Competition Fuels Chase for Efficiency

While the Frankfurt, Germany, auto show was buzzing last week with electric models designed to go farther on a single battery charge, a Charlottesville real estate developer with ties to Lynchburg, was discussing his own entry in the growing parade of fuel-efficient vehicles.

Oliver Kuttner has spent the last couple of years with a team of engineers inside a converted Lynchburg warehouse designing and assembling a lightweight car that should make Big Oil take notice. The engineers believe the vehicle will get 110 miles per gallon in the city and 140 mpg on the highway.

Kuttner’s team borrowed a name from the high-tech past as they have developed their entry in the Progressive Automotive X Prize competition. The name is Edison*2, as they see themselves as a contemporary version of the lab that invented the light bulb.

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Brad Jaeger, a professional race car driver and one of the engineers, believes the team will be a contender. “We’ll be one of the teams to beat,” he said.

The ultimate prize, as Kuttner sees it, is in the national interest. It is a vehicle that decreases America’s dependence on foreign oil. He also sees a vehicle that will slow the pace of global warming and revolutionize modern transportation.

“This is nothing less than a complete game changer,” he said.

Unlike the manufacturers at the Frankfurt Auto Show, who were putting dozens of electric models on display, Kuttner’s car of the future will continue to run on gasoline, but will weigh a fraction of the normal car today.

Every part of Edison*2’s car is made of strong, but extremely light metal. Its lug nuts, for example, will weigh about as much as a couple of pennies. Its wheels are smaller and lighter than conventional cars. While the team is currently working on a three-wheel version, the final one will have four wheels, will seat four people and will be slightly larger than a Volkswagen Jetta.

Hybrids and electric cars, Kuttner says, require heavy batteries and support systems that weigh down the car and make them energy inefficient. They also have a limited mileage range, although the newer electric cars are boosting that range.

The team is aware that a lighter vehicle is more vulnerable in crashes on the highway, but Kuttner says the materials are strong and safe. While he won’t reveal what they are, he says the vehicle will pass any government safety test once it is completed.

The goal — after winning the international competition, of course — is to license the car’s design to a manufacturer that will mass produce it for consumers at a price of about $15,000. If that works out, the entrepreneur believes the vehicle could slash America’s energy consumption by 30 percent.

That would make it a definite game changer for many Americans who depend on the family auto for daily transportation. Any car that will exceed 100 mpg has the promise of revolutionizing the auto industry and reducing America’s dependence on foreign oil.

It’s good to see the competitive spirit alive and well, especially in a Lynchburg warehouse. That’s the ingenuity that has always sustained America.