Electric Cars

After four years, an economic crisis, an industry meltdown, and plug-in cars becoming politically problematic, the 2012 Fisker Karma is on the streets at last. And it's a real car. We've driven it, shot video behind the wheel, and now we've formally reviewed it. We're still sorting out what we...

Until recently, most electric car drivers haven’t been expected to pay an electric equivalent of gasoline taxes to help keep the roads and bridges of their state in good order. But earlier this month, the Washington state Senate passed a bill to the House which, if passed into law by the...

Real Americans only drive pickup trucks (imported oil be damned). It's obvious because slaps at green cars and fuel-economy rules have become a staple of political campaigning among certain candidates. Yesterday, Newt Gingrich mocked the current Administration's promotion of fuel-efficient cars in...

We've all heard stories about woefully low range from electric cars in icy climates, but just how suited are EVs to very cold conditions? That's what a bunch of Finnish electric car owners decided to find out, led by Finland's Electric Traffic program. Nine electric vehicles participated in a...

When it comes to reminiscing about old TV shows, we find they fall into one of two categories -- shows we really miss, or shows so bad they make us cringe to think about. Electra Woman and Dyna Girl -- a 16 week live action kids show from 1976 -- most certainly falls into the latter category, but...

Less than a month ago, electric car infrastructure firm and battery swap specialist Better Place started deliveries of all-electric Renault Fluence Z.E. cars to customers in Israel. In the past, Better Place has explained the basics of how its rapid battery swap stations work, but what’s it...

It’s now been well over a year since the first 2011 Nissan Leafs were delivered to customers in California, Oregon, Washington and Arizona. But after one year, how are early Nissan Leafs performing? Are their battery packs still healthy, or have they started to show signs of wear already?...

This is the week when driving impressions of the 2012 Fisker Karma have started to appear, as Fisker invites in waves of automotive journalists for a half-day of driving in and around Los Angeles. (We'll have our report early next week, but we had a brief drive a few weeks ago, and another with...

Sixteen months ago, General Electric announced it would place the "largest order in history" for electric cars, to be used by its employees who are issued company cars. Now, those cars are starting to arrive and be placed with employees. And where changes are made, personnel policies are sure to...

We already know that appropriately-equipped electric cars can be used to provide emergency backup power to homes cut off from the electricity grid in a natural disaster, but can they also be used to help a city run as normal? Could they, for example, be used to power stop lights? It’s a...

To say the Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car has become a political punching bag would be to understate the obvious. Now, GM is slowly, carefully trying to get the facts about the Volt out to the public at large, hoping to win hearts and minds in a larger battle involving electric cars...

Less than a week after Tesla Motors [NASDAQ:TSLA] unveiled the prototype of its 2014 Model X Crossover SUV at an exclusive event in Los Angeles, the Californian electric automaker has called it the fastest selling Tesla ever. According to a press release posted on Tesla’s website yesterday...

Two days ago, President Barack Obama released his proposed U.S. government budget for the fiscal year starting in October. And in it, he followed through on a promise from his State of the Union address last month, by proposing to cut up to $4 billion in subsidies to the oil and gas industry. The...

Back in November, we reported that Ford was planning on starting deliveries of its 2012 Ford Focus Electric to customers in New York and California before the end of 2011, with sales in other areas due to follow some time this year. In reality, while Ford technically did get all-electric Focuses to...

First deliveries for Tesla’s all-electric Model X crossover are still a couple of years away, but the Silicon Valley-based automaker was already hard at work selling it to potential buyers at last week’s party-style premiere, held at the automaker’s design studios in Hawthorne...

We all know that electric cars charged from renewable sources of energy are much cleaner than gasoline-powered cars, but what about electric cars charged from electricity produced by a dirty coal-fired power plant? For some time, those against the uptake of electric cars have claimed driving an...

When the Nissan Leaf launched in 2010, it came with an optional Chademo direct current (DC) quick charging port that could enable its 24 kilowatt-hour battery pack to recharge to 80 percent in under 30 minutes at compatible quick charge stations. So far, there are only a handful of DC quick...

Tesla's upcoming product plans seem designed for maximum stability, so don't expect to see a new Roadster until after the launch of Tesla's affordable Gen 3 car.

It’s no secret that the NYPD has a fleet of twenty 2011 Chevrolet Volts which help civilian traffic enforcement agents carry out duties throughout the city of New York, but now the Chevrolet Volt’s European sibling is proving popular with law enforcement agencies in the U.K. In a recent...

Nissan North America has announced its second voluntary service campaign for the all-electric Leaf since it went on sale in December 2010. Offered for free to all existing owners of the 11,000 Nissan Leafs that have been sold in the U.S. and Canada so far, the software update is designed to improve...