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Limited: What's the value of talking about "range anxiety" all the time?

Here are three important facts about gasoline: It is available almost anywhere around the world it has tremendous energy content Using it the way we do creates a whole slew of negative environmental and political side effects It's hard to beat the first two items with a non-petroleum alternative, but those negative impacts (oh, and questions about its availability in the coming decades) are forcing us to try and find one. As regular readers know, the two most promising longer-term solutions are plug-in electric vehicles and ... Read more →

Detroit Preview: BMW Concept ActiveE set to amp up 1 Series Sam Abuelsamid

Six months into its Mini E field test program, BMW is getting ready for phase two of its electric vehicle development. At the Detroit Auto Show next month, the Bavarian automaker will introduce its ...

Toyota officially launches plug-in Prius program, retail sales in 2011 Sam Abuelsamid

In Japan today, Toyota officially launched its Prius Plug-in Hybrid (PHEV) lease program. Over the next six months, Toyota will be building and deploying 600 examples of the plug-in Prius for ...

Ricardo and Qinetiq announce reduced-cost lithium-ion battery Xavier Navarro

Ricardo and Qinetiq announced a new technology to produce cheaper lithium-ion batteries this week. Called Red Lion, the key to their claimed achievement is a new chemistry inside the cells. Instead ...

PREDICTION: Shift to electric vehicles could create 1 million jobs by 2020 Sebastian Blanco

Just how electric vehicles will change the world is an evolving debate, but one new analysis says that EVs and connected industries could be a $300 billion business by 2020 and create over a ...

LA 2009: The plug-in Prius makes its North American debut 17 days ago on Autoblog Green

Toyota rather unceremoniously parked their plug-in Prius at its North American market debut during the LA Auto Show, while their new Sienna minivan got a royal welcome at its coming out party. At a show that saw the production-ish Chevrolet Volt appearing in public for the first time, it might ...

Toyota starts discussions on who will get PHEV Priuses 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

Toyota is getting ready to start deploying a fleet of 200 plug-in Prius hybrids in the coming months and the company needs to figure out what to do with them. The cars will all be leased for purposes of field testing. Toyota is now in discussions with federal and local governments and energy ...

Buick Regal likely to be launch platform for next GM hybrid system 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

Last night, General Motors publicly unveiled the 2011 Buick Regal that goes on sale in North America in the first half of next year. The Regal will be Buick's new mid-sized sedan entry and is essentially just a re-grilled version of the Opel Insignia that went on sale in Europe last year. The ...

ETA says plug-in cars could "speed climate change" unless we get off coal 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

Think that plugging in your vehicle will protect the earth? Sure, this was the message that EPRI and the NRDC sent following a 2008 study that found that, if 60 percent of the U.S. fleet of light vehicles converted to plug-ins by 2050, CO2 emissions would drop by 450 million metric tons annually ...

At Witz' End: Notes from "The Business of Plugging In" 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

EV business may be booming soon I dropped by the Center for Automotive Research's (CAR) "The Business of Plugging In" conference in Detroit recently and came away with a collection of quotes and useful information from movers and shakers working to make vehicle electrification happen. ...

It's Friday: Swedish automatic PHEV charging prod gets a big WTF? from us [w/VIDEO] 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

Is it too harsh to say that the Trinnovator is a solution without a problem? At the very least, we don't think that a flexible, extendable prod coming out of the front bumper of a plug-in car and creepily finding its way into a grid of receptacles is the best way to recharge a vehicle. This is ...

Plug-in vehicles will get special license plate in Ontario next year 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

digg_url = 'http://digg.com/autos/Plug_in_Cars_To_Get_Special_License_Plates_in_Ontario_by_10'; Want to emblazon your ride with Ontario's new "environmentally friendly vehicles" license plate? There are two hurdles you'll have to jump. First, wait until next year when the plate actually becomes ...

Editorial: Henderson's fuel cell 10X cost comments are out of context 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

The other day we reported on an interview with General Motors CEO Fritz Henderson published in the Washington Post. While most of the discussion focused on the bailout and bankruptcy, from the perspective of this site, the main items of interest were Henderson's responses to questions relating ...

