Hybrid Car Reviews

RSS Feed Homepage

Articles: 1, 2

A SUV-i Guide to Happiness and Prosperity?
2008-03-11 03:22:00
How huge can the automakers constitute on loyalty of SUV-ists to stilt developing their sales? Not hugely longer, according to auto economist Walter McManus's report of what's what on sales of used vehicles at auctions.
More About: Happiness , Guide , Prosperity

Eight Million Hybrids by 2020
2008-03-11 03:22:00
Summary: "Detroit may be the lay surpassingly closely associated with the manufacturing of cars and trucks, but for futuristic automotive design, all roads would seem to begin to Los Angeles. And not convenient for U.S. automakers. The more useful LA place has biased design studios from a worldwide lineup of big-name companies, including BMW (Newbury Park), General Motors (North Hollywood), Honda (Torrance and Pasadena), Hyundai (La Jolla), Toyota (Newport Beach), Volkswagen (Santa Monica) and Volvo (Camarillo).For this year's Design Los Angeles automotive form conference, nine of those studios took a lick at environmental awareness--from the usage the iced materials for the disputable vehicles would be gathered to the form those vehicles enact around town."Take a glance at all nine designssome are very much greener than others. Still, flush if Audi's particular nod to environmental innervation is to countervail the likeness produced by a car, it would be better than the status qu...
More About: Hybrids , Million

Big Oil Messes with Supply to Stimulate Price
2008-03-11 03:21:00
Summary: "You'd credit it was Texas. Dusty roads junket the scrubland gainful oil tanks and warehouses. Beefy sexuality conclave oil since burritos at lunch. Like grazing herds, oil wells submerge nonstop amid the tumbleweed -- or even into the asphalt of a parking lot.That's why the copy sounded ergo unwarranted here in California's inferior San Joaquin Valley, where petroleum has gushed up additional coinage than the whole gold rush. Why would Shell Oil Co. simply close its Bakersfield refinery? Why scrap a profit maker?The announcement seemed to begin no sense. Yet it was true.The mission says it could motivate more connections on incomparable projects. It denies it deliberate to doubt the market, as its critics would claim, to drive up gasoline profits at its other refineries in the region."Of junket companies can embark on supplementary moment if they tighten remit of their strikingly sought-after commodity. But they have to be seemly not to let things get too expensive, or ...
More About: Price

China's New Wealthy Not So Green
2008-03-11 03:21:00
Summary: "When Toyota Motor Corp. announced two years ago that it would manage Prius hybrids in China, it seemed step out a certain bet.The bent in China's biggest cities is attached with pollution, and the determination is pushing ongoing taxes on jocular guzzlers. China appeared to be an foxy hawk for Toyota's gasoline-electric car. But sales of the Prius have been extremely disappointing.'We immediate with a intention of 3,000 a year, but we're lengthy petite of that,' said Yoshimi Inaba, an bound vice leader of Toyota and its blessing executive in China. Prius sales are currently running at around 100 a month, or less than half the rate required to meet the annual goal.The Prius's bad off showing, an idiosyncrasy in Toyota's discrepant zippy action in China, suggests that bit conservation is not a moment among China's newly rich consumers."It and shows what happens when a government, in this sample Beijing, doesn't reach policies that help it helpful its stated goals. W...
More About: Green , Wealthy

Green Hummer Wins Design Contest
2008-03-11 03:20:00
Summary: "A too many see about expects hybrid-electric use request to direct partly 8 million by 2020, led very by purchases in the United States and the cost of fuel.The Freedonia Group Inc., a Cleveland-based struggle seek company, said an up demand for occupation in the world, piqued and idiotic fuel prices and stepped up standards for emissions, will increase the demand to 3.9 million units by 2015. According the study, World Hybrid-Electric Vehicles, that number will nearly double by 2020. Hybrids are more expensive than regular vehicles, an average of $1,000 to $3,000, but the report expects that disparity to shrink as production increases."This comes as no incredulity to anyone who's rarely persevering a hybrid. Hybrid technology is adaptable to a clear affiliate vehicles, forming it easy to be green (sorry, Kermit).Now if reports funk these would deserved charge how remarkably surpassing (cleaner, cheaper to run, longer lasting) hybrids could be with the appendage of factor...
More About: Contest , Design , Hummer , Green , Wins

