CAN THE words ?cars? and ?environmentalism? coexist in one article?

We?ll sure give it a try. But we can?t blame the skeptics for raising their eyebrows on this, what with the accepted notion that cars?despite the modern conveniences they bring?have greatly contributed to the destruction of ecosystems. Hundreds of millions of these metal beasts in all forms, shapes and sizes, with their constant craving for fossil fuels and their climate change-inducing byproducts, have altered the complexion of this planet.

When the world?s number one carmaker registers a significant blip in the environment radar, right in this country, Inquirer Motoring can?t help but take notice; even if it happens way up in the far North in the Cagayan Valley.

It?s not just one blip. For the past three years, Toyota Motor Corp?s reforestation project in Peñablanca, on the foothills of the Sierra Madre mountain range in Cagayan Valley 24 kms from Tuguegarao City, has been slowly restoring the forest?s heartbeat.

The carmaker is now in the exact halfway point of the six-year, 2,500-hectare Philippine Peñablanca Sustainable Reforestation Project, which now enters the second phase of its $3 million project. The fund is the biggest an automotive company has invested in a reforestation project in the country, and Toyota?s second biggest reforestation project in the world after a similar project in Hebel Province in China.

The reforestation project has counted up to 1,360,000 trees planted in 1,772 hectares during phase 1 from September 2007 to July 2010. These trees-narra, molave, bignai, kalumpit, tindalo, dapdap, tuai, hauili, tibbig and alibangbang-are indigenous to the area.

For phase 2 of the project which runs from September 2010 to 2013, the project will target the rehabilitation of another 728 hectares of degraded lands through reforestation, enrichment planting and agro-forestry.

To make the project sustainable for the local communities, and to veer them away from their destructive slash-and-burn farming techniques that caused the deforestation in the first place, the reforestation has focused on planting 40,000 mango trees (which now stand at a robust 3.5 meters high) and over 12,000 assorted fruit trees like citrus, coffee, cacao, langka, and 300,000 fuel wood species like ipil-ipil, anchoan and kakawate. In time, the communities can already literally start harvesting the fruits of their labors.

Even before the harvest, the reforestation has bestowed considerable benefits on those communities actively involved in the project. In the second year of the project, the average income of the 725 project beneficiary families ranged from P23,530 to P113,600 depending on their participation in different activities such as plantation establishments, seedling production, paid labor in the nurseries, protection activities and fireline establishments.

And as what Conservation International Philippines, Toyota?s project implementing partner, showed, an additional P12,000 average annual income per household for mango harvests may be expected starting as early as the fifth year of the project.

It wouldn?t be a surprise why the Japanese chose Peñablanca as one of its biggest environmental projects. The Peñablanca forest is home for up to 178 species of flora and fauna (birds, reptiles, bats and owls), including the endangered Philippine Eagle, and is the site to numerous natural attractions such as the more than 200 caves (including the ancient Callao Caves where a chapel has been built inside its cavernous mouth) and pristine river systems. The Peñablanca forest occupies 102,782 hectares of the northern region of the Sierra Madre Mountain Range in Peñablanca town. One of the Philippines? last remaining old growth and mossy forest stands, the forest is where the rivers, which supply potable water to Tuguegarao City and irrigation to local farmers, originate.

When we first visited the Peñablanca Sustainable Reforestation Project in September last year, Conservation International?s Ed Angadol, protected area associate of the Sierra Madre Biodiversity Corridor of Conservation International Philippines, explained that even at the early stages, the project?s young forest has helped absorb excess rainwater and trapped soil sediments, preventing soil runoff and erosion (the prerequisite to landslides).

In that visit, Inquirer Motoring brought along the Prius to Tuguegarao City.

The ?surprised? Japanese

Last weekend, at the kickoff of the second phase of the Peñablanca Sustainable Reforestation Project, Inquirer Motoring was again invited. Once more, the hybrid gasoline-electric Prius was called into service to transport us from Manila to Tuguegarao. This time, however, we decided that it was high time that the car that symbolizes the carmaker?s vision for a sustainable motoring future meet the ?elements? first-hand-which meant a little off-roading for this city driving designed sedan from Tuguegarao to Sitio Lalongan, Barangay Sisim, Penablanca, Cagayan.

