If the Automotive X Prize has caught your attention and you'd like to do more than read about it, good news: the X Prize Foundation is hiring. As Cristin Lindsay, the senior director of the Progressive Automotive X Prize, told AutoblogGreen, these are four key positions and I'm thinking there's probably at least one of our readers who'd make a good Team Development and Relations director, a Sponsorship Activation and Relations director, a Education Programs director or an Executive Assistant. The hires are part of a doubling of the Auto X Prize team in the coming months, a move that certainly implies things are going well in the search for the 100 mpge, mass market car. One requirement that's the same among all of these jobs is that they are located in Santa Monica, California. I don't think you'll get moved to the head of the pack if you tell them you read AutoblogGreen, but it couldn't hurt.

This Friday you'll finally get your chance a General Motors executive where they hid the mythical 200mpg carburetor and the water engine. The latest edition of the series of online chats being held on GMnext occurs this Friday at 9am EST. The guest chatter will be Bob Kruse, Executive Director of Global Vehicle Engineering Hybrids, Electric Vehicles and Batteries at GM and the subject is "Why don't automakers make a 100mpg car?" If you're inclined to participate in the chat, you'll need register on the GMnext.com site. You might want to ask Kruse why GM and their competitors have declined to participate in the Automotive X-Prize.

[Source: GMnext.com]

Update: The follow up article about John's appearance on CNN.

Singer Neil Young and mechanic John Goodwin, who is converting Neil's 1959 (so it's not a 1960) Lincoln Continental Mark IV convertible to a plug-in hybrid that runs on biodiesel that will get 100 MPG, will be on CNN's "American Morning" Monday, November 19th, 6-9 am EST according to this press release. The interview will be featured on CNN.com and I will live blog Neil and John talking about "the new fuel-efficient life of the car and how it holds exciting possibilities for the future."

The press release (in full below the fold) from Reprise Records also says Neil is directing a movie all about the car called Linc-Volt. The film will feature the delivery of the car from California to Kansas and then a trip to show off the car in Detroit with the goal of "raising awareness of the feasibility of hybrid-powered cars within the mainstream consciousness." The film is scheduled for release in 2008 and we will sure be on the look out for it.

We love John and Neil's green efforts but we should point out that in past articles about the Linc-Volt and John Goodwin, many comments questioned if John's turbine Hummer could get 100 MPG. Even a Fast Company editor chimed in commenting "this story is generating a lot of interest and even controversy" and the turbine was a one-off experiment. Also causing some controversy, Ecorazzi's Michael and our own Sebastian had an all-in-fun disagreement on the quality of the Neil working with Pearl Jam. We will let you decide on that one. Below the fold are videos of the Neil and Pearl Jam partnership.

Don't forget now, Monday on CNN 6-9 am EST!

[Source: Reprise Records]

Can you beat all the alternative fuels and hybrids with a whopping 100 miles per gallon? Well, that's what a company called Transonic claims. Transonic, based in Camarillo, CA, declares that 100 mpg is possible with a revolutionary injection system. It's a system, though, that you can't see yet. According to the company's webpage: "Transonic Combustion's core technology is highly proprietary and, thus, reviewable only under NDA Agreement"

However, we can summarize some of their affirmations: They use conventional reciprocating piston engines with ultra-high compression rations with very precise ignition timing and minimizing waste heat. The fuel is injected with these new injectors that are the responsible for the use of so little fuel. Moreover, the injectors can be supplemented with existing technology such as thermal management, EGR, electronic valves and advanced combustion chambers.

The system is not only designed for gas engines and so can be adapted to any other fuel, regardless of octane or cetane ratios.

As always, let's take this with a pinch of salt, but if there's a really a way to improve fuel efficiency at Transonic, this is good news.

[Source: Transonic via Econoticias.com]

Do you remember the Loremo? It was a project for a car that with sporty looks could deliver a diesel consumption of 2 liters every 100 km - that is 117 mpg. Not bad! Well, the first road-ready prototype will be introduced at the Frankfurt Motorshow in September and although some of the specifications of the car won't be the same as the production model, this model will be very close to it. The current fuel mileage figures were obtained with computer simulation, so the working prototype will really have to prove that expectations are up to reality.

Loremo is expecting to participate at the California X-Prize-Foundation for cars able to run more than 100 miles on a gallon of fuel. The money would be very welcome to continue development because the Loremo team is saying that the model is almost ready for a production of 10,000 vehicles per year (a requisite of the prize).


Related:

• The Loremo: Never before has something German sipped so little

[Source: Auto-news.de]

"A gallon of gas is a miracle," says Jory Squibb. Unlike most of the other participants at the Alt Car Expo in Santa Monica this weekend, Squibb embraced standard petroleum fuel for his latest project. But, with his long history of making environmentally safe cars, he radically rethought what a car needs to be. The result is the Moonbeam, a microcar made from Honda Elite 150 scooters, one in the rear and two in the front of the dome-shaped car. The scooters and the rest of the material cost him about $2,500. The rest of the cost: about 1,000 hours of work.

Squibb originally considered driving the Moonbeam from Maine to California, but ended up towing it behind his Camry. While he's happy with the car now, the long nights in the garage are not necessarily over. Squibb said that, if battery technology continues to improve the way it has recently, he may convert the Moonbeam to lithium ion batteries in a few years.

For more details than you can shake a stick at, visit Squibb's website about the Moonbeam. And, if you like the video, please vote for it by clicking that little up arrow in the orange circle at the top of the video box. Thanks.

Lastly, a question for AutoblogGreen readers who pay attention to details: does the location of the video above look familiar at all?

I've observed with mild amusement the recent spate of stories in the mainstream media about fuel saving. Maybe you have too.

You know the kind of articles. "Ten Ways to Survive High Gas Prices". "8 Things You Must Do to Save at the Pump". Even the venerable old Federal Trade Commission has a published list. Gasoline price spikes bring these out like a spring rain conjures up the worms. Once the price surge recedes (or the public gets used to the new price level) the media attention to fuel-saving goes underground again - just like the earthworms.

Yes, our collective memory is short. The wheels seem to turn something like this in the American brain. "Geez, $2.98 a gallon! Next time I buy a new vehicle I'd better downsize to something with better fuel mileage. I'm gonna go broke filling up this barge." Two weeks later, gas drops to $2.80 a gallon. "Wow, only $2.80 a gallon, now that's more like it". Collectively, we blithely ignore both past history (remember $1.25 a gallon gas?) and future trends (how high can it go?). But don't take my word for it. Check out the Oct. 19 AutoblogGreen post The Forgetfulness is Real.

Talk about forgetting. These fuel-saving tip lists are largely forgettable and that's regrettable. Most of them haven't changed much since the '50s. That's all the way back to President Eisenhower, father of the interstate highway system, for you history buffs. Same old hoary axioms: slow down, check tire pressure. You know the dreary drill. That's the problem. Dullsville. Let's face it. Quoting your fuel economy numbers is not a slam dunk pickup line at Club Med. Ripping off low ETs at the local dragstrip has a whole lot more "red-blooded-American-boy" appeal.

OK, so we forget about fuel economy and pursuing it doesn't get our juices flowing. The question I'm left with is this: Can efficiency get hip, slick and cool?