Given GM’s recent history and recent revelations about how greens and corporations rent-seek together, this is one of the most disturbing car ads ever made.
“It’s not the car America wanted to build. It’s the car America had to build.” For Gaia and Mother Earth, they mean, but for political reasons, is the unintended message. Government Motors took a huge taxpayer funded bailout, its new de facto CEO, President Obama, wants to social engineer our way toward what he thinks is “green” energy, so Chevy rolled out the Volts-wagen for the president to pitch and sell.
And now the CEO who brought you ObamaCare’s individual mandate may have found a way to force you to buy his favorite car.
The CAFE rule is the fleet-wide average fuel economy rating manufacturers are required by Washington to achieve. The new rule — issued in response to a 2010 Obama directive, not to specific legislation passed by Congress — would require automakers to achieve a 40.9 mpg CAFE average by 2021 and 54.5 mpg by 2025. In case you’re wondering whatever happened to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, it has been supplanted in the CAFE process by the EPA. The proposed regulation was designed, according to the EPA, “to preserve consumer choice — that is, the proposed standards should not affect consumers’ opportunity to purchase the size of vehicle with the performance, utility and safety features that meets their needs.” But the reality is that consumer choice will be the first victim.
Getting from the current 35 mpg CAFE standard to 54.5 can be achieved by such expedients as making air conditioning systems work more efficiently. We have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell to anybody who thinks that’s even remotely realistic. There is one primary method of increasing fuel economy — weight reduction. That in turn means automakers will have to use much more exotic materials, including especially the petroleum-processing byproduct known as “plastic.” But using more plastic will make it much more difficult to satisfy current federal safety standards. The bottom-line will be much more expensive vehicles and dramatically fewer kinds of vehicles.
What kinds of vehicles? Naturally, the kind that pitchman in chief Chairman O wants you to buy. Even though, in terms of actual battery performance, the Volt isn’t an improvement over electric cars available in…the late 19th century.
Environmentalism gone beZerk.
Eventually, the voters will realise that The Climate will do what it will do and humans cannot affect it one way or the other. That all the sacrifice at the alter of environmentalism was wasted. That a very small group of humans profited enormously from that wasted sacrifice. Then there will be ‘ell to pay, Harry!
You can fool some of the people all the time and all the people some of the time but you cannot fool all the people all the time.
The AGW crowd is busted and within a decade will be brought to justice. Not by Mittens, however. Nor by the Obomination. A certain type of politician thrives on voters to stoopid to ask ‘Whot’s behind de curtain, Mac?’
Nor by Newt, who sat on the couch with Nancy Pelosi to talk about stopping AGW and promoted cap-and-tax schemes.
NO cars get 50mpg, the mileage stats on the hybrids are fantasies.
So if there are still ANY cars getting “only” 30mpg, how the HECK is the *average* ever going to get anywhere near 50?
“NO cars get 50mpg, the mileage stats on the hybrids are fantasies.”
That isn’t true. I do average very close to 50 MPG with my hybrid. Mileage is a bit worse in cold weather (about 48-49 MPG) but I’ve averaged 50+ MPG over hundreds of miles of city driving when it isn’t so cold out. I’ve also driven it hundreds of miles at interstate speeds (70+ MPH) and averaged over 50 MPG without doing any of that hyper-miling foolishness. It depends on the hybrid and the heaviness of your foot.
Larry, figuring you’re in a Prius, have you ever averaged 50mpg on a tank of gas basis? I’m curious. I don’t drive one, and have asked this of a dozen hybrid drivers, and none has ever tried to measure.
Starting with a full tank and a charged battery, ending with an empty tank and an empty battery, would be the “best case”, but also cheating a bit. You have to end with a charged battery as well, for it to be a real measure.
Of course the car reports a million miles per gallon, while you’re stopped at a light or on battery power in the parking lot – and actually, this is good stuff, my Honda Accord burns a LOT of gas in city driving, but that improves city driving mileage to closer to highway, not beyond it.
If a Prius can get an honest 50mpg on optimal highway driving, that is good, and it might come close because the gas engine is an optimal small size because it can use the electric drive for boost.
But – as the article suggests – a better fleet approach to real mileage would be to reduce gross weight, my Accord is at least 500 pounds heavier than it “should” be, it’s 1,000 pounds heavier than the Accords from twenty years ago, and it would get another 5mpg easily if that weight were removed. Plus it would get another 1mpg if it simply shifted itself to neutral at red lights, and 2mpg if it turned off at red lights like the Prius does.
My guess is that honestly measured the Prius is getting around 40mpg, and I’d be impressed at even that. But if it really, truly does better, I’d like to hear about it.
According to posts I have read at PriusChat.com, the gas mileage reported by the Prius is about 6% high. So if it’s reporting 50 mpg, you’re actually getting closer to 47 mpg.