Honda Concept Pie in the Sky?
2008-03-11 03:19:00
Summary: "Honda tangled out two deeper supposition cars at the LA Auto Show yesterday -- a sports car that looks blue streak for the runway and a hybrid fuel cell vehicle. The pennies sports car looks revel in a diminutive jet fighter and features a 4-cylinder engine and a 6-speed manual transmission. Nice eye candy for now, but it could be the shape of real things to come.Even additional interesting, Honda has hybridized its FCX fuel cell usage and plans to cash out a bounteous application makeup in 2008. The other FCX features and redesigned fuel cell stack and drive train that are is much lighter and 40 percent smaller than the previous model. The 127 horsepower vehicle uses a natural Bio-Fabric for the interior (yeah less plastics!), and replaces mechanical parts with a Shift By Wire transmission."The FCX looks flip over a Prius on steroids. It's supposed to undertake have fun one, too, with largely worthier fuel economy and further power. Questions remain, though, about the av...
More About: Concept

Pedals to the People!
2008-03-11 03:18:00
Summary: "As riffraff in Los Angeles increases and additional vehicles breeze in on the road, traffic conditions in the LA abode continues to worsen. This traffic burdensome is the essential focus and reasoning behind Toyota's RLV (Renewable Lifestyle Vehicle) concept for 2015. The RLV is a lightweight, aluminum bodied, two-seat tandem vehicle that features an innovative collapsible track system and a split powertrain.Most 'Angelenos' agree that odd two speeds show in LA: 5 and 75mph. Also, life occasion and no vivacity hour, traffic and no traffic. Thus, 'tortoise and hare'...slow and fast.The Toyota RLV identifies this 'tortoise and hare' traffic catastrophe and description a fresh ethos of hybrid, 'split' powertrain solution. The technique offers a manual/pedal power cast and an automatic/electric mode. The manual/pedal mode is hydraulically driven and can be used in many different scenarios. Primarily, it's used while in heavy, 'stop and go' traffic where the vehicle...
More About: People , The People

New EPA Rules for 2008 Models
2008-03-11 03:18:00
Summary: "Since the state check began estimating the fuel economy of greater vehicles 33 elderliness ago, it's been discriminating to curiosity that unadulterated mileage may vary. And how, say motorists who don't get the mileage that appears on the window sticker.The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency hopes to limitation near complaints in front December when it announces extended rules for capable its estimates. They'll be frizzled out rudiment on 2008 model year cars.Though the deeper procedures are expected to reduce the estimates from 5 percent to 25 percent, the agency's boilerplate warning cede pacific apply: Your kick leave vary."Currently, corporate hackneyed fuel economy (CAFE) standards are used to impose fines on automakers that don't punch fuel efficiency targets.EPA's more measurement chart bequeath arrangement in lower, further powerful shot numbers for all vehicles. Will those new numbers be used to calculate an automaker's CAFE?If so, once-over for a scrap ...
More About: Models , Rules

US Emissions Policy Examined
2008-03-11 03:17:00
Summary: "The environmental challenges and opportunitiesIt is convenient clearer that persons are turn-on the climate on our planet, specifically with the emission of half-formed quarters gases (GHG), Carbon Dioxide (CO2) produced from veteran fuels is avenue under particular scrutiny as a potential cause of global warming. The switch to renewable Bio-diesel outlined in this policy paper reduces net CO2 emissions from the transportation sector by some 700 million tons per year over the 13 year implementation period, and puts net CO2 production on a more sustainable trajectory in subsequent years.The specialist engineering challengesWhilst at boon garnet the CAF requirements seem parlous aggressive, in affair the systems are contemporary available and as adopted in baby measure to achieve the first 6-8 years of incremental improvements required. Increased adoption of hybrid and variable displacement technology has the potential to improve fuel economy in the amounts required, and dev...
More About: Emissions , Policy

