Obama Invests Record $2.4 Billion in Electric Vehicles, Advanced Batteries

President Barack Obama today announced $2.4 billion in economic stimulus funding for 48 new advanced battery and electric drive projects, the single largest investment in advanced battery technology for hybrid and electric-drive vehicles ever made.

President Obama visited Navistar International Corporation in Elkhart to make the announcement. Navistar will receive a $39 million grant to manufacture electric trucks, which the company reports will ultimately will create or save hundreds of jobs when full scale manufacturing at the site begins. Overall, seven projects in Indiana will receive grants totaling more than $400 million.

"If we want to reduce our dependence on oil, put Americans back to work and reassert our manufacturing sector as one of the greatest in the world, we must produce the advanced, efficient vehicles of the future," said President Obama.

President Barack Obama addresses a crowd in Elkhart, Indiana. (Photo by Dan Horst)

Industry officials expect that this $2.4 billion investment, coupled with another $2.4 billion in cost share from the award winners, will result directly in the creation of tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. battery and auto industries.

Selected by the Department of Energy through a competitive process, the 48 projects are intended to accelerate the development of U.S. manufacturing capacity for batteries and electric drive components as well as the deployment of electric drive vehicles, helping to establish American leadership in creating the next generation of advanced vehicles.

The new awards include $1.5 billion in grants to U.S. based manufacturers to produce batteries and their components and to expand battery recycling capacity.

The funding covers $500 million in grants to U.S. based manufacturers to produce electric drive components for vehicles, including electric motors, power electronics, and other drive train components.

Another $400 million in grants will purchase thousands of plug-in hybrid and all-electric vehicles for test demonstrations in several dozen locations. The funding will be used to deploy them and evaluate their performance, to install electric charging infrastructure, and to provide education and workforce training to support the transition to advanced electric transportation systems.

Vice President Joe Biden and four members of the Cabinet, fanned out across the country to promote the stimulus announcement.

In Detroit, Biden announced over $1 billion in grants to companies and universities based in Michigan. Reflecting the state’s leadership in clean energy manufacturing, Michigan companies and institutions are receiving the largest share of grant funding of any state.

"For our nation and our economy to recover, we must have a vision for what can be built here in the future – and then we need to invest in that vision," said Biden. "That’s what we’re doing today and that’s what this Recovery Act is about."

Two companies, A123 and Johnson Controls, will receive a total of approximately $550 million to establish a manufacturing base in the state for advanced batteries, and two others, Compact Power and Dow Kokam, will receive a total of over $300 million for manufacturing battery cells and materials. Large automakers based in Michigan, including GM, Chrysler, and Ford, will receive a total of more than $400 million to manufacture thousands of advanced hybrid and electric vehicles as well as batteries and electric drive components.

And three educational institutions in Michigan, the University of Michigan, Wayne State University in Detroit, and Michigan Technological University in Houghton in the Upper Peninsula, will receive a total of more than $10 million for education and work force training programs to train researchers, technicians and service providers, and to conduct consumer research to accelerate the transition towards advanced vehicles and batteries.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu visited Celgard, in Charlotte, North Carolina, to announce a $49 million grant for the company to expand its separator production capacity to serve the expected increased demand for lithium-ion batteries from manufacturing facilities in the United States. Celgard estimates that hundreds of jobs could be created, beginning as early as this autumn.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson was in St. Petersburg, Florida to announce a $95.5 million grant for Saft America, Inc. to construct a new plant in Jacksonville on the site of the former Cecil Field military base, to manufacture lithium-ion cells, modules and battery packs for military, industrial, and agricultural vehicles.

Deputy Secretary of the Department of Transportation John Porcari visited East Penn Manufacturing Co., in Lyon Station, Pennsylvania, to award the company a $32.5 million grant to increase production capacity for their valve regulated lead-acid batteries and the UltraBattery, a lead-acid battery combined with a carbon supercapacitor, for micro and mild hybrid applications. East Penn Manufacturing is a third-generation family business with over 63 years in battery manufacturing.

Commerce Secretary Gary Locke visited Kansas City, Missouri, to announce a $10 million grant for Smith Electric to build and deploy up to 100 electric vehicles, including vans, pickups, and their Newton brand of medium duty trucks.

