We Obsessively Cover the Green Scene…

When General Motors conceived the extended range electric powertrain for the Chevrolet Volt, the 40-mile electric driving range was specified so that most drivers would rarely, if ever, have to use any liquid fuel. Components like the battery were then sized to match the performance and range specifications. However, the whole point of incorporating the range extending engine was so that the Volt could keep going without the driver having to continuously monitor the battery level, even though GM once told us that the Volt would move without gas in the tank.

In any case, leaving the same gasoline in a tank for months or even years creates a new set of problems. One reason is that there's no such thing as pure gasoline. What's sold at the pump is a blend of numerous hydrocarbon compounds like octane, heptane and other additives that lubricate valves and fuel injectors, among other things. Many of these various compounds will eventually evaporate, reducing the performance of the fuel and possibly leading to engine damage. This is a new problem, as no other car has been asked to operate with gas that might never get used in the tank.

To address this, the Volt has a completely sealed and pressurized fuel tank. Pressurizing the tank helps minimize evaporation from the liquid fuel, forcing it to stay in liquid form. Before the fuel filler can be opened to gas up the Volt, the tank has to be depressurized, which takes a few seconds after pressing the release button. The engine management system also monitors the time between engine running and will periodically prompt the driver to run past the 40-mile electric range before recharging. If the driver doesn't force the Volt to run on gas, the system will eventually start the engine on its own in order to consume some of the aging fuel and circulate the fluids within the engine. Once this maintenance mode is complete, the engine shuts down until it is needed again or enough time has passed again. GM hasn't yet revealed what the time intervals are, but we'll find out soon enough since the start of Volt production is right around the corner.



[Source: Plug-in Cars]

After nine months of meetings, the Electric Vehicles Infrastructure Council created by Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell has issued its final report on how to promote the use of plug-in vehicles in the state. The list of proposed incentives covers all of the usual bases but doesn't get too specific about anything.

Unsurprisingly, the outline recommends tax incentives for the purchase of electric vehicles by both individuals and businesses as well as a build-out of the infrastructure needed to support those vehicles. The council recommends installing electric charging stations at state-owned locations, places like office buildings, parks, museums and highway rest areas.

Even if all of these recommendations are implemented, the council projects that plug-in vehicles will only account for about five percent of the vehicles on on the road or 25,000 units in the state by 2020. At least it's a start.

[Source: Bristol Press, Connecticut]

Aerodynamic performance is getting increasingly important for every new vehicle as automakers strive to improve fuel efficiency and reduce noise. That's especially true for hybrid vehicles as manufacturers aim for MPG bragging rights – and it's the main reason the Toyota Prius looks the way it does.

The next hybrid-only model from Toyota is the new CT 200h from Lexus and, while it doesn't feature the overtly low-drag styling of the Prius, it's spent its fair share of time in the wind-tunnel and on the CFD workstation screen. The smooth under-body and thoughtful tweaking of the bodywork around the front and where the air-flow separates has resulted in a drag coefficient of 0.28. The back end of the greenhouse has been carefully tapered and augmented with a spoiler extending back from the roof over the rear glass. Lexus claims that's the lowest figure in the compact luxury class. The production CT 200h will debut at the Paris Motor Show soon and goes on sale next year.



[Source: Lexus]

In the realm of vehicle electrification, EEStor and its super-duper ultra-capacitors are roughly the equivalent of Duke Nukem Forever for video game players. The creators of both products have made impressive claims and repeatedly promised public demonstrations and introductions for many years. In both cases, the creators have missed every single promised date with nothing to show for it.

In another strange parallel, reports have emerged from both camps this week that something will finally be delivered. The game is now scheduled for release sometime before the end of 2011 and EEStor has reportedly invited researchers from the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratory to view a demonstration.

It's not at all clear if EEStor has a full working prototype or just some components to display, but CEO Dick Weir apparently wants the Department of Energy to conduct an independent validation of its technology. EEStor reportedly needs to raise some additional funding in order build production facilities and hopes that a demonstration of some kind will be helpful. Will EEStor finally coalesce from vapor to reality? We'll just have to wait and see. A tip of the hat to Bret!

[Source: Bariumtitanate.blogspot.com]

Ford and its conversion partner Azure Dynamics have announced that electric and natural gas utility Xcel Energy will be the first customer for the upcoming Transit Connect Electric. Starting late this year, Xcel will get 13 of the battery-powered cargo vans with two retained for its internal fleet and the rest going to partners in its pilot deployment project.

