Wow, have we really been AWOL since the 22nd? Our apologies - things get hectic around Corn Car HQ from time to time. They’re still hectic now, to be honest, but we’ve been keeping our eyes on the news and the oil spill spreading through the Gulf and outward hasn’t escaped the ethanol industry. In fact, they’re using it to illustrate the importance of renewable fuels. Statements like “the choice between the dangers of our addiction to oil and the promise of American renewable fuels is as clear today as the contrast between the blackened estuaries of the Gulf Coast and the sparkling green fields of rural America,” which is a quote from EFA president Robert Dineen’s keynote speech at St. Louis’ International Fuel Ethanol Workshop & Expo, pretty much say it all.

Meanwhile, the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) has come through with an ad using images from the Gulf to highlight the importance of ethanol investment, and the USDA continues to promote ethanol as a net positive as the debate over the federal ethanol blenders credit and the ethanol fuel mandate continue on. Looks like we aren’t the only ones with a lot going on these days, huh? As crass as opportunism in the wake of environmental tragedies can be, it’s also the only thing a lot of Americans will listen to, and the Gulf spill really does symbolize our dependence on oil and the risk of not developing other steady sources of energy. Click the picture below to watch the NCGA’s ad.

Yay reader correspondence! One of our faithfuls emailed us this awesome story about solar panels being installed on houses at North Carolina’s Lejeune Marine Corps base. The panels are provided by FLS Energy and are used to heat water - according to NPR’s article, Camp Lejeune “is quickly becoming the largest [community] in the continental U.S. to heat water with solar energy.”

FLS’ solar panel heating system works like a greenhouse, heating fluid inside the house and transferring that heat into a 40-gallon, 180-degree water tank. They seem to specialize in installing solar panels in places that use a lot of hot water which, as is the case with Camp Lejeune, isn’t directly paid for by residents. The idea here, or at least one of them, is to show how inexpensive renewable energy can be. And the locals are agreeable to it; Sgt. Kirk Paulsen’s quote about the panel installation being “a milestone in our history books for the Marine Corps, for the state of North Carolina and for the continental U.S.” is well taken, as is his sentiment that “we’re conserving it for our children’s children’s children.”

This isn’t the first time that the military has tried out renewable energy, and their R&D wizards can improve it further if given the opportunity/funding. Their endorsement of things like solar power would provide a solid example for the rest of us, too, especially those of us whose political leanings are traditionally hostile to green energy. Most importantly, as the reader who sent this in pointed out, it’s more proof that “the anti-renewable energy crowd isn’t living in complete reality…their ideas just haven’t kept up with the way tech has advanced, especially in areas like solar.” Semper Fi!

Lots of manly car chat in this update, but first here’s an amusing hater from Townhall.com - it’s clear from his directionless rant about cap and trade (and Obama, and unions, and all the usual GOP scapegoats) that David Harsanyi doesn’t really understand what he’s angry about. Not that it’s impossible to rationally oppose wind and solar power, but he clearly has no grasp of them beyond their convenience as buzzwords. Guys like this would get in the way if they weren’t so retarded.

Among actual adults, however, there’s a lot to talk about. Arizona’s electric car enthusiasts are soon to benefit from a $99.8 million stimulus-act grant that will help local company Ecotality Inc. roll out 12,000 charging stations and show people how to use them once the Nissan Leaf hits the streets later on this year. Whether or not Mexican residents will be allowed to drive them remains to be seen.

The Leaf won’t be the only option with a sissy name, though. Norwegian electric car maker THINK is $40 million closer to expanding operations to North America, and has plans to start production at its U.S. plant in Elkhart, Indiana next year. THINK cars are currently assembled in Finland. We didn’t get retail prices from THINK, but they’re probably (and hopefully) less than the current $50,000 tag on Toyota’s first hydrogen car. Not exactly the best way to deflate criticism that hydrogen car research is too expensive, but Toyota reps are insistent that “production cost should be covered within the price of the vehicle.” At least they understand that they have to cut that price in half before making any serious pushes to sell these things in America - we have enough reasons to hate rich people already without their cars getting fancier.

And with that, we must dash, but it’s good to see electric cars and similar tech. gaining momentum despite laughable resistance from guys like Harsanyi. Seriously, “three-cornered-hat-wearing Visigoths?” What a tool.

