John Voelcker, Contributing Editor
Articles
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Ah, ethanol, that most political of alternative fuels.
Farmers love it, deficit hawks hate it, automakers want it for flex-fuel CAFE credits but nowhere else, and environmentalists only want it if it...
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Pedestrian Alert Noises Coming To Hybrid And Electric Cars, Needed Or NotIf you like the idea of hybrid or electric cars that whir silently down the road without the noise of an engine exploding gasoline thousands of times each minute, you'd better act fast. The U.S. government is moving inexorably toward a rule requiring all hybrid and electric cars to make noise...
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Did U.S. Senate Cut Deal To End Ethanol Subsidies After All?Almost three weeks ago, the U.S. Senate voted to end subsidies for production of ethanol, the alternative fuel that is largely refined from domestically-grown corn. At the time, conventional wisdom had it that this was a safe move. Because the subsidies were attached to a stalled economic...
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Will Euro-Squabbles Cripple Cross-Border Electric Car Charging?Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it, said the philosopher Santayana. And there seems to be a very real chance that Europe is heading toward a variety of multiple and incompatible electric-car charging standards. That's a path the U.S. rejected a decade ago. And it's one that...
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Which Hybrids Improve Gas Mileage The Most? Lexus, Lincoln WinThe Union of Concerned Scientists thinks hybrid-electric vehicles are a good thing, because they use less gasoline. But the savings in gas cost from that improved gas mileage varies enormously, and now the group has quantified the results. In their annual Hybrid Scorecard this year, the UCS ranks...
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First A Diesel, Now GM To Work On Natural-Gas Cars For U.S. (Report)General Motors makes a lot of vehicles globally. And despite all the publicity around its 2011 Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid, most of them run on gasoline. Now, GM has agreed to develop natural-gas engines for light-duty vehicles (that means cars and crossovers bought by retail customers) with...
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Launching the 2012 Fiat 500 minicar in the U.S. market was a gamble to begin with.
But it's one that is paying off in some unexpected ways.
Fiat's top North American executive, Laura Soave, told...
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June Electric Car Sales Continue To Climb: Leaf Soars, Volt SteadySales of plug-in electric cars continued their slow climb in June. The 2011 Nissan Leaf racked up its best U.S. sales number ever while the 2011 Chevrolet Volt sales held steady, as the company had warned they would. Following a May total of 1,142 sales--the first time more than 1,000 Leafs had...
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Consumer Reports On 56.2-MPG Gas-Mileage Goal: Meh, Can Do BetterMuch debate will occur--and that's putting it politely--over the next round of gas-mileage standards, which the EPA hopes to finalize next year for 2017-2025 vehicles. Earlier this week, news reports from Washington indicated that the Obama Administration and EPA are pushing for 56.2 mpg as the...
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Lexus CX 300h Hybrid: Luxury Brand To Launch RX Baby Brother?Last September, Toyota said the company would launch six new hybrids by the end of 2012. Now, a report from the German car magazine AutoBild suggests that one of those is a new Lexus: a baby brother for the brand's hugely successful RX 450h hybrid crossover utility vehicle. The new compact...
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Toyota Adds Prius Plus Performance Package To Hot Up Hybrid HandlingPretty much every Toyota Prius hybrid you see on the streets looks the same. Wild customization is generally limited to personalized plates that promote the driver's green credentials, solar panels, eco-living, or general hybrid luv-luv-LUV. That's about to change. Toyota announced today it will...
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CA To Hybrid Drivers: Sorry, We're Just Not That Into You--Any MoreSpare a thought, if you will, a momentary tear, for 85,000 doomed drivers of three models of hybrid car in California. They are the unlucky losers of a privilege that saved them time, raised the value of their vehicle, and undoubtedly increased their karmic contentment, all because of a set of tiny...
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They're not pretty, but they should catch your attention.
Yesterday, the Environmental Protection Agency issued its design for a warning label to be placed on so-called pumps that dispense the new...
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2006-2007 Lexus RX 400h, Toyota Highlander Hybrids: RecallToyota will recall 2006-2007 Highlander Hybrid and Lexus RX 400h hybrid crossovers to inspect and repair a component that could fail in the hybrid control system.
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White House, Feds To Push For 56.2-MPG Fuel Economy In 2025
The two Federal agencies that set gas mileage and emissions standards for future cars may propose rules that require corporate average fuel economy to reach 56 miles per gallon by 2025. News reports out of Washington, D.C., indicate that the Obama Administration is urging the EPA and NHTSA to push...
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Lots Of Orders For Yo Russian Natural-Gas Hybrid, Prokohorov SaysAccording to Russian billionaire businessman Mikhail Prokhorov, the company building a new natural-gas hybrid car known as the Yo now has orders stretching out as far as 10 years into the future. The business magnate, investor, and former basketball player told satellite TV channel Russia Today...
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2012 BMW X5 xDrive35d: Steering Recall For Clean-Diesel SUVAlmost 1,000 clean-diesel versions of the 2012 BMW X5 crossover will be recalled to replace a part that could cause the power steering to fail. Only the diesel model, known as the X5 xDrive35d, is affected. The X5 xDrive 35i and 50i versions with gasoline engines are not part of the recall...
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2011 Lexus CT 200h Compact Hybrid Hatch: First Drive Review
The 2011 Lexus CT 200h pretty much occupies a class of one. At the moment, it’s the sole luxury compact hybrid hatchback sold in the U.S. And it’s a dedicated hybrid, meaning there’s no gasoline-only version. If you want the compact hatch, you get the hybrid. It’s also terra...
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Right now, the sole plug-in vehicle you can buy from Chevrolet--or indeed all of General Motors--is the 2011 Volt range-extended electric car.
But that doesn't mean GM isn't testing a lot of other...
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Never Fear, More Priuses Will Be Here! Or Not. It DependsIf you want to buy a new 2011 Toyota Prius hybrid these days, you may have to scramble. Supplies are down to 3,000 units, which is less than 10 days' worth of sales. In auto industry terms, that means "sold out," and dealers are charging higher markups on the few precious Priuses they still have...
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Fisker Karma Electric-Car Charging Stations Have EV1 RootsWhen you buy an electric car, you will most likely need a charging station. As buyers start to bring home plug-in cars, they will also expect their dealer to help them acquire and install a 240-Volt charging station (technically known as an EVSE, though few people call them that). Startup Fisker...
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Gas Prices: How Much Are YOU Paying At The Pump In Taxes? (Infographic)Gas prices go up and down, lately more up than down. Today, however, the U.S. government has decided to release a portion of its strategic petroleum reserve, just as crude-oil prices continued a decline that started several weeks ago. Gas prices vary enormously from state to state, due to...
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Smaller, More Efficient: VW Passat With 1.2-Liter 3-Cylinder EngineHow large an engine do you need in a mid-size car? Just a few years ago, the answer would have been a V-6 of 2.8 to 3.5 liters, perhaps with a base model offering a four of 2.4 to 2.8 liters. Then Hyundai announced in late 2009 that it would abandon V-6 engines altogether for its 2010 Sonata...
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How Does A Hybrid Car Really Work? This Infographic Explains ItAs we've said before, we love infographics. Some of our favorites come from AutoMD, which did the one we ran two weeks ago on rising gas prices and simple ways to boost your gas mileage. Now they've tackled the perennial question: How does a hybrid car work? Specifically, they dissect the third...
John Voelcker