Green Car News
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Chinese carmaker BYD is facing tough times ahead, following reports that its stock has fallen 43 percent since its February high. As China's figurehead for electric vehicles, BYD is best-known in the U.S. for its e6 electric crossover, and being part-owned by billionaire entrepreneur Warren Buffett. Read our first drive of the BYD e6 crossover Buffett bought a 10 percent stake in BYD back in September 2008, and the company initially seemed to be heading towards electric vehicles, pre-empting the moves of several other manufacturers. Falling stock The New York Times reports that BYD's stock...
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2012 Kia Optima Hybrid Touts Its World Record Gas Mileage (Video)What do you do if you want to promote your latest high-MPG offering to consumers? You could report the model's official EPA figures, if you think they look good enough. Or, if you're Kia, you send two professional drivers on an 8,000-mile, 48-state journey around the U.S. and report their...
Antony Ingram -
Tesla Plans 5,000 Model S 'Test Drives' In 45 Days, Starting June 23This morning we told you about Tesla investor Steve Jurvetson, who, alongside Tesla CEO Elon Musk, became the first two official owners of a 2012 Tesla Model S. Up to this point, Tesla has been particularly guarded about giving test-drives of its all-electric sedan, with the only experiences to...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Green On The Outside? Five Small Cars With Poor Gas MileageWith many of today’s small cars hitting dealer lots with EPA ratings that rival those of hybrid cars, it’s easy to forget that not all small cars are green. Many small cars win the gas-mileage race, but which small cars should you avoid if you're trying to top out on fuel economy? These...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Chevy Volt Plug-In Sales Surge In CA, Outsells 'Vette TooIt's quite the morning for electric-car news today, but we didn't want to let one from yesterday slip by either. After a lumpy start to sales of the Chevrolet Volt, it appears that California dealers now can't keep the range-extended electric car in stock. According to an analysis of registration...
John Voelcker -
First 2012 Tesla Model S Delivered To Earliest Depositor Steve Jurvetson (Video)Deliveries of the 2012 Tesla Model S electric sedan will officially begin on June 22. But the very first production Model S off the line has already been handed over to its new owner. It went to none other than venture capitalist and Tesla board member Steve Jurvetson, who is now driving it around...
John Voelcker -
The 2013 Honda Fit EV has earned the highest EPA efficiency rating granted to any vehicle offered in the U.S.: 118 miles-per-gallon-equivalent. That's higher than the 2012 Mitsubishi i minicar, the previous record-holder at 112 MPGe, and considerably higher than the Nissan Leaf and Ford Focus Electric, at 99 MPGe and 105 MPGe respectively. MPGe is an efficiency measure based on how far the car can travel on the amount of electricity with energy equivalent to that in a single gallon of gasoline. The EPA has also rated the Honda Fit EV at 82 miles of driving range. That's more than the Focus...
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Hyundai Says: Let's All Make August 'Fuel Efficiency Month' !!!!!For readers of GreenCarReports every month is Fuel Efficiency Month, but Korean automaker Hyundai is now petitioning to make August the official "National Fuel Efficiency Month". "There's a day, week or month for just about everything else, so we feel the time is right for a national Fuel...
Antony Ingram -
GE Opens Electric & Plug-In Test Center In Eden Prairie, MinnesotaThe most effective way of getting regular consumers to warm to electric vehicles, hybrids and other alternative fuel vehicles is to get them behind the wheel. The same applies to business customers, who may be in a position to buy a fleet of green vehicles to replacing ageing current fleets. That's...
Antony Ingram -
BMW To Launch Diesel Flagship 7-Series Sedan For 2014If you want to know what's coming down the pike in German luxury cars, just watch Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi. Whenever one maker launches a new car, crossover, body style, engine type, or performance package...the others usually follow. And so it is with BMW, which reportedly plans to launch a...
John Voelcker -
Audi A3 e-tron Electric Car Testing Update (Video)It may have reportedly canceled its two smallest plug-in car projects, but Audi is hardly abandoning electric cars. Three months ago, the German luxury and sports brand said it would bring a limited test fleet of battery-electric Audi A3 hatchbacks to San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C...
John Voelcker -
5 Good Green Cars For Your Teen: Frugal, Fun, But Responsible TooIt's summer, the kid wants a car, what are ya gonna do? Chances are you want your kid driving around in something safe. Almost certainly something not too fun or stylish, unless you want them showing off with a car full of friends. And you probably want something with good gas mileage too--it ain't...
