What's the catch?

In the wake of record high gasoline prices in 2008, the automakers will introduce more hybrid and alternative fuel vehicles in 2009 than any other year. Before jumping on the bandwagon, know the pros and cons.

Gas/Electric Hybrids

Hybrids have gasoline engines with electric motors. The electric motors take over during city driving, allowing the gasoline engine to run less. Select hybrids also turn off cylinders not in use to reduce fuel consumption. Less gasoline is a definite pro.

Another pro is the limited carbon emissions. By burning less gasoline, the vehicles produce far less carbon dioxide than gasoline-only vehicles.

Cons include failure to meet mileage expectations and a very large price tag at the dealer. This is a double whammy: You will pay more for the car thinking it will save more money on gas, only to find out you are spending more on gasoline than originally promised.

Diesels

Diesels have gotten a "dirty" reputation from their European makers failure to met US emissions standards. As of 2008, diesels only represented four per cent of the cars on American roads. "Why?" is a good question. They routinely get 25 to 35 per cent better mileage than gasoline vehicles.

European auto manufacturers have successfully met the US emission standards. Research into bio-fuels are now producing diesel from plant and crop based oils. Researchers say they are only a few years from a bio-diesel using chicken fat. Be on the look out for more diesel cars.

Ethanol

Many models are designed to run on ethanol blended gasoline, since it burns cleaner and increases mileage, definite pro. Con for ethanol is it takes more energy to produce than it produces when it burns.

Ethanol was originally made of corn. Burning it in cars drove the food corn price through the roof. Research into substituting switchgrass and other cellulosic biomasses are not yet feasible.

Plug-in Electrics

The majority of auto manufacturers have been testing the technology of all electric cars, with Ford and Chevrolet producing concept cars. Saturn's 2010 model is the first of the production models to be offered for public sale. A complete departure from gasoline means minimal carbon emissions, inarguable pro.

The cons include expensive batteries and long battery charging times. One long term, far-reaching con is the possibility of overloading power grids. Arguers for all-electrics claim computers can modulate charge times for off-peak hours. They are not concerned with driver need times in this argument.

Hydrogen

As one of the best alternatives to gasoline engines, hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles are hitting the road in California. $20 worth of hydrogen can take a driver 270 miles with its 68 mpg estimate. It only emission: Water vapor. Big pros.

Cons: Very few fueling stations, fuel-cell costs, hydrogen handling regulations and safety, and the costs of hydrogen production.

Other

India is trying an air car. BMW is researching steam power over a century after steam cars went out of production. Hydraulics researchers are making headway in making heavyweight commercial vehicles more fuel efficient in heavy traffic.

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Computer driven cars?

Cars of today are safer in America than ever before. Are we moving toward computer-driven cars from the advances in computer-operated active safety features?

One of the top factors in choosing a new car is safety, according to J.D. Power's survey of new car buyers.

Manufacturer response to consumer demands and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) passenger protection mandates means safer cars for Americans.

Airbags
The current trend is adding more and smarter airbags. Even affordable sedans are offering a standard six airbags: Two front and four side curtain airbags. Luxury vehicles are doubling the effort with twelve.

New airbag offerings provide multi-stage deployment and passenger detection systems. In the event of a crash, airbags deploy only when a person occupies the seat and in stages for maximum injury protection.

NHTSA estimates airbags have saved nearly 22,500 lives since 1987.

Head restraints
Even lower speed crashes can produce whiplash-type head and neck injuries. Manufacturers offer most vehicles with active head restraints to prevent the backward motion of the head at impact.

While the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety (IIHS) reports quite a few models do not make their highest safety rating, the majority of American cars do.

Vehicle construction
The NHTSA has determined American vehicles have neared the safety ceiling for vehicle construction with the advances in alloys, crumple zones and modified cabin and roll cages.

Most vehicles introduced earn the highest safety rating offered by the NHTSA and IIHS. All vehicle safety construction changes have been made to obtain the NHTSA's five star rating and the IIHS's good rating.

Current research into roof construction will lead to a new NHTSA standard. The next frontier for vehicle safety is crash avoidance.

Vehicle stability
Under NHTSA mandate, all new vehicles must have electronic stability control by 2012. Computer-operated stability control could save as many as 10,000 lives per year and reduce single vehicle crashes by as much as 34 per cent.

Future technology
Since computers react faster than drivers, more active safety features rely on computers.

