A few weeks ago I described what the CAFE figures meant. Now I read that these targets are going to get adjusted - because people in the US are buying too many SUVs and trucks! The plan was for the fleet average to be 54.5 miles per gallon split across cars, SUVs and trucks. However because the price of oil has been relatively low of late, more buyers are trading up to an … [Read more...]
Corporate Average Fuel Economy Goals
This is going to be an abridged view of the policy known as CAFE. It is abridged simply because like many Government sourced policies, it can twist and turn based on where the votes are - and get changed through its life! The policy was born out of the 1973 Fuel Crisis when OPEC (the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries) announced an embargo on countries who … [Read more...]
Algae – The Natural Biofuel
Over the last year or so I have spoken about different types of bio-fuels and their sources. The most commonly discussed in the media has been ethanol from corn because of the dilemma of using lots of water to turn a food source into a fuel to power vehicles. Like range anxiety in an electric car, the media and others were concerned about running out of one of the resources … [Read more...]
E85 Fuel
This week’s article is about E85 fuel, another intermediate solution before drivers stop using petrol all together. E85, I believe is an intermediate solution because it still uses petrol as a base. E85 is a mix of ethanol and petrol – 85% ethanol and 15% petrol, so it helps to reduce the consumption of crude oil, however it increases the plant based ethanol production that … [Read more...]
Compressed Air Cars
When I first wrote about cars powered by compressed air in 2008, I thought that the world had jumped back 100 years ago. Then, like now, companies were coming up with ideas to try and sell machines and many of the ideas being developed today were in existence a century ago but the underlying technology wasn’t there to make it cost effective to produce or viable to sell. The … [Read more...]