5 Companies Making Fuel From Algae Now

Ubiquitous and easy to grow, algae has long been a promising biomass-to-fuel candidate in the eyes of researchers. Now algae is a burgeoning sector in biofuels with several high-profile start-ups, including Craig Venter’s Synthetic Genomics, and the interest of big-time investors like Bill Gates and ExxonMobil. Of course, hurdles still exist to make a competitive fuel. Algal biofuels still cost too much to produce—over $8 a gallon (pdf), according to the DOE. Furthermore, most existing strains do not yield oil in the quantities needed to quickly scale up to commercial production of biofuels. Companies also need to worry about contaminating local ecosystems and the amount of water needed to grow cultures in large batches. Despite these challenges inroads—and actual fuel—are being made in the nascent field. Here are 5 projects leading the pack today.

By Jeremy Jacquot

1. Algenol Biofuels

The Project /// $850 million committed to build algae farm that sells ethanol fuel for $3 per gallon

The Location /// Sonoran Desert (Mexico)

The Technology /// The company’s goal is to produce fuel directly from the algae without killing or harvesting the creatures, allowing for a shorter turnaround time to make fuel. The company claims its process lets it make around 6000 gallons per acre per year.

To Market /// Production is expected to begin by the end of 2010. Algenol intends to produce 1 billion gallons annually by 2012. They say their production costs will be around 85 cents per gallon.

2. Solix Biofuels

The Project /// A demonstration facility that could produce up to 3000 gallons of algal biofuels per acre per year by the end of 2009

The Location /// Coyote Gulch, Colo.

The Technology /// Solix uses specialized photo-bioreactors in which batches of microalgal cultures are grown in large, closed-growth chambers under controlled light and temperature conditions. The company claims its closed systems can produce up to seven times as much biomass as open-pond systems. Once the cultures are fully grown, their oil is extracted through the use of chemical solvents like benzene or ether. The solvents are mixed into the chambers to separate the oil from the algae, and it is then collected from the surface. Solix is also collaborating with the Los Alamos National Laboratory to use its acoustic-focusing technology to concentrate algal cells into a dense mixture by blasting them with sound waves. Oil can then be extracted from the mixture by squeezing it out; this makes the extraction process much easier and cheaper, obviating the need for chemical solvents.

To Market /// Tentatively by the winter of 2009.

3. Sapphire Energy

The Project /// A 300-acre integrated algal biorefinery

The Location /// Southern New Mexico

The Technology /// Sapphire’s focus is on “green crude," a liquid that has the same composition as crude oil, and is therefore compatible with existing refineries. The company has already shown that its fuel can be used in cars and even jets. Sapphire has a 100-acre pilot facility near Las Cruces, N.M.

To Market /// The plan is to make 1 million gallons of diesel and jet fuel per year by 2011, 100 million by 2018, and 1 billion gallons per year by 2025. There are no figures as of yet for the now-running 300-acre facility.

4. Solazyme

The Project /// Along with Sustainable Oils (camelina-based biofuel) and Honeywell subsidiary UOP (biodiesel), Solazyme plans to supply 400,000 gallons of fuel to the Air Force and 190,000 gallons to the U.S. Navy 1500 gallons of jet fuel for the U.S. Navy by 2010.

The Location /// South San Francisco

The Technology /// Solazyme engineers designer algal cultures using DNA from different strains to maximize oil production and size and grows them in large fermentation vessels before harvesting their oil. It first tested its jet fuel in late 2008.

To Market /// Solazyme claims that it is on track to produce over 20,000 gallons of fuel for the Navy by 2010. The company hopes to bring the cost of its fuel down to $60 to $80 per barrel within next two to three years.

5. Seambiotic

The Project /// 5-hectare commercial plant

The Location /// Israel

The Technology /// Seambiotic grows microalgal cultures in open ponds using flue gases like carbon dioxide and nitrogen from a nearby coal plant as feedstocks. Its 1000-square-meter facility produces roughly 23,000 grams of algae per day—three tons of algal biomass would yield around 100 to 200 gallons of biofuel. It recently formed a partnership with NASA to optimize the growth rates of its microalgae.

