Clearwater has an eco-theme, and the Toyota Priuses and VW buses are out in force. (Jim Motavalli photo)

I spent part of the weekend at the Clearwater Festival alongside the Hudson River in upstate New York. The river is considerably cleaner since folk singer Pete Seeger, who lives on the Hudson in Beacon, decided to get involved in 1966 and built the sloop Clearwater (the festival’s namesake) to focus attention.

The Clearwater Festival (also known as the Great Hudson River Revival) is in its 40s, and Pete Seeger (who appeared on stage this year as every year) is now in his 90s. That means a lot of graying ponytails and fraying tie dye at the annual celebration. I mention all this because as I was driving up to the festival I got behind two nearly identical Priuses festooned with bumper stickers (they both had the one saying “Coexist”) so I knew I could tailgate them all the way to the entrance. And so it proved.

The Toyota Prius is everybody’s favorite hybrid car, and it’s the pick hit of folk singers (and their fans). There were dozens of them at Clearwater, but they were followed closely by versions of the Volkswagen Microbus (number one transport for tofu vendors). So let it be said here that although both those vehicles have the eco stamp of approval, only one is really a green car.

It turns out that the VW Beetle and its Microbus variant (same engine) are like Rush Limbaugh to the Prius’ Al Gore. One auto analyst did a back-of-the-envelope calculation for me and concluded that the mid-60s Beetle produces more than 141% more hydrocarbons and 80% more nitrogen oxides (the main smog ingredients) than does the typical SUV the greens hate. Even a Hummer is far cleaner for the environment (and the Hudson, for that matter), than old VWs.