Green Car News
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Could your car seats become large, comfortable batteries? If experiments by scientists at Fudan University in Shanghai, China become reality, perhaps they could--as the group has developed battery technology that can be woven into fabrics. According to Phys.org, researcher Wei Weng and his colleagues have designed and fabricated carbon nanotube composite yarns that can be wound around lithium-ion battery fibers and onto a cotton fiber, to create a lithium-ion battery. MUST SEE: BMW, Tesla Are Only Electric-Car Makers 'To Build A Business': Really?? As fibers with a 1mm diameter, these than...
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Diesel RAM Review, Model S Aero, Top Gear Goes Electric: The Week In ReverseIn our new feature, The Week In Reverse, we take a look back at the most significant story we published each day of the previous week--collating them all in a single article for you to review, ogle, ponder, or simply catch up on any you may have missed. From electric cars to diesels and more, these...
Antony Ingram -
BMW & Tesla Business, 2014 Ram EcoDiesel Driven, Porsche 911 Plug-In: Today's Car NewsElectric cars, diesels, and plug-in hybrids make headlines today. What else would you expect from Green Car Reports?
Stephen Edelstein -
Eight-State Plan To Boost Electric Cars In Northeast, CA: More DetailsEight states plan to put 3.3 million zero-emission vehicles on their roads by 2025.
Stephen Edelstein -
2014 Ram 1500 EcoDiesel: Quick First Drive ReportThe 2014 Ram 1500 EcoDiesel is the only half-ton truck on sale this year with a diesel engine.
Stephen Edelstein -
BMW, Tesla Are Only Electric-Car Makers 'To Build A Business': Really ??Sometimes we read things that just make us scratch our heads. Often, statements about the electric-car industry by (presumably) highly-paid analysts in the finance industry are among those things. Take, for example, a statement by one such analyst, contained an article published two weeks ago in...
John Voelcker -
Hardcore Porsche enthusiasts are a picky bunch. The 1970s 914 sports car is not a real Porsche, according to them. Nor was the 924. Nor the Boxster, which saved the company in the 1990s. Or the Cayenne, and--God forbid--its diesel and hybrid variants, which have propped up Porsche's balance sheets for the past decade. No, to some Porsche enthusiasts, only an air-cooled 911 will do. So what must their reaction be to the image above--a patent image, showing a 911 with a charging cable plugged into its flank? MUST READ: BMW, Tesla Are Only Electric-Car Makers 'To Build A Business': Really?? It's...
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Japanese Electric-Car Makers Set Up Single Charging Network; Could It Ever Happen In U.S.?One challenge to more widespread adoption of electric cars is public charging--or rather, the scattered multiple networks of irregularly spaced public charging stations. In Japan, the four major electric-car makers have now joined together to form a new company whose goal is to build a single...
John Voelcker -
How Do You Cut City Traffic, Pollution? Move Cars UndergroundFigures vary year-by-year, but London constantly hovers near the top of Europe's most polluted cities. Like many of its European counterparts, it sprang up long before the car was invented, leaving little space for roads and the growing number of cars owned by its 8.3 million inhabitants. Pollution...
Antony Ingram -
Tesla Model S Aerodynamics, 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid, Mercedes Plug-Ins: Today's Car NewsHonda, Mercedes-Benz, and Tesla make headlines today.
Stephen Edelstein -
2015 Hyundai Sonata Prices Released, No Details On Hybrid YetThe redesigned 2015 Hyundai Sonata midsize sedan goes on sale later this month.
Stephen Edelstein -
Three Mercedes Plug-In Hybrids On Sale By End Of 2015: S-Class, C-Class, ML-ClassThe first wave of electric cars and plug-in hybrids has been largely centered on smaller vehicles, mostly from mass-market brands (Tesla excepted). Four years later, German luxury makers are entering the fray--and the plug-in cars and utility vehicles they sell will markedly expand the offerings on...
