Volkswagen Fast Tracks "One-Liter" Bullet Car

Of course it costs $30-50,000, but thats a detail. Just think of all the money you're going to save on gasoline.

Roger Baker / The Rag Blog / July 5, 2008

Laugh at high gas prices with a 235-MPG VW
(Of course, it'll cost you a pretty penny.)
By Chuck Squatriglia / July 3, 2008

With gas prices going through the roof and regulators requiring cars to be ever more miserly, Volkswagen is bringing new meaning to the term "fuel efficiency" with a bullet-shaped microcar that gets a stunning 235 mpg.

Volkswagen's had its super-thrifty One-Liter Car concept vehicle -- so named because that's how much fuel it needs to go 100 kilometers -- stashed away for six years. The body's made of carbon fiber to minimize weight (the entire car weighs just 660 pounds) and company execs didn't expect the material to become cheap enough to produce the car until 2012.

But VW's decided to build the car two years ahead of schedule.

According to Britain's Car magazine, VW has approved a plan to build a limited number of One-Liters in 2010. They'll probably be built in the company's prototype shop, which has the capacity to build as many as 1,000 per year. That's not a lot, but it's enough to help VW get a lot of attention while showing how much light weight and an efficient engine can achieve.

VW unveiled the slick two-seater concept six years ago at a stockholder's meeting in Hamburg. To prove it was a real car, Chairman Ferdinand Piech personally drove it from Wolfsburg to Hamburg. At the time, he said the car could see production when the cost of its carbon monocoque dropped from 35,000 Euros (about $55,000) to 5,000 Euros (about $8,000) -- something he figured would happen in 2012. With carbon fiber being used in everything from airliners to laptops these days, VW's apparently decided the cost is competitive enough to build at least a few hundred One-Liters.

VW's engineers -- who spent three years developing the car -- made extensive use of magnesium, titanium and aluminum to bring it in at less than one-third the weight of a Toyota Echo. According to Canadian Driver, the front suspension assembly weighs just 18 pounds. The six-speed transmission features a magnesium case, titanium bolts and hollow gears; it weighs a tad more than 50 pounds. The 16-inch wheels are carbon fiber. The magnesium steering wheel weighs a little more than a pound. How much of the concept car's exotic hardware makes it to the production model remains to be seen.

Low weight only gets you so far in the quest for ultimate fuel economy; aerodynamics plays a big role. The One-Liter is long and low, coming in at 11.4 feet long, 4.1 feet wide and 3.3 feet tall. It features an aircraft-like canopy, flat wheel covers and a belly pan to smooth the airflow under the car. The engine cooling vents open only when needed, and video cameras take the place of mirrors. The passenger sits behind the driver to keep the car narrow. The car has a coefficient of drag of 0.16; the average car comes in around 0.30 and the Honda Insight had a Cd of 0.25.

As for the engine, the concept had a one-cylinder diesel engine producing 8.5 horsepower and 13.5 foot-pounds of torque. Car says the production model will use a two-cylinder turbodiesel for a little more oomph. Doubling the number of cylinders is sure to cut fuel economy, so VW may install a diesel-hybrid drivetrain. The engine turns off at stop lights to save fuel, then automatically restarts when the driver depresses the accelerator pedal.

(Update: The car reportedly has anti-lock brakes, stability control and airbags. According to Canadian Driver, "Volkswagen says the One-Liter Car is as safe as a GT sports car registered for racing. With the aid of computer crash simulations, the car was designed with built-in crash tubes, pressure sensors for airbag control and front crumple zones.")

What's it gonna cost? Car quotes "one well-placed insider" who says the One-Liter could have a sticker price of anywhere from 20,000 to 30,000 Euros (about $31,750 to $47,622). That's a lot of money. But then, the One-Liter, despite its diminutive size, is a lot of car.

Source. / Wired.com

I think it's good they only plan to sell 1000 a year worldwide. That's probably about all they will be able to move, especially at that high price. And don't they know people are sociable creatures who like to sit at least two in a row? Back to the drawing board!

Jon Ford / The Rag Blog

Hmmm, turbocharged 2 cylinder diesel. Companies like VW and Honda are really good at coming up with tiny engines that roar. I still think that in the future there will be city cars and road cars. No road cars in the cities except on freeways. City cars will be tiny like this one, and likely electric too, no wasted space like empty back seats. Carbon fiber is the material used in most all race cars, stout and light but expensive. 600 pounds is super light. Maybe putting a weight limit on cars would be the best way to insure efficiency...

Gerry Storm / The Rag Blog

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Referring to the US Economy ....

