There’s a chart on fueleconomy.gov that’s a graphic illustration of what happened to GM. The chart is a compilation of 2009 hybrid vehicles. It lists 27 hybrid vehicles in descending order from the highest mileage cars to the lowest.

At the top of the chart, perch some of the highest mileage vehicles available, the Toyota Prius, the Honda Civic and the Nissan Altima. The top two clock in at 40 mpg and up. The Altima at 33-35 mpg.

The lowest mileage vehicles reside at the bottom of the chart. And the bottom five are all GM products: The GMC Yukon, Chevy Tahoe, GMC Sierra, Chevrolet Silverado and Cadillac Escalade.

This isn’t surprising. GM was focused on trucks and SUVs. It’s what they did best. And for quite awhile, America wanted these wheels. Now, everyone from lawmakers to Joe the Neighborhood Critic laments that GM failed to produce better mileage vehicles. Our vision is 20/20.

But what about this apparent tactical error of putting all their initial hybrid technology into large trucks and SUVs? Trucks and SUVs that tend to get 20 mpg on the highway and 20 mpg in the city (the four at the bottom of the list) — a 20/20 vision that doesn’t make sense in 2009, and especially not looking ahead to 2020.

Did it not occur to GM that perhaps these gas-guzzlers appealed to people who might not really care whether their luxury vehicles got 16 mpg or 20 mpg? Surely they understood that customers were mainly buying SUVs and big hulking trucks as status symbols (and occasionally to pull their boats or ATVs)? That pouring their gas-saving technology into this class of auto was like dressing up for a phantom ball?

Or were they just sticking to the market segment they knew best, making improvements on top sellers and clinging to high-margin models? Upping the gas mileage of the worst mileage vehicles did achieve a great percentage gain in mpg. But did the customers buy it? Did SUV drivers pay the hybrid upcharge? Not so much, and especially not now. Phantom Ball.

Roland Hwang, vehicles policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council, once referred to the Tahoe hybrid as putting lipstick on a pig.

By not building some smaller vehicles with great mileage credentials, sooner and with enthusiasm, as a hedge if nothing else, GM essentially put all its pigs in one basket. And now it suffers.

Copyright © 2009 Green Right Now | Distributed by Noofangle Media

You’d expect Doug Fox, the cordial co-chair of the North American International Auto Show, opening to the public on Saturday, to have some good spin on how this event will rise above the stench of economic panic in the Motor City, and the country.

Not only does he have the goods, by the end of our conversation Tuesday, I was convinced that this is a pivotal, but not hopeless time for the car industry.

Fox thinks this is not just an important, historic show, but “the most significant show without a doubt” in the 21 years since the NAIAS became a designated international show.

The automakers, he believes, are thoroughly jazzed by the technological road race in front of them and ready to turn out more energy efficient vehicles faster than “even they thought they could.” (Good point there. But then what are the alternatives for the American makers? Sell the remaining inventory of Navigators to the residents of Dubai and take early retirement?)

From his perch in the balcony above the convention, Fox pointed to the evidence supporting his premise: GM’s all-electric Volt, on target for market in late 2010 (as far as we know), and soon to generate new American jobs in batteries; the Prius, enough said; the Insight, back from the dead and touted as economical too; and the promised Chrysler EVs (Fox hadn’t spotted those on the floor, but suspected strongly that they’ll be surfacing).

And don’t forget China’s whimsically named Build Your Dreams (BYD) cars, keeping the pressure on our flabby U.S. flank to build hybrids and all-electric cars in big numbers, but with smaller price tags.

“I think clearly there were some people coming here, arriving thinking this would be a gloomy funeral like atmosphere,” said Fox of the NAIAS convention. “But when they walked into that hall and heard some of the announcements being made…there’s no other show anywhere in North America like this show.”

“The word I use is hope. That’s what this show has shown us. There is hope on the horizon,” he said.

So maybe all we have to fear is fear itself? We’ll see how that flies, or drives, in the months to come.

Copyright © 2009 Green Right Now | Distributed by Noofangle Media

Photo: 2009 North American Auto Show

The BYD E6 from China,a pure electric vehicle. All the chemical substances in the battery can be recycled.

Heated and cooled leather seats? Of course.

Touch-screen navigation system? Natch.

Killer Bose sound system? Satellite radio? Blind spot alert?

Check, check and check.

The 2009 Cadillac Escalade Hybrid offers all this and another luxury: a clear conscience.

Slideshow: View the Escalade Hybrid

Well, clearer maybe. Even with its state-of-the-current-art two-mode gasoline-electric hybrid system, the Escalade Hybrid is still pretty thirsty, getting about 20 mpg in a mix of city and highway driving. That’s about half the mpg of a Honda Civic Hybrid or a Toyota Prius.

