it). UPDATE: Mayor Adam’s has posted his response. See video of his declaration to make Portland EV capitol of the US.

As car companies lined up in Washington, DC last November for the first round of federal bailout money – in San Francisco we announced another way – our comprehensive plan to make the San Francisco Bay Area the “Electric Vehicle (EV) Capital of the US.”

Our efforts to advance electric vehicles are not limited to San Francisco. We’ve engaged the entire Bay Area – a region of 7.3 million people – to make our region the cornerstone of the coming market for EVs. Not just governments, but key companies, business associations, policy advocates, and international car and EV infrastructure companies are all working together to make the San Francisco Bay Area the EV Capital of the U.S.

In the last weeks, GM has increased the intensity of its internal dialogue and negotiations with the Obama Administration to keep from being killed off. A summary of where GM is as of right now:

While we wait to see if General Motors will go banko come June 1, Raser Technologies is hoping to change our minds about one of GM’s most iconic offerings: the Humvee.

During the upcoming 2009 SAE World Congress (Detroit, April 20 - 24) the company plans to unveil a Hummer H3 Range-Extended Electric Vehicle (ReEV) prototype. The vehicle is designed, first and foremost, as a purely electric vehicle with a drive train similar to the Voltec system in the Chevrolet Volt.

“We are resurrecting the Hummer,” David West, vice president of marketing for Raser Technologies said, adding that “It’s like a Volt on steroids.”

Wind turbine manufacturer Global Wind Systems announced today that it will be hiring 250 new employees to work in the company’s new wind turbine assembly plant in Novi, Michigan, thirty miles west of Detroit. The news brings a ray of hope for a regional economy struggle under the weight of a sinking auto industry.

In December, Global Wind Systems received $7.3 million in tax credits from the Michigan Economic Growth Authority in December to create 256 direct jobs over six years. Founder and CEO of Global Wind Systems, Chris Long told the Detroit News that he hopes to almost double that number of jobs in just two years.

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom struck hard at The Big Three for killing their electric vehicle programs and lacking the vision to move beyond hybrids.

So how much does a foreclosed home in Detroit cost? Two weeks ago, you could buy a home for $1 in the city. Today the lowest price I could find was $40. The city’s morale has dipped so low that only 14 percent of voters turned out for the big mayoral election in February, and two-thirds of children drop out of high school. What could we do to boost moral in Detroit? We could buy up [...]

I was recently glancing through the Washington Post, when the headline, “Green Is In The Eye Of The Beholder,” caught my eye — mostly because I have been wondering a similar question question as of late: What, exactly, makes a vehicle “green?”

It seems there are as many answers as there are shades of green. But, ultimately, the question all automakers need to figure out the answer to — especially the Big Three in Detroit — is which variety of environmentally friendly vehicles do Americans really want?

At the 2009 Detroit Auto Show, Audi announced that their Clean Diesel A3 TDI would be available in US by early 2010.

The Audi A3 is by far one of Europe’s cleanest and most fuel-efficient cars, and Audi is hoping the car will kick some major Prius butt. Pitching the car as a hybrid-fighter, Audi is pairing it off against both the Prius and the Honda Insight.

At the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Volkswagen showed off its latest roadster — the BlueSport Concept. The BlueSport features a 177 hp diesel engine with rail injection and a downstream NO_x storage catalytic converter, all in a 6-speed DSG dual clutch transmission.

Last week at the Detroit auto show, new, battery-powered, green cars reigned supreme. General Motors announced finalized plans for its Chevrolet Volt, which will be on the market in both fully electric and plug-in hybrid forms by late 2010. LG Chem, a South Korean company, won the much anticipated contract to manufacture the Volt’s lithium-ion batteries, beating out several other contenders, including Massachusetts’s A123Systems and Germany’s Continental AG.

Well, actually I wasn’t there, at the Detroit Auto Show, but it stands to reason that someone from Ford uttered those words, near a rotating platform, without breaking into a laugh.  I’m willing to go on record, though, with the prediction that Ford’s new engine, the EcoBoost, will bear a new nameplate within two years. In a world fixated on what is sustainable, that name is simply not.

The name of Ford’s new V6 engine seems to imply that power is somehow boosted by some naturally occurring and environmentally sustainable green technology, like tree leaves, or a river.  Cars are a long way from being environmentally friendly, regardless of the technology that’s been developed and put into hybrid and electric cars.  Electrical outlets don’t grow own trees, and in fact, much of the electricity we use is powered by coal, not exactly a clean or sustainable technology.