Domestic Agenda Drives Biofuels
Topic: Alt Fuel

While ethanol and biodiesel may not be competitive with oil on price and energy efficiency today, the strong desire to produce fuel from domestic crops and grasses guarantees that scientists will someday extract the maximum value from each each ounce of agricultural waste.

Dupont (which knows a bit about chemistry) is pushing hard to cash in on the biofuel market by designing organisms to make the plant-to-sugar conversion process more efficient. Dupont teamed up with biofuel refinery company Broin to develop technology that according to the companies "will significantly increase the amount of ethanol per acre achievable by using both the corn grain and stover."

Using agricultural products for fuels essentially opens a trillion dollar door that has been limited to a handful of big oil and refinery companies, and players large and small are creating competition that will overcome the technical hurdles.

The other driver is the "oil independence" that was brought to the fore by the uncertainty and conflicts of the Middle East. Pennsylvania aspires to becoming free of oil imports within a decade. Governer Ed Rendell (watch for him in 2008) says the state has enough agricultural resources to produce 900 million gallons of biofuels, replacing all foreign oil imports.

An important benefit is the ability to produce fuel much closer to where it will be consumed. Skeptics who talk about fuel used in producing ethanol should realize that getting oil halfway across the globe via ship also requires quite a bit of fuel. Importing fuel from neighboring farms eliminates that waste.  

Reggae SUV Sure to Draw Looks
Now Playing: Bob Marley
Topic: Concept Cars
Suzuki has designed the optimal car for folks who like to spend their time interacting with law enforcement officials.

The Reggaeton Grand Vitara concept vehicle celebrates Reggaeton dance music, a crossover (just like the SUV, how clever of them!) of Reggae and Latin dance.

Inside the vehicle is a rear swing arm DJ recording table with double iPod mixer, in-dash touch screen video monitor with DVD player and
LED lights.

The outside of the vehicle screams "pull me over." From the custom paint job and wrapping to the under car glow lights, Suzuki has created a vehicle that is an eye-catcher, especially if you happen to be wearing a badge. I'm all for freedom of expression, but the reality is some exhibitions are much more likely to get a reaction from the men and women in blue.

I wonder what the stats are on different models of vehicles being pulled over for minor infractions or driving in areas of high crime. I'm guessing that Volvo station wagons see flashing lights in their rear view mirrors a lot less often than say a low-riding turbo-charged Mustang.

Side Airbags Worth the Price
Topic: Safety
Side airbags are quickly becoming the norm, and with good reason. Those that protect people's heads reduce driver deaths when struck on their near side by 37 percent, according to a study from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Side airbags that protect only the chest and abdomen were less effective, dropping the mortality rate in crashes by 26 percent.

Side airbags that protect the head are especially important when a vehicle is struck by a high-riding truck or SUV, according to the study. For SUV drivers fatality risk went down 52 percent with head-protecting side airbags and 30 percent with those that only protect the torso.

Most new vehicles (about 80 percent) already have standard or optional side airbags that include head protection. The IIHS only gives "good" ratings to vehicles with airbags that protect the head. Investing in side airbags is worth the few hundred dollar premium.

Found via the Detroit News.

Automakers Ask for Cheap Steel
Topic: New Vehicles
The companies that manufacture autos in the United States say they need less expensive foreign steel to control their costs and save American jobs. The group of six, which includes DaimlerChrysler, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Nissan and Toyota, wants the U.S. International Trade Commission to end the tariff on importing steel from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and Korea.

You know times are tough when the much larger auto industry challenges the domestic steel business (and its army of lobbyists). I'm generally for free trade (as long as foreign workers are not mistreated) , but I'm surprised that one powerful group would lobby to threaten the livelihood of another.

The auto industry is looking for any edge to fight off the impending wave of cheaper vehicles produced in Korea, Russia, China and perhaps India.

We are very spoiled here in buying new cars every few years "because we can" and discarding cars that are in fine shape. Can we pay for the foreign steel in slightly used Hummers, Taurus' and Caravans?

Plant Hybrids to Drive Biofuels
Topic: Alt Fuel
Critics of the biofuels industry who cite the extensive agricultural resources needed to produce a gallon of fuel as well as the inferior energy yield should remember that the technology is still in its infancy. The petrochemical industry had about a half-century head start, so it is not surprising that gasoline is more efficient now. 

Despite Oil Change Hybrids Sell
Topic: New Vehicles
Event though gas prices have fallen well below $3 in most of the country the top-selling hybrid models continue to move out of dealerships. Truck sales are still slipping, but not as badly as in the previous months. Perhaps consumers who are opting for fuel efficiency won't ever go back to larger vehicles.