But the Civic and the Prius can’t haul six or seven people or tow a horse trailer. So, the Escalade Hybrid fills a niche and offers a more fuel-efficient alternative to the traditional big honking SUV.

The Escalade Hybrid – billed by Cadillac as the world’s first large luxury SUV hybrid – delivers a 50-percent fuel economy improvement in city driving.  The EPA estimated mpg of the old-fashioned V-8 powered Escalade is just 12 city and 19 highway. The hybrid gets 20 mpg city.

And it still has a big 403-horsepower, 6-liter V-8 mated with a six-speed automatic transmission.

The big SUV can travel up to 25 mph on electric power alone – if you have a feather touch on the gas pedal. A good habit to develop no matter what you’re driving.

The two-mode hybrid system consists of an electrically variable transmission and 300-volt nickel-metal hydride battery than works with the V-8. The hybrid system allows the V-8 to operate in its more economical four-cylinder mode for longer periods.

The cabin is well appointed and filled with gadgets. It’s a Cadillac, after all. One cool gizmo is a side mirror blind zone alert system that lights an icon in the side mirrors when a closing vehicle is in the blind spot. Handy feature to have in heavy traffic.

A rearview camera system also boosts visibility when backing.

All this technology doesn’t come cheaply – alas. The sticker price on the test car was $72,780.

Copyright © 2008 Green Right Now | Distributed by Noofangle Media

See more GREEN CARS stories

The Escalade Hybrid is billed by Cadillac as the world’s first large luxury SUV hybrid.

Green Car Journal editors have chosen the five finalists for the 2009 Green Car of the Year award. They include two “clean” diesels — the BMW 335d and Volkswagen Jetta TDI — the Ford Fusion Hybrid, the Saturn Vue 2-Mode Hybrid, and the Euro-bred smart fortwo. The winner will be announced Nov. 20 at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

According to the Journal’s experts, the five models are important milestones for their manufacturers. The VW and BMW clean diesels signal the advent of highly efficient, advanced diesel sedans that meet emissions requirements in all 50 states. Ford’s Fusion Hybrid is the American automaker’s first hybrid sedan. Saturn’s Vue 2-Mode represents the first time GM has used its two-mode hybrid system in a V-6 front-drive platform. The smart fortwo is fuel efficient micro car from Europe that just made it to the U.S. in recent months.

Video: See the five finalists

“This is an exciting year for ‘green’ cars because of the many innovative and advanced models now emerging,” Ron Cogan, editor and publisher of the Green Car Journal, said in a statement. “In fact, this year’s selection of nominees was more challenging than in years past because of the auto industry’s greater emphasis on greener vehicles and the number of potential vehicles to consider. For the first time, we’ve also seen a pair of clean diesels and a small gasoline model giving hybrids serious competition.”

Fuel efficient diesels have long been popular in Europe, but the engines have only recently been re-engineered to meet tough U.S. standards. The BMW 335d gets 33 miles per gallon and features a complex three-piece emissions system. VW uses a system developed in cooperation with Audi and Mercedes-Benz that temporarily captures particulate emissions before burning them off in a later part of the engine cycle.

The 2009 Green Car of the Year will be selected by a jury that includes Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club; Frances Beinecke, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council; Jean-Michel Cousteau, president of Ocean Futures Society; automotive expert and Tonight Show host Jay Leno; and automotive icon Carroll Shelby.

Jennifer Drukker expected people would stare at her new car. What she didn’t expect was this: “I was at the first stop light after I’d driven off with the car. It was literally the first time I came to a stop after driving off with the car,” she recalls. “The driver of the car next to me rolls down the windows and starts shouting questions.”

If it seems an extreme response to a Chevrolet Equinox, a fairly mainstream SUV, consider that the paint job includes the word “fuel cell” on the sides.

Fuel cell vehicles that turn abundant hydrogen into electricity are one promising alternative to gasoline-burning, toxic-fume-spewing internal-combustion engines. Widespread availability of such cars – which emit water vapor instead of greenhouse gases and stuff that’s flat out unhealthy – is years in the future.

But for Jennifer Drukker, Jamie Lee Curtis (yes, that one) and a handful of other drivers, the future is now.

General Motors has 100 Chevrolet Equinox Fuel Cell SUVs on the highways as part of “Project Driveway,” an extended research program that puts regular drivers behind the wheel of these costly cars for a few months.

Honda this summer began delivery of the FCX Clarity through a special leasing program expected to put another 200 fuel cell cars on the road over the next three years.

When you boil it down, fuel cell vehicles (FCV, for short) are electric cars. The juice comes from that single-proton gas once used to make zeppelins float. Hydrogen and oxygen are used in a chemical reaction that creates electricity. Think of it as the flip side to the electrolysis experiment you did in high school.

