Plugging in the alternatives

In the run-up to the Saudi OPEC summit, with oil prices continuing to climb, it's left to the the auto industry to get our feet off the gas pedal. As usual, the Japanese remain out in front. Honda is leasing out 200 fuel cell vehicles for the California market. The lack of fuel stations are the main impediment to wider deployment at this point. As usual, the rich and famous (i.e. movie star Jamie Lee Curtis) are the first adopters. In the meantime, GM is still struggling to get its electric car, the Chevrolet Volt, into showrooms by 2010. Chrysler is tinkering with the golf-cart-esque GEM. With Team Bush investing only $30 million in plugin hybrids, they are effectively ceding development to the market, thus ceding it to the Japanese. So while the Saudis go about the business of increasing production by a mere 200,000 barrels of oil a day, the U.S. will be looking to Japan to end it's reliance on foreign oil.