Flexible-fuel engines could make it easier for drivers to switch to alternative-fuel cars before a strong fuel distribution network evolves.

Consumers will have access to more supply and more choices in alternative-fuel cars than ever in 2012.

That means that initially, ending air pollution with alternative-fuel cars will be more costly.

The current bill also suffers by no longer requiring car manufacturers to produce alternative-fuel cars.

Detroit would be required to make 500,000 alternative-fuel cars by 1995, and one million a year by 1997.

He asserted, for instance, the administration's efforts to encourage Detroit to build alternative-fuel cars had accomplished very little, at a cost of $1 billion to taxpayers.

As for the public at large, voluntarily buying an alternative-fuel car hardly makes sense on economic grounds.

"I want to get an alternative-fuel car," he said.

Some advocates want the privilege extended to alternative-fuel cars.

Yet alternative-fuel cars have become a chimera that has receded ever further into the future for most of this century.