What do you think about the energy bill passed today?

Question

The bill states that in the future cars in the US must have at least 35 miles to the gallon. It is a wonderful idea, it will encourage car companies to develope more fuel effiecient cars.

Answer 1

I think a better solution would be to increase taxation on fuel and put that "surplus" into developing alternative methods of transportation, better mass transit systems, and increasing fuel economy.  Also, if gas prices were much higher, people would naturally be flocking to more economical cars and other transport solutions creating more demand for those, rather than forcing more fuel economic cars on people who may be losing interest as gas prices fall back down away from $4 and towards $2...

Answer 2

If you want smaller, lighter cars it's good.  If you want to keep your SUV or truck, or even a sedan with more than a 4 cylinder, be prepared to pay more.

Our car manufacturers are well behind foreign manufacturers but not even the foreign guys are getting 35mpg for a decently sized sedan unless they play with the numbers.

Not to mention a test coming next year that will reduce the estimated fuel mileage.

The internal combustion engine just can't get much more efficient than it is.  And ethanol only makes it worse, it doesn't have as much energy per gallon as gasoline.

So to sum it up, I think it's a bill to try to get us all to buy Corollas and Civics, or the like.

Answer 3

Like all government initiatives it will be a long  term disaster, creating more and more serious problems than it ever solves.

Answer 4

democratic politics - laws & bills - is the only mechanism of ensuring that the things we "own" in common are shared out equitbly. eg to stop people getting rich by dumping their rubbish for free on the rest of the world.

petrol consumption, and associated emmissions, comes into this category.

the bill probably won't have much effect as the most polluting SUVs are classed as trucks, eligable for tax breaks, and not cars. Unfortunatly laws only work by public concensus, and big oil & car makers  work hard/spend a lot of money to ensure that consensus is in their favour

Car companies have developed fuel efficient cars; they just don't want to sell them.

see GM EV1 http://ev1-club.power.net/,

or Toyota RAV4ev http://www.toyota.com/html/shop/vehicles...

Answer 5

Umm, sorry. It's not as great as you think it is.

Cars have reached their efficiency limit. The only way to make them better is to add expensive technologies onto the car... such as hybrid systems, turbo charging, direct injection, composite materials,and  low roll resistance tires.

Those things all cost a lot of money. If this bill passes expect the price of cars to SIGNIFICANTLY increase.

Answer 6

It is stupid having the politician design a car. I did work for NASA and the coming joke is that a elephant was a mouse built and design by NASA .

Answer 7

It will force car comanies to build lighter cars causing more traffic deaths every year, and it will not remove any vehicles from the the road. The total number of vehicles on the road will increase every year, resulting in more energy use instead of less.

Answer 8

You don't really think the oil company's care do you ? The less we use the more there going to charge anyway. Its not how many miles do you get per gallon anymore its how many miles do you get per dollar . Wake up America and smell the coffee

Answer 9

Prediction:  The auto companies will complain it can't be done.  They'll say the cars will cost a fortune and SUVs will disappear.

And then they'll do it, and fairly easily.  It's an old old story, and one that has happened repeatedly with regard to gas mileage and pollution controls.

It's a good start.

Answer 10

It's a step in the right direction.  The car companies have already complained that it's technologically not feasible, but that's ridiculous.  Even China already has mileage requirements of 35 mpg, and we're not going to have that requirement until 2020.  By then there will be lots of hybrids and electric cars available.  It will be no problem whatsoever from a technological standpoint.

I think it's stupid that the Republicans managed to remove the tax on oil companies, and the 4% annual increase on the mileage requirements after 2020, but this is a step in the right direction.

Answer 11

I like it. A lot.

Answer 12

Why not just let the market work?  If poeple want 35 mpg cars they can demand them ant the manufacturerers will produce them.

The silly part of the bill is the ethanol requirements.  Ethanol is the most evironmentally destructive alternative there is.

Answer 13

That's not going to go over too well...

The RV companies are going to find a loophole for that. I don't foresee a 35mpg vehicle pulling a full size trailer.

Answer 14

I think that it is a progressive good step in the right direction to have the automakers make cars more fuel efficient.  We have the science.  We just need the initative and the American spirit to do it.  If this is done right, we could revitalize the auto industry because the world can purchase cars that are flashy and are good to the environment.

Answer 15

35 MPG is corporate AVERAGE fuel economy, so they can make cars that get <35MPG if they also make cars that get >35.

They finally put cars and light trucks/SUVs in the same category.  Before, cars were regulated more harshly than trucks, so the automakers dodged the law by making trucks pretty and selling them as SUVs.

SUVs are terrible passenger cars, they get terrible economy, weigh too much, have obsolete truck suspensions with leaf springs and "live" (solid) axles, handle badly and roll over easily and take too much space. They're trucks.  They shouldn't be cars.

Now that they're equal, we'll see the return of the large car.   It'll be much better.

Cost: This will force them into hybrid/electric drive.  10 years ago, GM was making the EV1.  Its real manufacturing cost was about the same as a Corvette. It had a more exotic/expensive chassis than a 'Vette.  It had a 150hp AC motor (dirt cheap) and very expensive custom silicon electronics.  And still cost no more than a 'Vette.  Now, the exotic chassis was unnecessary, byebye.  The electronics, you know what happens to the price of electronics when it's mass produced!  Down, down, down!

So I'm not too worried.  Cars will become very electronic creatures, but that's good news for cost.  Battery prices are still scary, but future cars will be plug-in hybrids, they'll have much smaller batteries than the EV1 because they'll have a gas/diesel/turbine engine for those rare longer trips.

As far as towing, Not A Problem.  General Motors locomotives have been electric drive for 60 years.

I expect to see a Sierra 2500 truck that gets 30 MPG, goes its first 20 miles on plug-in electric at 50 cents a "gallon", and is powered by a jet engine.   And can use biodiesel.  And can trailer the same as today, at half again the MPG.

Naturally this truck will have 2500+ watts of 110VAC electric available for running your jobsite, campsite, RV etc.  Just as the Silverado hybrids already do.

I also expect to see a Crown Vic station wagon that seats 8 and goes the first 30 miles on plug-in power, and 40 mpg after that.

The ethanol is government pork.