The European Investment Bank has approved €866 million ($1.14 billion U.S.) in loans to automakers to fund the development of greener cars. Two thirds of the funds for the new loans come from the European Economic Recovery Package and are targeted at…
Category: Autoblog
Mayor of Tbingen Germany gets a new Micro-Hybrid Smart ForTwo
The new Green Party mayor of Tübinge n Germany is fully in support of the city's “10% less CO2 by 2010” policy and he's got a new ride to demonstrate it. Boris Palmer has selected the Smart ForTwo MHD as his official ride when on city business. The…
Ford's tiny Ka might come to America after all
Ford CEO Alan Mullaly told Detroit radio station WJR that the company is reconsidering whether to bring its smallest car to the U.S. market. Ford officially introduced the second-generation Ka last week at the Paris Motor Show and up until now has…
Kelly Blue Book names its 10 greenest vehicles,
2010 Toyota Prius – c lick above for a high-res gallery
In honor of Earth Day last week, the team over at Kelly Blue Book sat down to generate its annual list of the greenest cars available on the U.S. market. The list goes beyond just fuel…
Hybrid tech won't save the full size SUV as new Tahoe/Yukon cancelled
It looks like the theory behind the creation of full-size hybrid SUVs may not hold water, at least from a marketing perspective. Certainly adding a hybrid drivetrain to a big truck will save more gas for a given number of miles driven than doing the…
Le Mans 2010: Early race report
24 Hours of Le Mans Qualifying and Practice – Click above for high-res image gallery
The 2010 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans is now well underway and as it has been for years now, the big enduro has turned into a twice around the clock sprint.…
XtremeGreen prices EM2-A09 electric motorcycle at $7,999
Last month, we first reported on a new electric motorcycle from XtremeGreen Products with the unforgettable name of EM2-A09. At the time we only knew the claimed specs of the lithium ion-powered bike. The claimed range is 95 miles on a charge with a…
VIDEO: Bob Lutz is “Super-Pumped” about the progress on the Volt
GM's product development chief Bob Lutz is one of only a handful of people to have driven the first Chevy Volt development mules with the full lithium ion battery pack in place. The mules have now been dubbed Mali-Volts alluding to the Malibu body…
New Renault Fluence compact sedan for Turkey, Russia, Romania… is Saturn next?
Renault has just announced a new compact mid-size sedan called the Fluence for its Turkish, Russian, and Romanian markets. The Fluence is sized to slot in between the usual C- and D-segment offerings, making it a bit larger than the Megane and…
Travelers want to be able to rent hybrids
Priceline.com, the website that helps their customers find cut-rate travel deals for air-fare, hotels, and rental cars recently surveyed their customers for Earth Day. Seventy-two percent of respondents indicated that they wanted to be able to rent…