Word: hydrogen
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...adopting an impressive array of advanced technologies invented both in Detroit and very far from it. Instead of an internal-combustion engine, for example, the Hy-wire is powered by fuel cells like those used in the orbiting space station. Power is generated by an electrochemical reaction of hydrogen and oxygen that yields as its by-product only heat and H2O. No smelly exhaust, no smog, no greenhouse gases...
Instead of a rearview mirror, there's a camera that projects an image of the road you have traveled, along with such driving data as speed and hydrogen-fuel levels. Because the car is fully programmable, drivers can set their performance preferences. (Brakes: soft or hard? Engine: sporty or fuel conserving...
...heart of the Hy-wire, however, is the aluminum, skateboard-like chassis that runs the length of the vehicle. Nestled within it are the fuel cells, an electric motor, tanks of compressed hydrogen and all the electronics. Because the fiber-glass body is basically a shell, different models can be swapped like cell-phone covers. So you could in theory drive a sports car on the weekends and change it into a minivan to haul the kids to school...
...prototype, and getting the first production units on the road by 2010 would require the notoriously sluggish auto industry to shift gears a lot faster than usual. For one thing, the roadside infrastructure that fuels and services today's gas guzzlers would have to be redesigned to dispense hydrogen and reprogram faulty control systems. But if the result were a fleet of safe, fuel-efficient, nonpolluting cars and trucks that reduced or eliminated the world's dependence on fossil fuel, it would be worth the effort. --By Anita Hamilton
...talk, Schor advocated the sustainable alternatives to materialist culture described in her new book Sustainable Planet: Solutions for the Twenty-first Century. These included, among other things, parking the gas-guzzling SUV in the garage and retreating in one’s electric car (or, her favorite, the hydrogen operated $100,000 BMW 750 class) to a safer place of simplicity and community—a place where one spends less than $100 on holiday celebrations, uses green cleaning products, eats organic foods and celebrates a generally happy and fulfilled life. As Schor’s personal bumper sticker reads...