Alt Fuels

  • 2014 Volkswagen Golf TDI

    Volkswagen wants to promote natural gas as an alternative to electrification, and hopes the EPA will help it.

  • VPG MV-1
    AM General Buys VPG, Defunct Natural-Gas Handicapped Van Maker

    Less than a year ago, Vehicle Production Group seemed a success: The startup maker had built 2,500 MV-1 handicapped vans in a year, about one-quarter of them powered by natural gas. But this past April, VPG shut down due to a cash crunch that meant it couldn't make payroll. Now, its $50 million...

  • Non-ethanol gasoline pump
    Gas Stations Claim Oil Companies Block E15, FTC To Investigate

    The idea is simple: Replace refined hydrocarbons yanked deep out of the earth with vehicle fuel derived from crops. The ongoing politics of ethanol remain anything but simple. The latest salvo sally in the ethanol wars was fired by two U.S. senators from agricultural states, Amy Klobuchar [D-MN]...

  • Concept drawings for Elon Musk’s 800-mph Hyperloop
    Elon Musk's Hyperloop: 30 Minutes In Windowless 800-MPH Pod?

    Tesla CEO Elon Musk is a man of many and advanced interests, and his latest notion--the Hyperloop rapid transit system revealed as a concept yesterday--fits into his vision of a very different future. In a nutshell, the Hyperloop is a system in which people board pods inside an elevated metal tube...

  • 2014 Mercedes-Benz E Class
    Bi-Fuel Mercedes-Benz E-Class Runs On Natural Gas, In Germany

    While electric cars get a lot of press, electricity is hardly the only way to power vehicles without using gasoline. Discussion of natural gas as a vehicle fuel is rising again, in part due to huge supplies coming online in North America. Now Mercedes-Benz has launched its latest vehicle powered by...

  • Hyundai Tucson Fuel-Cell vehicle enters production
    Hyundai To Develop Renewable Hydrogen Station In California

    Hyundai has announced plans to transform an existing hydrogen refueling station in California into a cutting edge renewable fueling station. The station will be built on the site of an existing hydrogen station at Hyundai America Technical Center Inc. in Chino, California. The original station was...

  • Solar Field, Mojave Desert [Credit: ©2012 Jamey Stillings, courtesy of the Forward Thinking Museum]

    Some of our electric car-owning readers already reap the benefits of solar energy with roof-mounted panels, but on a grid level solar still has a long way to go. The U.S. Department of Energy wants to change that, revealing targets that would mean one third of the Western U.S. energy demands could be satisfied by solar by 2050. According to Clean Technica, it could also save Americans $20 billion a year in energy costs, and reduce emissions to just 20 percent that of 1990 levels. The DoE's SunShot Initiative is designed to "reduce cost and uncertainty in future low-carbon electricity...

  • Algaeus, a 2008 Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid conversion running on biofuel blended from algae
    Biofuel Company Latest To Pay Off Government Loan Early

    Government lending to green technology companies has been a political hot potato in recent years. Huge loans were offered to dozens of companies. Automakers, solar companies, biofuel concerns and more received money, but high-profile failures like Solyndra lent credence to those critical of the...

  • Natural-gas vehicle prototypes, Los Angeles, May 2013 - group shot at Playa del Rey storage field
    Senate Bill Boosts CAFE Ratings For Natural-Gas Vehicles With Gasoline Backup

    A new bill in the U.S. Senate would amend Corporate Average Fuel Economy rules to encourage production of a new class of natural-gas vehicles with "reserve" gasoline tanks. As demonstrated in a drive of prototype vehicles earlier this year, the range-extended natural gas cars would run for perhaps...

  • 2014 Ford F-150 fitted with natural-gas readiness package
    2014 Ford F-150 Natural-Gas Readiness Package For Half-Ton Pickup

    Ford is the latest automaker to offer a natural gas fuel option for its best-selling pickup truck range. The 2014 Ford F-150 will be offered with a natural gas (CNG) and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) preparation option aiding installation of a suitable fuel system at qualified third-party...

  • Prokhorov CityCar natural-gas hybrid vehicle, design prototype
    Yo-Auto Natural-Gas Hybrid Update: Production Now In 2015?

    With Teslas and BMW i3s dominating the green car headlines, it's easy to forget that plenty of other automakers are creating their own low-emission vehicles. In Russia, that company is Yo-Avto. The automaker has promised a natural gas hybrid vehicle for some time--and that time could now be 2015...

  • Hyundai Tucson Fuel-Cell vehicle enters production
    Hydrogen Fuel Cell Cars More Viable With Cheaper, More Efficient Electrolysis?

    Whatever you think of hydrogen-powered vehicles, recent technology-sharing deals have shown the automakers themselves are beginning to push towards fuel cell vehicles. Among other issues, it's hydrogen's production causing a few issues for the burgeoning industry--it's neither very efficient, nor...