In addition, Secretary Locke announced three other grants supporting manufacturing and educational programs in Missouri: a $30 million grant to Ford Motor Company supporting the manufacturing of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles in Kansas City and in Michigan; a $73 million grant to Chrysler, for the manufacturing of 220 plug-in hybrid and electric pickup trucks and minivans in St. Louis and in Michigan; and a $5 million grant to Missouri University of Science and Technology in Rolla to fund educational and workforce training programs on advanced vehicles technologies

On the Fairway, New Lessons in Saving Water

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Cory Blair, left, Matt Corentin and Joe Hollis put out water catch cans for an irrigation audit at the Atlanta Country Club in Marietta, Ga., which uses several methods in its water strategy.

With emerald fairways that glistened even in the most blistering conditions, they were a tempting target.

Yet golf course managers were indignant. They argued that they were reining in water use in dozens of ways, like planting native grasses and auditing sprinkler spray patterns. Instead of being penalized, they said, they should be emulated.

It took a while, but from the South to the arid West, their wish is coming true. Mindful that global warming could provoke more and longer dry spells, state governments are increasingly consulting golf courses on water strategies.

In Georgia, golf course managers have emerged as go-to gurus on water conservation for both industries and nonprofit groups.

Marriott International is applying lessons learned at its golf course here to its resort properties in other states. Habitat for Humanity is landscaping front yards with drought-tolerant plants recommended by golf superintendents.

“Look, if you want to learn how to irrigate, these are the guys to ask,” said Garith Grinnell, who recently retired from the Southern Nevada Water Authority.

Such accolades are a turnabout for a business that is often faulted for harming the environment through excess use of water and pesticides.

In Georgia, the shift in perspective came about largely because of a crippling drought that peaked in 2007. By that year, 97 percent of the clubs that belonged to the Georgia Golf Course Superintendents Association had voluntarily adopted what are viewed as best-management practices for water use, reducing consumption, they estimated, by 25 percent in just three years.

Lake Lanier, Atlanta’s main source of water, had meanwhile dropped to record low levels, exposing muddy bottom not seen in half a century. It dawned on state and local water managers that golf courses might have some useful know-how.

Golfing grounds managers “are great technical assistance to me,” said Kathy Nguyen, president of the Georgia Water Wise Council, a state association of water professionals that encourages conservation. “I can call them up and talk to them about different technologies.” (Georgia’s drought eased significantly this year.)

Ms. Nguyen has relied on golf superintendents in drafting guidelines for homeowners like letting grass grow longer, fixing leaks in hoses as promptly as possible and keeping lawn mower blades razor sharp. (Grass cut by duller blades is more frayed and requires more water to stay healthy.)

The golf industry still draws strong criticism from environmentalists. Turf is, after all, the thirstiest of plants. The average American golf course drinks up some 50 million gallons of water a year — comparable to the yearly usage of 1,400 people. In the West, the figures are higher.

Yet that reality, coupled with rising water prices, is what led to strides like irrigating golf courses with “gray water,” or nonindustrial wastewater that is recycled for other purposes.

Tom Bancroft, chief scientist with the National Audubon Society, says that for all the progress golf has made, it remains a deeply problematic industry. Many courses “use fertilizers that can run off into fresh water, and many use pesticides in lawn and grass,” Mr. Bancroft said. (Audubon International, a separate group, works with golf courses to encourage wildlife preservation.)

Mark Esoda, superintendent of the Atlanta Country Club in suburban Marietta, where initiation fees are $85,000, acknowledges that practices among the nation’s courses range from indifferent to conscientious. But Mr. Esoda maintains that he and other superintendents have a lot to teach municipalities about watering their ball fields and homeowners about tending to their yards.

Zipping around the course on pine-shaded paths, Mr. Esoda stopped abruptly near the seventh hole. He gestured toward a patch of newly laid turf of zoysia, a warm-weather shade grass native to Southeast Asia and Australia. On shady parts of the course it is replacing fescue, a genus of cold-weather shade grass that can live through the winter and thus requires five months’ more watering and mowing.

