Mean Clean Machines

By Anita Hamilton

The car, at least as we know it, is on the way out. New types of fuel and construction materials are on the horizon, and the look and feel of autos are on the brink of a radical redesign. Driving promises to become more environmentally friendly, stylish and fun. We may not be whizzing around in flying cars like the Jetsons or speeding vertically toward the sky on magnetic tracks as in Minority Report, but we will definitely be traveling in ways previously unimagined.

And we won't just ride in cars--a top U.S. inventor has transformed the lowly scooter into what he calls a high-tech "human transporter," while the humble bicycle is poised to incorporate a few tricks of its own.

Of course, the best way to conserve energy and reduce pollution would be to phase out cars in favor of mass transportation. But let's face it: that's not going to happen. People want a private, comfortable way to get around, and so our love affair with the automobile is as hot as ever. More than 17 million cars are sold each year in the U.S. alone, and demand is surging in developing countries such as China, where sales are expected to grow from 600,000 in 2001 to 2 million in 2010.

Because people won't give up their four-wheelers, the challenge is to reduce the tail-pipe emissions that contribute to everything from respiratory distress to global warming. "We have to build a sustainable transportation technology that doesn't ask people to sacrifice," says John Wallace, executive director of Ford's Think Group. Lighter-weight materials and cars can help reduce overall energy consumption, but the key is to find a better power source.

The first solution, a few years ago, was battery-powered electric cars, like Ford's cute little Think model. But electric cars have less range than gas-powered cars, and it's hardly convenient to recharge the batteries. The newer gasoline-electric hybrid cars, like the Toyota Prius and Honda's hybrid Civic, recharge themselves and go much farther on a gallon of gas than do conventional cars, but they aren't pollution free.

Many industry watchers believe that the fuel of the future for powering electric cars will be hydrogen. Special fuel cells can combine hydrogen with oxygen to produce electricity, driving a motor that can spin the wheels of the car much more quietly than a gas engine can. The only thing spewing from the tail pipe is water--pure enough to drink. Because fuel cells and electric motors are more compact than bulky internal-combustion engines, the new technology will free up the shape and design of cars.

Researchers at General Motors have shown one of the most innovative approaches to fuel-cell cars with the Hy-wire prototype, unveiled this year. Gone are the engine, transmission and gas tank found in today's internal-combustion cars. In their place is a skateboard-like platform--just 6 in. thick--that houses the fuel cells, the hydrogen tank and all the electronics that are needed to power the car. Electric motors placed inside each wheel get the car rolling. Because the steering controls are all electronic--a concept known as "drive by wire"--gone, too, is the mechanical steering column. Instead, drivers rotate a small handgrip to accelerate and squeeze it to brake. "The basic premise is providing consumers with a design they can get passionate about, rather than asking them to compromise their lifestyles," says Christopher Borroni-Bird, director of "design and technology fusion" at GM.

Support for fuel-cell cars is accelerating faster than a Corvette. Every U.S. automaker has demonstrated a prototype version, and full-scale production models are expected to come out within the next 10 years as costs drop. Before the big roll-out, Toyota and Honda plan to bring small test fleets to market in the U.S. sometime next year, and Ford says it will follow in 2004. To speed the debut of the fuel cells, President Bush is proposing tax breaks and other industry incentives.

A more immediate approach to developing eco-friendly cars involves reducing their all-around energy requirements in the first place. The steel that most cars are made of could be replaced by carbon-fiber polymers, which are lighter and more aerodynamic, as well as easy to make. The body panels on the diminutive Smart car from DaimlerChrysler are made of a recyclable thermoplastic alloy called Xenoy that is several times lighter than steel and helps the car get up to 65 m.p.g. Some 116,000 Smarts were sold last year in Europe and Japan, a 16% increase over 2000. But Americans' appetite for fast, powerful cars and roomy sport-utility vehicles (SUVs) makes it unlikely that they will ever settle for a two-seater the size of a golf cart that takes 17 sec. to go from zero to 60 m.p.h. (about twice as long as the typical car sold in the U.S.). Hence Detroit's preoccupation with fuel cells, which could ultimately clean up even the most monstrous SUV.

Making personal transport less damaging to the planet means looking beyond cars as well. "If you could wave a magic wand and make every car fuel efficient, it wouldn't solve all our problems," says Dean Kamen, founder of DEKA Research in Manchester, N.H. "It is still very energy intensive to move a 2,000- or 3,000-pound machine." His solution: the Segway, the recently unveiled high-end scooter that goes up to 13 m.p.h., is powered by an electric motor and runs on just a nickel's worth of electricity a day. The batteries today are standard nickel- metal hydride and nickel-cadmium, but the scooters could easily be switched over to a hydrogen-based power source. One of the $8,000 machine's coolest features is its steering and braking system, which uses a series of gyroscopes to sense and respond to your body's movements: lean forward, and the Segway accelerates. Lean backward, and it stops.

For those on a tighter budget or just eager to get a little healthful exercise, there is always the bicycle, which appears to be mounting a comeback. After a slump in the mid-1990s, bicycle production leaped to more than 100 million units in 2000, compared with just 62 million in 1980. But what about couch potatoes who have no willpower to pedal? At least two manufacturers, Aprilia in Italy and Manhattan Scientifics in the U.S., think they have the answer: make the venerable two-wheeler propel itself with its very own fuel cell. --With reporting by Joseph R. Szczesny/Detroit

With reporting by Joseph R. Szczesny/Detroit