Toyota is doubling the battery range on its newest plug-in hybrid: the Prius Prime will be able to go 22 miles just on its battery, the company announced today, which is twice as far as the most recent model. [More]
electric vehicles
Nissan Recalls 47,000 Leaf Electric Vehicles Over Braking Concerns
By 3.14.16
Less than month after Nissan found a security flaw in an app owners can use to control some aspects of its Leaf electric vehicles, the car company says it found another, more serious, issue: the brakes on the cars can malfunction, increasing the risk of crashes. [More]
Report: Regulators Ask VW To Produce More Electric Vehicles To Make Up For That Emissions-Cheating Stuff
By 2.22.16
While hundreds of thousands of consumers in the U.S. continue to wait for Volkswagen to create a plan to fix vehicles that cheat emission standards, federal regulators are apparently looking to the future, asking the carmaker to produce more electric vehicles in the country as a sort of penance for its use of “defeat devices” in diesel cars. [More]
Scarcity Of Public Charging Stations In California Is Turning Electric Vehicle Owners Against Each Other
By 10.12.15
Electric cars are pretty popular in California right now, but there’s one major problem facing all those owners — there aren’t enough charging stations for all those new vehicles hitting the streets. This has led to some bad behavior at the plug, so to speak. [More]
Tesla Says Software Update Will “End Range Anxiety” For Model S Cars
By 3.16.15
The base version of the Tesla Model S already gets around 200 miles to a charge and the 85kwh version can reach more than 260 miles before needing to be plugged in; farther than any other electric vehicle currently in production. But company founder Elon Musk is promising that a new software update will “end range anxiety.” [More]
GM Provides More Details On Long-Range Affordable Electric Chevy Bolt
By 2.12.15
A month after General Motors showed off a prototype of the Chevy Bolt — a purely electric vehicle that the carmaker estimates will get around 200 miles per charge and only cost around $30,000 — the company has provided details to show that it intends to move ahead with production on the Bolt. [More]
Musk: Tesla May Eventually Use Car Dealers But Not Ones Who Have Been “Jerks”
By 1.14.15
Even though upscale electric vehicle maker Tesla currently only puts out around 35,000 cars a year, it’s already gotten under the skin of the auto sales business with its refusal to use the traditional franchised dealership model, leading some states to enact backward-looking laws blocking non-dealership sales of automobiles. But Tesla founder Elon Musk admitted yesterday that his company may eventually go the dealer route, but only with non-jerks. [More]
Chevy Bolt Takes Aim At Tesla With Up To 200 Miles Per Charge, Cost In Low $30Ks
By 1.12.15
While the world still waits for the Tesla Model 3, an electric car that will get upwards of 200 miles per charge and cost around $35,000, General Motors today revealed a prototype for its Chevy Bolt, which aims to match that upcoming Tesla in both mileage and cost. [More]
Should Nissan Leaf Driver Have Been Arrested For “Stealing” $.05 Worth Of Electricity From Public Outlet?
By 12.4.13
An Atlanta-area man admits that he didn’t have permission to charge up his Nissan Leaf outside a local middle school while waiting for his son to finish tennis practice on a Saturday, but he also believes he shouldn’t have been arrested for using about 5 cents worth of electricity from a publicly available outlet. [More]
California City Requires All New Homes Be Wired For Electric Vehicle Charging Stations
By 10.1.13 — Updated: 10.2.13
Electric vehicles like the Chevy Volt or Nissan Leaf may be the future of automobiles (personally, I’m holding out for someone to create the Mr. Fusion), but one city in California’s Silicon Valley is betting on EVs by requiring that all newly built homes be wired for EV charging stations. [More]
Who’s Behind The $100,000 Lit Motors Kickstarter Campaign? Not Lit Motors
By 9.10.13 — Updated: 9.11.13
The C-1 from Lit Motors sounds like the perfect commuting vehicle: a small and zippy gyroscopic motorcycle that runs on electricity, and is enclosed and climate-controlled like a car. The first models hit the road in 2014, but you can reserve one of the first ones now, before the dealerships even open, by contributing $500 that will serve as your deposit to the C-1 Design Team’s Kickstarter campaign. Only the company says that they aren’t behind the campaign. Who is? Update: the campaign is down. Yay! [More]
Owning An Electric Vehicle Could Get You A Sweet Deal On Car Insurance
By 5.21.12
Drivers of electric vehicles might have to hand over a bigger wad of dough to buy their cars, but it could be worth it, if they get a good deal on insurance due to their status as EV owners. It could partly be due to the fact that often, EV drivers are more careful and tend to get in less accidents. [More]
Parking Lot To Offer Discount To Hybrids & EVs, Charge More For SUVs
By 4.25.12
It’s one thing for a parking lot to simply offer a discount to people who choose to drive fuel-efficient hybrid and electric vehicles. But does that lot go too far when it charges a premium for people to park their SUVs and Jeeps? [More]
Pay-Per-Use Electrical Outlets Closer To Becoming A Reality
By 2.15.12
Right now if someone wants to charge you to use their electrical outlet, they need to physically block your access — or keep the outlet turned off — until you fork over some cash. But that could all change in the not-so-distant future. [More]
Chevy To Fix Every Volt Vehicle To Prevent Battery Fires
By 1.5.12
Late last year it was revealed that the Dept. of Transportation was looking into possible problems with the batteries in electric vehicles after a Chevy Volt caught fire following a crash test. Now it looks like General Motors will spend the next few months upgrading the battery containment and coolant systems in every Volt currently on the road. [More]
NHTSA Investigating Electric Vehicle Batteries Following Chevy Volt Fire
By 11.11.11
As mass-produced plug-in electric vehicles continue to roll off assembly lines, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is taking a closer look at the batteries that power these cars following an incident in which a Chevy Volt caught fire three weeks after undergoing a NHTSA side-impact crash test. [More]
Electric 'Boozer' Car Whizzes Past 1,000 Miles On Single Battery Charge
By 8.22.11
Detractors of all-electric vehicles, beware. A group of German automotive students has set a new distance record for EVs — 1,013 miles on a single charge — and may point the way to future battery-powered cars that won’t give owners “range anxiety.” [More]
Walgreens Wants To Be The Spot Where You Charge Up Your Electric Car While Filling Your Prescription
By 7.21.11
As electric vehicles continue to hit the market, some retailers are seeing an opportunity to offer a new service by adding EV charging stations to existing stores. [More]