Mr. Esoda said he had also installed affordable monitors that prevent automatic sprinklers from activating during or right after a rain.

And when isolated dry spots appear on the greens, he said, he sends staff members out with watering cans rather than turning on the sprinkler system.

Finally, Mr. Esoda has made an aesthetic adjustment after years of savoring the green glow of a perfect lawn. “Crispy around the edges is O.K.,” he confided.

Water is just one area where golf courses and environmentalists may find a rapprochement, said Anthony L. Williams, director of grounds at Marriott’s Stone Mountain public courses just outside Atlanta.

As metropolitan areas sprawl outward, golf courses may be the only large-scale green space for miles around, offering crucial potential habitat for migrating birds and other wildlife.

Mr. Williams, who has a degree in local horticulture, has been letting native grasses take over his lawns. Off the fairways he does not even bother to mow, and on the greens he is maintaining grass at one-sixteenth of an inch higher than typical courses. It makes playing slow, he allows, but “consistent.” He has also replaced all the flowering annuals with perennials, which generally require less water, choosing those that are attractive to native wildlife.

Since he took charge of the two courses in 2005, Mr. Williams has cut water consumption by 45 percent, he said, and witnessed the return of some wildlife species like the red-tailed hawk.

The changes have come with a price, like the occasional large brown spot on the fairway. But Mr. Williams says the golfers do not mind.

“I just stand out there on the greens and explain, ‘We are doing this so your grandchildren can come out here and play,’ ” he said. “People understand that.”

‘The Great Squeeze’ joins long list of doomsaying eco-films

The Great Squeeze, a documentary by director Christophe Fauchere (of 2007’s film Energy Crossroads), is full of such apocalyptic observations, none of which should surprise anyone even vaguely environmentally-minded.

The film is polished and put-together, chock-full of interviews with various professors and experts, and features powerful footage of displaced typhoon victims and third-world children picking through trash heaps. The problem with The Great Squeeze is that its subject matter is too broad, and its format and delivery are not unique enough to reach the legions of uninformed citizens who most need to hear what it has to say. Those of us inclined to pick up a documentary with the vague subtitle “Surviving the Human Project” are probably already on board with efforts to create a sustainable future. We don’t need more swelling, ominous music, staggering world population statistics, or haunting shots of belching oil refineries to convince us.

The Great Squeeze made some brief but interesting observations that I wish had been explored more deeply. It discussed the modern concept of progress, which has only barely begun to shift away from being defined by levels of consumption and convenience—barometers that developing countries have been monitoring for decades in an effort to emulate the American lifestyle. The film also touched on the fact that Americans have lost “the tragic sense of life”—that is, that our expectation of instant gratification has wiped away the truth that life contains loss as well as consumption, hard times as well as happy times, and that often pain and sacrifice are required of us before we can move to a better place.

For those balking at the idea of transforming our economy into a clean, green one, this is the message they need to hear. But I fear that The Great Squeeze, like so much environmental advocacy journalism before it, drowns this point with too many familiar images of bleached coral reefs and paddling polar bears. It’s no surprise to learn, then, that the production company, Tiroir a Films, is working hard to market the film to the academic community, where Energy Crossroads enjoyed some success, according independent producer Joyce Johnson.

Film Notes: The Great Squeeze was released in March. It won Best Long-Form Documentary at the Festival de Cine Ecologico y de la Naturaleza de Canarias (Spain) 2009. The producers are hoping to sign a broadcast deal with an independent channel and are focusing on distributing a version of the film tailored for academic settings.You can order a copy online.

Watch the film’s trailer:

Toyota Prius top-selling car in Japan for 3 months

Toyota's hugely popular Prius hybrid ranked as Japan's top-selling car in July, clinching the spot for the third consecutive month as tax breaks boosted sales of green vehicles, an auto industry group said Thursday.

The Japan Automobile Dealers Association said Toyota Motor Corp., the world's No. 1 automaker, sold 27,712 Prius cars in July, up 24 percent from June.

Sales of gas-electric hybrid cars have been surging in Japan despite the global auto slump, helped by government incentives such as making hybrid vehicles tax free.

