Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Wortley for her question. It is a very important one for South Australia and for Australia. A New Car Plan for a Greener Future throws down a serious challenge to the Australian car industry. It requires automotive companies to invest in new capacity, to modernise their operations, to increase the skills of management and workers and to develop environmentally sustainable products and processes. Above all, it requires them to innovate. The industry is responding to that challenge despite the worldwide recession and the upheaval that this has caused in the global car industry.

In the past three weeks, we have seen both Ford and Holden announce new green engines for their Australian made cars. Ford Australia has convinced Detroit that the first application of the company’s ecoboost turbocharge technology to a rear-wheel drive platform should happen in this country. This technology enables a four-cylinder engine to achieve the power and torque of a six-cylinder engine but with 20 per cent better fuel economy and 15 per cent lower CO2 emissions. It is a similar story at Holden, which is using spark-ignition direct-injection technology to create six-cylinder engines that match the economy and emissions of fours. Australia expects this latest innovation in these engines. We are demanding that of the industry.

Transmission and tyre design, increased fuel efficiency and all the rest of it lead to a situation where we will have a 13 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions—as much as 14 per cent across a range of models and configurations. These are very, very significant improvements. They demonstrate just what governments and industry can achieve when they work together. (Time expired)