A top-ranking Environmental Protection Agency official is urging the auto industry to call a truce over ongoing horsepower wars and refocus its efforts on a contest to determine the world's greenest manufacturer.
Margo Oge, EPA director-office of transportation and air quality, says in her appeal that auto makers have proven themselves technology leaders in the past and suggests they now should turn to a rising wave of young, green-thinking leaders to meet the challenge of higher corporate fuel economy standards.
“We must bring about an end to the horsepower arms race among auto makers and replace it with another different kind of a race, a race to produce the most affordable and desirable, low-carbon-vehicle each year,” Oge says during an address to the Automotive News World Congress in Detroit.
Auto makers likely would find it difficult to deny their ongoing horsepower rivalry. Despite the environmentally friendly theme of the recent North American International Auto Show, there was a plethora of passenger cars, pickups and SUVs boasting increased power.
For example, General Motors Corp. unveiled the Cadillac Provoq, an electrically driven concept vehicle that leverages an emissions-free hydrogen fuel cell to extend its range. Sharing the same stage was the '09 Cadillac CTS-V production car, a sports sedan that boasts a 550-hp V-8 gasoline engine.
GM also showed the '09 Chevrolet Corvette ZR-1, a 620-hp fuel gulper that trumped the 600-hp '08 Dodge Viper on display at Chrysler LLC's exhibit.
Nevertheless, all auto makers pledge better fuel economy from future vehicles. That fact wasn't lost on Oge, an engineer by trade, who says she saw many examples of current and green powertrain technologies at the show.
Oge goes so far as to suggest a green race among auto makers could create another industrial revolution.