Plug-in Vue for 2009
2008-03-11 03:17:00
Summary: "General Motors CEO, Rick Wagoner, tailor-made wrapped spreading his matter inscription to the salivating throngs of journos within the LA huddle limelight and the crux of his comments centered on the abandonment of GM's future vehicle's fuel systems.The main word was the increasing of a plug-in hybrid pigsty on the Saturn Vue Green Line's front-wheel storming platform. It entrust be based on the front-wheel offensive two-mode hybrid drivetrain that GM also announced today. Although no time frame was cited, Wagoner insists that development is underway with battery manufacturers to develop the technology as quickly as possible."This romance is in three parts: a blog with monotonous impressions, notes keen during the speech, and GM's factual press release. The writer's notes contradict the limelight release, which emphasizes plug-in and contradistinctive hybrid development by GM. According to the notes, Wagoner mentioned ethanol firstno surprise, since flex-fuel powertra...
More About: Plug

Who Licensed the Electric Car?
2008-03-11 03:16:00
Summary: "Small-business owner Tracy Crawford trims her overhead department mechanism debutante can. With two businesses a teddy shlep clothes importing involvement and an errand-running aid she needs to make lots of cross-town trips. For her, cutting her fuel usage results in major savings.In the ride six months, she's surfeited a shatter of $20 on gasoline for her vehicles.Crawford owns a Toyota Prius a gas-electric hybrid a moped and a DaimlerChrysler GEM, an lusty design that runs on batteries.'I thoroughly admiration it,' Crawford said of her Global Electric Motor, or GEM, car. 'It's witty to drive. Everywhere I crack I impression be pleased a star people stop and talk to me about it.'But there's a problem. Crawford can't legally incursion it universal she'd like."Wisconsin's millstone with these straightforward gas-savers is monotonous mutual by innumerable distant states. The truncated electric cars are limited by governors to about 35 mph, so they should be allowed...
More About: Electric Car

Time for a Carbon Tax, Says Toyota
2008-03-11 03:14:00
Summary: "The trust of a simulacre obstruction bequeath have to be revisited if Prime Minister Helen Clarke's chimera of a carbon-neutral scepter is to wax a reality, according to Toyota New Zealand's executive chairman Bob Field.He said that with all political parties now supporting sustainability, the photograph difficulty should be live fetch on the agenda. "Corrective and collective spirit is extravagant tardy if we are serious about reducing carbon emissions." Field was speaking at the launch of the hybrid Lexus RX400h, the luxury petrol-electric all-wheel-drive sports utility vehicle, priced at $99,050. He said most New Zealanders recognised and supported the need to take action on climate change.'The time could therefore be right for red-letter a image responsibility at the relating fling as reducing company and personal income tax so the whole exercise would be fiscally neutral.'Field and single executives in the automotive striving are pushing for a simulacrum clog at f...
More About: Time , Carbon , Carbon tax

Hybrids—No More, No Less Dangerous
2008-03-08 02:39:00
Summary: the growing popularity of "The vehicle-activated hybrid gasoline-electric brought safety worries some emergency responders, firefighters, and potential buyers to the new technology. But these vehicles are no greater threat broken any other car, according to manufacturers and experts in security. hybrids went first sold seven years ago America-beginning with the 2000 Honda Insight-but fears of the potential dangers associated with high system tension have inspired a recent spate of news stories and filled with fuel discussions online bulletin-board. Interested groups focused on the potential hazards associated with the systems used to operate vehicles, questioning the risks that electrical components could pose in the event of an accident. " ; 240,000 Toyota hybrids were sold, and did not save damage personnel so far. But that does not average cars are safer than their counter-parts gasoline-only. They have always gasoline flammable and toxic fluids to treat, as well as airb...
More About: Dangerous

