Gas 2.0

British Manufacturer of electric vehicles (EVs), Modec, has announced a joint venture with U.S. based Navistar International Corporation, a $15 billion per year truck manufacturer. The announcement comes at an ideal time as earlier this month, President Barack Obama announced the largest grant ever to develop and bring to market electric vehicles. Obama made the announcement at the Navistar premises in Elkhart County, Indiana. As part of this funding, Navistar was awarded a grant of $39 million, which will be used to accelerate EV production.

“The all-electric delivery vehicle is a concrete example of what business and government can do when we work together,” said Daniel C. Ustian, Navistar Chairman, President and CEO. “The future is now with this electric vehicle. In fact, we already have interested customers, including some of the most respected names in the industry.” Read the rest of this entry »

Daimler-Mercedes-Benz-Smart electric cars will begin a new round of testing of the electric Smart ForTwo using batteries from its new investment partner Tesla.

In 2007, Daimler began a 4 year trial to get 40,000 miles-worth of real world experience to determine the technology’s long-term sustainability.

But that was before Daimler decided to source its batteries from Tesla, and more recently Daimler and Tesla have formed a closer partnership as Daimler took a 10% equity stake in Tesla.

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President Obama announces $2.4 billion in grants to speed the manufacturing and deployment of the next generation of batteries and electric vehicles

As part of the $787 billion stimulus package approved in February, Congress agreed to include $2 billion in research and development grants for advanced battery technologies, and today, speaking in Elkhart, Indiana, the President announced that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will fund 48 new advanced battery and electric drive components manufacturing and electric drive vehicle deployment projects in over 20 states.

The President said the announcement marks the single largest investment in advanced battery technology for hybrid and electric-drive vehicles ever made. Read the rest of this entry »

Washington’s hugely popular cash for clunkers program has boosted all auto sales 16 percent from June to July as desperate and grateful Americans unloaded the gas guzzling behemoths they had been lured into buying with huge SUV tax credits by the Bush administration. (Small business owners like doctors, lawyers, and real estate agents had been able to use fossil friendly incentives to deduct more than $100,000 of the cost of an SUV from their taxes.) Now that they have the chance, Americans are unloading those gas guzzlers. Read the rest of this entry »

You can’t turn on the TV and avoid the ads for the dealers promoting the Cash for Clunkers program. Experts predicted that the money would last at least two to three weeks, but alas, it is not so. The LA Times is reporting that in less than one week, the $1 billion dollars for the program is already gone and the government is scrambling to find more money to keep the program going. Worst case, I suppose they can just write “IOUs” like the state of California is doing and according to Governor Schwarzenegger, may be bailing out the federal government some day.

“We are working tonight to asses the situation facing what is obviously an incredibly popular program,” the White House told the LA Times. “Auto dealers and consumers should have confidence that all valid CARS transactions that have taken place to date will be honored.”

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Smith Electric Vehicles made its much heralded first U.S. Smith Newton electric vehicle deliveries to lucky Coca Cola and PG&E today.

But it delivered them on The Mall in hopes of snagging some attention from lawmakers on the Hill. In this debut it was following the example of Plug-In America that got some great EV legislation passed by publicizing to the Senate just what electric vehicles can do for America. Read the rest of this entry »

US Department of Energy secretary Steven Chu and US Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack have announced that the two agencies will be providing $6.3 million dollars for 7 projects at research institutions throughout the US to improve the use of plant feedstocks in biofuel production.

Although biofuels have fallen out of favor in the public eye recently, the federal government — led by Secretary Chu — is still forging ahead with providing money to research next generation biofuels.

“Part of the solution to the energy problem will be home-grown energy crops,” said secretary Chu in a statement. “These projects will help us unlock the true potential of advanced biofuels, decrease our dependence on foreign oil, and create new jobs and a thriving biofuels industry in America.”

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Editor’s Note: This is Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates’ first post for Gas 2.0. Mayor Bates is the latest to join The Great Electric Vehicle Race.

Last month, our city council adopted Berkeley’s bold Climate Action Plan.  This plan calls for systemic action, by all Berkeley residents and agencies to reduce our city’s greenhouse gas (GHG) consumption by 80% below 2000 levels by the year 2050, and the investment in electric vehicle infrastructure will be a key method for achieving these larger goals.

