Bright and early this morning, Ford (NYSE: F) announced that it is going to invest $550 million to transform its Michigan Truck Plant to a more modern small-car plant. The plant will produce a new Ford Focus, which will be available next year.

In 2011 the automaker will begin producing its battery-electric Focus in an effort to meet its promise to deliver four new electric vehicles in America by 2012. The plant was originally used to produce the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator, both massive SUVs. It was one of the most prolific and profitable Ford operation during the SUV explosion of the late 90s, and the move symbolizes a strategic shift by the American icon.

New technologies are starting to set the auto world on fire, says Ford Motor Corp. (NYSE: F) executive chairman and former Ford CEO Bill Ford. Although auto sales have dropped sharply in the last eight months, Mr. Ford sure believes that products like electric vehicles and biofuels will enable the reinvention of the automobile.

The last year has definitely been a rocky one for the auto industry, with American icons General Motors (NYSE: GM) and Chrysler both receiving billions of dollars from Washington in hopes of avoiding bankruptcy. While a lot of the country feels as though it is important to try to save the auto companies, not everyone is so happy with the recent events, and have been taking out their frustrations at recent auto shows.

The first sign that things are not quite the same as before can be noticed on the auto show floors. Typically in the past, the major auto makers spared no expense at setting up elaborate displays to lure in people to check out their most recent designs. This is not the case anymore for some of the industry's major players.

For years China has been the world's leading manufacturer, and they are hoping to take that momentum into the auto industry.

When you think of foreign cars you would like to own, chances are that it is not a car made in China. The Chinese have fallen behind on gas powered cars, so they made a brilliant decision... just try to be the leader of the next industry evolution. They are looking at hybrid and electric powered cars.

Sister blog to Bloggingstocks, Autoblog, has posted that Digg.com's founder Kevin Rose uploaded pics of the Tesla Model S to Flickr and is featuring a gallery of the leaked photos.

The Model S is an electric car following up on the innovative Tesla Roadster, and bears a $57,400 price tag. More details about the car are expected shortly. The Model S is expected to be available for purchase in 2012, the Roadster can be purchased now.

Tesla Motors has certainly put out another shot across the bows of other car manufacturers.

"Our hope is that the new administration decides to fund 'the future'," says Sean Broderick. In Money and Markets he looks to some favored exchange traded funds offering long-term investors exposure to alternative energy, wind power, electric cars and the rebuilding of our nation's infrastructure.

"We need an efficient power grid that can carry renewable energy -- solar from the Mojave Desert and wind from the Great Plains -- to the population centers of the U.S. Too bad our power grid is 100 years old and falling apart at the seams. And demand is growing every year.

"In addition, we need more railroads for an energy independent America. Building those lines is a good bottom-up way to boost the economy. And we need an electric car program.

"I'm talking about developing mass-market battery-powered cars (hybrid or plug-in) that achieve at least 100 mpg of gasoline on new fleets by the year 2015.

"These three programs have one thing in common: Good American jobs that can't be shipped overseas. If you want to jump-start the economy, that's a 1-2-3 that might work.

General Motors (NYSE: GM) has finally come up with something to save its bacon. It will team with a number of utilities including Con Edison (NYSE: ED) and Duke Power (NYSE: DUK) to create a broad market for electric cars.

According to The Wall Street Journal, "Auto makers need the cooperation of utilities since they control the new technology's primary fuel -- electricity -- and must make sure that the vehicles' recharging processes mesh with the electricity grid and don't inadvertently undermine grid reliability." In other words, no one wants the cars to cause brown outs. GM also plans to negotiate special rates to make its electric cars cheaper to recharge.

The announcement is one of GM's first intelligent moves in a long time. It has allowed its reliance on pickup trucks and SUVs to drive down its sales and cut its market share in the US. Foreign rivals that kept lines of smaller cars now have products with broad appeal to consumers. This is particularly true of their hybrids.

GM's concern remains whether being late to the market will make it too late. Its potential customers want fuel-efficient cars now, when the price of gas is high. GM will lose billions of dollars while it tries to catch up.

