A do-it-yourself plug-in battery pack Is there too much focus on new cars? Today Dot Earth explores the idea of do-it-yourself plug-in electric cars, and whether they represent a way of “tinkering” better efficiency into personal transportation. The piece doesn’t really come …

Profitable by when without Chinese sales? Would a Chinese shift to hybrids slash plug-in forecasts and crush suppliers? Here in my home state of California, a few solar companies are hot. Unfortunately, the hottest companies don’t produce solar technologies. Instead, they lease them to homeowners and businesses. Sounds great, except that many …

Cruze all about sales, Volt all about marketing? Why isn’t Volt production back on track? Back in June GM shut down Chevy Volt production to upgrade manufacturing capabilities, enabling GM to produce more Volts, as well as some Opel Ampera’s – Europe’s version of the Volt. By mid July, everything was supposed to be back online, and GM was aiming to produce up to 16,000 Volts by …

Cruze all about sales, Volt all about marketing? Why isn’t Volt production back on track? Back in June GM shut down Chevy Volt production to upgrade manufacturing capabilities, enabling GM to produce more Volts, as well as some Opel Ampera’s – Europe’s version of the Volt. By…

ELR ready for a next generation Volt battery pack More and more the luxury segment is being defined by batteries The Cadillac Ciel plug-in hybrid, or at least a car built on the Ciel’s Omega platform, is almost a done deal and should be given the go-ahead before year’s end. While details are still scant, GM has decided it needs a new flagship to put Cadillac back…

The T.27 going through crash tests. Gordon Murray joins Lotus board Out of the box thinking is probably the key to the future of the auto industry. Inevitably, the current model of mobile transportation is a resource intensive, energy guzzling dinosaur. And automotive “engineer, designer and entrepreneur” Gordon Murray, of McLaren F…

The fuel efficient, but expensive Silverado hybrid pickup Ford and Toyota hybrid partnership focuses on the nearly impossible Hybrid pickup trucks. Sounds like a great idea, right? If you want to improve American fleet fuel economy, then focus on the biggest, most inefficient segment, and pickup trucks are that segment. In fact, that was the argument GM used against the Toyota Prius as GM launched its first dual mode hybrids, including…

Your choice: Gasoline, hybrid, plug-in hybrid or EV? Hybrids and plug-ins have a role, but not critical to success, at least according to Forbes In today’s 7 cars that will save Detroi t, Fortune offers up a pretty surprising list of vehicles critical to the success of the US auto industry, and…

By making your own biodiesel fuel, you will be in a position to run your automobile in a green, eco-friendly way. It's a much more efficient way to run your auto, not so mention cheap. You also won't be feeding the reliance that so many millions of folks have on … A few of the people have a tendency to…

By making your own biodiesel fuel, you will be in a position to run your automobile in a green, eco-friendly way. It's a much more efficient way to run your auto, not so mention cheap. You also won't be feeding the reliance that so many millions of folks have on … A few of the people have a tendency to use straight vegetable oil and nothing else without heating it, while …

… use in your diesel powered vehicles . You should talk to your auto manufacturer first, some car corporations do not support the use of biodiesel fuel within their vehicles and will void the warranty if an engine is damaged by its use. … It does take more time to develop algae and refine the algae oil but the results are the same, a more eco friendly fuel which can be…

Self-driving Prius competing in DARPA challenge The he said, she said of new CAFE rules Lots of interesting news out there regarding the new CAFE rules. However, if one thing is clear, it’s that what the impact of these new CAFE rules will be is almost anyone’s best guess. Nevertheless, the most interesting idea I’ve seen so far …