To Market /// Up and running since 2003, Seambiotic set up a pilot plant in 2005. Seambiotic expects its commercial plant to be ready by late 2009.

Project Sipster: 0-60 7 sec, 70mpg, $7000

Project Sipster: Sipster Indeed

By Dave Coleman|Photography by Jared Holstein & Christopher Gifford
Mar 27 `09|25 Comments

On Feb. 20, TopGear.com declared war on oil, poverty and slow cars, all at the same time. We naively proposed that we could build the car that no car company could manage to build themselves. Specifically, we proposed to marry timeless Italian style with thoroughly adequate performance (0-60 in 7 seconds), shocking fuel economy (70 mpg) and humble frugality (you can duplicate it for $7,000). And we decided to build it in 55 days. In retrospect, both symmetry and our own sanity would have been better served if we gave ourselves 77 days to pull this off, but no matter.

In a perfect world, we would have started with a 1974 Volkswagen Scirocco. This paragon of low-rent sex appeal could easily swallow the turbodiesel Volkswagen engine we planned to use, and it's far more aerodynamic than the brick we finally settled on. We rejected that plan because we feared the bureaucratic hurdles involved in registering a car that had been converted from gas to diesel. We have since been informed by countless readers who have easily registered diesel-converted cars that we're complete idiots. That would explain a lot of other things as well…

Having settled on a Volkswagen Rabbit, we really should have shopped for one that was cheaper (we paid $1,700, but should have paid closer to $0), that hadn't been crashed and didn't have a fuel tank full of rust and french-fry bits from its former life as a grease-powered hippy car. See idiot comment, above.

Maybe you have to own wrenches to grasp just how ridiculous is the idea of putting a modern (2002) engine in an old (1981) car. Putting a Jetta TDI engine in a Rabbit is an egregious abuse of the word "put." You can put your hat on a rack, and you can put a head of lettuce in your grocery bag, but try putting an elephant in your trunk. Easy to say, far more complicated to do, and odds are good something will go wrong when you try.

Unconstrained by realism, we drove the car to Canada, where Cam Waugh, owner of CWS Tuning, skillfully coaxed the engine under the hood, along with its turbocharger, computer and hundreds of wires. Surprisingly, things didn't really go wrong at first.

It ran, in fact, for a full 60 miles before we figured out the old fuel tank and new fuel gauge couldn't agree on what was in the tank. The gauge said half full, but the dead Sipster on the side of the road clearly said empty. As soon as we made it to California, the car died again when our new fuel filter filled again with rusty old french fries. Two weeks later, black smoke started belching out the tailpipe, accompanied by a distinct lack of quickness. Another fuel filter — this time a German one — and a new Diesel injection pump fixed it for a while, until, a few days later, it simply refused to turn over. Finally, we figured out that by reaching under the steering column and giving a certain bunch of wires a proper squeeze, the car would start right up. That worked for about a day; eventually we moved on to jumping the starter with an abandoned piece of speaker wire.

Each of these problems took hours — sometimes days — to figure out, and by the time we nailed our 0-60 in 7 seconds goal (that's faster than some 1980s Corvettes) and were ready to tackle the 70 mpg part, we had less than a week left and a lot fewer brain cells to work with.

There are two sides to improving fuel economy. You make the engine more efficient, so it takes less fuel to make power, and you make the car itself more efficient, so it takes less horsepower to move it in the first place. We've already done everything we can to make our horses more efficient — our new TDI engine is incredibly frugal, with tuning modifications that made it more so — now it's time to tune the car.

