UK luxury car-manufacturer Aston Martin has teamed up with Toyota in a trail-blazing deal to make a ‘cheap’ version of the Toyota iQ for £20,000 ($32,000), making it the world’s smallest luxury supermini.
The new model, called the Aston Martin Cygnet, will be offered to the company’s existing customers (and those with vehicles on order) by the end of the year and will go on general sale following an introductory period.
The Senate passed the Cash for Clunkers Program today, which gives consumers with cars that get less than 18 miles per gallon the ability to turn them in for a $3,500 or $4,500 cash voucher. The bill was nearly defeated by Republicans, but Democratic support saved the day in part due to Obama’s lobbying of the program. The President still needs to sign the bill into law.
Although many people believe that the program is designed to reduce global warming emissions through the eradication of gas guzzling cars, its true purpose is to help out struggling automakers and car dealers with new car sales. A person who receives a credit as part of the program cannot buy a used car with the monies. Car sales in 2009 are predicted to be nearly half of what they were in 2008.
I was in Miami recently and had the opportunity to rent a Toyota Prius. I’ve never driven a Prius before and once I actualy figured out how to drive it, it was quite fun. But as gas prices continue to climb in the wake of Memorial Day, I was most impressed with the gas mileage. So when I saw the new Jetta TDI commerical this weekend where the car is compared to a Prius I found it quite amusing.
The Jetta TDI claims that it gets 58 miles per gallon (mpg), breaking the record for all current “gasoline” fueled cars, even beating the Toyota Prius - a hybrid. I might have grown skeptical in my old age, but I’m having a hard time swallowing this claim to fuel economy. What, were they driving 20 mph on the highway and never stopping?
Listening to NPR’s Morning Edition yesterday, there was a segment in which some environmentalists lamented Obama’s new fuel economy standards as being a small drop in the bucket for what needs to be done to solve our climate problems.
While this is true, two comments made by Harvard University Professor, Robert Stavins, during that segment struck me as weird and based in something less than reality — a kind of academic fantasy if you will. At the time, I was driving and the comments slid out of my mind. But last night an old friend from college brought it up again in a Facebook thread and it got me thinking more in depth about it.
President Barack Obama has his own idea of how to fix the auto industry, and part of that plan is to increase the federal fleet fuel consumption average to 35.5 MPG by 2016. The plan calls for incremental increases of 5% per year from 2012 to 2016, and the standard is nationalized, putting an end to the costly legal battle that California and several other states have been waging to use their own stricter MPG requirements. The plan will supposedly reduce domestic oil consumption by some 1.8 billion barrels, and for the first time the EPA will be required to measure the contaminants coming from a cars exhaust pipe.
It has long been said that its not what you drive that determines your gas mileage, but how you drive. Stomping the gas pedal at every stop light, even in the most frugal fuel sippers, will suck up more gas than slow and even acceleration. Drivers have been applying hypermilling techniques to get the most out of their mpgs, and in an effort to promote their new Fusion Hybrid, Ford launched its mid-size family sedan on a 1,000 mile journey with just a single tank of gas.
That was on Saturday, April 25th. Yesterday, the 28th, the Fusion finally ran out of dinosaur juice after a staggering 1,445.7 miles on a single tank of gas over the course of three days. This publicity stunt not only showcased the Fusion Hybrid’s ability to get an average gas mileage of 81.5 mpg, but also raised more than $8,000 for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
Struggling Indian car company Tata Motors has announced the commercial launch of the Tata Nano, the most fuel-efficient petrol-driven car in India, and quite possibly the world.
The Tata Nano, keenly anticipated across India since its unveiling early last year, is capable of an incredible 23.6km/litre (55.5 mpg) and ultra-low carbon emissions of 101 g/km, one of the lowest in India. Oh, and with prices starting at about 100,000 rupees ($2,050), it’s also the cheapest car in the world (more pics after the jump).
Just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse for General Motors, they did. The financially beleaguered automaker announced a recall of 1,738 of its new Hummer H3Ts on Friday, after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said a weak support strap could cause the H3T’s gas tank to fall off, “Increasing the risk of crash.”
German car giant BMW has announced plans to attach radioactive heat-collectors to the tailpipes of future models, in a move predicted to slash fuel use and reduce carbon emissions by around 5 per cent.
The massive fuel saving is bigger than the three per cent achieved by the two current key Efficient Dynamics technologies - stop-start and brake energy regeneration.
The revolutionary technology, originally designed to power space satellites, captures waste heat transferred down the tailpipe and converts it to electricity via a radioactive ‘thermolelectric generator.’
A group of engineering students at Dalhousie University will enter their “Maritime Mileage Machine” in the 2009 Shell Eco-marathon America to try to beat the current fuel efficiency record of 1,445 kilometers per liter.
“It’s basically a big weed whacker.” - Matthew Harding, team manager
Editor’s Note: Our friends at Popular Mechanics have written an in-depth piece about an essential piece of fuel-saving technology: the turbocharger. Read the rest of this story at PM.In the 1980s, it was difficult to escape the turbocharger. The twin energy crises of the 1970s forced automakers to produce cars that delivered better fuel economy. And that meant downsizing engines. By the 1980s, turbo technology was evolving and automakers installed them to boost the power of these smaller engines. But turbos promised more than just power—they promised fuel economy benefits too.
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