Monthly Archives: January 2009

The EV Curveball

Welcome back to guest blogger Andrew Grin … [caption id="attachment_1574" align="alignleft" width="400" caption="Andrew Grin and his modified Hyundai Tuscon"][/caption] As a new driver, learning on the roads of Kansas City, I pass by Suburbans and Tahoes on a daily basis. “Who Killed the Electric Car?” made me realize the huge impact that these big SUV’s [...]

  • Share/Bookmark

Smart Meters and Electric Cars

This is a well written story in the Pasadena Star News about how the utilities are gearing up for the coming plug-in vehicles. While many people are wringing their hands over how the grid, old and cranky as it is, will be able to handle the millions of EVs that will be on our roads [...]

  • Share/Bookmark

Bright’s Plug-In Car: Aerodynamics Are Key

This new company, Bright Automotive, is founded by ex-GM EV1 people, and the super efficient Rocky Mountain Institute to make plug-in hybrids in Indiana. Like Paul MacCready’s original design for the Impact that established the world’s lowest drag coefficient of .195, Bright will be building cars that “do more with less”, a philosophy MacCready was [...]

  • Share/Bookmark

Plug-in America’s Inaugural Parade

Guest Blogger Colby Trudeau takes us behind the scenes at Plug In America’s Inaugural Parade All photos take by our Production Photographer, Todd Westphal. What an amazing day! Last Saturday, January 17th, 2009, 77 highway capable plug-in vehicles, their drivers, and spectators came together to celebrate the upcoming inauguration. [caption id="attachment_1479" align="alignleft" width="186" caption="Jordan Howard, [...]

  • Share/Bookmark

Will CARB’s New Rules Damage EV Startups?

[caption id="attachment_1464" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="Paul Guzyk and Daniel Sherwood of 3Prong Power. Photograph by Chris Duffey."][/caption] 3Prong Power converts existing Toyota Priuses into plug-in hybrids that can run entirely on electricity. The company  launched last month at Green Motors in Berkeley, California.  But  it now looks like the California Air  Resources Board (CARB) is about [...]
  • Share/Bookmark

Interview with Chris Paine in the Whole Life Times

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="225" caption="Chris Paine in the Whole Life Times"][/caption] The Whole Life Times just published an Interview with Chris : The Electric Car Returns (and This Time It’s Personal) Filmmaker Chris Paine, director of Who Killed the Electric Car? and its forthcoming sequel, talks to us about the fate of GM, the downfall [...]
  • Share/Bookmark

Electric Cars: Yes We Will

[caption id="attachment_1436" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="400,000 at the Lincoln Memorial  concert"][/caption] Dateline: Washington, DC The buzz is everywhere and completely electric in Washington DC this week. And some of that energy is headed directly to plug-in cars.  We’ve heard electric cars mentioned time and again in our two days here, and we haven’t even been to [...]
  • Share/Bookmark

Tesla Offers ‘Sport’ Model…0-60 in 3.7 seconds!

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="475" caption="Roadster Sport with optional clear-coat carbon fiber top."][/caption] When I was a kid in Arab, Alabama, in 1965, I discovered slot cars. They were a new phenomenon then and quickly got everyone’s attention. They were fast as hell, sounded cool, and it only cost one penny per minute for track time. [...]
  • Share/Bookmark

The Climate Change Caravan

Say Hello to Guest Blogger Alexis Ringwald – with this first dispatch from the Climate Change Caravan in India. On January 3, 2009, a group of passionate individuals launched the Climate Solutions Road Tour : an epic month-long 3,500 km journey from Chennai to New Delhi, India to demonstrate that clean transportation solutions do exist [...]

  • Share/Bookmark

Gadget’s New World

[caption id="attachment_1401" align="aligncenter" width="611" caption="Starting Again (photo: Steve Payne)"][/caption] Over the holidays, the “Revenge” team spent time filming with Greg “Gadget”  Abbott as he moved into a cavernous new warehouse space in downtown LA. Gadget runs an electric car conversion company called Left Coast Electric.   He’s also the star of the TV shows “Smash [...]
  • Share/Bookmark

Lotus Reportedly Planning Electric Car

[caption id="attachment_1324" align="alignright" width="240" caption="Lotus Evora 2+2"][/caption] Well, it had to happen. Lotus is making an EV. Actually, it’s a plug-in hybrid much like the Chevy Volt. After both Tesla and Chrysler chose the Elise and Europa, respectively, for their slot car-fast EVs, it only makes sense that the car company named after a flower [...]
  • Share/Bookmark