'Green' is the new 'black'

Hybrid and clean-diesel power trains, fuel-cell and plug-in cars, and BMW's Hydrogen 7 mono-fuel sedan (internal combustion engine luxury car run solely on hydrogen) set the stage for a promising, sustainable personal transportation future. Perhaps the most optimistic booth featured maps of hydrogen fueling stations in major American cities that could be available within a decade for filling up fuel-cell powered vehicles.

It seemed this trend to greater environmental responsibility and energy independence was made more imperative—and legitimate—by the unbridled rise in U.S. fuel prices to record levels going on outside the hall. I say "legitimate" because those of us with enough corporate memory remember calls for energy independence and fuel efficiency going back to the First Energy Crisis in the early 1970s—perhaps this time we'll finally get it right.