Green Stars for Every Class
2008-03-08 02:38:00
Summary figure of "Go Environmental Defense, a group recommendation, has teamed with the folks Yahoo to offer a Web site listing the 100 main cars based on how 'green' they are - and they ' re not speaking the external colour. They speak more easily to humans and the planet as it is easy to take a group of bytes of air that is not solid. example, the best is yet more green. A visit www.autos.yahoo.com had to learn what machines are clean and green. Naturally, there were gas / electric after gas / electric, with each sold as Toyota, Honda, Ford and General Motors had explained . hooks But what the eye is a trio of cars you expect on a list. " The most desired environmental If you want after an electric Tesla Roadster downwards but just can not $ 100K on a car, take heart! For about half that, you can get the same body with an internal combustion engine of gasoline and feel guilty just a lotus-bitten by the tad Elise is found on the list of 100 choice of the greenest car. And if is...
More About: Stars , Green , Class

GM Won't Kill Electric, Lutz Says
2008-03-08 02:38:00
Summary: President "General Rick Wagoner engines indicate a new phase in programs vehicle alternative-fuel GM's auto exposure to Los Angeles this month. While not saying what direction GM will take, vice president Bob Lutz said GM executives believe that electric vehicles are the future. work on GM's vehicle fuel cell may initially bear fruit as hybrid "of" series; vehicle, he said. Series A hybrid could operate primarily on electricity batteries with lithium-ion, with an engine as protection to complement the standard battery, Lutz said. engine relief has been an internal combustion engine of diesel or petrol. L Energy Relief was also coming from a fuel cell. " ; GM continues to fly off guzzlers ugly and outdated gas while floating big ideas for exhibitions automatic and giving lip service to the new technology. It has yet to sell a full hybrid. Even the idea of hybrid series is feasible now if the company would also be the barrier. Electric vehicles may be the future, but also t...
More About: Kill

Clash of the Hybrid Titans
2008-03-08 02:37:00
Summary: exit "You can not sushi bar or a set of avant-garde without being struck by the number of hybrid cars in the parking lot. But what if you live in a place where carrying lumber is more common than grignotant on sashimi, which leaves the road is more popular qu'allant addition to Broadway? 'There is a significant market of people who phase in a place where SUVs are sacrosanct,' said Bradley Berman, editor of Hybrid Cars.com. "There's something about climbing higher and have more space that these people are not ready to give up." ; Fortunately for those who love SUV, the car manufacturers are waking up to the need for heavy carriers that are light on the gas. Introduce the next generation of hybrid vehicles: big trucks that hide their conscience in a green exterior. " Intimidation; Saturn VUE GreenLine, hybrid Ford Escapes, and hybrid Toyota mountain are three different interpretations of what should be a hybrid SUV. How do they mesh with hopes of SUV drivers?
More About: Titans , Clash

Americans' Common Sense Linked to Gas Prices
2008-03-08 02:37:00
Summary: "Who can remember all the way back to last summer when we had the day-time economy, baseball and $ 3 price of a gallon gasoline? Buyers non-US car apparently, and you can see clearly in the results of the automobile sales. " October; The big trucks and SUVs sales led by domestic manufacturers last month, as consumers could not seem to see beyond the incentives and gas prices lower. Heads firmly buried in the sands of oil, they stubbornly forgotten the ice caps melt and the finite nature of petroleum's. The bright spot in this story is all persons who have purchased any vehicle at all in October, not to mention the thousands who have chosen models more fuel-efficient. Unfortunately, they are paved with the same brush as these ugly Americans whose concern for the rest of the world (and indeed, their own future) takes a back seat to the instant satisfaction.
More About: Sense , Gas Prices , Common , Common Sense

Takimoto's Vision
2008-03-08 02:36:00
The futuristic concept vehicles were on full display this week at the 22nd International battery, hybrid, and Symposium common-electric vehicle fuel cell known as evs22. But the clearest vision of tomorrow's cars has been provided by Masatami Takimoto, executive vice president of Toyota responsible for the development of powertrain, during his opening speech at the conference on October 26 in Yokohama, Japan. Rai of Takimoto explicitly about embrochables hybrids. Some of Today's hybrids do not need to be plugged, but the idea of extending the possibilities of electric hybrid's by connecting to a power output of household had accelerated in the United States. Until recently, Toyota has dismissed the idea as unworkable. Earlier this year, pressure from Jim, president of Toyota North America, has advised that the company may seek technology plug. Fuel additional maintenance Takimoto's fire. He showed slides comparing the current generation Prius with a plug, and has discussed the i...
More About: Vision

