Green Car News

  • 2011 Nissan Leaf

    If you’ve been following the story of what happened when popular British entertainment show Top Gear took a 2011 Nissan Leaf and 2011 Peugeot iOn (nee Mitsubishi i) for a drive to the rural eastern U.K. city of Lincoln, you’ll know that Nissan wasn’t exactly happy with the way its all-electric hatchback was portrayed. But while Top Gear may have struggled to find somewhere recharge their purposely drained electric cars in a city known for not having any electric car recharging stations, staging those infamous shots at the local university campus, Nissan has stepped in to...

  • 2011 Fisker Karma plug-in sports sedan at Fisker Santa Monica, July 2010, from WebRidesTV
    Next Fisker Model: Wagon-Crossover At Frankfurt This Fall? (Video)

    Fisker Automotive still hasn't seen fit to let more than a small handful of journalists drive its extended-range electric 2012 Fisker Karma luxury sports sedan, and not yet on public roads. But founder Henrik Fisker continues to wax eloquent about the company's future plans. At the launch of the...

  • 2012 Ford Focus Electric on Late Show with David Letterman
    2012 Ford Focus Gives Letterman a Late Show Test-Drive

    You’re the CEO of a global automaker who has just been invited to appear as a guest on the internationally renowned Late Show With David Letterman to talk about your new electric car. But rather than just talk about it, why not bring the car along too? And then let the show’s host drive...

  • 2010 Chevrolet Spark
    Chevy Confirms Smallest-Ever Spark Minicar For U.S. In 2012

    The 2012 Chevrolet Sonic subcompact just going into production this month is the smallest car sold by Chevrolet in the U.S., but the bowtie brand isn't finished downsizing yet. Today, General Motors confirmed that the Chevrolet Spark minicar will be sold in the U.S. GM's executive director of North...

  • 2012 Buick Regal with eAssist
    2012 Buick Regal With eAssist Mild Hybrid Priced At $29,530

    Buick announced today that it would offer the eAssist mild-hybrid technology on its mid-size 2012 Regal sedan as a $2,000 option over the base 2.4-liter model. That brings the price of the 2012 Buick Regal with eAssist to $29,530, including a mandatory $860 destination charge. The EPA rates the...

  • 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid
    2012 Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid: Five Things We Hate

    In the past year, we’ve put the 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid through an extensive set of test-drives, resulting in our first drive report, winter test-drive, financial analysis and even a family vacation. With so many miles behind the wheel, our editorial team has already shared our five...

  • 2012 Mazda MAZDA3 with SkyActiv

    The 2012 Mazda3 will be the first of Mazda's U.S. models to benefit from the automaker's SkyActiv initiative, which aims to improve fuel efficiency, reduce emissions, and make Mazda products even more competitive.

  • China's National University of Defense Technology sent a robot-controlled car on a 216-mile trip
    China Builds And Tests Its Own Robot Car

    The select global fleet of self-driving cars has a new Chinese addition, and the developers claim the intellectual property behind it was created entirely at a Chinese university. After gaining early publicity five years ago, the robot-driven vehicle made the trip between the interior Chinese...

  • Tough Tractor Trailer
    New Study Links Diesel Particulates And Heart Disease

    Researchers at the University of Edinburgh have found that nanoparticles present in unfiltered diesel exhaust can lead to blood clots, heart attacks and strokes.

  • 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In Drive  -  March 2011
    2012 Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid: Five Things We Like

    We’ve now had four chances to put the 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid through its paces, covering everything from fast-moving freeways and inner city streets through to mountain passes and trips to the local Costco. In the end we concluded that for some drivers, Toyota’s 13...

  • 2011 Honda CR-Z Mugen RR Concept
    Honda CR-Z Mugen RR Concept Shows Hybrids Can Be Sporty

    A lighter carbon fiber infused body and a possible supercharged hybrid drivetrain would enable stunning performance from the Honda CR-Z Mugen RR concept.

  • 2011 Nissan Leaf - battery pack cutaway
    Nissan: “Leaf’s Battery Pack Should Last As Long As The Car”

    Nissan’s all-electric Leaf isn’t having a great time of it this week in the mainstream media. Firstly, Nissan had to defend itself against popular British motoring entertainment program Top Gear after it showed the electric hatchback in a less-than favorable light, quoting a battery...

  • BMW i Launch Event, Frankfurt, July 2011

    Diversity among electric cars is rapidly expanding, from the all-electric Nissan Leaf and Mitsubishi 'i' to the upcoming Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid, which provides just 9 to 13 miles of electric range. Now, it turns out, the 2014 BMW i3--the all-electric urban four-door subcompact that BMW showed last week in concept form--will offer the option of a gasoline range extender. The i3 will run entirely on electricity from a 21- to 22-kilowatt-hour lithium-ion battery pack in the floor. The battery pack powers a 125-kilowatt (170-horsepower) motor driving the rear wheels. Photo Gallery: BMW i3...

