Hybrids

The prices of all five trim levels of the new 2010 Toyota Prius will rise next month by $400, or roughly 1.5 to 2 percent, reflecting increased costs and an unfavorable yen-dollar exchange rate. Toyota announced the changes on December 21, buried at the bottom of a lengthy press release on the...

As luxury automakers focus more on how to extend their brand into smaller packages that maintain the prestige and performance of their larger models, Audi has a few advantages. Its new 2011 Audi A1 subcompact hatchback can draw on the full experience of its parent, Volkswagen Group, while selling...

We don't cover electric two-wheelers much here at GreenCarReports.com. They're not cars, and while millions are sold each year in China, we don't see many of them in the United States. But we thought it was worthwhile to note the launch of the world's first hybrid two-wheeler.  We're not entirely...

If you're one of the 120,000 people who own a Honda Civic Hybrid made between 2003 and 2008, you may already know about the proposed settlement to a lawsuit against Honda contending its advertising overestimated the gas mileage of your car. If you're not aware of the suit, read up quick. EPA...

Not surprisingly, automotive journalists compete to be the first to drive the latest new cars. Some crave Chevies, others follow Ferrari. Here at GreenCarReports.com, we want to be among the first to drive electric cars and other plug-ins, new hybrids, clean diesels, and so forth. We've driven a...

Sadly, they're not actually orange. Nor do they smell like citrus when they get hot. But by infusing orange oil into natural rubber, a new line of tires from Yokohama cuts four-fifths of the petroleum needed to manufacture a tire. They lower rolling resistance too, meaning better fuel efficiency...

The huge SEMA show, mecca of car modifications from awful to awesome, now attracts even manufacturers, who commission custom versions of production cars in hopes that hotness will rub off on them. Even Toyota showed the Prius Aerius and Aemulus this year. But the real action is in the aftermarket...

With early data now showing that hybrid cars seem to hit pedestrians more often, carmakers are ramping up efforts to find ways of alerting people when a nearby car is operating in electric mode. Now the UK's Group Lotus Engineering has come up with a noise-generating system, one of several...

Another day, another announcement in the series of carefully timed press releases on the 2011 Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric car. In this case, it's the news that GM's investment in the Detroit-Hamtramck plant where the Volt will be built totals $336 million. General Motors says that sum...

One of the standouts among the global carmakers at the 2009 Los Angeles Auto Show was Hyundai. The Korean company has seen its market share rise from 3 to 4 percent during a dismal downturn, even without any new volume models to spur excitement. Now, with its Los Angeles launch of the 2010 Tucson...

The 2010 Audi A3 TDI was awarded the 2010 Green Car of the Year Award today at the Los Angeles Auto Show by Green Car Journal, which has presented the award for five years. It follows last year's winner, the 2009 Volkswagen Jetta TDI, to make two clean diesels in a row to win the award. The 2010...

While Toyota's press conference today at the Los Angeles Auto Show covered the new 2011 Toyota Sienna minivan, a very special Prius hybrid on the show floor signaled the company's first tentative step into the world of plug-in vehicles. Toyota will deliver the first of 150 Toyota Prius Plug-In...

Only a handful of U.S. auto shows count as important. Detroit, in January, is one; historically, New York in April has been another. But the up-and-comer is the Los Angeles Auto Show, which now occurs in late November or early December and focuses on green cars of all stripes: hybrids, electric...

Ack! It's December! Wha'ppened? Well, to avoid thoughts of the holiday shopping you haven't done yet, here are the most popular posts of the past 30 days on AllAboutPrius.com, three of them returning from October's most popular posts. This month, it's all about safety and recalls. The...

We're gearing up for the Los Angeles Auto Show here at GreenCarReports, and the press releases are flying across the desk. Most of them don't apply to green car buyers and fans, but here's one worth watching. At the show, Capstone Turbine Corp. will unveil its CMT-380 concept, an extended-range...

Carmakers have dived into the deep end of social media, with iPhone apps, Facebook pages, Twitter streams, and a whole host of other online ways to reach potential buyers and promote their brands. Not surprisingly, given the affluent, environmentally aware nature of its audience, the 2010 Toyota...

Well, maybe "soon" is a bit of an overstatement. But Jim Lentz, the president of Toyota's U.S. arm, recently told Ward's Auto News that sales of the Prius--the best-selling hybrid in the U.S. market--could grow to equal those of the Toyota Camry sometime this decade. The Toyota Camry, including its...

The Two-Mode Hybrid project was hailed as a model of technical cooperation when it was announced five years ago. But now the partners are going their separate ways, and the complex hybrid system may end up solely as a General Motors technology. GM said in late 2004 it would partner with Daimler and...

We've covered BMW's first two hybrid vehicles, just launched for the upcoming year: the 2010 BMW ActiveHybrid X6 "sports activity coupe", the world's most powerful hybrid, and the 2010 BMW ActiveHybrid 7, the world's fastest hybrid sedan. Now a spy photo from the British magazine Autocar shows that...

The 2010 Toyota Prius is in fairly short supply all over the world, and its U.S. sales are trouncing those of the 2010 Honda Insight, its competitor in the arena of dedicated hybrid hatchbacks. So perhaps it's not that surprising that Toyota doesn't feel the need to sell the lowest-spec 2010 Prius...