Did you see the new dollar bill they just released in commemoration of our $4+ gasoline?


Thanks to Mariann Wizard / The Rag Blog

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Two For The Road : Heading For The Exit Lane

By 2012 there should be roughly 10 million fewer vehicles on the road in America...

We stand at a turning point for US transport.

Real gasoline prices have already surpassed the peak levels that followed the second OPEC oil shocks, and even when adjusted for potential fuel efficiency improvements, have increased to the point where they will dramatically change driving behaviour in America.

The some 57 million Americans who own a car and have direct access to public transportation will start to act more and more like Europeans, who have long paid much higher gasoline prices. By 2012, average miles driven will have shrunk by more than 15%. SUV and other light truck sales, which until 2006 accounted for almost 60% of total motor vehicles, will plummet to less than half that level, reversing the last fifteen years growth in market share.

More fundamentally, the freeways are about to get less congested. Not only will the number of vehicle registrations in the United States not grow over the next four years, but by 2012 there should be roughly 10 million fewer vehicles on the road in America than thereare today.

Jeff Rubin and Benjamin Tal / CIBC World Markets / Toronto

Heading for the Exit Lane
by Jeff Rubin / June 26, 2008

Recent announcements from OPEC and China won’t be sufficient to hold oil prices in check. The additional 200,000 barrels per day pledged from Saudi Arabia is apittance compared to the four million barrels per day that depletion will hive off world production this year. What little increase in production Saudi is capable of will probably all be gobbled up by that country’s own voracious appetite for energy. Nor is the $145 per tonne cut (48 cents per gallon) in Chinese fuel subsidies likely to dent demand much.

Most North Americans would gladly line up at the pumps for China’s now $3.25 a gallon gas, particularly those of us who live north of the border.

With half of the world’s population never having to pay world oil prices, it shouldn’t come as a great surprise that $130 per barrel crude prices have yet to quash world demand. And the only supply response to date has been yet another round of cost overruns and lengthy project delays running the gamut from Canadian oil sands to deepwater Gulf of Mexico wells.

With the basic laws of supply and demand are compelled to once again raise our target prices for oil. We are lifting our target for West Texas Intermediate by $20 per barrel to an average price of $150 next year and by $50 per barrel to an average price of $200 per barrel by 2010. Under prevailing refinery margins, that should translate into a near-$7 per gallon pump price within two years, a 70% increase from today’s already record levels.

Higher oil prices spell stagflation for the US economy next year, and we have marked down our GDP growth forecast to barely over 1% for 2009 (pages 9-11). The biggest impacts will be in transport and none greater than the adjustments on the road.

After all, America is the quintessential land of the car.

As gasoline prices climb inexorably, American driving habits are going to have to undergo a massive change, mimicking the driving habits long adopted by Europeans who have faced much higher gas prices. Average miles driven will likely fall by as much as 15%, while the market share of light trucks, SUVs and vans will be literally halved, reversing the trend of the last fifteen years. But the most fundamental, and unprecedented change will be in the number of vehicles on the road.

Over the next four years, we are likely to witness the greatest mass exodus of vehicles off America’s highways in history. By 2012, there should be some 10 million fewer are today—a decline that dwarfs all previous adjustments including those during the two OPEC oil shocks (see pages 4-8). Many of those in the exit lane will be low income Americans from households earning less than $25,000 per year.

Incredibly, over 10 million of those American households own more than one car.

Soon they won’t own any.

Source. / CIBC World Markets / Toronto

Thanks to Roger Baker / The Rag Blog

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Two For the Road : Killing Off the Small Town

A road going to Leeton, Missouri, population 619. Photo by jelene's photostream.
High Gas Prices Threaten to Drain
Small Towns' Populations
By Donald Bradley / June 28, 2008

LEETON, Missouri - In this small town south of Warrensburg, directions usually begin with, "From Casey's, you go ..."

That would be Casey's General Store, the only gas station in town. It's where folks fill up while talking about goings-on, politics, weather and who's got the best-looking tomatoes.

These days, they're also cussing and shaking their heads about the price of that gasoline. People are doing that everywhere, but in small towns such as Leeton, population 619, it's even more of a gut punch because nearly every working adult commutes to jobs elsewhere.

These days, there had better be a really good job on the other end of that trip.

Don Campbell's daily commute to Kansas City - about 100 miles each way - costs him roughly $866 a month at $3.90 per gallon. But he's a union iron worker and says he can make the math work.

Most of his neighbors can't. For them and thousands of other small-town residents across the country who drive long distances to jobs that pay little more than minimum wage, the high cost of gas is making that daily commute cost-prohibitive.

