Three-quarters of Americans accept climate science, regardless of Trump

Photovoltaic solar power field at Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, TennesseeThe new U.S. administration has made it clear that it does not accept the scientific consensus on climate change. From President Donald Trump down through his nominees for key roles—Scott Pruitt for EPA adminstrator, Rick Perry for Department of Energy head, and others—key elected and appointed officials have rejected the idea of human...

Hybrid sales, coal in China, Panasonic loves Tesla: Today’s Car News

2017 Toyota Prius Prime, Catskill Mountains, NY, Nov 2016Today, we cover coal plants in China, plug-in hybrid tests in London, and hybrid sales right here in the U.S. All this and more on Green Car Reports. Tesla Motors has bought battery cells from Panasonic for 10 years; now the Japanese company wants to tighten the partnership. Despite critics' questions about how serious it is about reducing carbon...

Hybrid market share peaked in 2013, down since then

U.S. hybrid vehicle market: total sales and market share, 2000-2016   [source: PIRA Energy Group]What's a "green car"? Is it a hybrid? A zero-emission vehicle? One that plugs in? Or just one that uses less fuel than other cars in its segment? It's a perpetual conundrum, for Green Car Reports among others, but it illustrates one of the longstanding challenges in the field. Will the market for green cars expand as more enter the market, or is...

SimpleFuel home hydrogen fuel dispenser wins $1 million DoE prize

SimpleFuel team demonstrating home hydrogen fuel dispenser with Hyundai Tucson Fuel CellLast week, the U.S. Department of Energy awarded a $1 million prize to a little-known team for what you might call a new garage appliance. The SimpleFuel team—actually a collaboration of three separate companies—won the prize, first offered in November 2014, for its hydrogen home-fueling station. The goal is to let drivers of hydrogen...

China axes 103 coal-fired power plants, citing smog, overcapacity

Beijing smogDuring negotiations for the Paris Climate Treaty signed last fall, a major concern among critics was whether the carbon emissions of China's sprawling and inefficient energy sector could be reined in. With China, the U.S., and dozens of other countries signing the agreement, the world's most populous country committed itself to decarbonizing its...

New Tesla Model S 100D version rated at 335 miles of electric range

2017 Tesla Model SIf anything, the pace of new Tesla model changes seem to have increased of late. Over the last year, a 60-kilowatt-hour battery option has reappeared, a new 100-kwh battery was launched, followed by a sequence of software updates to make it faster, and all Autopilot sensors were replaced with new hardware. Now, quietly, Tesla has launched a new...

Action on climate change ‘harmful, unnecessary’: Trump White House

The White House, Washington, D.C.  [Creative Commons license by dcjohn]If there were any doubt that U.S. policy on climate change would change drastically under President Donald Trump, it should have been laid to rest shortly after noon yesterday. Following inauguration ceremonies for the 45th president of the United States, the Obama White House website was replaced with an entirely new site for the Trump White...