Contact:
Keith Hay
303-573-3871 x 339 (o)
510-502-9491(m)
Denver, CO— Surrounded by hybrid and alternative fuel car
owners staging a park-in, Environment Colorado Research & Policy Center released
Beyond Oil: The Transportation Fuels That Can Help Reduce Global Warming,
a report outlining policies that will wean the United States from oil to
cleaner, more secure alternatives.
“So far, the debate about lowering prices at the pump is
missing the point. Congress and Colorado legislators are talking about drilling
the Roan, opening the Arctic, and melting oil from Colorado shale. These are
not sensible solutions to high energy prices,” said Keith Hay, energy advocate
at Environment Colorado. “Getting power from renewable resources will be
cheaper, cleaner and politically wiser.”
The report, Beyond Oil: The Transportation Fuels That Can Help
Reduce Global Warming, evaluates the leading contenders in the alternative
fuels race, with a specific focus on their impact on global warming and the
environment. It shows that the best
solution to lowering emissions from vehicles is to combine the approaches that
offer the greatest environmental benefits. For example, an efficient plug-in
hybrid vehicle operating on electricity and cellulosic ethanol made from crop
waste has emissions that are at least 70% lower than gasoline.
“We need smart solutions to our energy crisis, and here in
Colorado we are building one of them—a smart electrical grid that will allow
hybrid owners to plug in to Colorado’s abundant wind and solar resources.” said
Carl Lawrence, CEO of Hybrids Plus Inc., a Boulder based company that is
working with the Governor’s Energy Office and Xcel Energy on implementing
vehicle-to-grid technology in Colorado.
While there are siren calls in Congress for a quick fix, the
report makes it clear that during the current energy crisis public policy
should be supporting transportation fuels that are clean and have a long-term
potential to replace gasoline. A low carbon fuel standard that moves us toward
electricity from renewable resources is a key in meeting that goal.
While most Coloradans are feeling pain every time they stop
at the pump, hybrid and alternative fuel car owners highlighted their savings
at a time of rising fuel costs.
Golden resident Steve Stevens, the owner a hybrid Toyota
Prius commented, “My slogan is ‘To zero and beyond.’ Once I switch to plugging
the car into some of the surplus output of my solar panels, it might actually
cost me below a penny a mile. However, this isn’t about cheap fuel.
Making the switch will mean that my lifestyle goes below zero in global warming
pollution. I have grandkids and want to do what I can to reduce the threat that
we face from global warming.”
The report
makes a number of recommendations to local, state and federal policymakers for
achieving large reductions in global warming pollution from cars and light
trucks and reducing our oil dependence; including:
- Adopting a low carbon fuel standard that will help
open a market for plug-in hybrid vehicles.
- Requiring that by 2020, all new vehicles are
capable of using lower carbon fuels, whether electricity or bio-fuels.
- Supporting additional research into advanced
technologies such as batteries, cultivation techniques for cellulosic feedstock
and into technologies for converting cellulosic feed-stocks, especially waste,
into fuel.
- Improving vehicle fuel economy and pursuing
measures to reduce total driving.
- Amending the recently passed federal renewable
fuels standard to require that all ethanol sold be subject to a low carbon fuel
standard.
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Environment Colorado Research & Policy Center is a
501(c)(3) organization. We are dedicated to protecting Colorado’s air, water,
and open spaces. We investigate problems, craft solutions, educate the public
and decision makers, and help Coloradans make their voices heard in local,
state and national debates over the quality of our environment and our lives.