Which is what brings us to the El Mirage dry lake, Middle Of Nowhere, Calif. Over the past week we've been semi-blindly improving our Rabbit's aerodynamics, hoping to make the barn-shaped car slip through the air. We've smoothed out the nose with a front bumper from a mid-'90s Golf, slapped on the side skirts and fender flares from a late-'80s Volkswagen Cabriolet, installed smooth, flat wheels from an old Honda CR-X, built covers to completely hide the rear wheels from the air, covered the grille with aerodynamic cardboard (we were getting desperate) and made the entire underside of the car perfectly smooth with an under-tray built from quarter-inch plywood, sheet aluminum and rubber floor mats.

We recruited the help of John McNulty, a friendly local aerodynamicist, to help with the modifications, but even to an aerodynamicist, air is a tricky thing. When we made the smooth underbelly, for example, John could tell us that the bottom of the car is the single biggest opportunity for reduced drag, and that for optimum affect our smooth belly should be between 5 and 6 inches off the ground, and the back should angle upward precisely 5 degrees. What he couldn't tell us was if all that work was worth 1 mpg or 10.

The dry lake will tell us that. Miles of uninterrupted flatness in every direction is the best aerodynamic laboratory this side of a wind tunnel. On a calm day, we should be able to run back and forth across the lakebed measuring fuel economy without worrying about traffic, hills or gusty winds. We can install our new aero bits one-by-one, test them all and know exactly what we need to reach 70 mpg.

Unless, of course, it isn't a calm day. Wind makes it impossible to gather aerodynamic data, and as our frantic week of fabrication dragged on, the storm forecast to hit the desert Saturday afternoon loomed larger and larger with each setback. By the time we had our aero bits finished, it was Friday night, and the storm was set to hit Saturday afternoon.

Undaunted, we headed to the lakebed at midnight, slept on the ground, and here we are at dawn, ready for science. Crisscrossing the lake to check for any unexpected bumps or hazards, the Sipster's massive torque and nimble handling prove irresistible. Just a squeeze of the right pedal and a flick of the steering wheel and the little blue box is sliding sideways across the desert at 80 mph. Fuel economy be damned, this is living! Those H&R coil-overs we installed a few weeks ago let us put our undertray exactly 5.5 inches off the ground — but really they make our ex-hippy-hauler turn like a race car (and we're pretending fabulous handling makes up for its lack of airbags). And that efficient turbodiesel? Just feel the torque!

Uh, feel the torque? As quickly as the fun began, it's over. Squeezing the go pedal isn't making any more go. Rolling to a stop, the engine dies, again, and a strange hissing noise is coming from the engine bay. All ears under the hood and the hissing is tracked to the brake master cylinder. Whaaa?

A phone call to Cam explains everything: The hissing is either a leaky brake booster or a bad seal on the master cylinder, which won't kill the car. Making it just die mid-powerslide? That would be g-forces stirring up the old french fries again.

Stupid hippies.

What's that, wind? Just a breeze at first, but within minutes it's gusting to 25 mph. Our science just blew away, the Sipster is dead and we need this baby running for tomorrow's mileage test. Then the driver-side door blows open and slams into the front fender, bending the hinges so much the door won't close anymore. Is this the part where the car catches fire and we get to go home?

Sadly, no. Abandoning the Sipster on the lakebed, we drive into Adelanto, the nearest town-shaped armpit, to get another cheap Chinese fuel filter and swing by the junkyard in search of a less-broken brake booster. Cam tells us we want one from a 1980-1984 VW Rabbit or Rabbit Pickup. When was the last time you saw a VW Pickup? Well, if you're looking for one, there are FOUR in Ecology Auto Wrecking in Adelanto.

One sleepless night later and the Sipster is purring like a kitten with tuberculosis. The website needs its editor back, and there are three hours from the time the car is fixed until he needs to be on a runway.

Our mileage test, then, becomes pass/fail. We'll fill the tank, drive 70 miles and fill it again. If it takes less than one gallon, we've broken the 70 mpg barrier.