Wow, it’s been a while since the last update. Sorry about that! Finals and one of us having to throw hours of his life into the Pit of Eternal Suck that is the Maryland Film Festival kinda got in the way of the blog for a minute there, but we’re back! And we’ve got some interesting news this time.

Electric cars are whisper-quiet compared to conventional automobiles, which poses a unique hazard to the deaf and hard-of-hearing. The scenario of an impaired pedestrian walking right in front of a car because he or she didn’t hear it coming has been brought up a lot, and while one would think people would help keep each other safe in situations like that, the sad truth of it is that investments in human kindness rarely see returns.

So electric car manufacturers are going for the next best thing: Star Wars. Yep, the Daily Mail reports that “regulators in the European Union, Japan and the United States are considering allowing manufacturers an array of sounds - from the conventional [engine noises] to sci-fi sounds from Star Wars” so pedestrians can hear them coming. There’s even talk of allowing manufacturers to create their own “signature sounds” for their electric vehicles, which strikes us as a potentially terrible ringtone-for-your-car situation, but the basic idea is (pardon the pun) perfectly sound. Car noises alert people to oncoming cars, and also inform drivers of whether or not the car is accelerating or decelerating. Plus, all the hopeless dorks at Corn Car HQ want our cars to sound like the Millennium Falcon.

What other sound packages would be cool to include with electric cars? Anyone?

Here’s a brief but important update: Purdue University scientists have been tinkering with their original analysis of ethanol, and “have cut about 10 percent of the total emissions expected from an increase in corn ethanol production.” Taking shifts in land use over time into consideration, ethanol is better for reducing greenhouse gas emissions than they’d previously thought. Purdue agricultural economist Wally Tyner told reporters that “the difference between this report and previous reports is advances in science. With any issue, your first cut may not be the best, but when you get new data and new methods, you improve.”

One of the consistent problems we find with media coverage of ethanol, and other green energy efforts, is ignorance of the very thing Tyner was talking about. Distillation technology has improved over the past few years, with cellulosic ethanol making particularly impressive leaps and bounds, and researchers are more than happy to get right back in the lab and figure out how to make them even better. That spirit of frontier innovation is evident throughout green energy projects these days, especially ethanol, solar power, and wind, which makes it endlessly frustrating when the media reads one study by one research team and then parrots those results for years afterwards. This revision might not get much coverage, and certainly not enough to break through the Phil Spector-esque wall of noise about how supposedly wasteful and inefficient ethanol is.

But this is all stuff we’ve said before, and this is supposed to be a happy update. So we’ll leave off here, with a big thumbs up to Purdue and a picture of kittens to sustain good cheer.

Cars.com just put out a list of 2010’s greenest American cities and, whaddaya know, seven out of the top ten are on the West Coast (mostly California and Oregon). The top twenty branches out a little bit to include Charlottesville (VA), Fairbanks (Alaska), and several cities in the Midwest. Baltimore, sadly, is #103, in spite of all the recent green efforts - rooftop gardening, hybrid buses, etc. - we’ve undertaken. It’s even more depressing when you consider that Washington DC, a mere 30 minutes south of us, is #20. We’re at a loss to explain why that is; DC has a lot of the same problems Baltimore does in terms of corruption and money being scarce for things that actually matter and wealthy suburbanites leaving the city’s urban center to rot. Perhaps DC’s status as the federal government’s company town keeps enough money flowing to start up green city projects.

On the other end of the spectrum we have Detroit, which is turning green in the most literal sense of the word, at #140. Detroit certainly doesn’t have the money to buy hybrid buses or solar paneling - they can barely sustain a population - and city services have been cut to the point where parts of the city are becoming “rejungled,” AKA overtaken by weeds and plant life and, in some extreme cases, impromptu marshland sprouting from large puddles. It sounds and is horrible, but people are looking at Detroit as a site for urban farming efforts because of this, and entire abandoned neighborhoods are being bought to turn into greenhouses and communal farms. The response of Detroit’s remaining population will certainly be interesting, and varied, but the green movement’s eye for opportunity is one of its better qualities, and since everyone else has abandoned Detroit, kudos to them for thinking something can still be done there.

We’ve gone a little far afield from our original topic, but it’s also worth noting that this listing defined “green cities” by how many of their residents are “researching hybrid cars, crossovers and SUVs” thus far in 2010. Hybrids are great and all, but that’s not a complete sample of green efforts by any stretch of the imagination. Taking more green projects into account, we wonder how those numbers might change.