  • Rusty car (Image: Flickr user Another Seb)

    Rust is usually something to be avoided in the automotive world, unless you're a hot-rodder looking for that sun-scorched appearance or a VW scene kid wanting the "rat look". But while most associate rust with decay, scientists are finding another use for it--and one which could improve hydrogen production, benefitting fuel cell vehicles. The hydrogen producing process results from mixing nanoparticles of haematite (crystalline iron oxide, or rust) with water and the energy from sunlight. According to the BBC, researchers in the U.S, Switzerland and Israel have isolated a particular size of...

  • All-gas biofuel plant in Chiclana, Spain (Image: All-gas)
    Spanish Town To Run Cars On Biofuel From Human Poop...

    Humans are a lot like cars. No, seriously--in order to make us work, we need fuel. That fuel is our food, which we metabolize in order to function, and anything not required by the body we produce as waste. Sounds familiar, right? Conveniently, that waste can then also be used to fuel our cars...

  • Natural-gas vehicle prototypes, Los Angeles, May 2013 - gasoline & natural-gas fillers in gas door
    'Add Natural Gas' Ad Campaign To Promote New Type Of Cars

    On Tuesday, six prototype cars powered by natural gas for their first 60 or so miles and by gasoline thereafter were unveiled in Washington, D.C. Now, the natural-gas industry is taking them on the road to "drive a conversation about the benefits of natural gas as a transportation fuel for...

  • Natural-gas vehicle prototypes, Los Angeles, May 2013 - group shot at Playa del Rey storage field
    Prototype Natural-Gas Vehicles Use Gasoline As Range Extender

    To date, natural-gas vehicles have come with significant compromises. The high-pressure tanks that hold enough compressed natural gas to run 200 miles or more take up many cubic feet of space in the trunk, load bay, or pickup bed. But what if you could design a vehicle that had just enough natural...

  • Hyundai ix35 hydrogen fuel-cell car
    Hyundai Still Backing Hydrogen Fuel Cells--Where Infrastructure Exists

    On June 3, Hyundai delivered the first ix35 Fuel Cell vehicle in Europe, to the City of Copenhagen in Denmark. Production of the company's hydrogen-fueled vehicle began in February. That means that its first production hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle is now on the roads, albeit at low planned volumes...

  • Biofuel crops (photo: Texas A&M University biofuels research alliance)
    Low Carbon Fuel Standard Proving More Successful Than Expected

    A report analyzing the uptake of low-carbon fuels says that fossil-fuel alternatives are actually growing faster than expected. The report, produced by a coalition of investors, utilities, and makers of alternative fuels and vehicles, suggests alternative fuels are proving more popular than...

  • Solar Panels by Flickr user Chandra Marsono

    It's perfectly reasonable to be skeptical when an alternative energy organization says we should move away from fossil fuels, and likewise reasonable to be skeptical when the fossil fuel industry says we have nothing to worry about. But when the world's largest coal producer turns to solar power admid concerns its coal reserves won't last much longer, people start to take notice. That's exactly what Coal India is doing, according to dna India--and it'll also invest in solar to cut its own energy costs. It'd almost be funny if the message behind it wasn't so serious. You can almost imagine the...

  • Audi A3 g-tron first drive, Berlin
    Audi A3 g-tron: First Drive Of Natural Gas Compact Car

    We lost count of just how many times Audi engineers used the phrase "no compromises" during their 'tron' presentations in Berlin. And driving the Audi A3 Sportback g-tron, a near-standard A3 running on natural gas, it's hard not to agree with them--at least initially. For the average car buyer, the...

  • Mercedes-Benz Hydrogen Fuel-Cell vehicle
    Hydrogen Production Gets Cleaner: Now With Lower Carbon Monoxide

    Hydrogen is often lauded as a fuel of the future--a way to offer the combined benefits of electric vehicles and combustion cars in one, simple package. The reality is a little more complicated, as you might imagine. But one of hydrogen's long-standing issues, the cleanliness of its production...

  • 2012 Honda Civic Natural Gas
    Do Electric And Natural-Gas Cars Compete Against Each Other?

    We've been thinking a lot about natural-gas fueled vehicles, for reasons that will become clear in due course. Writing about green cars can occasionally be awkward, because there are different audiences for diesels versus hybrids, for plug-in electric cars, and for other types of alternative fuels...

  • Algae [source: VentureBeat]
    U.S. Perfectly Placed For Algae-Based Biofuel Production

    The U.S. is sitting on top of a fuel goldmine, it seems. Not shale gas or crude oil, but fresh water and suitable land to produce 25 billion gallons of algae-based biofuel--a month's worth of the country's fuel needs each year. The discovery comes from the U.S. Department of Energy's Pacific...

  • Two BNSF locomotives hauling coal trains meet near Wichita Falls, Texas
    Another Convert To Natural-Gas Fueling: Railroad Locomotives?

    The U.S. is increasingly awash in natural gas, so it's natural to consider it as a potential vehicle fuel. From passenger cars to long-haul trucks, both compressed natural gas (CNG) and refrigerated liquid natural gas (LNG) are being eyed as a replacement for diesel fuel and gasoline. Now, natural...

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