By Beth Lowery
Unlike the world’s supply of oil, there is no scarcity of opinions out there on topic, the role that automobiles should or could play in the environmental and energy equation. I will share GM’s vision with you. . .the strategic choices we’ve made and the risks we’ve assumed. . .as we attempt to solve the very real, very daunting issues facing our world and the auto industry.
Despite the very difficult market that automakers face in the United States currently. . .our industry is experiencing tremendous growth elsewhere, in emerging markets like China, India and Russia, to name a few.
There are about 820 million vehicles in the world today. With rapid sales growth in many regions, more people are behind the wheel of a car than at any time in history.
As these emerging markets develop, we expect that at least 15 percent of the world’s population will own a vehicle by 2020 – that’s more than a billion vehicles. To put that in perspective, if you were to park all of those vehicles end-to-end, you would circle the globe 125 times!
We are forecasting that the vehicle market in China will surpass the volume of the U.S. market to become the world’s largest by 2014. This fact alone assures that energy supply – and the impact on oil prices – will remain critical for the foreseeable future.
This unprecedented growth in vehicle ownership only heightens concerns about the automobile’s almost exclusive dependence on petroleum.
Today, more than a third of the world’s energy needs are met with petroleum, and the automobile is 96-percent dependent on fossil fuels.
Supply and availability, fuel prices, sustainable growth, climate change, or even national security – pick your issue, but the common denominator is oil. As we look at this picture today and consider the future of the automobile, one fact stands out above all others: Going forward, we can no longer rely primarily on oil to supply the world’s automotive energy requirements. It’s just that simple and obvious.
Defining the auto industry’s course going forward in terms of priorities, choices, and actions remains an open field. While we have our eye on the future, we’re not ignoring consumers’ needs today. Thanks to strong designs, excellent quality and competitive fuel economy, our small and midsize cars are experiencing double-digit sales increases.
And we are pushing to further improve the efficiency of all of our vehicles. For example, we recently announced the replacement for the current Chevy Cobalt, the Chevy Cruze, which will get an additional nine miles per gallon in fuel economy when it debuts in 2010.
We announced that we are building on the segment-leading fuel economy of our full-size pickups and SUVs with new models of the 2009 Chevy Silverado, Chevy Tahoe, GMC Sierra and GMC Yukon.
These new Extra Fuel Economy models use a combination of mechanical, aerodynamic and mass-reducing enhancements to deliver a 5-percent increase in EPA-estimated highway fuel economy, and more than 7-percent improved mileage in city driving.
These improvements mean that customers who need the capability of full-size pickups and SUVs won’t have to sacrifice the very best fuel economy available in the marketplace today.
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