A quick scan of the numbers from September:

Toyota boosted passenger car sales in September by 12.4 percent over last year, including a 23.1 percent jump in Prius' sales. Honda's best selling Civic Hybrid shot up 25.9  percent, while Honda car and light trucks rose 7.3 percent.

Ford increased overall sales by 5 percent including a 26 percent gain in cars, while GM and DaimlerChrysler both saw drops in car sales.

So winning back customers to vehicles that don't get great MPG may be difficult even if oil doesn't jump back to $70 a barrel. By 2009 will see many more fuel-efficient vehicles on lots including several diesel models, but guessing on what the price of oil will be then is a crap shoot.

Waste to Hydrogen: Trash Talkin
Now Playing: Devo
Topic: Hydrogen
Startech Environmental Corporation claims that it can take nearly any kind of waste and turn it into a gas rich in hydrogen that can in turn be converted to "ethanol, synthetic diesel fuel and other higher alcohol fuels."

Startech claims its plasma converter system "safely and economically destroys wastes, no matter how hazardous or lethal, and turns them into useful and valuable products." Now, that's a pretty grandiose claim, and I'm not convinced that vaporizing medical waste is completely safe. The Department of Energy has given Startech some grant money to study hydrogen from coal, but I'm skeptical of technologies that aren't also being investigated by other researchers.

Startech, which is based in Connecticut, has waste-to-gas production plants in China, Japan, Australia Panama, and a small plant in Bristol, Connecticut. The company also claims to be able to make ethanol from old tires. In a press release issued today, the company dedicate seven paragraphs detailing how Ford is building a truck with a hydrogen internal combustion engine, even though they have nothing to do with Ford or hydrogen engines.

I spoke with Startech president Joe Long, about his technology.

Read More...

Bluetooth to Drive Auto Systems
Topic: Telematics
Your car and GPS system could soon be speaking the same language, enabling it to tell you when its sick or when you should make a turn. Automotive companies Johnson Controls and  Tom Tom are integrating satellite-based navigation system with vehicle communication networks.

Johnson Controls created a Bluetooth gateway so that wireless devices can communicate directly with the vehicle network. According to the Small Business Times, entertainment devices will be able to send their audio wirelessly to the car speakers.

So listening to your messages or making calls on your mobile phone won't require cables or complicated software integration. Wireless networks will be coming to vehicles in a big way within the next few years, including being able to download movies or music to your car from your home network.

Diesel Wagons to Pressure SUVs
Topic: Diesel
I was talking with my wife this morning about someday buying a larger vehicle, and was thinking about a Subaru or Volkswagen wagon, but I want a fuel-efficient diesel or hybrid. Sadly for me neither company offers one of these options today in a new vehicle.

But low and behold, Subaru announced (per Jalopnik) on Saturday that it was putting the finishing touches on a new horizontally-opposed diesel engine, which hopefully will find its way into a future Outback or Legacy. It will take a few years for the turbo diesel to make it into a production vehicle, but Subaru's impressive track record on safety make a diesel wagon a competitive alternative to a hybrid SUV.

Volkswagen is also planning on reintroducing the Jetta diesel wagon in 2008, which should encourage other automakers to consider getting back into the station wagon game. Sure, you can't ride high and mighty like an SUV, but the rollover worries are much less, and you won't have to fill up the tank twice a week.

Now that I'm a parent, I'm hoping that the station wagon can make a comeback and convince more people to consider buying something besides an SUV.

Time to Buy Brazilian Biofuel
Now Playing: The Mosquitos
Topic: Alt Fuel

The Brazilian government is greatly expanding biodiesel production in the country, and we should get in on the action. Through their success with ethanol and friendship with Venezuela, Brazil doesn't have to worry about buying oil from Middle East nations, and now they are in the process of ramping up biodiesel production, according to the Detroit News.

The economics, weather, and abundance of land are more favorable in Brazil than in the U.S. for growing sugar cane, palm, castor and soybeans, but we could still expand our biofuel usage.

However, we could greatly expand our biofuel production if the federal and state governments guaranteed our domestic farmers on a volume and price of corn, sugar cane and soybeans. (I know corn isn't the long-term answer, but in the short term it's better than fluctuating oil prices). Even if we powered just our military vehicles with biofuels we could solidify the market. We could easily finance paying higher prices by eliminating the billions of dollars in tax breaks given to Big Oil for exploration and increases taxes on their sky-high profits.

But regardless of it that happens it is time to sign on the dotted line with Brazil to buy a few hundred million barrels of biofuel per year. Where should we export our dollars to -- unstable dictatorships or a democratic country with lots of poor farmers ready to work? We would help to move the country further into the first world, and they aren't about to attack anyone. One sticking point: Brazil isn't too keen on the leadership of this country, so it might take some convincing.