The Automotive X-Prize, sponsored by Progressive Insurance, was awarded late last week. The company that won is based in Lynchburg, Virginia. This is Tom Perriello's Congressional District, CD-5. Virginia CD-5 covers the southern and central areas of Virginia. In fact, it is the largest Congressional District in Virginia, edging out the western most CD-9. He's in a tough race as he is a major target for the right wing who think that this PVI R+5 district belongs to them. There is more over the jump with a tremendous video of Oliver Kuttner, the head of the winning Edison2 team.
But before we delve into some juicy links, I wanted to make sure that everyone who can, to look at this incredible video of excerpts from the acceptance speech by Oliver Kuttner, the winning team leader. I'm sorry I don't have the transcript. Maybe someone out there can find it and I'll add. This should be spread widely and it speaks for itself.
Wow, that tells us what it's all about. Here's Tom Perriello's ActBlue page. You know what you want to do.
OK, let's fill in the story.
Oliver Kuttner, the Charlottesville real estate developer turned automotive developer, has won the $5 million top prize in the Progressive Automotive X Prize, it was announced Thursday morning. His Edison2 team’s winning vehicle, a four-seater called the Very Light Car, reportedly gets 102 miles per gallon of fuel and could, Kuttner hopes, reshape the automotive industry.
Just as an aside it seems like Oliver Kuttner likes to make waves:
Two years ago, Kuttner helped embarrass local water officials— who were busily portraying dredging their main reservoir as impossibly expensive— by offering to dredge for $30 million, a fraction of the quarter-billion one consultant claimed it might cost. "It would be a dream job," Kuttner said. "I’ll make so much money."
Here's a post from Climate Progress that gives an overview with a cool picture of the winning car.
Three design teams from Mooresville, North Carolina, Lynchburg, Virginia and Winterthur, Switzerland have succeeded in building extremely fuel efficient vehicles that are capable of traveling at least 100 miles per gallon of gasoline (or equivalent, MPGe). The teams survived a series of performance lab and road tests that eliminated 133 other vehicles from the first ever Progressive Insurance Automotive X Prize competition.
The AP speaks:
The "Very Light Car No. 98" seats four and is built on a steel frame of mostly aluminum parts. That keeps the weight at 830 pounds, around a quarter of the weight of an average car. It has a space-age, race car look and a tear drop shape, with the wheels set far out from the car to help deflect crashes.
Kuttner, a real-estate developer and race-car driver, said a team of around 100 people — including many racing veterans — developed the car. They opted for a one-cylinder, ethanol-capable engine instead of an electric car because batteries add weight and gas is readily available. But the team said its innovations in aerodynamics and the use of lightweight materials could apply to any kind of vehicle.
CNET News says:
The challenge set for this particular prize from the famed X Prize Foundation was to design and build a car with a fuel economy of 100 MPGe, a new acronym for a vehicle that gets "miles per gallon or energy equivalent." In addition to getting extreme gas mileage, the winning car of the Automotive X Prize also had to pass Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. The winner of the mainstream category also had to seat four people.
So what is this MPGe standard? It's a new standard that tries to compare the energy used by various means by incorporating into the more familiar miles per gallon standard. Here's more about that:
Basically we ask: how much energy was delivered to the vehicle, and how far did it go? We convert the energy to the number of gallons of gasoline containing equivalent energy, and we express the result as miles per gallon.
Snip.........
MPGe is an attractive figure of merit because it’s a direct measure of overall "pump-to-wheels" efficiency, because it’s technology-neutral, and because it relates nicely to consumer intuition – i.e., it reduces to the familiar MPG if the fuel is in fact gasoline.
Here's Peter Diamandis, Chairman & CEO, X PRIZE Foundation, in a HuffPo piece
We've seen a shift in the market since we first launched this competition, and a greater awareness by the American people to think more seriously about the actions we take, and how they affect our environment. We have also seen a rise in acceptance of the MPGe model used in our competition, a new benchmark in measuring fuel economy. MPGe has the advantage of public familiarity. That is why our partner, Consumer Reports, has joined us in championing MPGe as a robust, transparent and fuel neutral standard that consumers can use to make apples-to-apples comparisons of such next-generation vehicles to the cars they drive today.
Here's a nice post from the the Grey Lady herself, here quoting Peter Diamandis
"You get what you incentivize, and our goal was to incentivize 100 miles per gallon or the energy equivalent, or better," he said. "We really are hoping to give birth to a new industry. That process is critical. That happened with the Ansari X Prize, and we really are looking to make that happen here."
Here's a nice article from Mother Nature Network:
The company’s mantra will be that today’s cars are aerodynamically hopeless, and the road forward is with airplane-like rounded cabins whose outboard wheels are on struts. "The direct angle car has been developed as far as it can go," he (Kuttner) said. "The numbers don’t lie: When you use a traditional McPherson-type suspension there are a huge number of load points, and that dictates a heavier chassis. Our design means a smaller chassis, smaller components and you end up with a positive feedback loop."
So let's get Tom's back here, he's a good one.