 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
Cars, Economics and Politics. In the early 1980's I owned several Volkswagen diesel-powered cars. The model was called the Rabbit. The Rabbit Diesel was first produced in 1976 only 3 years after the Organization of Oil Exporting Countries (OPEC) graphically demonstrated the value of oil to our economy, and the power our oil suppliers can wield. Those Rabbits got between 50 and 60 mpg. In 2007 I bought a "state of the art" Toyota Prius Hybrid II that also got between 40 and 50 mpg. Compare automotive advancement in efficiency (and price) to the PC. In the mid-1980's I bought an IBM XT with a 8088 8-bit processor at Computerland for $8,000. It had the power of today's $19 Walmart watch. Compare that with the 64-bit computers available today... Why has fuel economy not progressed at the same rate? Why is our economy still based on oil over 30 years after OPEC demonstrated the control outside influences could have on our economy? For more, read on below and listen with the associated streaming audio links. Thank you. -Ray Carr
Click on the photo to the left and link to World Affairs Council portal and block and paste Jeff Rubin into the search box at the upper left for an audio lecture from 6/09/09 by: Jeff Rubin. The former Chief Economist, CIBC (Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce) World Markets, forecasts that despite the current recessionary dip, oil prices will once again soar once the economy recovers. With the disappearance of the world’s oil reserves, the amount of food and other goods we get from abroad will be curtailed and long distance travel will be rare. Globalization as we know it will reverse. Alongside these predictions, Rubin prescribes priorities for the Obama administration and other leaders: from imposing carbon tariffs and investing in mass transit to forging green alliances between labor and management that will be good for both business and the climate. Rubin is a Canadian economist and energy expert, and among the first to predict the dramatic oil price increases back in 2000. Click on The Diane Rehm Show header above to link to her show on electric cars. Scroll down to the 11:00 portion of the show. Use your Real Audio or Windows Media Player to listen to the show. The show features the following guests: Les Goldman representative of A123, a battery company that makes a supplemental battery that fits into the spare tire well of a Toyota Prius Hybrid increasing its mileage to 120 mpg. Chelsea Sexton, part of the General Motors (GM) team who in the late 1990's worked on the EV1, an electric car that got 100-150 miles on a charge. GM reclaimed all of the EV1 vehicles and destroyed them. The EV1 was highlighted in the movie "Who Killed the Electric Car". John O'Dell senior editor of Edmunds.com. Elon Musk founder and chair of Tesla Motors, maker of the Tesla high performance $109,000 electric car, which speeds from 0-60 mph in 3.9 seconds.
Caption: The 8' long by 4' wide MyCar has a light plastic body. It is a micro in the same class as the Smart car . Designed by Italian Italdesign-Giugiaro and built by Hong Kong based Innovech. "Explosion engine" (gasoline/diesel) and electric models will be manufactured in China. The most powerful models will go about 50 mph and will cost about $7,000. It is expected to get between 60 and 90 mpg. Micro cars are designed to be short-range city street vehicles.
Click on the photo above and link to NPR 6 minute 14 second streaming audio story: America's Car Culture Clashes with Climate Change by Laura Sydell. For the last century, Americans have had a love affair with their cars. Americans drive bigger cars than any other country. And, even if they're currently trendy, fuel-efficient cars still don't sell as well in the United States as elsewhere. Can America change?
Click on the photo to the left and link to World Affairs Council portal and block and paste Lovins into the search box at the upper left for a 1 hour streaming audio lecture by: Amory Lovins, described by Newsweek magazine as “one of the Western world’s most influential energy thinkers”, Amory Lovins is cofounder and CEO of the Rocky Mountain Institute. A consultant and experimental physicist educated at Harvard and Oxford, he has advised the energy and other industries for over 30 years, as well as the U.S. Departments of Energy and Defense. The title of his speech to the World Affairs Council is Amory Lovins has outlined a strategy for American business and military leaders to shift the United States functionally and profitably away from oil by 2050. Lovins argues that by 2015, the United States can save more oil than it receives from the Persian Gulf; by 2025, use less oil than in the 1970’s, by 2040, import no oil; and by 2050, use no oil at all. He believes American business can lead the nation and the world into the post-petroleum-era, a vibrant economy and lasting security.
Click on the photo to the left and link to World Affairs Council portal and block and paste Vaitheeswaran into the search box at the upper left for a 1 hour 9 minute 48 second streaming audio lecture by: Vijay Vaitheeswaran, award-winning Global Environment and Energy correspondent, The Economist in conversation with Daniel Kammen, Director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory and Professor in the Energy and Resources Group, UC Berkeley. The Economist correspondent Vijay Vaitheeswaran and ZOOM co-author Iain Carson write: "Oil is the problem. Cars are the solution." Vaitheeswaran joins the Council in conversation with Daniel Kammen to discuss issues raised in his new book: Zoom: The Global Race to Fuel the Car of the Future. With an eye on both global warming and world energy supplies, he will look at how pioneers in Japan, India, China, and the USA tackle the challenge of creating automobiles that will run on cleaner energy sources. Tracing the history of the linked industries of oil and automobiles, the "industry of industries," and how the two have shaped domestic capitalism and the international landscape, he will discuss how Toyota topped American competitors to become the world's largest automobile manufacturer and, more importantly, a leader in hybrid cars using electric power. Will the combustion engine go the way of the steam engine? Will the big oil companies go the way of the dinosaur? Will the minds that made (and the money made from) the Silicon Valley giants revolutionize the auto industry?
|
