World consumption of fossil fuels continues unabated despite the universal acknowledgment that it is a finite resource. Examples of the problem of declining fuel supplies – and potential solutions – can be found in Allen County.
In October, International Truck & Engine Corp. announced plans to help build diesel-electric hybrid industrial trucks that consume 40 percent to 60 percent less fuel and release fewer toxic emissions. The trucks are part of a pilot program with utility companies to test the commercial popularity of hybrid technology. Employees at International’s Truck Development and Technology Center, in southeast Fort Wayne, designed the trucks.
Sadly, just after International announced its hybrid truck program, it introduced the CXT – a 14,500-pound SUV that makes a Hummer look demure. The CXT is a 22-foot pickup truck that looks like a semi and gets an appalling 7 miles per gallon of diesel.
Another solution can be found across town, where General Motors has begun making a hybrid pickup. The two local operations prove that vehicle manufacturers have the ability to produce technology that conserves fuel.
Unfortunately, Allen County, like much of America, is not making fuel conservation a priority. The list of the top 10 vehicles registered in Allen County in 2003 includes only one car. The most popular vehicles in this community are gas-guzzling SUVs and pickup trucks. According to the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles, Chevy Blazers topped the list and Chevy pickups came in a very close second.
Motorists complain about climbing gas prices that change almost as quickly as traffic lights, especially around peak holiday travel times. But U.S. drivers had better get used to paying more for a tank of gas if they continue to drive inefficient vehicles.
Americans are gradually warming up to hybrid vehicles, as more automakers introduce hybrid models. But market forces are not enough. Congress needs to update fuel efficiency standards to give vehicle manufacturers more than a gentle nudge to improve fuel efficiency.
Increasing demand
The United States uses 25 percent of the world’s oil – 21 million barrels per day, or 3 gallons per person per day. America’s thirst for oil is at an all-time high and is projected to grow by 50 percent in the next 20 years. Most of America’s oil consumption can be tied to its love for cars and trucks.
At the same time, global consumption is more than 82 million barrels a day and is expected to hit 140 million barrels by 2025. Much of the dramatic increase is coming from developing nations with huge populations, such as China and India. Chinese oil imports alone have risen by 35 percent.
Unfortunately, for every five barrels of oil the world consumes only two barrels are discovered.
Hybrid alternatives
Some vehicle manufacturers are taking steps to introduce greener products. Toyota introduced the prototype for the world’s first mass-produced, gas-electric hybrid car several years ago. The Prius couples a traditional gas engine with an electric motor and gets twice the gas mileage of a regular car. The Prius never needs to be plugged in – a huge deterrent to the popularity of some other electric cars – because the battery is charged by the gas engine and by stepping on the brake.
The Prius is very popular. There is a still a six-month wait for a 2004 model one year after it was introduced, despite the $3,500 premium above sticker price some dealerships charge for the hybrid feature. Toyota has sold about 1,180 Priuses in Indiana since 2001, and the state ranks 21st in national sales. Toyota plans to increase production of the Prius in 2005 and introduce hybrid SUVs – a move that may prove popular in Indiana.
Honda also has several hybrid offerings, including the two-seat Insight, a hybrid Civic, and the recently introduced hybrid Accord.
The Sierra Club estimates that if all vehicles in the United States used hybrid engines, they would save 4 million barrels of oil a day. But too rarely is fuel efficiency among the top criteria Americans or Hoosiers use when they shop for a car or truck. Despite rising gas prices, the popularity of SUVs and pickup trucks is not decreasing. Until consumers change their demands for large, inefficient vehicles, manufacturers will continue to produce gas guzzlers such as the CXT.
Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFÉ, standards have remained static at 27.5 mpg for cars and 20.7 mpg for light trucks and vans for the last 20 years. The Bush administration supported raising standards for SUVs, vans and pick-up trucks by 1.5 mpg by 2007. But the standards will only encourage manufacturers to add weight to vehicles to avoid the standards.
Local solutions
Earlier this year GM introduced the world’s first hybrid pickup trucks in both its full-size extended cab 1500 Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra models. The trucks are manufactured at the Fort Wayne GM Truck Assembly Plant, but they are not available for sale in Indiana. They are available only in Alaska, California, Florida, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. GM will expand sales of the trucks in other states in 2005 based on market demand.
GM’s new pickups are considered mild hybrids because the electric motor does not propel the vehicle on its own. The electric motor starts the truck, runs the engine when idling at stoplights and serves as a mobile generator. While there is only a 10 percent improvement in fuel economy with the hybrid, the added feature of the four 120-volt outlets in the pickup bed and cab might be the carrot devoted pickup truck owners need to try a hybrid.
The hybrid feature is available for $1,500 – after a $1,000 GM rebate – over the base price of the traditional trucks.
Susan Garvaglia, spokeswoman for GM’s hybrid program, says GM is getting good feedback on the hybrid trucks, and the “120-volt, 20 amp outlets are a big hit.”
Garvaglia says that GM is planning on expanding its hybrid program and will have the broadest portfolio of hybrid products in the industry. She says GM launched its hybrid program to specifically target the highest fuel-consuming vehicles. Hybrid trucks and SUVs are a step in the right direction because they may encourage large vehicle enthusiasts to consider more environmentally friendly options, but it is still only a baby step. M. King Hubbert is famously quoted as saying, “Our ignorance is not so vast as our failure to use what we know.” Americans know that there is not an infinite supply of fossil fuel, but are still reluctant to embrace the need for change.
Since the depletion of oil is more than one election season away, it is difficult to get politicians to make fuel conservation and alternative fuel research a priority. Serious thought needs to go toward raising fuel efficiency standards. If Congress puts enough pressure on automakers, they will produce products that conserve fuel and keep consumers satisfied.
The upward movement of prices at the pump can be explained by a theory called Hubbert’s Peak.
In 1956, M. King Hubbert, a geophysicist, theorized that U.S. oil production follows a bell curve. He predicted that the United States would hit the peak of the curve in 1970, and that U.S. oil supplies would quickly go downhill from there until the nation’s oil supply runs out completely. Experts – oil executives and economists – scoffed at the theory.
History has proven Hubbert right – many experts think we hit Hubbert’s Peak in 1971.
Since Hubbert, many have applied the same mathematical model to the world’s oil supply, most notably, a geologist and former Princeton professor, Kenneth S. Deffeyes, who wrote the book, “Hubbert’s Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage.” He explains that oil production is cheap and easy at first, but after it hits the peak, it becomes increasingly more difficult and expensive to extract oil from the earth.
Deffeyes’ prediction: The world will hit Hubbert’s Peak on Thanksgiving Day 2005. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates another 10 to 20 years before we hit the peak.
While the debate about exactly when the decline of oil production will begin is interesting, the more important issue is what the nation does to prepare for the increased cost and declining availability of fuel. Now is the time for Americans to decrease their dependence on fossil fuels and look for alternative energy resources: nuclear, solar, wind, hydrogen and geothermal.
