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ETA says plug-in cars could "speed climate change" unless we get off coal

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 (the same as taking 82 million cars off the road) while electricity consumption would increase only eight percent. Not everyone is convinced that plugs are the answer. The Environmental Transport Association in the UK, for example, believes that ... Read more →

STUDY: Hybrids more likely to be involved in crashes with pedestrians, bicycles Jeremy Korzeniewski

A recent study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration finds that hybrid vehicles are more likely to be involved in accidents with pedestrians and bicyclists under certain scenarios. ...

STUDY: Market share for plug ins, hybrids set for huge growth by 2013 Sebastian Blanco

Reports that hybrid vehicles would continue to be popular are nothing new and seem to be coming true. But a new study by NextGen Research paints a picture that might be a bit too rosy. Maybe. ...

Coming Soon: Downloadable ring tones for your silent electric car? Jeremy Korzeniewski

Like to download new ring tones for your phone so that you don't sound like everybody else in the world that opts for the free cell phones from their chosen service provider? The same kind of ...

Debate rages over whether to extend HOV-lane exemptions for hybrids in CA Frank Filipponio

Besides the potential feeling of environmental superiority, one of the great benefits to having a hybrid in California has been the availability of a magic little sticker set for a vehicle's rear ...

REPORT: Toyota looking to apply Prius name to other hybrid vehicles, but not as a sub-brand 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

Not long ago, we wondered just how steep the hill of customer acceptance is for a new technology like the Volt is. The question was how well the Chevy Volt and the Voltec powertrain could compete with the established Prius brand? Toyota, for its part, apparently thinks it's worth spreading the Prius ...

Mercedes-Benz now shipping the S400 hybrid to U.S. dealers 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

Mercedes-Benz has apparently begun shipping the new S400 BlueHybrid sedan to its U.S. dealer network. One of our readers spotted one and grabbed a photo of the window sticker. The S400 is Mercedes' first production hybrid vehicle and utilizes the mild hybrid system it developed in conjunction ...

Going Green: Hybrid sales increase again in August 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

Buoyed by Cash for Clunkers for the second month in a row, hybrid sales looked pretty darn good overall. Let's look at a few numbers. The biggest winner of the month was Nissan, which posted an almost unheard of 207-percent gain last month over August of 2008. Delving a bit deeper, Nissan's ...

REPORT: Toyota to ask Japanese government to extend green car incentives 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

It comes as little surprise that Toyota would want the Japanese government to extend its current series of green car incentives past their scheduled ending date of March, 2010. After all, the automaker has seen sales of its latest hybrids skyrocket in its home market, and much of that success ...

REPORT: China pondering hoarding precious metal exports used in hybrids and EVs by banning exportation 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

Ever hear of neodymium? How about dysprosium or yttrium? Thulium or lutetium? These are just some of the metals that China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is considering either banning for export or at least severely limiting the amount that it will let leave the country. These ...

GM looked at hybrid for new GT2 Corvette - passed for now, could happen down the road 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

During yesterday's conference call to announce the new GT2 version of the Chevrolet Corvette C6.R, we asked program manager Doug Fehan about using a hybrid or KERS powertrain in the Corvette. The Corvettes race in the American Le Mans Series where the Green Challenge is becoming an increasingly ...

Surprise! Hybrid sales rose in July thanks to new Prius, Cash for Clunkers 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

For the first time in what feels like ages, a small handful of automakers were actually able to post positive sales numbers as they reported July sales this week. On the currently-available green car side of the books, strong demand for the new Prius and the Cash For Clunkers program helped push ...

At Witz' End - scoping out magazine coverage of electric vehicles 3 months ago on Autoblog Green

With so much information (and disinformation) available on the Web, does anyone read magazines any more? Most are struggling to retain both readers and advertisers, and many are going upside down. In the specialized area of auto magazines, there are still plenty of good examples in many ...

STUDY: Despite insurance breaks, hybrids driven more, cost more to fix, and get more tickets 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Conventional wisdom is that hybrid vehicles reduce our dependence on foreign oil and emit fewer environment-hurting CO2 emissions. When comparing a hybrid to a conventional gasoline-powered model on a mile-by-mile basis, there's some logic to this argument, provided the pricing disparity ...

Columnist: Hybrid growth in the near-term will benefit ... lead-acid battery makers? 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Even though demand for hybrid vehicles is expected to grow like mushrooms after a summer rain in the coming years, there's a big problem looming, says John Peterson, a writer for investment site Seeking Alpha. Peterson has crunched some numbers and done some reading and discovered that the ...

Hybrid sales up despite another down month overall, Prius leads charge 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Initial strong sales of the 2010 Honda Insight slowed last month, but new models of the Toyota Prius and Ford Fusion helped give hybrids car sales in June 2009 a nine percent increase over last June. In the U.S., dealers sold 26,205 new hybrids in June, 49.6 of which (12,998 units) were ...

REPORT: Japan could require hybrids to emit sound 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Now that hybrid cars have taken the top sales spots in Japan for the last few months, that country's Transport Ministry is reportedly launching an investigation to determine if it's wise to require hybrid automobiles to emit an artificial sound when operating with the internal combustion switched ...

EDITORIAL: Attention Wall Street Journal - Ford does not use Toyota's hybrid system! 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

in an op-ed piece published in the Wall Street Journal, Alan Reynolds of the Cato Institute starts by making a few decent points about fuel taxation and fuel economy rules. Unfortunately, he undermines himself with some blatant errors and misinformation. In discussing how Detroit automakers ...

