Are Times Changing in Detroit?

On Monday, The New York Times reported that Ford Motor’s chief executive acknowledged the link between greenhouse gases and global warming and vowed to respond to the threat of a heating planet by creating a new post at the company, vice president for sustainability, environment and safety engineering. According to The Times, this is the first time that the executive of a Detroit auto company has the word sustainability in her title. Susan M. Cischke, who will fill the new position, will be tasked with “creating a long-range strategy on sustainability matters.”

Is this just lip-service to the environmental movement? Some of the representatives of environmental groups interviewed in the article think so. Dan Becker of the Sierra Club told The Times that Ford has a strong track-record of making promises to help the environment, but “when it comes to doing them they seem to forget or fall down on the job.”

Will things be different this time? Let’s wait and see.