Turbo Hydrogen-Electric Prius
2008-03-08 02:36:00
Summary: "Ignore the great job painting, and glances 2005 Toyota Prius - and orders - like any other passenger vehicle hybrid years on the road. Type That's the point." ; Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. Has tinkered with a Prius so that it burns hydrogen instead of gasoline. But you can not beast lost too far from the mother ship in him, at least not yet. The hydrogen infrastructure is still in the embryonic stage, and its viability is far from assured. One possibility that seems hydrogen electrolysis is attractive by solar energy, which could be adapted for use at home. Using cells from hydrogen fuel instead of burning hydrogen in the internal combustion engine still lead to higher returns and lower emissions, too - but many say that the technology is up to 20 years in the manufacture.
More About: Hydrogen , Turbo , Electric

Does Your Car Starve Terrorists?
2008-03-08 02:14:00
Summary controls high holidays of "The 5767 are inside synagogues in the country, and it appears that usa Jewry have completed all disks previous coaching commitment. Is estimated that this years, American Jews send approximately $ 660 million in Saudi Arabia. Yes, you read it correctly. You did not fold by piece of cardboard or stuff an envelope, but the commitment was as good a commitment. may Encore be better. after all, the Saudis will not harass you have to pay up. Imports from the United States about 1.5 million barrels of Saudi oil daily. At $ 60 per barrel, it comes to about $ 33 billion per annum. course, we Jews are only 2 percent of the population of usa, and the Jewish community sends only about $ 660 million. With 6 million Jews here, that's $ 110 per head. " ; Even if you do not know what the boom slatted a Tzedakah box, you'll probably appalled that analysis of where your gas money goes. Anyone interested in seeing more attacks on American soil knows that Saudi mone...
More About: Terrorists

Prius Leads the Pack
2008-03-06 23:12:00
Summary of cars "Which are the best value? According to the consumer reported estimates of depreciation, affordably several models had indicated the price - such as the hybrid Toyota Prius , the mini cooper, and models Youth - oriented Scion - keep their sports better than more expensive models of value and luxury. And while all 10 main models have the plates Japanese or European, nine of the 10 were lower household models. contribution to their depreciating high is the fact that many are older models, generally used by fleets and rental companies, and often heavily discounted. " ; Prius completes the list of ten best media value, and the Honda Civic anchors (including hybrid) that list. The domestic dogs as Buick wetter and the Crown Victoria Ford were among the worst. But look at the above paragraph ... He said that the "nine of the 10 models are inferior." Home; Someone meet specify the non-domestic on the list: Ford, Buick, Lincoln, detour, mercury, GMC, and Chrysler. They must m...
More About: Leads , Pack , The Pack

Green Lite
2008-03-06 23:02:00
Summary: "It would be easy - without effort, equal to accuse GM of bad faith in the Green Line Saturn Vue, a maximum minimum hybrid powertrain technology, which seems less about fuel economy and more about setting the coveted hybrid insignia on the doors (and the credit worthiness of taxes of $ 650 for current buyers). Unlike the 'strong'; hybrids from Toyota, Honda, Ford and most Nissans recently, the Green Line project does not deploy an engine of Atkinson cycle gas-sipping; transmission without interruption with variable speed power-exotic journey place; a climate cooling power that does not depend on the functioning of engine, electric motor powerful traction, or a great and effective forward-battery chemistry. It uses, instead, a large starter motor driven by belt cornant that - with a polarity when Flip the vehicle is slowing down and walking - act as a generator supplying electrons to a relatively small 10kW battery under the cargo floor. Otherwise, the green line is also c...
More About: Lite

Students Build Ecological and Economical Automobiles
2008-03-06 23:01:00
Summary: Car manufacturers are not the only ones who invest in the search for automobile industry in Brazil; universities do too. Such is the case with the school's Center of Industrial Engineering University (FEI) in Sao Bernardo do Campo, in the greater Sao Paulo, Brazil's south-east, which shows the environmentally correct model developed by its students at the Trade Show of the 24th International Automobile. One of the highlights is the hybrid Astra, 25 operated by electric batteries, which in turn are charged by a small combustion engine. "It is an engine combustion of low-displacement with just one cylinder, so it is very economical. Unique Its aim is to drive the generator that charge batteries," said Milton Monteverde Belli, a student and auto mechanics Technology who worked on the project.
More About: Automobiles , Students , Build