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Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) have sponsored the NAT GAS Act. This bill is aimed at giving natural gas the push it needs to become part of the cure for America’s oil addiction. Senator Reid (D-Nevada) is also an original co-sponsor.

“Each day, our nation consumes about 21 million barrels of oil- more than 25 percent of the world’s oil supply,” Reid said. And most of that oil comes from foreign soil. “With only 3 percent of the world’s oil reserves, we cannot produce our way to a safe and secure energy future,” Reid continued.

The new legislation would promote the use of natural gas over traditional oil by using tax credits. This legislation would, in effect, be an extension of the CLEAR Act - encouraging the growth of natural-gas infrastructures to go along with the current boom in hybrid-electric vehicles.

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Just this morning, the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water approved $190 million for the hydrogen and fuel cell program office which is part of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). This action, in effect, restores the program to current year funding levels. Earlier this year, the administration demonstrated its lack of support for the future of hydrogen by pulling programs for hydrogen and fuel cell development. In addition, another $54 million was approved for the SECA program. The full appropriations committee meets tomorrow. This funding is for 2010.

“Congress recognized and embraced the role hydrogen fuels cells and their fuels play in the portfolio of energy technologies for the 21st century,” said Bob Rose, Executive Director for the U.S. Fuel Cell Council. “We hope that the Secretary of Energy (Steven Chu) and his staff embrace this as a spirit of goodwill.”

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Late Friday, the House passed the first legislation solely dedicated to reversing global warming. Now the fate of the Climate Change Bill is in the hands of the Senate, and political pundits are predicting the bill won’t pass. This exact bill might not pass but sooner than later one will and until then they will have several things in common. A climate bill will change how we produce and use electricity. It will change how you travel from point A to point B. It will change how every business operates and how every American lives. Our lives will never be the same. Dramatic? Yes. True. Yes.

The passage of this bill will change your life in three ways:

1. It would affect what type of car you can drive - smaller.
2. It would affect how much you pay for energy - more.
3. It would affect what type of job you have - green job.

Energy affects every facet of our lives. When energy prices go up, food prices go up, clothing prices go up..the price for everything we buy gets more expensive. Why? Because our society is intricately intertwined with energy, and energy is intertwined with our economy.

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Steven Chu this morning finally puts the nail in the coffin of the congressional No We Can’t contingent’s stance.  For the last 8 years they’ve been saying that “government can’t pick winners and losers”, by which they simply meant keep all the current lavish oil subsidies in place and don’t make any changes in energy policy that might develop a competitor. Read the rest of this entry »

The Senate passed the Cash for Clunkers Program today, which gives consumers with cars that get less than 18 miles per gallon the ability to turn them in for a $3,500 or $4,500 cash voucher. The bill was nearly defeated by Republicans, but Democratic support saved the day in part due to Obama’s lobbying of the program. The President still needs to sign the bill into law.

Although many people believe that the program is designed to reduce global warming emissions through the eradication of gas guzzling cars, its true purpose is to help out struggling automakers and car dealers with new car sales. A person who receives a credit as part of the program cannot buy a used car with the monies. Car sales in 2009 are predicted to be nearly half of what they were in 2008.

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Okay people. I’ve had enough of these willy-nilly government programs and incentives in the transportation market without being given an actual national plan of action. This habit our country has of “let’s throw out everything and see what sticks” is not in any way in our best interest. All of these programs cost us taxpayers money — something that is scarce for many of us today.

I’m tired of waiting around for our legislators to create a long-term sustainable transportation platform so I went ahead and did it myself. Someone had to do it. Why not me?

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Last week, the Hybrid Truck Users Forum (HTUF) of CALSTART hosted a “Hybrid on the Hill” day where they showcased new truck technologies. Mack Trucks, Inc. participated in the event and gave federal legislators and policymakers a first-hand look at its parallel diesel-electric hybrid technology, known as the MACK® TerraPro™ Cabover, for heavy-duty trucks. Mack is initially introducing these technology in refuse trucks, aka garbage trucks, where hybrid technology seems to have the greatest impact due to the stop-and-go nature of the trash pick-up system.
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