Well, we mentioned the original Ansari X PRIZE in Tuesday's blog, and serendipitously we have news concerning the forthcoming Automotive X PRIZE.

The same organization that awarded $10 million to a team that built the first private spacecraft to leave the earth's atmosphere announced this week the draft competition rules for its premiere automotive competition. The guidelines were released Monday for a 60-day comment period.

The X PRIZE Foundation, the organization behind the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE that successfully challenged teams to build private spacecraft to open up the space frontier, is taking a step toward launching an Automotive X PRIZE (AXP) that will inspire super-efficient vehicles that exceed 100 miles per gallon or its equivalent.

In draft guidelines released at the New York Auto Show, the AXP outlines an independent competition that will result in "clean, efficient vehicles that help break our addiction to oil and stem the effects of climate change." The AXP invites interested teams — major auto companies and innovators alike — to execute letters of intent to participate as the AXP moves toward an official launch later this year.

The draft guidelines outline a challenging multiyear competition with a multimillion-dollar cash purse. Teams first are required to meet arduous standards proving they are capable of designing and building production-capable, super-efficient vehicles.

The winning car will have the lowest overall time, but all contestants must meet stringent goals on efficiency and emissions.

The winning vehicle will have to achieve at least 43 kilometers per liter (100 miles per U.S. gallon), regardless of the type of fuel it uses. "That would be a big leap up from today's U.S. average of about 9 kilometers per liter," Nature News notes. The international, independent competition will be open to multiple fuels and technologies.

Moreover, its carbon emissions must be no more than 125 grams of carbon per kilometer, and it has to be commercially viable; each team must prepare a business plan for building at least 10,000 of the vehicles each year at a cost comparable to that of cars available now. European cars today average around 163 grams per kilometer, and the European Union is already shooting for a target of 130 grams per kilometer across all cars by 2012. In today's mainstream market, the greenest cars achieve something like 28 kilometers per liter (65 mpg) and 100-120 grams of carbon per kilometer, says Nature.

After meeting these standards, the vehicles then will compete in a series of rigorous stage races that test the vehicles under real-world driving requirements and conditions. Vehicles will compete in two different categories:

• "Mainstream" entrants, or 4+ passengers and 4+ wheels, must have a top speed of at least 160 kilometers per hour (99 mph), do 0-95 kilometers per hour (59 mph) in less than 12 seconds, and have a range of at least 320 kilometers (199 miles). The draft rules state that entrants in this category must also have air conditioning and a stereo.

• "Alternative" entrants, or 2+ passengers and no requirement regarding the number of wheels, must have a top speed of at least 130 kilometers per hour (81 mph) and a range of 160 kilometers (99 miles)

Vehicles in both categories must have windshield wipers, lights, seat belts and so on.

Unlike many of the fantastical concept cars or science projects that are presented at auto shows, entries must be production-ready and capable of reaching the marketplace.

The challenge may lie more in manufacturing and economics than in developing radical new technologies.

"To achieve 100 miles per gallon can be done with existing technology," says Rob Thring, an automotive engineer at Loughborough University, UK. "But it requires a fairly radical design."

"This is not a question of curing cancer," The New York Times quotes Goodstein as having said. "The technologies to build super-efficient vehicles exist. It's just a matter of convincing manufacturers to build them."

Nature reports:

The prize will culminate in 2009, in a series of races between the contenders over a range of different driving conditions, from long road trips to commuting in congested cities.

Even before it began publicizing a draft of the rules for the competition, the foundation had fielded inquiries from more than 1,000 potential contestants and institutions willing to participate, according to NYT, which went on to say: "Many major automakers have also expressed interest in monitoring the contest, including some that are considering competing themselves."

Ideally, some of the top teams would see their designs purchased and used in some form by automakers, Mark Goodstein, executive director of the Automotive X Prize, tells NYT.

Although the prize's value has not yet been announced, the draft-rules document says it will "likely be in excess of $10 million." The two previous X Prizes — for spaceflight and genomics — each had a value of $10 million.