Innovating toward profitable sustainability

This year's SAE World Congress theme, “Racing to Green Mobility,” aims to help the auto industry ensure the survival of the planet-as well as its own long-term success.

In today's car business, green is the new black. More than a mere fashion trend, being green-that is, meeting the thorny challenge posed by the car's key role in climate change-not only could help pull the auto industry out of the red, but guarantee its very survival in the long run. Such is the heady-even Hydra-headed-issue that top experts from all over the globe will consider in a series of panel discussions that are scheduled for late this month at the SAE 2009 World Congress in Detroit.

The participants hope that sharing their best thinking on the manifold aspects of “green mobility” will help spur the industry to better address the threat of global warming. This human-caused conundrum is surely ripe for solution, if only the full innovation and creativity of engineers and other leaders can be brought to bear on it. But even as the industry attacks this problem, the vehicles it produces must remain attractive to consumers and affordable. The organizers hope that the panelists' dialogue will provoke useful discussion and encourage the attendees to pass on any strategic, theoretical, or conceptual insights they gain to the rest of the industry.