Me with GM President Troy Clarke

“We need to start this industry on a path of energy diversity,” Troy Clarke, President of GM North America stated to a small handful of bloggers last Thursday in what he likes to call a frank “dialog” about the energy crisis and GM’s plans to be an industry leader in energy diversity. During this dialog I was told that the largest gains to the environment are going to be made in hybrid trucks and SUVs not economy cars. This point seems to be greatly misunderstood by consumers who see a Hybrid Silverado or Hybrid Escalade (due in 2008) as an oxymoron.

Over 1 million trucks are sold each year by GM alone and the utility of these trucks cannot not be solved by using a hybrid economy car. We need to look at these trucks as low hanging fruit; by increasing their gasoline fuel economy (through hybrid and flex fuel solutions) we will make a much greater savings to the environment than making a small economy car achieve, in some instances, marginally better gas mileage. In 2008 GM plans to introduce the world’s first Two-Mode hybrid in full-size SUVs that will provide at least a 25% improvement in fuel economy.

The Event

Lunch overlooking the ocean

After giving the usual Corporate message to the masses at a recent New York auto show, Troy Clarke sat down with four bloggers and had a discussion that lasted for three hours. This sparked an idea that GM needs to “find a way to get in the community and find what works and doesn’t. We must find our way onto the internet.” This is where I come in. I was invited to have lunch with the President of GM North America at Hughes Research Laboratories (HRL) in Malibu California with about 25 other bloggers. This is quite different from GM’s usual advertising strategy which Mr. Clarke said consisted of “carpet bombing” television ads.

The lunch menu

With the emergence of democratic news aggregators like Reddit and Digg, any one of these 25 bloggers could write an article that could reach beyond their own blog audience to hundreds of thousands of interested viewers. Online communities hold a lot of power and GM is starting to recognize the importance of reaching those communities.

After hearing two speeches, we were given a short tour of HRL which is doing research into hydrogen fuel cell technology for GM among other things. We were allowed to view their class 10 clean room that boasts a mere 10 particles per square foot. Then we were immediately hustled off to lunch were I ate a “Gourmet ‘Kobe’ Beef Burger with Grafton Cheddar”. Thanks GM! The view of the ocean was spectacular and weather was perfect. I can’t imagine how these researchers don’t get distracted.

The Future

Troy Clarke said that the future, “points us in the direction of the electrification of the car.” By doing this we can, “diversify the source of energy” with things like wind, solar and nuclear. He even went further by saying that he is “extremely excited about it” and related battery technology to “finding an erector set under the Christmas tree.”

Having a “dialog”

One of the areas that the United States needs to concentrate if we want to keep up with the race to the electric car is in Lithium-Ion (Li-ion) battery research. Japan just announced a grant of 1.8 Billion dollars toward Lithium-Ion battery research. Right now in the United states there are only a few producers of Lithium-Ion batteries whose revenues are in the area of 13 million dollars annually. I am not sure how much money in the United States is spent on Lithium-Ion Battery research but my understanding is that it pales in comparison to Japan.

Truck shaped stick drive containing electronic press materials (124 MB)

GM plans to bring to market by 2010 the Chevy Volt their first 100% electric car running on Lithium Ion batteries. The car was debuted this year at the Detroit Auto Show. It will also include what they call a range extender which is simply a 3-cylinder engine to allow you to drive extended trips when the battery in the Volt has been drained.

Conclusion

All in all I thought the event was worthwhile and had a lot of fun attending it. This notion that the greatest savings to the environment will come from hybrid SUVs and trucks is something that I believe will take some time to permeate general understanding. This might also be a niche in which U.S. automakers will have a distinct advantage over their overseas counterparts and I see this as a great strategy for GM.

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This entry was posted on Monday, June 25th, 2007 at 2:00 pm and is filed under Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.