Carmakers show their green side at Detroit auto show

0 Comments | AFP, January, 2005

DETROIT, United States (AFP) — Green was the hottest color as the Detroit auto show opened, with carmakers vaunting their efforts to bring new fuel-saving technology to the competitive US market.

Although there was no scarcity of rugged trucks and sleek roadsters, the major automakers at the North American International Auto Show were emphasizing their environmental as well as technological efforts.

Ford Motor Co. chairman Bill Ford said his company, which won the coveted North American Truck of the Year award with its hybrid Ford Escape SUV, expects to have five hybrid gasoline-electric vehicles on the market within three years.

"It's only the start and it's only one of the fuel efficient technologies we're working seriously on," the company chairman,...