In an interview with Design News, GM Vice President for R&D and Strategic Planning Larry Burns reiterated the company's intention to have the lithium ion battery pack last essentially the life of the car. Since early on the program, GM officials have…

Long-time ABG reader Yanquetino was perusing the recently re-designed site for AC Propulsion when he stumbled across an interesting photo that may point to ACP's latest OEM project. The car sitting on the hoist in the photo above is a Chery Eastar…

GM's 2011 1.4L four cylinder turbo
In Flint, MI on Thursday, General Motors started to reveal some details of the 1.4L four cylinder that will serve duty in two of GM's most important new cars come 2010. This engine may be new to the U.S. market but…

2006 GMS Sierra Parallel Hybrid Truck
A few years back General Motors silently introduced the PHT versions of the Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups. The parallel hybrid trucks (PHT) had GM's first cut at a mild hybrid system. Unfortunately, they…

You thought a 1990 Geo Metro for $7,000 was bad? By now we should all be aware that you should probably never attempt to buy anything of any real value on eBay. The scammers who prey on unsuspecting dupes on the on-line auction site love to make it…

Prabhakar Patil was in charge of Ford's hybrid vehicle operations from 1998 to 2003 and is now CEO of a start-up called Compact Power Inc. Compact Power is developing lithium-ion batteries for hybrid vehicles and is a division of Korean company LG…

Canadian cellulosic ethanol producer Iogen has shipped the first 26,000 gallons of an order for Royal Dutch Shell. Iogen recently announced a deal with Shell that would see them cooperate on commercializing cellulosic ethanol production. Iogen has a…

In the realm of vehicle electrification, EEStor and its super-duper ultra-capacitors are roughly the equivalent of Duke Nukem Forever for video game players. The creators of both products have made impressive claims and repeatedly promised public…

We've had numerous opportunities over the last two years to drive various SUVs and pickup trucks equipped with the two-mode hybrid system spawned from GM, Chrysler, Daimler and BMW. Among the claimed advantages of the two-mode hybrid system is the…

Hyundai Sonata Wagon – Click above to enlarge
It's always nice to know that someone is listening to your ramblings. A couple of days ago when we saw a speculative rendering of a station wagon version of the new Kia Optima, we postulated that its…