Today, President Barack Obama unveiled a plan for making America more green by increasing the fuel efficiency standards for American cars. His plan calls for the auto industry to build vehicles that average 35.5 miles per gallon by 2016. I don't know about you, but I am thinking that this is a plan for the weak hearted! Let me explain why...
I own a Toyota Corolla which averages around 30 mpg. With Barack Obama's plan, every year, Toyota has to strive for improving the standards by less than a mpg to reach the goal by 2016! Even a novice engineer or a non-engineer can figure out how to do this. All you will have to do is to reduce the weight of the car a little bit by either a slight redesign or remove of some non-essential features. Today, Honda and Toyota have cars that can already give upwards of 40 mpg. The latest Prius is said to give 50 mpg. One can only wonder if the Obama administration has any clue about where to focus to improve our lives.
On a slightly different note, the railroad industry has been advertising that they can move a ton of freight 436 miles on a gallon of fuel. The first time I heard this I was astounded. A simple fact check reveals that this is true although their pollution standards are not as high as for automobiles. However, this begs the question, why is our auto industry so archaic? Can't we do better?
James Watt invented steam engines more than 200 years ago. These engines used burning coal to power them. We are still in the same arena. We are burning fuel instead of coal! Can't we think of a better way to power something without burning something? I am sure we can. The real revolution is not when we achieve higher mpg, but it is when we figure out a better way to power our automobiles. I just hope it is in our lifetime.