Larry, figuring you’re in a Prius, have you ever averaged 50mpg on a tank of gas basis?
Yes. My personal in-town record for a tank of gas was 54 MPG (reported by the car’s computer). Most of the time in warm weather, I get 50-53 MPG in town. Highway mileage varies considerably based on many factors. For example, I’ve found the car’s mileage drops considerably in a strong headwind, sometimes to less than 40 MPG.
The car has a couple trip odometers. I reset one of them with each fillup and let the other one go. It automatically resets to zero at 9999 miles. I don’t reset that one so I can see what the car averages over long distances. Currently, it’s reading about 4000 miles and 49.5 MPG.
As a geek (and in no way am I a “green”), I appreciate the energy management system in the Prius. It does a remarkable job of balancing energy draw from the batteries and the gas engine. For example, there’s a stretch of road about 3 miles long on my way to work that has a very slight downhill grade (so slight it isn’t visually noticeable). I can maintain the 55 MPH speed limit without the gas engine running at all. The Prius batteries are recharged while coasting or slightly braking and the gas engine shuts down. In cold weather, the gas engine runs more to provide passenger heat so the mileage drops a bit. Lately, we’ve had some pretty cold weather and I’m averaging 48 MPG.
The current model Prius uses battery power for many of the auxillary systems such as the air conditioning, power steering, and the water pump for the heater core. To this geek, it’s pretty cool.
So now that we could have a “historical” duel of heads of state getting involved in cars for the masses….
For my Democratic friends, here’s the thing about Volkswagen. Yeah, maybe Hitler had a connection in the 30s, and yep, they’re Germans, so any cheap Nazi shot you ever want to take will work to at least some level, as long as your target is German to some extent…
…but on the other hand, they have a company that is profitable, they make cars that are reliable and that people actually want–all of which is a little more than the Democratic friend that is GM has been able to do for quite some time. So as far as I’m concerned liberals can blow it out their ear.
“Even though, in terms of actual battery performance, the Volt isn’t an improvement over electric cars available in…the late 19th century.”
While I was no fan of the GM bailout, I don’t know where you are getting your facts from. Today’s lithium-ion batteries, used in the Chevy Volt and Nissan LEAF, are far lighter and more energy dense than traditional lead acid batteries. They also have considerably longer lifetimes if managed well, and in the Volt, can take the car up to 100 mph on battery power alone.
The fact is that development began on today’s electric vehicles while Bush was president, and it was President Bush who initially signed into law the federal tax credit for EV purchases. He recognized the importance to our national and economic security of diversifying our energy sources. It is in the interest of our country to end the virtual monopoly of oil in transportation. I personally lean conservative, am a registered Republican, love cool technology, and am having a blast owning a Nissan LEAF EV.
I think the CAFE standards are the wrong way to reduce oil dependency, as they require more government involvement than necessary. Better would be to eliminate all oil subsidies, gradually increase fuel/road taxes, and simply let the market gravitate toward more efficient transportation. As increases in fuel efficiency are already reducing the amount of fuel/road taxes collected, this would enable the nation to keep infrastructure funding at reasonable levels. Also, the EV tax credits are already set to expire on their own within a few years. Eventually the government will have to come up with a way to collect road taxes on electric vehicle use, perhaps a simple flat fee or by taking odometer readings.
“Even though, in terms of actual battery performance, the Volt isn’t an improvement over electric cars available in…the late 19th century.”
Yeah, I’m not quite sure where they get that either, probably from some Model-T class electric car that could go the same 35 miles on its batteries. But it would only go that far at about 30mph, with no air conditioning and probably no lights, and certainly no GPS!
And would take longer to recharge, and would burn out the batteries in six months.
Nixon’s greatest crime was not Watergate. It was creating the EPA.
Two cases will exist if this CAFE increase stands:
1) It includes light trucks. The auto industry goes bankrupt in one year, while we all drive older cars. And no one can haul anything around without a semi.
2) It doesn’t include light trucks, and they are the only rolling stock selling worth a damn. Remember when the safety stuff started, and exempted light trucks? CAFE also? That’s when many teenage boys (who didn’t get a car handed to them by mummy and daddy) turned to trucks – they were cheaper.
Government cannot control a market – not any market. I have more examples of this than you (whoever you are) have counterexamples.
We have a 2006 diesel Chevy Silverado that gets about 20 mpg on the highway. We bought it in 2007, long before the bail-outs. First, this will be the last government-motors car we’ll ever own. Second, we plan to drive it til the wheels fall off, which will probably be a loooooong time. Maybe we’ll go into business hauling stuff for the green-weenies who all drive Priuses. Oh wait, the government will be taxing us into submission if we have an independent idea…After all, according to Janet Reno, we’re just a couple of extremists anyway.
whoops, meant Janet Neapolitano. A little senior moment there…
urg, a senior moment…meant Janet Neapolitano!