Chrysler Prepares Alternative-Fuel Car Models for ’92

Chrysler Corp. will have the capacity to build 100,000 cars annually that can run on methanol, gasoline or both beginning in mid-1992, company officials said Friday.

The announcement made Chrysler the first auto producer to disclose its plans for satisfying a requirement in the new federal Clean Air Act that car makers make alternative-fuel vehicles available for sale as part of a pilot program in California.

Chrysler officials said at the Chicago Auto Show that the firm is laying plans that will enable it to sell high volumes of so-called flexible-fuel vehicles in less than two years. Chrysler plans to offer the specially engineered fuel systems on its new line of LH-body mid-sized cars to be introduced as 1993 models and on the Dodge Spirit and Plymouth Acclaim.

General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. are now supplying about 5,000 flexible-fuel vehicles to public and private auto fleets under a California Energy Commission program.

About 600 are on the road so far.

The vehicles can burn gasoline or a gasoline-methanol blend sold at about 25 Arco, Chevron, Exxon and Mobil service stations in California.

The fuel’s availability is slowly increasing.

Methanol burns more cleanly than gasoline and, by substituting for gasoline, helps conserve oil. With compressed natural gas and electricity, it is touted as one of the more promising substitutes for gasoline.

A Chrysler spokesman stressed that the firm would only go into full production of the special vehicles if there is demand for it.

The 100,000-vehicle volume could represent as much as 20% of the likely annual production of such vehicles, the spokesman said.

“I think you can expect to see the other auto companies making similar announcements,” said Claudia Barker, spokeswoman for the California Energy Commission.

The energy commission says a flexible-fuel car is likely to be priced $200 or $250 higher than a conventionally equipped car.

Barker said the California program that is part of the Clean Air Act requires the industry to make available for sale 100,000 alternative-fuel vehicles each year from 1993 through 1995 and 300,000 a year from 1996 through 1998.