cars
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Memo to Prius owners: Get the extended warranty
I do not give financial advice. Even if you accept the analysis here on peak oil, global warming, and clean tech, that is insufficient information on which to base investment decisions — as the financial meltdown of the last few months should make clear. But I do think the Prius is easily the best hybrid […]
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Oliphant and Washington Post ignorantly smear GM and plug-in hybrids
I think this is worthy of an email campaign — this time to the Post (see below). There’s nothing wrong with mocking GM. It is a target-rich environment that has gone the extra mile and painted a bunch of bull’s-eyes on itself. To fire at GM and hit yourself instead thus requires a special kind […]
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Cellulosic ethanol ranks dead last
Mark Jacobson (associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, Stanford University) has just published a paper in the journal of the Royal Society of Chemistry. You can read the entire article here (PDF). BEV = battery electric vehicle HFCV = hydrogen fuel cell vehicle CSP = concentrated solar panels PV = photovoltaic CCS = carbon […]
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NYT: Temporarily relax regulations to allow Big Three’s European models in the U.S.
The Big Three make high-quality, fuel-efficient cars. No, really, they do. They just sell them in Europe — Ford Ka, anyone? And now that $15 billion of the the $25 billion designated in the 2007 energy bill to provide funds for fuel-efficiency retooling will likely serve as loan guarantees to keep GM and Chrysler solvent, […]
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The transportation story at the heart of a history-making crisis
There’s a remarkable graph that has starred in blog posts and news stories with some regularity over the past year. It shows vehicle miles traveled in America over the last quarter century or so. For most of the period, the line rockets upward, straight and true, preparing to blast off the page. But then the […]
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Car dealers offering two for the price of one
It used to be a chicken in every pot. Now it’s two cars in every sale — at least at some Dodge dealers. At a Quebec dealer, buy a Dodge truck and get a Caliber for “free.” In the U.K., a similar deal (bonus: video with fun British accents!). In Miami, buy a four-door pick-up […]
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Bob Lutz: Fuel-efficient cars, like global warming, a crock of sh*t
“At $1.50 per gallon, the American public wants sport utilities and large pickup trucks.” — GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz, going off-message from his boss Rick Wagoner’s pledge before Congress to implement “a dramatic shift in the company’s U.S. portfolio” toward “more fuel-efficient cars and crossovers”
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Senate and House divided over state emission standards in auto bailout plan
It seems the House and Senate have reached an impasse on the automaker bailout bill, and it focuses on whether to force automakers to abide by state emissions regulations. The disagreement over the rules on doling out the $15 billion in loans centers on a single word — “federal.” The Senate bill says in order […]