Studies Say: a wrap up from the green car front: "Internalize the Externalities," more 1 month ago on Autoblog Green

This is a particularly busy time for studies trying to understand the impact of green vehicles. Here's a quick round-up: Paul Scott writes that, for anyone to fairly compare driving plug-in vehicles and gasoline-powered ones, we need a better understanding of the "exernalities" of fossil ...

PEV 2009: GM's Lauckner wishes for bigger incentives to get drivers out of gas-powered vehicles 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

At this point, it's no secret that the Chevy Volt and other plug-in vehicles are not going to come cheap. The least-pricey full-speed electric vehicle may very well be the Nissan Leaf, which after incentives might drop into the $27-28,000 range before the extra cost of leasing the battery. While the ...

Lists? Yeah, electric vehicles get on lists. Hopeful, hopeful lists 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

Here are five technologies that "could change everything": Advanced car batteries Carbon capture and storage Space-based solar power Utility storage Next-generation biofuels This is the list culled by the Wall Street Journal, and we note that plug-in vehicles benefit/are tied to ...

Webchat with Tony Posawatz and Felix Kramer, 3:30pm EST today 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

Readers of this site are probably quite familiar with the names of Felix Kramer and Tony Posawatz. Kramer is the founder of the California Cars Institute (CalCars) and major proponent of plug-in vehicles. Posawatz is the vehicle line director for the Chevrolet Volt and has been part of the team ...

GM to suppliers: Keep working on Two-Mode Hybrid PHEV 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

Now that General Motors has offloaded its Saturn brand and the once-planned Buick plug-in hybrid SUV failed to get off the ground after being roundly criticized by the press and public, GM needs to pick yet another platform to introduce the Two-Mode Hybrid powertrain in its first plug-in capable ...

Frankfurt Preview: More on Toyota's new lithium-ion Plug-in Prius 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

Toyota's new-generation plug-in hybrid Prius will be shown for the first time at the Frankfurt Motor Show next week, and now we've got some new images and details. As expected, the PHEV Prius will be equipped with a lithium-ion battery pack. The hybrid synergy drive system has been upgraded for ...

Survey says... nearly half of Americans want to buy something like the Volt, but do they want to pay? 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

The Chevrolet Volt is a data driven design in many ways. The shape is driven by aerodynamic data. Its conception was in part driven by public perception data. Its powertrain architecture was driven by empirical data about how drivers actually use their cars. For example, roughly three quarters ...

Frankfurt Preview: Toyota to show Auris Hybrid, Prius PHEV and two iQ variants 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

In addition to the LF-Ch from its Lexus luxury division, Toyota also intends to bring a few more environmentally friendly automobiles to the upcoming Frankfurt Motor Show, some seemingly close to production form and others as concepts to whet our appetites for the future. Included among these ...

BREAKING: GM cancels Buick crossover before birth, will add PHEV drivetrain to another vehicle 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Surprising news comes by way of General Motors today as the automaker has already canceled its recently announced Buick crossover, which in reality was little more than an ex-Saturn Vue emblazoned with Buick's trademark chrome waterfall grille. And therein lies the rub. As confirmed to Autoblog by ...

Quick Drive: Buick/Saturn Vue plug-in hybrid prototype 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

We had a chance for a quick drive of a development prototype for Buick's upcoming plug-in hybrid crossover this week at the GM proving ground. The prototype was still wearing its Saturn grille and badging as that was the original intent of the program. When Rick Wagoner announced in late 2006 ...

Is retro-fitting older vehicles the solution to accelerating electrification? 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Is the mass retrofitting of older vehicles the solution to a rapid transformation to an electrified vehicle fleet? Felix Kramer, founder of Cal Cars, certainly thinks so. The problem lies in the fact that there are nearly 250 million vehicles on the road in the U.S. with a median age of about ...

