Bengt Halvorson, Senior Editor
Articles
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Before Volkswagen’s $50 billion push, and the e-Golf, there were these VW electric cars Bengt HalvorsonWith the formal nod of Volkswagen’s board on Friday, Volkswagen is embarking upon a five-year, $50 billion all-in push to develop a new generation of electric cars, plus complementary...
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Tesla will soon be compatible with all DC fast charging—in EuropeWhen the Tesla Model 3 arrives in Europe in early 2019, it will carry a special toolkit: the ability to charge—quickly—in more places than any other electric vehicle. Tesla revealed this week that Model 3 sedans sold in Europe will come with a CCS charge port (inlet). Full compatibility...
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Track Mode released to make more of Tesla Model 3 PerformanceTesla confirmed last Thursday that Track Mode has started rolling out for the Model 3 Performance, in an update for vehicles that have already received Version 9 of the automaker’s vehicle software. The company emphasized that Track Mode is intended specifically for closed circuits...
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VW is planning to build 15 million electric vehiclesUPDATE: The very premise of this piece has been shaken when Volkswagen told the original source of this report, Automotive News, that its chief executive had misstated the number of MEB vehicles it now planned to eventually build to be 50 million, not 15 million. The latter is not surprising based...
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Green Car Reports Best Car To Buy 2019: Tesla Model 3The Tesla Model 3 is Green Car Reports' Best Car To Buy 2019. It’s the second time a Tesla product has won our annual award, which was captured by the Tesla Model S in 2013. Many have called the Model 3 Tesla’s “iPhone moment.” But that was the Model S—the shock to an...
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Eight years of winners show how plug-in vehicles have evolvedAs we’re on the eve of naming our Green Car Reports Best Car To Buy 2019 award winner, a quick glance back at our previous winners offers several points of perspective. One of them is that the field, particularly for anything that plugs in, has evolved tremendously since then, in such a...
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Toyota has teased what is probably an all-wheel-drive Prius, slated for introduction at the Los Angeles auto show late this month.
In studying the picture the company teased, with a Prius churning...
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Base price of VW's electric cars could be as low as $21,000Volkswagen plans to price its new generation of upcoming fully electric vehicles lower than it had previously hinted—as low as 18,000 euros for Europe, or about $21,000 for an entry-level fully electric model that will launch there in late 2019. The news, via Reuters, comes as Volkswagen aims...
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Finalist for Green Car Reports Best Car To Buy 2019: Tesla Model 3
Just 16 months passed from when Tesla first showed its Model 3—and we got our first ride in a Model 3 prototype with its VP of engineering Doug Field—to when it made the first batch of deliveries. And it was certainly not our intent to wait nearly another 16 months before considering it...
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Nissan Frontier pickup made mission-ready with two Leaf battery packsIn a concept vehicle for the São Paulo Motor Show, Nissan has outfitted its local-market Frontier pickup with two Leaf battery packs—creating what it’s calling the Frontier Sentinel. But it’s not anything close to what you might suspect. The Sentinel isn’t...
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E-bike maker sees space for bare-bones electric car in congested citiesA Danish bicycle and e-bike company, Biomega, has shown an open-wheel concept car that takes the sculpted, less-is-more ideas of Scandinavian design to new extremes—to what may be a regulatory impossibility in the U.S. The four-seat four-wheeler, called SIN, for Singapore, appears to be aimed...
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Finalist for Green Car Reports Best Car To Buy 2019: Jaguar I-PaceThe Jaguar I-Pace is a front-runner—the first fully electric, longer-range vehicle from a long-established luxury brand. But it’s not a “Tesla-fighter” as the I-Pace has often been called. More accurately it exists not to conquest Tesla drivers but to keep...
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In our quest to find Green Car Reports’ Best Car To Buy, the 2019 Hyundai Kona Electric is shaping up to be the “no drama” candidate.
By now, we’ve had four distinct...
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Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid recalled for stalling, fire riskFiat Chrysler Automobiles is recalling 10,021 Chrysler plug-in hybrid vans for an issue that could result in a stall, or possibly the increased risk of a vehicle fire. In the vehicles affected—2017 and 2018 Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid models with production dates of August 16, 2016 through...
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Which car would you pick as Best Car To Buy 2019? Take our Twitter pollWe've announced our final three contenders for Green Car Reports' Best Car to Buy 2019. They include the Hyundai Kona Electric, the Jaguar I-Pace, and the Tesla Model 3. The qualifications for our annual award require that a vehicle be all-new or substantially updated; and that it be widely...
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One of these 3 cars will be Green Car Reports’ Best Car To Buy 2019Despite a long list of green-car debuts anticipated over the next couple of years, this year hasn't exactly brought a bevy of new electric models. As we wait for the market to blossom with new entries in coming years, we have three strong contenders for this year's top position—our Best Car...
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GM creates a global e-bike, looks for branding help with contestGeneral Motors is already shaping up to be second only to Tesla in blasting past the 200,000-vehicle ceiling for the federal EV tax credit; and it has plans to produce 20 new fully electric vehicles by 2023. Part of that EV-savvy strategy, apparently—or a parallel one, perhaps—involves...
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California stands firm, Honda joins GM, SEC investigates Tesla: The Week in ReverseWhich automakers are now openly opposing the EPA’s proposed fuel-economy rollback? And which automaker teased an 800-volt electric car good for the drag races? This is Green Car Reports’ look back at the Week in Reverse, for the week ending Nov. 2, 2018. Friday we updated a piece about...
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Austria is offering would-be electric-car owners (and current ones) a tempting incentive to go tailpipe-emissions-free: permission to drive faster than those with gasoline, diesel, or hybrid vehicles...
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Hyundai and Kia reveal solar roof tech for electric cars—or gasoline onesAs solar cells get more efficient, powerful panels can fit on smaller areas. For those looking to use renewable energy for transportation, that means solar panels can now move from home rooftops used to power car chargers to cars themselves. In Korea on Wednesday, Hyundai and Kia revealed some...
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Tesla ‘Starman’ stunt commemorated by Hot WheelsTesla’s chief executive officer Elon Musk has pulled off some elaborate visions—and madcap stunts—for future mobility, often with multiple levels of nerdy references to be found within. If that appeals to you and you’ve ever been a Hot Wheels collector, there’s...
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Blink charging network joins interoperability pushBeginning in early 2019, all 135,000 users of the Blink charging network will soon be able to use other charging networks as part of their membership, while Blink’s chargers will be open to easy access by a wider range of drivers with other charging-network membership cards. The...
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Sources: GM manufacturing revamp could signal faster lane-change to EVsLess than a week after speaking out in favor of a national electric vehicle mandate, and in the shadow of Tesla reporting a profitable quarter, General Motors might be on the verge of announcing a radical change to its plans for future electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids in the U.S. The automaker...
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EPA faces backlash, Fisker interests Caterpillar, Hyundai unsubscribes: Today’s Car NewsThe backlash builds over the EPA fuel-economy freeze; Hyundai’s subscription plan for the Ioniq Electric is gone; and Caterpillar shovels some money into Fisker for solid-state battery technology. All this and more on Green Car Reports. Honda has joined General Motors in calling for a...
Bengt Halvorson