Ford hasn't publicly announced pricing or production volumes for the Transit Connect Electric, but Xcel will pay $20,000 toward the purchase of each of the 11 vans that will go to government agencies, municipalities and businesses. Currently, the city of St. Paul, MN is scheduled to get the first electric van.

Azure will be upfitting the Transit Connect gliders that it gets from a Ford factory in Turkey with an electric motor and a Johnson Controls-Saft lithium ion battery for an expected range of about 80 miles. The installation work will be handled at an AM General Facility in Livonia, MI.



Photos by Sebastian Blanco / Copyright ©2010 Weblogs, Inc.

Prospective Nissan Leaf buyers will be glad to hear that Aerovironment has just received approval from Underwriters Laboratories (UL) for its EVSE-RS home charging station. Aerovironment is the preferred partner for Nissan's electric vehicle program.

The UL listing allows Nissan and Aerovironment to avoid the sort of embarrassment that Mini faced when it introduced the Mini E with a charge cable that had not yet been approved. Many municipal building codes require electrical devices like EV chargers to be UL approved to ensure safety.

The EVSE-RS charger is equipped with the SAE J1772 coupler and the housing is sealed for outdoor use. Since the J1772 connector is a standard unit, this charging dock should work with any of the coming range of plug-in vehicles including the Chevrolet Volt and the Prius PHEV. In the event of a blackout or brownout, the charger will automatically continue the charging process once power is restored. The charging stations start at about $700 and typical installations cost about $1,000-2,000, depending on the home wiring setup.

[Source: Aerovironment]

Audi has announced that it will partner with utilities E.ON and Stadtwerke München (SWM) as well as the Technical University of Munich (TUM) launch a field test program with its A1 e-tron in Munich, Germany by mid-2011. The automaker will supply 20 of the extended-range electric vehicles to its partners for an evaluation of the communication systems between the driver, vehicle and grid. Smartphone applications that let drivers monitor and manage charging will be a big part of the test program.

The A1 e-tron was unveiled at the Geneva Motor Show earlier this year and uses a novel powertrain setup. The lithium-ion battery pack gives 30 miles of driving range before a range-extender powered by a small single-rotor Wankel fires up. Under the current EU draft proposal for measuring fuel consumption of ER-EVs, Audi estimates the A1 e-tron will get about 124 miles per gallon combined.



[Source: Audi]

Hyundai has unveiled the BlueOn, which it claims is South Korea's first full-speed battery electric vehicle (EV). The tiny BlueOn is based on the Hyundai's i10 minicar and was first shown as a prototype at last year's Frankfurt Motor Show when it was called the i10 Electric. The little EV is equipped with a 16.4 kWh lithium-polymer battery pack but other than the capacity, Hyundai hasn't announced details about the battery yet. The pack will probably come from LG Chem, which also supplies lithium polymer energy storage for the Sonata hybrid and Chevrolet Volt.

Hyundai began development of the BlueOn a little over one year ago and has invested about $34 million in the program. Thirty BlueOns will be supplied to South Korean government agencies for a two-year pilot program that begins next month at the G20 economic summit. The BlueOn has a nominal range of 87 miles and charges in six hours from a 220-volt outlet. If a 380-volt DC charger is available, the battery can be replenished to 80 percent charge in 25 minutes. Hyundai has equipped its EV with a Virtual Engine Sound System to create synthetic audio feedback for pedestrians as well as a telematics system to help drivers find available charging stations in the area.

[Source: Hyundai | Image: Korea Herald]

Nissan has dropped a teaser image of the headlight for a new electric vehicle concept that will be unveiled at the Paris Motor Show later this month. Based on the statement that the Townpod, "is more than just a car and it's more than just a van," we're assuming that this is not a new variant of the Land Glider that debuted at last fall's Tokyo Motor Show but rather some new sort of electric MPV. This could be a tall wagon – something like the Ford C-Max – based on the Leaf platform or it could also be a passenger version of the NV200 which is getting an electric variant. The extended headlights would be at home in this sketch, wouldn't they?

[Source: Nissan]

Since the earliest days of Lotus, founder Colin Chapman lived by the philosophy of "Simplicate and add lightness." Over the last 60 years, that has manifested in cars from the Seven and Elan to the Elise and Evora. We can look for more of the same from the company, now that the California Air Resources Board has awarded Lotus Engineering a $2 million grant to conduct a study into future lightweight vehicles.