So much so that economists predict that over the next few years, the country could see a migration that would greatly reduce the population of Small Town America - resulting in a painful shift away from lifestyle, family roots, traditions and school ties.

"This town's the only place I know," said Louie Rector, who drives 35 miles to his job at a window factory from his home in tiny Dixon, Mo., about 20 miles west of Rolla.

"I grew up here ... raised my kids here. I got my family and friends all here. I don't want to pack up and leave. But it's getting to the point where a fella can't afford to drive to work, and that don't seem right to me."

A Common Fate

Towns such as Dixon and Leeton are everywhere in America. Many don't have much beyond a post office, a grocery and maybe a school. Economists use Wymore, Neb., as an example in that 68 percent of working adults in town commute to jobs elsewhere, most to Beatrice, Neb.

The expected exodus from small towns, said Don Macke, a widely considered authority on rural economics and head of the Center for Rural Entrepreneurship in Lincoln, Neb., will be far more profound than the gradual erosion that has been going on since World War II. That decline was due to the country's shift away from an agrarian economy and a choice for convenience: People wanted to be closer to jobs, shopping and entertainment.

The new flight, Macke thinks, will be more out of necessity.

Most commuters from small towns are high school graduates. They are driving 50 miles or more to work as school cooks, hospital aides, office workers, dental assistants and unskilled factory workers.

"The reality is that those jobs don't pay all that well," said Macke, who is also a visiting scholar with the Rural Policy Research Institute at the University of Missouri. "They're spending up to $500 a month on gas. A third to half is already technically working poor.

"And as gas goes higher, they will get poorer and these towns will soon struggle to hold on to these people."

David McGranahan, a senior economist with the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, added that the decline would not be entirely longtime residents moving away.

"Young people who leave these towns to go off to college or the military may decide not to go back - as many have always done in years past," McGranahan said. "Also, fewer people will leave the city to move to small towns in search of a quiet life."

But nobody is writing off small towns. Who knows what type of vehicle will come along next? There's carpooling. Computer technology increasingly allows people to work from home. And some communities are working on ways to provide jobs in town.

"I have a lot of faith in ingenuity and the entrepreneurial spirit," Macke said.

That rescue better happen fast, said Leeton Mayor Larry Mudd. He has lived all his 62 years there and used to commute to Kansas City to work as a school administrator - back when gas was cheap.

He hears the talk around town and he expects to see people, particularly young families, move away.

"People are mad as hell, but they don't know who to blame," Mudd said. "I know we got people here who are buying gas instead of paying bills.

"What a lot of towns are going to end up with is a bunch of empty buildings and empty houses."

Open Space, Cheap Gas

Since the advent of the automobile in the early 20th century, the American rural landscape has been one of spacious land and cheap fuel.

It was commonplace for people to drive long distances for jobs. In isolated areas, such as western Kansas, the drive could be 100 miles or more. Those commuters may have complained about the time in the car, but seldom about the price of gas.

Throughout that period, too, many towns had a factory, and mom-and-pop stores lined main streets.

That has all changed.

Factories in many towns closed years ago as small companies folded or manufacturers sent jobs overseas. Mom-and-pop stores gave way to Wal-Marts in bigger towns. When those changes occurred, jobs and shopping required trips out of town.

And now, gas prices are at all-time highs.

Brian Dabson, co-director of the Truman School of Public Affairs at the University of Missouri, said the new financial reality has changed the parameters of "rural poor."

The term used to apply mainly to pockets of poverty in Appalachia, the Mississippi Delta, Indian reservations, and the Texas-Mexico border area.

"Now, it's everywhere - Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska," Dabson said. "The price of gas has redefined a 'sustainable wage.'"

There is little public transportation in these rural areas. And there is less pubic assistance today. Farmers make more money from corn because of its use to make ethanol, but towns aren't sharing in any windfall because the cost of farming has gone up, too, and there are fewer farmers.

No question that gas prices will chase some people closer to urban areas, Dabson predicted.

"There is no hiding place from global pressure," he said.

So why isn't the same thing happening in Europe, where gas prices are even higher?

Because trains connect almost every town there, Macke said. And yes, some people in urban and suburban areas in this country drive 30 miles to work, too, but they tend to be more affluent.

It is in rural America where lives are being turned upside down.

"This country had not planned on a big jump in fuel costs," Macke said.

"No Jobs Here"

Well I was born in a small town,
and I can breathe in a small town.
Gonna die in this small town,
and that's probably where they'll bury me.

