| Nissan Breaks Ground on Their U.S. Electric Car Battery Plant Posted: 26 May 2010 05:05 PM PDT 
The hot, sweltering Tennessee sun baked us under a big white-top tent this morning as Nissan dedicated the future site of their $1.7 billion dollar, state-of-the art Nissan LEAF battery plant in Smyrna. Encompassing 1.3 million square feet (22 American football fields), when the plant comes online in late 2012 it will be one of the largest battery facilities in North America. (more…)  |
| Nissan LEAF Early Adopters Won’t Get Gouged By the Dealer – Here’s Why. Posted: 26 May 2010 04:04 PM PDT 
The Nissan LEAF is the world’s first truly mass-market, affordable electric car and there are plenty of folks who’ve plunked down the $99 reservation fee with plans to be one of the first to own one when they start going on sale at the end of this year. But, from those intrepid early adopters, I constantly hear a deep-seated worry that dealers will try and squeeze some extra dollars out of them because of the incredible groundswell of demand. Given the lack of clarity on the subject to this point, the worry is justifiable. After all, we saw it with the Prius back in the day, no? There must be something Nissan can do to stop dealer price gouging. Well, yes, yes there is. (more…)  |
| Quirky EV is Made with Bamboo and Paper Posted: 26 May 2010 02:58 PM PDT 
So, clearly, this little car is not meant for the mass market of the United States. It resembles a traditional rickshaw, but the Meguru is an electric car made of bamboo, steel and paper. It has a range of 25 miles per charge, and a top speed of 25 mph. It’s lithium battery takes two hours to charge. The frame is made of steel, the floor is bamboo and the fan-shaped doors are actually made of paper from wood pulp. Estimated price for this novel form of Asian nostalgia? Less than $10,000. (more…)  |
| Honda CR-Z: The Most Desirable Car On The Planet? Posted: 26 May 2010 02:41 PM PDT 
The Honda CR-Z is, to me at least, a bit of a confusing car. Honda absolutely nailed the sporty hatchback look, and this car can certainly pass for a contemporary cousin of the now-classic CRX. But while it looks sporty, and it even has a six-speed transmission, the engine output is, well… about the same as a 20 year old CRX. So they went and made it a hybrid. But for a hybrid, it gets sub-par gas mileage. So it kinda fails, for me at least, on both fronts, and I feel like I’m not alone on this. Apparently though, across the Atlantic, British car reviewers are raving about the CR-Z. Did I miss something? (more…)  |
| China Will Buy Between 15 and 17 Million Cars This Year Posted: 26 May 2010 10:14 AM PDT 
At our peak auto purchasing capacity, Americans bought an average of 17 million cars almost every year from 1997 to 2007. That means in just ten years, 170 million cars were added to the road, and far fewer were scrapped. In fact, 2009 was the first year in four decades where Americans scrapped significantly more cars than they bought. 14 million autos were sent to the scrapyard (helped in no small part by Cash for Clunkers), while Americans bought just 10 million new vehicles. Over in China though, the auto industry is going through unprecedented growth. After outpacing U.S. sales in 2009, analysts are estimating Chinese consumers could buy between 15 and 17 million new cars in 2010. And that number is only going to grow in the years to come. (more…)  |
| Nissan LEAF Pre-Orders Reach 13,000; LEAF “Sold Out” Posted: 26 May 2010 09:55 AM PDT 
Despite some serious efforts by nearly every major automaker to get an electric car on the roads within the next five years, EVS are still being met with a lot of skepticism. Some say the limited range will lock it into city driving, and others are say the driving public isn’t ready to jump behind the wheel of something so similar to a gas-car, and yet so different. Don’t tell that to Nissan though. The Japanese company’s LEAF electric car has been met with thunderous applause. Now, just a little over a month after Nissan sent out the first pre-order emails, CEO Carlos Ghosn has announced that the first 3 months of LEAF supply is officially “sold out” with 13,000 $99 reservations on the books. (more…)  |
| Report: Porsche 918 Spyder Eco-Supercar Being Readied to Race Posted: 26 May 2010 03:50 AM PDT |
