Hybrids

  • BMW Megacity Vehicle official teaser

    "Racing improves the breed". So said the late Soichiro Honda, believing that the lessons learned on the racing cars and motorcycles could be used to improve the marque's road vehicles. The evidence is plain to see. Technologies such as anti-lock brakes, traction control, unibody chassis, electrically adjustable shocks and many others have all stemmed from motorsport and have undoubtably helped to improve performance and safety in road vehicles. BMW Experts take on the electric challenge BMW have taken the theory one step further though: Following their exit from Formula One racing last year...

  • 2010 Toyota Prius
    Bad News For Electric Cars: Consumers Don't Understand Them

    Despite the hype and the near-ubiquity of the Toyota Prius (pictured), most Americans remain leery of buying alternative-fuel vehicles. That’s probably because they don’t have the basic knowledge to understand it, according to a new survey conducted by Harris Interactive. The survey...

  • 2012 Ford Grand C-Max
    Paris Motor Show: Ford Confirms C-Max Hybrid And Plug-In Minivans

    Since launching the Ford Escape Hybrid in 2004, Ford has confined sales of its hybrid-electric vehicles to North America. But that's about to change. In European markets, where up to 50 percent of new cars are fitted with high-efficiency diesel engines, Ford has focused its efforts over the last...

  • Mercedes-Benz Reporter plug-in hybrid pickup truck concept, from MBtech
    Mercedes-Benz Reporter: Plug-In Hybrid Pickup Truck Concept

    If you're all about saving gasoline--or "displacing petroleum," as energy wonks say--then the place to start may not be passenger cars. It may be commercial vehicles. From electric trucks in urban delivery fleets to more efficient hybrid-electric powertrains, there's a lot of innovation happening...

  • 2011 Toyota Prius
    2011 Toyota Prius Hybrid Prices Raised $250 For Every Model

    The 2010 Toyota Prius had an exceptionally long model year, introduced in early spring 2009 and delivered to dealers by May or June that year. But now the 2011 Prius hybrids are arriving at dealerships, and Toyota has levied a modest price increase of $250 across each of the four trim packages it...

  • 2011 Toyota Highlander Hybrid
    2011 Toyota Highlander Hybrid: New Styling, Higher Mileage

    The 2011 Toyota Highlander Hybrid has been restyled and made more powerful as part of a comprehensive freshening of the Toyota Highlander line, last fully redesigned for the 2008 model year. Along with more prosaic gasoline-powered Highlanders, the front-end styling has been updated. The hood and...

  • 2010 Fisker Karma S Concept

    It's been a year of press announcements but no cars from Fisker Automotive. Now the company says that the first factory-built 2011 Fisker Karma will debut at the 2010 Paris Motor Show, to be held at the end of the month. That may allow Fisker to keep its promise to deliver a handful of production models before the end of 2010. According to powertrain supplier Quantum, which announced a $30 million order from Fisker a week ago, production will start to ramp up in February 2011. The company will also expand on its plans for global distribution and, ummm, discuss "the addition of unique images...

  • 2010 Lotus Elite Concept
    2015 Lotus Elite Coupe To Offer Flywheel Hybrid Option For V8

    Add Lotus to the list of luxury and sports car makers offering hybrid models to raise fuel efficiency and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. It won't be on the market until the "spring of 2014," says Lotus, but 10 days from now at the 2010 Paris Motor Show, it will introduce a concept for its...

  • 2011 Mercedes-Benz A-Class E-Cell battery electric vehicle (Europe only)
    Latest Toyota Hybrid Synergy Drive Licensee: Mercedes-Benz ???

    Toyota leads the world in hybrid-electric vehicles, having built well over 2 million of them since 1997. That's more than half the hybrids on the planet. Now, with new electric cars about to hit the showrooms--the 2011 Nissan Leaf and 2011 Chevrolet Volt, for example--Toyota wants to cement its...

  • prototype 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid, April 2010
    Prius Plug-In Hybrid Now By June 2012, Cheapest Plug-In In U.S.?

    Amidst a flurry of battery-electric vehicle announcements by automakers all over the globe, Toyota reiterated plans to launch six new hybrid models by 2012. But the company will push back the U.S. launch date for its first plug-in vehicle, the 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid. Toyota had said this...

  • 2010 Ford Fusion Hybrid
    So What's Your Favorite (Green, Please) Ford Of All Time?

    If you're a Twitter user, you may have noticed that carmakers are starting to tweet big-time. And it's not just regurgitated marketing propaganda either. The @Ford account just tweeted the following, which intrigued us: @Ford: In 1953, Ford produced its 40-millionth U.S.-built vehicle. We're still...

  • Pre-Production 2010 Toyota Prius in Orlando
    Another Hybrid Study Misses the Point: It's Not About Payback

    Sometimes, you'd think that hybrid-electric vehicles were the most important development in the automotive world, if not the entire geopolitical sphere, in the last 15 years. They're not. More than a decade after they launched into the U.S. market, their market share hovers just south of 3 percent...

