In 1984, General Motors and Toyota joined forces to produce cars together at a single plant in Fremont, California. Called the New United Motor Manufacturing Inc., the joint venture gave Toyota its first manufacturing base in the U.S., and GM a chance to learn from its rival Toyota on quality and lean manufacturing techniques. Over the years the plant gave us the Geo Prizm, the Toyota Hilux, and Pontiac Vibe/Toyota Matrix, among many other items.... 

New research out of Kuwait , using a new method of calculating the crude oil production potential of 47 of the world’s largest oil producing countries, has found that peak oil — the period in time when oil production reaches a maximum and then begins to decline — will come much sooner than expected… 2014 to be exact. (more…)  Read More →

Hummer is another one of General Motor’s zombie brands that will likely soon cease to exist (if no last minute buyer steps up). The builder of gas-guzzling SUV’s was thought to have been saved when Chinese construction company Sichuan Tengzhong, but the Chinese government squashed the deal. GM was preparing to wind down the brand, even as it entertained two other potential buyers. But Hummer still has a little bit of life left... 

After its surprise introduction at the Geneva Auto Show last week one thing is clear: the Porsche 918 Spyder supercar has struck a resounding nerve in the automotive community. You see, true car nuts, no matter how green they aspire to be, are always drawn to fast, sexy cars. And if there’s one thing the world of car nuts felt like it might be losing in this profound shift to green transportation, it was sexy speed. (more…)  Read More →

New research out of the University of York in Britain is unraveling some mysteries of the common wood-eating gribble that could provide the key to cheaply turning abundant wood and straw fiber into biofuel. (more…)  Read More →

Fresh off its official unveiling at the Chicago Auto Show a couple weeks ago, Azure Dynamics, Ford and AT&T have just announced that AT&T will be the first company to own some Ford Transit Connect Electric commercial fleet vans. With an order of just 2, it certainly is a small start, but the list will surely grow from here. (more…)  Read More →

“Range anxiety” — the worry that your EV will run out juice before you get to where your going — is a term that has been bandied about a lot recently… almost annoyingly so. From a common sense standpoint, it seems only logical that range anxiety is a real phenomenon. But since we have so few EVs on the roads right now, the fact of the matter is that range anxiety is, at this point, a made up concept …  Read More →

Container ships straddle a fine line between ultra-efficient and ultra-polluters. They can carry thousands of 20-ft containers across thousands of miles of ocean in relatively short time, but they also burn sulfur-laden heavy oil fuels. Each ship can emit over 150,000 tons of CO2 every year , 5,000 tons of sulfur, and other harmful particulates attributed to death and disease along heavily populated coastlines. A.P. Moller Maersk AS operates... 

So far as we know, oil is a finite resource. But it is still the most widely used fuel for transportation right now, and likely will be for the near future. It could be twenty-five years or more before alternative fuel vehicles make up a majority of the new car market. So until then, we are stuck with petrol engines. But that doesn’t mean they won’t get better. A California-based company called Transonic claims that its fuel injection... 

I love me a fast Ford. The 2011 Mustang GT gets a new 5.0 liter, 412 horsepower V8 engine, 25 mpg, and a plethora of other improvements. It is a real Camaro killer. But if I’m going to be honest, it is the 305 horsepower V6 Mustang that has caught my eye. Not only does it share the GT’s sharper, improved looks, but Ford had estimated the V6 engine would return 30 mpg on the highway. Well the official certification results are in,... 

Let’s just say I’m not exactly a fan of the California Air Resource Board, or CARB. For all their good intentions, they cause a lot of headaches with unintended consequences of sometimes poorly conceived ideas–especially for those of us who enjoy performance cars. But every now and then they get something right. And while Roush is a name most often associated with supercharged Mustangs, the company is  Read More →

I remember when Subaru first introduced the WRX version of their Impreza sedan. I vowed to one day own one. Alas, to this day I’ve yet to get my hands on one, but that vow remains. There have been murmurs of an impending Subaru hybrid vehicle for about a year now, although the company is certainly tiptoeing into the electric/hybrid car race. The first guess was the larger Legacy sedan, but Road & Track seems to think the the Impreza... 

We all want more choices, right? Zero Motorcycles, maker of electric motorcycles, has heard the call and for 2010 they are giving customers more options to play with. They have also made improvements to acceleration, power, and their battery technology. It’s a good thing too, because competition in the electric motorcycle market is already starting to heat up. (more…)  Read More →

Speaking at a conference in Santa Barbara, CA, Shell CEO Peter Voser said that by 2050 he fully expects 40% of all vehicles in the world to be some kind of electric car. Shell has calculated that by 2050 there will be 2 billion cars in the world, up from today’s 1 billion. (more…)  Read More →

Well folks, it’s official, Lexus will be selling the CT 200h luxury compact hybrid wagon in the US. After a well-received launch at the Geneva Auto Show , Lexus officials were still non-committal about what a “global launch” of the car at the end of the year actually meant. But now Lexus has taken the mystery out of that phrase–and apparently the US is still considered part  Read More →