That’s very similar to the intent of the U.S. Energy and Independence and Security Act because it’s particularly associated with the very significant improvement in CO2 and fuel economy that the European industry is having to make between now and 2012.

Joann Muller (Forbes): How will the strings attached to these programs change the way the auto industry looks five to ten year from now?

Alan Mulally:It is premature to speculate on what will be in the agreements that we reach, but I would offer that the tone of the conversations is very positive, because of the actions that have been taken over the last few years by the automobile industry in support of energy security, energy independence and sustainability.

We stepped up first when we went through that legislative process over the last few years to be part of the answer to those very important issues. So the response that we are getting is that this is an important industry, we’re moving in the right direction, and in Ford’s case we’re improving the efficiency on every vehicle size, we are complementing our larger vehicles with a full complement of small- and medium-size fuel-efficient vehicles.

The real conversation about additional financing is really around the fact of how important the industry is and if the economy really degraded substantially it’s a very important aspect that we have the automobile industry stay in business to be part of the answer of economic recovery. So that’s really the tone of the conversations.