Saturday, November 15, 2008

The clown who is sick does the trick of disaster: Neil Young dictates his terms to the auto industry

Neil Young blogging on "How To Save A Major Automobile Company" at Huffpo is certainly an interesting development. Here's the plan:
[...] The big three must reduce models to basics. a truck, an SUV, a large family sedan, an economy sedan, and a sports car. Use existing tooling.
Is there a mini-van in there somewhere? This won't go over well with my crowd.
Keep building these models to keep the workforce employed but build them without [italics in original] engines and transmissions. These new vehicles, called Transition Rollers, are ready for a re-power. No new tooling is required at this stage. The adapters are part of the kits described next.

At the same time as the new Transition Rollers are being built, keeping the work force working, utilize existing technology now, create re-power kits to retrofit the Transition Rollers to SCEVs (self charging electric vehicles) for long range capability up to and over 100mpg. If you don't think this technology is realistic or available, check out the Progressive Insurance Automotive X prize. Alternatively, check out Lincvolt.com or other examples.

A bailed out Auto manufacturer must open or re-purpose one or more factories and dedicate them to do the re-power/retrofit assembly. These factories would focus on re-powering the Transition Rollers into SCEVs but could also retrofit and re-power many existing vehicles to SCEVs. These existing vehicles are currently sitting unsold at dealerships across America.

Auto manufacturers taking advantage of a government bailout must only sell clean and green vehicles that do not contribute to global warming. No more internal combustion engines that run exclusively on fossil fuels can be sold period. [...]
Will people buy these things when the alternative is, say, a Toyota? Neil asserts "People will buy those vehicles because they represent real change and a solution that we can live with." OK, Neil, I guess if you put the words "will" and "real" in italics it must be true. Of course, a southern man don't need you around anyhow.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad

Update: Young isn't the only blogger with ideas about the automotive future.

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