Today, President Obama was inaugurated in Washington DC and gave a speech Martin Luther King would have been proud of, but buried within that speech is a line which underpins the commitment of billions of dollars and the US Government:
We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.
There are quite a few others packed in there as well including reference to reducing energy dependence which strengthens enemies abroad and so on.
What this means is simple – a kickstart to the further development and adoption of green technology and applying eco-friendly machines in our daily lives and the biggest one is the car.
In very recent years the popular interest in green cars has grown in a major way, fuelled (!) by the realization that we are killing the planet with our pollution, and the cost of oil, not to mention the fact that oil is a finite resource and supplies will fail at some date in the not so distant future.
The debate will continue as to what constitutes green transport and it is not just low or zero emissions. For example, the environmental cost of a petrol/electric hybrid vehicle should take in to account the cost of production and disposal of the (large) battery, and in the case of an electric car not only the battery but also the electricity which must be generated to charge the batteries.
Pressure has been taken off green car development recently as fuel prices have dropped but if you had the choice of two cars, one of which did more miles to the gallon, was cheaper to service and was more environmentally friendly, which would you choose?
With federal government and a popular incoming President adding his weight to the argument, it is in the manufacturers interests to hasten the development of green technology.