Needless to say, the Japanese executives who visited the site (who included Toyota Motor Corp?s Nobuyori Kodaira, senior managing director; Toshinori Ogure, general manager for Biotechnology and Afforestation Division; and Toyota Motor Philippines Corp?s president Michinobu Sugata) were delightfully surprised to see the Prius in attendance, along with other Innovas, Fortuners and Hi-Aces that shuttled select guests, local and Japanese media.

At the press conference in Makati Shangrila on Friday, Yukitoshi Funo, executive vice president of TMC in Japan, told local and Japanese press that the project was awarded a gold rating last December with a third-party validation from the Rainforest Alliance under the standards of project scheme and design set by the Climate, Community and Biodiversity Project Design Standards Alliance.

Difficult road for the Prius

We couldn?t help but compare our 1,300-km trip from Manila to Tuguegarao and back on a Prius with the conservation efforts of not only Toyota and Conservation International but of all the rest of those fighting for the sustainability of the ecology of the planet.

The route from Manila to Tuguegarao via Nueva Ecija, Nueva Vizcaya and Isabela provinces comprised of 500 kms and 17 hours of bad roads and stormy Friday night and Saturday dawn weather, which forced us to take the return trip to Manila via the longer but better paved route via the picturesque Cagayan and Ilocos Norte and Sur provinces along the western coast of northern Luzon?a good 800 kms and relatively brighter Sunday weather. The return trip, though longer, took only just as much time and was a virtual feast for the eyes. Along the way, we even passed another reforestation project in in Nassiping, Cagayan. While the Prius quietly negotiated the well-maintained winding roads hugging the northern coastal mountain passes of Ilocos Norte, we were awed by the lush vegetation along the Kalbario-Patapat Natural Park in Sta Praxedes in Ilocos Norte, with peaks touching 2000 feet above sea level. A grounded ship, gathering rust, lay seemingly an arm?s length away from the Patapat Bridge, which made us think, quite pensively, did the wreck leak some bunker fuel?

The heavy Prius held its own against the forces of momentum on the mostly zig-zag roads of the North, considering that it was designed not as a sports car. We actually asked a lot from the Prius this weekend?making it go off-road in Peñablanca when it actually had low ground clearance and unsuitable tires, and forcing it to hold on to its side of the road on relatively high-speed cornering on mountain passes. Admirably, the sedan did what it had to under the circumstances.

Interestingly, the route back to Manila provided us with a couple of environment-themed sights, such as the Bangui Wind Farm?which harnesses wind power to generate electricity using the 15 or so gigantic white windmills situated along the windy coast to selected communities in Bangui town in Ilocos Norte, and the Cape Bojeador lighthouse which uses solar power to charge its batteries during the day, which in turn powers the lighthouse at night.

On Power Mode (which we used for most of the trip), the Prius hauled metal like a 2.4-liter sedan in the body of a 1.8-liter Altis. Its seat cushion, scuff plates and other interior components are made of ecological plastic. Its dashboard is dominated by green indicators, the better to remind its occupants of its environmental leanings. The seamless interplay between the electric and gasoline engine is managed by the breakthrough Hybrid Synergy Drive and its intelligent energy management system. In terms of amenities, there are plenty of compartments: two glove compartments, another two compartments in the middle, six cupholders, four cubby holes and one huge trunk. Perhaps these spaces encourage Prius owners and occupants to keep their trash in the car instead of throwing them out somewhere.

The Prius, however, did what it was designed to do, save on fuel and help save the environment in the process. The gasoline-electric combination showed an interesting pattern in our thousand-kilometer trip: The more we actually went slower, the less fuel it consumed. The fuel consumption reading was 24 kilometers to a liter (combined highway and city) when we were running at an average speed of 38 kph. Then, when our average speed went up to 45 at the highways, the fuel consumption went down to 16 km/liter and 12.416 km/liter when we hit the 65 kph average.

Using the cruise controls along the 130-km stretch of SCTex (Tarlac to Mabalacat) and NLEX at a set speed of 100 kph and at Eco Mode, the fuel consumption improved to 18 km/liter.

Notwithstanding the rut Toyota?s battered image is in at its North American front, its Prius may as well represent a constant that guides it in its future as a carmaker, a future planned with some human warmth in this cold-hearted business of automobile manufacturing. Toyota, after all, is human. Its fate, like everyone else?s, begins and ends on the earth.