When it comes to cars, in previous few years much has been said in about safety of passengers and drivers. There were only a few words though about the safety of the environment. After making huge steps in backing up all that has been said about drivers’ safety, it seems automobile manufacturers are making the first steps towards backing up all that was discussed about environment.
Automotive industry’s new models are being designed and built to fit into a “lightweight” category with the goal of reducing fuel usage and limiting gas emissions. Much has already been done in field of developing and installing new engines that would be more fuel efficient. Led by the Fiat’s example of low fuel consumption line of engines launched more than 10 years ago, all European manufacturers have been working on developing their own new and advanced fuel saving power units, and the results of their work can be seen in new models today.
As for the USA ‘s manufacturers, it seems that not only they’re thinking about making fuel efficient engines but are also considering using new lighter materials in car production. In this way they believe new models won’t be polluting environment as much as today just by using new technology in engine production, but also by their overall weight reduction which should create considerable reduction in gas emissions thanks to lower fuel consumption.
As far as fuel efficiency goes European car manufacturers already have low consumption engines installed in almost every of their models (Peugeot, Renault and Fiat leading the way) although those are not as popular in USA because they are considered to be a rather small vehicles by American standards. It seems US manufacturers still have a long way to go, since the goal is to build a car that could make 54 miles per gallon run and according to this year’s report fuel consumption with newest models is at just over 30 miles per gallon.
Besides mentioned approaches to reaching the year 2025 goal of 54 miles long run, manufacturers are also thinking about altering the propulsion system, and making a car that could run on batteries (at least a part of the distance) is also being considered. Although electric car is not the newest concept and there are prototypes in existence serial production is still far from becoming reality, the good thing is that we have started thinking about environment safety as well as about ours.