REPORT: Toyota hopes to boost profits by licensing hybrid technology 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

Over the last ten years or so, Toyota has amassed a wide-ranging assortment of more than 2,000 patents related to its proprietary Hybrid Synergy Drive. That's an impressive figure to be sure, and it's also a possible source of income as more and more automakers follow Toyota's lead by ...

Lamborghini adds solar power to factory, vows to cut range CO2 35% by 2015 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

In the grand scheme of things, the facilities and products of Lamborghini don't really amount to a hill of beans. After all, the company only has one main factory that produces a few thousand cars a year. While those cars are high-powered and consume a lot of fuel per mile driven, Lamborghini ...

Survey Says: One in five cars sold in U.S. by 2020 will be a hybrid 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

According to a recent study conducted by JPMorgan, hybrid sales are about to take off. Last year, there were some 480,000 total hybrid vehicles sold around the world, which represents less than one percent of global sales. By 2020, though, JPMorgan predicts that 11.28 million hybrids will be sold ...

What should I consider before buying a "green" car? 8 months ago on Autoblog Green

Car sales have totally tanked. So what good is a post on buying the right green car? Well, the reality is that most people in the U.S. still need a car to get around and, with the possibility of a "cash for clunkers" deal moving through Congress, why not start to think about getting a new car? ...

2009: Year of the hybrid sales boom bust? 8 months ago on Autoblog Green

Three things to note: The new Honda Insight went on sale in Japan earlier this year and has been selling well. Toyota has sold a million hybrids in the U.S. Ford has built 100,00 hybrid SUVs. Sounds good, right? Not so fast. The truth is that, overall, hybrids are not selling well. ...

Toyota to Ford: 100,000 hybrids? That's cute. We've sold a million in the U.S. 8 months ago on Autoblog Green

Yesterday, Ford announced it had built its 100,000th hybrid SUV. Today, Toyota coyly released a statement that outshines the Blue Oval 10-to-1. Toyota Motor Sales has now sold more than one million Toyota and Lexus hybrids in the U.S. and dominates 75 percent of the hybrid market here. TMS has ...

Used hybrid values have "fallen off a cliff" 8 months ago on Autoblog Green

As we're sure you've noticed every time you've gone to refill your gas tank in the last few months, gas is once again relatively cheap. Just under a year ago, the price for a gallon of fuel was about double what it is today in most parts of the country, and those high costs were driving the sales ...

How do power-split parallel hybrids work? 8 months ago on Autoblog Green

Over the past decade, if there is one word that has become synonymous with green motoring it is hybrid. Ever since Toyota launched the first modern commercially viable hybrid with the original Prius (above) in 1997, over one million of them have hit the roads. Of course, as is so often the case, ...

Rahm Emanuel - Obama's fighter for hybrid cars in the White House 10 months ago on Autoblog Green

Who's going to be pushing the hardest for cleaner cars in the U.S. - hybrids, PHEVs and CNG vehicles, specifically - in the coming years? According to HybridCars, it will not be Plug In America or AutoblogGreen readers; instead, it could be President Obama's White House chief of staff: Rahm ...

GM sold 2,555 hybrids in December, HUMMER sales cut in half 10 months ago on Autoblog Green

All things considered, it appears that we think of GM's 2,555 hybrid sales in December a success. GM's press release (posted after the jump) certainly makes it all smell like roses. The 2.5k deliveries are up from the 1,957 hybrids the General sold in September. At that time, GM was averaging about ...

Toyota cuts spending, increases hybrid development 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Even mighty Toyota isn't immune to the downturn in sales in the United States due to the horrible current economic climate and credit crisis. Revenue is down nearly 70 percent for the Japanese giant, a situation that it is anything but familiar with. So, Toyota has created a team headed by its ...

Small cars, hybrids more expensive to insure 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

If your goal is to do nothing more than cutting down your petroleum usage for either political or environmental reasons, a small car or hybrid seems to be the way to go. If your desire is solely to save money, there are many more costs to factor into your decision. One of them is insurance, as a ...

Hybrid drivetrain costs on the way down 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

According to a recent report by JPMorgan Chase & Co, the average cost surcharge for a hybrid drivetrain will go down by 67 percent in the next decade. This means that using both an electric motor and an internal combustion engine under the same hood will cost both automakers and consumers less ...

Toyota Sustainable Mobility Seminar morning sessions: the bad news 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

As we gathered sleepily in the conference rooms early in the morning, host John Hanson said that Toyota's hope with this one-day seminar was to present the complexity of the sustainability mobility situation and to highlight the challenges that the world is dealing with. The solution is not just ...

GM Hybrid sales slowly picking up some steam: 1,629 deliveries in August 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

digg_url = 'http://digg.com/autos/GM_Hybrid_Sales_Slowly_Picking_Up_Some_Steam'; General Motors is finally starting to regularly break out the sales figures for its hybrid vehicles and while the numbers are improving, they still look very weak compared to the competition. August was the ...

Hybrid drivers most brand-loyal 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Click above for more high-res shots of the 2007 Toyota Prius Touring When it comes time to choose their next new vehicle purchase, recent data suggests that hybrid drivers are the most likely to either choose the same model again or, even more likely, the same brand. Experian Automotive reports ...

Edmunds blogger lays the hate on hybrids 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

A blogger over on the Inside Line blog at Edmunds known only as The Mechanic has published an editorial that expresses supreme disdain for hybrid vehicles such as the Prius and Civic. He/she/it does make some valid points in that the really efficient hybrids (as opposed to Lexus hybrids) are ...

NHTSA listens to arguments against quiet hybrids 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Hybrid and fully electric vehicles have come under fire as of late due to the quietness at which they operate. While this is seemingly a good thing for passengers of the vehicle, there are legitimate concerns that blind people will not be able to detect the rapidly approaching vehicle if it is not ...

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