Green Car News

Since about 1930, U.S. vehicles have largely been fueled on gasoline. Diesel passenger vehicles arrived in the 1960s, and there are now about 120,000 locations in the U.S. that offer one or both fuels. Since then, several alternative fuels have been proposed but largely failed to get a...

Believe it or not, Toyota has now sold more than 4 million hybrid cars worldwide since it launched the original Toyota Prius hybrid in Japan in 1997. According to Toyota, the milestone was passed in late April, when the 2012 Toyota Prius C had only been on sale five or six weeks. But while it --...

It’s official: in one month, Tesla will deliver its first 2012 Model S electric sedan to customers in the U.S., webcasting the whole ceremony live on the Internet. A few weeks ahead of schedule, Tesla’s engineering team have been working hard to ensure that production is up to speed at...

There's a phrase oft-quoted in the automotive world when the topic of lighter cars is discussed. The phrase, "add lightness", originated from Colin Chapman, founder of Lotus Cars and builder of some of the best sports cars and racing vehicles ever made. And the influence has remained--Lotus still...

When Toyota first announced that it was going to resurrect its iconic RAV4 EV after an absence of nearly ten years, electric car fans rejoiced. After all, the original 1997-2003 RAV4 EVs are so reliable and so beloved that they still command a high price at auction. When the production version of...

We spend a fair amount of time here defending Toyota Prius drivers, who seem to have a bad reputation for slow and inept driving. We point out that gentle acceleration gets you there almost as quick and saves you money, despite the angry SUV driver 18 inches off the rear bumper. But then something...

Here are two subjects we never thought would go together: zombies, and plug-in cars. But the winning entry in the 2012 MOFILM Barcelona Chevrolet Volt Video Contest by director Josh Soskin does just that, and now it's being aired by Chevrolet Europe to help drum up interest for its plug-in hybrid...

You may have just read our take on the Volkswagen Up, an excellent minicar that unfortunately won't be coming to U.S. shores. What you may not have realized is that it has two siblings, sold under different branches of the Volkswagen-Audi (VAG) empire, SEAT and Skoda, known as the Mii and Citigo...

The Volkswagen Up is a small, simple, very modern hatchback minicar that's fun to drive, keeps up with U.S. traffic, and returns 40 to 60 miles per gallon. But you won't be able to buy one in North America. And that's a shame. We drive a lot of cars here, most of them perfectly competent subcompact...

With the 2012 Toyota Prius V wagon, 2012 Toyota Prius C, and 2012 Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid all launching within the past 12 months, it’s been easy to forget that there are other Toyota hybrids outside of the Prius brand. In fact, the 2012 Toyota Camry Hybrid and 2012 Toyota Highlander...

We're all familiar with daily car rental. Even hourly car rental is becoming a growing trend, with car-sharing services allowing you to pick up a car somewhere in a city and deposit it somewhere else, paying for the hours in between. In Europe, things are taken one step further, with rental by the...

They’re large, hardly pretty, and serve just one function, but Nissan Australia has managed to turn the humble gas pump into art in order to promote its all-electric 2012 Leaf. Unlike its U.S. ad from last year, which asked us to imagine a world where everything was powered by gasoline...

Last week, we told you about a house fire in Texas on May 3 involving a 2012 Fisker Karma luxury Sedan, which fire investigators believed to be the cause of the blaze. Shortly after the story broke, Fisker Automotive released an official statement stating that it had “not ruled out possible...

We've seen our fair share of dubious modifications to Toyota's Prius over the years, but we've discovered one that's actually pretty cool. Anyone who has ever tried will know that sleeping in the back of your car isn't always the most comfortable of experiences, so anything that improves this...

There's no getting around it: Hybrids cost more than gasoline models, and plug-in electric cars cost a lot more than gas vehicles. Each type of green car cuts operating costs, either by raising gas mileage substantially or replacing gas costs with grid electricity that generally cuts the...

For the past five years or more, the iconic Tesla Roadster has been the poster child for electric cars. Produced between 2008 and 2011, the two-seat Tesla Roadster combines the desirability of a luxury sports car with race-car performance, while its massive 53 kilowatt-hour battery pack gives...

It seems like the Toyota Prius has been zipping around our roads forever, but in reality the first examples only hit U.S. soil just over a decade ago, with the Japanese market getting the car a few years before that. The premise remains the same--a mass-market hybrid vehicle that offers the best...

We all know electric and plug-in hybrid cars can help cut down consumption of gasoline, but just how do you measure how much gasoline savings can be made? Normally, we measure gasoline savings in gallons, or barrels of oil, but General Motors has decided to measure the gasoline saved by its...

The Department of Energy has hit out at the recent Coordinating Research Council study into damage caused by using E15 gasoline. In its rebuttal, the DoE points out several flaws in the CRC's study, and says the Council failed to establish a proper control group to determine the statistical...

“It’s better to burn out, than to fade away,” once penned songwriter Neil Young, addressing the hazards of a life lived in the spotlight. If you were a fan of the Lexus HS 250h hybrid, you’ll be saddened to learn that fading away is exactly the fate of Lexus’ compact...