May 2006 Archives

Due to new federal emissions standards that take effect this fall, Volkswagen of America will lose several models. Diesel versions for the Jetta, Golf and Beetle will be dropped this fall for the 2007 model year.

I recently had the privilege of spending a couple days with Jeff O’Brien while documenting his barn building with a photo package and video.

Jeff O’Brien moved a barn 9 miles with a 1991 Ford F-250.

Made popular by a chase scene in the movie "The Da Vinci Code," the SMART car made by smartUSA, a division of Mercedes-Benz LLC, may soon be more accessible to consumers. The company Zap is seeking interested people for dealerships in the United States.

Hourcar.org is an innovative way to have access to a car from a Minneapolis nonprofit affiliated with the Neighborhood Energy Connection that redefines consumer cost, pollution and congestion in an urban setting by creating a pool of member owned cars.The NEC brought car-sharing to the Twin Cities to support its overall mission of promoting environmentally responsible communities.

Honda Motor Co. will add a dedicated hybrid vehicle to its Honda-brand lineup in 2009.

The vehicle will be "suitable for family use" and will be priced below the current Civic Hybrid, says Honda CEO Takeo Fukui. autoweek.com

Honda is expected to market a super clean diesel at the same time.

Starting today, hybrid vehicles can travel the New Jersey Turnpike’s HOV lanes. This follows a trend by other states like Virginia and California to allow solitary drivers with hybrid vehicles in lanes traditionally reserved for carpools.

When I think of hydrogen propulsion, the first thing that comes to mind is a flaming, cigar-like object in an old black and white photograph from 1937 over Lakehurst, N.J., accompanied by a scratchy soundtrack of people in terror.

Of course, the famous Hindenburg was not powered by hydrogen, but rather the gas that is lighter than the surrounding air provided the air ship with buoyancy. It was powered by 1,200 hp 16-cylinder Diamler diesel engines.

While in Pennsylvania, we can take advantage of huge rebates on big SUVs that aren’t selling... there is a unique Norwegian joint industry initiative about to begin to demonstrate real life implementation of hydrogen energy infrastructure along a 360 mile route known as HyNor. http://www.hynor.no/eng/

The project’s goal is to develop a hydrogen infrastructure for varying transport means: buses, taxis and private cars, and varying transport systems: urban, inter-city, regional and long national transports.

Quantum Technologies has received a purchase order for 15 hydrogen-fuelled Toyota Prius hybrid vehicles to run on the highway. This same company sold 30 hydrogen Priuses to municipal fleets in Southern California.

An interesting twist on the internal combustion engine, the Scuderi Air Hybrid Engine will debut their designs tomorrow at Engine Expo 2006 in Stuttgart, Germany.

The company line goes... for more than a century engine manufacturers haven’t done much to increase efficiency. Gasoline Electric Hybrids use a complex electrical system to recapture energy lost during driving but nothing dramatic has been done with the gasoline engine that is used in these systems and conventional cars in the past 130 years. Large gains in efficiency and lower emissions can be gained by adding hundreds to the price instead of thousands for a gasoline electric hybrid.

R.L. Polk & Co., a marketing firm that collects and interprets automotive data, lists the top ten states with the most registrations of hybrid vehicles for 2005. The states, registrations, and percentage, are:

1. California 52,619 26.4 percent
2. Florida 10,470 5.3 percent
3. Texas 9,632 4.8 percent
4. New York 9,372 4.7 percent
5. Virginia 8,650 4.3 percent
6. Illinois 7,286 3.7 percent
7. Washington 6,970 3.5 percent
8. Pennsylvania 6,948 3.5 percent
9. Massachusetts 6,060 3.0 percent
10. Maryland 5,673 2.8 percent

I have always been amused by the amount of fuel needed to get politicians to energy related press conferences and media opportunities to promote technology that conserves fuel.

Funny excerpts from Washington Post Columnist, Dana Milbank:

"Since George Bush and Dick Cheney took over as president and vice president, gas prices have doubled!" charged Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), standing at an Exxon station on Capitol Hill where regular unleaded hit $3.10. "They are too cozy with the oil industry."

She then hopped in a waiting Chrysler LHS (18 mpg) -- even though her Senate office was only a block away.

The Prius uses a keyless lock and starting system. When you start the car, you are telling the computer to boot up much like turning on your PC. BMW also uses a keyless starting system. Car thieves are using laptops to run decryption programs that can take up to 20 minutes to break into the car’s computer, open the doors and start the car.

Crude pushes up past $74 a barrel as I am writing this, you can bet gasoline will follow in real-time. Here is a bit of high tech repackaging of information to help you find the best price at the pump.