John Mellencamp, "Small Town," 1985

The classic song was seemingly written for guys like Rector of Dixon. He never figured he would ever leave his hometown on the edge of the Mark Twain National Forest.

According to Dixon's marshal, Clifty Yoakum, most every working adult leaves town each morning for jobs in other places, such as Rolla or Jefferson City.

"They have to - no jobs here," Yoakum said.

For 29 years, Rector has driven to the Quaker Window factory in Freeburg, 35 miles to the north. The factory is unusual in that it has more employees than that town has people.

"We got about 450 workers and they come from all over, probably six or seven counties," said owner Mike Knoll. "We pay $8 to $10 an hour - better than minimum wage - but I know my people are really feeling the gas crunch."

He recently ordered a switch to four 10-hour days to save his employees a day's drive.

"That's one day we don't have to pay $20 for gas," said Rector's daughter, Tracy, who also works at Quaker.

"Everybody is feeling what's going on. They're cutting back at the grocery store, not going out to eat. But even with that, when you get your check there's nothing left. Gas goes much higher - people are going to stop going to work."

Her father may leave Dixon and move closer to Freeburg, but Tracy Rector isn't yet ready to commit to such a drastic move from her hometown.

"But I'm like most people - I don't know what to do."

Back in Leeton, school Superintendent William Nicely knows he could see a drop in enrollment if families leave. It's a highly accredited school and this year graduated 19 seniors.

But he knows why it would happen because he commutes the other way.

"I live in Sedalia and drive here every day - I know what families are going through," Nicely said.

Resident Jerry King doesn't have to worry about it. He's retired. He used to work at a tire shop in Sedalia.

"I wouldn't want to be making that trip these days, not with gas where it is," King said. "Heck, I don't even want to drive to Windsor for groceries."

Mudd, the mayor, worries that younger residents will start thinking the same way.

"When people move away, towns lose their tax base," Mudd said. "Then you can't fix streets ... you can't do much of anything. That makes even more people leave.

"Pretty soon, won't be much left in these old towns."

Source. / Kansas City Star / truthout

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Draw!

Dario Castillejos / Imparcial de Oaxaca, Oaxaca, Mexico.
The Rag Blog / posted June 28, 2008

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Pesky Kudzu Fuels Speculation

Good for Something? The kudzu vine, also known as "the plant that ate the South," was brought from eastern Asia in 1876, can grow more than 6.5 feet a week. Because of its high biomass and resilience, kudzu is being considered by some researchers as a potential biofuel. Photo from Getty Images.
Kudzu Gets Kudos as a Potential Biofuel
By Jessica Marshall / June 16, 2008

As concerns rise over corn ethanol creating competition between food and fuels, ethanol made from one of the country's most invasive plants -- kudzu -- could be part of the solution, according to Rowan Sage of the University of Toronto and colleagues at the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The kudzu vine, also known as "the plant that ate the South," was brought from eastern Asia in 1876 and can grow more than 6.5 feet a week. Its starchy roots plunge deep into the soil, and just a fragment of the plant remaining in the ground is enough to allow it to come back next season.

"Kudzu is just a large amount of carbohydrate sitting below ground waiting for anyone to come along and dig it up," Sage said. "The question is, is it worthwhile to dig it up?"

His team gathered samples of kudzu from different locations in the south at different times of year and measured the amount of carbohydrate -- which can be converted into ethanol by yeast -- present in leaves, vines and roots.

The roots were by far the largest source of carbohydrate in the plant: up to 68 percent carbohydrate by dry weight, compared to a few percent in leaves and vines.

The researchers estimate that kudzu could produce 2.2 to 5.3 tons of carbohydrate per acre in much of the South, or about 270 gallons per acre of ethanol, which is comparable to the yield for corn of 210 to 320 gallons per acre. They recently published their findings in Biomass and Bioenergy.

Crucial to making the plan work would be figuring out whether kudzu could be economically harvested, especially the roots, which can be thick and grow more than six feet deep. To balance this expense, Sage said, the plant requires zero planting, fertilizer or irrigation costs.

Even if equipment could harvest the roots, a large fraction of kudzu vines blanket steep hillsides and would be difficult to access. The team estimated that about one-third of kudzu plants would be harvestable. If so, they calculate that kudzu could offer about 8 percent of the 2006 U.S. bioethanol supply.

"It's not going to solve anybody's energy crisis, but it would be a useful supplement," Sage said.

"You could use it to get rid of the kudzu," he said, "or, alternatively, you could let it regenerate naturally, and just walk away and then come back and do it again in a few years."

