2018 BMW i3 electric car range adds sportier i3s version

2018 BMW i3 and i3sWhile the 2018 BMW i3 will formally debut next week at the Frankfurt auto show, the company has released details ahead of time on the updates to the lineup of its compact electric car. While battery range stays the same as last year, a new i3s model (for Sport) has been added, with revised suspension and a Sport mode added to its drive-mode...

Electric cars and public charging: hot dog and bun, not chicken or egg?

2015 Nissan Leaf at evGo fast charger at Livingston Mall, Livingston, NJ   [photo: John Briggs]It's an old cliche used to indicate an unsolvable problem: which came first, the chicken or the egg? Sometimes it's applied to the challenge of electric-car charging stations: which comes first, sales of the cars or installation of public charging to support them? Well, Jeff Allen isn't having any of it. He wants to talk about hot dogs, and buns...

Here’s how to comment on EPA proposal to loosen emission limits on cars

Chrome exhaust pipeOn August 10, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced it would reopen the Comment Period for the vehicle-emission standards for model years 2022 through 2025 it had finalized in January. The auto industry and its lobbyists had complained that the agency had moved too quickly, despite its issuance last summer of a voluminous Technical...

VW engineer gets 40 months in jail, $200K fine, for diesel cheating role

2015 Volkswagen Golf TDI SEFormer Volkswagen employee James Liang was sentenced in Detroit yesterday to serve 40 months in prison and pay a $200,000 fine for his role in the global Volkswagen diesel-emission cheating scandal. It was a stiffer sentence than expected for an engineer who helped to create software that controlled exhaust emissions only when Volkswagen and...

New LG Michigan plant could boost GM electric-car domestic content

2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV pre-production vehicles at Orion Township Assembly Plant, March 2016The question of where consumer goods are made has become more prominent in our political discourse of late, cars among them. Every automobile sold in the U.S. carries a listing of content sources, specifying what percentage by value of its overall content comes from which countries or regions. Electric cars, it turns out, have some anomalies...

2018 Chevrolet Equinox Diesel (very brief) first drive

2018 Chevrolet Equinox Diesel, first drive, Teaneck, NJ, Aug 2017We spent a few days with a gasoline-powered 2018 Chevy Equinox back in May, but now we've driven a much rarer version. The 2018 Chevrolet Equinox Diesel will start to arrive at U.S. Chevy dealers within two weeks, the company says. On Wednesday, as part of a comprehensive presentation on the five diesel engines GM uses globally, we got some "seat...

2018 Nissan Leaf teaser: electric car will ‘amaze your senses’

Teaser for 2018 Nissan Leaf debuting on September 6, 2017With the 2018 Nissan Leaf electric car due to be unveiled to the world in Japan on September 6, the company continues to release bits and pieces of teaser information. Yesterday, Nissan issued a video promoting a list of the new model's features. It also provided a photo of the electric hatchback's rear corner, showing a very different taillight...

Who will be biggest electric-car maker in 2020? Take our Twitter poll!

A Honda dealership in Erie, Penn. Every week or so, Green Car Reports posts a poll on Twitter to survey our followers on their opinions on a variety of topics related to the news we cover. In general, we get 100 or so responses to our polls: more on electric cars, fewer on other subjects. In the many comments on a previous week's poll results, one reader made a smart...

Ford pairs with Chinese maker Gotye for electric-car expansion

Ford Mustang in ChinaFord was the U.S. maker to build hybrid cars, starting in 2004, and it launched its Focus Electric hatchback in December 2011, just a year after the arrival of the Nissan Leaf. It also continues to sell Energi plug-in hybrid versions of its mid-size Fusion sedan and its compact C-Max tall hatchback, two vehicles now in their sixth model years...

What car is closest Tesla Model 3 competitor? Poll results

2018 Tesla Model 3Much of the electric-car world is waiting to see how quickly production of the Tesla Model 3 will ramp up over the balance of this year. Will it reach the remarkable level of 5,000 cars per week by December 31 that CEO Elon Musk has set as a goal? Analysts and industry commentators are skeptical, owners and advocates are hopeful, and now at least...