America’s auto industry was doing great. In 2016, its sales rose for the seventh year running to record highs. In 2017, sales slipped 1.2 percent but remained among the top five in history, dominated by…
On Wednesday [March 15, 2017] in Detroit, beneath a vast American flag, President Trump answered 17 automakers’ call to reopen the Mid-Term Review of the 2022–25 “CAFE” automotive efficiency…
This decade China is set to regain the status it has held for 18 of the past 20 centuries: the world’s largest economy. A major engine of historic success was China’s inexorable drive to develop…
Green Footstep is an online assessment tool for reducing carbon emissions from building construction projects and is publicly available at greenfootstep.org. The Green Footstep tool guides the user through the process of life-cycle carbon assessment,…
In writing “The Electric Car, Unplugged” for the New York Times of Sunday, March 25, John Broder and his informants assert that “enthusiasm over electrification in the industry has begun to…
Feasible technological improvements in vehicle efficiency, combined with “long combination vehicles” (which raise productivity by connecting multiple trailers), can potentially raise the ton-mile efficiency of long-haul heavy tractor-trailers by a factor ~2.5 with respect to…
Development of dramatically lightweight and fuel-efficient vehicles has been slowed by perceptions that lighter vehicles are less safe. Highly safe lightweight vehicles may seem counterintuitive. Yet, size need not determine the weight of a vehicle…
This letter was written by Amory Lovins in 2005 and sent to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In the letter, Lovins commends the NHTSA for its 2005 adoption of CAFE standards based on size…
In this 2004 letter to the NHTSA, Amory Lovins challenges the agency’s proposed policy about the Automobile Fuel Economy Standards Program. He argues that NHTSA’s policy should be performance-based, not prescriptive; that the standards should…
Designing and making cars differently and emphasizing ultralight weight, ultralow drag, and integrated design can reduce required propulsive power by about two-thirds. This can make direct-hydrogen fuel cells and commercially available compressed-hydrogen-gas tanks practical and…