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Johnathan Goodwin The MPG Rock Star!

By JustCool on Apr 1, 2008 in Cool People

Hummer Fast Company

Jonathan Goodwin, the auto conversion phenom who likes to tinker with Hummers and Lincolns and make them behave downright green. His current project is converting the ultimate gas guzzler — 1959 Lincoln Continental Mark IV convertible — into potentially a 100 MPG hybrid.

“It will run a 120 miles just on pure electric power,” he said, adding that the car will contain two dozen lithium ion batteries operating at 426 volts. A small diesel will recharge the batteries power a large generator to provide the juice. He’ll also use regenerative braking to help keep the batteries charged.

In fact, the batteries will be so powerful, they can provide “Vehicle to Grid (VTG)” electricity to power buildings when the car is stationary, claims Goodwin. One wonders about the safety of such a power-laden vehicle. Expense, too. Goodwin says VTG technology was developed in the early 1990s from the development of electric cars.

The hybrid vehicle and political blogs are humming about this project and Young and Goodwin are producing a documentary about the project that’ll be released in the spring. Goodwin has been on the national morning talks shows, on the cover of Fast Company magazine and yesterday was the subject of a CNN feature pegged to the one hour removal of the Continental’s stock gas-guzzling engine.

“If necessary, the little diesel in this thing – a two and half ton boat on wheels – could take welders and fire them right up,” says a gleeful Goodwin. Clearly, he is on a mission to disprove that it’ll take decades to produce meaningful alternative energy and high mileage vehicles. That he is doing it with the biggest gas guzzlers available helps drive home the point even more.

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