AutoblogGreen

The widespread electric vehicle work done by the Renault-Nissan Alliance will make its way to the Netherlands soon now that the Dutch government has requested the Alliance join the government in its attempt to use electric vehicles to reduce CO₂ emissions in the country. Renault-Nissan says that they, "will fill the roles of front-runner and development partner in the introduction of electric vehicles to the Netherlands." The alliance now has "nearly 30 agreements worldwide" with partners like local and state governments that will help it launch its first electric vehicle next year. Vehicle and charging testing is happening with municipalities and the like around the world, while two fleet companies are helping Renault-Nissan determine pricing and costs.


Photos Copyright ©2009 Sam Abuelsamid / Weblogs, Inc.

[Source: Renault-Nissan Alliance]

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Initial strong sales of the 2010 Honda Insight slowed last month, but new models of the Toyota Prius and Ford Fusion helped give hybrids car sales in June 2009 a nine percent increase over last June. In the U.S., dealers sold 26,205 new hybrids in June, 49.6 of which (12,998 units) were Priuses. Compared to May, hybird sales were up two percent, according to data released by the automakers and complied by Green Car Advisor. This was the sixth month where hybrid increased in sales volumes. Potential reasons for the increase include the new models as well as rising gas prices (and the expectation thereof) and some uncommon hybrid sales incentives. Overall, sales were down for everyone but Subaru and Volvo compared to June 2008.


[Source: Green Car Advisor]

Chrysler has made a big deal in the past about its long history selling GEM electric cars, and there are tens of thousands of them on the roads today. Of course, the EVs that Chrysler has been selling since 2000 (when DaimlerChrysler purchased GEM) are all NEVs - expensive, slow electric vehicles that aren't selling well these days. With Chrysler's recent emergence from bankruptcy, the company is still looking to cut losses wherever possible. Letting some GEM dealers go is one option.

Last month, Chrysler axed almost 800 Chrysler dealerships. According to a U.S. Bankruptcy Court filing, the company now wants to eliminate 64 of 150 low-performing GEM dealers as well. Chrysler attorney Corinne Ball wrote in the filing that Chrysler has "determined that the GEM dealership agreements are neither necessary nor valuable to their estates and should be rejected."

The newest addition to the GEM lineup was to be the Peapod (pictured), but Chrysler announced recently that it would release this car under its own brand name, Peapod Mobility.


[Source: Detroit Free Press]

The Smart ForTwo isn't for shy people. Even though Smart USA has sold about 30,000 of these tiny two-seaters in the U.S., the little rollerskate attracts a lot of attention. On the road or in a parking lot, the ForTwo is a conversation piece, and people will come up and talk to you. Some will tell you about the Smart they saw in Europe. Others will ask if it has the guts to make it onto the highway. Most will assume it gets great gas mileage (it doesn't). But one thing's for certain, during our week with the ForTwo, there was a 100-percent conversation rate wherever we went. Anthropophobes, be warned.

Follow the jump to see what it's like to spend wheel time with a Smart ForTwo Cabriolet.



Photos Copyright ©2009 Sebastian Blanco / Weblogs, Inc.

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The American Le Mans Series has made greening their image and events a part of the plan since at least 2007, when the organization got serious about biofuels. Last year, the group held the first Green Challenge, which became the Michelin Green X Challenge earlier this year. Today, ALMS is announcing its support for the Nature Conservancy's 'Adopt an Acre' program.

Starting in the middle of July, ALMS will start contributing to Adopt An Acre with the goal of protecting 500 acres in the Las Californias region through the "acquisition, restoration and reforestation along the Californian coastline." Oh, and there could be wine to be had from the deal, too. A part of the plan calls for "the development of ground-breaking and environmentally sound vineyard designs that will allow native plants and animals to flourish." Yum.

Interested in contributing? ALMS will take your money here. Minimum donations are $10, and $50 will protect an acre.

[Source: American Le Mans Series]

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If any car screams "Alabama!" it's the e-Zone electric car pictured above, right? The quirky low speed vehicle is a project of CT&T Co. Ltd, a South Korean company, and might be built in the Heart of Dixie in the next few years. CT&T wants to build a variety of vehicles for the U.S. market, including "City Drive Electrical Vehicles (EVs), Mid-speed Electric Vehicles, High-speed Electric Vehicles, Utility Electric Vehicles." The vehicles will use lead acid, advanced lead acid, lithium polymer and lithium ion chemistries and will cost between $8,000 and $16,000. The company says that, "By the fourth quarter of 2009, the company expects to begin selling c-Zone utility EVs for commercial and government applications as well the e-Zone City Drive EVs." Nothing like an ambitious goal.