The competition will not be sitting still.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

General Motors Corporation (NYSE: GM) investors, as well as auto industry trackers, will want to read Jonathan Rauch's "Electro-Shock Therapy" in the July 2008 issue of Atlantic Magazine. Mr. Rauch was given unprecedented access to all personnel involved in GM's company-wide commitment to have a market-ready electric car by late 2010. GM personnel note the Chevy VOLT, as the car is named, will not be a hybrid per se, but will be the first mass market electric car with a range of 40 miles per charge, enough to cover the daily commute of 75% of American workers. The car's small gasoline engine will be used to recharge the battery, while only electricity will be used to power the wheels. GM is trying to wow consumers by manufacturing an affordable electric car that will sever the connection between driving and the gas pump.

GM lost the engineering and publicity wars on electric cars to Toyota's Prius years ago. Toyota has been eating GM's lunch ever sense. According to GM's VP Bob Lutz, it's payback time. Using the same rhetoric President Kennedy used to launch the Apollo space program and race to land on the moon, GM has sectioned off the Volt division and given it complete decision-making and spending authority to reinvent not only the electric automobile, but also the company itself. In one Volt engineer's words: "Go big or go home."

Yes, there are problems with the weight to power ratio in the battery. And yes, production of both the battery and the car body are being rushed towards production without the normal period of evaluation. But GM has staked its future on the Volt, and unlike my colleague Michael Rainey who isn't that positive on the Volt, there's reason for at least cautious optimism, a quality currently in short supply coming out of Detroit.

Tesla Motors chairman Elon Musk said at a conference recently that he plans to take the electric car maker public by the end of 2008. Without having had an opportunity to look at the financials -- there hasn't yet been a registration statement or prospectus -- I would say that this is exactly the kind of IPO that investors should avoid.

I know, it's exciting and new. It's technology. It's stuff that could change an entire industry and quite possibly the world. As Musk said, "Thirty years from now the majority of new cars will be pure electric, not hybrid."

Exactly. Just like Sirius Satellite Radio (NASDAQ: SIRI) and XM Satellite Radio (NASDAQ: XMSR). And all those internet stocks. And the hundreds of exciting new car makers a hundred years ago that captured the fancy of investors before they ended in bankruptcy.

General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), after seeing sales plummet for larger cars and SUVs over the past 18 months because of higher energy prices, is now doing a major about-face. It's no secret that a large part of GM's future strategy is tied up in alternative fuels and electric vehicles for the consumer market. Translation: inflation and energy prices are changing consumer gas price attitudes.

Robert Lutz, GM's product design expert extraordinaire (oh, and Vice Chairman), is placing a large bet on the Chevrolet Volt, a 100% electric vehicle that GM hopes will capture the imaginations -- and wallets -- of energy-conscious consumers. Lutz even calls the Volt GM's "moon shot" in a reference to a once-in-a-lifetime NASA goal to place a man on the moon in the 1960s. GM has a once-in-a-product-cycle chance to get a mass-produced, well-liked electric vehicle into dealer showrooms before any other global auto manufacturer.

Lutz, who speaks the best geek-speak there is concerning vehicle dynamics and drag coefficients, seems certain that GM can outfox Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) by getting a popular, 100% electric vehicle into mass production first. Toyota's existing Prius is a hybrid (gas and electric), and the race is on to get a completely electric car onto the showroom floor. Since there is no gas engine, which provides power for air conditioners and many other components, all systems from entertainment to windshield wipers had to be created from the ground up for the new Volt. From reading this Lutz interview, the Volt has the potential to place GM on top of the auto world again. That is, if done right and before the competition beats it to the electric vehicle game.

General Motors (NYSE: GM), believe it or not, is working toward alternative propulsion systems as energy prices continue to be seen at new highs (while still showing wild volatility), and the electric Volt is just one of its efforts. What will power the electric vehicles of the future? That's a billion-dollar question, since batteries are probably the largest barrier to really commercializing the fully electric vehicle -- from any manufacturer.

GM, according to sources this week, wants its fuel cell technology -- a leading contender for high-energy batteries -- to be commercialized as soon as possible. If fuel cells could be refined even further than where they are today, the economic and practical viability of totally electric cars could be seen soon. So far, talk like that has been full of hot air. But then again, automakers see pent-up demand for this technology as gas prices go absolutely nuts. Oil stands right at $100 a barrel right now. You make the call.

