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Buick Regal likely to be launch platform for next GM hybrid system

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 North American Regal will be built at the Oshawa Ontario assembly plant in Canada beginning in calendar 2011 and will only be offered with a choice of direct-injected four-cylinder engines. However, the Regal is actually slated to go on sale in calendar ... Read more →

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

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 ...

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. ...

Some say "No plug, no deal," but not everyone is gonna buy that Sebastian Blanco

This week, the Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers found that plug-in hybrids have to be "affordable" if automakers think that customers will want to buy them. People are interested, U ...

PEV 2009: GM's Lauckner wishes for bigger incentives to get drivers out of gas-powered vehicles Sam Abuelsamid

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 ...

Webchat with Tony Posawatz and Felix Kramer, 3:30pm EST today 1 month 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 ...

Officially, official: Mercedes-Benz Vision S 500 Plug-in hybrid brings big numbers to Frankfurt 2 months ago on Autoblog Green

News of the Mercedes-Benz S 500 Hybrid has been quickly confirmed by Daimler, with the added information that this is a "near series" concept that we'll see in Frankfurt next week. The 3.5-liter luxury PHEV will indeed get 73.5 U.S. mpg (3.2L per 100 km) and it appears this was calculated on the ...

Frankfurt Preview: Toyota to show Auris Hybrid, Prius PHEV and two iQ variants 2 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 ...

Illinois, Colorado put money into plug-in infrastructure 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

While there is no coherent national plug-in vehicle legislation aside from the PHEV tax credit bill, some states are moving forward with their own proposals to encourage more vehicles with plugs. Both Colorado and Illinois recently passed plug-in support laws. In Colorado, House Bill 1331, the ...

Columnist: Plug-in cars are the new ethanol-style boondoggle 4 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 ...

GAO says truly clean plug-in hybrids need to be powered by alternatives to coal plants 4 months ago on Autoblog Green

The long tailpipe. The longer you've been interested in cleaner cars that come with a plug, the more chance there is you've heard about this topic and thought of ways to mitigate the effect of the resources that are being consumed elsewhere to move your wheels. Solar and wind are two obvious clean ...

Mitsubishi iMiEV price cut, plug-in hybrid version coming 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

With incentives, Mitsubishi's all-electric i MiEV car will cost about $31,300 when it goes on sale in Japan later this year. That's a pile of cash for the zero-tailpipe emissions car. The good news is that Mitsubishi's president has announced that it plans to cut the price in half (!) by the ...

PICC plug-in Prius can now go 70 mph on battery power 5 months ago on Autoblog Green

Thanks to a beefed up bit of software, Priuses converted to plug-in drive by Plug In Conversions Corp. (PICC) have gotten quite a bit better. They can now go up to 70 mph using nothing but their batteries and get 170 mpge. The software manages to get around Toyota's built-in top speed limitation of ...

Toyota to lease 200 PHEV Priuses in Japan starting in late 2009 5 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 ...

Toyota questions demand for plug-ins, cost, range, durability concerns 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

We all know that there is a hardcore group of you out there chanting the mantra of "No plug, no sale!" Okay, well, at least a few of you. The problem is that, like commenters on the internet, the loud fringe makes most of the noise, but actually represents a very small percentage of the total ...

Plug-in Saturn Vue not dead, will be revived (sorta) by 2011 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

For all the jokes about how Americans now own GM, it turns out that AutoblogGreen readers and GM executives think alike. In a poll we ran yesterday, the most popular choice for what to do with the Saturn hybrid powertrains was "Move the powertrain to the Equinox." A GM spokesperson said today that, ...

Foreign Affairs Auto named as official Hymotion PHEV kit installer 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

A123 Systems has named Foreign Affairs Auto of West Palm Beach Florida as an authorized installer for its Hymotion L5 plug-in conversion kits. The L5 kit consists of a battery pack containing A123 lithium iron phosphate cells designed to be installed in the second-generation Toyota Prius. The kit ...

GM ends Saturn brand in restructuring; PHEV Vue, we hardly knew ye 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

As part of the big and updated Viability Plan that GM released today, GM has moved up the "resolution" of three brands - Saturn, Saab and Hummer - to the end of 2009. That means that some of the hybrids that we were promised - including the 2010 Saturn Vue 2-mode hybrid and the plug-in Vue ...

SAE 2009: Yazaki's booth proudly displays J1772 connector 6 months ago on Autoblog Green

At the SAE World Congress last week, one of the more important technical discussions revolved around a new connector standard for plug-in vehicles called J1772. As we mentioned in our write-up of the progress made at the event, the Yazaki company was behind the connector's original design. The ...

SAE 2009: Toyota plug-in Prius (and 3rd-gen Prius) update 7 months ago on Autoblog Green

To get a little bit of clarification on the reported 12-mile EV-only range that the plug-in Prius is achieving in current testing, we spoke with Toyota Prius vehicle specialist Stephanie Wohlgamuth, who is working at the Toyota booth here at the SAE World Congress. Wohlgamuth said that the number ...