John Voelcker -
Honda was the first car company to sell a hybrid in the U.S. by a few months, but it hasn't done nearly as well with its hybrids as Toyota has done with its Prius. Its first two-seat Insight wasn't close enough to the mainstream--and the first Honda Accord Hybrid in 2004 didn't post gas-mileage numbers that were all that great. That's changed with the new 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid, which we named Green Car Reports' 2014 Best Car To Buy. It gets much better gas mileage--but does the hybrid Accord truly have what it takes to challenge the Toyota Camry Hybrid this time? DON'T MISS: Green Car...
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Aerodynamic Tesla Model S Electric Car Wins The Wind-Tunnel WarsAerodynamics are a vital component of automotive efficiency. The more air you have to push out of the way to reach or maintain a certain speed, the more energy you're using. And the more energy you use, the less efficient your journey will be. ALSO SEE: Solar Roadways Smashes Crowdfunding Target...
Antony Ingram -
Efficiency, Performance From Audi's Electric Turbo Prototype"Turbo" was the word to have on your car in the 1980s. Preferably in huge, bright script, completely out of correlation with the car's actual performance. Now, it's more often used as an indication of efficiency--take Ford's Ecoboost brand, for example. Audi has used them for many years on its...
Antony Ingram -
BMW: China Biggest Electric Car Market By 2019, i3 On Sale SoonBMW has become the latest in a growing list of automakers to put its faith in the Chinese electric car market. The Chinese automobile market is huge: 18 million passenger cars alone were sold in 2013. That's ten times that of similarly-populated India, and around 2.4 million more than were sold in...
Antony Ingram -
2014 Nissan Leaf Newbie Drive, Solar Roadways Funded, Google Electric Car: Today's Car NewsGoogle, Nissan, and Solar Roadways make headlines today.
Stephen Edelstein -
BMW i3 REx Range-Extended Electric: No NJ Sales-Tax Exemption, Costing Owners Extra $3,000-PlusElectric cars enjoy many incentives, from tax credits and purchase rebates through carpool-lane access, to encourage buyers to give them a try. But the range-extended model of the BMW i3 electric car turns out not to qualify for a state exemption from New Jersey's new-car sales tax--despite at...
John Voelcker -
Earlier this month, we asked whether solar roads could generate enough energy to serve some of the nation's power needs. With tens of thousands of miles of solar-power generating roads, parking lots, sidewalks and other open spaces--without needing to clear space in untouched, natural areas--it seems like an ideal, if expensive solution. It's one that's caught the public's imagination though. The company proposing the idea, Solar Roadways, has smashed its Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign target of $1 million by almost 50 percent, with four days left to run. Now it's important to note...
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2014 Nissan Leaf: Bestselling Electric Car, Driven By NewbieDriving the world's highest-volume battery-electric car in New York's Hudson Valley.
Stephen Edelstein -
China To Ban 6 Million Gross Polluters From Roads In Smog FightChina will step up enforcement of emissions standards, removing 6 million of the worst-polluting vehicles from its roads.
Stephen Edelstein -
2016 Mitsubishi Outlander Plug-In Hybrid U.S. Arrival: Fall 2015 After AllWithin the next year and a half, three different plug-in hybrid SUVs or crossovers will arrive on the U.S. market, or at least some parts of it. And one of them will be the 2016 Mitsubishi Outlander Plug-In Hybrid, whose limited launch is set for sometime in autumn 2015--despite quite recent...
John Voelcker -
Why CVTs Won, Direct-Shift Gearboxes Lost Fuel-Economy FightIf you're reading this in North America, the vehicle sitting on your driveway probably has an automatic transmission. So do around 95 percent of other new vehicles on the U.S. market right now, though the Canadian figure is slightly lower. The numbers don't lie: Drivers just aren't buying cars with...
Antony Ingram -
Google's Electric, Autonomous Test Car Looks Happy, Has No Steering WheelThis is probably not the car you'll be whisked around cities in, in the future. Which is either a good or bad thing, depending on how much you like cars that look like koala bears on a substance recently legalized in Colorado. But it is Google's latest, dedicated test vehicle for its autonomous car...
Antony Ingram