Obama plans to visit electric vehicle facility

President Barack Obama will visit an electric vehicle research facility this week, highlighting the administration's push for advanced technology vehicles.

But the president isn't visiting any of Detroit's Big Three automakers, opting instead for a research arm of a California utility. California is home to a number of small electric car start-up companies working to produce or convert vehicles to plug-ins.

Obama will visit Southern California's Edison Electric Vehicle Technical Center, a research center in Pomona, on Thursday.

"Obviously as we imagine an auto industry for the future, and I know the auto industry has put a lot of research and funding into the development of cars that can go 40 miles on one charge of a battery, the president hopes to focus and highlight the ability for clean energy jobs to spur economic growth and job creation as we go forward," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Monday.

Edison Electric has had a partnership with Ford Motor Co. on electric vehicle research since 2007. Ford provided Edison with a fleet of Ford Escape Hybrid SUVs to use as part of the plug-in project.

The technical center also services Southern Cal's test fleet of plug-in vehicles, which has logged more than 16 million miles.

Ford won a $10 million grant from the Energy Department last July along with Southern California Edison and Johnson Controls-Saft, a joint battery venture, on a project "to identify a pathway that accelerates mass production of plug-in hybrid vehicles."

In January, Ford announced it would bring a battery electric vehicle to market by 2011 and a plug-in by 2012.

Obama wants 1 million plug-in hybrid vehicles on the road by 2015 and the $787 billion stimulus package approved by Congress last month includes more than $2 billion for new advanced battery research.

Chrysler LLC will have produced 100 all-electric vehicles by year's end, and in January said it plans to have four electric models on the road in 2013. The company says it expects to have 500,000 electric vehicles on the road in four years. Toyota Motor Corp. will have a test fleet of 150 plug-ins on U.S. roads by early next year.

General Motors Corp. plans to begin production of its extended range electric vehicle -- the Chevrolet Volt -- late next year as well.

Southern California Edison is that state's largest electric utility, serving more than 13 million people in a 50,000-square-mile area. California has been pushing utilities to produce more power from renewable sources and automakers to produce zero-emission vehicles.

Last March, the California Air Resources Board agreed to reduce a requirement for automakers producing zero-emission vehicles to 7,500 from 25,000 between 2012 and 2014.

The original mandate, set in 1990, would have required automakers to produce 10 percent of their fleet as zero-emission vehicles by 2003.

Automakers sued to overturn it and the board pared it back in response.

Interview: Ed Welburn, V.P. of Global Design at General Motors

His eye for detail is impeccable. It is evident in the sleek, smooth contours of his designs, which he scans incessantly.

Ed Welburn, V.P. of Global Design, General Motors.

“Can you straighten out the wheels, please,” Ed Welburn asks a helper. “I hate that,” he says, watching the vehicle inch forward on the showroom floor per his directions. It is the cadillac Converj Concept, a breathtaking new eco-friendly electric car he helped conceive. As Vice President of Global Design at General Motors, Welburn, oversees the design of every GM vehicle worldwide. He is the highest ranking African American in the automotive industry, but more impressively, he is only the first head of the global design market, which is also the largest in the world. With his eye on such a sprawling fleet, BET.com caught up with Welburn at the 2009 D.C. Auto Show to get the word on the future of the auto industry, what’s hot on the street for ’09, and what he’s done to go green.

Tell us a bit about your background as a designer, and the path you took to get there. You started out at Howard…

I started out at Howard University, and the thing that was so great about being at Howard was that my instructors there knew that my goal was to be a car designer, and they did everything they could to help me do what I needed to do to reach my goal, which is terrific. I will never forget the attention I got at Howard.

At General Motors, up until about 2005, it was a series of about five or six different companies under one umbrella that did not work together, and in 2003 I was named Vice President of Design for General Motors, which is really Vice President for North America, and the other areas of the world just kind of worked their way around. In 2005, the decision was made to consolidate all of them, and that I would run all of the designs at General Motors globally. Every GM product that is designed on this planet is done under my direction. I’m only the sixth person to run design for GM, and the first to do so globally in the 100 years of the company. 
I love what I do. I visit those other design centers around the world, in Michigan, and California, and Germany and India and China and Australia and Brazil, and I’ve been to them all on a regular basis. I like to give the design team, which is around 1,500 people, a lot of room to work. I don’t like to micromanage. But I’m very aware of every single project in development in GM. My way of leading is by giving people a great deal of responsibility. Basically what I do is open the door and allow them the freedom to create. And vehicles like [the Converj] can happen quickly when you fit the right environment for your people to work in.

You are the first African-American head of design.

Welburn: Yes. You know, I never celebrate that because it also means that for many years there wasn’t one. I was the first African American hired as a designer at GM 36 years ago. I’ve had an amazing career working with some amazing people along the way, and when I stepped into the job it felt natural, it was right, it was within the right environment at the company. I get incredible support from everyone I deal with. At times I still have to pinch myself when I walk into a design review in Brazil or in Korea or China or Australia, and the teams have made incredible efforts to prepare for my review. I never take it for granted. It’s a responsibility I have both as the leader of design organization and as a Black man leading this international design organization. It is the largest design organization in the world, automotive or nonautomotive, and I don’t dwell on it, I just enjoy it. It’s a challenging auto industry, but I thoroughly enjoy what I do.

