It's Not Just about Hybrids: Three Tips for the Car Industry. Posted by Frances Beinecke, NRDC.org, May 23, 2008. "The first indicator [that the U.S. automakers' efforts to delay the inevitable are running out of gas] came [last] Monday, when House investigators revealed the White House interference likely played a role in the EPA's December decision to deny California the right to regulate greenhouse gas pollution from cars...The second... came on Wednesday when the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee passed a bill requiring President Bush to endorse California's right to regulate global warming pollution from cars. So what does this mean for U.S. automakers? I recently sat down with a correspondent from a GM website and told him the three things I think his and other car companies need to do to confront a carbon-constrained future. You can view our conversation online, but here are the three steps: Make cleaner products... Weigh in about what kind of fuels cars use... [and] offer options to get consumers out of cars [altogether]... The scale of global warming is so enormous that it is no longer sufficient for car makers to offer better designs. They have to participate in all three parts of the debate. Creating a cleaner energy future is not an incremental process. It is a revolutionary, transformative one. We need leaders in the auto industry to help jumpstart it." Frances Beinecke is president of the NRDC.
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