Starting at our favorite gas station in Seal Beach, Calif. (which sells diesel cheaper than regular unleaded), our plan is to drive down the freeway to Dana Point, Calif. — exactly 35 miles away — turn around and come back. Getting good mileage will mean driving slowly, between 55 and 65 mph, which is tough to do on a Southern California freeway where the average is closer to 80. Trucks here still have to go 55, though, so we can duck in behind one and let them both push the air out of our way and take the blame for screwing with traffic.

About five miles into the drive we remember an important detail about truck drivers. They apparently don't work on Sundays.

It's ironic how squeezing the most out of every last drop of fuel — a selfless bit of environmentalism, if there ever was one — means driving like an erratic, self-important douchebag: Accelerating like a grandma, coasting up hills, etc. Our apologies to anyone within a mile of the Sipster who actually has somewhere to be. This said, we're complete novices at this hypermiling thing, so we're sure an actual hypermiler nerd could have infuriated drivers with better results.

Exactly 70 miles after we started, we clatter back to the same diesel pump, swipe the card and, with held breath, start pumping. The pump shuts off almost immediately. 0.14 gallons! No, that's not right. That would be 500 mpg.

Diesel is like beer; pour it hastily and it's all foamy head, which shuts off the pump. Slowly, then. It's a painful process, but finally the fuel reaches the top. One more drop and it will start dribbling down the fender.

This is it. If the number is bigger than 1, all the bloody knuckles, all the sleepless nights, all the stress and favors and promises would be for nothing. We turn around and there it is: 0.833 gallons. Covering 70 miles with that little fuel works out to 84 mpg. We didn't just meet our spectacularly arbitrary goal, we crushed it! Eighty-four mpg is nearly double the highway rating of a Toyota Prius. OK, yes, a Prius would probably do pretty well if you employed the half-assed hypermiling tricks we just tried over the last 70 miles, but it wouldn't touch our number. Besides, the Prius is all Dr. Jekyll; at least the Sipster has its Mr. Hyde side.

Sometime next week we'll explain the financial realities of building a clattery, unreliable, silly-looking, fast, nimble and incredibly fuel-efficient Sipster of your own for only $7,000. And after that? You decide. Aside from replacing the fuel tank, what should the Sipster do next? Should we try to set a land speed record? Do the 12 Hours of Sebring without refueling? Hit the forums at TopGear.com and let us know.

Relive every twist, trip up and triumph.
All Project Sipster content can be found here.

California Planning for Alternative Fuel Highway

Biofuels, electricity and hydrogen will all feature on California's highway of tomorrow

By Colin Sullivan

Delayed: California's hopes for a hydrogen-fueled highway don't appear to be on track to materialize by 2010.
FLICKR/DRB62

SAN FRANCISCO – Soon after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) took office in 2003, he set in motion a campaign promise to build, by 2010, a "hydrogen highway" composed of 150 to 200 fueling stations spaced every 20 miles along California's major highways.

Schwarzenegger's "Vision 2010" plan promised that every California motorist would have access to hydrogen fuel by the end of the decade. He has since repeatedly mentioned the highway in a standard stump speech on his environmental accomplishments.

But the program has fallen short of expectations. With less than 10 months until the end of the decade, only 24 hydrogen fueling stations are operating in California, most of them near Los Angeles.

The vision of a hydrogen infrastructure, with fueling stations dotting the interstates, has not materialized, partly because the eager governor may have set unrealistic targets.

Gerhard Achtelik, manager of the hydrogen highway program at the Air Resources Board, admitted in an interview that the state would not hit its 150-station goal by 2010.

"That was a very optimistic guess," Achtelik said. "It's certainly been a learning experience."

The state's hydrogen-highway experience points to a fundamental question confronting any effort to build an alternative car market, be it powered by hydrogen or electricity: What comes first, the vehicle or the infrastructure?

Of the hydrogen effort, Achtelik conceded that the public has "not received the vehicles as quickly as we hoped."

Automakers have developed test models and advanced fuel-cell technology in labs around the world, but this test phase has not yet resulted in anything close to a commercial hydrogen car market.