Enginer claims to have $2,000, 2kWh plug-in Prius conversion kit ready 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

We'll start with the numbers: $1,995 will get you a 2 kWh plug-in battery pack for your second-generation Toyota Prius; $2,995 will get you a 4 kWh pack (the installation feel and the $95 delivery charge are extra). For your two or three grand, you can reach "the holy grail of achieving 100 ...

Breaking: Saturn Vue plug-in hybrid reborn as new Buick crossover 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

GM CEO Fritz Henderson may not believe in re-badging Pontiacs for other GM brands, but it looks like at least one Saturn model will live on. The mid-size Vue crossover will become a Buick in 2011, and a plug-in hybrid will be part of the program. The Two-mode hybrid system that was originally ...

REPORT: PSA says it's not working with Mitsubishi on plug-in hybrids 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

PSA, the parent company of Peugeot and Citroën, this morning denied a report that came out in the Japanese Nikkei business newspaper about a new tie-up with Mitsubishi. The paper had reported that PSA and Mitsubishi would be collaborating on plug-in hybrid vehicles. The two automakers are ...

REPORT: Toyota will launch series production PHEV Prius in 2012 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

According to Japan's Nikkei news agency, Toyota has decided to start series production of a plug-in version of the Prius hybrid in 2012. At launch, the automaker plans to build about 20,000-30,000 units a year of the plug-in hybrid. The report indicates that the model will be priced comparably ...

Columnist: Plug-in cars are the new ethanol-style boondoggle 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

The amount of money that the U.S. federal government poured into corn ethanol is legendary. Today, we're left with a floundering ethanol economy and a few happy corn farmers but not an abundance of the biofuel powering the nation's cars. A columnist for the Washington Examiner thinks that we're ...

GM will do "heavy lifting" toward plug-in goal [w/POLL] 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

- It's going to be awfully tough to hit President Obama's stated goal of one million plug-in hybrids on American roads by 2015. After all, that's just over five years away and there aren't actually any affordable plug-in-capable vehicles available as of today from a major automaker that meet ...

REPORT: 115 Plug-in Priuses fail to crack 50 mpg average in year-long test 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

When Consumer Reports tested out the Hymotion L5 plug-in Toyota Prius conversion earlier this year, they weren't overwhelmed with the results. Sure, the mileage they observed was boosted to about 67 mpg over the first 35 miles of the drive, but that didn't match the claims of 100 mpg (or more) that ...

Hydro Quebec joins Ford Escape PHEV test program 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

Ford's Escape plug-in hybrid test program has found another electric utility partner for its field test program. Hydro-Quebec has been selected by Ford and the Electric Power Research Institute to join the three-year program. Hydro-Quebec has received one of the 21 Escape PHEV's built by Ford ...

Bright thinks its a good IDEA to apply for DOE grants 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

Bright automotive not only introduced the IDEA PHEV van in Washington recently, but they also asked for grants. Bright applied for two grants from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009. The first one would be used to create a technical center for the design, development and ...

Toyota to lease 200 PHEV Priuses in Japan starting in late 2009 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

They won't look like the second-generation Prius plug-in pictured above, but Toyota has announced the first of its non-European leasing programs for its new PHEV (see here). Starting late this year Toyota will start leasing 200 plug-capable Priuses to government and commercial fleets in Japan. A ...

Modified PHEV Prius setting out on 1,100-mile, one-tank drive - but why? 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

File this one under slightly sketchy (AFS Trinity style). A Florida Toyota dealer is taking a Prius on what he calls an "epic" 1,100-mile trip to Washington, D.C. and he wants to do it on only one tank of gas. Since the tank of the Prius is 11.9 gallons, that'd be quite a mileage feat. 92.4 mpg ...

Americans "need" big trucks, says Sen. Hatch, and the Raser Hummer EV is just right 7 months ago on Autoblog Green

Worried that the Obama Administration's latest CAFE requirements will put the hurt to big trucks? Fret not, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) has got your back. At an event held in the nation's capital, Hatch got the chance to pilot the extended-range electric HUMMER H3 from Raser Technologies that ...

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