GM is helping Seattle get a little greener
King County, was awarded a contract today for the purchase of up to 500 buses, which will be powered by General Motors. The five-year contract is between King County and New Flyer Industries, which is provided its hybrid system from GM. This will increase the fleet of alternative fuel buses to more than 700, saving an estimated 1.1 million gallons of per year.
This announcement makes some wonder why GM is seemingly focused on buses instead of its consumer automotive division which has been taken to school by the Japanese hybrids that eclipse them by some 80% of Miles Per Gallon efficiency. In the recent documentary “Who killed the electric car” GM seemingly was made out to be a culprit in what were odd choices in the production of the EV1 in California. They actually hired a firm to attack their own product in the media and went out of their way in promoting all of its shortcomings.
However the actual owners loved their cars and were forced to give them back or face criminal charges even if they were willing to pay for them. After GM reclaimed the vehicles, promises of donating them to colleges for research and recycling every part, proved untrue as they were crushed in the Arizona desert.
As gas approaches $4.00 a gallon in this area, some might wonder what might have happened if the program was expanded and an American car company would have been the dominate presence in field. The Japanese companies were only reacting to all the US car makers that were seemingly making a huge switch in tactics from their combustible engine successes. Just a few years later the same US companies had virtually abandoned their programs and Toyota came out with the Prius, and the rest they say is history.