"If all the cars were there that would be needed for the infrastructure, then the stations would be there," Achtelik said.

Vision with 'hiccups'

Roy Kim, of the California Fuel Cell Partnership, also said developing hydrogen stations when there are not enough cars to serve them does not make sense. The most likely candidates to build the stations in the private sector -- the oil companies -- still see the infrastructure as a questionable investment, while public dollars, especially in cash-strapped California, have been scarce.

But Kim sees reason for optimism, with General Motors Corp., Honda Motor Co., Toyota Motor Corp. and Daimler AG moving closer to putting hydrogen cars in the hands of customers. Once the Honda Clarity or GM Equinox catches on, the stations will come, he argued.

"It has had its hiccups," said Kim of the hydrogen highway program. "But this is characteristic of any emerging new technology. It takes time to realize a vision, and it takes patience to get there."

Kim compares the hydrogen fuel cell to the personal computer and likes to reference Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates' famous prediction that he would one day see a personal computer in every household. Hydrogen fuel cells are getting slimmer and safer, he said, and commercial pilot projects have shown promise.

Catherine Rips, managing director of the California Hydrogen Business Council, puts it another way. She said the alternative car market in the United States – with hydrogen matching up against plug-in electrics, hybrids and biodiesels, to name a few – has spread itself outward rather than imitating the internal combustion engine's more linear path. This means the highway concept, which was adopted early in the decade, may not apply, at least for the time being.

"What sounded like a good idea in 1999 doesn't necessarily match up with reality a decade later," Rips said. "New technology doesn't follow a straight path."

Joan Ogden, director of the Sustainable Transportation Energy Pathways program at the University of California, Davis, says the 150-station idea was a "broad-brush vision" that experts quickly realized was unlikely to be fulfilled after the governor launched his program.

Transportation planners and policymakers, Ogden said, several years ago stopped taking the highway concept literally. They came up with a new image – the cluster – and decided a more doable pilot program would be to create a network of 10 to 20 stations in a specific region, to fuel the cars where they reside.

Shell Hydrogen BV, an industry leader, and GM soon advocated the same concept in a study that called for the creation of station clusters in three locations, including Los Angeles. So now you have, in theory, a developing network in a region where automakers can directly market their cars.

"GM has repeatedly said the development of such a cluster is what is needed to take their learning to the next level," Rips said.

Zero-emissions rule

Crucial to the emergence of the cluster, in Ogden's view, is California's zero-emissions vehicle rule, which goes into effect in 2012. Under the regulation, which was advanced by the state's Air Resources Board, automakers will be required to make 7,500 "pure ZEVs" in the 2012-14 time frame, and 25,000 in 2015-17.

Because pure ZEVs emit no greenhouse gas emissions from their tailpipes, that means fuel-cell cars powered by either hydrogen or electricity. "I'm actually pretty encouraged," Ogden said. "When I started watching this 15 years ago, it took the whole back of a minivan to hold a fuel system. You have a very attractive car now."

The market for the vehicles and the infrastructure, Ogden added, should "really be driven by this ZEV regulation." The automakers have announced plans to introduce hundreds of fuel-cell vehicles into Southern California in the years ahead, in hopes that a cluster would emerge.

"Clusters make a lot more sense at this point," agreed Achtelik, who predicted "bridge stations" to Las Vegas and Santa Barbara, Calif., from the Los Angeles region by 2014 or 2015.

But just who will build the fueling stations beyond the experimental stage is still an open question.

Ogden said the oil companies, unlike the carmakers, are not regulated to build the infrastructure or participate in the fledgling market. Shell Hydrogen and Chevron Corp. are involved in demonstration stations, but they have been resistant to all-out investment for a reason.

"There's some question as to how this is going to take place," Ogden said. "What we really need is a network demo."

'It's in the mix'

To the automakers, the bumps on the hydrogen highway are emblematic of the state of the alternative car market and the difficulties associated with building cars during the economic downturn.

