Car Tech

Late last night, a sensational blog post circulated through Silicon Valley. It claimed that several $100,000-plus Tesla Roadsters were now useless as the result of a "devastating design problem," with their battery packs "bricked" from being left too long without plugging in. Early this morning, we...

Heard of "bricking" yet? No? You will shortly. It's the phenomenon in which the lithium-ion battery pack of an electric car that's left unplugged for a long period goes completely, utterly dead--to the point where it cannot be recharged, and becomes a large, expensive "brick." [FURTHER UPDATE: Is...

You can't buy them just yet, but a few drivers in one state may soon start to see driverless cars on the streets. Last week, Nevada passed a law that set out the conditions under which autonomous vehicles could operate on its streets. Among them: The cars must be fitted with special red license...

The 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid is one of the more eagerly awaited green cars coming this year. With fuel economy projected at up to 48 mpg city, it improves considerably on the well-regarded current Ford Fusion Hybrid, which is rated by the EPA at 41 mpg city, 36 mpg highway, for a combined overall...

The U.S. Department of Energy hasn't made any new loans under its Advanced Technology Vehicle Program in well over a year. At its current rate, it may never do so. The latest company to walk away from applications for low-interest loans from the $25 billion DoE program is Chrysler. This afternoon...

A new prototype supercharger from Rotrak uses a CVT drive to vary compressor speed, optimizing boost across all throttle positions.

The launch of a new Mercedes-Benz E-Class is always important, given the influence the car has in the luxury sedan sector. We'd be hard-pressed to call it exciting though, rapid AMG models excepted. That could be about to change however, as one example of the model's next generation will be very...

We'd be the first to point out that many of the electric car owners currently out on the roads have had absolutely no trouble with the 100 or so miles they get from a full charge. However, it'd be foolish to assume that some people really don't need more than that, and as a result there's always...

Electric cars might have been killed off a couple of times in the past, but the current wave appears to have hit at just the right time. It's not all to do with concerns over global warming or energy prices though - it's the potential to be more connected to your car than ever before - via...

While electric-car advocates may avoid the issue, some buyers simply won't choose a plug-in car that can't travel unlimited distances. That's where the Chevy Volt-style range extender comes in, though the Volt adds unlimited range by burning gasoline in a conventional engine to generate electric...

Mazda has supplemented i-Stop with a capacitor-based regenerative-braking system, called i-ELOOP, that should provide some of the benefits of a mild-hybrid system without added bulk.

It would be a shame to put so much effort into making a luxury super sedan like the 2012 Fisker Karma, only to fill the interior with materials that go against the low-carbon ethos. That's why Fisker and Scottish leather producer Bridge of Weir have announced their partnership for the Karma. The...

Electric cars and hybrid vehicles may still lag a little behind traditional gasoline cars when it comes to sales figures, but their impact is wider-reaching than you might think. Even if you're yet to go electric or drive a hybrid, there's a fair chance that the vehicle you're driving owes some of...

To improve fuel efficiency, engines are gradually shedding accessory drives. Electric power steering is now commonplace, and electric air conditioning compressors are used on hybrid cars to keep them cool while the engine's off. Now, BMW has taken a new tack to electrifying ancillary equipment...

Car companies are taking several different directions towards making their cars of the future more efficient. Some are going down the hybrid route, using electric motors to assist and occasionally take over from gasoline engines. GM is taking a two-pronged approach, with the range-extended Volt and...

Okay. We admit it. Just like most automotive journalists, most of the team here at GreenCarReports love the thrill of power, speed and driving a really powerful car really fast. But we know driving huge gas-guzzling V8s around a race track isn’t exactly good for the planet, our health, or our...

When cable TV’s “MythBusters” program recently investigated the idea that emissions from motorcycles are gentler on the environment than emissions from cars, they burst the bubbles of eco-enthusiast motorcycle riders—and put a small New York company’s innovative...

Once a secret project, Google's autonomous vehicles are now out in the open, quite literally, with the company test-driving them on public roads and, on one occasion, even inviting people to ride inside one of the robot cars as it raced around a closed course. Google's fleet of robotic Toyota...

It's been a big morning for General Motors, with news coming left and right from its big media event in Detroit to celebrate Chevrolet's 100th birthday. In addition to confirming the 2013 Chevy Spark minicar and its all-electric Spark EV model, GM has announced a new Trailblazer sport-utility...

As long as the internal combustion engine has existed, engineers have been trying to find better ways of igniting the highly combustable mixture of air and gasoline that powers cars. Everything from higher voltage coils through to electronically-timed ignition and making spark plug tips from metals...