The recent announcement that Mazda Motor Corporation wants to cut the fuel consumption of its entire fleet 30 percent by 2015 shows the entire industry’s shift toward greener ways. Mazda has indicated that it is making major adjustments to its current fleet and bringing along new vehicles that will meet this mandate in the next eight years. The company will begin its path to fuel-efficient vehicles by dropping the weight of each make by at least 100 kilograms in the next three years.

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Honda is taking another step toward Toyota in the hybrid vehicle market with its new FCX Clarity. This hydrogen/electric hybrid is rolling off the assembly line of Honda’s New Model Center as you read this post. The three-year goal for Honda is leasing 200 of these vehicles to consumers in the United States and Japan. The initial run of FCX Clarity vehicles will enter Honda dealerships in southern California by July 2008.

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The good news keeps rolling for Toyota Motor Company regarding its Toyota FCHV-adv sports utility vehicle. This vehicle was given vehicle-type certification by the Japanese government last week. Organizers from the Environmental Showcase at July’s Hokkaido Toyako Summit have allowed Toyota to highlight the FCHV-adv as a prototype for attendees. There are many reasons why Toyota’s newest hybrid vehicle is getting the attention of auto tastemakers.

The FCHV-adv contains hydrogen tanks that are able to hold up to 10,000-psi pressure that fuel the vehicle. Toyota’s initial testing found that the FCHV-adv can run up to 516 miles on a single filling of hydrogen. Subsequent tests have placed the vehicle’s range between 348 and 472 miles in real driving conditions.

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The European Parliament is devoting its fifth Joint Technology Initiative (JTI) to the subject of hydrogen and alternative fuel cells. This continental legislature has addressed diverse issues like nanotechnology, medicine, aeronautic transportation and computing through these funded initiatives. The fifth JTI supports the European Union’s Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Initiative with an initial budget of one billion euros.

The intended goals of the EU’s initiative are to development and implement alternative technologies that can be implemented within the next decade. The one billion euros will be distributed to companies and agencies promoting the creation of affordable hydrogen fuel cells and other power sources. These fuel sources will be directed to public transit bodies, military organizations and consumers with the hope that additional innovations will be born because of initial funding.

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The head of Audi continues the trend among German automakers in recent months toward developing marketable electric cars. Rupert Stadler from Audi has said that the venerable German company will create electric cars in Europe by 2018. The rationale given by Stadler for Audi’s new commitment to electric-powered vehicles is the accelerated affordability of electrical components. Audi is following competitors like Mercedes-Benz and BMW toward the lucrative global market for zero-emission vehicles.

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The Ford Motor Company has built 30 hydrogen-fueled E-450 buses for use by corporate and government clients. The Wayne County Airport Authority has procured two of these buses for passenger transportation within the Detroit Metropolitan Airport complex. This purchase means that Ford has two-thirds of its hydrogen bus fleet running in cities from Florida to Vancouver.

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What is green, soft, glows in the dark and can do a 360 standing in place? The Honda PUYO concept car. Although it is not literally green, not until it glows in the dark perhaps. With a design reflecting a cross between a space moon buggy and cartoon car, this concept car is pointless. Well, we mean to say it is all curves and soft bumps, and is void of sharp edges.

Late last year Honda opened the 40th Tokyo Motor Show with the theme “For the endless joy of mobility on our earth”, and I imagine they were going for safe with this concept car as well. The PUYO runs on a fuel cell and is constructed of a soft gel body that glows at night.

Now whether is evokes the ethereal feel of a bubble or the recoiling feel of a chewed bubblegum exterior is subjective. I would liken it to Mr. Bean’s car of the future; simple, safe, friendly. Along those lines it seems well suited as a vehicle for road therapy, one to be assigned to road rage offenders rather than a car you would purchase for a functional purpose.

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E. coli is being manipulated to produce hydrogen. Professor Thomas Wood and his research team at Texas A&M University’s Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering are managing to create 140 times more hydrogen with less energy than the amount it would take to process it naturally.

You can’t talk about fuel-cell technology without talking about hydrogen; and maybe someday we won’t be talking fuel-cell technology without mentioning E. coli. The use of E. coli goes beyond the association with food poisoning. In the late nineties studies of the genome sequence of E. coli identified over 4,000 genes. It was touted as “one of the most studied cells in all of science,” importantly so since the process of studying E. coli is the first stepping stone to tackling the human genome which is 25 times greater than E. coli.

So, where would one start? Professor Wood had to look at E. coli, a bacteria containing somewhere in the range of 5,000 genes today, a bit more than ten years ago, and make power? By deleting six genes in its DNA, E. coli was changed enough to produce hydrogen. The six genes that were eliminated weaken the E. coli bacteria enough to make it able to use more sugar as its power source through its own glucose-conversion process.

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