If GM does not get there first, you can bet the competition will -- and will feed the insatiable consumer demand that lies waiting in the proverbial wings. The good news here is that innovation and speed will happen as the race to be first in this "fuel cell" space becomes more heated. As history has shown, in the end, the winner will be the consumer, much to the chagrin of oil producers.

Bill Joy was a co-founder and scientist at Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ: JAVA) until he left for private capital in 2005, joining Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers. Although out of the tech spotlight these days, many still follow what he has to say based on his credited involvement with inventing several widely-used internet technologies. As a venture capitalist, many want to know what Joy sees as viable investments from 2007 moving forward.

He gave a glimpse of what he's not looking at this week when he delivered an outlook at the Lux Research conference on nanotechnology. According to Joy, green technology is hot, internet is not. Wha? Internet investing is out of style with one of its founders? How can that be? Let me put it mildly: the valuations of some companies operating almost solely in the 'net these days makes for a "wacky" investment strategy, according to Joy.

Although Joy speaks the virtues of several semiconductor firms, he stated that internet investments are "wacky right now" and that the better opportunity in the near term will be in green technology investments. You know, ones that allow electric autos to become affordable and available, as well as alternative energy sources like photovoltaic products that convert sunlight directly into energy.

He shuns biodiesel and ethanol in favor of all-electric personal transportation and notes that investment in these areas is exploding. His firm has already invested in solar thermal and photovoltaic technology, but the sheer fact that Joy slaps all internet investments is a surprise. Perhaps he's one of the many who think Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG)'s current $620+ share price is a bit overblown. Does Google even have a moat? Perhaps, perhaps not. Bill Joy doesn't care, and he's not investing there. Are you?

It's hard to decipher the electric car market right now. Hybrids are all the rage, with the upcoming Chevy SUVs from General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM) about to enter the mix as well as having vehicles like the Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) Escape hybrid, the Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) Camry hybrid and the nameplate for hybrid cars in the last decade, the Toyota Prius. Is this window dressing for automakers to quell energy-conservation aficionados rather than try to change to an all-electric format for future vehicles?

Anyone who believes that vehicles not relying on oil refining in some way as being the norm in the near future needs to re-examine the facts. I agree with Michael Kanellos of CNET's News.com point of view that while all the efforts so far have been grand, there are literally too many reliances (politically, globally, you name it) on oil at this time. These reliances will hinder any kind of switch to non-hybrid, all-electric vehicles. Sure, progress has been made recently, but it's half-hearted (and will be for the near future).

Batteries, electric motor technology and distance shortcomings all plague the all-electric auto industry as it tries to figure out how to provide the same driving distance (on a battery charge) as gas engines now get while trying to get the cost down to barely over current internal-combustion vehicles cost. Do you think most consumers are going to pay that 35% and up premium for an electric version of that new sedan? Guess again; the environment be damned.

We made it this way, so there's nobody but the market, consumers and automakers to blame here (including you and me). Will we ever see cost-efficient and all-electric vehicles? The road to get there will be very slow and painful, but eventually it will happen. If you can time when and find the companies that will be involved with this transition, you'll make out like a bandit.

Bloomberg.com reported today that unnamed sources privy to Chevrolet's plans for their version of the hybrid, the Volt, say that General Motors (NYSE: GM) hopes to build as many as 60,000 of the vehicle in the first year of production, 2010-11.

In its current iteration, the car would be capable of traveling up to 40 miles on its lithium-ion battery alone, or 640 miles between gasoline fillups. A (much more expensive) fuel cell version is also in the works for the Chinese market.

Industry experts are skeptical of the company's ability to reach such lofty goals. The process will be expensive -- GM expects to spend a least half a billion dollars in bringing the vehicle to market. The plan compresses GM's normal development cycle, and will test its corporate flexibility. The projected quantities also represent a real gamble on the car's popularity.

Chevy is also depending on the timely development of a new type of battery to power the E-Flex system. This system would allow the car to cruise at highway speed on battery alone, and could be recharged via house current, overcoming the limitations of current hybrids from Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) and Honda Motor Ltd. (NYSE: HMC).

In this episode of the BloggingStockcast we talk about American Idol, SEC vs spammers, new finance website for the younger set, electric cars, and Wal-Mart delivering marijuana.

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