  • 2011 Lincoln MKZ Hybrid

    When your lead-in to a first-time-ever hybrid sedan is a North American Car of the Year trophy winner, things are probably okay in your world. That's Lincoln's world right now, where the brand is embarking on a complete renovation that will include 7 new or refreshed vehicles in the next four years. Whatever corporate agita was induced by the Ford takeovers of Aston Martin, Jaguar, Land Rover and Volvo is over now--and now Lincoln has the company's attention as it pivots back into the lead role in Ford's luxury movement. The next step in that movement is The 2011 Lincoln MKZ Hybrid, which...

  • The 2010 Toyota Prius
    Global Toyota Prius Hybrid Sales Level Off As Incentives End

    Talk about up-again, down-again. It was just a year ago when a global shortages of 2010 Toyota Prius models kept supplies tight all over the world. Now, they may start to pile up on dealer lots again. Last summer, the company had just launched the all-new 2010 Prius, the third generation of the...

  • Peugeot 3008 HYbrid4 diesel-electric hybrid
    World's First Diesel Hybrid SUV: 2011 Peugeot 3008 HYbrid4

    Almost exactly a year ago, we wrote that Peugeot would display its 3008 HYbrid4 Concept at the 2009 Frankfurt Motor Show. Right on schedule, the French automaker is now showing the production version of the compact crossover ahead of its debut at next month's Paris Motor Show. Why would we cover a...

  • 2008 Morgan LIFECar Concept
    Morgan LIFEcar 2 Diesel-Electric Hybrid Promises 1,000mi Per Tank

    Diesel-electric hybrids aren't cost-effective for mainstream cars. The price of either hybrid or diesel powertrains makes it hard to justify on a cost-recovery basis for fuel savers, though the environmental payback is obvious. But for the supercar set, money is no object, and so cars like the...

  • 2010 Honda Insight
    Ouch! Honda Yanks Civic Hybrid AND Insight Off Sale In Canada

    [UPDATE: Honda Canada later clarified to Autoblog Green that it was not removing the cars from sale, but merely selling down available stocks, and that it would order more units from Japan when and if customer sales actually depleted its supplies of either model.] As early as last year's U.S. sales...

  • 2010 Toyota Prius
    Toyota Backs Off On Aggressive 2011 Hybrid Production Plans

    There's no question that Toyota dominates global production of hybrid-electric vehicles, but even the king of the hill has to take smaller steps sometimes. According to the Japanese business newspaper Nikkan Kogyo, Toyota [NYSE:TM] plans to build almost three-quarters of a million hybrid vehicles...

  • 2010 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 Nurburgring

    Last week, Karl-Friedrich Stracke, GM's vice president of global vehicle engineering, set to rest rumors of a mid-engine next-generation Chevrolet Corvette. That got a lot of attention among Corvette fans. But a footnote to the story was that Stracke said not only that a hybrid Corvette was possible, but that such a powertrain would be "an interesting idea." He noted that Porsche has announced it will add hybrids across its lineup, to meet new fuel efficiency regulations. Hypothetically, Stracke said, a carmaker might offer a very small number of standard powertrains in its sports car lines...

  • Bright IDEA plug-in hybrid delivery van, prototype
    Not-A-Big-Surprise Dept: Bright Confirms Switch to GM Engines

    When GM Ventures announced it would invest an unspecified amount of money into startup hybrid truck-maker Bright Automotive, several of us noted that the prototype Bright Idea delivery van used an 2.0-liter engine and transmission from a Dodge Caliber. The announcement two weeks ago from General...

  • 2012 Infiniti M35h hybrid sedan
    2012 Infiniti M35h, Its First Hybrid, Previews at Pebble Beach

    Almost a year ago, Infiniti confirmed a hybrid version of its new M sedan, to be launched at the end of 2010. Now, the company has unveiled that car, in the tony surroundings of the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, the premier U.S. showcase for classic cars. Infiniti has adopted the Lexus...

  • 2010 Toyota Prius
    Why The Cost of Insuring Your Hybrid Car Is Going To Rise

    We already knew that the quintessential hybrid car, the Toyota Prius, costs a little more to repair than non-hybrid cars. Now, the news gets worse: Insurance rates for hybrids are going to rise, probably at a faster rate than auto insurance premiums overall, according to Mitchell International's...

  • 2010 Honda Civic Hybrid
    Honda Civic Hybrid: Software Upgrade Fixes Battery Issue

    Honda is asking Civic Hybrid owners to bring their cars back to the dealership for a software upgrade, as the hybrid system's original power management tactics might result in a battery life that's shorter than intended.

  • General Electric GE WattStation charging
    Who's Buying Green Cars? Not Only Consumers, But Big Fleets Too

    Most of the focus on new green cars--like the 2011 Nissan Leaf, the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, and a slew of new and existing hybrids--has been on how consumers will adapt to them. But in fact, a portion of early years' production of any of those cars is likely to go into car fleets maintained by state...

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