Lane departure warning systems are being added to some models for the NHTSA to research their efficacy before mandating their installation in all new vehicles.

More complex systems, like collision avoidance systems, are the first baby steps toward computer-driven cars. These vehicles anticipate crashes, close windows and sun roofs and preload brakes.

Slowing cars prior to impact reduces the severity of crashes. Closing of cabin openings, like sun roofs, increases the stability of the cabin, reducing injuries inside.

Read on to find out how these changes are making the safety ratings harder to attain and driving safer.

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Cold Weather Driving Safety

With the cold weather back, please drive safely!

Winter driving safety is as easy as following the three "P"s.

~ Prepare

1. Prepare for the winter season. Maintain you car to perform in cold conditions. Check the battery, windshield wipers and tire tread. Put no-freeze windshield wiper fluid in the washer reservoir. Check your antifreeze.

2. Stock your car with essentials in the event of a breakdown, bad road conditions or an accident:

Flashlight Jumper cables Flares Sand or cat litter Ice scrapers and snow brush Shovel Blankets

While the first three should always be in your trunk, the last three are winter necessities. Sand or cat litter will help you gain traction should you find your car on an icy road or parking lot.

When your car stalls, put on the hazard lights, put out flares and put on the dome light. Make sure other motorists can see you.

Ice scrapers are a necessity for clearing the windshield. Remember, ice builds up while you are parked in a lot, so you need scrapers in the car. Snow flying off the hood can stick to the windshield and refreeze into ice. Brush it off.

If you could not control the skid and ended up in a snow bank, you will need to dig out your tires, hence the shovel. If your car is stopped, use the shovel to be sure the exhaust is clear so you can stay in the car and be warm.

You know the heater works, so why carry blankets? If you are in an accident or the car breaks down, you cannot guarantee your heater will work. In freezing weather, hypothermia can grip you in as little as fifteen minutes.

3. Plan your route. Avoid areas where accidents occur on clear days, as they will be particularly dangerous in wintry conditions. If you must go through these areas, be overly cautious.

Plan how long it will take to get there and add ten minutes. No one will fire you for being early.

Check the weather. On days of snow, allow an extra minute per mile to account for other drivers who may not be as winter driving savvy. Leave earlier for sleet.

Let someone know your route and when you should arrive. If you are late, they can call for help for you.

4. Practice winter driving. If this is your first winter, you are uncomfortable on winter roads or you are inexperienced, drive during daylight in an empty, snow-covered parking lot. Get a feel for the way you car reacts to the conditions.

Steer into a skid. Turn your wheels into the skid. Pump standards brakes or apply constant pressure to anti-lock brakes. Practicing what to do when you skid on ice will help you calmly react if you skid on the road.

Know braking distances. Cars are harder to stop on water, snow and ice. Test how far it takes you to stop the car.

~ Protect

Protect yourself by buckling your seat belt. Use child safety seats and restraints properly. Never place a rear-facing infant car seat in front of an air bag. Keep children under twelve in the backseat, buckled up.

~ Prevent

1. You are the number one person to prevent an accident. Never mix alcohol or drugs with driving. If you are planning to drink, designate a sober driver.

2. Slow down and increase the distance between your car and other drivers. Watch out for pedestrians and bicyclists. Share the road courteously.

3. Avoid fatigue. Get plenty of rest. If driving long distances, stop every three hours. When you can, alternate drivers.

Driving safety is the responsibility of all drivers. Driving safely in winter does not have to be difficult.

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A tree is just a tree?

How important to the environment are trees really?

Air pollution destroys the atmosphere which protects the Earth. Trees "eat" pollution by taking the carbon dioxide out of the air, and then they "exhale" oxygen. Planting a tree can help prevent pollution as well.

What is atmosphere, and why is it important?

The atmosphere is composed of mostly nitrogen and oxygen. It acts like a security blanket around the Earth. The ratio of nitrogen to oxygen is the tightly woven fabric of the blanket.

The atmosphere traps radiant warmth from the sun's rays. It keeps the temperature of the planet stable and warm enough to support plant and animal life, yet cool enough to maintain water in the oceans.

How is the atmosphere damaged?

Many everyday activities produce air emissions: pollution. Even human breathing produces pollutants. Humans exhale carbon dioxide, after taking oxygen from the air. These pollutants damage the atmosphere.