Tell me a little about this concept car, the Converj, and in general what types of designs we can look forward to?

Welburn: I don’t like boring cars. I like bold designs. I like very creative designs, striking vehicles. The Escalade is a vehicle that I was very much involved in its design. There’s a very strong direction for the Cadillac brand. But we also need to look at how we can do that, and do it in a responsible way. This car [Converj], is very dramatic. Very dramatic presence, every line is absolutely right. It even has a hint of a fin on the back, like the Cadillac of old. It’s also a guilt-free car because it’s an electric vehicle, and particularly in an urban setting to have a vehicle with this technology, if you drive less than 40 miles a day, the gasoline engine doesn’t even start. It’s purely electric and I’m very excited about that. And I think it’s a very relevant vehicle for any urban setting.

The big thing to me is that I don’t think African Americans have any one particularly type of aesthetic, or can be placed into any one particular mold. In our company we have a number of brands that allows everyone to find something that is different and that fits their needs. The Buick LaCrosse is part of a whole renaissance of Buick designs. It’s a very striking, very bold, powerful design. Maybe the strongest Buick design since some of the old Buick designs of the 1960s.

 You mentioned the Escalade, a favorite in the hip-hop world. Rattle off a few names of the designs that you conceived.

Welburn: Chevy Camero, Malibu, Corvette, this new Chevy Beat (small car). Small cars don’t have to be boring, they don’t have to be something you apologize for. A small car can be just as dramatic, just as cool as any other vehicle. So we developed a concept called Beat, it’s a small car. It’s going into production and the excitement and energy surrounding the car has been so great we’re going to produce it and we’re going to sell it in all markets around the world. Cadillac, not just the Escalade, but the CTS, CTS Coupe, CTS-V.

Is green the new black?

Welburn: I think it is, and I think we’re going through an understanding that there’s a lot of green and there’s a lot of “faux” green out there. There is a display [at the 2009 D.C. Auto show] of a lot of green technology, some of it works, some of it doesn’t work. And it’s hard to know what really works. There are a number of hybrids, you know, a lot of people are saying, ‘Gotta have a hybrid!’ Some of them really work, others really do not. If you’re going to make a drive from Detroit to Washington then a hybrid isn’t going to do much for you. But it may be good around town. The next couple of years we will all sort through what works and what doesn’t work, what’s real and what’s just smoke and mirrors. And then we will see what is really green.

Lastly, what is on everyone’s mind is the economy. Money is tight right now but folks still want to support the American auto industry. How has the recession affected auto design and in what direction should budget-conscious buyers be looking?

The economy has affected not only General Motors, but everyone. It has affected every auto company and every industry in different ways. I think that as we come out of this, it is an eye-opener. Frankly, there have been people who have been leasing some very high-end vehicles they probably never should have been. And this is kind of a slap in the face and a reality check that they probably should have been getting a nice Malibu LTZ and not that high-end car that you were getting. And when they come back to reality, they will see that the new Malibu is a very smart vehicle to own. It’s got great accommodations inside, very premium look, Chevrolet in particular really has developed a whole new family of vehicles that look far more premium than they actually are and look far more expensive than they actually are. The Malibu, the new Equinox and the new Terrain. And I think people will find that they can be more comfortable than they may have been with brands X,Y or Z.
I think we need to do a whole lot more to connect with Americans and communicate and listen to America as we develop these products.

Welshman Gren Thomas: a gold hero

A rugby-loving Welshman, who became a billionaire diamond hunter, has been honoured as one of Canada’s greatest ever explorers.

ROBIN TURNER and GAVIN O’CONNOR report on a modern-day Boy’s Own adventure...

BORN in one of Swansea’s most crowded housing estates, the story of 67-year-old Gren Thomas reads like a comic book story of adventure, excitement and self-improvement.

A major sponsor of Canada’s national rugby team, he has just been inducted into Canada’s Mining Hall of Fame.

Now living in Canada’s “millionaire’s retreat” of West Vancouver, he occasionally pops into the Red Lion pub he had built – an exact replica of the Red Lion in Morriston, Swansea, which his great-grandmother used to run.

And the story of his daughter Eira, who literally followed in her pioneering father’s footsteps across the snowy tundra of Canada’s North West Territories, is a Girl’s Own tale of reaching the top in what was once a man’s world.

Dubbed “the Queen of Diamonds”, with her sled dog Thor and defying killer bears and bone-chilling -40°C winds in remote territory made famous by TV’s Ice Road Truckers, she helped her father discover the lucrative Diavik diamond mine.

Millionairess Eira (Welsh for snow) is married to an artist who called in for a drink at the Red Lion.