Raser Technologies E-REV SUV coming to Detroit, promises 100+ mpg 7 months ago on Autoblog Green

Last year at the SAE World Congress, Raser Technologies announced it had, along with FEV, designed a plug-in hybrid powertrain for large trucks. Earlier this year, Pacific Gas and Electric ordered two converted vehicles that use this lithium ion system for testing in their fleet. The potentially ...

$2 billion? Nah, more like $12.5 billion for plug-in cars in the stimulus bill 9 months ago on Autoblog Green

When the big stimulus bill was passed this week, the number that rose to the forefront was a $2 billion investment for plug in vehicles. But, if you add in all the additional plug-in help for things like infrastructure, the actual plug-in stimulus package is closer to $12.5 billion, according to ...

Toyota: Plug-in Prius returning 65 mpg in testing 9 months ago on Autoblog Green

According to Toyota, its plug-in Prius hybrids are averaging 65 miles per gallon in real world testing. This is an improvement of 15 mpg over the recently-unveiled 2010 Prius. The secret to the big fuel mileage increase is a battery with the capacity to store much more energy than the unit in the ...

Responses to Obama's move, and looking at the potential of a $10,000 PHEV tax credit 9 months ago on Autoblog Green

There were good and bad receptions to President Obama's move earlier this week to push the EPA to rethink the California waiver decision (details here). GM released a very short statement that said they were "ready to engage the Obama administration and the Congress" on this topic (read the whole ...

Texas governor supports $5,000 incentive for plug-in vehicles 9 months ago on Autoblog Green

. Here's a benefit to living with dirty air in Texas: getting $5,000 off the price of your plug-in hybrid vehicle. That's the amount being proposed in the state legislature and supported by Gov. Rick Perry. In the governor's state of the state speech last night, Perry said, "I support giving ...

CARB puts off plug-in hybrid conversion warranty, emissions decision 9 months ago on Autoblog Green

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) has decided to take another look at rules it is currently mulling over that would have required PHEV conversion shops to follow the same rules for emissions tests and warranties as the automakers. When word of this decision got out, some voices were ...

Almost 70 plug-in vehicles will take part in Inaugural Parade West 10 months ago on Autoblog Green

When Plug In America first announced their "Inaugural Parade West: Plug In, America!" that's taking place in Santa Monica this weekend, they were hoping about 30 vehicles would take part. They underestimated interest. An update PIA sent out this week says that 68 vehicles are now confirmed to roll ...

Saturn Vue plug-in hybrid delayed to 2011 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

During the General Motors third quarter earnings (or lack thereof) conference call on Friday, company executives discussed the vehicle introduction schedule for 2009 and 2010. Several cars that had been expected to debut during 2009 have been pushed back to the following year, including the Saab ...

British mag tries out the VW Golf Twin-Drive, 94.1 mpg (U.S.)! 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Volkswagen recently built twenty prototype diesel plug-in hybrid Golf prototypes for a field test of the technology. AutoExpress magazine in the UK recently had an opportunity to try out the so-called Twin-Drive Golf. The Twin-Drive combines a 1.5L diesel with electric drive and lithium ion ...

Plug-In Supply launches new Prius PHEV kit for $4995 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Plug-In Supply has just released its new $4995 kit which converts your 2004-2008 Prius into a Plug-In Hybrid Vehicle (PHEV). Because the system is based on the Cal Cars reference design and uses lead-acid batteries as opposed to the more expensive lithium or nickel-based batteries, this new kit is ...

California considers legislation for PHEV conversions 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

If the California Air Resources Board (CARB) passes the legislation that it is currently considering, getting your hands on a PHEV conversion, like the one recently created by Hymotion, might be a bit more difficult. Whether or not this is a bad thing depends on your point of view. Those looking to ...

Mercedes wants to eliminate petroleum from its lineup by 2015 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

By the middle of the next decade Mercedes-Benz wants its entire lineup to be able to operate entirely free of petroleum. The German giant is working on a variety of technologies that will help provide crude oil free transport such as battery electrics, fuel cells and highly efficient internal ...

Converted Plug-In Prius destroyed by fire! 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

The first known instance of a plug-in hybrid car going up in flames occurred on June 7 in Columbia, South Carolina to a 2008 Prius that had been converted to plug-in capability for the Central Electric Power Cooperative. The conversion was performed with a Hybrids-Plus PHEV15 conversion kit that ...

Plug-in Hybrid school bus gets 70% reduction in fuel consumption 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

digg_url = 'http://digg.com/environment/Plug_in_Hybrid_school_bus_gets_70_reduction_in_fuel_use'; Enova Systems has been collaborating with IC Bus for the past couple of years to build a series of plug-in hybrid school buses for testing purposes. Enova recently had an independent CARB-certified ...

Electric Power Research Institute joins Escape PHEV test program 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Ford's test program for the Escape plug-in hybrid is expanding beyond the original partnership with Southern California Edison (SCE). The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) will join the program, setting up a group of utilities in the New York-New Jersey area that will also participate in the ...

95 years for a PHEV conversion to pay for itself in gas savings? 1 year ago on Autoblog Green

Last year, Google made some waves when they announced the RechargeIT project to convert a fleet of Toyota Priuses and Ford Escape hybrids to plug-in capability. The company has just issued their first progress report on the program, and the results may be disappointing for those promoting plug-in ...

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