"The government program is spurring demand for hybrid vehicles like the Prius. Strong sales of the Prius also reflected a trend that consumers were interested in eco-friendly products," said Kentaro Nakata, an association spokesman.

Toyota's rival, Honda Motor Co., also enjoyed brisk sales of the Insight hybrid. Japan's No. 2 automaker sold 10,210 Insight cars in July, up 16.3 percent from June.

The Insight, a hybrid marketed as a cheaper alternative to the Prius, held the No. 4 slot in July auto sales. Honda's popular Fit compact secured the No. 2 spot in July sales.

Toyota's Vitz subcompact, which is marketed overseas as the Yaris, came third in July auto sales, the association said.

Honda, meanwhile, Thursday brushed off claims in Japanese and overseas media that the Insight is a copycat of the Prius.

"We don't think it looks like the Prius at all," said Nobuki Ebisawa, managing director at Honda R&D Co., Honda Motor Co.'s research unit. "There may be some similarities in the roof line, but it is clearly different."

Ebisawa acknowledged considerations for maximizing aerodynamics and placing the hybrid system of electric motor and gas engine may make for similar styling in hybrids cars.

Any similarities between the Prius and Insight are coincidence, he said.

Florida Bay's ecology on the brink of collapse

Boat captain Tad Burke looks out over Florida Bay and sees an ecosystem that's dying as politicians, land owners and environmentalists bicker.

He has been plying these waters for nearly 25 years, and has seen the declines in shrimp and lobster that use the bay as a nursery, and less of the coveted species like bonefish that draw recreational sportsmen from around the world.

"Bonefish used to be very prevalent, and now we don't see a tenth of the amount that we used to find in the bay, and even around the Keys because the habitat no longer supports the population," says Burke, head of the Florida Keys FishExperts fear a collapse of the entire ecosystem, threatening not only some of the nation's most popular tourism destinations — Everglades National Park and the Florida Keys — but a commercial and recreational fishery worth millions of dollars.

Florida Bay is a sprawling estuary at the state's southern tip, covering nearly three times the area of New York City.

The headwaters of the Everglades — starting some 300 miles north near Orlando — used to end up here after flowing south in a shallow sheet like a broad, slow-moving river, filtering through miles of muck, marsh and sawgrass.

'Virtual garden of Eden'
Historically, the bay thrived on that perfect mix of freshwater from the Everglades and saltwater from the adjacent Gulf of Mexico. It was a virtual Garden of Eden, home to a bounty of wading birds, fish, sea grasses and sponges.

But to the north of the bay, man's unforgiving push to develop South Florida has left the land dissected with roads, dikes and miles of flood control canals to make way for homes and farms, choking off the freshwater flow and slowly killing the bay.

Ill effects
The ill effects extend even across the narrow spit of land that makes up the Florida Keys to the shallow coral reefs in the Atlantic Ocean. Many popular commercial fish like grouper and snapper begin their lives in the bay before migrating into the ocean to the reefs.

"If Florida Bay heads south and there's a lot less fish in there, well, when that's done, it's all over down here," Burke says. "When that goes, your reefs are going to go, too, and it'll just be a chain reaction.

"You could argue that the bay has already collapsed," he says.

Algae blooms block life-giving sunlight from penetrating the water's surface. Sea grasses that filter the water and provide habitat for the food chain are dying. And some migratory birds aren't returning.

"The health of Florida Bay is very much tied to the state of the Everglades, and the Everglades isn't improving either," says Tom Van Lent, senior scientist with the not-for-profit Everglades Foundation. "Their fates are one and the same."

Struggle to curb pollution
For decades, the state has struggled to find a way to restore natural flow through the Everglades and curb the pollution caused by runoff from sugar farms, cow pastures and urban sprawl. It is the largest such wetlands restoration effort ever.

"Having that water coming down from the Everglades is key," says Rob Clift of the National Parks Conservation Association. "It has to be restored."

Attempts to fix the Everglades by constructing water treatment marshes and reservoirs, among other things, have been dogged by politics, funding shortfalls, and contentious, litigation-filled disagreements over the best solutions. And while land has been purchased and some projects completed, key restoration components are undone.