The father and daughter’s heroic dual exploration has helped propel Canada above former gem capital South Africa as a diamond producer. Just 20 years ago the country produced no diamonds at all.

As Gren Thomas stepped up to the podium earlier this month at Toronto’s luxury Royal York Hotel alongside fellow Hall of Fame inductees like geologist Donald “Digger” Gorman and uranium producer Bernard Michel, he could only have been thinking of his humble beginnings.

At the time he was born in 1941, air-raid sirens were whining and searchlights were desperately seeking German bombers over the wartorn skies of Swansea.

The city’s vast docks and metal-working history made it a major target and Clase, where Gren grew up in a terraced house (now overshadowed by the DVLA built in the 1960s), was close to the city centre which took the brunt of the Luftwaffe’s pummelling.

As he grew older, he loved calling into his grandmother’s busy pub, The Red Lion Hotel, but crucially devoted a lot of his time to studying geology.

He won a place at Cardiff University and in 1964 graduated with a degree in mining engineering.

He could have been expected to work at any number of Welsh coal pits.

Instead, he tried seeking his fortune in Canada.

Gren told Wales on Sunday: “It was a summer job I had set aside and I had never known anything else other than coal mining.”

After an apprenticeship at tough nickel mines in Falconbridge, Sudbury, Ontario and then at the Giant Mines in Yellowknife in Canada’s North West Territories, he decided to strike out on his own.

He founded the Toronto-based Aber Diamond Corporation (named after Abertawe, Swansea).

With survival gear and arctic weather- resistant tents, he headed to the permafrost of Canada’s deadly tundra,inhabited by caribou, musk ox, bears and miles and miles of snow.

With him was his daughter Eira, who by this time was a frontline geologist.

Just as Gren evaded the German bombers in the 1940s, the pair survived bears, ice storms and deadly crevasses in their determined search for signs of elusive Canadian diamonds.

In the mid-1990s, they struck it rich by discovering the huge Diavik diamond mine.

After a series of wise trading moves which made Gren one of the wealthiest men in Canada, the mine is now owned by the glamorous Harry Winston Diamond chain plus Rio Tinto Plc. It churns out eight million carats a year – worth an estimated £440m – and has helped Canada become the world’s number three diamond producer behind Botswana and Russia.

After a successful career in the diamond industry, in which he is still involved through Strongbow Exploration and North Arrow Minerals, Gren now lives in “a sizeable house” in West Vancouver, where some homes change hands for £20m.

It is known as the “millionaire’s retreat” because its beauty and tranquility (heavy industry is banned by law) make it a magnet for Canada’s rich.

But, however much success the diamond magnate has achieved, he’s never forgotten his roots.

Gren still gets Welsh papers sent to him by family members living in Morriston, is backing local groups fighting plans for a wind power station in north Gower and will be home for the Wales v Ireland game at the Millennium Stadium next month.

“Wales are looking pretty good at the moment,” said, Gren, who has kept a softly-spoken accent.

“I’m looking forward to seeing the Ireland game.”

And he still has one eye on events in his birthplace, as well as a look to future resources the world will rely on.

“I’m currently working on a project with lithium, which is used in batteries,” he said.

“There’s a huge focus on cars going green right now and lithium is going to be very important in the years ahead because there are going to be more and more electric cars.”

Gren has included Patagonia on his recent travels and confesses to having learned “quite a bit of Welsh” over the years.

One of the issues he is passionate about is the surge in wind farms across the country.

He is currently supporting SOCME (the Save Our Common Mountain Environment group).

They are fighting against the Duke of Beaufort’s family trust, The Somerset Trust, which as landowners wants to build a large wind power station on the beautiful and historic Mynydd-y-Gwair in north Gower.

Gren said: “I just don’t believe in wind farms.

“These huge things are screwing up the countryside and I don’t think they are particularly efficient, or economic – they are not necessary.”

In his Hall of Fame acceptance speech, Gren said he was pleased his work would help Canada’s so-called First Nations people (Inuit and Metis) share in the riches of the Tundra.

He said: “Diamond discoveries will ensure that Yellowknife will continue to be one of the great mining towns of the north, even after the closing of its gold mines.

“In addition I am extremely proud of the effort of the diamond sector to provide employment and business opportunities to the region’s Aboriginal communities, allowing them to enter the wage economy.”

A spokesman for the Hall of Fame, run by the mining industry and a mining newspaper, said: “Gren left the ‘Old World’ as a young mining engineer to become a pioneering prospector and company-builder in the New World, where he made a series of important mineral discoveries and contributed to the advancement of Canada’s fledgling diamond industry.”

For her exploits, Eira, 40, is now a major player in the industry.

In 2003, she founded the Stornoway Diamond Corporation.

Once asked by reporters if she felt like a millionaire, she said: “Definitely not. But I consider myself a multi-millionaire in terms of my experience.”

From the age of seven she remembers spending summers with her father on explorations for mineral deposits.

It was after graduating from Toronto University that she joined Aber as an exploration geologist.

She is now the only woman in the world who can wear diamonds from a mine she discovered.