John Voelcker, Contributing Editor
Articles
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Pity poor Mitsubishi, whose Outlander Plug-In Hybrid has been on sale in Europe and Asia for almost two years.
But the plug-in hybrid SUV's U.S. debut has been delayed several times, and now is set...
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Diesel Pollution In London Makes Air Worse Than Beijing For Nitrous OxidesThere's a lot of talk about so-called clean diesel, which in North America means any diesel that meets tailpipe emissions standards that went into effect seven years ago. Those standards, known as Tier II, Bin 5, are among the strictest in the world--and considerably tougher than the European...
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Toyota Fuel-Cell Ad Asks: Are You 'The Bold Few' Or A 'Handbrake'?The piano music is somber, the announcer's voice well modulated and filled with gentle concern. Over the next year, we'll be faced with a decision to support, oppose, or even ignore the future of hydrogen-fueled propulsion. Indeed, and most likely the discussion--whether it's a flat decision is...
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Tesla Needs Cash? $6 Billion Required Through 2025, Says Goldman SachsCarmaking is very, very, very expensive. A conventional vehicle platform or architecture generally costs about $1 billion to design, engineer, test, certify, and put into production. And the various models derived from that architecture usually last about seven years. Multiply that by multiple...
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Feds Should Boost Electric-Car Incentives: Harry Reid, Nevada SenatorToday, most plug-in electric car buyers qualify for a Federal income-tax credit of $2,500 to $7,500--but Senator Harry Reid thinks those incentives should be expanded. He proposes to overcome one challenge with that incentive: Buyers must wait up to 15 months to realize the benefit, which they...
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Electric Pickup Truck, New Fiskers, Green-Car Sales, Diesel Hybrid Concept: Today's Car NewsWe've got a whole host of green-car stories for Friday, including a startling one-off electric pickup truck, news on the latest relaunch plans for the Fisker Karma, and some analysis of green car sales--are they rising or falling? All this and more on Green Car Reports. Imagine, if you will, an...
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The future of the Fisker Karma range-extended luxury electric sedan has been in the hands of new owner Wanxiang America for many months, with little known about its relaunch plans or timing.
Now,...
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Natural-Gas Stepchildren, Iron Butt Record, Has Tesla Beaten Dealers? Today's Car NewsIf you've never heard of the Iron Butt Assocation, you may not be a motorcycle rider--but you'll be interested in the first electric bike rider to win the honor. Plus a crack in the dealer opposition to Tesla Motors, and some encouraging news on wind and solar energy. All this and more on Green Car...
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Some Solar, Wind Power Competes With Natural Gas Without Incentives: StudyFossil fuels have been an integral part of the industrialized world since it began 250 years ago. While renewable, carbon-free energy sources have long been viewed as the ideal solution, they were always more expensive than pumping carbon into the air. That may now have changed, according to a new...
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Tesla 'Will Prevail In All States' Against Dealer Lawsuits: Dealership CommentatorHave we just seen the first crack in the facade of auto-dealer opposition to Tesla Motors selling cars directly to retail buyers? An opinion piece in auto-industry trade journal Ward's Auto concludes with the following remarkable sentences: We can keep Tesla busy defending what are basically...
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Natural-Gas Vehicles: Honda, Chevy Are 'Neglected Stepchild' Among Green CarsDiesels seem likely to gain U.S. market share in light trucks and SUVs, hybrids are at least holding their own, and of course sales of plug-in electric cars are rising steadily. Wait...are we missing a green-car technology? As an article in The Los Angeles Times points out, natural-gas powered...
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Tesla Model 3 Cost, Mercedes CLA Sales, Plug-In Hybrid Concept: Today's Car NewsThere's more Tesla news today (of course), with the electric-car company winning a court battle to sell cars in Massachusetts but facing a grim prediction by one analyst of its Model 3 price three years now now. Plus the smallest Mercedes is flying out of dealers, and a new French plug-in hybrid...
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Just one day after it revealed a small portion of the design in a teaser photo, the updated Ford C-Max for the European market has been unveiled ahead of the Paris Motor Show.
With sleeker front...
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Renault Eolab: Preview Of Nissan Plug-In Hybrid At Smaller Scale?French carmaker Renault hasn't sold cars in North America in almost 30 years, But as half of the global Renault-Nissan Alliance--and Europe's earliest volume electric-car maker--its cars and concepts are important to watch for clues to future Nissan offerings. So the Renault Eolab Concept that will...
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Tesla Battery Cost: New Report Suggests Model 3 To Cost $50K Or MoreIt's likely the biggest question for the future of electric cars: How low can battery cost go, and how fast? Tesla Motors is thought to have the lowest cost-per-kilowatt-hour in the electric-car business, with some estimates suggesting the company is already approaching the crucial $200/kWh level...
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Nissan's Electric-Car Battery Future: Will It Be With LG Chem?Nissan is set to close electric-car battery plants in England and the U.S. and turn to Korean maker LG Chem for some batteries. Or perhaps not. A startling and exclusive Reuters report yesterday said that Nissan is in the middle of reassessing its plans for electric-car production and global...
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2016 Mercedes-Benz S550 Plug-In Hybrid: First DriveThe 2016 Mercedes-Benz S550 Plug-In Hybrid luxury sedan will arrive in the U.S. next spring. We've now driven a prototype of the U.S.-spec car, which is quiet, luxurious, and likely to carry a six-figure price tag. And it will be followed within a year by two more plug-in hybrids using the same...
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2016 Toyota Mirai Sedan Photographed Testing In Southern CaliforniaPity the poor automotive spy photographer. She spends months in Death Valley with an expensive camera, only for her paying clients to be swamped with cellphone shots snapped by eager readers and sent in for free or posted on social media. Which is (more or less) how we come to see our first shots...
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It's often said by electric-car owners and advocates that once you start driving electric, you never want to go back.
Now it appears that at least a handful of car dealers are learning that the...
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California Has More Than 100,000 Plug-In Electric Cars On RoadsCalifornia has hit a major plug-in car milestone this week: Since the first electric vehicle was sold back in 2010, more than 100,000 others have now hit the streets. The figures have been compiled by the California Plug-In Electric Vehicle Collaborative. The number is impressive on its own, but...
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Will Smaller Pickups Be More Popular Than Carmakers Expect?Sometimes it's the throwaway lines that carry the most interesting news. In a routine report on August sales of new cars and trucks last Wednesday, The Detroit News had this nugget about the upcoming 2015 Chevrolet Colorado mid-size pickup truck: "GM said dealers have ordered nearly 28,000 midsize...
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Ford Hybrid Sales: So Far, Not Hurt By All Those MPG ReductionsIt's embarrassing when an automaker has to reduce its EPA gas-mileage ratings after being investigated by the agency, as Ford did in August 2013 for its 2013 and 2014 C-Max Hybrid. It's even more embarrassing when the company has to cut the rating on those vehicles again--along with five...
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Echo Automotive Fails: Bolt-On Plug-In Hybrid Kits Used Bright TechnologyStarting a company is tough; starting a company in the green automotive field may be even tougher. So it seemed like the engineering team from defunct startup Bright Automotive, once granted investment by GM, might have a second chance to see their technology on the road. The assets and...
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Tesla's Nevada Gigafactory: Elon Musk, Brothel Owner, State Work Toward DealAs expected, Tesla Motors announced yesterday afternoon that it would build its first battery gigafactory outside Reno, Nevada. The electric-car maker released platitudinous statements from CEO Elon Musk, Nevada governor Brian Sandoval, and state Speaker Marilyn Kirkpatrick. Much of the business...
John Voelcker