CT&T is looking at building a North American headquarters, a research and development center and several manufacturing facilities in America, likely in the Southeast. CT&T is looking at Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and California as potential locations for its operations, which it says will employ 2,600 people. The company's U.S. subsidiary is called CT&T United. Thanks to Mart for the tip!

[Source: CT&T, Birmingham News]

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Someone at Fortune noticed that 2009 is now officially half over, and thought it was a good time to look back and pick out the absolute dumbest business moments of the year thus far. Screeching in at 35-mph is the GM PUMA (aka, the Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility Project) that the General debuted with Segway just before the New York Auto Show. Fortune called the vehicle "ridiculous" enough to beat out Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's non-detailed plans to loosen up credit, Tropicana's botched bottle redesign and those $200,000 season seats at the new Yankee Stadium.

Fortune's declaration begs a question: do AutoblogGreen readers agree that the PUMA is so absolutely terrible? It might not have been the best decision, but was it really worse than that $35,000 toilet installed for Merrill CEO John Thain?



Learn more about the PUMA (and see a video) here.


[Source: Fortune]

How many barrels of oil do you think you could steal in a month, y'know, if you were into that sort of thing? Ten people in West Texas were arrested recently for stealing about $2 million worth of oil and gas condensate and a local sheriff said that the thieves were able to steal 8,000 barrels of oil during a single month. That's good for a lot of trips to the grocery store.

Actually, the thieves were not stealing the fuel to use themselves. Instead, the men stole the barrels and then sold them the "oil and gas to buyers who didn't know of the theft," according to the AP. What, did they say the barrels just happened to fall off the back of a truck? We'll probably learn more soon, as the men were arrested following a seven-month investigation. There's got to be some good information in upcoming court filings.

[Source: AP]
Photo by david drexler. Licensed under Creative Commons license 2.0.

BMW has gotten a lot of press (some bad) for their MINI E project. Even though the all-electric car comes with a plug, the plug-in advocacy group Plug In America (PIA) has a problem with the way that the Bavarians might be able to get a lot of legislative good will without really putting EVs on the road for good.

PIA released a statement (read it after the jump) that criticizes CARB's loophole that could allow BMW to get as many Zero Emission Vehicle credits for the one-year lease of the electric cars as it would for a standard vehicle production program. PIA's legislative director, Jay Friedland, said that, "CARB is allowing BMW to game the system by accruing the maximum number of ZEV credits with the least amount of effort." Friedland said that lease-only programs are what led to the EV crush-fest in the 1990s, something that long-time PIA members still remember as a real slap in the face. PIA wants BMW to only get the credits if the MINI Es are also offered for sale.

Another criticism of the lease program is that, according to PIA, when the June 30 deadline got closer and closer, BMW began:


Not long ago, we heard that the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department got a good deal on some MINI Es.

CARB's response was to say that it will look at its regulations next year and that "we've urged BMW to consider extending that one-year lease." Undoubtedly, there will be more to come on this.


[Source: PIA, Reuters]

UPDATE: typo fixed.

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The amount of money that the U.S. federal government poured into corn ethanol is legendary. Today, we're left with a floundering ethanol economy and a few happy corn farmers but not an abundance of the biofuel powering the nation's cars. A columnist for the Washington Examiner thinks that we're headed down a similar path with plug-in vehicles. This time, though, "the feds may foster addiction to a fuel concentrated in a socialist-run South American country."

Those are the words of Timothy Carney, who writes that the government's rush to EVs is troubling because all those electric cars will need a bunch of lithium - some of which might come from Bolivia - to move them (Editorially, the controversial Examiner is right-learning, so the scary s-word in Carney's piece shouldn't be too surprising). Carney names some of the lithium lobbyists who worked hard in D.C. to promote plug-in vehicles to Congress. He writes that, "If the electric car lobby succeeds, brace for another harsh lesson in unintended consequences."

Carney also brings up the long tailpipe. While Carney is right that the GAO did warn against all of the coal that could be used to power the EVs of the future, he forgot to mention the GAO's finding that "Research we reviewed indicated that plug-ins could shift air pollutant emissions away from population centers even if there was no change in the fuel used to generate electricity."


[Source: Washington Examiner]