Electric

  • Lithium Air Battery

    General Motors is quietly conducting research into Lithium-Air batteries, the next Holy Grail of electric vehicle technology, according to a Friday article in The New York Times. GM acknowledges that while the battery technology has some way to go before it is used in commercial electric cars, the leap in capacity these batteries could offer could yield ranges per charge rivaling that of a conventional petroleum fueled car. For many years now lithium has played a part in high-density batteries from laptops through to electric cars, but Lithium air batteries have remained less common. Lithium...

  • Three-seat, three-wheeled electric vehicle in traditional Japanese style, photo by Kyodo Photo.
    What Wacky Forms of Electric Tourist Transport Can YOU Invent?

    It must be Friday, when the silly stuff comes up. According to Japan Times, in the Kansai region of Japan, four companies have got together to produce a new vehicle which they hope will capture the hearts and minds of eco-minded visitors needing a way to get around the ancient cities of Kyoto and...

  • Hawaii
    Hawaii: Island Paradise for Electric Vehicles As Well As People

    You'd be forgiven for thinking Hawaii is the center of the electric vehicle universe. Wednesday, Nissan announced it would be one of the first markets for the 2011 Leaf electric vehicle. Then yesterday South Korean manufacturer CT&T signed a deal with the state's governor, Linda Lingle, to...

  • Mitsubishi i-MiEV electric car at quick charging station
    Electric Vehicle Range, In the Real World: What You Need to Know

    At the moment, drivers of cars from the  2011 Mitsubishi i-MiEV to the 2010 Mini E are struggling to achieve the official mileage-range figures. So far, only Tesla's 2010 Roadster seems to be able to deliver on its range promises, and that's just when driven conservatively. Why are we hearing so...

  • Comedian Adam Carolla complains about electric cars and energy policy on Gizmodo
    OK, We Get It: Adam Carolla Likes, and Hates, Electric Cars

    As if legitimate news outlets didn't have enough trouble covering electric vehicles sensibly, now we get the comedians weighing in. Late-night talk-show host and stereotypical grumpy guy Adam Carolla recently lit into electric cars, in an interview with Gizmodo's Jason Chen in which he was invited...

  • First 2011 Chevrolet Volt built on production tooling at Detroit Hamtramck plant, March 31, 2010
    2011 Chevy Volt Marketing Theme Emerges: An EV for Road Trips

    GM has been talking about the 2011 Chevrolet Volt for three and a half years now. After absorbing an enormous amount of Volt propaganda, we've learned that subtle shifts in message can be important. A conference call yesterday revealed what we suspect will become a main marketing message for the...

  • President Bill Clinton

    Former President Bill Clinton recently visited social network digg.com  for a special Earth Day interview that touched on electric-vehicle policy and legislation. He answered user questions about many ecological and environmental topics--including third-world development and global warming--as well as future transport solutions for the globe. When the discussion moved to electric cars, Clinton urged that the move to electric vehicles should happen as rapidly as possible. But he also warned about hurdles that must be overcome first. Citing the success of last summer's Cash for Clunkers...

  • 2011 Nissan Leaf prototype
    Covering Electric Cars: Is It Really THAT Hard For the Media?

    If you pay attention to the so-called mainstream media, you could be forgiven for thinking that electric vehicles are alien technology, rather than cars with plugs. Though happy to cover natural disasters; governmental coups, and the latest celebrity gossip, pretty much any reporter seems...

  • 2011 Chevrolet Volt pre-production prototype, January 2010
    2011 Chevy Volt To Offer 'Mountain Mode' For Hill Climbing

    The 2011 Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric car will offer a capability that General Motors hasn't previously discussed: a "Mountain Mode" that the driver can select if he knows that he will be climbing a long hill. GM's executive director of powertrain engineering Larry Nitz revealed the new...

  • Aptera 2e during Automotive X-Prize handling tests, from Consumer Reports video on YouTube
    Aptera Grits Its Teeth, Glosses Over Auto X-Prize 2e Handling Issue

    Optimism is a useful thing for a startup company, maybe even a requirement. But the April newsletter from Aptera Motors, which is struggling to launch its ultra-aerodynamic three-wheeled electric vehicle in the face of delays and funding constraints, smooths over some crucial handling issues with...

  • 2011 Nissan Leaf
    Nissan Says: We'll Make Money On Selling Leaf Electric Cars

    It's almost an article of faith in the auto industry that electric cars will require huge subsidies in their initial years. Certainly Toyota is widely assumed to have put tens of billions of dollars into its hybrid-electric vehicle program before it started to cover its costs. Never shy of taking a...

  • BYD e6 electric crossover, Electric Avenue, 2010 Detroit Auto Show
    Chinese Electric Carmaker BYD Loves LA Too, For U.S. Offices

    While Chinese car company BYD exhibited its E6 all-electric crossover at the Detroit Auto Show last January, they've otherwise been fairly quite of late. Now comes word that the company has chosen downtown Los Angeles as the location for its U.S. headquarters. Friday, California governor Arnold...