"It's really aggravating," Burke says. "We've seen very little, if any, really ground breaking projects that would help change the flow into Florida Bay."

Lawsuits
A litany of lawsuits filed by parties favoring one solution over another are partly to blame, says Carol Wehle, executive director of the South Florida Water Management District, the state agency overseeing Everglades restoration.

Name an environmental group, and the agency has been sued by them.

Wehle calls them "obstructionists." Her agency heads back to court Aug. 6 for closing arguments in yet another lawsuit.

"There are a handful of people that choose not to participate in this process and instead use litigation, and who is losing? The environment is losing," Wehle says.

The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians, who call the Everglades their ancestral home, have sued the water district repeatedly. It's the tribe and a few others who now have the district back in court as part of an effort to block the state's planned $536 million purchase of land in the Everglades from U.S. Sugar Corp.

Tribe spokeswoman Joette Lorion says the deal could end up costing taxpayers billions of dollars, leaving little money to pay for actual projects, and will create more delays as officials figure out exactly what to do with all the new land.

"Meeting upon meeting, and the Everglades continues to die," Lorion says.

The water district says the deal is a historic opportunity to take sugar out of production and provide land to build much-needed reservoirs and treatment areas to clean and store water.

Back on Florida Bay, Burke just wants something done before it's too late. To the casual onlooker, the area is stunning even today. But Burke knows better.

"In a lot of ways," he says, "it's still pristine and beautiful down here, but it's also on its last dying breath."ing Guides Association.

$2.4 Billion to Make Cars Greener

Seeking to put the nation back in the lead on an important technology, the Obama administration awarded more than $2 billion in grants on Wednesday for manufacturing advanced batteries and other components for electric cars.The president and four members of his cabinet fanned out across the nation’s industrial heartland, hit hard by the recession, to announce the grants, meant to help companies bolster large-scale manufacturing lines for modern batteries of the sort now mostly made in Asia.

President Obama traveled to Elkhart, Ind., for example, to give a $39 million grant to Navistar International, a truck manufacturer. And he sent the vice president, the secretaries of energy and commerce, the deputy secretary of transportation and the head of the Environmental Protection Agency to other cities to make similar announcements.

In most cases, the recipients were required to match the federal money dollar for dollar. Some companies that received grants make chemicals for batteries, or components for chemical batteries. Several make capacitors, which are mechanical devices that can absorb or give off jolts of electricity in a few seconds. Those are useful in electric vehicles, for getting them moving or soaking up the electricity they can produce when the driver applies the brakes.

The money comes from the economic stimulus package and is intended to further several goals: cutting dependence on petroleum, reducing carbon emissions, creating jobs and giving the United States a better start on what is likely to be a competitive global industry as companies start bringing electric cars to market.

Sarwant Singh, a consultant at Frost & Sullivan, said the business should work well in the United States, because only 10 percent to 15 percent of the cost of a battery was labor. “There’s no reason that this battery should be manufactured in China,” he said. “There’s no reason to look for a low-cost manufacturing base; you should look for a high-tech manufacturing base.”

The Volt, the coming electric car from General Motors, which will have a small gasoline engine and also draw energy from a wall socket, dominated the grants.

G.M. received $106 million for the production of battery packs for the car, which is planned for next year and is supposed to go the first 40 miles each day on electricity and the rest on gasoline. G.M. will make the packs in Brownstown, Mich.

In addition, G.M. received $30 million to build 125 Volts for electric utilities and 500 more for other consumers to use as a test fleet. That comes to nearly $49,000 a vehicle.

And it received $105 million for construction of factories to produce a second generation of electric vehicles, with rear-wheel drive, in White Marsh, Md., and Wixom, Mich. (The Volt is front-wheel drive.)

Compact Power, an affiliate of LG Chem, received $151 million, one of the largest grants, for production of cells for the Volt. It will do that work in the Michigan towns of St. Clair, Pontiac and Holland.

The Ford Motor Company received $30 million to work with 15 electric utilities and deploy up to 150 plug-in hybrid vehicles, including the Escape, its small sport utility vehicle, and the E-450, a heavy-duty van derived from its old Econoline series. The carmaker also got $63 million to produce components of an electric drivetrain.