The manufacturers are developing a number of models to meet increasing fuel economy standards, with an eye on greenhouse gas emissions reduction policies like the one adopted in California under A.B. 32. That means flex-fuel, compressed natural gas and biodiesel vehicles in addition to hydrogen and electric fuel cells.

What are lacking, said Charles Territo, spokesman for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, are clear signals on stations and how drivers will be able to drive long distances. "Our industry is committed to offering the vehicles," he said, "but the reality is there needs to be a very significant effort to expand the alternative fuel infrastructure."

Ultimately, Territo added, consumers will likely decide on a region-by-region basis what technology they prefer. Some regions in the Midwest could see ethanol-85 networks emerge, while more urban areas could see electrification.

And hydrogen? "It's in the mix," Territo said. "Our goal as manufacturers is to provide as many different technologies as possible."

In the short term, hydrogen advocates have applauded the federal stimulus package, which has billions set aside for research into fuel cells and $300 million earmarked specifically for alt-vehicle infrastructure projects. In the long term, they would like to see more public dollars to build the stations, possibly alongside state and federal facilities in highway rest stops.

"There's not yet a commercial case for an infrastructure provider," Rips said. "It's going to take public support, or a mandate."

Back in California, state officials say all this is part of what they now view, in the words of ARB spokesman Dimitri Stanich, as a "retooled" hydrogen highway.

"It's very much alive," Stanich said of the program. "This vision is still there. It's just being groomed."

Reprinted from Greenwire with permission from Environment & Energy Publishing, LLC. www.eenews.net, 202-628-6500

VW Launches New Fuel-Efficient and Low-Emission Brand, BlueMotionTechnologies

Written by Jerry James Stone

Volkswagen’s launched a new brand: BlueMotionTechnologies.

It houses all of Volkswagen’s best eco-friendly tech. It currently includes a new start-stop system, regenerative braking, SCR catalytic converter and the NO_x storage catalytic converter.

BlueMotionTechnologies is aimed at bringing fuel-efficient and low-emission systems to market without skimping on the fahrvergnügen. Yah, I had to dust that one off…sorry.

If you’re thinking that BlueMotion isn’t all that new, you’re right. Back in 2006 VDub introduced the Polo BlueMotion, and in 2007 they unveiled a Passat flavored one.

But unlike the Polo and the Passat, the concept behind the newly branded BlueMotionTechnologies is not limited to diesel engines. In fact, it won’t be defined by a single set of technologies at all; it will evolve.

Alongside the BlueMotionTech launch, VW has also announced a new set of “principles for the sustainable development and production of its models.” These new tenets are:

• Reducing the fuel consumption of its vehicles and lowering greenhouse gas emissions.
• Resource efficiency and resource conservation: recyclability and the use of renewable and secondary raw materials. Moreover, alternative powertrain technologies will be developed and the use of alternative fuels and other energy storage systems.
• Health protection: focus is on exhaust emissions and interior emissions as well as reducing exterior and interior noise levels.

VW is kicking off the new brand with three different versions of its Passat:

Passat BlueMotion:
Here a common rail TDI (81 kW/110 PS) provides for 4.9 liter fuel consumption and CO2 emissions of just 128 g/km. The Passat BlueMotion has a Start-Stop system and conforms to limits of the Euro-5 emissions standard. Its range of over 1,400 kilometers on one tank of fuel is a minor sensation – travelers starting out in Berlin will not be looking for a gas station until shortly before Rome. Naturally, the Passat BlueMotion will also be available as a wagon.

Passat BlueTDI:
Its 105-kW diesel is ahead of its times; that is because Volkswagen is introducing the first TDI to conform to limits of the Euro-6 emissions standard that does not take effect until 2014. Aboard the Passat BlueTDI, a SCR catalytic converter reduces nitrogen oxides to less than 80 mg/km. Fuel economy of the sedan shifted by a 6-speed gearbox: 5.2 liter/100-km (CO2 emissions: 137 g/km). Further options: the “BlueTDI” will also be available as a wagon, and it will be available with a 6-speed DSG.

