Autoline after hours: Lutz and Detroit Autoshow

i just read that sub prime mortgages are back, repackaged as 'non prime'. those who forget the past are destined to repeat it.

 

In fairness, I believe gas prices, when adjusted for inflation, are low in comparison to the last 30 years. Seeing how greedy speculators or a blow out in the Middle East can quickly raise it, it would be foolish to declare CAFE unneeded though.

 

Why doesn't Klutz, er, Lutz go away?

DBCassidy

 

IMHO the key line on Lutz's resume should be that his awful car market judgement helped bankrupt GM. Next line is he seems to be able to garner lots of fans in the 60+ age range predicting what will happen in the auto world.

The karma is a pretty car. I don't don't think corvette is nearly as pretty, but represents a great value (low price) for all the performance it provides. The fusion is also a pretty car, but much less expensive. The great thing about the 'vette for those fan bois is that its built in the US and performce great. MOst of the buyers wanted one in highschool That doesn't seem to be a good fit for the karma that is much heavier. How will it compete against say the Lexus RC f or BMW 6
Lexus RC F is a predatory sport coupe with a 450-horsepower beating heart - Autoblog
It won't. I am sure there are enough Lutz fanbois to buy a few of these karma conerts.

Architecture is fine, but its Lutz and it will fail, like GM failed. These things are too expensive, and if they take off Ford or GM or Toyota can build a better, cheaper, plug in hybrid.

Yep and he bet gm would not need efficint cars before gas spiked in the past. How did that work out for the american taxpayers, that bailed him out.

Green is dead this year on the detroit autoshow circuit. That is because all of the previous green vehilces have been anounced before. Nothing new, not that customers won't increase. Now on the greener side we do have the new aluminum boday on boxed steel frame Ford F150, and the above Lexus RC-f with a atkinson V8, but this is nothing like last year with the electics and phvs coming out party.

On Gas prices even analog stoped clocks are right twice a day, so maybe this time Bob Lutz is right. I saw Bob Carter sounding a lot like Bob Lutz recently also predicting stable gas prices and talking about selling hybrids when gas prices aren't going up. Bob Carter also sounds a lot like Bob Lutz used to on Fuel Cell cars, and toyota seems to anounce the same fuel cell mirracles at every auto show.

Now what was Bob Carter thinking about gas prices and building the prius in america back in 2008?
Toyota projects gas prices to bottom out at $3.50
Yep, that they wouldn't fall lowre than $3.50 and should be closer to $5 by now, and

Ofcourse that price floor really is a level that gas is bellow today, and has been most of the time since the statement.
Historical Gas Price Charts - GasBuddy.com

Ofourse Bob Carter was simply following the auto industry group think. Its amazing when I looked for the quote, I found a site claiming gas would be much higher.
Toyota Projects Gas Prices To Hit $5.00 By Middle Of Next Decade, We Think They're Being Optimistic

Now imagine if Bob and Bob are right this time, and I don't see why we won't have stable gas prices for a few more years before going up. Given easing tensions with Iran and more North American oil, I doubt the wall street speculators are going to bid it up to the crazy 2008 levels for awhile. Then Carter's stopped clock correctness may also be true, that we need to raise fuel taxes if the country is going to sell more efficient cars. Hey he was wrong about the SUVs being a great place for GM to be, that doesn't mean phevs and higher oil taxes aren't a good idea today.

 

Lutz is probably only wrong 70% of the time.

 

Oil price may be driven by the increasing difficulties in prospection and production: deeper, harder, less API grade...
Certainly the price will rise over time.

And given the earth atmosphere 400ppm CO2 threshold soon to be reached, diverting from "green" seems pretty stupid.

 

Absolutely, but this does not mean prices due to speculation, underestimation of reserves, and long term prospects of switching to other energy (plug-ins, biofuels) has not gotten ahead of itself.

Short-Term Energy Outlook - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)
EIA expects slowly declining oil price trends for this year and next which are why both bob carter and bob lutz are echoing the prediction. Could it be wrong? Sure. Their could be a war with canada that closes the border and drops out much of canadian oil from the world market until they can build infrastructure to send it to china. The european economy could heat up, or china could go to 10% growth rate. There could be war or revolution in Iran or Saudi Arabia. But none of these things are likely in the next couple of years. Go out decades and one could defiitely happen. Deutch Bank put out this prediction in 2009, so it should not have been totally unexpected.

I don't think any of the car companies except maybe Lutz's via is turning less green, and lets put that in perspective, they want to convert 25 cars, which isn't much. Also I don't think many buy cars for low co2, and it would be strange if they did. Say you get 10% of the efficient cars to put out half the ghg, that would not even be a rounding error in the ppm in the atmosphere. It would cut oil imports for that country though, a much more achievable goal, as buying a more efficient car does nothing to reduce the number of coal power plants being used in asia.

So lets look at where lutz gets it wrong. He wants to end cafe to help his own company, which when oil gets more expensive hopes to convert trucks to plug-ins.

Then where he gets it right is oil prices in the short term are stable to declining. That is a great time to add a gas tax in the US, which may encourge more efficient cars more than cafe standards do.