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What will the transformation cost? GM notes that it spent $1.1 billion to shrink the length and weight of its 1977 models (TIME, Sept. 13) and figures that retooling for the more drastic changes needed by 1985 will cost several times that. The expense, no doubt, will be passed on to buyers, raising another question: will they accept higher prices for shorter, lighter, less powerful, slower-starting cars? One possible clue is the renewed popularity of imported cars, which took 20% of the U.S. market in April. Foreign car makers are far ahead of Detroit in the technology of fuel saving and weight reduction. For example, front-wheel-drive systems already are standard equipment on many Volkswagen, Audi, Fiat and Honda subcompacts. Thus, if the nation's consumers do not like the new cars that Detroit produces, they will have somewhere to go.
In any case, one much talked of method of saving fuel, the development of the electric car, is not even mentioned in the GM study. Its deficiencies are familiar to Detroit, but they were sarcastically highlighted last week by Kansas Republican Senator Robert Dole, who jokingly claims to have got a look at one of Energy Chief James Schlesinger's secret projects. Said Dole: "It's an electric car that will take you from Washington to Los Angeles on $4.12 worth of electricitybut the extension cord costs $12,000."
* The agency requested and has received such reports from all the automakers, but GM is the only company to have made its report public.
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