The new study is a follow-up to an earlier program that saw Lotus build a prototype vehicle capable of being built in volumes of 50,000 units a year. The mass of this earlier vehicle was slashed by 38 percent while the cost was only increased by 3 percent. More importantly, fuel consumption of the lightweight vehicle would be reduced by 23 percent. Unlike many lightweight concepts constructed from carbon fiber, the Lotus-designed vehicle was built mainly from more conventional materials like aluminum, magnesium and high-strength steels.

The goal of the new program, due to be completed by April 2011 and led by the Lotus Engineering office in Ann Arbor, MI, will be to demonstrate that the lightweight vehicle can meet all U.S. crash standards. If anyone can do it, we think Lotus has a shot.

[Source: Lotus]

Since Ford is replacing the entire engine lineup for the 2011 F-150 pickup trucks, it has apparently decided not to reinstall at least one component that is usually bolted to those engines: the hydraulic power steering pump. According to PickupTrucks.com, the updated models will be the first full-size trucks to use electric power steering (EPAS) almost across the board.

Previously, the only full-size trucks equipped with EPAS were the General Motors two-mode hybrid pickups and SUVs. These machines powered the system from the 42 volts available as an off-shoot of the high-voltage battery. All F-150s powered by the 3.7-liter V6, 3.5-liter Ecoboost and 5.0-liter V8 will use the on-demand, electric motor-driven steering assist in place of the traditional, always-on hydraulic system. Only the specialty Raptor and Harley-Davidson models with the larger, heavier 6.2-liter V8 will retain the old system. EPAS is expected to contribute a fuel efficiency improvement of up to four percent thanks to the reduced parasitic losses.

[Source: PickupTrucks.com]

Until now, one of the big downsides of battery electric vehicles (EVs) was the risk of running out of energy before getting back to a charging station. When an internal combustion vehicle runs dry, a driver can always call roadside assistance to bring some fuel or just hike to a station and bring back a can of gas or diesel. Under the same circumstances, an EV would require a tow to an outlet somewhere.

A research team led by Zafer Sahinoglu at the Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories in Cambridge, MA is developing a system of portable chargers that could be deployed to locations where EVs run low. The plan would be to equip electric vehicles with live telemetry that transmits battery state of charge and location information to a central server. The portable charging stations would likely be a giant battery pack on wheels that would be charged at a central depot and then sent to wherever EVs need replenishment. Supposedly, five mobile units could cover 100 EVs on a 60-mile stretch of highway. Sahinoglu is presenting his concept at the Vehicular Technology Conference in Ottawa, Canada, this week.

[Source: New Scientist]

With the recent launch of the LaCrosse and Regal, it's clear that the big, floaty Buick sedan is a thing of the past. However, the debut of the Opel GTC at the upcoming Paris Motor Show begs the question; will we soon see a Buick hot-hatch to take on the Volkswagen GTI? The GTC is a stylish, three-door hatchback version of the latest-generation Astra compact that debuted last year. Buick has already confirmed that it will introduce a four-door sedan version of the Astra in the U.S. market (which may or may not be called the Verano).

As usual, Buick doesn't like to talk about unannounced products, but we can't help but wonder how a three-door like this with a waterfall grille can succeed in America? Imagine a base version with the 1.4-liter turbocharged inline-four from the Cruze and a performance variant with the 220 horsepower, 2.0-liter direct-injected turbo from the Regal. That latter engine is what Opel has installed in the show-car, along with an automatic start-stop system and six-speed manual gearbox. We'd drive one.



[Source: General Motors]

Chevrolet's all-new B-segment challenger will make its world debut at the Paris Motor Show later this month before arriving in the United States next year to take on the Ford Fiesta. The production version of the 2012 Aveo has retained the vastly improved styling the public first saw on the Aveo RS concept in Detroit last January, including the exposed round head and tail-lamps.

European customers will get a range of four-cylinder gas engines from 1.2- to 1.6-liters along with 75 and 95 horsepower 1.3-liter diesels. Here in the U.S., we will probably get only the 115 horsepower 1.6 and perhaps the 100 hp 1.4 that also does duty as the range extender in the Chevrolet Volt. Start-stop technology will be standard on Aveos in Europe, but General Motors has not announced if the American cars will get that capability. It'd be a shame if they didn't.

After decades of being told that small cars could not be produced profitably in the U.S., GM has opted to produce North American-market versions of the Aveo in its Lake Orion, MI assembly plant north of Detroit while Aveos destined for European customers will likely be sourced from GM's South Korean factories. When the Aveo goes on sale next summer, the five-door hatch shown in Paris will also be joined by a four-door sedan which will probably debut in either Los Angeles or Detroit.



[Source: General Motors]