Ethanol has, quite literally, gone commercial; Growth Energy is putting $2.5 million into a pro-ethanol marketing campaign, which will unfold over the next six months. The TV spots are en route, and former Democratic presidential candidate Gen. Wesley K. Clark. is acting as a spokesperson of sorts, seeing as how he’s co-chairman of Growth Energy and all. The ads, and doubtless everything else in the campaign, will pitch ethanol as an American-made renewable fuel that lessens dependence on foreign energy sources. Why does that sound so familiar?

Of course, some foreign energy sources want us to be dependent on them. Brazil, for instance, has also launched an ad campaign, complete with a website - Sweeter Alternative - geared to an American audience. It’s also, according to Gas 2.0, trying to drum up support against the tariffs that have kept Brazilian ethanol out of American gas tanks thus far. Gas 2.0 pushes the Brazilian ethanol industry a little too hard, we think - yes, they’re doing much better than us regarding flex-fuels, and yes they are a democracy with whom we could trade, but pushing their ethanol too hard would discourage us from making any of our own. The whole point, after all, is self-sufficiency, which is not achieved by galloping after foreign countries with things we want at the expense of our own manufacturing sector. That said, if Brazil wants to lobby for lower tariffs, let ‘em. We just need to make sure we aren’t heading into a frying pan/fire situation.

And credit where it’s due, “cane in the tank means money in the bank” is a cool slogan. “For drivers, competition means even regular gasoline would cost less” still needs some work.

We are busy people over here at Corn Car, so forgive us for leaving the blog unattended - hopefully our readers had a green St. Patrick’s Day in the environmental sense of it. Since we’re still digging our way up through mountains of work, here’s some reading material to keep everyone occupied for a while.

China Drawing High-Tech Research From U.S. - Yes, the Chinese are literally taking our jerbs. Specifically, engineers seeking jobs in a high-tech economy; according to the article, “companies are concluding that their researchers need to be close to factories and consumers alike.” Of course, China’s green energy/tech growth is due as much to unfair protectionism on their part as it is to the huge investment they’ve made in those industries, but they’re still a competitor and now the traditional flow of workers from east to west is reversing course. And after a certain point, the West can’t bitch about China locking out foreign companies when a) we’ve been stacking the deck against the developing world for decades, and b) many of American’s policy-makers are too stupid to see the potential in green energy.

Meanwhile, High-Speed Rail Gains Traction in Spain - A lot of EU members are trying to reduce their carbon footprints, and high-speed rail is a good start; “emissions per passenger on a high-speed train are about one-fourth of those generated by flying or driving.” But more importantly, Spain’s new rail system is upscale, convenient, and comfortable. Passengers get comfy seats, good food, polite service, and the new rail system chops the travel time between Barcelona and Madrid from 6 hours to two and a half. It’s basically what airlines used to be like in the 50s before they got greedy.

Speaking of, the American airline industry is miffed that Obama is investing federal funding into trains. But, according to Transportation Sec. Ray LaHood, that’s just tough shit for them. “We’re going to get into the high-speed rail business,” he told the the Federal Aviation Administration’s annual forecasting conference, following that up with “people want alternatives…people are still going to fly, but we need alternatives. So get with the program.” His candor is more than welcome. Airlines have been providing steadily worse, often frustrating service to passengers over the years, then bitching at the government when they lose money. They don’t seem to be able to connect those dots, or else they don’t want to. Either way, the entitlement from that industry has been rewarded for too long, and it’s nice to see someone tell them to suck it up and quit whining. Of course, the question of why it will take us 30 years to install high-speed rail when parts of the EU already have it is a question no one’s answered yet, but feel free to leave a comment if you have any ideas.

Any more links? No? All right, back to work.

This hasn’t been a good winter for a lot of people, but Tesla Motors has had a particularly rough 2010 so far. First they cease operations on their Roadster, then three of their employees die when their plane crashed into high-tension power lines. CEO Elon Musk identified the three victims of the crash as “plane owner and pilot Doug Bourn, 56…Brian Finn, a 42-year-old senior interactive electronics manager…and electrical engineer Andrew Ingram.” Finn reportedly lived a couple of blocks away from the crash site; Doug Bourn “shared responsibility for the design and testing of the power electronics module for the Roadster.”

Since we’ve covered Tesla in the past, and rooted for them as a potential developer of mass-market electric vehicles, we at Corn Car send our condolences to the families and friends of Doug Bourn, Brian Finn, and Andrew Ingram.