Chrysler received $70 million to develop and deploy 220 plug-in hybrid pickups and minivans. Since the auto bailouts, the federal government owns 61 percent of G.M. and 8 percent of Chrysler.

Greg Martin, a spokesman for G.M., said the reason that the company did so well in the grants was that it was ahead of its American competitors in developing a plug-in hybrid.

“It’s really captured the imagination of the country and the consumer,” he said. “If we’re not going to take the leadership in this, other countries will.”

In fact, foreign manufacturers with plants in the United States also got slices. A partner of Nissan, the Electric Transportation Engineering Corporation, which is based in Phoenix, received nearly $100 million to deploy up to 5,000 all-electric vehicles as a demonstration.

The money is mostly for lithium-ion batteries, but spread around several different chemistries within that group. A Seattle company, EnerG2, got $21 million, which it said would be used to build the world’s first commercial-scale plant for nano-structured battery materials. Those materials reduce battery weight by providing large amounts of space for chemical reactions, in nooks and crannies of finely textured materials.

Some of the money is for education, but it is not for research. Nearly all the money is being spent to reduce battery production costs, by getting manufacturing started on a mass basis.

Not all the money went to batteries. A small Oregon nonprofit, Cascade Sierra Solutions, got $22 million to install electric outlets in truck stops and to help modify 5,450 trucks so that when drivers park, the cabs can be heated or cooled without idling their diesel engines. Colleges and universities received money for training mechanics.

Fumes from rotting seaweed on France's northern beaches could kill

Holidaymakers have been told to keep away from beaches in northern France covered in seaweed after doctors gave warning that it could give off lethal fumes when it rots.

A stretch of beach had to be closed after a horse rider lost consciousness as a result of the putrefying algae. His horse was killed. Local residents have also been treated in hospital.

The incident was in Brittany, where green seaweed is spreading across the region’s beaches as nitrates pollute the water supply as a result of intensive agriculture.

Scientists say that as the seaweed — known locally as sea lettuce — decomposes, it forms an impermeable white crust under which hydrogen sulphide accumulates. When the crust is broken, the gas is released.


Alain Menesguen, director of research at the French Institute for Sea Research and Exploitation, said: “This is a very toxic gas, which smells like rotten eggs. It attacks the respiratory system and can kill a man or an animal in minutes.” Some scientists believe that a build-up of hydrogen sulphide in the atmosphere wiped out the dinosaurs 300 million years ago.

Pierre Philippe, of the Lannion hospital in Brittany, said that hydrogen sulphide was as dangerous as cyanide. He said that he had treated several cases of poisoning caused by the seaweed among local residents, including a council worker paid to clear beaches of the algae who was taken to hospital in a coma.

The health scare is a new blow to the French tourism industry, already suffering from a big fall in the number of British visitors.

The dangers were highlighted after Vincent Petit, 27, a veterinary surgeon from Paris, said that rotting seaweed a metre deep had killed his horse last week as he rode across St-Michel-en-Grève beach. Mr Petit lost consciousness and was pulled off the beach. A post-mortem on the horse showed that it had died of pulmonary oedema caused by inhaling hydrogen sulphide given off by the rotting seaweed.

Jean-François Piquot, a spokesman for the environmental group Eau et Rivières, said that toxic seaweed had been present on beaches in Brittany for decades and was spreading. “There are about five beaches that are unusable. The problem is getting worse.” Up to 70,000 cubic metres of seaweed is cleared off about 70 beaches every summer in Brittany, according to Eau et Rivières.

“There is no doubt that farming is to blame,” said Mr Piquot. “Britanny has 5 per cent of French agricultural land but 60 per cent of the pigs, 45 per cent of the poultry and 30 per cent of the dairy farms. As our rivers are not long, the pollution does not have time to clear before the water reaches the sea. If it enters a closed bay and there is sunlight, that produces the seaweed.”

There was further dismal news for French tourist industry leaders when a beach in Villefranche-sur-Mer on the Mediterranean coast was closed last week because of toxic seaweed — this time blamed on global warming.

In Marseilles, 13 beaches were shut at the weekend after heavy rainfall washed the contents of the city’s sewer into the sea