Energy consumption, the burning of fuels such as coal, gasoline and diesel, removes oxygen to burn and replaces it with pollutants which collect beneath the atmosphere. The effect of this pollution is adding another blanket to the Earth. It increases the planet temperature and destroying the delicate nitrogen to oxygen balance.

Use of electricity causes air emissions which strip away portions of the atmosphere, essentially tearing holes the security blanket.

Why is planting trees great for the atmosphere?

By removing the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, trees remove the extra layers in the atmosphere which threaten Earth's temperature. By replacing the carbon dioxide with oxygen, trees restore the nitrogen to oxygen balance and ensure enough oxygen for animal breathing.

Where should trees be planted?

Trees planted along the Interstate highways help absorb the pollution of the traffic, but they help the atmosphere another way as well. Trees need to have their roots protected. The ring of mulch around the trees reduces the amount of grass that needs to be cut. Less fuel burned and less pollution result from less area being mowed with tractors, whose exhaust systems are not regulated for emissions.

Sidewalk trees are planted to beautify streets, but they are doing triple duty. They reduce the need to run pollution coughing lawn mowers and the pollution caused by the trucks which transport them. Add to that, sidewalk trees pull cigarette pollution out of the air from the sidewalk denizens.

Landscaping a yard with small trees and shrubs trims yard size. Trees make great shade for your home, reducing the need for cooling. Less energy used equals less air pollution produced.

Manufacturing and transporting fertilizer uses many forms of energy and produces many different air emissions and pollutants. Recycling the leaves which fall from trees in autumn into mulch makes the landscaped and native shrubs healthier. Healthy, flowering plants "eat" more pollution and "exhale" more oxygen.

Planting plots of trees helps regulate not only the amount of oxygen produced in an area, but also the wind pattern. By creating a large area to vacuum carbon dioxide and making a wind block, wind patterns change to accommodate the new obstacle and distribute the gases of the atmosphere equally.

Changing wind patterns can ease weather conditions, such as drought, or promote different weather conditions, like rain, which require nearly exact chemical balance to exist.

Planting trees is great for the atmosphere not only because they reduce existing pollution, but also because they prevent pollution.

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What does ethanol really cost?

When everyone is looking for better fuel efficiency and cleaner burning energy, biofuel is quick to the attention of eco-conscious consumers. So how expensive is ethanol?

Bio-fuels seem to present a renewable resource alternate to fossil fuel. A closer examination of the costs of producing ethanol and biodiesel shows the true economic and ethical costs involved in choosing bio-fuel as a long term solution.

All of the following depend on fossil fuel to produce bio-fuel:

Hybridization of crops
Planting and irrigation
Fertilizer and pesticide
Harvesting
Grinding biomass
Transporting the crop
Production facility machinery

To gauge how efficient the bio-fuel alternative truly is, a joint study by Cornell and University of California -Berkeley determined that the energy output of both ethanol and biodiesel were not worth the effort of producing them.

Ethanol production from switch grass required 45 percent more energy than the resultant ethanol produced. This is the equivalent of spending $1.45 to buy a dollar.

Biodiesel produced from sunflower plants required 118 percent more energy than the biodiesel could produce. Would you spend $2.18 to buy a dollar?

These pitfalls are considered short-term shortfalls. As bio-fuel machinery becomes more widely available, the production costs will go down. Yet, the research into such machines is not likely to begin for more than another decade and only when the United States government decides which bio-fuel to endorse.

The long term pitfalls are more ominous. Ethanol and biodiesel do not burn as cleanly as burning biomass, pure wood or switch grass waste. The air emissions contribute to the greenhouse effect and further global warming.

Bio-fuels need a constant agricultural supply. To meet the United States need for liquid fuel, one of two scenarios present: 1. Residential property will be regulated to upward growth only (apartment dwelling). 2. Rural residential lands will be relegated to subsidized agriculture of biomass producing farms.

Both scenarios result in larger air pollutant emissions. The transportation of food contributes the second largest air pollutant emission in the United States. Multi-level housing creates traffic congestion and household emissions in higher concentration.

Additionally, the choice to use wood biomass to produce ethanol would result in fewer trees to protect the atmosphere, higher fossil fuel demand than even switch grass (12 percent) and increase prices of common wood based products. This price increase would impact industries that produce or use paper, cardboard, furniture, building supplies and wood as a fuel source.

So what does that mean for food prices, water and soil pollution, sustainability and fertility?

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