Gas 2.0

California has just updated its Air Resources Board website to give consumers a wide range of information about all the alternative power cars coming out next year, from electric cars to diesel hybrids.

The new site—driveclean.ca.gov—offers well-organized data that ranks vehicles according to various emission and cost characteristics and provides tools to compare models on a variety of qualities, including the new incentives that low carbon emission vehicles qualify for: up to $5,000 for cars, and up to $15,000 for electric trucks or vans.

One aspect of the site is revolutionary: For the first time Americans will be able to compare models based on how many grams of CO2 each spews per mile.
Read the rest of this entry »

It certainly is the dawning of a new era in automotive technology when the tiger in your tank becomes a moldy relic of bygone ad campaigns while the humble leftovers from harvested wheat get awards for new sustainable thinking. A. Schulman, Inc.’s AgriPlas wheat straw fiber has just been named a Blue Ribbon Finalist in Environmental Innovation by the Automotive Division of the Society of Plastics Engineers, for its application in the Ford Flex crossover vehicle.

AgriPlas’s contribution to the Flex is an injection-molded storage bin and inner lid made of polypropylene and a bio-filler made of wheat straw. Though the application is modest in scope, a spokesperson for Ford’s Plastics Research division sees it as a litmus test of things to come, in terms of increasing fuel efficiency by decreasing vehicle weight.

Read the rest of this entry »

The tapering tail is no secret among scientists for improving stability and fuel efficiency. Many high-mileage concept cars feature just such a design to smooth the aerodynamics of the vehicle. Now imagine applying the same concept to container trucks that log more miles in a year than most of us travel in five.

A Dutch public-private enterprise did just that, adding a 6 foot long tail to the end of a tractor trailer truck. The results from two years of testing were a 7.5% increase in fuel efficiency, and thus a similar decrease in emissions.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Progressive Automotive X-Prize, closing in on its May 2010 competition start date, held a technical summit of the participating 43 teams at the 2009 SEMA show in Las Vegas. Twelve of those teams brought along vehicles to display at the show, each one in varying degrees of completeness.

This post is an excerpt of an article from Popular Mechanics. You can read the full post on their website. Written by Ben Stewart.

Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday, Chrysler/Fiat’s new CEO Sergio Marchionne presented the 5-year business plan he hopes will save Chrysler, and bring Fiat back to the US market for the first time in nearly 30 years. The company presented its plan during a live, seven-hour-long marathon webcast, which was notable for two things: first, a virtually unprecedented willingness to discuss future product, and, second, the conspicuous absence of New Chrysler’s much-ballyhooed ENVI electric-vehicle division.

What happened to the Dodge EV? Can we expect some innovative green tech from Marchionne’s new Dodge product future? The depressing reality, after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tata Motors, the company whose claim to fame is selling one of the world’s cheapest and most fuel efficient cars, is considering letting other local India-based manufacturers produce and sell their Nano under their brands.

The company began selling the 56 mpg car last July, and, due to high demand, is in the process of building a manufacturing facility that would produce an additional 350,000 units per year. The plant, located in Sanand in Gujarat, should be up and running by March of 2010.

But in the meantime, Tata Motors is considering allowing smaller manufacturers produce, rebrand and sell the car under license from Tata. The maximum amount of production per year in this fashion would be 10,000 cars. Now that’s an interesting way of selling more cars. I would venture to say that I doubt an American car company would take a similar tack since they use the brand to drive sales. Read the rest of this entry »

A US-built Tesla Roadster has broken the world record for the distance travelled by an electric production car on a single charge.

While competing in the Global Green Challenge, Australian Simon Hackett and co-driver Emilis Prelgauskas drove an incredible 313 miles before the batteries finally died in their Roadster.

Until now, the record has been held by another Tesla Roadster, after completing a 241 mile road rally on one charge.

Read the rest of this entry »

The U.S. military has been pushing for the development of alternative fuels for a while now, and nobody paid much attention until the Pentagon finally put a price tag on the oil habit. As reported by Roxana Tiron in thehill.com, last week Pentagon officials disclosed that getting conventional petroleum fuel to remote combat locations in Afghanistan costs a whopping $400 per gallon.

There couldn’t be a more clear illustration of why the “drill baby drill” mentality is a non-sequitur when it comes to energy security.  Regardless of whether petroleum fuels are domestic or imported, they need to be transported to their point of use.  That’s not much of a problem when you’ve got modern seaports, highways and fuel depots, but to paraphrase one infamous former Secretary of Defense, you have to fight the war you have, not the war that’s got the ideal infrastructure to support your fuel of choice.

Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: This is a guest contribution by Mary Fraser, BASF, American Chemistry Council - Plastics Division Automotive Team

Despite all of the challenges facing the automotive industry today, this is a time of great innovation.

Electric vehicles are just months away from entering the U.S. market and evolving engine technology is consistently improving fuel efficiency. Auto manufacturers are taking big steps to reduce emissions and hybrid cars are becoming mainstream. While powertrain technology has significantly improved fuel efficiency in recent history, the materials used in production of automobiles are increasingly playing a key role in making vehicles more sustainable.  One group of materials, in particular, that is opening new doors to auto design and fuel economy is plastics. Read the rest of this entry »

This is an excerpt of a guest column Nick Chambers, editor of Gas 2.0, wrote for Popular Mechanics. You can read the whole column on the Popular Mechanics website.

The road trip—driving cross-country for days on end, crammed into a vehicle with your family—is virtually a required rite of passage for most Americans. The lure of the open road is as ingrained in our psyche and culture as the hamburger, football or fishing. So it’s no surprise that proposals for new types of taxes on these seemingly free highways—traditionally paid for by gas taxes and tolls—are causing an uproar.

Back in July of this year, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Oregon) proposed a bill that allocates funds to research the effectiveness of taxing highway usage by the mile. On the surface, the bill seems to be laying the groundwork for big government to track our driving habits while simultaneously discouraging the driving of more fuel-efficient vehicles. It doesn’t have to be this way.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve spent a lot of time around the car hobby, and I’ve seen some pretty stupid people do some pretty stupid things. My favorite story involves a V6 Mustang and a leafblower strapped to the air intake, approximating a cobbled together stand-alone supercharger of sorts. Alas, no one ever explained to this man-child that if you add more air, you also need to add more fuel. His engine did not last too long.

But a UK company may be on the right track with an electric supercharger that actually works. Not only does it provide a 40-50% bump in power and torque, but also a 20% decrease in CO2 emissions.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Optibike OB1 electric bike gets an equivalent of 2,287 MPG.* Could bikes like these be the future of transportation?

Ever wonder what happens when you cross the finest mountain bike components money can buy, an 850w brushless DC motor and a 20ah lithium-ion battery with motocross styling and sensibilities? You get the Optibike OB1, an electric bike that can get up to 45 miles on a nine-cent charge, and what is arguably the finest electric bicycle in the world.

In fact, the Optibike OB1 even found a spot in the California Academy of Sciences museum, touted as “the future of transportation.” There are only 24 OB1’s made per year. When one of them is bought, the owner becomes part of an elite club of enthusiastic riders. And for four fun-filled days in August, I was lucky enough to be a member of that club — or at least able to pretend like I was after being provided one for a short term test drive. Read the rest of this entry »

This debate has already taken so many faces, and been argued so many times, that I cannot hope to add much more to it.

But I’ll try anyway.

A new study published by the Journal of Consumer Research has found that many Hummer owners excuse their large, oft-unnecessary H1 and H2s by crying patriotism and quoting American ideals like individualism. So are Hummer owners the morally righteous in the debate of anti-consumerism versus over-consumption?

Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been happy with all the recent efforts by European auto manufacturers to bring fuel-efficient diesels back to the States. From Volkswagen to Mercedes, diesels seem to be the new attempt at pleasing the US “green” crowd with classy, low-emissions fuel-sippers.

Reading that last sentence over, it seems funny to call them a “new attempt” because these high mileage diesels have been available to Europeans for a LONG time — but that’s another story.

So, while it’s debatable whether a gasoline-powered Prius at 40 mpg is more “green” than a diesel-powered Jetta at 40 mpg — it all has to do with how much of each type of fuel comes out of one barrel of oil — It’s a fact that having these new clean diesels as an option is certainly something the US has been lacking for a long time. And I appreciate having that option, I really do.

Read the rest of this entry »

Today the Obama Administration released a 1,200 page document of proposed regulation changes that will drastically alter the fuel economy and emissions standards that auto manufacturers are required to meet in the US. Although it could be an incredibly contentious topic, it seems that so far the proposal has gained wide support from all sides of the spectrum including environmental organizations and industry lobby groups.

The changes — which would alter both the Department of Transportation’s and the Environmental Protection Agency’s rules — call for what amounts to about a 5% increase in fuel economy standards per year from 2011 to 2016 starting with 27.3 mpg in 2011 and ending with 35.5 mpg in 2016.

In addition to the new economy standards, the White House has outlined the first ever greenhouse gas emissions limits for new cars sold in the US. Starting with model year 2016, each manufacturer’s new car fleet would have to meet an average limit of 250 grams of carbon emitted per mile driven.

Read the rest of this entry »