Dig out the long power cable else it's the end of the Great American Car Company

Interesting para in the New York Times last week that is likely to have a big impact on all of us in Materials land, "With car sales running at their lowest level in 15 years GM and Chrysler face the possibility of bankruptcy".

To say the least, this is a bit of a serious issue for the US economy and their suppliers. When you examine the figures, it's fair to say that GM didn't have a great time in the last financial quarter, losing a tidy US$15.5 billion!

One of the ideas being floated to solve the car industry problem in the US is the idea of a mega merger of the big three auto makers - now I'm not one of those Wall Street smart kids, but it sounds to me like this may make the problem three times bigger.

Then again, what do I know about high finance, to me "Standard and Poor" sounds like the new lifestyle for many on Wall Street.

Let's just face it, the oil based car era is in terminal decline and maybe it's not such a bad thing - at least on this note we can give GM a pat on the back for their introduction of the Chevy Volt.

This tech laden horseless carriage recently made an appearance at the Australian Motor Show - notable this year for the absence of something pretty important at car shows - namely car manufacturers.

Around 18 of the big boys (including BMW, Mercedes, Aston Martin etc) decided that a couple of weeks in the Sydney sunshine could be missed this year - a sure sign of global budget cuts rather than an aversion to kangaroo steak?

Anyhow, enough whingeing let's stay positive and charge up the Volt.

It can run for 64km on electric power from its lithium ion battery and then if needed a petrol motor kicks in to power the generator to recharge the battery and allow a further 900km plus of driving range.

The Volt takes between three and eight hours to recharge and GM estimates the energy bill is equivalent to a household refrigerator.

It's also packed with materials tech including Lexan Polycarbonate from GE Plastics to reduce weight and to increase design options in comparison to good old glass.

Several parts are also fabricated from GE plastics Xenoy iT™ resin. A polymer derived from recycled PBT (plastic bottle) polymers - thereby reducing the carbon footprint in the manufacture of the vehicle.

According to GE,

if all of the PBT in the world were made from the PBT in Valox iQ™ resin, producers would save 7.9 million barrels of crude oil. This is equivalent to the total daily consumption of crude oil in Japan or US$ 440 million worth of crude oil.

Still mileage in materials innovations in these troubled times, but I digress, back to the Volt.

The only bit I don't get is what do you do when you're on your 3 week driving trip around Europe? You'll need a stack of power adaptors and a 300m extension lead to hook your volt up with the voltage in your 5th floor apartment every evening.

Can't see that concept catching on with Italian hoteliers!

Maybe the solution resides with Shai Agassi and his Better Place Company . They plan to use a mobile phone business model to sell/lease electric cars to consumers as part of a monthly package.

The cars would recharge at a network of charging stations that could either recharge the cars or replace the flat battery with a fully charged version.

Simple but brilliant or a crackpot idea?

Well, consider that many cellular phone operators will "give" you a $1000 phone as part of a monthly package and a Tata Nano costs $2500, maybe they are onto something, plus they've just raised $200M, so it must be a better investment than a sub-prime mortgage.

Better get my order in quick for the Koenigsegg CCX, the $2m gas guzzler that can hit 388 km/h - gonna be a collectors item in 10 years.