“We’re using hydrogen to store electricity,” says Mark Vann of General Motors.

For drivers, that means an electric car with the range of a conventional automobile. The range of the Equinox FCV is 160-200 miles between fill-ups. The Honda FCX goes about 270 miles.

Hydrogen as a fuel offers several advantages over gasoline. When used in fuel cells, the byproduct is water. It’s abundant. Industrial volumes of hydrogen are produced from natural gas and used to refine petroleum. Enough hydrogen is now produced globally each year to replace 56 billion gallons of gasoline, according to the National Hydrogen Association.

And hydrogen is a fairly cheap fuel. “The cost of operating the fuel cell Equinox is equivalent to getting 40 miles per gallon and paying $2.50 a gallon for gas,” say Vann.

The high amount of torque an electric motor offers compared to an internal-combustion engine means even an SUV like the Equinox is delightfully quick off the line.

“It goes faster than you legally need to go,” says Gates Clark, another Project Driveway participant. “There are no performance compromises.”

Quick and quiet. Low impact and low operating costs. Why can’t I have one now?

Pushed by the dwindling prospects for fossil fuels, the auto industry is undergoing changes not seen since the days of Henry Ford. Today’s innovators aren’t just looking to gear up production, they’re trying to dial back energy use, and that’s produced a bumper crop of wild and wacky (and some not so wacky) concept cars.

Here are eight of our favorites:

Air Car

It would cost less to manufacture (and buy), less to maintain, less to fuel and there would be no emissions. The makers of this car, Air Car Factories, are either on drugs or they’ve seized the Holy Grail. Their car would run on compressed air collected by see-saw devices on the road. Each car would be refueled through regenerative driving. The Barcelona-based company expects to begin with electric models, until testing is completed on the Air Car. A green dream? We hope it’s a reality.

Nike ONE

That’s right. This is a car designed by a shoe maker. It doesn’t much look like a shoe. More like…nothing you’ve seen before. The car is intended to be “athletic.” No joke. “An athlete training to drive the Nike ONE uses a physical resistance simulator, that mimics the vehicle’s controls, along with the digital simulation within GT4 to train their muscles and mind for specific tracks and competition scenarios,” explains Phil Frank, lead designer, who said his team was inspired by the principals of Nike founder Bill Bowerman. The long term plan is that any movement by the driver would be converted into electricity through nanotechnology using a “Spark Suit.” Frank calls it “the ultimate in convergent technologies.” We agree.

Toyota Fine-S/ Fine-N

These aerodynamic hydrogen fuel cell cars would employ motors in the wheels, thereby opening up space in the cabin for passengers. The designs have been out for a while. No word on when such a car could be in production.

Honda Puyo

Honda has already hit the road with a hydrogen vehicle, the FCX Clarity, a few select models of which are being test driven by celebs in California. The concept Puyo, though, still seems from another planet. This hydrogen fuel cell car actually glows in the dark, not due to any radioactive fuel on board, but because the body is luminescent to enhance maneuverability. But that’s just where the fun begins. The whole Puyo concept is to produce a cuddly car. “‘PUYO’ is a Japanese onomatopoeia that expresses the sensation of touching the vehicle’s soft body. It is meant to convey a warm, friendly impression,” Honda reports. Looks cool too.

Chevy Volt

This much discussed plug-in is expected to be available by the end of 2010. GM promises that its lithium-ion battery will allow it to run around 40 miles on a single charge – without using any gasoline. Past 40 miles, the engine will be able to use gasoline or ethanol working along with the battery. Unlike some of the cars on this list, the Volt appears very close to production, and no wonder, GM has assigned more than 200 engineers and 50 designers to the project.

Nissan Pivo2

The electric Pivo 2 is not just a car, it’s an “intelligent life form design,” which means…we’re not sure what. But there is a “Robotic Agent” on the dashboard, a sort of alien friend who talks to you. The car is intended to be more like a living creature and less driven by mechanical design. One problem, though, while this three-seater can twirl 360-degrees, it’s not easy to envision a successful double date in this mini-car, unless one in the party is content atop the cabin.

Saab BioPower100

This turbo-charged sedan would use 100 percent biofuel in a production 2.0 liter engine, which with modifications, could produce a surprising 300 hp. The car debuted at the Geneva show in 2007. The concept explores maximizing power within an environmentally responsible vehicle.

Toyota RiN

This literally green car remains shrouded in mystery as to how it’s green, that is, how it will be powered. Toyota has much to say, however, about how the car will work to improve passengers’ awareness of their natural surroundings, improve their posture and overall health. The car’s “meter cluster” would change colors depending on your mood, which would presumably be more “serene” in this car. And…it’s cool looking.

Copyright © 2008 | Distributed by Noofangle Media