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Toyota Aims for 17,000 Prius Plug-in Sales in U.S. Next Year

2:08 pm in Cars & Transportation, electric cars, hybrid cars, News, Science & Technology, transportation by TreeHugger

toyota-prius-plug-in-phev-photo Photo: Tom Raftery, Flickr, CC Competition for the Chevy Volt While Toyota is getting ready to go 100% electric with the Scion iQ EV and the Toyota RAV4 EV with a Tesla powertrain, it is also betting a lot on the intermediary step that is the plug-in hybrid technology (...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Boston Metro Area to Get 150 ChargePoint Electric Car Charging Stations

4:12 pm in boston, Cars & Transportation, electric cars, electric vehicles, hybrid cars, News, Science & Technology, transportation by TreeHugger

chargepoint-ev-electric-car-charging-station-photo Photo: Chargepoint I Wonder What Santa Drives... Coulomb Technologies, the electric vehicle infrastructure company, has announced that it will install 150 'ChargePoint' EV charging stations around the Boston metropolitan area. The money for this comes from a $37 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy, and Boston will be just one of many areas that will see ChargePoints pop up like urban mushrooms. When all is said and done, Coulomb plans to have built 4,600 EV charging stations around the U.S. ...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Should a Green Writer Buy a Hybrid?

4:15 pm in car, Cars & Transportation, hybrid cars, transportation by TreeHugger

via internet cars transportation Having lived in New York City for five years, I've come to relish the car-less life. Honestly, I was never a huge fan of the things; I wasn't a natural driver, and I didn't care to be. I drove slowly and boringly (and sometimes poorly), often to the chagrin of my passengers. So I'm perfectly at home hopping on the subway and wandering around on foot. But there are scant few places in the nation where you can get by without a car. Which is why Mother Jones' environmental reporter, Kate Sheppard, has decided she's going to buy one. And in a piece that I think deftly sums up the concerns of many conscious auto con...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Honda Launches Fit Shuttle Hybrid in Japan (71 MPG)

3:18 pm in Cars & Transportation, hybrid cars, Science & Technology, transportation by TreeHugger

honda fit hybrid shuttle photo Photo: Honda You Can Fit More Stuff and More People... The Honda Fit is turning out to be quite the versatile little car. After the hybrid version and the electric version, Honda is now launching - in Japan only for now - the Shuttle and Shuttle hybrid versions. Honda's real coup was keeping fuel economy for the compact wagon equal to the non-Shuttle Fit by improving things like engine friction ...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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2011 Chevrolet Volt Receives NHTSA 5-Star Safety Rating

3:33 pm in Cars & Transportation, electric cars, electric vehicles, hybrid cars, Science & Technology, transportation by TreeHugger

chevy volt crash test nhtsa photo Photo: NHTSA Video capture Recently Also Got Top-Rating From Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) Electric vehicles, like many new technologies, have to overcome certain perception problems before becoming mainstream. Ubiquitous fast-charge stations and incrementally better batteries should take care of 'range anxiety' over time (as this Dutch team showed by driving a LEAF 780 miles in 24 hours), and crash tests of various models will show that electric cars are as safe as...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Ask Pablo: Could A Hacked Hummer H3 Really Get 60 MPG?

7:13 am in biodiesel, cars, Cars & Transportation, electric cars, electric vehicles, fuel efficiency, hybrid cars, ultra capacitors by TreeHugger

Yellow Hummer H3 photo Image credit: Anatoli Axelrod, used under Creative Commons license. Dear Pablo: Is it true that a hacked Hummer H3 could achieve 60 miles per gallon? There are plenty of claims out there from people promising amazing fuel economy. Some of these claims are based on technology, while others are based on behavioral changes like "Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Toyota Recalls 52,000 Prius Hybrids (2001-2003)

2:41 pm in Cars & Transportation, hybrid cars, News, Science & Technology, transportation by TreeHugger

2001-2003 toyota prius recalled photo Photo: Public domain. An Ounce of Prevention... If you are a Prius early-adopter and still have your 2001 to 2003 model, listen up: Toyota is doing a voluntary security recall on 52,000 first generation Prius hybrids in the US to "replace the electric power steering pinion shaft attachment nuts [...] If the steering wheel is repeatedly and strongly turned to the full-lock position, there is a possibility the nuts securing the pinion shaft in the steering gear box assembly may become loose. If the ...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Electromobility Awards Announced at Challenge Bibendum 2011 in Berlin (Photos)

11:25 am in alternative energy, electric cars, electric vehicles, germany, hybrid cars, News by TreeHugger

Berlin hosts the Electromobility Conference and Challenge Bibendum Awards photo Image: Michellin Challenge Bibendum This week Berlin plays host to the Electromobility Conference and the Michellin Challenge Bibendum -- a race testing the ability of electric-powered vehicles to withstand the demands of everyday driving. Which vehicles are winning the race to the future? Read on for photos and highlights of the top cars in the 2011 Challenge Bibendum....Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Steven Chu Highlights 1,800+ Electric Car Charging Stations Installed Under Recovery Act

4:34 pm in Cars & Transportation, electric cars, electric vehicles, hybrid cars, News, Science & Technology, transportation by TreeHugger

electric car charging stations photo Photo: felixkramer, Flickr, CC Plugging-In Anywhere, Anytime The vast majority of EV owners will recharge their vehicles at home during the night, but what happens when that's not possible? That's why we need charging stations to be widely accessible before electric cars are adopted by the mainstream. Range anxiety is a real, but addressable, concern, and this is part of the solution. On that front, Steven Chu, the U.S. Secretary of Energy has some good news......Read the full story on TreeHugger

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All Prius Models Will Be ‘Plug-In’ Starting in 2014

3:04 pm in cars, Cars & Transportation, electric cars, electric vehicles, hybrid cars, News, prototypes, transportation by TreeHugger

toyota plug-in hybrid prius photo Photo: Toyota Any Model You Want as Long as It's Pluggable The Nikkei is reporting that Toyota will make the whole Prius family (by then, larger and smaller hybrids will join the current model) 'plug-in'. In other words, you'll be able to recharge the batteries using electricity from the g...Read the full story on TreeHugger

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