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Blog
Carbon, cars, and practicality
February 11, 2008
While at the ARC event last week, I was on the lookout for some folks from a large oil company, for whom I had some article-related questions. I spotted some badges I was hunting for at a reception where they were talking to the chief strategic officer from a well-known process automation company. I sideled over to latch on to my subjects without being too much of an interruption to the existing conversation.
Gradually I joined the group by osmosis and picked up on the conversational line. The strategic officer was making disparaging remarks about hybrid cars and the general impracticality of the technology. When I identified myself as a hybrid owner, he summarized his remarks by saying that hybrid cars are far too expensive and complicated. While high mileage is certainly a worthwhile goal, it can be attained with far simpler approaches, such as turbo Diesel engines common in Europe. It was a shame, in his opinion, that those cars have never caught on in the U.S.
That conversation was on my mind over the weekend when I was home reading the paper on Saturday. The big Chicago Auto Show has been going on, and it always gets lots of press coverage. (I went once, back in 1993 or so.) The front page of the Chicago Tribune business section had a story headlined, "Star attractions: Shiny new SUVs." The story says that people are still interested in SUVs but want them with better gas mileage. Better in that context is something in the realm of 19 mpg, roughly half the mileage of my Prius.
The article had one very interesting quote:
"We aren't stupid," Mark LaNeve, GM's sales and marketing chief, said bluntly. "We know things have changed dramatically and that consumers want their vehicles to be more fuel efficient. That means, over time, the mix of vehicles we sell will shift."
I suppose it has shifted to some extent, but one could question how quickly or how far. "Stupid is as stupid does," to quote Forrest Gump's momma. GM still makes a whole lot of gas hog SUVs, and people still buy them.
Posted by Peter Welander on February 11, 2008 | Comments (0)