  • Electric Car Battery Swapping- Chinese Style
    Say Hello To Electric Car Battery Swaps, Chinese Style

    We all know that one of the biggest challenges facing electric cars is the fact that recharging a battery pack is orders of magnitude slower than filling a gasoline car’s fuel tank. As battery packs have become more advanced, we’ve seen an increased use of rapid charging technologies...

  • BMW i3 Concept
    2014 BMW i3 Moves Us Closer To Autonomous Driving In Cities

    Driving is often a pain, particularly in dense, congested urban cores. Start and stop, brake suddenly, stay carefully in your lane, drive defensively, then park in tight spaces. What if the car could do all that for you? Last week, BMW showed off its new BMW i3 Concept, which points the way toward...

  • Ryan Reynolds Nissan Leaf Spokesperson
    Electric Car Sales: Leaf Trounces Volt, But Don't Take It Seriously

    It was a slow month for electric-car sales, with just over 1,000 Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt vehicles together delivered during July. Nissan delivered 931 Leaf battery-electric cars, a decline from June's 1,708, and Chevrolet--which is suffering from a now-ended four-week summer shutdown for...

  • Tesla Model S Alpha build cars testing on track
    Tesla Releases Trio Test-Track Fun Model S Teaser Video

    If Tesla’s Model S all-electric seven-seat sedan were in high school, it would be the kind of girl every heterosexual boy would lust after and every teenage girl would want to be. At least, that’s certainly the line being taken by Tesla in its latest teasing track-test video, in which...

  • BBC Top Gear Team Use Handicapped Spaces
    Top Gear On Electric Cars: “We Are Allowed To Put Into A Film What We Want To”

    Uh-ho. Those crafty chaps known as the BBC Top Gear team may have thought they got away with their recent review of the 2011 Nissan Leaf and 2011 Peugeot iOn (a rebadged predecessor to the 2012 Mitsubishi i) - but they would be wrong. The fur started flying yesterday, when Nissan Senior Vice...

  • 2012 Mazda CX-5

    Mazda has unveiled a brand new compact crossover that’s destined to go on sale early next year and could prove to be the most fuel efficient model in its class. We’re talking about the new 2012 Mazda CX-5, which will serve as the replacement for the current Mazda Tribute and make its official world debut next month at the 2011 Frankfurt Auto Show. The key to the future Mazda’s fuel efficiency prowess will be its SKYACTIV range of fuel saving technologies. SKYACTIV is a group of green technologies Mazda plans to launch and encompasses everything from downsized gasoline and...

  • 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid: Everything to Everyone?

    The iconic Toyota Prius was the car which started the hybrid revolution. Offering fuel economy that very few other gasoline cars could hope to achieve, it has been loved by politicians, movie stars and wannabe greenies for over ten years. Although Toyota improved its hybrid drivetrain for the...

  • 2012 Audi A6 live photos. Photo by Joe Nuxoll.
    2012 Audi A6 To Offer High-MPG Hybrid, Clean-Diesel Models

    Despite lack of an official confirmation from Audi of America, we'd bet significant money on the arrival of the Audi A6 Hybrid in the U.S. market. Why? Because the U.S. has the highest hybrid penetration of any market in the world except Japan, and "hybrid" means "high gas mileage" to a large...

  • Nissan Carwings App for Android OS
    Nissan North America Releases Android App for Leaf Electric Car

    Ever since the launch of the 2011 Nissan Leaf, owners have been able to remotely access information about their car’s state of charge, estimated range and even pre-heat or cool the cabin using Nissan’s built-in telematics service - Carwings. But unless you happened to own an iPhone in...

  • 2011 Ford Edge - first drive in and around Nashville
    2012 Ford Edge With 2.0-Liter Ecoboost Four Gets 30 MPG Highway Rating

    It's taken a very long time to get here, but the 2012 Ford Edge fitted with the Ecoboost 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine may be worth the wait. The website FordInsideNews reports that the Ecoboosted Edge will receive EPA gas-mileage ratings of 21 mpg city and 30 mpg highway, for a combined rating...

  • Top Gear Stage Another Electric Car Stunt
    Top Gear Tests Nissan Leaf, Peugeot iOn: A Fair Assessment?

    It's the episode electric car enthusiasts have been itching to see- and now the guys at BBC motoring show Top Gear have tested two electric cars to see whether they make any sense for the car buying public. Now we already know that Top Gear hasn't had the greatest history with electric cars. First...

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