"There is a conundrum there," said Irwin Forseth of the University of Maryland in College Park. "Unless you're going to let it come back and devote some land to cultivating it, it wouldn't form a stable source. You wouldn't want to put in a stable infrastructure and work out how to extract it from roots to have it go away after three years."

However, if existing corn ethanol manufacturing plants could be used to process kudzu, too, then the approach might be feasible, Forseth said.

Bob Tanner of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., proposed using kudzu for energy in the energy crisis of the 1970s, but he now suggests that the starch, which is used as a gelling product in food in Japan, carries a higher value as a food product.

He advocates using the starch for food and converting the cellulose -- the woody, fibrous carbohydrate that gives structure to the stems and leaves -- into ethanol once processes under development are commercially available.

The fibers also make fine textiles, Tanner said. "My suggestion is, be creative. Don't cuss at it. Use it creatively."

Source. / Discovery

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Truckers Blockade Traffic in Europe

Truck drivers parked on a highway leading out of Madrid yesterday, one of a number of roads they blocked. Other roads included some leading into the center of Barcelona and the border with France. Photo by Denis Doyle/Getty Images.
Two truck drivers die as fuel protests spread across Europe
June 10, 2008

MADRID -- Two lorry drivers were killed on picket lines in Spain and Portugal on Tuesday as strikes by thousands of truckers over soaring fuel prices turned deadly.

Spanish police escorted petrol supply tankers into Barcelona on the second day of the stoppage that has caused food and fuel shortages and huge tailbacks on the Spanish-French border.

French railway workers began their own walkout, increasing the transport chaos.

A Portuguese driver was killed after he was hit by a truck as he manned a barricade filtering traffic near Alcanena, north of Lisbon.

A police spokesman quoted witnesses as saying the 52-year-old man climbed onto the side of a truck in a bid to stop it and fell off under the wheels, Lusa news agency reported.

Later Tuesday, a truck driver in Spain was run over and killed by a van as he manned a picket line outside a wholesale market in the southern city of Granada, police said.

Road haulage representatives suspended strike negotiations with the Spanish government following the incident.

Other trucks in Portugal and Spain have been stoned or had their windows smashed and tyres punctured for working during the national strikes.

A total of 15 people, most of them manning picket lines, were arrested in Spain Tuesday for disturbing public order, assault or threats, Spanish media said.

Tens of thousands of truckers are on strike or joining the protests to demand government help to offset the higher fuel costs.

Authorities in northern Spain ordered emergency measures after many petrol stations in the Catalonia region ran out of fuel.

"Twenty tanker trucks escorted by the regional police left an industrial zone this morning for Barcelona port to help supply and distribute to petrol stations in the region," a regional police spokesman told AFP.

Forty percent of petrol stations in Catalonia have run out of fuel, according to Manuel Amado, president of the Catalonia Federation of Service Stations.

Arrivals of fresh meat, fish and fruit in Madrid have come to a near halt, according to officials at the Mercamadrid market, Spain's biggest wholesale market. They said that fish would be in short supply from Thursday but stocks of other foods should last until the end of the week.

Automakers in Spain said most of the country's automobile plants, including those of Nissan, Mercedes Benz, Seat and Renault, have had to cut or halt production.

Auto plants are particularly vulnerable to a strike by hauliers, which provide them with spare parts.

Truckers stopped lorries from crossing the French-Spanish border and caused major tailbacks around major Spanish cities, including Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia.

Spanish and French truckers staged pickets on either side of the frontier between the two countries. They blocked a bridge on the border at Bidassoa in the western Basque region and other main crossing points.

On the French side, service areas on motorways were packed with trucks from the border right back to Bordeaux, about 200 kilometres (125 miles) away.

Spain's second largest hauliers' union Fenadismer, which claims to represent 70,000 out of Spain's 380,000 truck drivers, launched an open-ended strike on Monday.

Talks Monday between the hauliers and the government ended in failure, Fenadismer said.

The Portuguese government said it hoped to have an agreement with its truckers by the end of the week.

A separate strike by workers at the French rail company, SNCF, severely hit rail traffic.

About half of intercity and local commuter trains were running along with about three quarters of TGV high speed trains from Paris to southwest France. Some express commuter lines into Paris were badly affected by the strike.

Spanish fisherman were keeping up their strike against fuel prices but most French trawlers have decided to go back to work after several weeks of blocking ports and access to oil refineries.

Source. / AFP

Anger: Transport workers block the toll gate of the A7 Highway in La Roca del Valles, near Barcelona.
Also see 90,000 truckers bring Spain to a standstill. / Daily Mail

Thanks to Jesse James Retherford / The Rag Blog

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