Porsche 914 EV Conversion
JANUARY 31, 2007
One of the major issues with electric vehicles is keeping the battery pack healthy so it lasts a long time. The issue with having a long string of batteries is that when you charge them, not all batteries charge at the same rate. Without going in with your multi-meter and measuring the voltage on all the batteries individually, it's hard to keep track of which ones aren't as charged as the others.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 31, 2007
Investors Business Daily posted an editorial this week, Just Plain Fuelish , that just plain gets it. A smorgasbord of research alternatives and subsidized if politically profitable good intentions just won't cut it anymore. IBD is ready to choose. And they choose electricity, not ethanol. The State of the Union may have seen Sen. Grassley dancing in the aisles, but Investors rains on the ethanol parade.
Plug In Partners
JANUARY 23, 2007
E arlier this month, the announcement of the GM Volt eclipsed another important announcement at the Detroit show. Ford is now getting the word out that the Ford Edge crossover platform gives the company "the ultimate in flexibility in researching advanced propulsion technology" and thus could easily use a small gasoline or downsized diesel engine in lieu of the fuel cell.
Porsche 914 EV Conversion
JANUARY 30, 2007
Whew, the charger arrived last night. I'm glad it didn't get lost in shipping. I have to be careful sometimes because the UPS guy leaves stuff behind a post on my front porch and sometimes I don't look there when I get home. Although I haven't fired it up, the charger seems to be in one piece. The specs say that it draws 115V at 20 amps. I'll ask Zivan if I can tune down the required power so I can plug it into the 15A/115V outlet at work.
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Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 27, 2007
Michael Kanellos over at CNetNews.com reports from the recent Clean-Tech Investor Summit that Tesla Motors will be selling its battery packs to other electric car companies. First in line appears to be Th!nk Global of Norway with its ready-for-manufacture Th!nk City. Martin Eberhard, CEO of Tesla Motors, said that Tesla has formed a group called Tesla Energy Now to sell battery packs to other companies.
Porsche 914 EV Conversion
JANUARY 25, 2007
Yay! I just got my first shipment from ElectroAuto in months! The motor mount and adaptor to the transmission showed up. This is progress. The only thing vaguely unsettling to me is that the invoice says that they already shipped the Zivan NG3 charging system, but I haven't received it yet. I'll give it a couple of days to show up and then send off an e-mail to get a tracking number.
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Porsche 914 EV Conversion
JANUARY 20, 2007
Over the past few weeks I've been trying to contact the folks at Electro Automotive to get the status of the EV 914 kit. They finally responded last night and apparently they're completely buried under the demand for EV conversion kits. Mike and Shari both have colds and the welder that creates the frames for the battery holders is quite backlogged.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 20, 2007
GM wants to know if you think they should make the Volt. As of today, it's Yes: 106,000; No: 1800. Vote for the Volt. It can't hurt. UPDATE: FWIW Sun 6pm. Yes: 156,000 UPDATE: Tuesday 1am: Yes 200,000 UPDATE: Tues 6pm: Yes 214,000 UPDATE: Friday 12:30 am Yes 265,000 UPDATE: Saturday 5:45 pm Yes 287,000.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 20, 2007
In the wake of the Chevy Volt presentation by GM, my "plug-in hybrid" google alert has filled my inbox with reports from other automakers about their PHEV projects. The buzz about the Volt has generated automaker PR reactions. One big corporate "ME TOO!" Daimler/Chrysler has dusted off its long ago announced Sprinter PHEV. Nancy Goia of Ford got some ink for comments at the Automotive News World Congress in Detroit.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 16, 2007
David Roberts is a staff writer at Grist , an online enviro magazine. He's written a piece in TomPaine.com that deserves attention. As Roberts' posits, 2007 holds out tremendous promise, the stars are aligned. Everyone is paying attention to green. But enviros are all over the map. They have no consensus message. Everything from light bulbs to organic food, to flex-fuel cars to a carbon freeze tax—no, make that a cap-and-trade program—clamors for attention.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 12, 2007
NPR's Science Friday with Ira Flatow spent half an hour on the Volt. Bill Moore of EVWorld.com , Paul Scott of Plug In America. Enthusiasm and scepticism. Well worth the listen. [link]. Tags: chevy volt Ira Flatow Science Friday.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 12, 2007
Corn and petroleum course through our veins. As Michael Pollan convincingly argues in The Omnivore's Dilemma , what we eat has become almost as corn-based as our driving is petroleum-based. And without cheap oil, corn would not have become Big Corn, the big agricultural combines (principally ADM and Cargill). Now corn is making a play for a chunk of the transportation market once surrendered to Big Oil.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 10, 2007
