1. Increase noise
Yeah, that will cause people to slow down. Pay attention to how fast the loudest cars are going. Noise does not get people to slow down. The best way to figure that out is to notice that speeding tickets have been issued for decades, issued to cars that lacked all of the fancy sound deadening and vibration reduction of modern cars because such refinements had yet to be invented.
2. Reduce standard equipment
Reducing the weight of the car will have a positive effect on its mileage, but what adds the most weight to a modern car is not the luxury appointments but the mandatory safety equipment. On average it adds 600 pounds to a car, and you're complaining about the drag of an alternator?
An alternator sucks up about 1hp per 25 amps at full load. A whopping 4 horsepower with the typical car today.
Lugging the equivalent of three full sized greenies (or two Americans) around everywhere you go has a much larger effect on your mileage.
Air-conditioning is also blamed for killing mileage. At full tilt they consume about 10hp (compared to about 25hp in 1979!). You'll find lots of internet answers claiming they consume 20% of engine power. Who makes a 50hp car? But is is better to run the AC or leave the windows down?
That depends. How much extra drag is imposed by rolling down the windows? That drag increases logarithmically as speed increases, so it will also depend on speed. The base aerodynamics of the car matter a great deal as well. No matter what though, there's a point where the increased drag from the air will cost more than the cost of running the compressor.
3. Radical aerodynamics
They act like this isn't already happening. That cars still can be designed to look appealing after leaving the wind tunnel is a testament to the talents of the aerodynamic engineers who actually know and understand this topic compared to a greenie with a journalism degree.
How do I know Mr Greenie doesn't understand aero? Point 1 gives it away. Wind noise is a sign that air is not flowing smoothly. That causes drag and drag consumes energy.
4. Tandem seating
Here he's right. Decreasing the frontal area is a proven way to decrease drag. To a point. Area ruling is something he might wanna look up, but for a car sized object there's not a lot you can do. The real problem with tandem seating for a car is utility. (By the way, your typical car already has seats in tandem, the back seats are tandem to the front seats... DUR). A two seat car with tandem seats is aerodynamic and forgets that we use our cars to get stuff from the store. It also overlooks that many people need more than two seats. It's the same reason the Smart 4-2 and Corvette aren't in more driveways, where's the kid gonna sit?
Form follows function and the form of the automobile did not pop out of a vacuum.
5. Delete gas-guzzling engines from the range
Define gas-guzzling. The "gas guzzling" V-8 in a new Corvette is a 450 horsepower 6.2L engine that gets 30 miles per gallon (epa calculated). It replaces a similarly powered engine that gets 26 miles per gallon. A 450 horsepower engine in 1965 is a NINE miles per gallon engine that also weighs twice as much! Additionally, the Corvette engine has been getting more displacement, more power and better mileage since 1984. Derivatives of these engines can be found in full sized pick-ups and the mileage improvements are much more felt.
A 1975 Pinto with an 83 horsepower 2.3L 4 cylinder and a manual transmission only got 34 miles per gallon. The Vette engine is 542% more powerful and "only" gets 88% of the mileage.
A 155 hp 2.0L 4 cylinder engine in a manual transmission Mazda 3 is eking out 39 mpg with the same technology as the new Corvette.
He mentions that car makers must sell cars. It should be pointed out, firmly, that every car made that embraces all five of his points is not being sold today. No car company that embraced all but #4 are still in business.