Jun

GM readies all 2009 Cadillac Escalades for ethanol

Posted by admin Published in Cadillac

2009 hybrid Escalade.

You can put canola oil in a Cadilac. You can nearly get an Escalade with a hybrid powertrain. And, now, you will be able to get the behemoth (either the Escalade, the Escalade EXT or the Escalade ESV) with an ethanol-ready flexfuel engine. GM announced today that all 2009 Escalades will be flexfuel capable. that announcement isn’t a surprise - is there anyone more gung-ho about living green and going yellow than the General? - but now at least it’s official. The flexfuel Escalades are the latest step to GM’s stated goal of getting half of GM’s U.S. production vehicles flexfuel capable by 2012. GM made the announcement in Atlanta, where 12 new E85 stations opened that week.

Press Release:

Cadillac Escalade Adds FlexFuel Capability for 2009

June 6, 2008 10:16 AM EDT

ATLANTA, June 6 /PRNewswire/ — All models of the 2009 Cadillac Escalade will be able to run on either ordinary gasoline or E85 ethanol, or any combination of the two, General Motors announced Friday.

And customers will have the fueling choice at no additional cost.

The Escalade, Escalade EXT and Escalade ESV as well as the GMC Denali, join the previously announced 2009 Chevrolet HHR, Buick Lucerne and HUMMER H2 and H2 SUT as additions to GM’s industry-leading flex-fuel lineup.

“The success of E85 as an alternative fuel depends on having the fuel readily available and having a range of cars and trucks that can use it,” said GM Vice President of Environment, Energy and Safety Policy Beth Lowery. “We will offer more than 15 flex-fuel capable models for 2009 compared with 11 that year.”

The latest E85 product announcements coincided with

the opening of a dozen new E85 fueling stations in the Greater Atlanta area that week.

“We continue to believe that ethanol used in high blends like E85 offers the best near-term solution to offset increased oil demand,” Lowery said. “There are more than 7 million vehicles today that can use E85. We need significantly more stations that offer the fuel.”

E85 ethanol (a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline), is a cleaner-burning alternative fuel that can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 23 percent compared with gasoline.

GM has committed to compose half of its US production flex-fuel capable by 2012 providing the infrastructure is in place. GM built more than 1 million flex-fuel capable vehicles worldwide last year. It is committed to helping to speed sustainable ethanol to market via its alliances with Coskata Inc. and Mascoma Corp., two next-generation ethanol startups that can assemble ethanol from a range of non-grain sources.

General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), the world’s largest automaker, has been the annual global industry sales leader for 77 years. Founded in 1908, GM today employs about 266,000 citizens around the world. With global headquarters in Detroit, GM manufactures its cars and trucks in 35 countries. In 2007, nearly 9.37 million GM cars and trucks were sold globally under the following varietys: Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, GMC, GM Daewoo, Holden, HUMMER, Opel, Pontiac, Saab, Saturn, Vauxhall and Wuling. GM’s OnStar subsidiary is the industry leader in vehicle safety, defense and info services. More data on GM can be found at www.gm.com .

[Source: GM via Paddocktalk]

[Source] Sebastian Blanco