Hybrids: The Next Best Thing
2008-03-05 23:30:00
Summary: For more than 100 years, the electric car was the car of tomorrow, but never the car today. Why? The new documentary, "Who killed the Car?" Electrical; offers a fascinating attempt to answer this question, but falls victim to the usual radical deplores this public secondary track. The truth "inconvenient; is that the electric car will never replace the family sedan. Those who continue to put electric cars on a pedestal hunt a utopian dream when a promising solution is now close: "plug-in hybrid" car, which is recharged at home as an electric car, but also leverages the power of a gasoline engine.
More About: Hybrids , The Next Best Thing , Thing

L.A. Auto Show's Future Dreams: Wicked Neato?
2008-03-05 23:25:00
Summary: Say what you like about LA Auto Show - they know serve upwards of sugar a look. Last challenge of designing year's - explore the hallucination enfiévrée about the lifestyle "of" the LA -- Tried to persuade us that Los Angeles needs cars film festivals rolling and drift CNG-powered. This year they're bypassing the nutritional value of foods and nuts going directly to the center of sticky nougat - boguets dune biodegradable plant-mobile oxygen-effusion and aqua-pods nanotech-led ...
More About: Dreams , Future , Wicked

Saturn's Second Chance
2008-03-05 23:22:00
Summary: When the former president Roger Smith of General Motors dreamed up Saturn in 80 years, he envisioned a small remote autonomous car company of the problems of bureaucratic GM sold 500,000 cars per year. But Smith retired in 1990 and his successors did not see it that way. They took away the independence of Saturn's are dead and the hunger for new models. After losing billions of dollars, Saturn has struggled with old ideas a few years ago when the GM (diagrams) decided to give him another chance. It has invested $ 3 billion, a few themes borrowed from conception to its German Opel brand, and sent him out to battle.
More About: Chance

Simplifying the Switch
2008-03-05 11:52:00
Summary: Mitsubishi Motors Corp. Drops plans for engines in-wheel electric vehicle for her. Rather than jumping in the movement of hybrid-car, Mitsubishi is developing an electric car. The prototype uses the same body that I minibus. As reported earlier, Mitsubishi plans to make electric cars in North America. He did not indicate when, but current plans call for the fleet to continue examining in Japan by 2008.
More About: Switch

IRS OKs More Ford Hybrid Tax Credits
2008-03-05 11:52:00
Summary: A pair of Ford SUV hybrids have been certified for tax credits under the Credit alternative motor vehicle of government's. The revenue service said that the escape of 2005 Ford two-wheel-drive hybrid is certified for a credit of $ 2,600, while the model with four-wheel drive in the same year is certified for $ 1,950. The level of tax credit applies to vehicles purchased or after Jan 1 of this year.
More About: Hybrid , Credits

GE to Develop Hybrid Fuel Cell Bus
2008-03-05 11:51:00
Summary: General Electric Co.. Monday said it has formed an association of research with $ 13 million the administration of passage, feeding systems Ballard and federal systems A123 to develop a lightweight, bus hybrid fuel cell zero emission dominant Battery. The research will be conducted by the research centre of GE's Global in Niskayuna.
More About: Hybrid , Fuel , Cell , Develop , Fuel Cell

Combining Cleaner Diesel Fuel with New Technology Could Result in a Car tha
2008-03-05 11:50:00
Summary: The new, cleaner diesel fuel now being phased in means probable new Yorkers will and drivers in four other states still have access to a wide variety of new diesel cars and small trucks beginning in less than two years. The new fuel also raises again the possibility of combining the benefits of economy of diesel fuel and technology in a hybrid electric vehicle. Three such experimental models produced by Detroit automakers during the Clinton adminstration were able to obtain 90 mpg, with the help of lightweight materials, according to their designers.
More About: Technology , Diesel , Fuel , Cleaner , Result