Recently, I attended a TechKnow: Alternative Fuel Cars forum on the University of Michigan campus where automotive industry experts, including engineering managers from automotive OEMs (Toyota, GM, and Ford) briefed us on the status of hybrid and alternative fueled vehicles along with forecasts of fuel sources. For more on the forum, go to: www.techknowforums.org
The United States is a country unlike others in the world where government and industry work together to develop products that can be sold globally. For example, in Japan automotive manufacturers, suppliers and government researchers have been actively co-funding the research and development of commercial hybrid vehicles for over 25 years. Whereas, the US government has been more interested in funding the global policing of Middle Eastern religious wars than working with the automotive industry to make US products more globally competitive. Today, the US Congress debates raising the fuel economy standards---as their current answer to forcing US automotive manufacturers to be more fuel efficient and globally competitive. "There are all kinds of dire warnings. The fact of the matter is that Detroit has done nothing about mileage efficiency for the past 20 years and the time has come," said Senator Dianne Feinstein.
One significant question raised for discussion at the TechKnow Forum was how knowledgeable and motivated automotive consumers would be as these new eco-vehicles are mass produced and available for worldwide purchase? Would mainstream automotive buyers continue to buy large energy consuming vehicles rather than more fuel-efficient and kinder-to-the-environment eco-vehicles? If the price of gasoline slides back down to below $2.50 per gallon, will large gas-guzzling SUVs again become hot sellers while eco-vehicles sit on the sales lot?
The hope is that people across the globe will recognize that global warming is a life and death issue for future generations and that we must take necessary steps to change our automotive purchasing and usage behaviors to conserve the Earth's natural resources. To make this hope a reality will require a huge change in the way 'we see our world.'
When we become attuned to the many voices of the natural world, this communion instills a transformative reverence for life.
Sources: The Associated Press and SHIFT: At the Frontiers of Consciousness, June, 2007