2011

Gas mileage is on absolutely everyone's mind these days. Strife in oil-producing nations, and the associated rising gasoline prices, have already led to a surge of interest in any vehicle's MPG ratings. Now production in Japan (source of most of the world's hybrids) is shut down, at least...

If you listen to the enthusiastic founder and CEO of Better Place Shai Agassi, the ability to swap depleted electric car battery packs for fully charged ones at a dedicated swap station is an essential and much-needed part of electric vehicle infrastructure. But while the ultra-fast way of getting...

Expect to see smaller engines for BMW’s future models, as high fuel prices and greater environmental concerns push automakers towards engines with lower displacements. We’ve already seen this trend with the recent announcement of BMW’s new TwinPower Turbo 2.0-liter four-cylinder...

Mazda should be beaming as much as the front-end of their Mazda3s with the recent announcement from Insurance Institute of Highway Safety (IIHS). The 2011 Mazda3 has made the IIHS “Top Safety Pick.” The Mazda3 earns the top rating of “Good,” in front, side, rear and rollover...

For all the media furor over the 2011 Nissan Leaf and the 2011 Chevy Volt, you'd think that tens of thousands of them were flooding onto our streets each month. Not so. As of Feb 28, the total sold between both cars was just 1,102, made up of 928 Volts and 174 Leafs. Now, it may be that those...

Nissan Europe has officially started rollout of its 2011 Nissan Leaf to customers in the U.K., with multiple cars being handed over this morning to private customers at multiple dealers across the U.K. Radio Presenter Mark Goodier was the first customer in the U.K. to take delivery of the five seat...

Last year both Honda and Mitsubishi unveiled new minicar concepts previewing their respective small car futures--Honda with the Brio Prototype and Mitsubishi with the Concept Global Small. Since then Mitsubishi has confirmed the production version of its Concept Global Small for eventual sale in...

If at first you don't succeed ... make your race car better. That's the principle behind yesterday's launch of the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid 2.0. It's the second iteration of Porsche's ground-breaking 911 endurance racer fitted with a Kinetic Energy Recovery System, or KERS. The first version of the...

Chinese battery firm turned automaker hit the news a couple of times last week for all the wrong reasons. But less than a week after the firm was the center of a major auto scandal it has quietly started to prepare itself for a late 2011 U.S. Launch. So why is a company which previously been...

Just a few months in and we’re already hearing stories of electric car owners getting stranded as their new electric cars ‘suddenly’ run out of power. We’ve already examined the reasons behind why two 2011 Nissan Leaf drivers recently found themselves stranded without...

Gas prices are rising, so you'd think that the 2011 Toyota Prius hybrid would be the car of the moment. But with car production halted in Japan following the earthquake and tsunami, Prius supplies are already growing tight. And Toyota is hardly helping the thriftiest buyers, those who want only a...

Should electric cars make noise? It’s one of the most contentious arguments in the electric vehicle world today, with passionate cases made on both sides for and against warning systems designed to announce the presence of a plug-in car to pedestrians. But early reports coming out of a recent...

After three weeks of using our new 2011 Nissan Leaf for most of our local commuting, it has a valued and important place in our two-car family. We appreciate the driving economy and features of the car. But it has been shocking how little notice the car has received. As one of the first half-dozen...

Eighteen months after Australian Tesla roadster early adopter Simon Hackett broke the world record for the longest distance travelled in a production electric vehicle Tesla Australia is planning a 3,000 kilometer (1,864 mile) trek along the country’s east coast After receiving official...

Late last month, Toyota announced that it had delivered its 3-millionth hybrid-electric vehicle, with 3.03 million sold as of February 28. Of that total, almost 2.2 million were the company's dedicated hybrid Prius model, now in its third generation. The 1997 Toyota Prius four-door sedan was one of...

Some things about the 2011 Chevrolet Volt we liked, and there were a few that puzzled us. But GM's innovative range-extended electric car also has its share of annoyances. We found several features irritating, or (to be more diplomatic) perhaps not-quite-entirely-thought-through yet. That's...

Every new car has a few teething problems, but a few reports of Nissan's all-electric Leaf running out of charge prematurely hasn't helped the age-old stereotype that electric cars will leave their owners stranded without power. But are these incidents as rare as the reports suggest and what...

The 2011 Chevrolet Volt is a remarkable achievement for General Motors, but it does have a few features and behaviors that make us scratch our heads. After living with the car for five days and more than 700 miles, here are five questions we'd love to get answers to. (GM PR: You know where we live...

We're going to have a lot of 2011 Chevrolet Volt coverage this week, as we round up our impressions on the five days and hundreds of miles we've racked up on GM's first extended-range electric vehicle. We'll do a full drive report later on, but first, a few quick hits about the things we like in...

The shuttered Saturn brand is quickly fading from memory, but now GM plans to bring back one former Saturn model to live on in a new incarnation. But even if you're a Saturn fan, you won't be able to buy one--unless you're a business. Vue redux The compact crossover that sold for only two years as...