Ford Donates Hybrid, Solar Panel System To Extreme Home Makeover Family
Filed under: buildings and construction, cars-houses, film-tv, television, transport — Michael d'Estries @ 1:13 pm
January 19th 2009
The Ford Motor Company isn’t well-known for their eco-friendly vehicles. Sure, we hear a bit about their Ford Explorer Hybrid — but generally GM or Toyota steal the headlines with their fuel-efficient announcements.
Of course, in light of last year’s high oil prices and Americans seeking to increase their mileage, Ford is trying to enhance their green image. This Spring, the new Ford Fusion hybrid — with MPG in the high 40s will hit dealerships. On last night’s edition of ABC’s Extreme Home Makeover, however, one lucky family got a free Fusion a bit early. From the release,
After the big reveal of their new home on “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” the Drumms say they were astonished when they saw a brand new 2010 Ford Fusion Hybrid pull up in the driveway. “I was so excited to just have a vehicle and not have to worry about trying to figure out how we were going to get from one place to another,” said Blasia. “And to have a new car that’s so fuel efficient just takes a lot of worry off of us because we travel so much to doctor’s appointments and to see my son at school.”
Adding to the energy-saving theme, Ford also threw in the solar panels for the Drumms new photovoltaic system on their roof. “The idea of the home being more self-sustaining and not so dependent on the grid as we were before is pretty cool,” said Matt Drumm. “I’m looking forward to not paying so much for electricity as I’ve done in the past.”
Nice work, Ford & ABC. We hope this is ongoing partnership that can continue to highlight solar energy for homes and hybrid vehicles for transportation.
via Autobloggreen
Ford isn’t as bad as people think. I worked at a Ford dealership for nearly four years and during that time, they had more PZEV vehicles in their line-up than any other car manufacturer (including Toyota). In fact, my Focus is a PZEV, which means it is actually less harmful to the environment then the Toyota Highlander Hybrid. Hybrids typically give you better fuel economy, but not all of them are PZEV clean. I was proud to work for them and always a little saddened by people’s bias against American cars. With everything they have in their pipeline, including their , soon to be released, Eco-Boost, I am not worried about them at all and am proud to drive around in my eco-friendly Focus.
yeah… it’s great when network tv catches up with the times. my husband is a producer for the show (and in fact produced the Drumm’s episode). And though network productions can be (and typically are) incredibly wasteful, Extreme Makeover Home Edition certainly tries to do their part. They donate many materials from the torn down homes to organizations like Habitat for Humanity, they incorporate “green” elements into every show & i’ve been to set multiple times… their behind-the-scenes recycling program is pretty impressive. Seriously… way to go EMHE – may more productions follow your lead!