Saturn News
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Well, now we know a little more about why the Cadillac SRX Plug-In Hybrid project was killed by its development team at General Motors. The culprit, according to GMInsideNews, was the lithium-ion battery pack. More specifically, it wasn't providing the efficiency gains that would have been needed to make the car viable. The SRX Plug-In Hybrid was to have been the most advanced version of a new generation of GM's Two-Mode Hybrid system. As well as refinements to its operating modes, it was to use a lithium-ion battery pack rather than the current system's older nickel-metal-hydride pack. But...
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Reduce, Reuse, Recycle: Saturn Vue Returns As Chevy CaptivaThe shuttered Saturn brand is quickly fading from memory, but now GM plans to bring back one former Saturn model to live on in a new incarnation. But even if you're a Saturn fan, you won't be able to buy one--unless you're a business. Vue redux The compact crossover that sold for only two years as...
John Voelcker -
GM Electric Meriva Van Tests Vehicle-to-Grid Charging in Germany
Last summer, Karl Stracke, the vice president of global vehicle engineering of General Motors, said the company planned to test three battery-electric vehicles in different global regions. This morning, the company's Opel unit announced that it would test a fleet of Opel Meriva small minivans...
John Voelcker -
Should I Buy a Car From a Dead Brand?
The Pros and Cons To Buying Cars That Have Been Discontinued
Jonathan McGrew -
We Begin To See the Shift For Saturn Dealers From New to Used
From Major Dealer to Major Used Car Lot
Jonathan McGrew -
Could An Alfa Romeo Be the Next Hot Hatch For Chrysler In the U.S.?
The Alfa Romeo Giulietta Has Been Rumored To Come To the U.S.
Jonathan McGrew -
GM Tries To Retain Its Customers
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2010 Detroit Auto Show: Lutz Lays Out (Some) GM Plug-In Plans
Cleaning up a few odds and ends from last week's 2010 Detroit Auto Show brings us to General Motors' future product plans for plug-in hybrids. In the crush of reporters asking questions (known as the "scrum") after a GM announcement, a few more nuggets came to light. GM showed its striking and...
John Voelcker -
Green Car Sales: Winners and Losers of 2009
It's beginning to look as if the worst is over for U.S. auto sales. The year that just closed was, in the immortal words of Queen Elizabeth II, an annus horribilis, with only 10.4 million vehicles sold, down 21 percent on 2008 and the lowest total since 1982. But some light seems to be appearing on...
John Voelcker -
Fisker Buying Delaware Plant To Build Midsize 2012 Plug-In Hybrid
At 10 am tomorrow morning, Vice President Joe Biden is expected to announce that Fisker Automotive will buy the closed General Motors factory in Wilmington, Delaware, his home state. According to reports, company founder Henrik Fisker will join Delaware Governor Jack Markell and other dignitaries...
John Voelcker -
Your Tax $$$ At Work: Argonne Lab's Better Batteries, Greener Fuels
If you watch TV or read the papers, you'll see lots of coverage of people who are pretty unhappy with one facet or another of the U.S. government. This post is about something government seems to do relatively well: pre-commercial research and development. Here at GreenCarReports.com, we usually...
John Voelcker -
GM's Plug-In Hybrid: Not a Saturn, Not a Buick, Will Try Again
Just two weeks ago, we reported that GM's first plug-in hybrid vehicle--originally meant to be a Saturn Vue before GM decided to sell Saturn to Pennske--would become a Buick crossover. My, how quickly things change in the new Internet world. As GM said Wednesday on its Fastlane blog, "not all the...
John Voelcker -
Well, the other shoe finally dropped. General Motors said today that the plug-in version of its Two-Mode Hybrid system would be fitted to a Buick crossover to be introduced next year, with the plug-in arriving in 2011. That'll be at least a few months after the arrival of the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, which is still said to be on track to arrive in dealerships in November 2010. The unnamed Buick model will be the first plug-in hybrid sold by a major automaker (e.g. not Tesla or Fisker). Using Volt technology GM also said the vehicle will feature a lithium-ion battery pack using the same LG Chem...
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GM Mild Hybrid System To Return In 2011, On Steroids
As Mark Twain is supposed to have said, "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated." (Although, sadly, he actually didn't say it.) In this case, the "my" is the General Motors mild-hybrid powertrain, sometimes known as the Belt-Alternator-Starter or BAS system. And it will return for 2011...
John Voelcker -
Penske to Buy Saturn: Small and Efficient Is the Mantra For the Future
Possible Outlet For Foreign Manufacturers To Break Into US Market
Jonathan McGrew -
2010 Opel Astra: Could This Be the Small Car Buick Is Missing
What Brand Will the New Astra Land Under
Jonathan McGrew -
Saturn Vue Plug-in Hybrid Will Live on as a New Brand and Model
Everything at GM is undecided at this point. At least almost everything. GM has decided that the progress made on the 2-mode plugin hybrid powertrain and is simply too much to lose. Though Saturn support will be ending, the engineering behind the planned Saturn VUE plug-in hybrid will live. The...
Eric Loveday -
AFS Trinity Heads To Washington With 150 mpg Plug-in Saturn Vue Looking For Funds
AFS Trinity, the group that touts their 150 mpg Saturn Vue plug-in around the country is made at least their second trip to Washington D.C. in hopes of securing funds from the Department of Energy (DOE for short). In January of this year, AFS applied for $2.5 billion in loans from the DOE. The...
Eric Loveday -
Today General Motors announced they will cease production of the Saturn line-up at the end of the 2009 model year. This is a sad day for die-hard fans, who embraced Saturn's "different kind of car company" credo. But this is also a major set-back to GM's plan for a complete line-up of battery electric and plug-in electric hybrid vehicles. Saturn accounted for a third of GM's hybrid sales in 2008, and with today's announcement that the Saturn brand will be discontinued also came word that none of the Saturn vehicles will be re-badged as anything else. According to GM, the re-badging...
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Mazda Decides Not to Join the EV Race
If this year's Detroit Auto Show taught me any one lesson, it was that every automaker is developing a line-up of electric vehicles, from plug-in hybrids to battery-electric vehicles. Every display boasted at least one new or improved electric vehicle, from the modest and somewhat dull BYD set to...
Jennifer Knightstep -
The Right Cord for the Electric Car
Saturn Vue Plug-In Hybrid If you envision your future electric car being connected to the wall with the standard bright orange extension cord, you're living in the past. The growing interest in electric vehicles is already leading to advances in cord technology. To make sure that there's no Blu-Ray...
Robert Scardino -
Fisker Karma Gets GM's Ecotec
Fisker announced Friday that they've chosen GM's turbocharged 2.0 liter, 4-cylinder Ecotec engine to extend the range of their plug-in hybrid performance sedan. The Fisker Karma has an electric-only range of 50 miles. After that, the Ecotec will kick in to generate more electricity. This is the...
Robert Scardino
