Car Insurance, Loan, Purchase, Lease Decisions

Another dual fuel engine / vehicle in the making - Amonia Powered Vehicle

Well folks the race to alternative fuels continues — now there is a new entrant.  This time it is an Amonia powered engine.  Actually it is a gasoline+amonia powered engine where according to NH3CAR (the company developing and commercializing the technology), the mix is 80% amonia and 20% gasoline.  The company has outfitted a GM S-10 truck with the system to use the new fuel — a system which actually allows for the vehicle to use both gasoline only as well as gasoline + amonia mixture.

According to the company, this alternative fuel technology has one very critical benefit — it helps reduce carbon emissions in the atmosphere as amonia does not have carbon in its chemical composition.

So there you have it folks — the rising energy costs are finally creating enough incentives for technology development and companies (as well as universities) are jumping in.

In the case of Amonia University of Michigan grad student is behind the dual fuel technology development.  At the same time, apparently Ohio State Univ. is developing amonia only engine.

When you think about it, both developments have merit.  I agree in the early stages having the dual fuel system is important as refueling of amonia only engine would be a challenge (until infrastructure develops) but if the fuel and engine really work (based on amonia as a fuel) this infrastructure development should happen very fast.  Amonia is so plentiful, the US and worldwide manufacturers have experience in its production, (after all it has been used in agriculture for a long time) so deploying the technology fast should not be a big challenge.

Lets see…..  I will track the progress of the two approaches…

Incentives for Hybrid Vehicle Purchase (tax rebates, HOV lanes, etc)

Here is a list of incentives that are either in place or being considered in various States across the US:

Tax Incentives: (please make sure you consult your tax advisor - the information below is NOT a tax advice)

• Federal Tax Credit: Per IRS, this tax credit is subtracted directly from the total amount of federal tax owed, and applies to vehicles purchased after January 1, 2006. The value of the tax credit varies by the type of vehicle purchased and ranges between $250 (for the not so efficient GMC trucks in 2007 model year) and $3000 for a Ford Escape 2WD 2008 model year for example. The popular Toyota Prius gets $1575 for the 2007 model year;
• Colorado: Also offering tax credit in the range of $2000-$3000; Interestingly some of the less efficient hybrids (e.g. Chevy Silverado, Dodge Ram) do not appear to qualify for the tax credit. More detail here
• Kansas: considering a $2500 for first 1000 people who apply for it. The state has already a $750 tax credit available but very few people have applied
• Other states - like Arkansas for example - are considering removing the state sales tax on sale of hybrids that are at least twenty-five percent (25%) higher than the miles per gallon rating designated for a comparable model that does not have hybrid characteristics.

HOV Lanes — this is another benefit of owning a hybrid. In several states already, this incentive will give you faster transit times as you can use the usually less congested High Occupancy Vehicle lane on the local highways. States like Arizona, California, are either considering them or have them in place already.

The Cost of Owning a Hybrid Vehicle is Discussed

Recently there have been a bunch of articles dealing with the cost of owning and operating a hybrid vehicle. In January (2007) Intellichoice, published analysis as well. Here is the summary table based on their analysis.  You need to be careful though — the assessment done by Intellichoice still assumes that going forward the tax rebates given by the Fed. Gov’t will continue and that the price of gasoline will continue to rise.  This is not necessarily the case.

Article published by Consumer Reports also shows that most hybrids also recover the initial premium buyers have to pay on purchase of the vehicles, but the overall cost benefit is not very pronounced.

At the end of the day, we all need to consider the hybrids.  It is a good choice both from the standpoint of reducing carbon emissions, and from the standpoint of driving fun — hybrids do have fast acceleration thus making them interesting to drive.  Plus the growing volume of hybrid purchased will continue to drive even their initial cost down.

New Hybrid Vehicles

I added some more vehicles to the list of hybrids, electric and concept vehicles.  Check it out on this page

Fuel Cell Cars are coming (supposedly in 2008)

Over the past several weeks there have been a number of articles/reports on fuel-cell vehicles coming into the market.  Honda has been testing its FCX product family (from Honda’s Web site)

(The car was apparently approved for commercial use all the way back in 2002)  The 2005 version is powered by designed by Honda fuel cell stack.  The car is definitely “Clean” — its emissions are essentially water vapor.  Honda has been road testing its fuel cell vehicles in the US since 1999.  Now they have also a concept vehicle for 2008 model year.  This one looks really cool and will probably be very comfortable and useful car.  Here it is

  (courtesy of Businessweek.com)   Then there is a GMC Hybrid SUV — per the recently posted articles this one will have a combined fuel consumption of 20mpg — interesting…

There are now many hybrids on the market

Recently I decided to check what manufacturers offer hybrids.

Reading articles on-line or in printed media you see many references to Toyota Prius, but after searching through the manufacturers I came across the following: Continue reading There are now many hybrids on the market…