A Natural Gas-Centric Revitalization Program
by: Michael Fitzsimmons March 21, 2009

Speaking of Honda, the company is sitting on a gold mine. Heading into the era of Peak Oil where worldwide oil supply will not keep up with worldwide oil demand, American Honda Motor owns and manufactures two critical assets:
The “Phill”
Honda Civic GX
Honda owns Fuelmaker and it manufactures the Phill. The Phill is a natural gas appliance which can be installed in the garage so the Civic GX can be refueled at home. The mere fact Honda considered selling FuelMaker to Boone Pickens’ Clean Energy Fuels (CLNE) last year indicates Honda management doesn’t understand their huge advantage. Although the deal was nixed, apparently by Honda Motor Corp, in talking with individual Honda dealers around the country, it is quite apparent that Honda marketing and management has yet to figure out the synergies possible in selling both the Civic GX and Phill as a package deal. Sure, there are some state regulations in the way, but there are many steps Honda could take to ease the availability issues with both the GX and Phill.
If the personal emails I receive on my NGV related articles on SA are any indication, there must be thousands of frustrated consumers (like myself) who would jump at the chance to buy a GX and Phill if only sales, installation, and service were available locally. Honda is sitting on a gold mine! All they need to do is figure out how to leverage the strategic advantage they now possess. If Honda hired me I could mold the Civic GX and Phill businesses into a multi-billion dollar cash-cow over the next 3 years. Promise.
On the other hand, if Honda waits until Toyota (#HYPERLINK "http://seekingalpha.com/symbol/tm"TM) wises up and manufactures this vehicle, Honda will lose its leadership position much as Motorola did in cell phones. Honda cannot afford to waste time while others catch up. It should press its advantage until it pays in gold. That means spending a little money to entrench the Civic GX and Phill all over the country and to make it available to anyone anywhere.
A Natural Gas Centric Industrial Revitalization Program Instead of more ridiculous financial bailouts (does anyone other than me think the Fed buying US treasuries simply incest?), what America really needs is a reindustrialization plan based on natural gas transportation. If Obama and his leadership team would focus an energy and industrial revitalization program based on natural gas transportation, the US could once again become a world leader instead of a world problem. America’s abundant natural gas resources combined with its tremendous asset of the existing 2.2 million mile natural gas grid is our key competitive advantage over many other countries. If Obama set a goal to convert half of America’s vehicle fleet to NGV’s over the next 5 years, we could:
Save millions of jobs in the automotive industry.
Reduce foreign oil imports by 5-6 million barrels a day (around 50% of total foreign oil imports).
Save trillions of dollars which would otherwise go to foreign oil producers.
Increase royalty payments to thousands of farmers and landowners sitting atop American natural gas.
Create thousands of jobs in the energy, infrastructure, and CNG sectors.
Reduce CO2 emissions by hundreds of millions of tons annually.
Drastically reduce particulate emissions from gasoline powered automobiles responsible for the smog in so many American cities.
Restore American energy and climate leadership and our reputation as a wise and moral country capable of attacking its own problems instead of other countries.
Rally the country behind a goal everyone could understand, participate in, and profit from.
Strengthen the US dollar and balance our financial trade and budget deficits.
Protect us from dire economic and social consequences of Peak Oil.
The costs of such a program would pay for itself very quickly by reducing the expense of foreign oil, including huge military expenditures to fund oil wars and securing foreign oil transport. Like the interstate highway system, cross country railroads and telegraph lines, the man-on-the-moon project and so many other government sponsored programs, natural gas vehicles and a natural gas refueling infrastructure would pay dividends to all Americans for decades to come. They would remove oil as a critical variable in the energy equation until clean energy capacity is online and clean vehicle technology is robust and mature enough to make the total transition to renewable fuels. Anything less than this natural gas centric policy will not keep America addicted to foreign oil. As we already know, our 65% reliance on foreign oil will continue the economic, environmental, and national security problems which are already at crisis levels.