Electric Cars

Piaggio MP3 Hybrid Gets 141 MPG On Three Wheels

Honda will unveil the Skydeck hybrid concept at this years Tokyo Motor Show at the end of the month.  The vehicle could become a future rival to the Ford S-Max.  This MPV has three rows of seating and could replace the FR-V in the European market. The Skydeck is about the same size as the Ford...

eTec, a subsidiary of ECOtality, announced that it has finalized its agreement and signed a contract to receive a grant of $99.8 million from the  U.S. Department of Energy to kick off the largest deployment of EVs and their related infrastructure in U.S. history. Officially called The Electric...

Fisker will release the much anticipated Fisker Karma about one year from now if everything stays on track.  The company, including founder Henrik Fisker believes that plug-in hybrids represent the future of automobiles and he believes that public charging stations will be unnecessary as consumers...

  Suzuki says that their cars are as much fun as their bikes. Now they're trying to make one model just as fuel efficient. The Japanese automaker plans to unveil a plug-in hybrid version of the Swift hatchback at the upcoming Tokyo Motor Show. Suzuki's subcompact already has a loyal following in...

Mitsubishi is introducing two new concept vehicles at the 41st Tokyo Motor show this month but of the two, it's only for the i-MiEV CARGO that the company is actually taking orders.  Both concepts, the PX-MiEV hybrid crossover, and the  i-MiEV CARGO are derived from the company's i-MiEV electric...

The 2012 Nissan Leaf hatchback, the first all-electric car from a major manufacturer to be offered in the U.S. since GM's late lamented EV1 two-seater a decade ago, won't go on sale nationally for more than two years. Nonetheless, Nissan is hoping to accumulate 20,000 U.S. advance orders for the...

We follow EEStor developments closely because if their technology comes to fruition it would radically and rapidly revolutionize the electrification of the automobile. Their unique technology capacitor-based battery, in theory, is far more energy dense and low weight than lithium ion , is cheap to...

According to Honda, the CR-Z hybrid will be the world's first hybrid sports car and will take on numerous other sports car when it launches next year. New pictures have been released showing an updated version of the CR-Z concept.  The concept vehicle will be on display at the Tokyo Motor Show at...

 Honda will unveil the EV-N electric vehicle concept at the Tokyo Motor Show later this month.  The vehicle draws inspiration from the Honda's N360 dating back to the 1960's. The vehicle is about the size of the SmartForTwo, but has seating for four.  It's powered by a lithium-ion battery and...

Bob Kruse, who formulated General Motors' long-term electric vehicle plans and whose team helped develop the Chevy Volt, has resigned, ending his 31-year career with the company. The 50-year-old Rochester Hills, Michigan, resident has served as GM's executive director of global vehicle engineering...

Mitsubishi, still scrambling to catch up to its rivals in the race for clean power-train technology, will be introducing the PX-MiEV hybrid crossover  concept-car at next month's Tokyo auto-show.  Like all Mistubishi's show cars this year, the PX-MiEV is derived from the production i-MiEV...

On September 25, 2009, the Venturi Buckeye Bullet 2 team from Ohio State University, broke the landspeed record for a hydrogen vehicle in their hydrogen fuel cell powered Venturi Buckeye Bullet 2 vehicle.  In two consecutive runs in opposite directions, they achieved an average speed of over 300...

After weeks of speculation about the fate of Vectrix Corporation, a premiere brand of electric scooters, "Vectrix has filed a voluntary petition for relief under chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code", and Vectrix's "assets will be sold pursuant to a sales and procedures order that is...

Nissan North America will open pre-order sales for the Leaf EV next spring and they anticipate at least 20,000 of the vehicles to be sold before their official release next fall.  According to Carlos Tavares, Nissan's American Chairman, "We are confident we will have 20,000 reservations for the...

Toyota has issued a safety advisory which will be followed by a recall regarding the all weather floors mats of many models dating back to 2004.  The company will begin sending formal safety campaign notices next week and is working to solve the problem, but strongly urges driver's of all...

Australia will begin production on it's first locally produced hybrid vehicle ever as they kick off the pilot production of the Toyota Camry Hybrid at the automaker's assembly plant in Melbourne. Toyota will begin with a pilot production of the vehicle in Melbourne as a way to test the process...

Japanese tuning firm, Tommy Kaira, has released a modified Toyota Prius that actually looks like it would be fun to drive. Unfortunately, it appears that the modifications are mostly visual, so if you were dreaming of a faster gas sipper, dream on. The pimped-out Prius certainly looks meaner, with...

On Sept. 28, 2009, Tesla Motor's Vice President of Business Development, Diarmuid O'Connel, made a post on the Tesla Motors blog regarding their recent DOE loan award of $465 million, which was announced on June 23, 2009. Perhaps as a response to confusion between the loans to GM and Chrysler...

California-based Fisker Automotive was recently awarded a $529 million government loan from the DOE to be used for the design and production of plug-in cars. Most of the funds are earmarked towards what Fisker is calling its Nina program. Nina refers to one of Christopher Columbus' ships and is...