The huge Hummer doesn't seem very green. And how could a Hummer do anything to battle climate change? But Johnathan Goodwin of Wichita Kansas is proving that even big American SUVs and muscle cars can be much more efficient. (Thanks to Casey Miner at Mother Jones' Blue Marble blog for the link.) Goodwin is currently working on a Hummer H3 conversion that he predicts will get 60 miles per gallon and accelerate from zero to 60 in only five seconds. He's throwing down a challenge to the Big (but getting smaller) Three American automakers to increase efficiency, cut emissions and use home grown fuels. Using a mix of biodiesel, hydrogen-injection and hybrids, he's raising the bar pretty high, and he's doing it with off the shelf parts. In a recent Fast Company interview he said:
Detroit could do all this stuff overnight if it wanted to
And they've got nothing to lose, he adds. But is better fuel efficiency the only issue? The H3 is a 5000-lb (2270 kg) vehicle. What could be done with something much smaller? Or maybe this will take some even more radical thinking. As Justin Thomas of treehugger notes:
I'm an advocate for transportation solutions that don't involve cars. Building more highways and larger bypasses is not a sustainable solution for our transportation need. Instead high-speed rail and car-free cities would be the most efficient.
Will we have to rethink transportation entirely in the 21st Century?
Photo by kleinman from Flickr, Some Rights Reserved