Passat TSI EcoFuel:
The Passat TSI EcoFuel is ushering in a new era of cars powered by natural gas. Until now, one of the drawbacks of cars powered by natural gas is that their performance can be rather unexciting. Thanks to its 110 kW strong high-tech engine, the Passat TSI EcoFuel combines a maximum speed of 210 km/h with excellent fuel economy and finally puts an end to these limitations. The car accelerates to 100 km/h in just 9.7 seconds. Despite its great agility, the world’s first turbocharged and supercharged direct-injection engine configured for natural gas operation is satisfied with just 4.4 kilograms of natural gas, which is about € 4.25 per 100 kilometers. With a 7-speed DSG, the Passat breaks the magic CO2 limit of 120 g/km in this class (6-speed transmission: 4.5 kg/100-km and 123 g/km CO2). If the natural gas on board should run low before the next fill-up station, the engine controller switches over to gasoline mode. The car has a total range of more than 900 kilometers.

And on the heels of these three new Passats, VDub is also previewing its Touareg hybrid:

Touareg V6 TSI Hybrid:
Because the future of the automobile – and BlueMotionTechnologies as well – offers more than just one answer, in parallel Volkswagen is presenting a prototype of the future Touareg V6 TSI Hybrid (333 PS / under 9.0 l/100 km). This car will enter production in 2010 as the world’s first hybrid SUV to have 3.5 metric ton towing capacity. Volkswagen is introducing one of the highest performance parallel hybrid systems in the world in this SUV. The German carmaker is utilizing a high-tech alliance of a V6 TSI (245 kW) boosted by supercharger and an electric motor (38 kW). Up to a speed of 50 km/h, the Touareg V6 TSI Hybrid can be driven by just the electric motor. In this case, no emissions are generated.

Photos: worldcarfans.com

New York City’s Green Taxi Program Red Lighted By Federal Judge

Written by Jerry James Stone

A federal judge has stopped Mayor Bloomberg’s attempt to clean up the air in New York City by using fuel-efficient hybrid taxis.

The judge, Paul A. Crotty, of Federal District Court in Manhattan, issued a 26-page ruling (PDF) to stop the city from enforcing the rule because, he said in a written order, the plaintiffs were likely to succeed in a key legal argument — that only the federal government has the right to set fuel efficiency standards under the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which bars state and local governments from setting their own, competing standards.

The hybrid-cab requirement was the centerpiece of Mayor Bloomberg’s PlaNYC 2030 package of environmental initiatives. It required all new taxicabs to be fuel-efficient hybrids and that all yellow cabs would be green by 2012. The initiative which would have started on Nov 1, specifically required a new cab coming in to service to get 25 miles per gallon, and the following year the standard would be 30 miles per gallon.

The standard yellow cab gets about 14 miles per gallon. Considering there are about 13,000 cabs in NYC and only about one-thousand of them are hybrids, this could’ve had a large positive effect on the city’s pollution.

Bloomberg said he was “very disappointed” and blasted the ruling for relying on “archaic Washington regulations” that keep New York and other cities “from choosing to create cleaner air.” He said the city was exploring options to appeal.

The Metropolitan Taxicab Board of Trade — they represent about a quarter of they city’s taxis – sued to block the enforcement. They argued only federal government could impose such restrictions, not the city’s Taxicab & Limousine Commission. They also noted that Hybrid’s aren’t safe enough to use as cabs.

“Millions of people who ride taxicabs and the thousands of drivers, owners and other participants in the New York City taxi industry can breathe a sigh of relief today,” Trade association president Ron Sherman said in approval of the decision..

“Greening the taxi fleet is a major priority, and we are going to use every mechanism at our disposal to make New York a cleaner, healthier city,” Bloomberg vowed.

Hopefully Yahoo doesn’t mind donating a few more of those green cabs…

Image source: Yodel Anecdotal on Flickr