Antony Ingram -
Inductive charging is one of those "wait a few years" technologies, right? Not if you live in Italy, where inductive charging isn't just being used now, but has been for a decade in bus fleets in Turin and Genoa. The buses are charged each night at the depot, but to ensure they remain topped up during the day, induction coils are set into the road at stops, terminals and hubs. Another coil is set into the bus chassis, allowing it to charge at the frequent stopping points. A top-up can replenish 10-15 percent of the battery's capacity. That, says The New York Times, is enough to keep a bus...
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RIP Hydrogen Highway? California Takes Back Grant DollarsEven more so than with electric cars, the future of hydrogen vehicles depends on a network of filling stations to allow people to go about their journeys as normal. That future has taken a blow in California, with the news that $27 million in grants for hydrogen filling stations has been revoked by...
Antony Ingram -
2012 Nissan Leaf Leases: $289 For Base SV, $319 For Nicer SLThe low sales of the Nissan Leaf electric car have been much discussed in the media--just as those of the Chevy Volt were until it began to log respectable sales numbers over the last few months. Nissan is now completing its switch from centralized online reservations for the car to treating it...
John Voelcker -
How To Make Money On Electric Cars: Sell Green Credits (To Other Carmakers)Most brand-new auto technologies are, at best, a breakeven proposition in their early years. Toyota is thought to have lost money on every Prius hybrid it sold for several years, until its sales rose enough to gain economies of scale. Makers of plug-in electric cars may be losing money on each one...
John Voelcker -
From Army Tanks To Fuel Tanks, Military Helps Raise MPGIf you took away all the technology developed through motor sport or the military from regular cars, we'd be surprised if you were left with something driveable. Between materials, electronics, safety devices and mechanical components, a great deal of modern automotive technology has been developed...
Antony Ingram -
Want A 2013 Tesla Model S Signature Edition? Too Late, They're All GoneIf you were hoping to get your name down for one of the exclusive 2013 Tesla Model S Signature Editions, you've now left it a little too late. According to Tesla, the company has sold every one of the initial run of cars, all of which are packed to the roof with equipment, use the larger 85 kWh...
Antony Ingram -
Mazda is no stranger to motorsport, with its MX-5 sports car one of the most-raced production cars in the world at grassroots level, and its high-profile victory in the 1991 Le Mans 24 Hours. That victory heralded the first--and only--for rotary power, and Mazda is set to innovate again by supplying Skyactiv-D engines to the GRAND-AM series' GX Class. Just as with the Skyactiv-G gasoline engine range, Skyactiv-D is designed to improve all the usual characteristics of diesel engines, while reducing their disadvantages. Compared to Mazda's previous diesel line, not sold in the U.S, the new...
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Do Tougher Gas-Mileage Rules Hurt Electric-Car Sales? We Think NotAt the moment, plug-in electric car sales are chugging along between 3,000 and 4,000 a month. So with the upcoming 2012 Tesla Model S added to the mix, it seems likely that 30,000 to 50,000 electrics will be sold in the U.S. this year--more than double last year's sales. But lately, the auto press...
John Voelcker -
Will Tata Nano Diesel--World's Tiniest & Cheapest--Get 70 MPG?We won't see it here, but diesel fans everywhere are eagerly waiting for the world's smallest, cheapest four-seat diesel passenger car to be launched later this year in India. The Tata Nano Diesel may get as much as 70 miles per gallon or more, making it the most efficient four-seat diesel vehicle...
John Voelcker -
Tree-Hugger? Nah, This Nissan Leaf Owner Hugs Corners, Beats Gas CarsThere are some who might say the Nissan Leaf is a bit of a car for wimps. A hippy car. Or even a car for those who don't really think we should be driving cars at all. Tell that to the guys who take their Leafs to autocross events--and even beat those racing on internal combustion. Of course, the...
Antony Ingram -
Hybrid Toyota TS030 Makes Successful Le Mans Test DebutResplendent in its new 'hybrid-blue' color scheme, Toyota's hybrid entry into this year's Le Mans 24 Hours has made a successful debut in testing. Toyota tested a pair of its TS030 Le Mans Prototypes at the Le Mans circuit. The #7 car of Alex Wurz, Nicolas Lapierre and Kazuki Nakajima completed the...
Antony Ingram -
Brine: Key To Cheaper, Longer-Lasting Electric Car Batteries?There may not be a magic bullet for battery technology, but improvements can come from the most unlikely places. One of those is the San Andreas fault in California, where one of battery tech's futures is bubbling out of the ground. As a tectonic fault line, the area is a great source of geothermal...
Antony Ingram