Hopefully you have read Part One of this article. If you have not, it is a realistic counterpart to our next great blunder of our government, Flex-Fuel Technology.

So, what is the answer to this dizzying conundrum of alternative fuels? HYBRID TECHNOLOGY!! Well, how about something even better? I believe in combining our most advanced technology — a plug-in hybrid flex-fuel automobile that gets its electrical power from solar panels? Does that sound good to you?

Here is what Wikipedia defines as a hybrid automobile:

“A Petroleum Electric Hybrid Vehicle (PEHV) is a vehicle using an on-board rechargeable energy storage system (RESS) and a fueled power source for vehicle propulsion. The different propulsion power systems may have common subsystems or components. The HV provides better fuel economy than a conventional vehicle because the engine is smaller and may be run at speeds providing more efficiency. Other techniques may be used to recover or reduce waste energy (such as regenerative braking and shutting down the combustion engine).” - Wikipedia.com

Here is where the great blunder is. Now pay attention because this is huge. In 1993 Ford started producing Flex-Fuel vehicles for the consumer industry. Every so many years another domestic car company would jump on the band-wagon and start producing their version of the Flex-Fuel vehicle. To date, there is approximately 6 million flexible fuel vehicles on the American road. But, in 2002, only 1% of these vehicles were using the E85 fuel*. The biggest problems with Flex-Fuel is the complex model that needs to be fully implemented before we can take advantage of this technology. Here are the steps to creating this model:

• Step One - Design and produce Flex-Fuel Vehicles for the consumer sector
• Step Two - Find the vegetative source for the organic materials needed for the production of Ethanol
• Step Three - Create the most efficient model for producing ethanol, making sure that more energy is created than it takes to produce it.
• Step Four - Recruit the distribution model to start selling E85 and offer E85 fuel stations all over the nation.
• Step Five - Motivate people to spend the same money on a less efficient fuel, so that this technology is being utilized.

To date, there is only one ethanol station for Austin, Texas, and this is a forward thinking city. In most cities there are still none. So, in reality, there are not even enough Flex-Fuel cars being utilized to their designed potential to even make a dent in utilizing this alternative energy. The six million Flex-Fuel vehicles might as well be regular gasoline models. To me, this sounds like it is still in its infancy stage. Even once fully implemented, these vehicles are still going to average 20.5 miles a gallon. Which really sucks in my opinion. Now, let’s look at this as if this was hybrid technology instead of Flex-Fuel.

Here are the steps to hybrid implementation:

• Step One - Design and produce the hybrid automobile
• Step Two - Sell them to the public
• Step Three - Well… there is no step three. We are done. It has been implemented.

With this model, we would have six million more hybrid cars on the road right now. I will use the the original hybrid car for an example — the Toyota Prius. The Prius, a car that I actually own, was estimated to get 60 miles per gallon, but I get about 50+ miles per gallon on average. In 2004 the average North American car’s fuel efficiency was 20.4 miles per gallon**. Therefore, there would be 6 million more automobiles with 40 more miles per gallon fuel usage. Thats nearly a 300% increase in energy efficiency, and a 70% decrease in greenhouse gases. This would translate to an approximate reduction of 200 million barrels of oil per year, and this would have already been in application today! No other steps necessary.

With all things being equal, there would be about 6-10 times the oil conservation*** with hybrid technology than with Flex-Fuel today going forward, plus, we would also be 66% less dependent on any type of fuel. That means 66% less dependent on big “fuel” companies and the government. All of these numbers are for the basic decade-old hybrid technology. We don’t even know would could have happened if the United States jumped on this technology when it first came out over 10 years ago. By now, we could have had cars that get 100 miles per gallon. But, this is all hypothetical and wishful thinking since our government is run by complete morons.

But, don’t get me wrong. I like flex-fuel. Just not by itself. If we could combine all the technologies together to form a strong union working together, we could really do some damage to our oil dependence. Or, how about personal mobility vehicles. Now that would be a great change from one driver riding around in a 34 passenger Lincoln Navigator!

Now this is an answer to our oil crisis. What do you think?
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Great resources:

http://www.hybridcarblog.com/2005/06/500-mpg-flex-fuel-plug-in-hybrids.html

* Wikipedia.com [Flexible Fuel Vehicles]
** Washington Post [Big Three Domestic Automakers Average Fuel Economy]
*** Department of Transportation [number of registered cars in US]/ National Resources Defense Council [percentage of energy for passenger and commercial use]