Associated Press report in The State of Columbia, South Carolina "The Volt overcomes range, noise and power issues that plagued previous electric cars." Noise issues? Tags: chevy volt.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 9, 2007
In Stockholm and LA it was just the BioPower 100, a 100% ethanol fueled hybrid. A premature press release identified it as a plug-in, but that was withdrawn and the plug was not to be found. It had, perhaps, been glued shut. Now that the Volt has premiered in Detroit to huzzahs and widespread press, this Saab , yet another GM concept hybrid, has been unveiled, again.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 8, 2007
What a difference a week or two can make. Chris Paine, director of "Who Killed the Electric Car?," is attending the Detroit Auto Show. And he's not the pariah-in-residence. He's all charged up about the Chevy Volt. So is Detroit. Just two weeks ago Free Press auto critic Mark Phelan was twisting Mr. Paine's words to justify GM killing the EV1. Now Phelan , GM, Paine and Chelsea Sexton, Plug In America's Executive Director, all seem to be on the same page.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 7, 2007
Amidst the well-deserved hoopla about GM's plug-in serial hybrid Chevy Volt , Ford is touting its own equally ugly plug-in hybrid concept car. GM's vehicle is eminently buildable today, as it relies on two energy sources that are available: grid electricity and gasoline. Ford makes no pretense of its intention not to produce its car. In place of a small gasoline generator, it relies on a hydrogen fuel cell to generate the electricity once the grid-charged Lithium batteries are depleted.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 6, 2007
With an Auto Show overview article dated tomorrow, Sunday, Jan 7, the New York Times becomes the first publication to name the much-anticipated GM plug-in hybrid vehicle. "General Motors will unveil an electric concept car, the Chevrolet Volt, which has created the most buzz in advance of the show. G.M. says the Volt, a plug-in hybrid, could deliver the equivalent of 150 miles a gallon.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 4, 2007
GM today announced two contracts to "design and test lithium-ion batteries" for use in the Saturn Vue Plug-in Hybrid announced last month at the LA Auto Show. Johnson Controls/SAFT, the huge battery company at which President Bush first publicly announced his support for plug-in hybrids, received one contract. A partnership of Cobasys (Chevron/ECD) and A123 got the second.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 3, 2007
Toyota released (and EVworld.com reprints ) President Watanabe's New Year's letter to employees. He mentions continued focus on hybrid technologies, including "research and development for plug-in hybrids" and the introduction in Brazil of a "flexible fuel vehicle (FFV) that can run on 100 percent bioethanol fuel." Not a word about hydrogen or fuel cells.
Plug In Partners
JANUARY 8, 2007
W e had heard rumors that GM would show something special at the Detroit Auto Show , and the rumors were true. Here is part of the story from the Flint Journal Detroit shocker: GM unveils plug-in hybrid - and plans to build it The Flint Journal Sunday, January 07, 2007 By Todd Seibttseibt DETROIT - General Motors unveils a shocking concept car today: the Chevrolet VOLT.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 23, 2007
First hint from the NY Times says ethanol will be the big winner in Bush's State of the Union Address. Advocates of plug-in cars are hoping for a another good word and perhaps some funding for plug-in hybrids. We'll see. Springtime for Ethanol (registration required) In his State of the Union address, President Bush is expected to call for a huge increase in the amount of ethanol that refiners mix with gasoline, probably double the current goal of 7.5 billion gallons by 2012.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 30, 2007
A report from IsraelNationalNews.com out of Davos reports on talks to build electric cars in Israel. At the just-ended World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Shimon Peres held informal talks about building an electric-car factory in Israel with representatives of Toyota and Renault. It's about time. If there's one country that ought to have long ago developed a domestic electric car industry it is Israel.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 23, 2007
Lodi News-Sentinel Reports Over 400 people turned out for a free viewing of Who Killed the Electric Car? in Lodi, CA last night. Lodi is not hippie or Hollywood. It's an agricultural town of less than 60,000 in reliably Republican San Joaquin County. The event was sponsored by the Lodi Municipal Electric utility, which leases five all electric RAV4 EVs from Toyota.
Plugs and Cars
JANUARY 31, 2007
The Detroit News story today, Big 3's call for U.S. aid gets cool reception , outlines the predicament faced by automakers and Washington. Many lawmakers are pressuring for action on fuel efficiency. The automakers came begging for research dollars and restraint on CAFE standards. As Michigan Democrats line up with the most Republicans to protect the Big 3 on CAFE standards, Bush has already disappointed Detroit on the money front: GM, Ford Motor Co. and DaimlerChrysler AG were disappointed thei
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