  • 2011 Nissan Leaf

    Rumors are flying that Nissan is preparing a subcompact electric vehicle to compete directly with cars like the Mitsubishi i-MiEV, and it may even be made in China. The rumors are unconfirmed: word of mouth from inside a partner company of Nissan. But given the number of pre-launch reservations for the 2011 Nissan Leaf EV--combined with Nissan's long history of EV development--a new, smaller EV could be just what Nissan needs to become the market leader. Nissan have been making electric cars for many years. Their first EV was produced between 1947 and 1950 and called the Tama; it was...

  • Nissan Leaf being charged
    GE, Nissan Join Forces To Ready the Grid For Electric Cars

    This story, written by Camille Ricketts, was originally posted on VentureBeat's GreenBeat, an editorial partner of AllCarsElectric. Nissan continues to beat the electric car drum. Last week, it started taking reservations for its all-electric Leaf, and beat its own expectations with more than 6,600...

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    New For Your Convenience: All Cars Electric Delivered By E-Mail

    We appreciate our readers, each and every one of you. And we want to make it as easy as possible for you to access AllCarElectric.com. So when our reader Peter Mac, in Spain, wrote to us this morning to ask if he could have ACE delivered via e-mail, rather than using an RSS reader, we said, "Sure!"...

  • SAIC Roewe E1 electric minicar concept, Shanghai, April 2010
    2010 Beijing Motor Show: SAIC Roewe E1 Electric Mini-Car

    Sadly, we weren't able to cover the Beijing Motor Show, which opened last week. It's too bad, too, because China is on track to become the world's largest single car market, its fuel efficiency regulations are far tougher than those of the U.S., and its industrial policy for the auto sector focuses...

  • Nissan electric taxi leaving Better Place battery switching station, Tokyo, April 2010
    Better Place Launches Battery-Swap Test In Four Tokyo Taxis

    This past Monday, the electric-vehicle infrastructure provider Better Place held a press conference in Tokyo at the site of its first completed battery-swap station to be put into regular usage, in the Ropongi Hills area. Together with Nihon Kotsu, Tokyo's largest taxi company, the company will...

  • Fisker Karma at Laguna Seca
    Fisker Funds Keep Coming: Delaware Adds To DoE's $529 Million

    Last fall, Fisker Automotive was awarded $529 million in low-interest loans by the Department of Energy, and the company has continued to rake in cash since then. In January, for instance, Fisker raised an additional $115 million in private capital. Last week, the DoE and Fisker announced that the...

  • Think City

    Yesterday, we published a piece called Five Myths About Electric Cars, Courtesy of Think, whose CEO Richard Canny sent them to us. Today we have five more, to finish off his list of 10 myths. Below is the second half of Canny's list (which is why it begins with # 6), along with our assessment of Think's rebuttal to each one. The Think City is a purpose-built electric car designed for urban use . It is capable of highway speeds and has a range of more than 100 miles, emission free, on a single charge. It's now built in Finland; U.S. sales will begin later this year. NOTE: We did a little...

  • 2012 Opel Ampera, first pre-production vehicle, April 2010
    Opel Ampera, GM's Other Extended-Range EV, In Pre-Production

    We write a lot about the 2011 Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric vehicle here. It's a radical new car, GM's first electric car since the late EV1, and it'll be in dealerships in just six months. But GM has another electric car coming next year as well. It's the 2012 Opel Ampera. Ummmm, what's...

  • Think City electric vehicle
    Five Myths About Electric Cars, Courtesy of Think

    Last Thursday was the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, and the CEO of one electric-car maker took the occasion to speak out on some of the popular myths around the manufacturing and use of electric vehicles. Richard Canny, who runs the recently refinanced Think, published a list of "top 10 EV myths...

  • 2011 Chevrolet Volt MPV5 concept, Unveiled at 2010 Beijing Motor Show
    2011 Chevrolet Volt MPV5 Concept To Be Unveiled in Beijing

    Tomorrow at the Beijing Motor Show, General Motors will unveil its a concept car that likely shows what will be its second unique model of the Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric vehicle. It's called the Chevrolet Volt MPV5 concept; "MPV" stands for Multi-Purpose Vehicle, which is what Asian and...

  • First 2011 Chevrolet Volt built on production tooling at Detroit Hamtramck plant, March 31, 2010
    2011 Chevrolet Volt Electric Car To Reach Dealers In October

    The three-year drumbeat of anticipation for the 2011 Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric car has just gotten slightly louder. General Motors CEO Ed Whitacre announced yesterday that the car will arrive at selected Chevy dealers in October, a month earlier than expected. The first pre-production...

  • 2010 Toyota Prius
    Surprise! Yes, Fuel Efficiency (Still) Matters to Car Buyers

    What a shock! Who'd ever have thought it? Will wonders never cease? Yes, yet another survey shows that fuel efficiency matters to car and truck buyers. And that more than half say their next vehicle will get better gas mileage than their current ride. Fuel efficiency: It matters Capital One Auto...

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